How I Unexpectedly Dropped $3000 in One Day

Tuesday morning found me out front deadheading the phlox plant. And that's when I was found by John. Another John. A John from Ireland but now the second John in my garden. John who was there to sell me on getting driveway. Big Bad John.

John's company had already been busy in this neighbourhood for several weeks, ripping out old driveways and installing new ones. Somehow, I got missed in the blitz, and that was okay, for we had at least had ours freshly blacktopped this summer. Admittedly, it was still not in great shape.

But when John found me on that morning, I agreed to part with $3000 in return for having him adding our driveway to his schedule.

That was on Tuesday, and I thought that it would take a few days, but come Wednesday they began the work. Astonishingly, they were all finished by suppertime. 

Here's ↓ how stage 1 went. There are notes to the side. These photo are b&w because the colour cast was weird and terrible. Note: the image is clickable if you can't read the notes but want to.

They went away; I went inside. After awhile I bolted out to see them rolling the gravel. It was so quick that I missed getting photos. They went away again, but before long they were back and spreading the hot asphalt.

There were many workers at this stage, plus a big truck and other machines. The labourers were all Mexican. That surprised me a lot. I was told that many of them also overwinter here when they do interior work on basements and so on. I am not sure what to think or believe, for remember that this other John was Irish, and I suspect that he just might have kissed the Blarney Stone at some point in his life.

Once the asphalt was spread, the roller did its/his thing with the asphalt being cooled by a hose at it went.

Shortly after 6pm, they were finished. and I was $3000 poorer. Phew! That was quick. A fool and his money etc etc.

I took a lot of video clips and spliced them together into two videos. No, I don't expect y'all to watch them, but I post them regardless because I did the work, and I want them there until heaven and earth shall pass away. I really did it mostly for Sue who was absent for all of the excitement.

The first, Tearing Up the Old Driveway is one minute long. Making the New Driveway is a minute and a half. I could have combined them into one clip, but you can see how silly the colour was in the first video, so I didn’t ant to mix the two. I must have somehow contrived to do something very odd to the phone that morning, but by afternoon, the colour was back to normal.

I simply should have obeyed the impulse to stay inside and not deadhead those phlox.