Gainfully Employed

I'm completely exhausted after my second day of shoveling dirt. It's been the first actual job that I have had in the past... six months. Wow, that's kind of embarrassing. I'm not including, of course, writing car reviews, or my chop-shop career that lasted 1.5 days.

So here I am, in San Carlos, CA - up by San Fransisco - staying with my aunt and doing manual labor down the street on some millionaire's estate. His back yard is a multi-level, terraced menagerie of gardens, decks, walking paths and outdoor furniture that wraps around the house (and the second house right behind it) and hugs the creek that defines the back of his property.

So while he is inside his second house, bustling about on the phone, running off to meetings and no-doubt raking in tons of money, Eddie and I are out back shoveling dirt. Literally, we are just moving dirt from one spot to another.

Having a complex and ornate backyard is great for aesthetics, and maybe fancy-shmancy dinner parties, but, man, it's a bitch to get around with a wheel-barrow. Its a rigmarole of ramps, sharp curves, and tight passages from the back (where the dirt is coming from) to the front (where the dirt is going). Eddie told me that he has moved this dirt three, maybe four times already. Back and forth, back and forth. Depending on the project.

I told him that moving dirt sucks, especially now that we were hitting the muddy clay near the creek, and he agreed, but said 'Hey, at least it's work.' I made a mental note not to tell him that I've been unemployed for the past half-year. But I would personally shoot somebody, without remorse, for making me move dirt that many times.

FUN FACT: Sometimes Eddie and I will be shovelling the same chunk of dirt and, near the end, our shovels - after getting close and closer - will clank. It's kind of like the Lady And The Tramp, except Eddie is a 40 year old Mexican, and there's no Italian music.

Time to rest the ol' back, go into comatose-mode for the night, and hope the ibuprofen will get me over the hump tomorrow. And maybe pack a gun in case the millionaire starts to get second thoughts about his dirt placement.