a day in the city

it's been a pretty crazy last couple of days at work. i've been busy actually working during work, so i haven't been able to post a new blog. i was working on a project in which the client insisted we get the permit this week, NO MATTER WHAT!

so we (the contractor and consultants) all went to the city this morning. there was a one hour wait just to see the fire engineer to approve our drawings. to top it off, we were still waiting for the electrical guy to come by and bring his drawings because the building plan checker wanted all our sets complete before he even looked at our drawings. his exact words were "well, you do your job, then i'll come by and do my job," then he walked away with a smirk on his face. punk ass.

anyways, the electrical guy comes through and we wait. we wait. and we wait. keep in mind that it is already 11 am and the fire engineer still has to look at our drawings, and he's only there till 12. and at 12, the building plan checker goes to lunch for an hour.

nevertheless, we meet with fire and of course he has to show us that he knows the code more than us and has more comments for us. luckily, he just noted those comments on the drawings and signed them off. one down, one more to go. building.

we wanted building to look at the drawings over the counter, but being the nice building guy he is, he says he will take a look at it later in the afternoon.

you see, building plan checkers know that you have to go through them to get a permit. so they basically have you by the kahunas. you have to laugh with them, joke with them, tell funny stories, basically kiss their ass because they are the ones standing between you and the permit.

my last boss hated plan checkers. he said that is the worst job. he called them designer drop outs, who can't design for sh*t, so their last resort is to be a plan checker, which gives them that chance to make them feel good about themselves and to play god, acting like their designers trying to change your design.

the building plan checker holds the drawings. we go to lunch, get a call from the client, and the client says "i don't care if you have to wait at the city till 5 pm, put pressure on the guy and get the ****in permit!" so we go back after lunch, tell the building guy we need this permit now, so he needs to look at the drawings. he tells us to "go home." he was basically telling us, you won't tell me when to do my job. i'll do my job, when i want to. fricken kahunas.

so we head back to the office and not even an hour later, the building guy calls the contractor and tells him to go back to meet with him because he has some questions about the architecture drawings. the contractor calls me up to meet him there, but i said no, we just got back to the office, have him call me to see if i can answer any of his questions. so i get a call. from the contractor. the building plan checker finally gave us the permit.

all of this work, for a building that they already started building and passed two building inspections already....all without the permit. gotta love this job.