Random thoughts

Sign of the neighborhood

I mentioned here that one company has become the people's choice in the business of connecting our neighborhood homes to the city sewer system, and it all starts with the sign in the yard. As you drive through the neighborhood only one company sign speaks to the work being done. You see it so often and in so many yards you become convinced this is the company to use. Throughout the entire neighborhood there are probably half a dozen signs standing; on our block, however, there is only one - but it's quite mobile.

Our local sign first appeared across the street at the Tanguma's. The company came and performed the work and the sign remained - testimony of a job well done. Then after a period it moved across the street and planted itself in our yard as the harbinger of things to come. The workers came and completed the task and the sign testified in our yard for a period. The other day it moved back across the street to the house straight across from us and work began over there. There should be a neighborhood pool for which yard it will move to next.

Digging Ditches

Which leads me to my second random thought: our house is below street level, so in order for the plumbing company of choice to connect to the city line the workers had to dig a very deep trench and brought in a back hoe to accomplish that. Across the street, the lawn slopes gently down to the street, so two men are digging a rather shallow trench by hand.

As I left the house this morning, I looked across at the two men - both Hispanic - and thought about the reality that in Texas at least, we are dependent on immigrants to dig ditches and do the dirty work. I thought about the the fact that very phrase we use for the most menial labor is "digging ditches." And then I noticed that one of the men was kneeling down, adjusting a sophisticated spinning laser device - marking with a bright red line the exact degree of slope needed for the trench. Even digging ditches has gone high tech.