The Red Herring

How to Get Paid to Nap

During my 3 and a half months working construction, I realized some things about how to slack off effectively. For example, most mornings I would start by contemplating quitting, then first break would roll around and I would stuff my belly with sandwiches and blueberries. After this banquet I would be bloated and narcoleptic, and the idea of manual labour would be incomprehensible. So, I got into the habit of taking 15-minute naps in the port-o-potty. They were stress-filled and delirious snoozes. This was partly because I feared the wrath of my boss, but it was also due to the pungent stench of the sanitary chemicals.
Another way to shirk responsibility is to adjust your clothing. Whether it be cleaning your glasses or taking off a layer, altering your outfit is a totally acceptable reason for not working. I also like to assume the “watching stance.” Known to professionals as the “micro-break,” such a pause in work is usually 5-10 seconds in length and may be taken if one is engaged in a strenuous or repetitive task. Mine were more like macro-breaks. When macro-breaking, your expression should convey mild fatigue and just a hint of intense concentration. You must look as if you are learning something important from what you are watching. The reason that you are not helping is because you can be of no assistance to the person. It’s totally okay to stand and watch, actually, lots of guys do it, sometimes together.
In addition to surprise luncheons, safety was promoted on site through awareness speeches on Mondays, and incentive draws each Friday. These draws were just like a raffle, with prizes lined up for all to see, and every worker’s name placed into a hard hat. At its peak, the site had about 140 workers. My name was pulled from the hard hat four different times. I won multiple gas cards, a bocce ball set, and a pair of Harley Davidson sunglasses. I always sold off the booty to my co-workers for cash. The master carpenter, Bruce, a spindly man with strong opinions on the Iraq war, was my number one buyer. The last prize I won, however, was not up for sale.
When I won the digital camera it was a sunny afternoon, and with my new item in hand I did very little work. I chose instead to conduct a photo shoot with my friends while sporting our do-rags and posing next to the rims of excavators. I got one really good shot of me doing a grab off this sand bank.

Our superintendent Tim was a mogul for this “safety culture.’ He had a goatee, a sun burnt neck, and one of those straps attached to the back of your glasses that enables them to hang from around your neck. During the mandatory quad exercises and wrist “fluxions”, the boss would tell some racist jokes, or jokes about people with hair lips. Once everyone finished fake laughing, he would remind us about the “zero incidents” rule and how to avoid injuries. He loved to use big words when he addressed us in the morning. His favorite word was “plethora” and his number one most uttered sentence was “be cognizant of your surroundings.” Armed with an industrial sized jiffy marker, my colleague, who had mad beef with Tim, drew a very good caricature of his nemesis on the wall of the port-o-potty. The sound bubble coming from the cartoon’s mouth said “Hey, my name’s Tim and no one shit’s on my time. There’s a cornucopia of work to do!” Tim wasn’t too pleased about this and threatened to bring in a handwriting expert to find the guilty subject.
For these reasons and more, Tim was the most feared man on site. He was especially scary when flanked by inspectors who had clipboards, white hardhats, and pre-faded or bell-bottomed jeans. I was digging a hole once, and could see with my peripheral vision that I was being watched by no less than 7 white heads; it was the hardest I have ever dug.
Despite what you may think, construction is a lot about style. I was a labourer, so I basically stuck to jeans and a white tee. I did, however, decide to purchase a do-rag. When I rocked beneath my hard hat, the rag absorbed sweat, looked dope and protected my neck. One guy named Murray used to be a crab fisherman, and so he only wore rubber boots. When I read “The Perfect Storm” during one lunch break, Murray told me that he ate a cheeseburger with one of the guys who died. There were 4 Germans on my crew, and they were all carpenters. One had a golden shark earring and bleached blonde hair, and another exclusively wore Harley Davidson shirts and ate weiners with his bare hands. I never saw him drink water, only coca-cola and coffee.
One of the best guys I met was a first nation’s man named Clarence. Of course, most men on site referred to him as an “Indian,” but Clarence wasn’t the type to care. I sat across from Clarence during our breaks, and each day he fascinated me with his meal choice. He always used McDonald’s salt bags and every item in his lunch was pinned between two paper plates. All of his things were kept in a plastic bag and he often left his pre-toasted bread sitting atop a newspaper in the lunch trailer. One time he captivated the entire room’s attention when he reheated his bacon and fried eggs and French toast only to break out the maple syrup. One day, Clarence missed the bus that shuttled us onto the airport tarmac. Not wanting to wait the 20 minutes until the next pick up, Clarence just walked past the security guards and along the various airstrips. After a half hour stroll, he arrived at the outskirts of the barbed wire security fence that surrounded the work site. He was never questioned.

Most people have an idea of what the average construction guy is like, and at first glance I had dismissed a lot of my co-workers to fit this mould. I was pretty wrong. Evidence of their nature came in the form of: pats on the back, boxed doughnuts, extra laces to replace my busted ones, extra overtime hours I didn’t even work, tips on how to vibrate concrete walls, and times I phoned in late and didn’t catch any slack. The thing I like about the older construction guys is that their tattoos are green. These aren’t the new breed of crisp and detailed body images: these tattoos either state what gang you’re in, or are an anchor.

- Rupert Common
The Red Herring
Vol. XX no. 0.5

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• Posted on September 17th, 2008
• Written by editorial staff
• Articles, Rupert Common, Web-only