Fun with Construction

As everyone knows when you have a big (or sometimes even a small) construction project the inevitable budget busters come along. We've had a couple of them already. We underestimated the cost to finish the interior of the barn. Actually we were pretty accurate with all of the costs with the exception of electricity. The barn is well off the road, and the cost to move the electrical service that far was not a small number. It makes me seriously dread what the cost will be to run electricity to the second barn after it is built.

Our other unexpected expense was our stupid rock. Having to bring in the backhoe for a day was not something we had planned on when we went to install that water line.

The latest expense overrun was having the bulldozer work done to prepare for building more fencing. There were a lot of wooded areas where the fence lines will be and we knew we would have to have someone with a bulldozer do some pushing to clear a path.

I should have known something was off when Jason started talking about the dozer work as we were feeding today. "The dozer guy really outdid himself. You should see this area he cleared around the big oak tree by the creek. It is so beautiful. " I thought to myself "huh, Jason seems unusually impressed with this. That's nice." And I carried on with my work. It should have more clearly registered with me that Jason of all people isn't going to use the word beautiful to describe work done by a bulldozer.

He brought it up again this afternoon, talking about the beautiful work by the dozer operator and commenting again on how he outdid himself. Then he says "I'll need to pay him on Monday. It's fine to write that check, right?" I said of course it was, assuming we were still talking about the same amount of money we had originally planned for. I still wasn't catching on to where this was heading. I think Jason was hoping that I was going to be quick on the uptake but I was being dense. So he had no choice but to just put it out there.

"The check is going to be for $XXXX" he says. I almost croaked. I was sure I had misheard so I said "WHAT???????" in a very loud and unfriendly voice. Jason repeats this number that is triple what I was expecting. I couldn't help myself. I launched into a rant about what a totally over-the-top ridiculous sum this was to push out a fence line and how sick and tired I am of all things associated with construction. Jason and I take turns ranting and raving on this topic and today was my turn. I ended my rant with "I don't care what it costs to run a bulldozer per hour, I don't care about the fact that it ended up being more work than we expected and I am sick and tired of having to think about, talk about, answer endless questions about, and more importantly PAY FOR all of this stuff."

I felt better once I got it all off my chest. No doubt I'll hear another variation of the above tomorrow as I listen to Jason's version of "why I am sick of construction projects."

the bulldozer at work

Jason looks at this and comments repeatedly on the "beautiful work." Well it should be #$%&! beautiful for what it cost!

I look at this and think, did he really have to clear a path *this wide* for the fence?

Dozer work had to be done for almost a full mile
I'll admit I would like to go trail riding through this picture

Bear and Bush love to ride on the Gator

Cuff Links

Clayton and Tiny

Silky, Missy and MyLight

Homer

Grand

Tony and Chance

Hemi and Leo

Alex, Darby and B-Rad

Murphy and Chili

Sebastian