"he thinks he's a conservative"...yep. I know a lot of tradesmen who , when shit hits the fan will blindly support party over thinking.
Yikes, I think it's less likely a case of early dementia and just a substandard focus on quality. Quality of his hygiene , his work, and how his performance impacts others. I dread having to have an actual job done and going through guys like that to find someone who knows what they're doing , is willing to do it, and isn't going to charge 10x's the amount (because they know the market).
Plumbing has gotten worlds easier since PEX came into play. Not having to sweat, solder, and test multiple multiple connections turned most 5 hour jobs into an hour and a half (or less). Which was necessary due to so many plumbers being addicts, convicts, or low IQ clowns who lack pride in their work.
I'm not sure I could've made it an entire day with your friend. He probably has no idea why he's depressed (drunk) or in the position he's in either.
The guy is totally against drinking and drugs so he gets credit for that but then, according to him he loves pastries. In my mind, that's worse than having a couple of beers. Just way worse on your health and his shows. I think what ruined his knees was because he was so heavy when he went down on his knees he would sort of slam down every time.
Another thing that kind of galled me a bit was his customer base. Many of them were very poor so he wouldn't charge that much and of course I don't get much either since it's a percentage.
I could have done better getting more jobs for him as the percentage would have been higher so that's on me. It's my first time working as a plumbers assistant so I did learn a great deal and I have to give him some praise for that as he loved to tell me about the work.
One job we did embarrassed me. It was an old friend of his, an 80 year old black grandpa with a house shared with his daughter, her kids and his wife. Apparently he'd gone there a couple times to clean out the main sewer line and had installed a two way cleanout. Then had to return again for a repeat. Maybe he had told the guy his huge tree in front of the house was the problem as when we went by the tree had been cut down and the old guy was out there trying to cut the stump out by hand. I'm asking the plumber, "Where's his grandkids? Why aren't they helping him?" It offended my sensibilities to see a frail old man out there hacking on massive stump. We'd go by every so often to other jobs and the guy would either be out there working or the stump would just be there as a reminder.
So one day we went by and I asked the plumber to stop, telling him this can't go on as the old man is going to die on that stump. It's not right.
So, we get out and I express my concerns and tell the old man he needs help. I'll help. We negotiate a payment of $100.00 which is insanely cheap but I would have done it for free. I remember people taking advantage of my Grandpa and I felt the same way in this case. You don't leave an old man to do this sort of stuff. No way.
So, I start driving over there on my own and helping the guy. I brought a sawzall with some good blades as it was a hollowed out half rotted stump and I figured I could cut it enough to split it, dig out the roots and remove it by sections.
We worked on it for three days and finally got it all out. The man's neighbor came over to berate us for doing it the hard way as he worked for the city and claimed he could have had it out with some quick work using a stump grinder. I point to the half uncovered old clean out where the main line drops down to the city line. "Oh, and you would have missed that?" The old cleanout had been buried underground years ago, no one knew it was there and the tree had encapsulated it, gone down to the union and broken apart the joints to invade the line.
Well, I dug the trench, made a good job of it and gave plenty of room to replace the area. Since I'm not certified the plumber came back and tried to get down into the trench. He's too fat, fell, and I had to get boards and wrestle him out of the trench. If it hadn't been so shameful I would have laughed at how it was like beaching a whale trying to haul his 400 pounds out of that trench. Well, maybe 340 pounds as he'd lost weight and looked like a half deflated whale. Just a whole lot of loose blubber spreading out. Huge shirt and holy sweat pants with some ass showing. Good Lord!!!. So he stood by while I did the work. I've already done about six of these as the man can't get into a trench but for some reason he insisted on bird dogging me which annoyed the hell out of me.
So, he's telling the plumber he'll pay him later and the plumber is saying, "Ok". He slips me a wad of bills, about $360.00. Unknown to him his granddaughter had slipped me a couple 20s the day before.
Real cost for the job should have been well over $1,000.00 so the old man got of cheap but honestly, I would have done it for free just so I don't have to think about the old guy dying on top of that nasty stump.
Imagine the mess if his neighbor had used a stump grinder. They'd be going to burger king to shit for a week at least.
A grand is underselling it (at least by me) that much work, over 3 days, would be 2 grand easy. Quality plumbers near me charge $150/hr. ..so that nog likely wouldn't have been able to ever pay it back.
Old men/women should be cared for by family. You aren't his family and he'll never appreciate what you did. Because, he can't understand the volume of actual work (not leaning, not sitting, not wasting time just showing up) and understanding of the job to get it done and done right.
You should've just let the root remain in the line, back the house up, to the point where it got condemned ...buldozed or gutted and redone...with a different owner.
Niggers belong renting, in the projects, because they are too stupid and poor to keep anything up.
No, the old man did understand and gave me what he could. He did appreciate the help even though most of his family was shit. The only other person who appreciated it at all was his grand daughter. When his grandson did come by I confronted him and asked him why the hell he wasn't trying to help his Grandpa and he said he would but then was careful to avoid us after that. The man's daughter would come by, have a look and then take off. The neighbor was worse. Just came by to talk shit and berate me and and the old man saying how much better a job he could do, blah blah. Finally I had enough and told him off so he quit that bullshit.
In a way I guess I'm sort of a sucker for getting involved but I remember before my Grandpa really went down hill he was still his old stubborn self and had a shipping container on the other side of his drive way out on his rural property. He had strung out an extension cord to have lights and a bit of power out there. It was just a shit solution. I kept telling him we should put in a new subpanel and get proper power to it and he kind of agreed but kept putting it off that summer.
I finally told him I'd had enough of his stubborn attitude and procrastination and was going back on a welding assignment. I had it all set up and the day I am leaving I look behind me in the rear view mirror and he's out in the gravel driveway with a pick axe. Oh, now he gets real? I know he's play acting on my sympathy but there's a real danger he will try this job on his own and botch it with substandard work. He's done this sort of shit before when no one would help him. I've got three uncles, lots of cousins and an aunt with four kids. They all talk a big game of being there for the grandparents but never really do anything for them. I'm the one who will stop work for the summer, come out for three months to do maintenance and repairs as well as building stuff that needs done. The rest will come down for a week, fiddle around, talk about how great they are and then leave and the whole time drop hints that I'm mooching off the Grandparents while I go out and put in a ten hour day actually WORKING for them.
Anyway, I stop my van, back up and ask Grandpa what the hell he's trying to do and he says something to the effect of, "Well, if I don't do this no one will". Like we never had ten conversations about this with him putting me off.
I spend the next week digging a 75 foot trench, installing a subpanel at the meter and a breaker box in the shipping container, overhead fluorescent lighting, outlets on the side, 240 for a welding machine and a solar controlled light for the drive way. Call professional electrician to inspect and hook it up to the meter.
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