Re: Tuba at Dillons


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Posted by Joe S. on August 08, 2001 at 21:43:54:

In Reply to: Tuba at Dillons posted by Alex C on August 08, 2001 at 21:05:13:

My solution to customers who want me to tear asunder my everyday "lets-squeeze-12-then-14-then-16-then-18-then-20-hours-of-work-each-day-into-nine-or-ten-hours" responsibilities, to work on their tubas for 8-40 hours, is to not accept any such repair work anymore.

I used to have tubas sitting in line to be repaired for months and months and finally decided that feeling guilty about not getting them done quickly enough wasn't worth the money (actually a good bit less per hour than when working on trumpets and trombones, because if you charged the tuba folks the same per hour as the trumpet and trombone guys pay, some of the repair jobs' costs would exceed the values of their instruments). Therefore, as of about six or seven years ago, I have politely and apologetically have not accepted tuba "projects", and if I do slip one in on a rare occasion for a friend, I make them promise not to tell anyone that I did the work.

Now that I (and surely quite a few like me) have made this decision, Matt is getting hopelessly "piled" on, because he is just about the last really nice guy and really good repairman left that will say "Yes". I'm sure that each day he could call all of the folks whose tubas he has not finished and discuss his delays with them, but perhaps he has rather made the decision to stay busy and productive all day, speak as necessary to people who actually enter the premises, and do as much work as he can do in the time available.

I'm not Matt, and I don't walk in Matt's shoes. I'm only guessing at his work situation and perspective. Matt can speak for himself. For the sakes of you guys who desire tuba repair work, I would go easy on Matt and make your patience equal to the huge mountain and the quality of work that he does.

Occasionally, I make the mistake of bringing personal business to this forum. I would encourage each who types in comments or posts to read carefully what has been written prior to entering it permanently.


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