Window Cleaning Titbits

Ask a Window Cleaner: This week, Andrew Horton (pictured), who has been a window cleaner for more than two decades and knows the secrets of the trade and safety practices, will be responding to readers’ questions about his career. Readers who would like to ask Mr. Horton a question should do so in the comments box below. His first set of responses will be published on Wednesday. Mr. Horton, 54, has worked on landmark buildings all over the city, including the Empire State Building, the Twin Towers, the Hearst Building and dozens of others.
He said he was always content with his job until one day, hanging off the 86th floor of the Empire State Building with just a belt tying him to a window, he decided that he should rethink his livelihood. Mr. Horton now runs New York City’s main safety training program for window washers at the building service workers union 32BJ, teaching future window washers how to reduce risks and promoting safety while working a thousand feet up in the sky. “What’s more important up there?” he asks. “Prevention, prevention, prevention!” Mr. Horton was born and raised in New York City. He is married, has two sons and lives in Queens. He enjoys fly fishing and is a youth basketball coach at his parish.

Bogus window cleaner stole from great-gran: A low-life who posed as a window cleaner to fleece an 81-year-old great grandmother has been locked up for five years. Serial criminal Philip Lamb (pictured) has spent 10 years of his life behind bars after carrying out distraction burglaries time and time again. Just weeks after getting out of prison for his last offence, he turned up at the home of a trusting pensioner and pretended to be there to clean her windows. Lamb tricked the 81-year-old into making it clear where she kept her money and when her back was turned stole £500 of her savings from her bedroom.
The victim, from Jarrow, had answered a knock at her door in the middle of the afternoon on April 21. Standing there was Lamb, who lied that he was there to clean her windows and she agreed. He asked her for a bucket and water and came into the lady’s hallway while she went to get the materials. She came back to the hall and Lamb told her the bucket was overflowing and when she went to check it he followed her into the kitchen. The devious thief then set about finding where she kept her money, first asking to borrow 10p to ring his girlfriend then asking her to change £5 from coins into a note. The old lady, trying to be helpful, went to her bedroom and took £5 from a box where she kept her savings. Lamb then went outside and made an excuse that he had to leave and when the pensioner went back into her bedroom she realised £500, which had been in the box was missing.

Why the glass is half empty at Pilkington: Pilkington was once a national treasure. From its St Helens base in England's northwest, it was a pioneer of the wor ld of glassmaking. Now, that same cradle of innovation is an operational outpost of a disparate Japanese empire. The Merseyside town is these days better known for its rugby league side rather than its iconic manufacturer. Britain's biggest glassmaker has all but slipped from public view since succumbing to a £2.2bn takeover by Nippon Sheet Glass in 2006. But the company has recently attracted some unwanted attention after hitting customers with massive price rises of 134pc in the space of a year. Pilkington last week wrote to its customers with the latest bad news - it is imposing a third huge hike in its tariff in 12 months, raising the cost of its most popular product by 20pc from July 19. Why the price hikes? The company has previously indicated that they were essential.
Founded in the Lancashire town in 1826 as a partnership by members of the Pilkington and Greenall families, it became a leader in the field in the 1950s when it invented the Float Glass Process. This was a method of producing high quality flat glass by floating molten glass over a bath of molten tin, which eradicated the costly job of having to grind and polish plate glass to make it clear. This success and pedigree inevitably attracted takeover interest. This is why Pilkington had to fend off advances from BTR Industries in early 1986, before succumbing to NSG in 2006.

Finding the Right Bus: The first prospective Double Decker PDX bus was discovered in Boise, Idaho. Based on the description, photographs, and price, it seemed like a deal worth pursuing so Metcalf, 23, and Thompson, 22, flew to Boise the weekend before midterms. What they found was a disappointment. The next bus they found was sitting in a parking lot in Osage Beach, Missouri. It was a green, 1959 Bristol Lodekka being used as a billboard for a real estate broker’s business. After serving Londoners for nearly 30 years, the vehicle had been shipped to Chicago where it was used as a tour bus. Eventually, it was retired and sat idle for a decade before the Missouri owner purchased it. There were aesthetic flaws and it needed mechanical work but most of the bus’s original interior was intact. The owner was asking $50,000. The partners negotiated and in the end, Thompson says they were able to purchase the bus for “a really good price.” They won’t reveal what they paid.
Thompson and Metcalf say they approached a number of credit unions, national and regional banks for a business loan, with no success. Although they had saved some money from past businesses (a mobile car detailing company and residential window washing service) the entrepreneurs had to secure private financing to purchase the bus and to complete the complicated renovation.

ABM Janitorial Services Inc, the wholly owned subsidiary of ABM Industries Inc. (ABM - Analyst Report) completed the all-cash acquisition of South Carolina-based janitorial services company Diversco Inc. from DHI Holdings Inc. The acquisition will expand ABM Industries’ janitorial and security businesses within key regions across the country and among key client segments. Diversco provides janitorial, security guard, yard and grounds, window washing, maintenance and repair services across the United States. In the fiscal year ended March 31, 2010, Diversco generated revenues of $79.3 million. ABM Industries expects the Diversco operation to be integrated by the end of the year. Given Diversco’s strong manufacturing and industrial client base in the Southeast, Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States, the acquisition offers ABM Industries a wider geographic reach. Diversco's business also complements its operations infrastructure and national presence.

Filth-obsessed genius creates car art from rear-window grime: We're far too lazy at Car Tech to ever clean our cars, but it turns out that's a good thing - some genius with a paintbrush has devised a way to turn rear-window grime into incredible pieces of art. That man is Scott Wade, an artist who paints using using dirty cars as his canvas. Rather than the usual dirt-art clichés - oddly shaped genitalia, "clean me", "if the Prius is a-rocking, don't come a-knocking" - Wade creates entire masterpieces you wouldn't dream of washing away. Wade, from San Marcos, Texas, uses an unusual technique. Ironically, he thoroughly cleans each car window before he begins his work. Once dry, he applies dust (plenty to hand in that part of the world) to each windscreen, grabs his trusty paintbrush and begins. Once done, he takes a snapshot for posterity then washes away all trace of his work. Reverse graffiti.

Medical marijuana for sale in Ferndale: More than 50 Michigan cities, townships and counties have passed ordinances limiting or banning medical-marijuana dispensaries, the term used in other states for shops that sell to doctor-approved patients. But a few communities are moving toward treating medical marijuana like any new industry. In a squeaky clean storefront sharing a building with a screen printer, a fitness studio and a window cleaning firm, Clinical Relief did a brisk business in packaged medical marijuana and in foods that have it as an ingredient -- from candy bars to soda pop. Each client signs a form promising not to resell the medical marijuana.

NEW YORK -- Every Fourth of July, Coney Island stages an event featuring two of America's biggest loves: hot dogs and competition. The two pastimes merge Sunday afternoon by the Brooklyn boardwalk for the annual Nathan's Famous Fourth of July International Hot Dog Eating Contest. In recent years, a crowd favorite is New York window washer and nude model Crazy Legs Conti, the star of a 2004 documentary whose dreadlocks bounce as he dances and speed-eats.

As with many objects of pop-culture nostalgia, the 1980s hit TV show "The A-Team" is more fun to reminisce about than to actually revisit. All that said, the new big-screen version makes the original look like "The Wire." If you've never felt an appreciation for the charisma of George Peppard, for instance, you'll understand that, for better or worse, he inhabited the role of Hannibal Smith, while Liam Neeson, in the same part, is just doing an impression - and a bad one. Cue the action set pieces: an escape from a U.S. Army base in Germany, during which the boys parachute from a demolished transport plane while inside a tank; an assault on an office tower involving shoulder-launched missiles and the old fake window-washer ruse - see minute 2:04 here on the official trailer.

Shortly after Robert De Niro and Mayor Michael Bloomberg affixed a sticker supporting the 9/11 Memorial to the front door of De Niro’s Locanda Verde restaurant last week, the sticker disappeared. After DNAinfo's inquires, a new sticker appeared Thursday evening — not on the door, but on a side window, behind a pine tree and several bushes. Only if passersby look past the shrubs and through the branches can they see the blue, black and white sticker, which is not much bigger than a playing card, from outside De Niro’s restaurant. Its message reads: “We Support the 9/11 Memorial. Forever Changed. Forever Connected."
De Niro, who is a board member of the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, installed the sticker in a ceremony with the mayor as part of the memorial’s “Signs of Support” program, where local business owners get a sticker to place in their windows in return for making a donation. The purpose of last week’s photo-op was to encourage other businesses to do the same. A manager at Locanda Verde, who did not give his name, said Thursday afternoon that the sticker put on the front door last week was never intended to be permanent, because it was stuck to the outside of the door, where it was subject to wear and tear and window-washing.

MCCC takes strides towards a more energy efficient campus, including replacing the windows of the Life Science building. On May 7 the maintenance crew of MCCC began replacing the 39-year-old, two-story curtain walls due to costly damages resulting from leaking and also the potential of future hazards. The project also goes along with other renovations being done to make the college more energy efficient. According to the director of the Physical Plant, Jim Blumberg, many people were unaware of the reasons for this work. “Most people have been asking me if it’s just for aesthetics,” Blumberg said, “But we should have replaced the windows ten years ago.” Some of the problems caused by the water intrusion include damage to computers, desks, carpet, drywall, the surrounding wooden framework, and costly lab equipment. Extended exposure to water damage can also lead to mold or rotting wall systems, both wood and brick. “Water can get into the walls, into the ceilings, places you don’t see, so then air quality becomes an issue,” Blumberg said. “We haven’t had any, thankfully, but you don’t want anything to develop.”

It could have been a volunteer window cleaner! UCLA students, alumni team up with Clean Carwash Campaign to boycott car washes, fight for worker rights - During the summer of 2008, Aura Lopez, a worker at Best Way Hand Car Wash in Los Angeles, was standing on the wheel of a truck while washing its window when she fell and landed on a metal key. The fall damaged her spinal column. She should have been using a ladder, but she said the owner told his workers he did not have the money to buy more. UCLA students, alumni and university labor programs have been incessantly fighting alongside the CLEAN Carwash Campaign for the rights of car wash workers like Lopez. Best Way Hand Car Wash and Celebrity Car Wash declined to comment on the claims because of lawsuits they are facing. Vermont Hand Wash and Lawndale Car Wash refused to comment. Five Star and Magic Wand were unavailable to give a response.
According to campaign members and car wash workers, industry owners have been exploiting their employees for years. Instead of taking Lopez to the hospital, the owner took her to a family clinic. “They didn’t have the adequate doctors to treat me there. When my sister told my employer she was going to take me to a general hospital, he said he wasn’t going to make himself responsible for me,” Lopez said. The hospital Lopez was treated at informed her that she had the right to press charges. Fearful of losing her job, Lopez initially refused to do so. However, she filed a lawsuit after realizing her employer would not pay the bill two months after her injury. The lawsuit has yet to see its full way through. Since the accident, Lopez said she suffers constant pain, and she was recently told she needs surgery. Unemployed since the incident, Lopez cannot afford to undergo the operation and is relying on either her insurance’s coverage or the lawsuit to cover the charges.

Pfizer Inc. volunteers assisted the Children's Museum of Southeastern Connecticut in Niantic with some large improvement projects earlier this month. Forty Pfizer employees worked at the museum on June 10 and 11 and washed all the windows and weeded the museum's gardens. They also scraped, sanded, and primed the exterior of the building in preparation for a fresh topcoat. Some of the volunteers are planning to return to the museum on their own time to complete the paint job. In addition, the Pfizer volunteers brought their own ladders, paintbrushes, and window-cleaning supplies, saving the museum additional costs. Christy Hammond, the museum's executive director, said similar work would have cost the museum between $25,000 and $30,000 with outside contractors.

Tips for selling your house this summer: If you are counting on selling this summer, then take some advice from agents who look at homes 24/7. We may be in the middle of the selling season, but it is still a tricky market and, they say, small details make a big difference in encouraging people back up the path for a second viewing. “Think about how you would want to present yourself on a first date,” says Edward Church, partner at Strutt & Parker in Canterbury, “and do the same for your house – all buffed up clean and shiny, and smelling nice.” People are always drawn towards windows – a plus in the height of summer when they can look out onto your carefully tended garden, so make them a real focal point. Apart from ensuring the glass is sparkling (well worth paying a window cleaner), clear junk off window sills and keep curtains pulled well back to make rooms seem lighter and bigger.

Village cricketer Steve Witham has scored the world's quickest century in a one-day game - off just 35 balls. Steve's ton included nine sixes and nine fours. He was finally out for 110. He took the record off Pakistan's Shahid Afridi, who hit 100 off 37 balls against Sri Lanka in 1996. Steve, 38, from Sudbury, Suffolk, was captaining his club's second team against Clacton. The window cleaner, who once hit six sixes off one over, said yesterday: "I was hit in the groin by the first ball so I decided to do as little running as possible." Team mate Louis Brookes said: "Steve is a big hitter and he was on really good form that day."

Skyscraper plan cut down to size: An ambitious plan to build a glass needle skyscraper that would have been Cardiff’s tallest building has been axed, the Echo can reveal. The iconic £50m development, earmarked for land next to Cardiff Central Station, would have housed more than 100 luxury apartments. Officially named Seren – the Welsh word for star – by developer Urban Solutions, the 32-storey needle would have stood alongside two smaller blocks containing luxury hotel rooms. They would have been run by a company called Doubletree , which is part of the Hilton group. But after years of delays and the onset of the worst economic downturn in 60 years, London-based Urban Solutions has scaled back its plans. It has submitted a proposal to Cardiff Council to build two hotels on the derelict site. Instead of acres of gleaming glass, the buildings will have white metal cladding, according to documents lodged at City Hall.

Rivals Gareth Potts and Adam Davis are on course to meet in the final of the Foster's World 8-Ball Pool Championships. The two friends have battled through to the last eight of the £25,000 tournament at Blackpool's Imperial Hotel. Victory over Ely window cleaner Harrison will earn Davis a shot at former champion Mick Hill or Gareth Hibbott.