I am in the midst of a very unpleasant situation with a contractor. In all my years of home ownership (30 in Castleton-on-Hudson and 18 in Samsonville) I have never had a bad experience, much less anything like this happen. It is not over yet, and I have no prediction for when or how it will resolve. I consider myself unmaterialistic, and so I know it is only a house, but it's a significan part of my retirement portfolio, not to mention a source of relaxation and stress reduction, a place to get away from the demands of professional life. Bob is proud of the work he has done on the house, and in fact, only finished his every-three-year maintenance of the exterior finish a couple weeks ago (and this time it took two summers to complete). Since he received the startling news from the contractor while he was at work late Thursday afternoon, we have discussed and brainstormed and theorized about "Why?" Why is this happening? How could it happen? WTF? We want a logical explnation, one that makes some kind of sense. Sometimes there is no rational explanation I guess, and that's hard to swallow. Maybe the dude is just plain crazy, or a liar, or a cheat. Last night we postulated, perhaps he is a drug abuser, and is addicted to opioids. That would explain his behavior, and make more sense than anything else we have formulated.