howdy howdy

We are in Elberton, Georgia for a bank job… well a bank remodel. The job actually started 2 weeks ago by another superintendent who was filling in until Buddy could get here. The campground owner helped us get backed into the site, apologized for the wet ground, said it had rained 11" in the last 2 weeks. Buddy apologized right back, stating that he was the reason for the rain, sticking out his hand, "Howdy, they call me Muddy Buddy."

Elberton is the granite capitol of the world, we passed by many granite plants, giant hunks of granite, tombstone manufacturers, we hope to get to the granite museum in town soon, and of course out to see the Georgia Guidestones, aka 'America's Stonehenge.'

The campground owner is John and his son Barry runs the place. Barry was very nice and helpful, made sure we had everything we needed, made sure we had his cell phone programed into our phones, just call anytime. He used to work for DirecTV and has all campsites wired for DTV, just an extra $10 a month and he will install a receiver. Pretty neat, one less thing to drag out and set up, the satellite dish. But there is no DVR, so we are watching TV old-school, whatever happens to be on, if we want to watch something in particular we have to be on the couch at that time, no recording for later. I like it, keeping it simple. But Buddy is itching to get out the satellite, he does love his toys. 

Lots of very tall pine trees here, hence the name Pine-Der-Rosa Campground. 

Actually this is the second time Buddy has camped here, he was here 9 years ago working on the same bank, stayed in this campground in his dad's old Holiday Rambler. When time to leave, John talked him into selling his camper so it could stay there and be rented out for fishermen coming to the nearby Lake. So after we got all settled in, we walked over to see the old camper, it is still there! 

winter work

Loves Travel Center, Hanson, KY

Lowe's parking lot

Hanson KY

Hanson, Kentucky

Another job beginning, permits, meetings, angry neighbors, discovery of major waterline going through site, just another day in paradise.

bye bye Mississippi

opening day Magee Mississippi

another one in the books, 2 years 5 months to go!

precious stones

Here in the mountains, stone is a part of life. Just try to plow a field or garden or even dig a hole for your mailbox, you will hit rock. Evidence of old garden patches and fields can be found when walking through the woods, identified by the stone walls or piles surrounding them, stones culled out by the horse-drawn plow and stacked up along the edges.

In southern Louisiana there is no natural stone. So how do you build anything? How do you make a driveway? How do you cover a truck stop parking lot before paving? Who do you call?

Buddy was elated this week when they were finally ready for the stone after months of fighting with the 'crappy' soil there, soil that had to be removed from site down to 3 feet deep and replaced with somewhat better soil which then had to be mixed with different minerals just to make it stop crawling and be more compactible to meet specifications.

Anyway, back to the stone…

Buddy: The stone is finally here, tractor trailer loads of it coming in, it looks great!

Me: Where do they have to haul it from?

Buddy: It comes from Baton Rouge.

Me: That's pretty far to haul gravel, over an hour.

Buddy: Oh that is just where they get it off barges from the Mississippi River, it is all shipped in, there are no quarries here.

Me: What? Gravel coming in on barges? From where? Isn't it too heavy?

Buddy: That was the cheapest option, the other one was to get stone that came from the Gulf up the Atchafalaya River, but it would have to come through the lock system and that made it cost more.

Me: So how much does it cost, say compared to around here?

Buddy: At home we can call and get a load of gravel for around $15 a ton, here we are paying $35/ton.

This is of course in contrast to the last job he built in Oklahoma, where they hit rock every day and even the Love's rep would come by with his trailer to get giant landscape stones.

Dirt and stone, things we take for granted here, hard packed red clay and rocks are the things to contend with when digging here in Georgia, making a good firm foundation.

Here if your dirt driveway needs gravel you just call and a dump truck of crushed stone comes from one of the local quarries. Years ago all the driveways around here were covered with a pretty white gravel from Whitestone, GA (which is getting into the local marble vein). Now most of the gravel is quarried up at Cherry Log, and is gray granite.

But it comes right out of the earth here locally, just bust up one of the mountains and it makes great gravel, our own natural resource, precious stones.

So the next time you are trying to dig, be thankful for the dirt and rocks, it could be worse, you could be in southern LA where the soil is only good for growing rice and crawfish.

road warriors

W.H. Bass General Contractors has 40 superintendents all over the country. You too could travel, see the country, enjoy local food and customs. Join the team today!  

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Our subs always show up on time with a current set of  blueprints in hand and a full crew ready to do whatever it takes.

We only build on sites with perfect solid dirt, no rocks or mud or buried treasures left over from the last owner.

On our jobs the weather is always perfect and does not factor into the schedule.

coordination

going vertical finally!

crowded site - one city block in the small town with no room to spare

buried tanks

it's all about coordination - what goes where and when

and trying to get all the kiddies to work well together

Buddy loves his job :) 

Paradise, LA

The jobsite started out as a nice flat city lot covered in grass, but not any more. 

Construction progress is slow, or seems to be, as there is nothing coming out of the ground yet. When building a petroleum facility there is a LOT of underground work that has to be done first, one of the bigger underground projects is the tank installation.

First dig a big hole, right? Easy enough in Oklahoma where the soil is clay and rocks. But here in southern LA, Buddy calls it gumbo soil. So the excavators first drive steel pilings into the ground around where the hole will be (so the dirt will not cave in) then dig inside those pilings. The further down they dug, the more the dirt looks like pudding. Hence above-ground cemeteries here. A layer of sand cushions the bottom of the hole.

So the big hole is finally finished, tanks set in place, just in time for the forecast of torrential rains coming in. Between the time the tanks are set and the time there is concrete poured over them later in the job, the tanks must be filled with water so they will not float out of the ground (cemetery reference again).

Permission granted and payment set up from the city of Port Barre to pump 28,000 gallons of water from the hydrant into the tanks. Buddy left the tank guys there working into the night on Wednesday.

The next morning during breakfast we are watching the local news when the news scrolling at the bottom of the screen catches my eye "Port Barre water main break". Coincidence? I don't think so.

Apparently ancient pipes couldn't handle the volume or something, cracked right in two. Now the rain is coming down, there is no water in the hydrant, how to keep the tanks down?

The tank guys were scrambling to come up with a plan. Nearby city of Opalousas has water to sell, so a 6,000 tanker truck was acquired and is making runs from one town to the next to fill the tanks.

just another day here in Paradise, LA

It is all about the water, the water coming down in buckets, the water line breaking, water for sale, water pumped in, water pumped out, water water everywhere. Water in gas tank - a good thing? Yes keeps them from floating out of the ground.

Just remember if you bury something in Louisiana, you must weight it down really good. 

missing Thanksgiving

Hyatt Regency Westshore, Tampa, Florida

Opening December 1, 1986

The job was almost done but not quite, the big hotel on Tampa Bay had rooms already booked for the grand opening next week, so no stopping work now.

The smells of turkey and pumpkin pie wafted into the big 2-story lobby and up through the tower and made our mouths water, making it harder to concentrate on work and wishing we were home with family and our own Thanksgiving dinner.

Then the word came, passed around from carpenters to plumbers to anyone with a toolbelt or hardhat, Dinner is Served.

The kitchen staff wanted to practice before the opening day, and what better way than to feed an army of lowly worker types like us. The tables in the grand dining room were covered with linen tablecloths and napkins, the china and silver and crystal were all set out. You talk about an instant boost in morale! Nice folks, those kitchen workers.

Yes, we used to build these big skyscrapers that after completion we could not afford to go into again. But not any more. Now we build truck stops, and we can go into them anytime to get a cuppa joe or beef jerky.

And we work on Thanksgiving day to finish the truck stop jobs too. Why? Because that is what we do, we build things and try to meet our schedule commitments no matter what. 

No, there are no grand hotel rooms already rented, but the premise is the same, there is diesel to sell and $$ to be made, so the work goes on. 

"It all pays the same"  "Just glad to have a job"  "It could always be worse"

Today there will be no turkey dinner provided for the workers, but my frozen turkey dinner will be waiting for me in the camper tonight.

And today working out in the cold rain and shaking my head at all the shoddy workmanship by the subs - and seeing (via Skype) my family 900 miles away back home by the warm fire eating Thanksgiving dinner, I am trying but just can't think of a worse thing. 

Retirement is on the horizon, 4 more years...

job report - crunch time

down to the wire, paving done, lights on

tire shop

here's your sign

Carl's Jr.

maybe a little more work on the inside the main store :)

the cleaning crew is coming in next Tuesday and will be there over Thanksgiving with Buddy, then the week after that it turns over to Loves for stocking and training, anyone need a job?

Love’s Travel Stop 

**Love’s and Carl Jr.

Now hiring for the new Loves Travel Stop on I-35.
Starting at $9 hourly, benefits, and 401K for full time employees.

~Guthrie News

paradise, OK

Growing up through the concrete forms and weeds are the Oklahoma wildflowers, adding a little bit of color to the otherwise drab job-site.

looking more like a Love's store every day

It takes a lot of different materials to make a job, but when finished all will be hidden (hopefully) - pipes, sheet rock, insulation, metal studs, dirt, tanks, gravel, re-bar, leaving only the finished look of concrete and brick and tile and shiny windows.

It takes a lot of different specialties [subcontractors or subs] to build a job, some are good, know what to do, some can even read blueprints. Others are clueless, they show up late if at all, have no tools or the wrong ones. They are given endearing nicknames by the superintendent, like Whiney Wayne and Lying Bobby. The aforementioned superintendent says when told to do something, these [sorry subs] look like this:

There are still a few good subs out there, but they are few and far between. Gone are the days of craftsmen taking pride in their work, back when subs would be given a set of plans and do the job without hand-holding and having the super go and get them supplies and even water to drink... !!!  This super has often threatened to get boxes of pacifiers and tissues to hand out when the subs start crying about stuff. 

Oh well, the birthday present from Melissa sums it up, it's just another day in paradise here in Oklahoma :)

job report

It's beginning to look like a real truck stop!

Lots of underground work - tanks going in.

Covered with gravel after being filled by water trucks.

A busy week - even a visit by OSHA - yessir we have our hard hats on...

Hot and dry in Oklahoma, a good thing as far as work goes.