Monday, July 2, 2012

My friend walked through our slider door... part 1

After the duct tape fix... I didn't think to
take a picture at the time of the bent frame...
well maybe I did but I didn't think SCB
would appreciate it at the time so I decided
not to take the photo and anger him....
My best friend came over to my house on Thursday for dinner last week... and while she's my best friend, i'm lucky if we cross paths every other month or so since we seem to live very crazy lives at the moment... and not to mention a pretty decent distance apart as well. 

Well, after bonding over homemade spaghetti and garlic bread, we were hanging out on my patio, enjoying the summer breeze when it happened.

It was like sitting in slow motion, trying to prevent the action from happening, but to, no avail...

My friend walked through our patio screen door and fell into the house, onto my husband.

Thankfully my husband only got a scratch on his arm because he was able to slide away a bit since he was sitting in his computer chair, and my friend was fine, just shaken up and incredibly sorry...

The frame was contorted into a nightmare, but the screen itself was still connected (Thanks to my ex-boyfriends father who helped repair them 3 years ago when I bought this place and his amazing talent.)

After about 30 minutes of bending the door back into place, my husband was able to jam it back into the track and duck tape the door in place since we couldn't fix the frame entirely. Right now the door doesn't open or close, but at least with the duct tape on it we can keep the slider door open and get a nice cross breeze still.

****

We Google'd our hearts out and measured the frame because its truly shot and will need to be replaced. It looked like it would be $60 to custom order something from Home Depot so SCB went into the store the next day since he couldn't order the part online.

and that's where the story gets worse.

Apparently our patio slider door is so abnormally sized that Home Depot will no longer order the custom size screen door to fix it...

What's the point of paying for a custom size if they won't make it????

Why advertise on your website that you sell said screen door if you really don't??

So, we now have to contact specialty companies... and that means the price tag is going up up up.

SCB called a few places and the cheapest we can get is $160.00 for a very basic screen door for our patio... It's about $40 more dollars to put in a pet screen (something more durable), but that means its also more visible so we are thinking about going with the sturdier screen so people will see the door and not walk through it so we don't have this problem again... but if we do that, we might have an issue with our screen doors not matching (one darker, one lighter).... and both screen doors are right next to each other, on the same side of the condo so it might look funny.

Thankfully the company also re-screens existing doors as well, so we might just have our second screen re-done so the colors match... but depending on the frame they bring for the new one, we might just replace both at the same time so they are identical and we won't have the HOA to deal with.

But for now we won't know because they can't come out until the 17th of July... :(

9 comments:

  1. We're getting our screen door replaced by the guys that come out to the house. They are busy this time of year and we had to wait only to have him take the wrong measurements. He has to come back. He did leave the new screen door or (there's just a small gap at the top and we love it. We got the stronger screen and it is no easy to tell if the door is open or closed. I can see how your friend went through it. I think I'm just going to get a little sticker (butterfly or something) to put on it so we don't have an accident like you did. We paid $235 for ours but it is very high quality. There goes your 3 paycheck month!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I know... but the check is already spoken for retirement and our vacation so its going to have to come from some where else :(

      Delete
  2. Oh no!! :( I'm glad everyone was ok, but wat a pain! I hope it's fixed sooner than later!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ya, considering we need the screen for the breeze since we aren't running the AC wall unit because our windows are so terrible that its a waste of money...

      Delete
  3. They sells things called 'screen savers' which are 2 sided magnetically attached decorative objects. I have a dragonfly on mine - and it uses a magnet to attach - you put one on one side of the screen and the other on the other side. You put it at eye height and it should catch your eye enough to see that something is there. http://www.songbirdgarden.com/store/scripts/prodList.asp?idCategory=598

    hth!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Might be worth it to check those out so it doesn't happen again.

      Delete
  4. If you have two light magnets, you could use those. Just tried it with two of mine and it works fine.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Did your friend offer to help pay for the screen at all? Halfsies would help take the sting off.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes and no... Its one of those things that's always thrown out there after the incident happens, but I don't actually imagine her pitching in, in the grand scheme of things... and I don't think I could take her money.

      It was an accident and things like that happen all the time. I've learned not to let money and friendship mingle.

      Delete