When I got home from town the other day I found out this character who rented our Brown Palace cabin for six months in 2006 had been here and left a goofy statement for me to sign that he wanted to use in his court case against some former friends of his.

He owns/owned a lot of expensive teak outdoor furniture made by some fancy place in Vermont. When he was foreclosed out of his fancy house in Estes Park (trying to maximize the damage supposedly done to his life by a false arrest by Estes Park/Larimer County cops so he could sue them for millions) he moved into my place and brought all this furniture – three decks worth. He told me to spread it around here and use it, and I could even keep a couple of pieces for my trouble. So we had a bench in front of my house and loungers on my back patio, and lots of furniture in the yard at the Brown Palace and on its front porch. When he moved out the last week of December 2006 there was 3 feet of snow on the ground and he left the furniture with the understanding that he would come and get it when he got settled somewhere. I had kicked him out, or he would have stayed here. He thought I should let him and his two cats move into my house while I went to Las Vegas for the rest of that winter.



He finally showed up in June 2007 with a guy (the one he is now suing) and they loaded it all into a pickup and hauled it off. It really was nice furniture and it enhanced our place here. I had considered asking him if I could buy some of the pieces from him, but realized he always thinks in terms of what it cost new, even though now the furniture is about 10 years old and very weather beaten. I decided that even though I would miss it, if I wanted that kind of furniture it would be better to go buy it somewhere rather than get into what it was worth with him and have him think I had taken advantage of him. And I didn't remind him that he'd told me I could keep a couple pieces.



The guy with the truck and his wife own some vacation rental cottages west of Estes Park, and my guess was that my former tenant was doing with them like he did with me, letting them use the furniture and maybe offer them a piece or two. Turns out when he wanted to get his furniture from them maybe a year later, he offered them a piece or two and they said they wanted all of it, claiming he had given it all to them. So he tried to get the police to arrest them, but the cops wouldn’t do it.

So yesterday I wrote out a statement that his furniture was here for about a year and he came and got it, and I didn’t charge him to store it. The statement he wrote for me to sign said that I “watched his furniture for him” as if it was a small child, and some grammatical bloopers so I wouldn’t sign it. And now today here comes a process server with a subpoena for me to appear in court on Wednesday and testify about that stupid furniture.

And later this morning, regular circus around here, here comes Mr. Vacation Cottages himself, and tries to talk Mr. Troutbend into agreeing that he heard our former tenant tell the guy he was giving them all the furniture when they were here loading it into the truck. But Mr. Tbend heard nothing of the sort, and neither of us believes that our former tenant, a real piece of work, would ever give all of that furniture away: it's not his nature to be so generous without strings attached.

I don’t know why those people didn’t just hand over the furniture by now to get rid of him. When Mr. Tbend told the guy that we ‘stored it’ here for awhile, the guy said ‘we’d have never agreed to store it for him.’ Then he said ‘Thank you, sir. It was worth a shot.’

I didn’t tell him ‘I’ll see you in court’ because I’ll see him soon enough. I’m wondering if they sold the furniture or something and that’s why they can’t give it back. It seems like it must be something more than it appears. He really is a nice guy, and I feel a little sorry for him, but there must be something wrong with him and his wife to let this disagreement get as far as it has so my heart isn't breaking.

Of course, I’m not on the side of the plaintiff, either, because he is one of those people who tries to manipulate the legal system to harass people and extort money out of them like the gypsies do. He’s probably blown this up into a punitive damages thing and wants a lot more than his furniture. I’m just lucky he hasn’t figured out something to sue me for, and I’m surprised he isn’t suing the cops because they wouldn’t arrest these people. He probably talked to his lawyer about it and got shot down.

Maybe they will have one of those pre-trial mediations and settle it out of court. I think I hope so because although it might be interesting to hear more about it, I can live without it.