Sunday, June 27, 2021

Day Off

 It is my day off. When I got home from work yesterday, I talked to Cara for over an hour, and then I did three loads of laundry. While that was going, I whizzed through the house getting everything tidy. I folded laundry watching an episode of Downton Abbey. 

Tim had spent the day putting in an outside faucet for one of the tenants. The gypsy moths are awful this year and everything is covered with a fine layer of moth poop. She needs the tap to keep her deck clean, as well as to water her garden. 

When he was done, he began another job, shingling a garage. He did the tear off yesterday and put the tarpaper down. When he was done with that, he stopped, cleaned up and went to my nephews birthday party. His company has shut down this week, and so he's got a week off work to finish up all the odds and ends. I said, "You don't need to get it ALL done on your first day off." 

For me, Saturday work is less of a grind. For one thing, we are doing different work, which makes time go a little more quickly. For another, it is only an 8 hour day, and that helps too. 

I am not much of a talker at work, but I do listen, and little stories come out that sort of reaffirm my faith in humanity. 

There is a hulking tall guy behind me. He is quite a talker. Most of his talk is about silly things like if Megatron met --------, he would destroy him, and he and the kid sitting across the aisle talk a great deal about reality shows and super hero movies. But yesterday, there was a discussion about this paycheck coming. It will be a big one with 20 hours of time and a half and 16 hours of double time in addition to 80 hours of straight time, if you worked it all. Both of the chatterers did. One was holding forth on his big plans, and the big guy said, "Not me." 

Like me, he'd been 'permanently' laid off from the company before they got themselves in this pickle and scrambled around trying to hire us all back. His job hunting made it clear that he'd be earning less, working unpredictable hours, and suddenly insurance was an issue (it still is, actually. We are considered temporary employees. I get my benefits through Tim's job, but not everyone is that lucky). The outlook was pretty grim. I think that it frightened him a little. 

In any case. he left a job making $9 to come back to work temporarily for this company. Like I said, the money is good. I refer to us as mercenaries, 'soldiers of fortune', so to speak. He looked at the guy across the aisle who had been talking about his big plans for his big paycheck.  He said, "Not me. I am $6300 away from owning my house free and clear. I am all caught up on my bills, and I don't owe anybody anything, and it is the best feeling in the world." 

It made me smile. 

There's another guy, big burly fellow, bearded, tattooed, rides a motorcycle, wears a do-rag. He kind of looked like the stereotypical wild man. He knows this job is temporary, and he sucks up all the overtime he can without complaint. Saturday is the double time day. His friend asked him, "You working Saturday?" and he said shortly, "Nope." 

His friend was a bit astonished, and pointed out that he would be missing both Saturdays on our bi-weekly paycheck. Our biker man looked at him and said, "I've got my son this weekend." His friend said, "You had him last weekend." 

"I know it," said the biker guy. "His mother wanted to change weekends, so we did, but now she has something going on this weekend too, so I'll have him again and I'll never complain about that." 

That was a nice thing to over hear too.



10 comments:

  1. I am totally on board with the big guy. I wish we owned our home -- we're not that wealthy! But we DO live debt free, which is a great feeling.

    ReplyDelete
  2. It's always so nice to hear the good in the world.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I remember when I was counting down the last house payments.

    ReplyDelete
  4. That biker/Father's comment was wonderful!!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I wish every kid had a father like that.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Your male colleagues probably go home and say, "There's this woman at work who hardly gives anything away but she 's always listening to what we say! I think she's with the F.B.I.!"

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can tell you that no one is interested in what I have to say. I am the invisible woman.

      Delete
  7. I like hearing about people with their priorities straight.

    ReplyDelete

  8. I was diagnosed as HEPATITIS B carrier in 2013 with fibrosis of the
    liver already present. I started on antiviral medications which
    reduced the viral load initially. After a couple of years the virus
    became resistant. I started on HEPATITIS B Herbal treatment from
    ULTIMATE LIFE CLINIC (www.ultimatelifeclinic.com) in March, 2020. Their
    treatment totally reversed the virus. I did another blood test after
    the 6 months long treatment and tested negative to the virus. Amazing
    treatment! This treatment is a breakthrough for all HBV carriers.

    ReplyDelete

I'm glad you're here!

Weary

I am sure that everyone has seen the video of the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge. I lived in Baltimore for a couple years while my...