I mentioned recently that we'd had an upstairs window broken at Bungee Towers by a pigeon with no damn sense of direction. And that this window was unusual because it had no frame - instead, the glass was set directly into grooves in the stone mullion with lime mortar. All good 19th century heritage stuff, then, but not a job for just any old builder. Or any old glazier, either. It took us weeks to get even one quote!
So the job went to Steve, who had worked on all sorts of ancient buildings, including cathedrals apparently. Great start, lovely guy. It should probably have been a four or five hour job, or a long afternoon. Took seventeen hours over two days, and on the second day he was still finishing at 10 pm as it got dark. And we were dropping subtle hints that we were hoping to have supper before we died of hunger.
My god, Steve was into detail. I've never seen anybody so engrossed in his work, or so patient. But of course, that's one of the key autistic behaviours. Steve spent at least five hours cleaning out one groove with a file the size of a toothbrush. And then he started on the next groove...... Anybody else would have reached for the angle grinder and done it in fifteen minutes.
But golly wow, Steve got a perfect, perfect finish. He had absolutely no sense of time passing, or what time it was. And apparently that's another common characteristic of people with autism. He didn't increase his invoice because of all the extra time he'd taken, or because he'd missed his own supper at home. "My wife knows what I'm like," he said. But we slipped him a cash thank you all the same. Lovely guy, and we'll use him again. But maybe not for quick time-limited projects.
Postscript: Thinking about it afterwards, I remembered taking my car to a minor-damage repair shop after a scrape, where the owner was also reckoned to be autistic. A genius with detail, apparently, and also handy with tricky upholstery repairs. The difference was that that guy had no interpersonal skills at all - in fact, he was pretty rude - and that his quote was almost double that of the competition. Presumably because he knew he'd be slow, but he still wanted his hourly rate?
No sale, anyway, we went elsewhere.Steve, we love ya. We've got your number on speed dial.
BJ