Yep
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I was separated from this guitar for 15 years and recovered it from my ex’s shed last year. Was in real need of some TLC so I spent time refurbishing it and it plays as good as I ever remember. Possibly my favourite electric I’ve ever owned, it’s so playable.
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“Hang in there”
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Even mods can be off duty in this thread.
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Alright, I’m two drinks in, i guess i can post.
Stopped of at the liquor store on the way home to pick up some vodka and grapefruit hard seltzers. Its like a vodka soda but with more alcohol, say what you want…i dont care.
The lady at the checkout stand noticed my work shirt, a light brown Carhart button up with the cemetery’s logo on a patch over my left breast. we have made small talk about the cemetery work before and im there pretty frequently, so she picked up the conversation where we left off.
“You have the most relaxing job…”
huh… this struck me as strange. ive been running a gas powered weed whacker for 8 hours a day for over a month, grinding away the grass and dirt that has grown up over the edges of the gravestones. Its not so bad, but its also miserable, mind numbing work that gets you covered head to toe in mud when its raining, and dirt when its not. I also have to weed whack the ditches on the road outside the cemetery, and with traffic coming head on, you have to face into it and use the left edge of the weed whacker so that it spits the asphalt gravel back into your face rather than out into traffic where it could ding somebodies ride.
“Relaxing…” i say outloud to myself…
“Yeah, its so beautiful there, its like a park. It must be super nice to work there, i love it!”
I wonder if it was as relaxing as she thinks it must be, would i be there buying a handle of vodka and a sixer of hard seltzers? From the sound of it i would just go home and assume the lotus position and go back into my meditative hibernation until the new day shined its loving rays upon my semi sleeping face.
I absent-mindedly reach up and touch the open wound on my face where i got hit with a piece of a sequoia branch.
I hand her my card and we do that financial dance and im back in my car driving home.
She isnt wrong.
The job can be amazingly peaceful.
Driving a tractor trailer full of brush we have cleared up and over the hill and seeing the sun break through the clouds and through the bright green of fresh spring leaves, and the lusty pink of the dogwood tree flowers and the dark iron grey skies that threaten to burst and release a torrent of frozen spring hail down on us for a minute or two…
yeah. its pretty great. not gonna lie.
I will just repeat that to myself tmrw when im weed whacking the mud from around the edge of the stone and its hitting me in the face with velocity… i will smile and say, “This is relaxing!” “I am relaxing!” as
dirt fills the spaces between my teeth and gets behind my protective eyewear and behind my eyeballs.
This is RELAXING.
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If I start talking about how much I want the ST again, you know I’m drinking, or worse (reading ST threads).
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Every job has its weed whacking in the rain and it’s sun bursting through the clouds moments … Actually I’d just say that that’s life. For the lady checking through your order, I’m willing to bet her weed whacking moment probably happens when she can’t find a price and some clever customer quips that it must be free… how original… 
Very well written post by the way. You really painted a picture with your words. Cheers!
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I’ve been offered a job (on trial) at a cemetery in Sydney. It’s paying more than I get (got) as a photographer and more than I could get as a scientist (I have a B.Sc).
No experience necessary, answer phones, book maintenance. Pisses me off my university debt blew out to $40k
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Give it a go? the office side of things in this industry looks to be a real pain in the ass. If youre good with people and have a shred of empathy and a willingness to fill out paperwork to an exacting specification, Family Couselors can make quite a bit of dough…
It can be quite rewarding work. Even helping people navigate the hell of the paperwork side of a loved ones death is something to be proud of.
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I too work at a cemetery. I work with trees.
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They did mention that half the calls are angry relatives upset over missing flower pots. No start date yet, but definitely am taking it. Unless one of the other dozen interviews I’ve had bear better fruit.
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Don’t forget to laugh while you’re relaxing 
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Just trees?
are you a Feller?
my cemetery is about 148 acres or so. tons of old trees. most of them with lethal amounts of dead branches half splintered off and waiting for just the right gust of a cool breeze to come crashing down in a life ending/ dismembering crash.
i just hope i am not there when that shit happens…
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Yeah, I’m an arborist at an old-ass 300 acre rural cemetery in Louisville, KY. I climb, prune, remove, cable, brace, grind and protect trees from lightning.
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The Death industry is far out, my friend…
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WOAH!
you, sir, or madam, are an absolute badass… and i salute you with this next giant pull off of my vodka-hard seltzer mash up…
we hire out for all our arborist needs… and they do charge a right pretty penny.
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Finally home from work. Time to drink beer and hang out on Elektronauts LOL
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I recently decided to cut out drinking for a while, coincidentally, my pot smoking has skyrocketed
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