People Who Work Inside Strangers’ Houses Are Revealing The Wildest Things They’ve Ever Witnessed, And I’m Literally Gasping

8.

“I used to paint home interiors with 40 years of being in other people’s homes. One customer was a retired municipal court judge, and his house was neat as a pin. Almost minimalist, and tasteful. He wanted to have his basement floor epoxied. I told him it would take two days. I’d move everything to one side of the basement and paint half, then the next day I’d move everything to the other side and paint the cleared side. He gave me kind of a funny look and said, ‘Let’s go down to the basement, and you can measure.’ Cool. We go down there, and besides the furnace, the only other thing down there was a fold-up ping pong table. The place was immaculate. You could eat off the concrete floor. I have never seen anything like it.”

“That’s almost 40 years ago and it still amazes me. My basement is full of stuff. Old furniture, Christmas decorations, tools, you name it, it’s down there. We folded up the ping pong table and slid it into its niche and everything was good to go. Nothing even to sweep.

The judge ended up being a great client and a very sweet guy. Most organized man I ever knew. It turns out he went to Annapolis and was a naval officer in WWII. I wonder if that’s where he got it, or if it just came naturally. Probably a little bit of both.”

—jonthepain