Einsteins in the World of Construction

On Monday afternoon, Matt and I drove up to Timberline Lodge to get Alyssa. She had spent the week with my parents in Butthump, Oregon, We planned her trip around the fact that my folks were spending the night at Timberline for their anniversary and would be heading over this direction. We went to get her so they wouldn't have to drive all the way to Portland.

As we walked out of the house about 3:30, I turned and locked the doors. Three of the 'workers' (and I use the term loosely) were standing in the street on the other side of the trench from my house, inspecting that huge rock... wasting a few minutes after stopping work for the day but I'm sure before they clocked out.

They looked at us, and one said, "Do you live here?"

Matt said airily, "No, we're just robbing the place."

Unsurprisingly, it went right over their heads. They looked blankly at us, and then the head guy (I could tell it was the head guy by the way he hitched at his pants and hawked and spit while the other two watched respectfully) said quite unnecessarily, "You won't be able to park in your driveway tonight."

Feigning shock, I said, "No! Really???"

Again... whoosh, right over their heads.

"No, we're gonna have to break up this here rock before'n you can park there again."

They show up early and let their trucks idle outside people's homes until they can start in earnest at 7.
And what numbnuts fuckstick decided that 7 A freakin' M was a good time to start work in a residential neighborhood????

I can tell you for sure that decision was NOT made by a prehomicidal premenopausal woman, because all the construction workers would be DEAD.
It's taken most of my inner strength not to go out and tell them to
A. Get back to work
B. Get your ass off my lawn or
C. Get a real job you lazy butthook.

I don't know if the inner me will ever be okay again.

They stand around thumbing their asses for a good two hours of the day. They stop work between 2:30 and 4:00, after a morning break that lasts half an hour and an hour and a half lunch AND a half hour afternoon break.

We've had to park on the lawn at the bedroom end of the house for the last few nights. They know this, since at least one car is parked there when they arrive in the morning. So tell me why they are parking their equipment where I can't get my car out until they move it... and why are they putting their stuff BACK as soon as I leave so I have to walk half a block to get HOME??????

AAARGHHHHHHHH!!!!!

And TWICE they have rung my doorbell at 6:30 to ask me to either move a vehicle or open a locked gate. I told the guy on Monday (when we still had a driveway) "I will move my car when I leave for work at 7:15." I refrained from adding, "Asshole." and did NOT slam the door in his face. On Tuesday, I had to go out and open the back gate, which is chained and padlocked. It doesn't get opened often, and the lock is a little stiff. I wrestled with it angrily for a few moments before deciding there must be some trick to it, and trying to call Eric to find out WHAT the trick was. Just as he answered the phone, I managed to get the gate open. Great. Then, I looked down to see that each of my freshly-washed-right-after-the-camping-trip shoes was planted squarely in the middle of a pile of dog shit.

FAAACKKKKK!!!!

Break up the rock. So that's what they call it. It took Two!! Days!!
::chortle::
I realize it means that the project will go on two days longer because of it, but I see the humor in it. It's just what I do.

They started at 7 yesterday morning. Now I am ordinarily up anyway, but being awake and functioning is not quite the same as being awake and functioning while the entire house vibrates and things fall off the shelves in the bedroom.

When they told me they'd have to break the rock up, I was envisioning this:

(another aside here... when you do a google image search for jackhammer, you will see many interesting things. Trust me, the mild little cartoon version of Jack Hammer I am posting is the best option. Go look if you'd like to, but don't let your kids look over your shoulder while you do.)

Okay. So what we really got was a HUGE piece of heavy equipment parked directly in front of the house. The hammer was on the end of a long arm, and the operator (another pants hitcher) sat up in the cab with big heaphone style hearing protectors on and chopped away at the rock.

After picking up some of the pictures that fell off the wall in my bedroom, I sat down here in the computer chair. It only took a few moments to realize that if a person had the right chair and a few minutes alone, that amazing vibration could do all the work. Oh my goodness!

Alas.. wrong chair and no privacy.
(now go do that Google image search.)

If you look carefully, you can see that Mr. Jack Hammer didn't notice the edge of our driveway and chipped off the concrete in a couple places. I tell ya, I am surprised the man can operate the equipment without drooling or wetting his pants.

Progress? I don't know. It looks different than it did yesterday afternoon. Does that count?