--They say there are only

--They say there are only two seasons in Minnesota: winter and
construction. And it’s true. The minute the ground is thawed enough
to be dug up and maneuvered, the construction crews are out maneuvering
it, paving it, and praying it doesn’t start snowing before they get
done. We have a lot of Just In Time construction that occurs here
because of our meteorological conditions. Normally, this means you’ll
have freeway delays at the time of year when your car is most likely to
overheat, which gives the phrase “construction delays” a whole new
meaning for the beleaguered drivers of such outdated automobiles. Or a
neighboring street will be affected as they replace the water main.
You’ll be tipped off on this one by the neatly attached, block long,
single PVC pipe, placed next to the curb with a lonely pipe leading up
to each house, which will quickly introduce you to a harassed homeowner
who is about to suffer a whole summers’ worth of quick, weak showers.
Poor bastards. While you may be upset at the detours the work brings
about, it generally doesn’t affect you directly. After all, there are
a lot of streets here. The chance they’ll hit yours is rather small
in the scheme of things. Or so I thought. Cake Eater Crews have been
working on the blocks surrounding ours for a few weeks now. They’ve
ripped up the concrete, gone all the way down to the dirt and are
laying new sewer pipe before they pave the road. Ok, fine. I thought
they might be getting to us, but at the rate they were going, I assumed
a budget crunch would intervene and we’d be left out of it. Not so. A
magnificent Caterpillar asphalt-puller-upper just backed into the alley
behind our house and ripped up four or five inches of asphalt in about
five minutes. Then, when he was done, he backed up again and repeated,
in another straight line, while all the old pavement was rocketed into
a dump truck by means of a twenty foot conveyor belt. And all in the
space of ten minutes. This thing was the same height as my garage and twice as long. Scary.

And undoubtedly, the jackhammers will come out later today because the
alley is curved in one spot. The straight-line puller-upper couldn’t
maneuver it and is resulting in one large slab of unbroken pavement
that needs to be pulled still. Sigh. I’m not looking forward to this.
The noise will be spectacular. There will be all this dust in my mouth
later today and I will wonder what it is because all of the windows are
shut right now due to the heat. Then, as I will run my tongue over my
back teeth, I will realize they won’t have any pointy edges to them
anymore and the question but how am I supposed to chew meat now?
will race through my brain. Yes, that’s right. The dust will be the
remains of my molars because I will have ground them to nothing.
I am especially not looking forward to trying to back my car out of the
garage later today because the suspension on the rear end is on its
last legs. Dropping almost half a foot by just pulling out of the
garage might make the car say “Sorry, bub. This just ain’t happening.”
which will be followed by the back end suspension crashing in a
spectacular fashion that usually results in a fabulous flurry of tow
trucks and the junk yard offering $50 for the whole lot, “but not a penny more.”
I took a picture earlier, but I haven’t quite figured out how to post
pictures on here as of right now. This might be the one instance where
I learn so you all can share my agony.
--Chuckle for the day: It’s bad news when the bride’s a mean drunk.

--It’s always nice to know that even the most jaded of jackasses can be surprised.

Poor Bob. I feel so sorry for him. It must really suck to have your porn kingdom overthrown by young girls and their web cams