Comedy theater - right from my kitchen table!

From the back of our house, we have a rather nice view of the neighborhood behind us:
(This picture was taken from an upstairs window only moments ago. Isn't it a pretty day today?)

Yesterday afternoon I was rooted to the kitchen floor by a scene that was taking place on the roof of the house directly behind us. (The gray roof on the right side of the picture.)

Apparently, the homeowners (I know they're homeowners because I've talked to them. Their names are Travis and Suzanne and they have two little girls) hired some people to clean out their gutters. When the action first caught my eye, I could only see one guy. He was sitting near the chimney. It was a very windy day yesterday and he was having trouble with his black plastic trash bag. I stopped what I was doing to watch because I wanted to see if it was Travis. It wasn't. But I kept watching anyway as he finally got his trash bag under control, then, veeerrryy slooooowly inched towards the gutter, reeeeeached a hand out...grabbed some crud...fumbled with his bag...and finally deposited the crud. Then he paused...messed with his bag...adjusted his position...paused...then reeeeached into the gutter for another handful...fumbled with his bag...dropped some of it...finally deposited it, then paused.

At this point I was mesmerized. He was moving soooo sloooowly, I wondered if he planned to be there until dark? He adjusted his position...looked around...then reeeeached into the gutter. When he sat up again, there was nothing in his hand! This didn't stop him from messing with his bag, adjusting his position, and looking around though. Then he reeeeeached into the gutter. This time, he brought up a huge wad of crud. Was he making up for the previous attempt? As he fumbled with his bag, he dropped half the wad, and subsequently pushed the dropped crud back into the gutter. I couldn't help laughing. It's a good thing he didn't know I was there, watching his every move, memorizing it for a future blog post (poor guy...).

There was another person on the roof, behind the chimney. Every once in a while I could see an elbow, and there was lots of debris falling (being thrown?) to the ground. Then he, whoever that person was, got up and started walking towards the star of the show. Suddenly, Mr. Taking-it-easy stepped it up. He reached into the gutter, grabbed a handful, shoved it in his bag, reached into the gutter, grabbed a handful, shoved it in his bag. If I hadn't been laughing before, I certainly was now! Obviously he was very aware that his performance was sub-par and didn't want anyone to know!

I decided that I'd probably had enough fun at the guy's expense and found something more useful to do. I just hope Travis and Suzanne were paying them by the job and not by the hour!