Monday morning, the green-shirted door-pounders returned to the Mansion.
It was shortly after 9:00 a.m., and I was UP and sitting at HIPPIE at the front window. The Pony was leaning over the back of the long couch (with me hoping he couldn't read my open comments about him). Farmer H had just returned from town, having gassed-up A-Cad for a day trip, and was sitting in the new La-Z-Boy replacement.
"Oh, Mom. There are two men walking across the yard, and petting Jack."
"Those are the tree men."
Farmer H jumped up and ran for the door. He greeted them, and walked across the yard to Shackytown Boulevard. He was gone a good long time. As long as I was in the shower, after finishing up my computing.
"Why were you with those Tree Men so long?"
"I just walked them over. They said they'd talked to my wife before."
"I TOLD you that. Way back when they were here the first time. I said they could drive down to trim the trees, but they didn't because the ground was wet."
"Yeah. They wanted to make sure."
"What were you doing, SUPERVISING them?"
"No."
"I know! You were showing them your themed sheds!"
"I did show them my sheds."
"They are getting paid by the hour by our electric company, to trim trees away from the electric lines. Not look at your hoarded stuff!"
"They liked it."
"I'd like it too, if it was prolonging me from actual work."
"Then they wanted to make sure which trees they could trim. Because people tell them, then get mad after they're trimmed. I told them to cut down the whole trees."
"So you had them doing free work for you?"
"Well. I guess you could say that. I've been meaning to cut down some of them trees by the goat pen."
"I guess it's easier for them to cut down a whole tree at the bottom that get up in a lift and trim limbs. Did they also put the trees they cut in their woodchipper?" [WOODCHIPPER!]
"Uh huh. And I think I might have sold the red Scout to the young guy." [The Scout is a cheaper version of a Gator.]
"Did you tell him it doesn't run?"
"Yeah. I said it hasn't been started in a long time, and that it needs a battery. And probably a new carburetor. He said he'd give me $700 for it."
That Farmer H... He's a regular Tom Sawyer. I wish he'd tricked them into painting his ugly picket fence out by the carport.
There was an industrial-sized woodchipper on your property, and you didn't let me know?
ReplyDeleteIf I'd known, I would have traveled south to the Mansion, and stolen it. (Those big ones mean I wouldn't have to cut the limbs--ha!--into small pieces.)
And the guy in the grocery store... Was he young enough that you could be called a cougar?
I know plenty of people who take their time doing their work because they get paid by the hour, mostly council workers, but shop assistants too, they do the barest minimum, knowing their paycheck is safe as long as they turn up each morning.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't mind a good sticky-beak in Shackytown's sheds myself.
Sioux,
ReplyDeleteIt was the big woodchipper that gets pulled behind a truck! I'd say it could take a 300lb... TREE.
That gun-totin' shopping weirdo was at least 55. Maybe older. I will never be called a cougar! The way I see it, prospective suitors lose about 10 IQ points for every year younger than me!
***
River,
Some of my colleagues at the unemployment office took their time. I call it a Public Employee Standoff. Each waiting for another to take initiative to wait on a customer first.
You are welcome to stick your beak into Shackytown sheds anytime. Any time except before noon!