Bucket, Bucket, Who's Got The.......

We've all heard it, the clothes make the man....

And we're talkin a construction jobsite here. I try to dress at least acceptable on the jobsite. I usually wear a pair of cargo pants and a nice button down shirt. I try not to wear tee shirts, or sweats, I just think that's unprofessional....at least that's what my Dad always said. He sure loved his clothes! There were times that he would actually go shopping during the day for clothes and come back with some really nice skins.

This post is about the best suede jacket in the whole world.......Dad's words, although I admit it was a nice jacket until that chilly fall day..................


It was in fact a chilly windy day, and we were working on a brick front of a new home in New Brunswick

New Jersey. That in itself wasn't so bad, what made the situation ten times worse is that we were in the shade for a good part of the day, and the wind ripped around the corner of the house right into our faces. My Dad wasn't in a very good mood that day, in fact nobody was. It's kinda hard to keep a smile on your face when your freezing your ass off, and your boss (Dad) is in such a bad mood you just wish him away!

He complained about everything this day, and nothing we did could make him happy. 

We were moving too slow, or our work was sloppy, or we didn't have enough buckets or well..... you get the idea, nobody wanted him there!

Speaking of buckets, one of his pet peeves was having enough buckets around. Buckets are an invaluable item in the construction industry, and especially in the mason field. The best thing is you could get them for FREE!!. If you caught a house just at the right time, right after the spacklers, you just hit the jackpot.....the mother load! During lean times, we would dumpster dive and most of the time we would come up with about a half dozen buckets. Not a bad haul!

This always made my Dad happy (and eventually me too). It almost felt like stealing, and when I would go into the recently spackeled house, the hairs on the back of my neck would stand up, and I would stealth-fully grab a bunch and rush out of the house. Now that's funny because they were up for grabs, kinda like a first come first serve thing, but no matter how many times I was sent on the bucket mission.....I would get that rush......like a spy taking the crown jewels from the bad guys, and returning them to the King.....(Dad).

There were protocols to follow in bucket retrieval  

  

The first and most important was if you found a lone bucket just sitting alone in the corner of the room, you

Approach with Caution!

were to approach it with caution. If there was a cover on it, you were to be even more careful and cautious!
As you approached the lidded bucket, you should first give it a light kick. If the cover came off, you were to step back three steps, to avoid any undesirable liquids that may be in there and splash on you. If the lid did not come off, you were to carefully lift said bucket, give it a swirl and while you did this you were to observe any solids through the plastic. Most of the time that worked.......sometimes it did not. But even more of the time the bucket just has a bit of left over Spackle and water in it and just needed to be cleaned out. 

Getting back to the job at hand.....we were wishing my Dad away because he was being really nasty all morning. But as noon approached, he announced that he hated his stupid coat that had a rip on the inside and had lost some of it's warming capabilities and he was going to the store to buy a new coat. We all cheered!!!!....as the truck turned the corner.

Hours went by, it got colder but it was somehow more pleasant.

Yeah....that's what it looked like!

Then around three thirty, here came the truck a rollin down the road. It was Dad, and although he was sporting a brand new (pretty nice) tan suede jacket with a fur collar, he seemed to still have retained his bad mood. The first thing he yells when he gets out of the truck was......

"Were you guys sleeping when I was gone!? I'm losing my shirt here!!"

We were wishing him away again!

"Jesus Christ why aren't there any buckets around!!??? It's so damn easy to get them and you guys are working with three dilapidated buckets!"

We tried to explain to him that we looked the day before but were unsuccessful.

"Oh Yeah?! I'll show you guys! I bet I can find at least a dozen!"

And with that he jumped into his truck and sped down the road in a dirt haze.....we again cheered!

I don't know how he did it, but he did in fact come back with about a dozen buckets.....but the majority of them were the forbidden ones .....with covers! He jumped out of the truck and grabbed the buckets, and like a wild man was throwing them and saying things like..." I told you" and " That's because you guys don't know how to look" and See?! see?! I found at least a dozen!!....

The wind was picking up a bit, and we were getting even colder as the day was drawing to a close, which we were all extremely happy about. We started cleaning up and getting ready to leave and no one was really paying any attention to my Dad who was NOT following protocol.........when..........

"SON OF A BITCH!!!!!!!" He screamed

 He hit the mother load for sure! As he ripped off the cover from this one particular bucket he was

Okay, not my Dad....but that's what he looked like!

generously sprayed with.....let's just say someone didn't make it to the port a john. His brand new suede jacket was completely covered with this foul smelling combination of Human waste. I'm pretty sure we were all laughing at this point.....all except my Dad, who is very bad with nasty odors and who was gagging profusely as he ripped off his most beautiful brand new suede jacket and threw it across the street! He now had freckles, and Dad never had freckles before...if you know what I mean.

He drove home alone that day....and about a month after that because that's how long it took to finally get that nasty smell out of the truck.
Oh yeah...he never bought a suede jacket again!

 

TIP OF THE DAY:

How to turn an ordinary 5 gallon bucket into a planter!

• Get yourself a nice 5 gallon bucket.
• If you don't have one, you can get one at your local home improvement center for about four dollars.
• Pick up some spray paint while your at the store.

• 

  Not so creative, but you get the idea!

• Call your artistic friend or just paint the bucket yourself.
• Drill about ten 3/8" holes in the bottom of the bucket (after it dries)
• Then put about 2" loose gravel on the bottom of the bucket, should be at least 3/4" stone.
• Fill it halfway with potting soil.
• Put your really nice plant in there...I have a couple of fig trees.
• Fill up the bucket the rest of the way......and enjoy!
• You just saved yourself about thirty dollars for an overpriced plastic planter!
• Oh yeah, if you do have a bucket just laying around, and it's covered.......

REMEMBER PROTOCOL!!

See you next time......from beyond.........

She's gonna blow Captain!

To survive this economic debacle, we must "think outside of the box"

I call it an economical debacle because I've lived through two recessions, and as bad as they were, neither one was as long and as persistent as this recession. I have witnessed too many sad things in the last six years. I have seen friends and even some family members lose their homes, and I have seen a few of my fellow contractors go under. This economy has put some of the strongest businesses in troubles path.

Is this what's next?

In the first two years, I was hoping that this major downturn in the economy and the bursting of the housing bubble would weed out all the weak and bad contractors. It did get some of them, but sadly for a lot of people the economy is still in the tank, and it seems that there's more economic punishment ahead for us. So what can we do to survive? We need to reinvent the wheel......think outside the box......learn to diversify!

That's what I chose to do....Diversify..

Through my years in business, I tried to keep growing. Not just in the amount of men, and equipment, but in the things that I can offer. I didn't want to become that guy....you know..."jack of all trades, master of none".
But I wasn't happy just doing one thing. So I did grow in the things that I offered to my customers. Most importantly and the point of this story, I became a Dealer and Installer for a whole house water filter system and Salt Free water softener, You can see it here:

 This was the perfect add on to my business. I was not only selling these systems online to anyone in the country, but I was also selling and installing them in my local service area.......which brings me to my story........

About  two years ago I get a call at my office for a full system. The guy, Joe, left a message that he was very interested in purchasing the system but he wanted to talk to someone with some knowledge of how the system worked before he committed to our system. I called him as soon as I returned to my office.

Joe was interested in the "big" system we sell. 

The Pelican Whole House System

That was good, but when he told me that he lived in New York state, I was a bit disappointed, but I figured that I would at least sell him the system and make my commission from the sale. I try and stay within an hour of my shop, and he was about a two hour drive. He then tells me that he would be willing to pay extra for travel time, because I was highly recommended by the main company. To be honest here, I really didn't want to travel that far, and I tried to overprice the extra travel time to a point that Joe would find it too expensive and look for a local plumber to install the system.

Joe was Happy to pay the extra but before he committed, he wanted to "see" the system.

"Do you have a customer that I can go see their system?" Joe asked in his high pitched, kinda whiny voice.

"I can't give you a customers address, but I actually have the system installed in my own home and you are welcome to drive over two hours to see it" I replied.

"Okay, can I come by tomorrow?, what's your address? And if I like the system, I'll leave the deposit.....Okay?....How's that sound? " Joe screeched.

I thought it sounded weird, so I told him that I would ask my wife if that was okay with her. Which it was, and Joe made an appointment to "see" the system the following day. When I got home the following day, my wife told me that this guy Joe had stopped by and he was "very weird". He asked a bunch of questions, and when he was showed the system, he went about giving it a detailed inspection. He left the deposit, and I ordered his system.

Joe's  system arrived, and I got it all prepped and ready to go. 

Seems that I have every fitting I need!

Before I left my shop I wanted to make sure that I had everything possible for the install. I didn't want to be that far away into unknown territory, not having everything I needed for a successful installation. I left with total confidence and headed off to New York.....to Joe's house.

After a little over two hours of driving, I was pulling into Joe's driveway. It was a nicely kept two story
colonial. The grass was very neatly cut, and I could tell that Joe was a bit of a perfectionist by the way he kept his home. I respect that.

Joe greeted me at the side door, and I have to admit that I had him pegged from just our phone calls. He was a small skinny guy, and he had a nervous twitch about him. I reached out to shake his hand, and he laid his hand in mine like a princess would, and I almost thought I should kiss it instead of shake it. I followed him into the finished part of the basement and he showed me the closet that we were to install the system.

I got started right away. I turned off the main water supply, made my cuts into the system and figured out my piping. While I was doing this I heard a strange noise, so I stopped and listened. It was someone upstairs pacing back and forth right above where we were working. I thought that was very strange, but went ahead with the installation.

Every once in a while I would feel a presence and look behind me to see Joe just standing there. I didn't hear him come down, he would just "be" there and he would and ask how things were going. I assured him that all was going well. I could tell he was nervous. He seemed the kind of person who didn't like change.

We were now into the third hour of the install, and almost finished. I asked my helper to get one of the fittings out of my truck, and cut it to a certain length. When he brought it in to me, it looked like the cut was wrong. Sure enough it was! I was pretty upset because now I had to try to find a plumbing supply store to replace that fitting! I called upstairs to Joe who was pacing back and forth above our heads and asked if he knew of a plumbing supply store that was nearby. Joe came running down the stairs as if there was a fire, eyes bulging, and he started to panic and asked in a very concerned tone,

"What's wrong? Is everything okay? Oh Geez, maybe you should put everything back the way it was."

Joe...

I explained that everything was fine and I just forgot to bring a fitting. He was reluctant, but went upstairs to get me the address of the nearest plumbing supply store which was about twenty minutes away.  While he was upstairs, I told my helper to prime and glue all of the fittings up to a certain point, so when I get back all I had to do was glue in the last fitting and we'd be finished.

It took an hour and a half to get the part and get back to Joe's house.

I was not very happy at this point as I should have been heading back to my shop by now. So I went in with a new found determination to get this thing done and get out of there. My helper was in the driveway when I got there, and I confirmed that he did in fact prime and glue all of the fittings....he said yes, of course!
There wasn't much left to do at this point, I made sure to make the cut myself, as not to have any more mishaps. I primed and glued the last fitting and firmly held it in place for several seconds. Finally! I was finished, and I had my helper clean up the working area, and put away the tools.


Now I always find it nerve wracking when I'm finished with a system and ready to turn the water main back on. I found out from my licensed plumber Ken Kunich, that all plumbers secretly have that same oozy feeling in their stomachs. I told my helper to go ahead and turn the shut off valve to the open position, and in a very load voice exclaims...."Okay, here we go!"..... Which is why Joe stopped his pacing and came running into the basement to "see" the starting up of his new system.

Okay.....just a bit of an exaggeration...but close!

I looked around at the fittings like I always do to make sure of no leaks. All three of us were standing there when all of a sudden, a load bang, and an instant soaking shower!!! It was a shock to say the least! I yelled over to my helper to turn off the main shut off valve. I looked behind me to see a water soaked Joe, who was in what seemed to be a state of shock. I was SO embarrassed that this had happened, and at the same time intensely curious of how this could have happened.

"Oh Geez Dominick.....I don't want this system in my house now" whined Joe "Look it ruined my walls, and the door is soaking wet, and..."

Nervous Joe

I stopped him there..

"Listen Joe, I'm not taking anything apart. The system is in and that's that."

What had happened was my less than brilliant helper did not glue one of the fittings, although he did prime everything which was why I didn't notice. For those who are not familiar with pvc piping, the primer is purple, and the glue is clear. You will always see at least a bit of purple at all of the joints. I explained to Joe that it was human error, and sadly that happens. The good thing is that there was no damage to anything as we had dried up the area (the only damage was to my pride) and glued the fitting back on. This time I inspected EVERY joint to make sure that it was good to turn the pressure on again......it was.

Turned the water on again, and Joe was standing next to me with a plastic bag in front of his face. This time there was no exploding pipes, and the system ran proper. It was now 5 pm and I was dying to get out of there, but Joe wasn't going to let me out of there that easily. He came over with a flash light, a sock and a towel, and proceeded to SLOWLY check each and every joint in the system. that took around twenty minutes. When he was satisfied that there were no leaks, I handed him my bill and asked for a check so I could go home.

"Well I want to check all of the toilets, and sinks before I pay you"........ I have to admit, I had a bit of a "vision" with my hands around his throat.....I explained that this was completely unnecessary, but Joe was insistent, and proceeded to spend another 35 minutes checking anything that had anything to do with water.  
It's now almost 6pm, and this is when Joe tells me he can only pay me through PayPal.....WHAT THE.....! At that point I was so frustrated that I didn't care anymore and all I could think of is that it was gonna take me three hours to get home, which it did.

It took four long days for Joe to finally send me the money...... 

I guess there are a few lessons to be learned here. First is never trust an idiot. I should not have taken for granted that my helper did the right thing. I learned a valuable lesson that day and I now always double check everything. The second lesson is stay close to home......it figures that it took almost triple the time to do this job than it should have taken. And the final lesson, if Joe ever calls again.....just tell him that I moved to another country!

TIP OF THE DAY: 

How to glue PVC piping....without any explosions!

Purple primer is applied to PVC pipe fittings and pipe. When dry, PVC cement is applied and the pipe inserted into the fitting while rotating a quarter-turn.

• Apply some purple primer to the hub of the pipe fittings.
• Then apply primer to the end of the pipe.
• Let the primer dry for a minute before applying cement.
• When the primer is dry, apply some clear PVC cement to the hub of the pipe fitting.
• Then  apply glue to the end of the pipe.
• (By applying glue to the hub first, I can set the fitting down and not need to worry about the glue touching the work surface.)
• Then  push the pipe into the fitting WHILE turning the pipe about one-quarter turn.
• BUT... keep pushing the pipe into fitting. Often the pipe will "bounce" out of the fitting part way, so  keep the parts held together for a minute until the glue has a chance to harden.
• While holding the pipe and fitting together,  wipe off the excess glue

 

See you next time......from beyond.........

 

A Rip and Time.....

Okay, I couldn't resist.....Here we go again......Back in time...

And the reason for this is not that I need to relive that time in my life, it's just that since I've started writing about my working past, I can not let these stories pass away without being revealed. There was clearly some pretty incredible moments and some unbelievable shit that just begs to be told.

Back to the past!

Now you might think that the title has something to do with my mind going back in time (again) but that's just a play with words and it has everything to do what actually had happened one day......Let me tell you about it.

I was in my early twenties, full of energy and vigor. I worked because I had an apartment and bills to pay. I didn't work because I loved to work....who does? at twenty or twenty one? I did however love working outside and I enjoyed working hard. Not only was I totally in shape, and fully tanned, and my shoulder length hair was bleached by the sun, but I enjoyed learning and knowing how to do more and more with my own hands. I also enjoyed the experience of working with my Dad, and the mostly crazy people that worked on his crew.

Working with my Dad was probably the hardest job I have ever had. 

My Dad's thoughts were that because I was his son, I had to give more than anyone else at a lower wage. He treated my brothers the same way, so I know that I wasn't singled out.....it was just his old Italian ways rising to the surface. We mostly worked Monday through Friday, and believe me that was enough. But every once in a while he would (always) ask me and a couple of the others if we wanted to work a Saturday.

Never did get to see Bruce...

Most of the time I had no problem with working a Saturday.......but this one particular Saturday, I had made plans with some of my friends to spend the weekend down the shore, Seaside Heights and Asbury Park. Someone's grandmother had a shore house, and I really didn't want to miss out on this opportunity to finally hang out with my friends. Plus we had tickets to see Bruce Springsteen at the Stone Pony.


When I mentioned my plans to my Dad, he did understand, and promised that we only needed to work a half a day. He tantalized me by telling me not only would I get paid a full day, and he would pay me cash when we finished. Well, how could I resist?.......as long as it's REALLY a half day, my Dad promised it would be!

Saturday, I awoke to a perfect summer morning, 

 

I went outside to wait for my Dad to pick me up while sipping on my first cup of coffee, and I remember thinking what an amazing weekend this was gonna be as I gazed upon the cloudless sky. I couldn't wait to get to the job so I could get started on this fantastic weekend that was planned!

Just as I was thinking this, my Dad and his brand new shiny red GMC pickup truck pulled into the driveway.

Brand new Truck!!

Uncle Paul was with him and as much as I thought of all the things that could go awry, I forced myself to stay positive and happy. We said our "Good mornings" and headed off to the job.

It seems that my Dad had billed for two chimneys that weren't quite completed, and that was our mission....to finish the two chimneys. This was going to be easy, as each chimney was only a few feet from completion, and we kinda figured it should take about two hours each.

I mixed the cement in the machine that was a few houses away from the houses we were working on. My Uncle and I pulled the material up the scaffold, and my Dad got going on finishing up the first chimney. It took him exactly two hours to finish this one up, and I was even more excited to get to the next one because that one was going to take a little less work, and I would be free to go down to the shore. I stayed behind to "joint" up the brick, while my Dad and Uncle Paul went to the next house to start sending the material to the top.

I heard a yell.....then a crashing sound......

Seems that Uncle Paul didn't correctly tie off the clay flue, and the rope slipped through, and the flue came

These are clay flues...

tumbling to it's smashing death. Now this was a disappointment, because there were no extra flues, and I know my Dad.....there was no way he was not going to finish this chimney. Sure enough he told Uncle Paul to go to the Mason Supply store which was about fifteen minutes from the job. He jumped into the two week old truck, and off he went.......

One hour.....One and a half hours.....we did all we could on the chimney.......

Both my Dad and I were pissed off, but for different reasons. Mine was obviously personal, and I just knew that somehow I was getting screwed, and not getting to the shore! My Dad was worried that Uncle Paul had taken off to the "city" that he had done on occasion......

"But how could he do that??!! that son of a B....!"  Dad yelled

"Maybe we can do the porch instead" he said to me. I was not very happy at all because we were approaching the forth hour, and we should have been cleaning up to go home......But we didn't even have a truck!

It was now almost two o clock, I was a complete mess because I knew that my friends surely had left without me. I had swore that when I saw Uncle Paul I was going to Kick his ASS!! I couldn't believe that he would leave us stranded on a job site!! He completely ruined my weekend, and he was going to pay for it this time! Since this was in the days before cell phones we were really in a pickle, and being on a new home development, with very few homeowners yet, things were looking pretty bleak, just for us to get home.

My Dad went up the road to ask a homeowner to use their phone to call Mom to come and get us, and I was cleaning up the equipment. Just then, I see my Dad's truck turn the corner. In a way I was relieved, but in a much deeper way I was furiously mad. I couldn't believe that he would do this selfish thing.......but what exactly did he do? where had he gone for hours?? Oh I was gonna find out for sure!

The pickup truck pulled into the driveway, right next to where I was cleaning out the cement mixer. Uncle Paul stepped out and with a painful look on his face he exclaimed..

"Holy shit Dominick what am I gonna do, you father's gonna kill me!"

I concurred...."Yes Uncle Paul, but since he's looking for a way for us to get home and not here right now, you'll have to settle for me killing you this time!"

But he looked really worried, kinda like a five year old who knows he's gonna get a beating and runs around in circles, then pees his pants in anticipation of a beating. He exclaimed that he wasn't joking....."What am I gonna do??!!"

 So I asked, "What do you mean? what the hell are you talking about?!" I wasn't in the mood for any games, especially guessing games!

" I smashed the truck!" he sputtered out.....I looked at the truck and didn't see a scratch. I just thought he finally went over the edge..

"What are you talkin about?! I don't see anything wrong with the truck?!!" He pointed to the drivers side..."look over there....."

I expected to see a scratch, or maybe a small dent, but no.......there was a hole from the back of the cab all the way down the side of the truck to the tail light! it was huge!!

I looked at him and laughed "Well Uncle Paul, you did it again! If I were you I would start running now because when my father sees this, I think this time he's REALLY gonna kill you!" I was no longer mad at him, how could I be....he was about to be killed by my Dad.

And sure enough, just as I said that I could see my Dad coming around the corner. I knew he saw the truck because he was sprinting towards us. My Uncle's face turned a powder white by the sight of this, and  it even scared me. My Dad did not take it well.......He completely freaked out, so bad that he punched a nice size dent in the hood of the truck. I'm pretty sure that he hurt his wrist after repeatedly banging it on various (solid) objects.

The yelling was over, and the "story" was that while at the mason supply yard there was a steep hill, and somehow the truck swayed into a concrete truck that was parked on the side.....I personally didn't believe it.

Turns out I was right........years later the truth came out at a family picnic. Seems Uncle Paul went to one of his buddies houses, where they did a little partying, then decided to see how the new truck would handle some local dirt roads. Unfortunately, the poor truck wasn't built to withstand....TREES!!   

 

TIP OF THE DAY: 

CUTTING A CLAY FLUE.....

If you ever have the need to cut a clay flue....(you never know..)

SEE!! Here is a nice way to grow your herbs!

and you don't have access to a diamond blade saw or a Demo saw, I'm gonna go old school on this one. 

I was taught to cut a clay flue with sand!....Yes....that's right!

Mark out the area to be cut.

Fill the flue up solid with sand.

Pack the sand down into the flue.

 Then with a chisel and a hammer, lightly, tap around your designated mark on the flue.

Follow the mark, and lightly tap the chisel.

Work your way around the flue, it should take around three times around.

You will actually hear a hollow snap, you have cut the flue the old fashioned way.

 

See you next time......from beyond.........