Sydney Crew Announce 200 Cube Will Start At 2pm With A Laugh, Dinner Declared A Casualty Before The First Truck Backs In

HIGH ABOVE SYDNEY — Two hundred cube. Two o'clock. A Sydney crew has looked at the slab, looked at the clock and announced the start time with a laugh, the way a man laughs when the other option is crying into the hopper. Every pumper in the country can do that sum in their head: dinner is gone, the missus has been told by text, and the sun is going down on the finish.

The deck is a field of mesh with five blokes spread across it in hi-vis, hard hats and the thousand-yard stare of men who know exactly what the afternoon holds. Hoses are snaked everywhere. Shovels are already pushing mud around before a single truck has made its move. Nobody was asked how they feel about it, because the answer is written all over their faces.

"Two o'clock is when you start smoko, not a pour," said one linehand, who has stopped looking at his watch to protect himself. "Do the maths. We'll be hosing out in the dark and some cunt on the radio will still be saying one more truck."

A workplace psychologist who has never started anything after noon described the mood as "cheerful acceptance, which is just despair with good PR". The crew pointed out the job will be finished when it is finished, a time no one has ever managed to write on a pour sheet.

Tea is cancelled. Smoko is cancelled. The only thing booked for 2pm is the boys' last good mood.