Žarko and his pal have gone to move some pilot's furniture. I drove them to somewhere on the boulevard, in the older and shabbier area where it becomes just an ordinary street - the other street that follows its direction east, Laskin, is the proper boulevard-like four laner, with shopping blocks on both sides, almost all the way to the downtown proper, i.e. the 3-4 streets which are parallel with the boardwalk.
They only had to load stuff into the truck. Made a 100$ each. The guy drove them back.
In the evening they packed, and I got them to the chinese bus. There are two "stations" - one of them doubles as a restaurant in daytime - and the girl at the farther one didn't speak much English, only "bus full, no ticket". At the other one they were put on standby, and eventually got in.
I'm writing this three days later, and they still didn't call. No news is good news.
Later I heard the story that they were surprised that we gave them 200$ "for the road", which Aleksandar later commented with "they were happy to see your backs".
Paid 10$ for my skype subscription - so I get the low rate phone calls. Customers, and perhaps these two guys, if need be. Also, to call home. And then it seems the payment went twice, so I got one back.
Dad emailed us, small stuff. He put on a new, 100mm house number, as the old traditional one was long gone. The guy from the vineyard came and put the insect screen panes as the outer door. Took all day, as this was the first time he did something of the kind. Dad also cleaned the moss off our terrace, using the same old adze that we have, says it had to be sharpened twice. He then called Prletić and they took a good look at it. He proposes to 1) remove some hill soil, including staircase, to clean the front side, so all the openings can be protected; 2) to wall up both basement windows and then shovel soil on them, because as they are they have no function in airing the space, a fan would be more efficient; 3) to level the soil so the rainwater flows to the walnut in the middle of the backyard, not to the basement wall; 4) on top of the current concrete board, bitulit and reinforcement net, then concrete at a certain slope; between putting the net and pouring the concrete, no high heels narrower than 10mm while the bitulit settles. He had no estimate because the supplier didn't quote yet. Told us not to think of the price, even without the money from vineyard he has the means to cover the expense.
Wow. This guy made several mistakes: 1) there are no holes, the basement wall is waterproof concrete on the outside, brick on the inside, the only hole is that crack in the plate. 2) there's significant draft through those windows, which he could easily remember from the time his boys were building that chimney (on 12-XI-1993.). 3) There's nothing wrong with water going to the wall, there's a sewer going from somewhere between the windows all the way to the septic tank, but he didn't look there.
And on top of that we never liked the guy. So the response was to shoo him away and not let him in at all.
At work... skype:
22:42:19 Jan:
my condoleances for losing the EC footbal < 21 .. (talk)
22:42:49 me: football? what football?
22:43:16 Jan: Netherlands - Serbia (4-1)
22:43:22 me: I'm completely out of sports where you pay to watch the commercials. Specially american footbal... well they get their heads up each other asses, then someone farts and they all run around like crazy trying to catch the guy. After five seconds they're too tired and have a break. Then commercials.
He was drinking Amstel, Heineken not being his favorite. Prefers Grolsch, also belgian Palm.
Talked some about our status - the latest is that there's some talk about a Z visa, whereby I'd become a plain gastarbajter, or wait a couple of years until either of the girls can import us as close relatives, „but with the speed of the current admin, those two steps may take 8 years“. To which he said „Well hang on there... or else, go back to serbia, get internet and work from there.“
26-VI-2007 - 25-III-2026