There’s a construction site right across the street from my office. In late June, they brought out a large track-hoe and knocked down the building that used to be there. That was a pretty cool thing to watch, actually. I swear, the track-hoe operator was so skilled, I bet he could have picked up a toothpick on the first try (with the track-hoe, naturally, not with his fingers). Mrs. Ivorybill even brought the kids by to watch.
Last week the contractors brought out a truck crane and used it to set up a track-crane. Neat. Now they’ve attached said pile driver to the track-crane. Ouch.
Now, for some indefinite amount of time, there’ll be the delightful whunk-a-chunck, whunk-a-chunck, whunk-a-chunck, whunk-a-chunck, whunk-a-chunck, well, you get the idea, from across the street. Man, I’m going to need some pain-killers.
I just hope, for your sake, they’re not driving humongous I-beams. They did that outside my office window a few years ago, and that’s far worse than the traditional “whunk-a-chunck”, more of a “Whunk-a-CHAAaannng”. It sucked.
A few years ago the management of a construction project here decided to use “dynamic compaction” to settle the fill before starting. Yes, that’s the same thing as a pile driver: lift a big weight (I seem to recall 13 tons being mentioned) high in the air, and drop it.
It was entertaining feeling the ground shake as I passed by every day, but the neighbours didn’t like it much. Not only did it go on all day, but there were claims of broken windows and cracked foundations. The company settled to avoid the lawsuits.
They’ve started up. Rather than the whunk-a-chunck I’d imagined, it’s more of a chick-bunk, chick-bunk, chick-bunk, chick-bunk, chick-bunk about 60 times a minute. (Or, bunk-chick, bunk-chick, bunk-chick, bunk-chick, bunk-chick, depending on your point of view.)
Did I mention that I’m editing the literature citiations section of a book chapter today? My temples are already throbbing. Arghh.
Hmmm… chick-bunk It must say something about my chick-bunk mental state that these chick-bunk seem like equally good options. chick-bunk What kind of chick-bunk scope comes with the chick-bunk rifle?
It’s got an investment-banker silhouette in the reticle. Pan the scope around the construction site until Mr. Moneybags, the funder of your current misery, fills the silhouette, then blaze away… [sub]That’s a joke, folks. A sick one, but still just a joke…[/sub]
Won’t chick-bunk work. I’m in New chick-bunk Orleans. It’d have to chick-bunk have the silhouette of chick-bunk a corrupt city official, as well as his/her chick-bunk brother-in-law, and possibly chick-bunk some other folks who are chick-bunk also on the take. chick-bunk Thanks anyway. Guess chick-bunk I’ll just have to go chick-bunk the ear-plug route.
Seeing as you’re in the Big chick-bunk Easy, why don’t you just run a couple of cases of Southern Comfort down to the the site and ask them to knock off for a couple of hours? There’ll be no more chick-bunk for the rest of the day, and maybe not even any tomorrow, if you give 'em enough to create really good hangovers. I’m sure you could get a decent collection up from your coworkers and others in the neighborhood to foot the bill.