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Post by steev on Mar 21, 2015 21:48:25 GMT -5
While I get Joseph's point about the guy that can't be fired, even though he makes all the mistakes, my guy like that learns from his mistakes( mostly by the third repeat ).
No, Holly, you wouldn't show up to work, having far too much of your own to do.
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Post by blackox on Mar 22, 2015 14:51:32 GMT -5
Hey, I'm a home-stuck veg-head that doesn't have much to do on the family farm (it's small, and any available work disappears fast with teamwork). I can be lazy and somewhat dull sometimes (I'm not the best at weeding and don't enjoy doing it either) but I do know how to pull myself out of a chair and can take a beating, and I am a fast learner when it comes to things that I actually have interest in. I've bailed straw in 90*F+ many times, that's about the most back-breaking work I've done so far - still trying to find my boundaries. I'm interested in about everything that's been mentioned on this forum plus more, and would one day like to lead a lifestyle similar to many of you. If everything goes right - (landlord says that we need to be out of the house in Early August) - I should be helping flowerweaver this summer. Maybe she can provide some sort of review. |
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Post by flowerweaver on Mar 22, 2015 15:52:58 GMT -5
Well, if it all works out, blackox will be our summer intern and I hope to give him a good review. He will get some experience with desert farming of which he is very interested and we will have an intelligent extra hand. By this month's end everything should be tilled and planted. The summer is mostly about larger projects (perhaps the new greenhouse which was interrupted by the tornado), and keeping things alive (troubleshooting the wonky irrigation system), and keeping up with harvests. Fortunately most of our weeds are wildflowers. Some of our friends who run a local meat goat ranch have had very bad luck with both lazy local teens and woofers who, as already pointed out, seldom have the experience they tout. |
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Post by reed on Mar 22, 2015 17:53:57 GMT -5
Experience in a helper is like college name letters, don't mean squat. It's interest and liking to work that count. Although knowing how it feels to throw square bales on a moving wagon in 90+ degrees and still having interest is a pretty good sign.
Weirdest thing, on the dirt road from the field to the barn at my Grand Dad's we would ride on the edge of the wagon or on top the hay, several times we would jump off and pick up Indian Head pennies that we spied it the dirt. Always wondered where they came from. He was long dead before it ever occurred to me that he put them there. In any case I still have them.
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Post by 12540dumont on Mar 22, 2015 17:57:13 GMT -5
I forgot about the best employee on the farm, "Leo". He gets up early, hits the fields. I have to drag him back for breakfast, lunch and dinner. He sees me leave the field to make lunch, but won't come in to eat, even if he's eying baby chicks as a lunch snack...or some of these blue bellied lizards. Ever since he saw Templeton's photo, he keeps thinking he can stay out there with 2 slices of white bread.
Leo can fix irrigation, catch wandering sheep, herd cats, he pulls weeds, digs, fixes everything I break with never a whimper.
Me, I'm whimpering something awful right about now. Since 10 this morning, I've been planting tomatoes, onions and celeriac. Leo dug in the baskets and tilled the rows. Now it's kneel, plant, stand up, kneel, plant, stand up. Shovel more compost. Get another tray. It's 4 p.m. and I have snuck back to the house to see what in the world we are going to have for dinner.
Looks like grilled sausage, garlic bread, soup and salad.
I still have more tomatoes, the fennel, and leeks to go and to fertilize the tomatoes before I quit for the day.
Winge, whine. Wine, wine, I need wine, a cold beer, an iced adult beverage. Steev, how are my clones coming? Spring, it's that time of year when everything moves from 3/4 waltz time to 2/4 Hungarian Dances. Whirl, damn you, whirl girl.
Back to the barn. I forgot where I set the fish emulsion down. I accidentally killed the RG Bold Flavor Tomato. There was only one of them. 2 baby chicks died. The corn arrived and is ready to put in trays. Where is that inadequate help when I need her? If she had a hammock, she'd be there.
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Post by steev on Mar 22, 2015 20:04:15 GMT -5
Holly, Holly, Holly; YOUR clones!? I don't even know what happened to mine. Had I married a young woman from Eastern Europe or the Philippines, back when I ordered those clones, I'd practically have homegrown help by now. So much for biotech; traditional breeding is more reliable, though not infallible, I say ruefully.
You're right, though, the tempo of work has gone nearly overnight from funeral dirge to klezmer; I always have a hard transition from bass drum to clarinet. The wretched vetch on the farm is literally doubling its size weekly; I am fighting back, weakly. I'm up to my shpookies in 6-pack seedlings too small to pot up or transplant; it's uncommonly warm and I expected another couple months of cool. I'm definitely going to till in plenty of fire-extinguisher fertilizer and take a shot at very early corn; I think I have enough Joseph's Cherry Sweet, Mandan Lavender, and Oaxaca Green to spare, chancing frost-kill.
I'm sure those two chicks were the ones I was going to take off your hands, so I'm off the hook.
BTW, warn Leo that if he chooses to dine on Sceloporus ala T, he should skin them; those scales can have a very emetic effect; though that might bring him out of the field more frequently., unless he hides behind the favas.
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Post by steev on Apr 1, 2015 0:42:36 GMT -5
The newest guy I've started (this week) is getting chesty because I have the (apparently) stupid idea that he should put tools back where he found them, (rather than dumping them in the bed of the truck) so we can tell at a glance whether we're missing something, so I don't have to piss away 3/4 or an hour going back to find the missing tool, when it's hidden under a bag of trash in the truck. I don't know whether he has any clue how short his learning curve is, before he finds himself free to seek other employment. Really, I have neither the patience nor the profit margin to put up with this crap. It seems more and more often that I have to say "You can do things my way, or your way, but if you don't do them my way, you don't work for me." Why does it seem to me that that was commonly understood to be how things worked? I know, I'm so old school.
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Post by templeton on Apr 1, 2015 2:01:57 GMT -5
Well I got a couple of hours out of a new student worker today, turning beds for me. Poor bugger had a very serious hangover, but put in a good couple of hours, nonetheless. He got bonus veges from the garden, in addition to my generous pay rate. Two hours was all his hangover, and my ache-y back could stand.
T
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Post by steev on Apr 1, 2015 19:55:54 GMT -5
Another Wednesday quitting-time announcement that a new guy can't/won't come to work Thursday! The initial understanding was Monday through Thursday, year-round. If he shows on Monday, he'll get to meet his replacement, whom I'll hire tomorrow, work having been scheduled a week ago. Thirty-five years' experience leads me to expect 6-8 more flakes before I find a stayer/keeper interested enough to learn to tell shit from apple butter.
Sigh. Had I stayed in the chemical/pharmaceutical industry I'd have made a lot more money, gotten a pension ( and not unlikely, cancer, as did a dozen folks I knew or knew of ), and be retired ( had I survived ), but noooo! So here I am: poor (arguably); honest (arguably); healthy as a hog (indubitably).
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Post by steev on Apr 7, 2015 1:29:30 GMT -5
Speaking of shit from apple butter: the guy that's been with me for a year was told to rip out Crocosmia (tall, bulbs, seed-pods); he also ripped out Douglas iris (short, no bulbs, no seed-pods, different shade of green); having had that error pointed out to him, he also ripped out bearded iris (no bulbs, no seed-pods, different shade of green). Now, my question is: when I find somebody who can tell shit from apple butter, is this guy going to understand why I'm firing him? I won't bet "yes".
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Post by reed on Apr 7, 2015 4:21:34 GMT -5
One time my sister decided to hoe my corn patch for me, she did an apparently good job. Next day I could see before we got off the school bus that the corn was all tipped over. We ran over to the corn patch and before I could stop myself I said something like "O'NO you chopped off its anchor roots!", she cried. I propped it all back up and told her it was fine but she still cried, it was awful. It was fine, just a little crooked at the bottom but she cried again later when we ate it. Don't really know what this has to do with your problem, just reminded me of it.
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Post by 12540dumont on Apr 7, 2015 14:19:13 GMT -5
Many years ago, when the dino's still roamed and I lived in a small town, I had "Iris Virus". This is a technical term for being bitten by the Iris bug. In particular the Clara B. Reese Iris Society bug. I have always had a love for iris. But I had gone mad. I planted my entire front garden, side garden and back garden with iris. Every color, historical, re-bloomers, scented, bi-color. My garden was on the scheduled garden tour. At the time I also worked full time and went to school nights. I wanted the garden to look perfect so I hired a gardener to do the weeding the week before the event.
I came home to find out that they had weed wacked with a string trimmer the entire garden. (And they wanted to be paid). Apparently they had never heard of Hand pulling weeds. My entire bloom for the season was ruined. Not a bloom to be salvaged. They were lucky I didn't put garden stakes through their hearts. I cried.
Well, this cured my iris virus. I was too ashamed to ever return to the society. I was then bitten by antique roses, followed by the vegetable virus...which still has me in a strangle hold. I'd let Steev weed my garden....but not his crew. And what's wrong with Crocosmia?
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Post by steev on Apr 7, 2015 16:39:17 GMT -5
Only thing wrong with Crocosmia is that it can self-seed wildly, and had gotten mixed in with things they wanted to see better.
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Post by steev on Jul 23, 2015 21:55:22 GMT -5
So this week, the guy who couldn't distinguish Douglas iris or bearded iris from Crocosmia really hit his stride. I have three clients, close together, which he's done many times. We went there; I told him to shear the hedge of #1, which runs along the sidewalk and up to the house's corner, and showed him the neighboring side, for which we aren't responsible, pointing out that we do the top and inside; I left to do other work, returning to find him at #2, the side half of #1 hedge untouched; I took him back, show-and-tell, we don't shear this SIDE; we shear the top and inside; I left for other work. I returned to find him at #3, pulling weeds in the back, having walked up stairs and a path bordered by shrubs that REALLY needed shearing/pruning; hadn't occurred to him that that was something to do; just because the occupants passed that daily, why would that need attention?
I pointed that out and took him back to #1, which he hadn't touched; pointed out (for the third time) that it must be sheared on top and inside, up to the house; went to do other work. Came back to find that he'd taken care of #3, but had only done #1 squared off at the sidewalk section. Now, at no time did I vilify him, neither in English nor Spanish (my command of colloquial Spanish is woefully inadequate and I pale beside Mexican invective, which,I am told, rivals Yiddish, though I am no qualified judge of either). If I could communicate in (American regional) English with this guy, I think we'd not have had this problem, because my statements would have made sense and stuck in his head.
So the glass is half-empty; he quit; the glass is half-full; I didn't have to fire him.
My 7-8 year helper, who periodically quits because he gets better work/pay (he's got a family here to support, so no fault) is mulling my offer of better pay with his wife and will let me know ASAP. It's a cascade kind of thing: if I pay him more, I have to raise my rates; I may lose clients, but I think I'm better keeping him (he knows me, my expectations, and my clients). Down the road, I'll likely want to sell my clients to him. Besides which, we communicate well, and I hope for his help in building a house on the farm, without which, my sweetheart will never go here; it's all so inter-connected, kind of like the ecosystem.
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Post by steev on Jul 27, 2015 21:39:11 GMT -5
So the good helper shows up today and tells me he'll work today, but not tomorrow, unless he gets another 50 cents per hour (I'd offered him an 11%+ raise, but his wife needed to bargain, apparently). I haven't been able to raise my rates for ten years and with the drought, it's a bad time to try, so raising his pay comes right off the top, so I said that can't be done.
It turned out that he couldn't come Tuesday because he had to go take his driver's test at the DMV, of course, that would cost him a full day of bureaucratic delight; I'm so glad I'm old enough and un-ticketed enough to deal with this through the mail; his experience will be more like lining up to buy TP in the Soviet Union.
He conferred with his wife during the day, as I knew he would (these guys are all far more wired to mobile than I am; I admit to not wanting to be in touch every moment; well, I don't think it's that bad, but it has been suggested that I don't want to be in touch at any moment; well, maybe true, that).
Comes quitting time, I said "So, you're not coming back, tomorrow". He announced that my offer was good through the year's end; we can work with that, but he still has to deal with the DMV, poor guy.
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