It was just a small little job someone asked me to help them with on a Saturday. Apparently the electrician they had doing the work ghosted them and they just needed someone to get done ASAP, so they called your boy. It really wasn’t that intensive, all I had to do was install the lights and outlets in a newly renovated house.


Something that would normally take me maybe five hours to get done got dragged out to be all day. Since I was being paid cash, by the hour, I took full advantage of it. I got into that house, shut off all the power to the place, and got after it. Evidently I wasn’t the only one working in the house that day. About an hour later three guys pulled up to do the paint trim out painting on all the walls.

The only hiccup was that they didn’t speak a lick of english. I tried to say hi to them, you know the usual, “Another day another dollar” kind of thing and all they did was laugh like I was Mitch Helberg. They had no idea what I was saying. So I proceeded to turn up my music and do my job. They weren’t working on the first floor so I attacked there first. Once I finished that in record time I headed upstairs.

One of the guys was upstairs painting the doors, so I started in the room opposite him. I wanted to stay out of their way as much as I could mostly so I could still listen to my music all the way up. I had the whole master bedroom to myself and finished the room in four songs. When I got in the second room, the one where he was working, productively instantly went down.

As soon as I got in the room he was working in, he said something to me in Spanish. I had no idea what he said, I could make out two words he said and they were; grande and gringo and he pointed to my companies logo on our shirt. So all I knew was that he was talking about this big white dude. I asked him to say it again and still processed nothing more than the protagonist being a big white dude I had nothing.

He saw the blank stare I had on my face and promptly pulled out his Google translate and started talking into it like there was no language barrier between us. I don’t know what it was, maybe my clothes smelt like last night, maybe I mentioned something about partying too hard while I was on the phone, I’m not sure what it was but something about whatever I was doing opened the door for him to talk to me.

He broke the ice with his joke about the big white guy that works for my company making fun of his beard. He had me hooked, I was all for whatever he had to say, even if I couldn’t understand it. His phone was telling me what he was saying and I was dying laughing. laughing needs no translation. After that we couldn’t stop talking to one another.

Neither one of us was working anymore. We spent the rest of our Saturday afternoon shooting the shit. I’m not sure if it was the vibe I was giving him or if he could sense it off of me but he knew I liked to party. Maybe it was our back and forth joking with each other, but I felt like I could be honest with him.

But I didn’t want to be too direct so I answered as vaguely as I could, “Oh yeah most definitely, especially on the weekends.” I spoke that into his phone, waited for it to translate my English to Spanish and when his phone said those out loud he instantly smiled.

It was clear to me that whatever game he was playing I became a part of. It was like he knew exactly the type of person I was without us even having a full conversation with him. He asked me if I had to work the next day and I said, “Hell no it’s Sunday.” He then asked me if I liked to party and I said yes, confused as to why he was asking again.

He then asked again “?Te gusta la fiesta?” Of course me being the person I am, couldn’t say no no matter how many times he kept on asking me. Of course I love to party. It’s one of my favorite pastimes. All of a sudden this guy transformed from friend into a businessman real quick.

His demeanor got more serious when he spoke into his translator, “I have a good connect with some good stuff. It’s $1,000.00 for an ounce for that yayo.” Of course when he said it in Spanish I had no idea what he was talking about. The only thing I understood was a thousand dineros for yayo.

I knew what dinero was and that was all I cared about. All I heard was an eighth for one hundred twenty five bucks was going to give me some extra spending cash for awhile. Just like that I became one of the biggest distributors for the cartel in Charlotte North Carolina.

So I guess if anyone needs anything let me know.