You can reach the author at basementfiles@hotmail.com

Thursday, May 15, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Basement Files: Ask the sitter...

Last October, professional house-sitter Darren Sholtis shared his popular but controversial caretaking tips with Mercury readers. Today, Sholtis returns to answer your questions about the dos and don'ts of modern house-sitting.

Dear Darren,

I've been asked to house-sit for friends this weekend and I'm uncertain about the phone protocol. Do I answer it or is that presumptuous? And am I entitled to long-distance privileges?

--Stan M., Las Vegas

Stan,

It's a great question, my friend. And a multilayered one at that. Let's tackle these concepts in order. First, unless you've received instructions to the contrary, by all means answer the phone. To the distant traveler, an unanswered home phone suggests an abandoned post. In the anxious intervals between rings, he's forced to envision watering schedules left unmet, security systems unengaged and looting on a scale that dwarfs Baghdad's meager ransacking.

As the phone rings and your friend gives his wife a helpless shrug, I can assure you she's seething and mouthing the names of all the people they SHOULD have named as caretakers. This is bad for your buddy. He needs you to pick up. Seriously. Because a man on vacation can ill afford a tense and worried wife. (n.b. A handful of husbands go on vacation to see exotic locales. The rest holiday with the na•ve hope that their wife, freed from the strain of screaming kids and impossible schedules, will abandon herself to liberty and become again the untamed sex kitten of their courtship. As the guy's friend, it's your job to do for the wife by day what daiquiris do by night...release her from worry, modesty and shame.)

An answered phone, on the other hand, suggests that order reigns. The castle is secure. The drawbridge is up, archers stand ready at the parapets and every man will do his duty. I not only answer the phone, I like to go with the formal, old-fashioned "Hendersons residence." This is the 10-milligram Valium of creeping homeowner anxiety. Because I'm not only offering proof of order kept and duty met, but a reassuring statement of servile decorum. I am but a selfless steward holding down the manor while my Lord explores the empire's far-flung territories. Aware of my station, I will confine myself to the guest bath and trespass but lightly in their private realm. (None of which is true, by the way. I'll be going through their shit as soon as we hang up.)

The other reason I like the "Hendersons residence" thing is the brief confusion it offers to every other caller. Most people dial with a conversational tone in mind...authoritative, consoling, gossipy, wacky. In fact, they're already hearing themselves talk as the phone rings. But my "so and so's residence," with its odd, stilted formality, is just the wrong cue for their well-rehearsed lines. So they're thrown back on themselves.

"Uh...yeah...is...ummm...Lisa there?"

I'm supposed to help them out here. I'm supposed to ease their discomfort with a graceful explanation of their ruined conversation. I'm a friend of Dave's; he and Lisa are in Cancun this weekend; I'm just watching the house; they should be back on Tuesday. But I'm sorry, my friend, I'm not letting you off that easy.

"No, she's not. May I take a message?"

Jesus, I'm mean. Just a stone wall of polite, blank indifference. Can you guess who I am? I must be a close friend to house-sit for them, but the voice isn't familiar. Am I the guy you met at their Christmas party who kept going on and on about Scattergories? No, that wasn't me. But you thought you knew all their friends. And why didn't Lisa even mention that they were going out of town? Oh, gee, I wouldn't know about those things, but I'll be happy to tell her you called. Really. And your name again?

It must be said that not everyone's thrown by the formal answer. There's always one guy who mistakes civility for servitude and talks to you as though you're his simple-minded underling. He probably thinks I'm some kid from the mailroom at Dave's office who's been hoodwinked into a weekend's worth of ass-kissing drudgery.

Or maybe Lisa's little brother, fresh from drug rehab, who's been given this minor responsibility as a show of the family's "trust and support" for his shaky sobriety. Either way, he makes a point of allowing his impatient disdain to come rushing through the receiver. He's so irritating that I actually pretend to be writing with an invisible pen as I pretend to take down his message. "Okay, Thursday at 4. Got it. You bet I will. Bye now." These guys do sneak through now and then. Otherwise, it's a damn near foolproof system.

As for your second question, long-distance use isn't an entitlement. It's a privilege you earn with daring and heart-quickening stealth. It's a risk I like to take, but only with the guidance of the following actuarial table:

Chance the bill will be paid without a line-by-line examination: 8%

Chance the bill-payer spots your call as irregular, but assumes spouse responsible: 17%

Chance your call will be identified as extramarital, but considered too much hassle to contest: 22%

Chance couple makes a big stink over shoddy billing practices and forces phone company to eat it: 24%

Chance that call will be identified as extramarital and traced to you. (Wait a minute...weren't we in Cancun that first week of May? That's not poss...goddamnit...that's the weekend Darren was here!) 13%

Chance that your buddy talks wife out of confronting you. 12%

Chance that wife will call you and demand reimbursement in that "Dave and I feel a little betrayed" tone of voice: 4%

Twenty-five-to-one that you end up paying. You simply won't get better odds than that.May 15-21, 2003 ¥ 65