Sunset over a picker

A brilliant blue sky with the winter sun slowly setting, with only the silhouette of a MEWP hoisted on high to spoil it!

Waiting at the gates

Thumbprint recognition, turnstiles. Is it a prison? some high security establishment? Nope, its a school building site. Another week away in the mud and cold fitting out classrooms. Deep joy.

Reaching up

For the last few days the rain has been hammering down, the wind gusting along. At last the sky is blue and the sun is out and its nearly the weekend and time to go home.

Big laptop screen

This has been my life for the last few days. Arrive, unpack kit, bolt to wall, align, test. Repeat until home time. The only amusement we get is putting random songs on the speakers and films on the boards.

Village Peoples newest member

Really scraping the bottom of the barrel here. Theres nothing exciting to see on site! However, some PPE and a bit of signage. All I need is a cowboy, traffic cop....

Machines

Day two on site, this appears to be the middle of a digger graveyard. Machines with flat tyres, caked in mud and site debris. Abandoned in a corner of the carpark.

Zero Harm

Another week, another building site. We're back up to a school in Derby for five days. Five days of pointless H&S rules, five days of mud, five days away from home!

Mud, mud glorious mud

Mud, cold and H&S signage everywhere. It must be another building site to work on!

Romantic meal for two!

Staying away means evenings away from the family. It also means dining with whoever I happen to be working with. James was my hot date this week and we ate for England both nights.

Free breakfast

We have a rule at work, start anytime before 6am and the company buys you breakfast. As we were heading to Leeds we were off at 5:45am so filled our boots at the services on the M1.

Overgrown

Work this week has taken me back up to Leeds. A few weeks ago I was here in the shadow of a derelict church. The main school building we are in was also a church, but its been renovated into classrooms. The grounds are still a bit of a mess though!

Last day on the job

Well, the last day on the Derby job, off to Leeds tomorrow. But for now I never have to trudge round that school again or align a projector in a boiling hot classroom in full PPE!

down on the farm

Work today took us to Cambridge and a farm. Nothing beats a big old tractor (or brand new one for that matter!)

FIRE!

You can tell when a building site is nearly finished when they clear all the important building site stuff out. Anyone needing a fire extinguisher had a long walk to the front of the site to collect one of these!

Warning

I do like a dramatic warning sign. An theres nothing more dramatic than four of them squashed together on a door!

Hard day, cold pint

After a long and pretty rubbish day at work there is no better way to unwind than with a nice cold pint!

Oast House

Another night away from home, another hotel. At least this one looks a bit different being based in the design of an old Oast House.

Frustrating work

Health & Safety, the bane of many a building site workers life. We have a few days work on a site in Derby to do and it required an induction at 8:30am followed by donning full PPE, hat, boots, hi-viz, glasses and gloves. You may think its some incredibly dangerous place, but no. Its a primary school. All building work is pretty much complete and some of the classrooms could hold lessons as they are finished. Blanket H&S rules do nothing but slow down the work to a snails pace. We got done in a full day what should have taken an hour or two such was the redtape we had to cut through and the people we had to consult before lifting a tool. Have you ever tried to wire up a plug in over 30°c heat with a hardhat and gloves on, sweat running down your face and lenses steaming up!

Fricking lasers

After a few weeks indoors installing for work in sweltering heat, it was nice to get up on a roof top in the pouring rain and fit a laser link once more!

Give peas a chance

Back in the mists of time a clever artist called PEAS tagged the viaduct over the M25 near the M40 junction. A few years later some witty chaps added the extra wording to create a motorway legend. I've driven under it hundreds if not thousands of times but for once the sun was shining, the sky was blue and I was in the passenger seat.