I'm going out today to look at this adobe building that needs some help...
I am told it is/was a bar, and someone drove through the wall.
It's about 120 miles away, and I've been contacted, via the adobe newsgroup, by an (insurance?) agent in California who says he is representing the "owner", who lives in Utah. I'll be meeting a "relative" of the owner who lives right across the street from the job. The agent had been having a difficult time finding a legitimate contractor who does adobe, I'm told.
"Job" has a different meaning in the world of contracting. MY "job", which is a career, is to find the next in a long line of "jobs", projects I work on. My "job security" is my confidence in finding work, a positive outlook on life borne on a lifetime of experience. When I need work, I have always been able to go out and find it.
Sometimes that literally meant driving around in areas where new construction was underway, walking into a likely site and start talking. Later in my career, the next job usually found me before I needed to go find it, through referrals from former clients, other builders and architects. I haven't advertised in over 20 years; I don't even have business cards to hand out.
I am what I call "semi-retired", meaning I am collecting my SS, but will take on work that interests me if it comes along. I am getting by, but barely.
Oddly, the biggest personal driver for me in taking on this work is desire. I have allowed myself to desire something I don't have the money for but really reallly want. The particular "something" in question isn't germane to this conversation: I don't really need it, but I want it, so I am going to get it. This job prospect is obviously (to me) the Cosmic Redistribution Service at work, filling my order.
I have lived on the edge my whole life; I don't really know any other way to do it.
Meanwhile, friends, the Home Repair shop is open once again for your interest. We talk about emergency repairs and planned-for improvements and projects, and we have a lot of fun doing it.