His Boss Kept Screwing Him Over, So He Made Sure He Left A Lasting Impression On A Construction Project

Matthew Gilligan

4 months ago

Source: Reddit

This is a good one, folks!

And you gotta make sure you read all the way until the end so you can experience the huge payoff!

That’s all I’m gonna say: get started now!

Just do it, I don’t care how.

“Over a decade ago, my life changed forever.

I met my (now) wife & being with her made me look at my life a lot differently. I worked in a career that I no longer liked, for a company I no longer believed in. As soon as I could, I found another job & quit.

It was REFRESHING to be free of a job that was holding me back. Unfortunately….. this freedom was short lived.

Uh oh…

My new job was for a guy who’s employees called Meathead. He was a General Contractor, who did everything from home repairs, highway line painting, firewood & snow removal.

At first, I was eager to do whatever I could. I was young, the pay was great & I enjoy working outdoors.

Eventually, I proved to be TOO eager, and Meathead soon realized how I wouldn’t say no to anything….. This was also around the time I got engaged, so I obviously needed to extra money to pay for my wedding.

60 Hour Weeks were soon the norm. I’d paint parking lots all night, sleep a couple hours & be out roofing by 7AM.. but HEY! I was young & full of get up & go! I was about to get married, NOTHING could stop me!

With that setup, here’s where the Malicious Compliance comes into play.

Meathead was one of those contractors who would buy foreclosed properties, flip them & resell.

Meathead also would go to construction supply stores, looking for good deals… End of the Roll Carpets, the twisted lumber at the bottom of a load, stuff like that.

It wasn’t an ideal situation for us builders, but Meathead only did this on his personal projects, so whatever.. as I said, he paid well & everything was done to code.

For one particular project, Meathead wanted an interlock patio outside the kitchen.. about 16ft by 30ft, with a path leading to the driveway. Obviously, with me being the Eager Beaver, I was tasked with the job.

This wasn’t an easy job.

Now, for those who don’t know, Interlock is an enormous pain in the ***, requiring a decent amount of setup & planning. One of the key things is knowing what the interlock pattern is.

There are simple designs that all use the same brick, pretty straightforward, right? Boy.. was I in for a surprise…..

The stones are delivered, and just my luck!! Meathead had gotten a “DEAL” on a bunch of leftover pavers… there were 4 different sizes & the quantities were all over the place… Me, wanting to do a good job, spent two exhausting days counting & sorting out the stones.

I piled them into bundles of stones, evenly distributing all the sizes. As I laid them, I planned to use one pile, then use the next, never running out of one particular size, making the patio look uniform.

Dude!

Notice how I said PLANNED? I arrive on day three, just in time to see Meathead finish pushing all the stones into one big pile with the backhoe, to make room for a load of topsoil that he got another “DEAL” on…

When I tried to explain how he had disturbed my careful planning, he actually laughed at me… saying “You’re putting too much effort into this, Just do it, I don’t care how.” So I, with the gears of pettiness starting to turn, simply said “Yes Sir, Right away Sir”

Onto the Maliciousness!

Now, the stones I was using were 2×4, 4×4, 4×6 & 6×8. Thankfully, the dimensions were all consistent, so a pattern was eventually easy to create, once I found out how many stones were in each Group. But now, with my plans so inconveniently changed.. I had to adapt.

I had calculated around 300 groups of each stone, and I had to pick out the pavers for each group when I needed them… so my calculations weren’t completely wasted.

What I actually DID change was the pattern…. I simply randomized the pattern, with one SLIGHT change. EVERY group had a SPECIFIC arrangement of stones.

OH MY GOD.

It blended in very well with the pattern, to the point that even I could have overlooked it.. But in the end, there were over 300 stone **** and Balls forever enshrined onto that patio…

I never told ANYBODY about this, and as far as I know, it was NEVER noticed. I really wish there was some sort of fallout, but I’ll never know…

Eventually, I found employment elsewhere, as Meathead isn’t one of those employers that you tire of, even if the pay is good. Lesson learned, life goes on.

And the absolute icing on the cake? Remember how I said that Meathead got “Deals” for his personal projects?? 14 years later… he STILL lives at the House…”

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