BoneHead Move of the Week (Retro Active)

[Bobcat]

I did this last Thursday!

It's been slow work wise for the last three years, but recently it just took off like a wildfire. I've been doing my regular stuff during the day (concrete, block and Bobcats !) and doing 2-3 hours a night afterwards doing closet renovations....cabinets....decks and impact resistant windows.....So my neighbor asked me to help her put in a Pergo floor... I said no prob, and quoted her a higher than normal wage per hour....hoping she'd hire someone else. She said "Wow, I thought it would be more expensive" !:smash:

So she gives me the invoice to pick up the flooring from the Home depot.....and I decide to pick it up at the same time as I'm doing a concrete form lumber run (plus I have about 1500 pounds of concrete debris in the truck already) They say they are bringing it out.......30 minutes later the fork truck arrives out front to load it in my truck....I'm running late...and the stuff is on a pallet with tape holding it all together (here comes the bonehead part) I don't even check it.....or put my roll out screen over it.....I just drive off pissed off......make it to the first turn at the stoplight and it all goes flinging out of the truck and onto Roosevelt BLVD.....blocking not 1, not 2 , but 3 lanes (out of 6...not bad!) So there I am sweating like a Ho....throwing it all back in the truck.....boxes are all torn to hell......and I'm thinking " I just bought $1000 worth of fake hardwood flooring"

Thankfully it damaged the bottom of the boards and not the finished part. I still had to drag all of those boxes into the house in front of the home owner

Anyway it's all in and looks sweet ! tune in next week when I tell you how I almost killed myself with a $2 key chain and a 4200 pound Bobcat !!!!

 

[fund razor]

Subscribed.

 

[rschap1]

Hard not be interested in this...
Glad it turned out as good as it did for ya!

 

[C35]

i think we may be related. some days im afraid to leave the house anymore.

i do like hanging out at home depo on saturday morning watching people tie s hit to their cars roof with twine. that or have the wife lean out and hold onto it. classic stuff.

 

[old377guy]

funny chit.....

 

[Buoy]

Great thread Bobcat.
I'll have plenty to add.
When i was 19-20 (20yrs ago...) I had my first REAL job. I was installing fireplaces and garage doors. New construction was booming, so we were plenty busy.
We sold a garage door that was 16' x 7' with a "rough sawn" finish (model 128). It was a wood door with a "rough sawn" masonite skin. This was our most popular door amongst builders because it was the cheapest - and a PITA for us installers because they were more work than a steel door. We had Co. trucks with racks, and we just tied the doors down with essentially clothesline.
Because of the texture, when you stacked the four sections, there was very little contact/friction between the sections. We would use a chunk of scrap wood and nail it into the section ends to keep them together.
Now, if you were driving and had to make a panic stop, there was a good chance that the door sections would move, possibly fly off the front of the truck.
I got to a point that if you knew you had to make a panic stop because some blue-hair locked the brakes in front of you, you'd turn the truck a bit so that if the door slid off, it wouldn't hit anyone.
At least once every 2-3 weeks one of us "lost a door" - meaning it slipped off the rack, and landed in the road. Sometimes it was in pieces, sometimes just scuffed a bit. But, it wasn't uncommon for someone to report they "lost" a door.
So, I had a schedule one day to go out and hang two 128's out in Oregon, OH - about 45 mins from the shop. At this time, it was country roads, but building up.
I went and did the first door, got it done, and headed to the second job. It's about 11:00 am.
I'm ahead of schedule, and I should have an early day - be done by 3:00 (Bobcat KW style), and at the bar by 3:30...
I'm running country roads, and there are good tunes on the radio. I've got the radio cranked, and singing along (at this time I was also a lead singer/guitar player in a bar band in Bowling Green, so I considered it "practicing")
I get to the second jobsite and start unloading tools.
Then, I go to unload the door.
IT'S GONE!!!! The sections are gone, but I have the struts (supports) and spring shaft, and two loosely tied ropes (due to lack of door panels).
I jump back in the truck, and drive the route between the two jobsites twice, and I can't find the door - don't know if it landed in a ditch and I couldn't find it, don't know if somebody else snagged it, it's just gone.
Now, this is in the time before cell-phones, but our trucks had trusty 'ole Motorola two-way radios. My truck was "unit 54" - seriously, car 54...
So I radio my boss Dennis. He's the dispatcher/scheduler/shop manager. He's really a pretty good guy.
Me: "54 to base"
Dennis "Base, go ahead"
Me "Dennis, I lost a door"
Dennis "How bad is it?? Is it just scuffed??"
Me"No, I mean I LOST IT! I can't find it"
Dennis "Well drive back and look for it"
Me "I already tried that twice - it's gone"
Dennis "Oh chit - come back to the shop and explain this to Lee (the owner)"
Surprisingly I didn't get fired.
I went back out with a new door, hung it, and didn't make it to the bar until later that evening...

I've worked several places, but that place was one of my top 3.

 

[Bobcat]

I hate when I get excited about finishing early.......and it doesn't happen......its like canceling X-mas !

 

[Ratickle]

I hate when I get excited about finishing early.......and it doesn't happen......its like canceling X-mas !

But she's usually happier.....:leaving:

 

[Bobcat]

I probably told this story before, but hey I'm old !

About ten years ago Budweiser was giving out these key chains (see Pic) And I was using one to hold the keys to all of the toolboxes on the truck. It was a way to keep the hydraulic fluid off of my pants (changing attachments on the Bobcat is very messy) So whenever someone wanted to get something out of the truck , I could just grab the end of this key chain and pull it out of my pocket without getting sh*t on my pants.
So we are doing a demolition on an above ground pool at a gay guest house. There are two old mansions, and they are only about ten feet apart. It is so small in the pool area that I have to go out to the street to change from the 900 lbs Jack hammer, to the bucket, to the backhoe (and on and on) Every gay guy there kept saying "Ooh, I like that jack hammer" (heard that about ten times a day for a week) every time I go out of this narrow alley someone has left one of my shovels....or a level... or a laser right in the middle of my only exit( If they were not from my truck I would have just ran over them) About the 10th time this has happened I am in a rage......everyone has gone to lunch.....one of my shovels is right in the path..so fuming I leave the Bobcat running (no attachment on the front) and as I jump off.....that ever so clever key chain wraps around the left control lever and takes off just as I get my right foot on the ground.....that mofo climbed up the back of my leg and smashed my face into the 100 year old historically significant building...continued to climb and started to crush my ribs (all the while spinning the tire against my leg.) All I could think of was "Wow.....what a stupid way to die"....about then the key chain breaks and she backs off of me. I had a black tire tattoo on my calf muscle for about 5 days. I never ever ever leave any machine running when I get off now.

Later that same day I threatened to beat to death who ever left a tool on the ground...it worked.

 

[old377guy]

So did the guys at the place "nurse" you back to health?

 

[Bobcat]

EWWWWW!

 

[Donskihp]

Doesn't that Bobcat have a lap sefety bar that you have to lift to get out, which stops all hydrolices?

 

[rschap1]

Sounds like you were lucky to live through getting nearly run over....
WOW
Some scary stuff there.

 

[rschap1]

As close as I can come is parking my Expedition on my icy hill of a driveway about 10 years back.
Park the truck at the top of my drive where it is flat and level. BUT... front tires are just onto the down hill slope towards my garage. I help the wife out of the truck and into the house. Get the son out of his car seat and inside. Grab groceries and head in. Step back out to park truck down in the garage just in time to see the rear bumper sliding out of site. Truck is off and in park but drive is coated in about a 1/2" thick glaze of frozen rain-ice. First I scream a few swear words out loud. Grab the bumper and ski for a few feet. Then oped door and try to get in since keys are in my hand still. Step on brakes, turn key on, hand on gearshift....

just as truck gets to where the hill ends and approach to the garage door starts...it slows and stops.
Made it about a foot from bashing into the overhead door.
Wife and son got to watch it all out our sliding door from inside the house.

I learned to park a little more carefully.

 

[Bobcat]

Doesn't that Bobcat have a lap sefety bar that you have to lift to get out, which stops all hydrolices?

This was an old 642 model from the early 80's, it had most of the safety stuff bypassed.

 

[Ratickle]

Sounds like you were lucky to live through getting nearly run over....
WOW
Some scary stuff there.

That was when they officially changed his name to Bobcat from just Plain Old Bob.......:leaving:

 

[TUCK646]

Good stuff Bobcat, I'm still waiting for the hairs on the back of my neck to go down. I know I kringed,and I'm pretty sure i turned away from the computer screen at the tire spinning on the calf part. Steven King couldn't have written it better himself. Is there a NDE. (Near death experience) thread in here somewhere. I know i have atleast a half dozen NDE stories and probably twice as many bonehead /self sabotaging excerpts. Even a, hey I'm gonna rent me one of them u/w video cameras,and do a solo dive.I tried so hard to get my moneys worth out of that rental, i ran out of air at 177ft.

 

[Ratickle]

Good stuff Bobcat, I'm still waiting for the hairs on the back of my neck to go down. I know I kringed,and I'm pretty sure i turned away from the computer screen at the tire spinning on the calf part. Steven King couldn't have written it better himself. Is there a NDE. (Near death experience) thread in here somewhere. I know i have atleast a half dozen NDE stories and probably twice as many bonehead /self sabotaging excerpts. Even a, hey I'm gonna rent me one of them u/w video cameras,and do a solo dive.I tried so hard to get my moneys worth out of that rental, i ran out of air at 177ft.

Holy crap...


Do we get to see the video????:sifone:


Seriously, why are you still here?????? Lucky, or extremely skilled, or had a backup tank, or?????

 

[Bobcat]

We have this guy Chad that comes down from New York (Upper , not the city) Who is one of those rare individuals that I like to call.....A MORON WITH CONFIDENCE.
This guy f*cks up everything he touches......has no short term memory....of the chaos he causes. This will be story #1 of 3.

We are working on the Navy Base (Boca Chica N.A.S.) We are right off of the flight line in a secure area, multiple gates to drive through. Chad is leaving to go home in one of the company trucks.....as he is approaching the gate it starts to slide open ....right next to the gate is a port-0-potty......Chad suddenly remembers he has to pee......so He jumps out of the truck while it is still in gear......gets about halfway to the toilet and notices the truck still moving.....runs toward it , opens the door and jumps halfway in as the door hits the solid gate.....his head was sticking up between the door and the A Pillar of the frame.....it bends the door around his head.....the glass inside the door (window rolled down) explodes and the truck is wedged .....still running in gear....and he is yelling HHHHHHEEEEEELLLPPPPPPP! Navy calls their Fire Dept and they come screaming out to help him......they get the truck backed up...free his head and send him to the hospital (civilian) We fill out numerous forms in triplicate.
Next day he shows up to work....he's fine.....We had to replace the door because it wouldn't shut anymore.....you could see the outline where door had wrapped around his head.
He's got 3 kids by 3 different mothers and doesn't pay for any of them....Poster boy for the movie "Idiocracy"

 

[fund razor]

We have this guy Chad that comes down from New York (Upper , not the city) Who is one of those rare individuals that I like to call.....A MORON WITH CONFIDENCE.
This guy f*cks up everything he touches......has no short term memory....of the chaos he causes. This will be story #1 of 3.

We are working on the Navy Base (Boca Chica N.A.S.) We are right off of the flight line in a secure area, multiple gates to drive through. Chad is leaving to go home in one of the company trucks.....as he is approaching the gate it starts to slide open ....right next to the gate is a port-0-potty......Chad suddenly remembers he has to pee......so He jumps out of the truck while it is still in gear......gets about halfway to the toilet and notices the truck still moving.....runs toward it , opens the door and jumps halfway in as the door hits the solid gate.....his head was sticking up between the door and the A Pillar of the frame.....it bends the door around his head.....the glass inside the door (window rolled down) explodes and the truck is wedged .....still running in gear....and he is yelling HHHHHHEEEEEELLLPPPPPPP! Navy calls their Fire Dept and they come screaming out to help him......they get the truck backed up...free his head and send him to the hospital (civilian) We fill out numerous forms in triplicate.
Next day he shows up to work....he's fine.....We had to replace the door because it wouldn't shut anymore.....you could see the outline where door had wrapped around his head.
He's got 3 kids by 3 different mothers and doesn't pay for any of them....Poster boy for the movie "Idiocracy"

I would call him "hanging chad."