Another Brick in the Wall

Today we’re going to be schlepping the multitudes of retaining wall bricks that are sitting in the garage over to our friend Jason’s home. He wants ‘em, we don’t, so it’s a beautiful thing. The bricks are left over from a patio build and I guess we way over-estimated. I hope the delivery is a smooth one because getting these to our house was anything but fun.

We had bought a pallet of the bricks from Lowe’s and had them delivered. The original delivery date came and went, which was Mother’s Day, without any sign of the truck. I had taken Barry’s mother out for a massage, then to eat, with the intention of Barry meeting up with us. We ended up going back to the house so Barry could see his mother. Later in the afternoon, several phone calls resulted in finding out that the delivery date had been keyed in for the next Sunday, but that the delivery could be bumped up to Thursday. Sunday wasn’t going to do us any good because we had a crew coming over on Saturday to help. We should have just rescheduled our friends.

The pallet was loaded into the wrong kind of truck. It had a small hydraulic lift that was narrower than the width of the pallet, which meant hand unloading the truck. Except that they didn’t. They put the pallet on a pallet jack, rolled it to the mouth of the truck, then tried to roll it onto the lift. But the small lip where the lift met the truck kept the jack from rolling smoothly, but a nice shove got it right over. And into the street.

Needless to say, there were casualties. And while Lowe’s did replace them, we didn’t get an apology. They did, however, send people to help clean up the mess. But without cleaning tools. So Barry and I provided brooms, dustbins and bags to clean the mess up with. Nice.

So out they go. Or most of them. Will probably keep a large handful in case any of ours need to be replaced. But it looks to be a beautiful day, we’re clearing space in the garage and I get to get out of the house for a good while before I start my new job tomorrow.

And we’re also going to check in on Jason since his wife is out of town.
It’s not like that. Not worried about him partying hard or the like. I just want to make sure his two kids haven’t tied him up and are high on candy. I’m kidding. Sort of.

Actually, their children are the most well behaved kids I know. I keep telling Jennifer and Jason that it blows my mind how great their kids are because it’s so much easier to not be a good parent. But Jason and Jennifer are two of the coolest cats I know. In fact, Jason and his wife Jennifer set Barry and I up. For the longest time, I resisted meeting Barry. I had recently gotten back into the dating waters – and immediately wanted back out. I had gone on a year-long dating sabbatical, for all intents and purposes, and found that I preferred being single. The thought scared me, so I accepted offers and perused dating websites, all of which left me very disillusioned. I felt that I shouldn’t ignore my guy instinct and stay single.

And yet Jennifer and Jason wouldn’t shut up about Barry.

Fine, fine, I told them, anything to get you guys to shut up. I’m guessing Barry told them something similar.

Five and a half years later, with a one year wedding anniversary coming up, I blame them. So does Barry.

I worked with Jennifer for about a year before I quit and Jason was the younger brother of Barry’s best friend from high school. However, proof positive that St. Louis is the biggest small town, I actually knew Jason long before I ever met him. Turns out, he used to run in the same crowd as my best friend in early high school. So I heard stories about Jason, namely that he talked to trees. And when Jason and I had the moment where we realized that we knew the same people, I said, “You’re Jason who talks to trees!” Without batting an eye, he agreed.

Now, the story is that Jason was in the passenger seat while several friends were being driven home. Jason lived near Tower Grove Park and when he was nearly home, rolled down the window, stuck his torso out and started to tell the trees how much he liked them.

Jason Who Talks To Trees is a much funnier name than it is a story.

I just hope that today none of us end up with no one getting new names. I’m almost convinced these bricks are cursed.