Bert and I have been friends for 20 years, since our junior year in high school. He's been living up in Arcata for a long time, so we don't get many opportunities to hang out. Fortunately, he's really good about popping up out of the blue, even though he lives so far away. He did just that not too long ago, right before heading off on a sailing race from San Francisco to Hawaii. We caught up on the phone a few times after his race, and somewhere in there when he said he needed to keep busy I said "Well, if you're ever bored you can always come break up the concrete in my backyard." He said ok. Then he followed through. Today we broke up the entire 20' x 20' concrete slab in the back yard and hauled it into the dumpster waiting for it at the curb. No power tools. No jackhammer. Just a sledge, some big crowbars, and 2 wheelbarrows to haul the cement. Bert taught me how to use the sledge hammer, but he's much more effective and elegant with it. Notice in the picture he's not just swinging the sledge, he's standing on two big crowbars to hold up the slab and make it easier to break? Dad, of course, came and helped, because he is a saint. Seth came by for a bit at the end, and had a hand in getting the big pipe in the back corner of the yard out of the ground. But really, the credit goes to Bert. The man with the sledge.
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