Plumber Appreciation

The big fella with the bashful smile who saved us from a sewage situation last night, he's been here before and will be back again. He lives on the block, seems to have figured out that, since everybody, everywhere needs a handy plumber, why not offer those services in a nice neighborhood? It's the same work wherever you go, but a half-block from the beach the kids can play in the sand while Daddy mends pipes and unclogs drains for the kind of clientele that's more interested in the job getting done than the asking price. Savvy guy. The only downside is that this clientele don't like to wait; if they come knockin' at the door during dinner, dinner gets reheated later on. But they know it, and they know they'll pay a little extra for it. Time is money, right?

Also yesterday, since we are on the subject of the neighborhood, I paid the guy who guards parked cars on the street to bring his big ol' flat wheelbarrow up here and, over 4 trips, haul away the busted scraps from the fallen roofing. He makes his money guarding parked cars on one of the safest streets in the city, and otherwise from people who live on the street and need something large transported, like a t.v. or a ton of junk. There's a side income in marijuana, but it's not like the good life of our plumber. This guy often spends the nights curled up on the flat freight transporter, and does not get to set the price after the work.

We are now in the second half of June and I swear to you there has not been a real Rio beach day yet this month. We are a beach house. This vexes me. I am vexed.

But not too vexed. The property sale is humming along at a pace somewhere above zero. Genuine talk of "intent to buy" paperwork, blueprints, investors on board, somehow-relevent green lights. It need not go any faster, so long as it goes. Interesting.