Every crew of bricklayers has one. The asshole that can barely be tolerated by boss or fellow blue collar alike. Loud , crass beyond the pale, and the one guy everyone is rooting for when the eventual and inevitable industrial accident occurs.
Young Rene Jaques was not that man. Rene was the guy loved by all on the crew except for the loud and crass one who took great delight in needling young Rene incessantly. Now young Rene held some celebrity status as one particular Monday when he didn’t show for work we all got to see him on the Channel 9 Evening News. He’d taken his new girl friend trout fishing deep into the woods over the weekend and got them both lost. That’s how we got to witness them both getting off the rescue chopper after two days in the woods. Him smiling sheepishly at the news camera and her screaming over her fear of heights. The A- hole made endless sport of this.
Part of Rene’s job description entailed keeping the masons stocked with ample bricks and mortar and he was very good at the task. That didn’t prevent the A- hole from riding him incessantly however. Every day at break time Rene would add water and soften up the mortar in order that it might still be usable after the mornings coffee break. One morning, his work station being next to the ladder, the A- hole was the first to descend the scaffold though not with out first loudly calling out to Rene…..
“My mortar better be fresh when I get back ya little prick!”
Within twenty minutes the mornings break was over and we all ascended the ladder to witness Rene’s description of a tub of fresh mortar. Permit me, if you will, to describe what we saw in mason speak.
It laid there horizontally for all to witness across the top of the A- holes mortar. A huge log…. a very large finless Brown trout ….. an immense turd.
Standing there face to face with the finless brown, trowel in hand the A-hole stared at Rene to inquire….
“Just how in Gods name did you get that thing way up here without breaking it?”
“It came up here in me Muther Pucker …and that’s as fresh as its ever gonna get.
