Doing OT on the pride of the fleet/ Please Admire My Hole

  OK, crew change day was yesterday, but as planned, like a fool I did not go home. I am 'working over,' doing some overtime on another bunker barge for 2 weeks and then going back to the HQ for my regular 4 week hitch. Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife, OTOH, is keeping the home front down, and by keeping it down, I mean working 85 hour weeks while I'm away. 

        The barge I'm on? It is the single worst maintained and poorly made vessel I have ever had the extreme misfortune to ever step aboard, without exaggeration. Oh, it won't sink or roll over, it's sound as  a pound in the hull. Same hull as the HQ, in fact and those shipwrights at that yard really knew their shit. No, the hull is fine. Everything else sucks, though, it's an absolute dog to operate and the living quarters are both filthy and a crime against humanity. 

 I can say that because we don't own it. It's a rental. 

 You know what, though? I'm only here for 2 weeks and I can hack it and then make subtle cruel and snide comments to my superiors every time I see them for the rest of the year. 

 I'm a glass half full kind of guy.  

        My shipmate on here (there's just a crew of 2) had what I think might have been a panic attack when he saw what this is. Apparently he was offered this turd as a home, a permanent berth for him, an experienced and reliable tankerman.  I can read faces. I'm not autistic. The poor guy stepped aboard and there it was.

God is not here.

      The poor guy really was deeply upset that he had gotten the equivalent of a box of dogshit in the mail after being told a present was coming. So upset in fact, that it pushed my own cynical loathing through a full rotation, 360 degrees, and I arrived back where I started determined to make the most of it and be of good cheer myself. I'd never suggest to the guy that everything is not so bad, because it is, but I spent 3 hours cleaning the galley after my watch, and another 5 this morning cleaning the working area (there being no galley table, as there is a small table for two that is both the galley table and the office, lol. And all covered with grime, oil residue, mold and filthy stagnant water underfoot on the crumbling galley deck. 

Whatever. It's temporary and I'm getting overtime. I'll survive probably, until the mold gives me black lung. 

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   On the upside, I got some new pictures of the still-looks-like-present-day-Gaza  construction project on my home in Brazil.  And, as always, I got, for some reason, lot's of pictures of The Hole in the yard. 

           I have no idea why, but the builder is inordinately proud of one in particular of the deep buried columns I had poured before they lay the slab of the annex to the house. I don't know why, but the guy loves to send me updates on this one of 6 footings.  The annex will eventually be 2 stories, but we're just building the first floor now to get it done in time to visit this year or early next. Nonetheless I had them pour the foundations and supports for a much larger, heavier building.  The corner column, however, is in an awkward spot, close to a very tall unfinished wall between my neighbor and I, and there's no easy way to get a small excavator there, the footings for the pool, a separate water fountain and bamboo  garden already having been laid for some reason. So one of the columns is being laid by hand using concrete and rebar and a shovel rather than an excavator and forms.   

 So, in the back yard, as you walk out the back door of the house, there's a covered  outdoor kitchen with gas burners, a large wood burning brick oven with a steel rotisserie unit in it, plus a smoker and sink, cabinets, etc etc all built to entertain 20-30 people easily, and 50+ in a pinch, my wife's close immediate family numbering in the 300's or so.  On the far side of the outdoor kitchen is the annex, a bathroom and bedroom and sitting room, all moderately sized. The annex is where Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife and I will stay, the big house being mostly for her mom and her caregivers (my mother in law is a character. Blind as a bat and something of a black widow), my nephew who's a long-haul trucker in Brazil and will act as caretaker for the property, and my kid and assorted guests, when visiting.  

the annex, once complete. roof of the outdoor kitchen to the right. 

  I have no idea why the builder sends me updates with a description of the work done that week, but the pictures ALWAYS include the current state of The Hole. 

   The Hole must be looked at an admired before the weekly update is complete. Every week. 

Magnificent. Just look at it. 

And a week later

Admire it. Love it. The Hole is Everything.

 And anan

Yeah, you fill that hole. 

  4 weeks. In the meanwhile, construction continues apace, but if I want to see any of it,  I have to ask for the photos of it.  The builder, though, sends me pictures of The Hole on the reg, unasked. He wants me to see it and can't wait for me to see it I think.    

   I know it's the last of the sunk columns, and it had to be dug by hand, but I think it's odd that my updates are more like 

  Builder: "Here you can see the progress we made on the last and hand- laid deep footing, may the angels sing God's praises and I took Golden Hour photos so you could see the glory of the masterly craftsmanship in this blessed magnum opus and also we finished the master bathroom but I'm sure you don't care about that here's another picture of this glorious hole. " 

Me:  OK, looks very good but please send me photos of the master bathroom also when you can. 

Builder.  OK. Here is a picture of the bathroom that I took while looking out the window at the Hole. Enclosed please find a picture of the bathroom as well as 8 more photos of the Hole as seen from the bathroom window. And also one more picture of the Hole. From Space. 

 Me:   The bathroom looks fantastic! Your tile guy does beautiful work. 

 Builder:  yes yes. He's adequate. What did you think of The Hole?