Learners Permits, Career Change and a Billionaire
I’ve need to get back to the Sunday morning stories. I just can’t get used to this mid-week stuff. I think you guys are also on the Sunday schedule and don’t have time to read during the week. Anyway, here we go.
The twins have reached the age where they can drive, providing they get their learners permit.
They actually could have received their learners permit a few months ago. Elaine and I didn’t exactly push the twins to drive. Elaine and I had our reasons although we didn’t agree.
Elaine, the practical one, saw the increased family costs. Insurance, gas, and cars. I could see all those things also, but truthfully, I have been teaching and letting the kids drive for years.
Hey, when you are as old as I am and live where I live, you had better have someone who can throw your (construction language) in the car and get you to the hospital. Boy Twin has been driving these dirt covered mountain roads from the time he could see over the steering wheel.
Anyway, the twins have recently shown an interest in getting learners permits. Getting permits these days, is confusing compared to when I was learning to drive? Driver’s training was offered by the school system when I was a kid. Sometime between then and now, the laws were changed and kids learning to drive must enroll in state registered driving school.
I’m not sure, but I would guess some state legislator had a relative that needed a job. This relative convinced this state legislator to write a law taking Driver’s Ed. out of the school and put it in the hands of someone who could not find another job.
Whoa, did I say that? Anyway, someone in the state legislature amended the law; that if a family lives too many miles from a state registered driving school, they can enroll in a 4-hour course, take a test, and drive extra hours with parents. At least I think that’s how it works.
What I do know is, that Girl Twin (with Ivy’s help) enrolled the twins in the 4-hour class for last Sunday. Sunday is Monners Mumblings Day. I know Ivy or Elaine could have taken her. I said her because Boy Twin thought that a sleepover with a friend sounded like a better idea.
Boy Twin is different. He arranged to spend the weekend with a friend. He pretends not have a big interest in getting his permit. However, I have him figured out. He wanted Girl Twin to take the class and test, first. He could then ask Girl Twin for help and the answers. This kid won’t even set his own alarm clock if he can get his sister to do it for him. It’s kind of a good twin, bad twin thing.
Girl Twin is legally driving, Boy Twin is recovering from not sleeping this past weekend.
Girl Twin’s first time legally driving was an interesting story. Girl Twin asked if she could drive from the DMV to her school. I was sure I wanted her to drive across town that time of the morning. I planned the least congested route, which happened to be the same roads I learn to drive on, so many years ago.
The flaw in my plan was not to consider this town’s population has more than tripled since I was learning to drive. There are no uncongested roads.
Girl Twin pulled the car out of the parking lot and started down the road. I could see she was extremely nervous. She was holding the car to a speed slightly under the speed limit. Maybe a little more than slightly. She seemed to be getting comfortable. I noticed in the mirror we were being followed by a couple cars. OK, it was six, we were being followed by six cars. The first of the six cars was right on our back bumper. Before I could ask girl Twin to speed up, this fool decided to pass Girl Twin. The fool passed putting his car close enough to Girl Twin they could have shook hands. He proceeded to cut in front of Girl Twin. She didn’t panic. I told Girl Twin, “You handled that great. When you get a little older, I will have Grandma teach you a one-finger wave she uses when that happens to her.”
My construction career took a left turn this past Friday. I left the company I have been with for the last four years. I’ve known since January it was time to make a change, but until Friday morning I didn’t know that Friday would be the day.
My career has taken me to many strange places. I’ve worked on a fast food restaurant in Denham Springs, Louisiana, big box stores in Chicago and Richmond, Virginia, gas stations in El Paso, Texas and Salt Lake City, and a casino in Central City, Colorado, not to mention a few hundred houses along the way. I have ridden in a car with a billionaire and two millionaires to a construction project. (We stopped at a convenience store and bought lotto tickets. We pooled twenty dollars each and bought eighty tickets. It was one of the millionaire’s idea. The billionaire asked the millionaire “What the (construction language) do I need to win the lotto for? I will give you guys twenty dollars for this and that's it!” I heaved a sigh of relief hearing that, because twenty dollars was the exact amount I had in my pocket. Turns out the billionaire didn't need to worry about it. We didn’t win the lotto. Our twenty-dollar investment netted each of us eleven dollars.) I have sat across the table from a U.S. Senator in this crazy career. I have been asked to pray with a carpenter in the under construction attic of a national cafeteria chain. I have been shown a gun by a sub-contractor that did not receive his check on the day it was promised. Elaine wants me to put it in a book, but who would want to read that?
Last January, a company I had built a couple things for over the last few years contacted me. (Like at the mall.) I drug my feet, knowing that I would need to accept their offer at some point. Weirdly, during the last couple of months a friend and ex-partner and I have been talking about doing a couple house and basement remodels together (which we are really good at).
So needless to say this crazy life has taken a much needed turn. I couldn’t be happier, except now I need to decide what to do. I can’t write a book until the kids are out of school (and I develop some talent). I'm listening to ideas.
Our crazy lives!
Monner