A couple of years ago, my wife received a call from a vacuum cleaner saleswoman.
If we sat through a 30-minute presentation about the vacuum cleaner from her and her boss (read: her mother), we would receive some super-great item that my wife really wanted. For free!
Sounds great, huh?
So they came. They told us about how great the vacuum was. I admit, it seemed like a great vacuum, and probably worth every penny. But we didn't have enough pennies to buy it. Plus I'm no sucker for buying vacuums on time.
We were clear we only had 30 minutes. No more. We had to go to pick up the kids cousins from school, and couldn't be late. They assured us they would be done in 30 minutes.
At about 25 minutes into the demonstration the lady told us how horrible Arizona's salty sands were on carpet. It gets down into the carpet and when you vacuum it up it actually wears away the carpet each time you vacuum. And the little grains of sand tear up the carpet. Of course, most vacuums wouldn't pick up all the sand leaving a little sand and salts under the carpet which would destroy the carpet if not removed or was vacuumed up with an inferior vacuum, but of course, their vacuum would miraculously preserve the carpet.
To illustrate this she got out a container of salt and got ready to pour on our brand-new carpet.
"Uh, I'd prefer if you didn't pour that on our carpet," I said.
"Huh?" she replied.
"I said, I'd prefer that you not pour the salt on my new carpet," I said. "You said it wasn't good for carpet, and this is new carpet. Plus we really have to go in less than five minutes to pick up our cousins."
"But our vacuum will get it all up," she said.
"You just said that sand and salts were bad on carpets. That the grains of sand wore away carpets. And that this damage is accelerated with vacuums. Why would I want to let you do this just so you can show me that it hurts my carpet? I'd prefer not to give my carpets any unnecessary wear and tear. Why don't you just vacuum up the sand that is already in the carpet rather than add more to the issue?"
"Sir, that's not the demonstration," she said.
It was a stalemate.
"Tell you what. I'm getting hardwood floors in my office. Why don't you show my on my office carpet," I said.
"Okay. Fine," she said.
At this point my lovely wife didn't say anything, but I knew I had probably crossed some line jeopardizing the free gift by the look she gave me.
The saleswoman poured a heaping 1/4 cup of salt on my carpet. She first used our vacuum and vacuumed up about 3/4 of the 1/4 cup of salt. She then hurriedly vacuumed a tablespoon or so of the residue. The total was still less than the 1/4 cup of both salt and sand she had poured out, and it had a lot of sand mixed in.
We reminded them that we needed to go pick up the kids from school.
She simply packed up and left. Didn't give my wife the free gift. Left the harmful sand and salt in my carpet. They stopped back by the house 20 minutes later to drop off the gift. (And probably to check to see if we really had to go). We had already gone and come back.
I was reminded of this incident as I just found some salt coming back up through the carpet today, almost two years later.
