I Love My Job (ot)

Done lots of roofing before, and it's always satisfying to watch someone else do it. Trying to visualize that foreman and his "dance".

Lucky you Jeff...I hope this new roof sells your place at last ??...

My Dad could do that roofing dance and was just something to watch moving over a roof he was doing...He was fast and lefthanded, I was always late getting the stock up the ladder to him...and he did not have the new nail guns of today or pretty staging they have now...This was in the 50's and 60's...

I was glad he started doing just concrete walls and floors...When I fell it was not as far to the ground as it was from a roof...That's another story I had nighmares about...

Hope you enjoyed the beer...Hope it was a Canadian brew...

Lansing

Please remove the X to e-mail me...I get spam here daily

We need a new roof. The last one we did was when Robin was born. The last roof cost $2400 in 1984. We have been very lucky as to how long this one lasted. 80% of it is covered by trees, which have extended the projected life. Problem is that once we comit to it they will have to remove three layers, and the wood beneath it. Plus I need a new driveway, we had it done the same year.

I really want to sell this place, but before I can put it on the market I have to fix it up, then once I fix it up, why move. your screwed which ever direction you go.

You just described my last 12 months. Remodeled 3 bathrooms, a bedroom, painted the house, new pool filter, and now a new roof.... Now toss in family illness, college, wedding, career changes, marital bliss. Rick says I am turning into a hermit.. Wonder why Jeff

"Bill Glass" wrote...

____________________ Boy, the number of times I've bitten my fist to keep from sharing my adventures with the so-called "roofer's trade"... I turn off the radio whenever some illegal-advocate says "We care for your babies, we put on your roofs." Where the hell ARE all these supposed roof applicators? I ask bitterly, having sought same for over 5 seasons. No shortage of Z-ending names in my 'hood, but my neighbors are 2nd, 3rd generation Texicans: millwrights, refinery supervisors, union stewards. They don't even know any immigrants. A trip "down south" is Corpus Christi. Sure, grandad was a migrant farm laborer (so was mine), dad used to roof in the 50's (so did mine), but their kids are honor students at summer camp (with mine), and we all [got that degree/served that apprenticeship/went through that trade school/choose one] just so's we wouldn't have to dance on one knee on a 135-degree roof 10 hours a day. So much for cheap labor.

Wife's Mennonite cousins can shingle a barn from the inside out--but they spend the summer building villages in the D.R. (I BETTER not catch them in Florida). So much for relatives.

Two rooms want new ceilings JUST as soon as I'm sure the slow valley seep, which began in 1989 in the first rain after the roof went on, is finally over. The six flush-mount glass skylights (which do not leak) are like wolfbane to a vampire. The one Old Established Firm that finally consented to call (and wanted to pull them all out and replace with curb-mounts) confidently and smilingly handed me a work-sheet for $28K, for 18 squares. The 4 different "friends of a friend" who did the original roof, the garage, the barn, and the rubber on the flat part are long gone out of the business, and the phone-solicitors and door-to-doors make appointments but never show for the peak-walk. So much for the professionals. Guys with crews I know from the sportsman's club are either booked a season in advance, when new housing is up, or out of town when it's down. I had one on the cell phone and on the way over when an errant tavern beckoned. AFAIK he ain't come out yet. So much for the buddy-ocracy.

BUT, I am having a new roof put on. The old man was lolling in his air-conditioned Buick waiting for the refinery credit union to open, and a white-shirted sort in a commercial-only roofing staff car pulled up and asked where Gate 5 might be. Dad said he didn't know if he should tell him or not, since all roofers were either crooks or drunks, and when he got over that, showed him into the plant and double-dog-dared him to come look at my roof. I never saw a guy walk a 4-in-12 slope in smooth-sole wingtips before, but by god he did 'er. Had his own ladder, too--it folded to go in the trunk.

It'll be slate-shaped shingles made of recycled truck tires and cancer-causing initials, fireproof, hurricane-proof, it's $18K plus any plywood we can find, my kid should have to worry about it when he's 65, and I can't wait to watch. Union crew: I'll buy the beer, but I'm thinking of saving the 8% Trappist for quitting time.

I have an all Caucasian crew. Good ol' southern boy's (except for the foreman, who is from New Jersey )... They are doing great work. One guy did a little misstep and busted something, but they are fixing it, so what do I care... Jeff

Well, see, that's where the six skylights come in...