First time gaffing

When I started everyone had to gaff. Gaffing is when you climb a telephone pole using tiny spikes on your boots, and then strap on with your belt harness when you get to the top. I never liked it. When I was young we would get drunk and climb the water tower in town, and I would always get half way and have to go down...forcing everyone under me to go down. Then, being drunk I'd forget why I was the only one at the bottom and climb up again to repeat the process. My drunk self knows I don't like heights, my sober self knows it right away.

So here I am learning to gaff and saying in my mind I will never use this, and I will learn to use my ladder. I get to the top of the pole, and I am instructed to belt off and hang out.

I do so.

I am up there and I see a scissor-tail flycatcher  perched on the pole opposite me. It darts out over the wall and circles. It goes up, and then jackknifes straight down, pinching a moth in its beak and brings it back to sit and eat opposite of me. I never thought about the term flycatcher until then. They do actually hunt flies/moths.

I have gaffed twice since then after 8 years, and the last of those two I almost fell of the pole hence why I turned in my gaffs when I was allowed to.

BTW--I stream of consciousness these posts. Give me shit on grammatical issues and I will flip you the bird in my mind. You know who you are. 

Boy toy

Most of my stories are recollections from years past. This one happened this week.

My town is known to have a large homosexual population, and that doesn't bother me. Everyone likes cable. This apt was interesting because the young guy was flaming. He had a short tube top on, and his pants were cut so every time he slowly bent over to pick up things around me his crack would show, and he wasn't fat either. I had to quickly turn away, lest I gag. It may be your cup of tea, but it isn't mine fella.

Well, about half way through install, the owner shows up. This guy is in his 50's-60's and is the spitting image of a friend of my father in law, except for the earring in his left ear. So here is this old guy and this young boy toy talking and fighting over their little yorkie dog and about how to get it to stop barking, and I am laughing cause the old guy is the doppelganger of a family friend. I finish the install and leave.

Kangaroo lady

There is this lady in town who used to have a kangaroo she let roam on her property. She was on a hill in the woods so it wasn't a big deal. After several years of her having this kangaroo, it extended its range and would hop down to the road. The city caught wind, and made legislation specifically that people cannot have Kangaroos in city  limits.

She had to get rid of her kangaroo. When I walked up to her house and asked about the giant stuffed kangaroo in her front window, she gave me that story with a tear.

My Small world story

I was working on an older gents house, and he was a follower. He asked if I minded him following to see what I was doing. I gladly let him, so he could learn about how his cabling worked. We talked cable for a bit while my hands kept busy fixing, and then he noticed my last name. 

     He mentioned he knew a guy with my last name, and asked if I had family around. I said no, as my family came through with BNSF, and my dad moved on while I stayed. He mentioned the guy's name, and that was my dad's name. I said naw, couldn't be, he was here 25 years ago. He said, that is the right time frame. 

I called up my dad right there, and sure enough he knew the guy. My dad remembered because they both worked sales together, and my dad used the term "Hey don't Jew me down." to a customer. The guy who was following me was Jewish, and overheard it. They had the conversation about how that was a racist/anti semite remark. Thus they remembered each other.

The guy turned out to have a hobby. He makes prize winning jams and jellies. He wins the state fair every other year, and gave me some of his Jelly. He then cursed about the guy who takes the prize from him every other year. They both have the name Jim. The Jelly Jims. I thanked him after fixing his cable, we shook hands, and I took the Jelly home. My family loved it.

That week I was cleaning my backyard and met the guy who lives behind me. His name is Jim. He makes Jellies, and every other year some asshole named Jim takes the prize from him at the state fair.  He gave me some of his Jellies. My family loved his Jellies also. 

I live in a suburb of a rather largish city.

Small world.

Alarm Bongs

Recently I was installing an alarm system in a house in a lower middle class neighborhood. People want systems for numerous reasons, and seeing the pictures of kids and wife in the house led me to think the guy wanted a system to protect his family.

I was wrong.

I had to run a line to the camera on the front porch. The line was going to go through the attic. The Customer insisted that he accompany up in the rafters, to understand what I was doing. So he said. 

Rather than watch me while up in the attic I noticed he mainly stood in one specific spot and watched from there, even though he couldn't see me that well due to the darkness and direction of my head lamp. On my way back through the attic I looked him in the eye, and my headlamp illuminated him/flash blinding him while I talked....He couldn't see my eyes, and I looked past him at his massive bong collection hiding in the insulation.

    Pretty sure this guy was a pot dealer, hence the alarm system.  I've got no qualms with pot, so I let him be.

The Turtle Man

It was a spring several years ago.  I remember this one well because it's one I tell my friends often.

 Part of being a cable person is being observant. I, with my tool belt on and my meter on my shoulder, was walking up a driveway and noticed a small dead bird laying in the grass beside the drive. I continue walking and knock on the door. No answer. I ring the bell. No answer. I walk back down the drive and hear someone hollering that they are here. I smile and greet them at the door.

He looks like a fat Wayne from Wayne's World. He has the ball cap, long black hair, and a printed black t-shirt. He is 40, I know because it is the first thing he tells me and that he lives with his baptist preacher parents. I instruct him to take me to the tv having the problems. He leads me upstairs to a bedroom. I immediately avert my eyes from the bed covered in brown stains and tunnel vision lock on the television. He notices my quick eye diversion and says don't worry its from his turtle. He then lifts a pillow and pulls a box turtle from his bead. "He has to sleep in bed with me because if he doesn't he will bang his head against the glass of his aquarium all night."

OK.

I look at the television.  While looking at said tv, flipping channels, trying to find any problem at all, customer asks if I am a Marine.

"No." I say.
"Did you see the dead bird in the drive?" He asks.
"Yes."
"They shot it.  They hid in the woods in my backyard and shot it." He continued. "They watch me. They even send their kids on their bicycles to come over and alter the green can by the road that controls the cable." He leans closer. "I know they do. They even tap my phone."

I look at him curiously, still needing something to fix. "What's wrong with your phone?"

"It buzzes."

I can fix buzzes, so I offer to fix his phone. He takes me to it and continues. "I'm ok with the government listening in, but I dont think cable companies have the right to listen. I want them to stop, and I want them to quit hiding in my backyard."

I naturally trust people and want to help, thus why I played along as long as I did, but at this I told him I have to go check outside. I go to my truck and check.  He has his phone through a competitor.   I call my manager and tell him I don't know what to fix here and that the customer is crazy. 
"He's crazy?" My manager asked.
"He says we have ex-marines employed who watch his house, bug his phone, and shoots birds in his front yard."

"Oh, one of those. Code it customer education and get out of there." My manager said with a straight, non joking voice as if it happens all the time.

After doing this as long as I have, situations like this are a yearly event, and happen to every technician.

Epic use of a staple gun

A staple gun is one of the standard tools used by a cable guy. It is how we attach/run wire around houses with exposed wood. 

One such house happened to have a wasp building a nest right where I was intending on running a cable wire. 
     
My mind ran through several options. I could swat it, go back and get my spray, or hey what's in my hand?

I proceeded to fire an entire clip of staples at the erratically buzzing insect. After about 15 shots I got him. I nicked his wing, and he fell. I then stapled his head to the ground to put him out of his misery. 

Life on the front lines.

My favorite hoarder story

Every cable guy has a hoarder story, mine is kinda unique.

I arrive at the house ready to fix their tv, as it says per the work order. The guy greets me outside and has me walk around the house to enter in through the back door. He has a nice garden outside, and i admire that sort of thing, but what caught me off guard was when we entered.

I walked into the kitchen and immediately knew this is odd. The room was full. It wasn't full of just crap though, it was full of everything one could ever hope to buy that relates to happy birthday. A happy birthday Kermit on the table, surrounded by boxes of wrapping paper. Cards hanging all over, napkins, coasters, candles, the entire kitchen---happy birthday.

The tour goes on.

We enter the living room and walk the path through it. The room is christmas. It is March. 6ft tall toy soldiers line the path, and numerous christmas trees and presents all over.

Get to the stairs...frogs. The entire stairway is covered in frogs. The first room at the top of the stairs is dolls and care bears...and all of them are looking at the entrance. I opened the door, and slowly shut it back. Let's go to the next room.

The next was aliens...et. alien. star wars. The one after that was football.  

The house was so unique that I remember all the rooms, but after so long I forget what the actual problem was and what I did to fix it.

Overall it was a work of art.

Buddy in a tree

Being a cable guy, we spend a lot of time up climbing telephone poles and running aerial lines. We have numerous safety protocols that must be abided by or else we face being written up or worse. 

We have to wear a climbing safety belt, specific boots, eye protection, gloves, and a hard hat. Some guys gaff, but I have opted out of that since it isn't needed so much anymore. I can carry my ladder to just about any pole.

It was late, past 7pm. and about time that I was wanting to head home, but I had to run a drop from a pole to a house.  Problem was, there was a large tree bordering the alley in between. I had been fighting the line through the tree for about thirty minutes already. I had attached it to the old line, and pulled....didn't work. I had thrown it numerous times, always got hung up.

A buddy shows up to assist, and did something that didn't even cross my mind due to all the safety topics we had to sit through over the many years of my employment. He walked up my ladder, into the tree, and walked from branch to branch with the line, and threw it down on the others side. 

He thought off the ladder. It didn't come close to crossing my mind, but it got us home. 

Good guy.

Lady and her adult movies

 I had a trouble call at an apartment complex. I show up and it is a single young mother, attractive, who was having lots of porn movies showing up on her bill. She wanted to contest them to me in person because they were all ordered during hours she was at work and her child was in child care.  No one was home, so she couldn't have ordered them.

We went through all the possibilities and found that the first was ordered on a day that management had sent a guy over to fix something in her kitchen while she was at work. It appears he had been coming back and watching movies on her dime several times a week since.

I taught her how to set up parental locks.

Being a cable guy and dealing with spiders

Where I live there are two main types of spiders you have to worry about, fiddlebacks and black widows.

Fiddlebacks are everywhere. They like woody material that is dry mostly, and around 70 degrees.   They live in your walls, in your couches, under your furniture, everywhere. I smash them on sight.  
They are a light tan/brown and semi translucent. I have been mildly bit by one on my chest, only realizing later that evening. The bite remained a large lump on my chest for a month.

Black widows like pedestals (where cable meets the main line in your backyards.)

They generally live alone. I always knock on the ped before opening, and that scares them down to the bottom. I've caught a few.

The best way is to put a bottle down below them, and then knock on the tap plate, and they will scurry down into the bottle. Cap it, and I got myself a pretty.

Here recently, this last fall, it was dark and one caught me off guard in a ped. I had to squish the poor gal. Thinking I'm ok after she was gone I began my work. Turns out they can live in close proximity to others. She had a sister that nearly got me. The customer was standing over my shoulder with a flash light, and I let out a good yell. We both laughed about it. He used to be in the army.

The difficulties of running new lines

In the southern part of town there are numerous new additions consisting of fairly large houses.   They are nice, I'll give them that, but they are all the same. After walking through around four from the same neighborhood, and the floor plans repeat.

I enter in after the walls are all done, and the televisions are on site (hopefully). However behind every wall plate, the electricians left the bare line tucked in the plastic box in the wall without a fitting on it. So in each of the 20+ outlets I have to pull off plates, attempt to pull the cable from behind the electrical box with damaging it, and then put a fitting on it. This is standard for new builds, but it gives an insight that electricians don't really take into consideration what the cable guy needs done with the wires. Why have an electrical box? All it does is make it more difficult to replace the line if/when the electrician puts a staple in it.

Well one such house had numerous techs to it over the course of 2 years. They put in amps, took them out, swapped fittings, and replaced boxes, but there was always tiling on the tvs. The reason took me very little time to figure out. The main drop from outside leading into the attic--good signal outside, bad signal inside. Duh, replace the drop! Why didn't anyone else do this?

Because to do so would violate many of the rules of the HOA and the the company. 2 years, numerous techs, and everyone attempted something other than the fix because they didn't want to deal with the horrible situation.

Fuck it, I told the customer whats up.

Beautiful neighborhood, and the only way to get it to the upper story was to run it over the gutter, over the shingles and up to the slats that lead into the upper attic. The only way into the upper attic requires a gymnastic move to duck under the heater drain pipes, while crawling along rafters up a slant. Once past that area the upper attic opens into a space large enough to throw a football back and forth in safely. 

I had to let my manager know about the over the shingles/gutter running of a cord because it is atrocious, and as such I got to get a buddy to come out and verify that was the best course. We hung out, ran the cord, and bullshitted afterwards talking before going to our next jobs. 

My back was sore for a couple days due to the funny bending under the heating pipe.  

Gotta Start Somewhere

I have been installing cable for close to a decade now. People just have no idea, it changes you, it changes how you see the world. I hear from family that people should travel, get to see other cultures.

Bah! I meet people from around the world every day. I am in their homes, I hear their languages, I smell their smells, and am offered their foods. 

As a cable person I get to see the numerous ways people interact and the subtle nuances different parts of the world have.

I have conversations with all sorts, from the very dull, to the very enlightening. 

This blog will be my testament to help people understand that you don't really understand people until you get to go into the little worlds that they build for themselves, and call home.