Random Facts About You #55

Nap time. The rest of the week in unstructured with all the kids gone on vacation.

 

"before wednesday" is almost gone

and i havent heard a peep from that friend

 

Now that sucks.

 

I am not surprised that happens.

This church consists of mainly an older congregation who are old school about credit. Most repairs or expenses are paid for at the itme it happens. Being that the land is owned by presbrytry is the issue for insurance sake as most of the congration take down their own tress for heating.

 

Some of the wood taken down yesterday will be ready this year... dead Ash tree. There was a suffering barely alive Maple and that wood won't be ready though, so that will be for next year. I did split some yesterday but the majority still needs cut/split/stacked. When I was splitting the wood yesterday it dawned on me that each piece probably weighed more than I do... So much for taking it easy. So today I just went back to brushing and burning.


The guys that did the work yesterday are certified/licensed/bonded and very good at what they do. It still freaks me out that they got $1600+ for about 3 hours work. For them, these were the easy trees out of all the ones we talked about last month. I couldn't have brought them down myself without damaging stuff though. This leaves me with the hard trees to deal with myself.

 

i delivered almost $500 worth of food once to a church

no one helped...no one even held the door open...no one came to pay me i had to hunt down the pastor or whatever he was...


and there was no tip..it was paid to exact penny (we got paid crap ..tips was our real pay)



probably not the same pastor but in the last few years whoever was in charge of that same exact church got charged (and/or convicted) of neglecting to provide neccessities of life to their dying wife

edit: better link

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/03/07/minister-let-his-bedridden-wife-die-horror-death-i-wouldnt-want-to-be-the-judge-in-this-heartbreaking-case/

 

How many crew members and what kind of equipment?

 

He better hoped he was mentally compromised.

 

Four guys, that 4WD thing I posted and the chipper truck. One younger guy got some practice climbing on the Ash tree. They used the 4WD bucket on the other two trees.

 

$1600 seems steep to me. If I remember right....I think I thought those guys were a little over-priced last time too, didn't I? Or am I thinking of something else?

The market can't be too drastically different from ours (but I really am just making an assumption there). For 2 guys, a bucket and a chipper....I'm shooting for about $200-$250/hr. So add in two more guys but no more gear....that's a little more per hour but not that much more. Plus, they put a noob up there and it took 3 hours. You shouldn't have to pay more for training the new guy. It would probably take a seasoned climber about 25% of the time to do whatever the younger guy did.

If you have to go with those guys, you have to do it..I suppose but it seems like that sounds like a $1000 job to me...all day long....maybe even less. No clean-up jobs are usually pretty easy and we charge less to do them.

 

Last time it was twice the number of trees but the same crew and equipment and you said this is why you don't work for friends. This still came down to about $500 per tree, they don't charge by the hour. The "noob" as you call him did a great job and it didn't take him 3 hours to down that tree. Don't forget, at one point in time you were that guy...


Anyways, it's done and paid for. I'll have to handle all the other trees myself...

 

My granddaughters are going to Disney World tomorrow. I'm so happy for them!

 

Not slamming the noobs. Everyone has been there. They may not be charging "by the hour" but you better believe that they are bidding it that way in their own minds. It's really the only way you can bid it...even if you don't present it as "by the hour". I'm just saying that they should be looking at the work as if a pro is doing it and bidding it that way. Then if they want to send a new guy up....that's on them. The customer shouldn't pay for extra time to train people.

And I never said I don't work for friends. Half of the residential work I do is for friends. I said my friends don't pay for tree work. I do it for free because I feel better about that. But we all help each other out. It's not about money.

 

handled some paperwork for tankers carrying ethylene oxide today... some heavy stuff. people worried about oil passing thru their neighborhoods, this shit sounds pretty wicked.. It usually is when followed up with ERIC/ Emergency Response Intervention Cards.. This stood out because it was a bundle with dangerous goods regulation papers ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethylene_oxide

 

I didn't pay extra for that guys training... They gave me a quote and that's what I paid. How they chose to do it wouldn't have changed the price.

 

Ok. As long as you're happy with the way it went...great. I don't mean to rain on the parade around here when to comes to this topic. I just know how a lot of people in this industry are and I know every single game they play and approach/justification they can make. There are a lot of good guys and a lot of bad guys out there. I have no tolerance for the bad guys out there. The bad guys are one big reason why it costs so much to have this work done. They are responsible for higher costs for everyone else. Maybe these guys are legit and can justify that cost. Costs of doing business do vary from state to state. If you're happy with the work...that's what matters the most, I suppose.

 

Trying to get a big kayaking trip set up for this weekend. It might not be the last one of the year but it might be the last time that everyone goes out together for this year. Hopefully, we can get it lined up.

I have so much shit going on that kayaking shouldn't be a priority right now buuuuut....It kind of still is so let's get some boats on the water!

 

having fun should always be a priority over work

you never hear a dying person wishing they had worked more

 

thats why im staying up a bit drinking a beer and watching Banacek..

 

i really liked that show