I have submitted a few stories about my father-in-law, including this one. My father-in-law is a pretty smart man, especially when it comes to anything construction, and the company he has worked with for several decades really trusts him, although they have questioned his actions on a few occasions. This is a story of one of those times. 

[Father-In-Law]’s boss had him go across state lines to bid on a job. [Father-In-Law] really didn’t want to because it was a two-and-a-half-hour ride that he knew would be rough on the men in his crew. He got down there as the State representative for the Department of Transit was going over the job. Apparently, the job was partially completed. It was a rather long stretch of a new highway connecting two other highways. The problem was that the previous contractor had started the project at both ends with the plan to meet in the middle. Yeah, you already see where this is heading. They didn’t plan well, and the ends were at least a mile apart. So, instead of doing the right thing and fixing the problem, the company decided that since the state foolishly paid fully upfront, they would go out of business, thus providing no way for the state to get the money back.

The State representative made it clear that this job had to be done quickly. Some big politician had made this highway a big part of his campaign, and now his reputation was on the line. The representative said that whoever got this job had to complete it in thirty days.

Father-In-Law: “Excuse me, sir. This job won’t take thirty days. It will—”

At this point, the representative went on a cussing tirade that he knew what he was talking about and it WOULD take thirty days and that was all there is to it because they had to redo over twenty miles of the road.

My father-in-law decided then and there that he didn’t even want to fool with this guy. Plus, it was a long drive for his crew. He overbid the job. In construction, especially big jobs, if a company doesn’t want the job, they will still bid on it because it makes them look good. If they don’t want it, they will place a high enough bid that they know they will not get it. Well, turns out [Father-In-Law] didn’t bid high enough. His company was the lowest bid.

His boss and the owner of the company called my [Father-In-Law] in for a meeting.

Boss: “What were you thinking? We looked at this and we stand to lose over $200,000.”

Father-In-Law: “Lose? No, we will make a whole lot more then that.” *Turning to the owner* “Look. You’ve known me for a long, long time. Have I ever let you down? Do you trust me or not?”

Owner: “No, you haven’t. But this… I don’t see how you can do this.” *Pauses* “But I do trust you.”

Father-In-Law: “Okay, look at this contract.” *Points to a clause* “This is how we are going to make money.”

Boss: “With the early completion bonus?”

Most large construction contracts have what is called an Early Completion Bonus Clause. This is where they pay a certain amount of money for each day the job is completed ahead of schedule. These can vary from a few thousand to millions.

Father-In-Law: “With the clause that the State representative put in there himself of $20,000 a day for early completion. Now, I want to make a bet with you. If I make this company money, which I will, I get a week off and each member of my crew gets a week’s bonus pay.”

Owner: “You seem mighty sure of yourself. You got yourself a deal.”

[Father-In-Law] went back to his crew and filled them in on his plan to fix the problem. They were at first not very happy until he told them about the bonus. They went wholeheartedly into it. The crew worked themselves from sunup to sundown and some, like my [Father-In-Law], slept in their vehicles so they wouldn’t have to make the five-hour daily commute.

The job was completed… in eight days! [Father-In-Law] said the solution was easier than anyone had proposed if they had just bothered to look at the layout of the land. All that was required was a change in about a two-mile stretch. 

The State representative was thrilled until he got the bill for not only the $200,000 but the request for over $400,000 of Early Completion Bonus. The representative balked at it at first, but when presented with the contract HE HIMSELF had written, he had no choice but to authorize payment.

The owner was so thrilled that he gave the crew a full two weeks bonus and a week off paid. [Father-In-Law] spent his week off working on his old truck and taking the grandkids fishing.

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This Lesson Really Stings, Part 3

While doing my grocery shopping, I grab a box clearly labeled as apple turnovers, but I happen to notice a bit of blue syrup leaking from one of them. I find an employee.

Me: “This box is labeled apple turnovers, but I’m pretty sure they’re blueberry. See, this one is leaking something blue.”

Employee: “Oh, yeah, sometimes they put on the wrong labels.”

Me: “Okay. Well, I don’t want to buy this. Can you take it back and see about getting an accurate label printed for it?”

Employee: “What difference does it make? They’re the same price.”

Me: “But they’re not the same flavor!”

Did they really not get that some people might want apple and not want blueberry? Did they assume that almost nobody would bother reading the label anyway, so as long as it scanned at the right price it would be fine? And scariest of all, were they RIGHT in that assumption? I’ve never heard anyone else complaining about the misleading labels, even though the employee said it was a common problem, and I’ve seen other mislabeled pastries since then.

I’ve submitted a few stories about my pain-in-the-rear mother-in-law, including this one.

This happened when the kids were still very young and before we changed our locks. 

My mother always had a bit of advice for the girls in our family: never mess with another woman’s man or kitchen cabinets. My mother-in-law never followed that advice.

I came home and into my highly-organized kitchen and couldn’t find stuff. Y’all, she had so messed up my kitchen organization.

Mother-In-Law: “Oh, I straightened your kitchen up. It was so silly how you had stuff arranged.”

Me: “EXCUSE ME? I had it arranged exactly how I wanted it. How dare you?!”

She knew this would upset me.

Mother-In-Law: “WELL! See if I ever do anything for you again.”

My husband, who was still in the fog at that time about his mother, actually fussed at me because, after all, his mother was just doing something nice. (He now sees it was just a control thing for her.)

The next week, while she was at work, I went into her house and rearranged her kitchen. I put pans in the laundry room above the washer and dryer and dishes under the sink, laid her utensils out on a cabinet shelf, poured the sugar in several old butter containers — you get the gist. When she got home, she came storming over, demanding to know if I was in her house.

Me: *Smirking* “Why, yes. I was so thankful for you reorganizing my kitchen that I wanted to thank you by redoing yours while you were working. It was such a mess, and I spent alllllllll day working on it.”

Husband: “Oh, that is so nice, isn’t it, Mom?”

She just spit out something and left. She never messed with my kitchen cabinets again. Game, set, match.

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My family has always been blessed/cursed with extremely bright cats. Several of us have stories about how we’ve been outsmarted by our own pets, but my favorite is my mom’s.

When I was a kid, Mom had several indoor/outdoor cats, the kittens of a feral cat she befriended. Since microchip cat doors weren’t affordable – they may not have even been available – at the time, and Mom was absolutely not willing to have a flap that anything could come through in her front door, we let the cats in and out manually.

When a cat wanted to come inside, it would sit at the front door and meow. Mom quickly learned to check to make sure the cat’s mouth was empty before opening the screen door, because they kept trying to smuggle rodents into the house to hunt later. We were fine with them hunting – there were a lot of mice around and no endangered species that we knew of – but not bringing prey inside!

One evening, Mom heard a very clear “Mew?” from outside. It sure didn’t sound like the cat had anything in her mouth, but she opened the door and looked anyway. The cat looked up at her, and even seemed to be turning her head from side to side as if to demonstrate, “See? I don’t have anything!”

Mom opened the screen door, and the cat took two steps into the house, bent over, and deposited a live, extremely unhappy mouse onto the floor. As near as we could work out afterward, she must have pinned it while she meowed, then gotten the whole thing – including the tail! – into her mouth in the time it took Mom to come to the door.

Mom eventually caught the mouse and released it outside, and from then on, the cats had to open their mouths before they could come inside.

I have told several stories about my father-in-law, including this one. This story is actually about the man my father-in-law went to work for when he first started working in construction decades ago. We’ll call him Dave. My father-in-law said this older man taught him everything he knew about construction. Dave was smart, a hard worker, and tough as nails.

One day, Dave fell off a ladder and heard a sickening crack in his arm. My father-in-law could see that Dave’s arm was broken, but thankfully, the skin was not broken. Dave went to the site boss and told him he’d broken his arm. The boss said he could leave for the hospital but Dave wouldn’t get paid for the day.

Dave told my father-in-law to run to his car and get an old shirt and a roll of duct tape. I won’t describe here what Dave did because it is not a wise thing to do. Anyway, with some… pulling and help from my father-in-law, he got the bone reset. Dave then cut off the sleeve of the old shirt and put it over the broken arm. With my father-in-law’s help, he duct-taped a piece of wood to the arm and went back to work.

After they got off of work that evening, Dave asked my father-in-law to drive him to the hospital. They walked into the emergency room. After taking most of his information, the nurse asked:

Nurse: “Is that really duct tape around your arm?”

Dave: “Yes.”

The nurse ran and got the doctor, who immediately got him into the X-ray.

Doctor: “Well, Dave, it’s really broken. But you did a great job setting it. I don’t think I could have done better. We are going to put a new cast on it, but I have to ask why you didn’t come in earlier. Why did you wait to come in?”

Dave: “If I had come in, I wouldn’t have gotten paid. I’m poor. My family needs this paycheck to eat.”

They put a new cast on it. The doctor made sure there was no bill. The next day, Dave showed up on the job site and went to work, even using a hammer with the broken arm.

My father-in-law said he learned so much from Dave — although learning how to set a broken arm with duct tape was not among the things he would have guessed.

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This Lesson Really Stings, Part 3
This Lesson Really Stings, Part 2