Podcast Episode #16: Thinking Back To When We Used To Booze It Up On The Jobsite

*For the audio version on Anchor, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or other platforms, this episode is divided into Part A & Part B.* Podcast Episode #16: Thinking Back To When We Used To Booze It Up On The Jobsite

Hello Everyone! The topic for this episode, I am thinking back to when we used to booze it up on the jobsite. One of the things we all used to do regularly in construction, drinking on the job was as normal as working. When I was a first-year apprentice, I was sent out for beer for afternoon break. Nowadays, there is only an afternoon break if you work overtime. This was on the very first job in my construction career. I didn’t bat an eye and did exactly what was asked. As a fresh face, I know I should have found the request as odd. However, it didn’t take long to figure out that this was “normal”. An old timer would say to me to, “never trust a person who doesn’t drink”. I thought about what he said. It made sense at the time. If someone is not willing to get down and have a beer on the job with the crew, that person could very well snitch. I learned quickly that “snitches get stiches”. Twenty-five years ago or more, it felt like you were an odd ball if you didn’t drink. I knew of some co-workers who would work better after drinking all morning. On the other hand, I used to monitor some people’s level of drunkenness. I would not let a guy label wire pulls after about 11:00 AM each work day. I would take care of it for him and he would do other tasks. If I didn’t babysit him, we would end up ringing out a bunch of wires and wasting time. Mind you, I was an apprentice and he was making a hell of a lot more money than I was making. It was the culture to look after people and help them avoid doing dumb stuff. I can’t count how many times my co-workers and I have babysat drunk co-workers. There were guys who left a beer can over each light fixture they wired. Under normal circumstances, it doesn’t take very long to enter a wire in the fixture and splice. This gives you an idea of how hammered these guys would get each day. There were guys who would dump the empties down a finished wall. I loved hearing stories about doing demo in a space years later. While the laborer was removing the wall, he was met with an avalanche of beer cans. It was quite normal to go to the bar as early as 11:30AM for lunch. It was also very common to not leave the bar to go back to work. In the trade, we called that a “nooner”. I cannot honestly say that I never did it in my career. I pulled that move with a journeyman back when I was an apprentice. I got a bad layoff, my first and only ever, two days before Christmas. I talked about that dilemma in detail in my book #ConstructionTales. I was so embarrassed about that situation at the time. I laugh at myself that I opened up enough to document it in my book. I did a few extended bar sessions, during the course of my career, when I wasn’t having to rush home to get my son from daycare. I was on a girl’s private school job, back in 2002, where the entire crew would shape up in the job trailer and stick around till 6-7pm at night. We would watch our general foreman drive down the road for his doctor’s appointment. The general foreman was an absolute gentleman who was enduring cancer treatments. My crew sure as hell made sure to take advantage of the times where he left the job. Once his tail lights disappeared, we all gathered to drink a ton of beer. The acting foreman was a huge drunk who aided in the whole boozing sessions in the job trailer. It was like leaving a fox in charge of the hen house. No Bueno. Guys were doing cocaine on the duct work. That job was a lot of fun and absolutely out of control with the antics. That was a Turner Construction job where Turner was the general contractor. The super would scratch his head and wonder why the hell the entire crew stayed on the job in the trailer for hours instead of going home? We would often play tricks on each other. I need a podcast episode to talk about that job alone. I plan on writing about that jobsite in detail when I get my tail back to writing Construction Tales: Volume 2: My Illuminated Path Continues… My favorite source of high/drunk co-worker stories come from a guy on the job nicknamed “Dirty Sanchez”. His name was similar to his nickname and his reckless behavior on the jobsite earned him the nickname. Dirty started out tipping back a fifth of vodka at lunch. We would sit in our car for lunch when the weather was decent. I would sometimes sleep in my car for lunch or heat my food in the trailer. You would see Dirty in his car drinking straight from the bottle. He would stumble back from the car, through the gates, and back onto the jobsite. Dirty then graduated to smoking weed during lunch. He would come back twisted after lunch. I remember roughing in MC flexible metallic cable with him. I would watch him like an expectant father. He was not allowed in or around live panels while he was “gooned up” after lunch. I would feel horrible, even if it is not remotely my fault, if the man got hurt during my watch. By this point, I was a relatively new journeywoman and Dirty was my partner sometimes. Some people have always said, over the years, that I am soothing to speak with and iron out issues. I have saved some marriages, over the years, by giving out some common-sense advice. At some point, Dirty shared that his girlfriend was pregnant and he was expecting his first child. Once he disclosed his impending family, I became more perplexed by his behavior. I realize that people react differently to stress. I have never believed, no matter how hard the circumstances, that the bottle was a solution to my problems. If anything, hitting the bottle each night makes your problems even worse. Now, I have been dealing with a bunch of back problems for the past five years, so I totally get it. I have gone through a few procedures, doctors, physical therapy, pain and suffering, over the years just to solve the problem. I started using a bunch of Motrin so I could not go out of my mind with the pain. I have cut out the Motrin habit and now use Kratom & CBD as needed when I have pain. I also realized my recent pattern of drinking each night after work to numb the pain, extreme stiffness, and manage stress last year was no good. It was right around the beginning of the pandemic. Upon recognizing the weight gain from working from home and the drinking, I pulled back from the bottle and started walking at night. I recently underwent a procedure where my doctor injected anti-inflammatory fluid to some of the facet joints in my spine. I am having great luck with much less pain than a year ago. My point is, that you have to keep falling, wipe yourself off, and get back up on the horse, and try again. No matter how aggravating shit is, we have to keep coming up with solutions. Here, I think my boozing was a problem that I reigned in after recognizing the pattern. I cannot even imagine going a lot harder than that. Just when I think my issue is a problem, a co-worker of mine will trump it. Back when I was working on a deck job with Dirty, we would chat while working. What I have learned is that men on the job need someone to vent about their life. I took pride in being an ear and a voice of reason for many of my co-workers over the years. I am sure, if I felt comfortable, I would share parts of my life as well. Somehow, Dirty disclosed that he received some drugs in liquid form in the mail from California. Prior to coming into the trade, I had no idea how many different types of drugs there are on the market. I grew up with an overbearing father who ended up sheltering me. My dad ruled with a tight fist and did not allow that in his house. I never even saw him or anyone else take a sip of alcohol. Going into the military at 17-years old was a rude awakening with the drinking! In all fairness, I have learned about drugs from working in construction. I had a co-worker approach me, when I was about 24-years old, with a small, white vial, with rice in the bottom of the vial, while we were working in a high school. I asked him, “what was that?” and he put it back in his pocket. He assumed that I “partied” and he was very wrong. He was also trying to offer drugs as a peace offering for being a dirt bag to me when I first came on the job. My co-worker later on explained that it was cocaine. This dude was bold as hell for having that on his person in a high school. About two-years later, I am on a ladder working with Dirty while he explains what is in his clear vial. I had never heard of angel dust!! He was highly amused by my questions and expressions of amazement and disbelief. Dirty explained that he would use an eye dropper and put the liquid on his blunts. He would then smoke the blunts at lunch and come back TWISTED!!! I was like what!?! You don’t need to be psychic to know that this will not end well for Dirty. Despite Dirty’s reckless disregard for himself or his surroundings, the general foreman and the foreman, known on the job as the #1 & #2, did not discover his antics for a while. Almost our entire crew would go to a well-known dive bar near the job for lunch. In comes Dirty to join the crew for lunch. Toward the end of the lunch where we are going back to work, Dirty pulls out a blunt. He puts it to his mouth and swiftly lights it up at the bar. The entire group rushed to get him to put it away! We were not looking to get into trouble at a bar we all patronized on Fridays for lunch. We all kept watch on Dirty as he became more and more twisted on the job. One time after lunch, Dirty actually starts walking back to work with a Belvedere bottle in his hand. A group of us grabbed him and told him to put the bottle back in his car. The visual of him walking in a left and right slide to the side manner to the jobsite kicking up dirt and dust while holding the bottle by the neck. Dirty was squinting in the sun with his head tilted to the sky looking absolutely out of his mind!! It was around this time that Dirty’s task was a ¾” conduit run. He needed to use the stud punch to knock out one hole for each conduit. Dirty got distracted, staired out to the nearby parkway, and just started punching out a bunch of holes. By the time Dirty waked up from his stupor, he had a pile of one inch round pieces of metal at his feet and an entire section of metal stud gone!! His foreman showed up in the work area and yelled at Dirty. It must have been hard to not laugh at the mess! He told him, “I don’t know why the hell you did that but you better get a piece of bottom track and fix that ASAP!” Once we finished roughing in some office sections and conduit runs, it was time for the wire pulls. When you are on long wire pulls, there is some down time. This work was easy for Dirty to lay low and avoid detection. Depending on where we were in the building, we would all keep an eye on him. Just when you think it was good low-key work for Dirty, he screws himself up. We must lubricate large bundles of wires prior and during the process of pulling in the wire into a conduit run. The easiest job sometimes is to give a co-worker the wire lubrication task. Depending on the level of difficulty, wire can be pulled by a group by hand or a machine is installed in the deck or wall and mechanically pulls the wire. We have used the hitch on a truck to pull wire when we are desperate for some help on at least one job that I remember. While lathering the wire with lubricant, some people want to use gloves and a rag and some opt to use their bare hands. When I was tasked with the lubricant job, I always preferred to use my bare hands. Of course, the temptation to make jokes while lubricating wire was way too high. I often engaged in dirty banter with my co-workers while in the middle of the task. It was Dirty’s turn to manage the lube on the wire pull. Dirty did his usual routine of getting tuned up at lunch then working the afternoon high as hell. It was during one of these moments when Dirty decided to dig into the five-gallon lubricant bucket way past his elbows. Dirty went a bit further with the wire lubricant and was actually playing in it. He was hallucinating and saying that pretty butterflies were coming out the bucket and he was trying to catch them. Of course, this is when the #2 foreman stumbled upon his antics and raised hell! He grabbed the shop steward and discovered exactly how stoned Dirty was while working. Oh boy!! Dirty was immediately removed from the jobsite. The shop steward drove Dirty home since he was deemed unable to drive. The next day, we saw Dirty returning doing the “walk of shame”. Dirty came on the job to get his tools and collect his last paycheck and layoff. He actually got a drug related layoff that meant he needed rehab before returning to the bench and becoming available for work for another contractor. If I am not mistaken, I have heard that workers get a shot at rehab at least two times through our medical in the union. I have crossed paths with many co-workers who were in desperate need of an intervention. I know of one co-worker who I absolutely adored who could have used rehab. He used to religiously give me rides when I had car problems as an apprentice. They would make beer stops before the carpool ride and once the ride finished. He was in need of surgery and tried drying out on his own at home. He ended up dying due to a seizure, as a result of alcohol withdrawal, while at home. I found out about his plight after attending his funeral. He is indeed a person I miss and wish he had gotten help. The bar scene was so engrained in our construction culture for many years, we used bars as references for jobsites. I remember, many times at lunch, trying to pound down as many beers and shots as possible before having to return to work. By the time I was on a jobsite around 2008, the general contractor was really trying to stop the drinking on the job. They actually tried to patrol the bars and catch different trade workers drinking. We managed to find this nearby low key eatery spot that served beer. It seemed like a place that would avoid detection. That only lasted for a short period of time. When anyone from management found it and walked in, we would immediately stop drinking. We were staring out the window watching the street to avoid anyone sneaking up on us. As soon as a white hat walked in, we would push all of the beer bottles to the center of the table to avoid getting busted. The manager, from the general contractor, would get frustrated and walk out. We would all split up and enter the jobsite from different directions to avoid detection. Sometimes, the general contractor had people as a checkpoint near the entrance gates looking for workers with booze on their breath. A couple guys were pinched and forced to go home for the day. The very next day, the same guys were back at the spot drinking beer. It didn’t stop them. They only learned how to be more strategic. Sometimes, they would call a co-worker in the building and ask them at what gate were the white hats trying to bust the lunch time drinkers. If there is a will, there is a relative! I always figured that I would work with the tools. When I was younger, I had zero aspirations to get into management. I had figured that I would just be one of the guys until my retirement. I wanted to go to work, take pride in the creation, talk trash amongst my co-workers, poke fun at stuff, hit the bar for lunch, and last on a project as long as possible until the layoffs come. Life works in mysterious ways. I believe I changed my mind shortly after the 2008 recession and went back to college for my Business degree in 2009. The huge blocks of no work really frustrated the hell out of me. I then started to panic about the “sky falling” so to speak. What if New York construction jobs never come back? When you run out of unemployment, savings, and union funds, that is when the real fear set in for me!! How the hell am I going to take care of my family!?! It was during this recession, that made me feel like I had a very limited skill set. I envisioned a bunch of electricians fighting over ceiling fan jobs. There are only so many side hustles out there. I really felt backed into a corner, like a rat in a maze, so I opted to go for more training. I never wanted to ever feel like that ever again during bad economic times in the future. Somewhere along the way while in night college, I decided to work towards becoming a project manager. As a result of huge blocks of no work, I ended up really taking a leap of faith and trying out management. I cannot even articulate into words the level of fear I had when I made that leap six weeks after leaving the tools. My last day with the tools was March 7, 2014. I had many thoughts racing through my mind. What if I fail? What if I make a mistake? I am so nervous about the lack of available work, my sons most certainly are aware of my fear. Despite my fear, I took the leap and it worked out so far. I landed in management for some very large electrical contractors for quite a few years. I now work for a smaller yet growing woman owned electrical contractor. In the past year, I have now shifted my focus into safety. There has been a lot of elbow grease studying for the past 18-months. My first exam was the Certified Health Safety Technician (CHST), then Associate Safety Professional (ASP), next was the Certified Safety Professional (CSP). I just passed the New York City Site Safety Manager exam in February. I was having to rigorously study NYC Building Code in order to pass the last exam. The choice to evolve and continue gaining more training is something that I would have never anticipated back when I worked with the tools. My mindset has also shifted along with my training. I no longer think that boozing on the job is acceptable. If I come across someone who is drunk, I will be forced to ask them to go home. It is somewhat humorous that I evolved from a typical construction worker who drank at lunch to being the person monitoring people as well as looking out for the health and welfare of the entire project. As a woman who has started out as an apprentice, I have seemed to earn the respect of the fellas on the job. As I have gotten older, I see that there are more and more women in management roles. I admit that this is something that is foreign to me. I am not there to hurt anyone’s livelihood. I see myself as more of a person who is looking out for the interests and safety of people on the job. The goal is for everyone to go home to their family in the same condition each day that they showed up. Years later, I was talking about the whole drinking on the job antics and ways of being back as an apprentice. Sometimes, a group of us will share old job stories. The younger people are wide eyed and cannot believe that an entire crew was drunk by the afternoon. Anyone who is drinking on a job today must be rather discreet. When times are tough, you must try to walk the line and not get into trouble. I was talking to a co-worker who has always been in management. He doesn’t get the culture at all. Only a fellow field person turned management would have understood the job culture from over 25-years ago. The guy was absolutely perplexed and asked me why I didn’t snitch? I started with explaining about how the jobsite culture was, back in the 1990’s. The unspoken rule was you didn’t have to get up from the bar stool until your foreman did. They didn’t want you to “spook the herd”, so to speak. Once he got up, his entire crew got up and followed suit. I remember one jobsite, where there was a hidden liquor cabinet. The crew would go for a refill. On one job, we were stuck working in a ridiculously hot space. We had this cold gel filled handkerchief we used to freeze and put around our necks throughout the day. The job water container was filled with ice, vodka, and Sprite for the crew. Being a little tipsy, was the best way to handle working in this greenhouse structure in the summer. It was enclosed with all glass and didn’t get have the air conditioning hooked up. We used to hit each other, on occasion, with either a Super Soaker toy gun or the water pump used to put water in with a coring machine. The coring machine is a tool we use to bore holes in walls or decks. Once a hole is penetrated, we would be able to continue our conduit run to the intended destination. Electricians were not the only trade who drank. Pretty much each trade was a heavy hitter with the booze. I am sure the booze served as a means to tolerate rough jobsite conditions. It always felt like it was very cold or super-hot and humid on the job. The fall and spring times felt very short with moderate temperatures when working outside. My crew was working on PVC in a trench and would go hit Applebee’s for lunch. Once we were boozed up, the rest of the day didn’t feel so dreadful in a hot and dirty trench. The downside after drinking at lunch was feeling absolutely tired a few hours after it wore off. Years later, I think about all of the times where you should be looking for and avoiding hazards. However, that wasn’t the objective. The goal was to finish the work day and go home. If I was in the middle of partaking with the rest of the crew, how the hell could I snitch? The person who joins in then drops a dime would become an outcast on the jobsite. People would avoid them socially like the plague. Not to mention, I am reminded that I am a female. I was a woman on the job trying to blend in with the crew. The last thing I wanted was my name being known as the, “job site snitch”. I was not willing to make my life harder than it already was. Besides, I am a pretty loyal person by nature. That was never an option when I worked with the tools. Now that my son followed me into construction, I worry about him picking up the same habits. I would be hypocrite to tell him to not do something I did many times over the years. I am glad that the culture has shifted to where hitting the bar is after work. I know on his first job as an apprentice, he landed on a project with some notorious guys who love the bar. He would join in for the social bonding at the bar. He lands on later jobs and the crew has a way different vibe. I guess it is good he gets to experience different environments. One has to be careful with the habit to booze it up since it can age the hell out of you. I am glad that I joined in on some moments of fun then dialed it back. I opted to drink a bunch of water and hit the gym, after work for many years, as my habit. I now avoid the gym, due to my back issues, and do nightly walks instead. You can pick out who the people are on the job that always smoke and drink vs the health nuts. The personalities of people in a crew run the gamut. I have often said when you pick out any crew, each person can be identified as a self-proclaimed expert in different disciplines. Electricians like to read and have a hunger for knowledge. The average electrician is very smart but they are not cut out for the cookie cutter cubicle life. Many guys have a rebellious streak in them that makes construction work a viable choice. I know a few known drug dealers in the trade as well. There is one we nicknamed “The Sprinkler” because of his antics on the jobsite. I will discuss him in a different podcast episode. I did talk about him briefly in the four Apprentice Life episodes with my sons recently. I am sure that for each story I remember, there are some stories that I forgot. I plan to have a few co-workers on my podcast to discuss some jobsite stories. There is one buddy in particular, who is so damn funny and shares my brand of humor. I first met him as a first-year apprentice and I was the OSHA instructor for a college course. We met up later on a jobsite and we’re cutting it up with our back-and-forth banter. I have another funny friend Mike, he is like a brother to me, who we both went through our apprenticeship around the same time. I need to get him on for a podcast episode. I would hang out on a street, in a town with a bunch of bars with Mike and others. I would joke with him to give me his driver’s license so I know he would swing by again. He did hand it to me, I held onto it, and he would come back later to chill My eldest son Tom would be absolutely humored by our transaction. Mike happened to be on my son’s first jobsite. I go to the Yardhouse, which is a restaurant & bar, with my son for my birthday and Tom’s crew would be there. Mike and I saw each other and hugged it out for the longest. Tom would ask, “how we know each other?” We would say that we “grew up” together in this business. I have made a bunch of lifelong pals in this business while socializing at the bar. If I could go back, I probably would not change a thing. Well, maybe I would change my personal struggle a bit. Maybe I would have connected with a good person back then, I would not have suffered so much. Then again, a struggle builds character. I am sure I can go on about funny jobsite stories. However, you have had enough of this dosage- for now! Let me know if you have some similar stories to share? What do you think about the old culture of drinking on the job? Would you participate, if you had the chance? Let me know why you don’t like it, if that applies. Do you have a topic suggestion for me? If so, leave it on my website and I will consider it and work to produce some content. As always, I thank you for choosing to carve out your free time and spend it on my work. For the mothers out there, I hope you have a great weekend. I hope your family comes up with something thoughtful and doesn’t force you to cook on Sunday. Have a good day and try to enjoy the sunshine wherever you are in the globe! By for now! Cheers! Leslie M. Jasper -Author & Host of the #VerballyDisastrous podcast now alive on many platforms that include: Acast, Anchor, Apple Podcasts, Breaker, Castbox, Deezer, Google Podcasts, I Heart Radio, Listen Notes, Overcast, Player FM, Pocket Casts, Pod Bean, Podchaser, Podcast Addict, Podcast Gang, Radio Public, Soundcloud, Soundtrap, Spotify, Stitcher, Tune In, and YouTube. -The Audio Blog: Verbally Disastrous Podcast & Construction Tales Blog. 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