Now, before I go much
further it's important for you to understand a
couple things here. My
Wife's friend is an RN and works in a
hospital in Spokane and
her working schedule is so twisted up it'd
make a tub of guts look
simple. Dave works at an electrical power
producing plant and his
working schedule is the same twisted tub of
guts with the only
difference being in his tub of guts a troop of Boy
Scouts camped out and
spent an entire weekend tying them in exotic
knots. It turned out they
both had the same weekend off.
I probably should have
gotten some lottery tickets.
"Well done, Big Keyboard
man!" I said to myself, "You just HAD to
send that note, din't ya?"
"Shut up!" I yelled at
the screen, "I need me some time to figure
out how to weasel outta
this."
I love arguing with myself
and I generally win, but sometimes I
believe a little
consideration must be appropriated to doing the
right thing. In this case
the right thing to do was abundantly
clear; since Dave came to
help with my shop I must go help with his.
We're barely out of the
driveway and I reach for the cell phone...
<Riiiinnnnggggg> I get
his message - "I'm up to my ears in
alligators at the moment
and unless you're the IRS then you aren't
important enough for me to
talk to right now. Beeeepppp." A super
clear image then flashes
on the movie screen in my mind - Dave walks
over, plucks the phone
from a cluttered make-shift workbench sitting
on sawhorses and looks at
the incoming call's number. "Awww, crud,
it's Joe!" He screams and
throws the phone down like it was crawling
with botulism. "I don't
have time for this!" He yells, shaking his
fists at the ceiling and
stomping his feet like he just lost a game
of dodge ball, "How does
he do it!? He's not even here yet and
already he's got me
slaving!"
"Hey, Dork!" I smiled
after listening to his lame message, "We're on
the way, see you 'bout
1230 hrs and you best have all your ducks in
your poop." I love clever
little analogies like that.
Little did I know (or
care) that he had got off work at 0630 hrs
Friday morning and
immediately flung himself into a headlong frenzy
to finish hanging the
remaining sheets of drywall to be ready for
me. When he was at my
shop-building, I told him flat out, "I don't
hang drywall - I'd rather
live in a room full of cats than hang
drywall - I can finish it,
but I don't hang it, do you
understand?" When I
arrived I walked around and noticed all but the
mechanical room was
ready. I was appalled. "Why isn't there..." I
theatrically waved my arm,
"...any drywall in this room, Dave?"
"Uggghhh, welllll...ahem,
I...ummm..."
"Well..." He stammered
while I plainly saw the wheels turning in his
head, "We...ahhh, we
haven't finished the wiring in there! Yeah,
I looked at him with
antipathy washing down my entire being. "Don't
bullshit a bullshitter,
Dave."
"Okay, I...ugghhh...I
didn't really expect you until tomorrow. I
just got off a 12-hour
work shift, Joe! Don't...hey, just look at my
eyes, can't you see
they're all bloodshot 'n everything!
"I'm sorry," I said
feeling a wee bit guilty, "I did notice them, I
merely thought they were a
result of binge drinking."
He chuckled then turned
and walked into the bathroom space where I
distinctly heard the sound
of a Tic-Tac jar being shook.
I got down to business and
instantly ascertained from the enormous
beads of sweat cascading
down his forlorn face that he didn't have a
ghost of a clue what to do
next.
"Calm down, Dave, I've got
everything well-in-hand," I said reaching
into my pocket and drew
forth a capped bottle. "Here, I brought some
Diazepam for you, chase
five or six of these with a coupla beers and
you'll be good for the
rest of the day."
I waved my hands and
interrupted him,"It's a drug, Dave, and it's a
four-syllable word, so
that places you in an extreme
disadvantage. You know my
wife is a psychologist, right? Well, I
had her prescribe them for
you, so trust me, they'll make you feel
all gushy and good with
the World. Now, there's a good chap, go 'n
fetch me a clean 5-gallon
bucket."
There's one other thing
you should be privy about. In a previous
Email to another Dave - we
call him 2Dave - our Dave said to him, "I
should be pretty much done
hangin' drywall by the time Joe gets here.
Parts of it are pretty
damned ugly, but that's what the mud & tape is
for, right?" What our
Dave wasn't aware of was the fact that 2Dave
forwarded me what our Dave
said.
So, during the 173-mile
drive from Ronan to Post Falls, Idaho, the
statement of "parts of it
are pretty damned ugly" hovered over my
head like a very dark and
ominous cloud. I got there and after
looking around for just a
little bit, I determined his 'pretty damned
ugly' more closely
resembled my description of repugnant and repulsive.
"Jeepers, Dave," I said,
pointing to the enormous cracks between the
ceiling and the walls, "Ya
know, they have these things called tape
measures? You stretch
them out and they have numbers on them? Maybe
you oughta look into
getting one of them, huh?"
There were places where
chunks of drywall were blown out because the
cut was too tight and
since seemingly there wasn't a tape measure to
be had anywhere on the
entire planet, he simply used a hammer to bang
it into submission and
into place .
"Good job, Dave," I said
while thinning and mixing the mud with some
water, "Hey, I got an
idea, why doncha quit standing around watching
me and find something to
do." With that, he turned on his heels and,
quite literally, walked
out of the building. The next thing I hear
is his truck starting and
he drives away. A couple hours later he
gets back and I have quite
a bit of the vertical drywall taped and
mudded. Walking back in,
he claims he went to get the machine for
blowing in the
insulation. "Ohhh, really?" I asked, while scraping
and cleaning the mud off
my hands and fingers, "Where a'bouts in Iowa
did you have to go get
it?"
He's an excellent
chuckler, Dave is.
We knocked off about 1700
hrs Friday evening. The insulation machine
was now on site in
preparation of Saturday's arrival of 2Dave and our
stand-up comedian, Tim,
whom together, would make up the tour de
force of the insulation
crew. My forecasted plan up to that point
was working brilliantly,
that is up until Saturday morning's breakfast.
When Dave was helping with
my shop, he'd amble downstairs, mind you
still in his jammies and
rubbing his eyes and he'd plop down at our
table where I fed him a
King's Breakfast every morning prepared by
yours truly. Pancakes,
sausage 'n eggs one morning. Egg and cheese
omelette with ham steak
and toast the next. Lunches were gourmet
hot-dogs and exquisite
cold cut sammiches prepared by Her
Nagness. Dinners were
rib-eye steaks, baked potatoes, home-made
pizza and I don't know
what all. There is absolutely no doubt in my
mind that Dave didn't gain
30 pounds during the three days he was
with me here in Montana.
When I left his place in Idaho I was skin
'n bones. In fact, I'll
wager Nazi concentration camp internees were
in better nutritional
shape when they were liberated.
I left the house we're
staying in at the buttcrack of dawn on
Saturday morning and the
only thing stirring at Dave's place is his
dog, Oscar. I've told you
before that I'm an excellent noticer and
the first thing I noticed
about Oscar is that he calmly announces the
arrival of anyone stepping
into the fenced-in yard with a mild
'woof'. But, if someone
were to drive by on the street then he
throws a shoe. I don't
know how a person goes about confusing a dog,
but Dave has it mastered.
Oscar's muffled noise must have been loud
enough for Dave to hear
and pretty soon he parades into his shop like
a world renowned chef with
a tray being held over his head - only,
instead of a tray, it's a
box of measly two-day-old donuts. I stared
unbelievably into the box
and notice one of them was already
half-eaten. "You really
shouldn't have gone to so much trouble, Dave."
"Awww, it's nothing." He
said, waving his fingers whilst grabbin'
another and ignoring the
half-eaten one, "Dig in."
"A finer breakfast has
never been had, I'm sure. Coffee?"
"Naaghhh..." He guttered
while nibbling and gnawing on what looked
to be an eclair,
"...franks, I dun't dink the sssstuuuuff." He said,
as he slurped up the creme
that had oozed onto his thumb.
"I'm certainly glad for ya.
Well, I'm stuffed," I said, pushing
myself away from the donut
destroying machine standing across from
"Ooofff k. Wafff yu wana
doo firs?" I looked up and there was
chocolate frosting all
around his mouth.
"Well, the first thing I'd
like to do is tie a bib around your neck."
He garbuchuckled and now I
don't have to wonder what wearing a
partially chewed eclair
would be like.
I designated myself as
Scaffolding Commander; I would stand on it and
tape all the ceiling
joints. Dave was my ground crew; upon my
command he would roll the
scaffolding in the direction I needed to go
and, as an added test of
his organizational skills, I put him in
charge of filling the
drywall banjo with fresh mud. I soon found out
putting Dave in charge of
filling the banjo was like putting a monkey
in charge of a football.
"No, Dave! Pull the tape back then fill it
up!" or, "No, no no! See
that lid there? You gotta take it off
before putting on a new
roll of tape! Say, how many of them
He was also designated to
be my Tool Support Technician. From aloft,
I would call down my
requirement for a certain tool and his
responsibility as TST, was
to hand it up most promptly and
gleefully. Turns out my
TST doesn't know the difference between a
jack hammer and a knitting
needle. The blade in my utility knife was
dull so I called down my
first tool requirement, "I need a Phillips
screwdriver." He runs
around looking through the building like he's
on an Easter Egg hunt.
"Dave!" I said, pointing below me, "There's
your makeshift workbench,
you suppose it's on there?"
He hands up a
screwdriver. "Ummm, this is a regular screwdriver,
Dave, I distinctly ordered
a Phillips."
He scrambled down
mumbling, "Yer'a picky bastard, ain't ya."
"That was hardly gleeful,
Dave."
I wasn't more'n three
minutes into the job before gaining advanced
knowledge on the
difficulty Dave had with the conception of setting
the screws a tad bit below
the surface of the drywall. The heads
were sticking out all over
the place, forcing me to hammer them
in. "Hey," I called down
to my monkey-minded ground crew, "I'm
quite sure my memory isn't
playing tricks on me, but...didn't I see a
drywall screw gun
languishing around here somewhere?"
"You know it!" He said as
he picked it up and waved it the air like
it was a battle flag,
"It's a Crapsman...got it on sale 'n everything."
"Swell, by any chance did
ya have a driving bit in it or did you just
use the ass-end of it to
beat them in? You see that little nozzle at
the pointy end? It's
there so you can adjust it to properly set the
He made monkey faces while
staring at it. "Really?"
"No, I'm lying. It's
there to confuse people and to give them
I had almost all the
ceiling joints taped when 2Dave and Tim, who
were the insulation crew,
arrived. I only had a couple of strips to
finish but my banjo was
out of mud and my ground monkey was no where
to be seen - he was
outside visiting with the newly arriving
help. So, I climbed down
to fill it myself.
We shook hands and the
first thing Tim says is, "I need to get you a
new hat." I look at his
shirt and notice it's cluttered with a bunch
of NASCAR crap then I
remember I'm wearing a hat with a number 55 on
the sides of it. So, I
yank it off and wave it at him saying, "I
don't even know who the
Hell this guy is...I was handed this hat. I
wear hats and don't give a
flying care what advertisement is on
them. In fact, if someone
handed me a cheesehead hat, I'd wear it."
"No, it's the NAPA name, I
work in an auto parts store and it ain't
NAPA. We got stores all
over the place, we do parts for all..."
"Snore..." I'm sorry, did
I drift off? Were you saying something?"
I climbed back onto the
scaffolding to finish the few remaining
joints and to allow the
insulation crew some time to set up their
operation. From their
vocalizations, it sounded to me like they were
planning the D-Day
Invasion. "Now, 2Dave," Tim said with all the
seriousness of a doctor
about to remove your heart, "When I come
around here I expect you
to be Johnny-on-the-spot with moving this
"Location noted, but what
precautionary measures should we take in
case Oscar gets in the
way?"
"We'll let the
ground-monkey take care of him, I also want you to be
aware of how imperative it
is that you keep that machine manned at
all times, it could blow,
ya know."
I chuckled and yelled
down, "Of course it blows you bonehead! That's
how it gets the insulation
up there!"
"Shut up, we're talking
serious stuff here!"
They droned on for another
15-minutes or so, moving this over there
and that over here. They
whiled away a good 10-minutes adjusting
their masks then took them
off and stopped for a donut break.
I looked at them with
despair and thought, "You guys would make great cops."
Then came my traumatic
scaffolding injury. Dave left a Pony #50 pipe
clamp between two of the
scissor trusses. Since I was already up on
the scaffolding, I reached
up to turn the handle but the drywall was
in the way. "No
problem." I said, as I picked up what was left of
the hammer I had worn out
driving all the protruding heads of the
drywall screws, "I'll just
tap the release bar and be off this
scaffold in a jiffy so
that the insulation crew can get up here and
continue their war
planning."
A 'jiffy' was exactly
that. The clamp sprung loose, I reached out to
grab it, missed it and now
I'm over-centered. As I was falling I did
some quick
ciphering..."Let's see, the scaffolding is 7' high and I'm
6' tall. If I factor in
half the six and plus the seven, I'm about
to hit this concrete floor
from a combined height of 10 feet. Ohhhh,
this is gonna leave a
mark."
On the way down I hear
2Dave say, "Ohhh, no!" Tim says, "Get his
hat!" Dave says, "I got
the clamp!"
Dave steps over to me as
I'm trying to pick myself up off the floor
and puts his hands on my
side. "You Ok, Joe?"
"I think so...it's a good
thing this soft concrete was here to stop
my fall. Now, why doncha
get off me so I can stand up to see if
anything's broken or
jarred outta place." I'm an EMT and from the
initial evaluation of
myself, I determined my right hip and left
inner heel took the brunt
of the trauma and other than a nasty double
limp, I was fine. Dave,
on the other hand, was a basket case.
His pallor was bright
white - whiter than a ghost even. "You sure
you're alright?" He
asked, slapping me on the shoulder. And, if his
eyes were flashlights, his
would serve majestically as lighthouses.
"Yes, I'm quite alright.
Now, leave me alone because that shoulder
you just slapped on is
starting to hurt, too."
I no sooner hit the floor
and the scaffolding was commandeered by the
insulation war mongers,
"Pull 'im back to safety..." Tim yelled,
I watched as they wheeled
the contraption to the other end and I'm
hobbling around the shop;
too damn sore to sit down and too damned
obstinate to not do
anything, so I work off of ladders to mud and
tape the bathroom. I even
gave one up for the Gipper and tried to do
the lofted storage area
but that space required me to grovel, which
was something my hip and
heel strongly objected to. Alas, I was
forced to climb down and
found myself feeling quite inadequate. But
I managed to find solace
in the cooler of beer Dave had standing
by. Pretty soon I needed
to empty some of it and hobbled to the back
Upon returning, there
stood a woman whom 2Dave later described as
being, "Very easy on the
eyes" and I couldn't have agreed more. She
was holding a pad of paper
and asked for my sandwich order. Looking
at her, I couldn't do
anything more than blink. "Whut?" I stood
there mesmerized. "I'm
sorry, I just fell offa Dave's
scaffolding...I don't
rememver ordering any sammich on the way down."
Dave slapped my sore
shoulder, "She's TAKING your sandwich order, you
idiot. 'Rememver', I told
you I had lunch taken care of?"
"I'll say you do!"
Suddenly, my traumatic scaffolding injury
transformed into a mere
paper cut.
I chatted her up and
discovered she's Dave's neighbor, she's a nurse
who works in the same
hospital my wife's friend works, and, she's in
the same field of
counseling psychology Her Nagness is in.
On the way out of town I
definitely stopped for some lottery
tickets. I haven't
checked them yet but if I win, I know who I'm
splitting the winnings
with. I said earlier I believe in doing the
right thing and in this
case I'd like to cut you in for a share,
Dave, but when you fell
out of the Ugly Tree you hit every branch on
the way down. Therefore,
you lose.
