Before I start, I would like to mention that just about everything that has caused this rant is my fault entirely. But I still hate that fucking sand.
The Readers Digest version of this rant is at the end, after the line of asterisks.
When we moved into our house, going on 6 or 7 years ago (it’s a rental), the landlord had recently removed the semi-above ground swimming pool, because keeping it clean was too much hassle for the previous tenants, which meant our landlord presumably had to do it. No problems, we did not want a pool, and the landlord said they would be filling the hole in.
Fast forward to a couple of months ago. The hole in the yard is still there. It was no great drama, because it was closed off with the compulsory fence, so the dog could not get into the super long grass anyway, but we decided enough waiting was enough. We cleaned it out, and decided to get some sand to fill it in.
The landlord would not pay for sand. So we called a pool excavation company, and they delivered 18 tonnes of sand onto our front lawn. For free. No delivery charge, absolutely gratis. We had asked about cubic metre to tonne ratios, from both one of the guys in charge of making roads for our local council and the pool excavation company guy that called us back about the sand. They both said the same thing, 1 tonne of sand is half a cubic metre. No dramas. Measured out the hole (roughly), and the depth. Got 9 cubic metres.
And here’s where it went downhill, instead of what I thought was an average depth of 50cm worth of hole, it’s lucky to actually have been 30cm. So there’s about 7 tonnes of sand that DON’T FIT IN THE FUCKING HOLE!
Secondly, the access to our yard is somewhat restricted, which means that all the sand was done via a wheelbarrow, and shovels. No bobcat, even the little tiny Dingo ones are too large. 18 tonnes of sand in a wheelbarrow is not very much fucking fun.
Thirdly, the sand is full of fucking rocks! Some of them are larger than my head, but even the rocks the size of a baseball are enough to send a shock up your entire arm when the shovel hits them at full speed. Half of the previously bare soil garden beds in our yard are now covered in rocks of varying sizes. Every conceivable hole in our yard is filled with sand, and packed down hard.
AND THERE’S STILL AT LEAST A TONNE OF SAND IN MY FUCKING FRONT YARD!
It’s been 2 months now. And while I admit that we’ve not done the sand every spare day we’ve had, we’ve done as much as two people who work 60 hours (incl travel) a week can reasonably be expected to fit in around other necessities like buying food and sleeping.
To top it all off, the landlord was annoyed because there was sand in his front yard, and we had not told him we were getting it. We’ve been asking the fucker for 6 years to fix the hole, and for three months that we were getting the sand as soon as we could get some delivered! It got to the point where I got so angry that I actually yelled at him through the phone. Relating that story to my parents, neither of them believed me, because I don’t lose my temper like that. My wife was in the room, and could not believe it.
So… in conclusion, and I will demarcate the post with asterisks for those who read the second paragraph and want to skip to the end…
Fuck you hole.
Fuck you company who delivered rocks covered in sand.
Fuck you me, for being a dick who cannot do simple maths.
Fuck you landlord, for not fixing this yourself over the last 6 years, and actually being the first person I’ve yelled at in more than 10 years.
Fuck you fucking sand for making my fucking weekends suck for 2 months.
