I mean, really...

how dumb can you get?

The city has been upgrading the infrastructure in my neighborhood now that gentrification has settled in and the population density has tripled.  Not to mention that this is an old neighborhood and everything is old.  We got new water and sewer pipes and recently the gas company has been replacing all the gas lines from the the street to the meter.  They are digging holes in the easement and somehow inserting these new pipes underground to the meters beside the houses.  They did most of the block but us.  In fact, I thought we were the only ones they hadn’t done but there were three in all.  When we arrived back in the city Tuesday, they were remedying those three exclusions. 

Part of this process involves turning your gas off and connecting the new gas lines to your meter.  When we arrived at the house, they had completed us and were digging in a neighbor’s yard.  We could see the new pipe coming out of the ground and not connected.  Our immediate assumption was that our gas was disconnected awaiting reconnection because they had to get inside your house to do some test.  This was all explained to us by the fellow that came around to let everyone know what was going to be going on and we were given the phone number of the superintendant in charge in case we had some concerns.  Since we are gone so much of the time we are a little out of touch.

I saw the guys working further down the block so I marched my little self down there and asked the guy who acknowledged me when the gas was going to be turned back on.  He looked at me kinda funny and said he had already called it in to his boss.  Because English is his second language, there was the possibility of mis-understanding, or perhaps perfect understanding and some jokes later on about that crazy white woman.  Anyway, I figured he was the official spokesman of that particular work group since he had the best English.  Don’t get me wrong.  I have no problem with people in this country not speaking English and most the work crews, especially in my neighborhood, don’t have much.  

So today, Husband is talking to a workman by the fence and he’s asking when the gas will be turned back on.  

“It’s on.” the guy says, “It won’t be disconnected til they come out to hook up the new pipe.”

When he realizes that we thought we didn’t have any gas last night, he asks incredulously, “You didn’t even try it?”

We laughed our asses off, because, in truth, we had not.