July 2, 2002

One lone guy showed up today just before 8 AM. He left just before noon because it was too hot to work. Yes, it was hot, but we do get this type of weather in Ottawa during the summer. They're over three weeks behind schedule and they don't work when it's raining or when it's hot or evenings or weekends.

This is particularly bad for two reasons.

1. Our neighbours down the street are also getting some brickwork done and their crew, from another company, worked late on Friday, part of the long weekend, are working today and have more guys on site.
   
   
2. We just got off the phone expressing our concerns with the schedule to the owner, who promised it would be done on time, when the guy came to our door to say goodbye.

We called the owner back again and he said all the sites were shut down because of the heat. If they're not careful, they get in trouble with the labour board.

I'm not saying the guys should kill themselves for this project. When there's one guy doing all the lifting and cutting of the heavy stones, then yes, that's too much. The work needs to be done by several guys and they should take frequent breaks and drink lots of fluids. If it's really too hot during the day, then come back after 5 PM and put in 3 or 4 hours when there's shade where they're working.

I'm probably over reacting but I don't want this to become like our renovation where the workers showed up whenever they felt like it, which wasn't often.

There was cutting of the top stones today. One consolation is that the quality of the work looks good.