So I can't remember if I've told this story, but it was several years ago and involved my landlord.
I lived in a one-level triplex, and the landlord/owners were pretty cool. They lived in Alaska, and generally left us tenants alone. There is a huge *however* included. When they did pop down to inspect their properties, they would stay a couple weeks and try to do everything themselves. Or, schedule lots of stuff all at once and not tell us. Yeah, one day I woke up to a freaking tree being taken down about 6' from my window.
But this is a different tale...
Anyways, this was a DIY failure. I get home from work, early as it was slow. What do I do? I boot up my laptop, and turn on the tv. I still had cable tv service at the time. Oh, noes! Nothing works! After doing the whole check the cables, turn everything off, unplug, reconnect, repeat several times, I have the brilliant idea of going outside.
The back yard had a major drainage problem* and the landlord had mentioned some months previously that he intended on putting in a drainage system. Here's what he did! Flew in, called the "Call Before You Dig" number, waited like two seconds and dug anyway. So as I walk outside I see this big trench, I follow it until I see a bunch of cables totally destroyed. As I'm staring at this, who walks up, but the utility guy. We had a moment of mutual WTF? And he said that he got out there really fast, this was early afternoon, and he only got the call in the late morning. They aren't magical creatures who can just pop up at the snap of the fingers. So the landlord had to pay out the nose to get it all fixed, but if he had waited one or two more hours he would have saved all that money.
*A private school had been built behind our triplexes, and they had NOT put in a proper drainage system. Said school fully knew what they had done and gave not one f*ck.
I lived in a one-level triplex, and the landlord/owners were pretty cool. They lived in Alaska, and generally left us tenants alone. There is a huge *however* included. When they did pop down to inspect their properties, they would stay a couple weeks and try to do everything themselves. Or, schedule lots of stuff all at once and not tell us. Yeah, one day I woke up to a freaking tree being taken down about 6' from my window.

Anyways, this was a DIY failure. I get home from work, early as it was slow. What do I do? I boot up my laptop, and turn on the tv. I still had cable tv service at the time. Oh, noes! Nothing works! After doing the whole check the cables, turn everything off, unplug, reconnect, repeat several times, I have the brilliant idea of going outside.
The back yard had a major drainage problem* and the landlord had mentioned some months previously that he intended on putting in a drainage system. Here's what he did! Flew in, called the "Call Before You Dig" number, waited like two seconds and dug anyway. So as I walk outside I see this big trench, I follow it until I see a bunch of cables totally destroyed. As I'm staring at this, who walks up, but the utility guy. We had a moment of mutual WTF? And he said that he got out there really fast, this was early afternoon, and he only got the call in the late morning. They aren't magical creatures who can just pop up at the snap of the fingers. So the landlord had to pay out the nose to get it all fixed, but if he had waited one or two more hours he would have saved all that money.
*A private school had been built behind our triplexes, and they had NOT put in a proper drainage system. Said school fully knew what they had done and gave not one f*ck.
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