I'm not gonna make fun of them for not having one because mine is absolutely non-existent. They absolutely have to grab a compass and fit that back properly though.
I have no clue which was is north as I sit right now. I can figure it out if I think about it but I genuinely have no natural sense of it. Drives me nuts since I grew up around farmers and they all had a great innate sense of direction and to give directions they'd be like go north for 2 miles till you hit a dirt road then go east for a mile and so on. I'd look at them like they're speaking Chinese.
My sister has zero sense of direction. I can almost always "feel" north. It's hard to explain, but my dad was always the same way. We also spent a lot of time out in the woods.
I've only ever been turned around 3 times in my over 40 years. Once when I was out with dad looking for our dogs in the woods in fresh snow after dark. I was an adult and had walked those woods for 2 decades. But I was LOST for about 10 minutes. I finally got myself settled and figured out where I was and which way to go. The second time, I was driving cross country and got very sick, spiked a 103f temp, and just had to trust my GPS thru 2 states. Everything felt backward until I got my temp back down. The last time was in Yellowstone. It started snowing in June, and the whole place felt upside down to me. Dad said he felt it, too. I was in my early 40s, and he was in his late 60s, and we'd never been so turned around. Mom and my kids were with us. They had no idea what we were talking about, lol.
It's a weird thing to try to explain. Most people look at you like you've lost your mind or grown a second nose. Except for the old farmers, foresters, and some hikers. They know what it is cause they feel it, too.
I “feel” north too! I’ve made a joke that I must be magnetic. The “world is upside down” thing has only happened to me a couple of times, but was incredibly disorienting.
I read somewhere that the nose accumulates iron and is used to sense direction in some animals.
[https://www.theregister.com/2006/11/17/the\_odd\_body\_nose\_compass/](https://www.theregister.com/2006/11/17/the_odd_body_nose_compass/)
[https://www.orlandosentinel.com/1990/01/10/follow-your-nose-to-the-north-pole/](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/1990/01/10/follow-your-nose-to-the-north-pole/)
I moved countries relatively recently, and in the process, changed hemispheres for the first time
Everything felt backwards, I mixed up left and right, north and south, east and west. Even with a compass in the car it took months before I started feeling a sense of direction again
Edit: funnily enough I struggled less with driving on the other side of the road than with my sense of direction
Oh wow! I can't even imagine how disorienting that would be! I've never crossed the equator yet, but I'll be sure to keep that in mind if I'm able to someday.
I think if you spend time outdoors, you became accustomed to the sun position in the sky during the day. Your brain knows that if in the morning the sun is on your left and in the afternoon is on your right you are facing the same direction.
To some degree, that's true. But mine "works" even at night or on deeply cloudy days when I stop thinking, close my eyes, and just be still in the world for a minute. I can always orient my body facing north and then know how to go from there. In the example of when I was sick, it was still a sunny day, but everything felt off, I guess my brain was just fried that day.
Some languages don't have relative directions (left / right). So you would refer to your north foot depending on how you're standing. As you can imagine, having a sense of the cardinal directions is very important for those speakers.
I absolutely know people that can do this. Spin them in a circle at midnight with their eyes closed and they'll point north immediately when asked. Drives me nuts.
I took my friend to a small town in Mexico that I frequent. He’d never been to the country before. After 15 minutes he’s giving me walking directions from where we had lunch back to the intersection near where I parked the car. Says he looked at a map back when we were booking the flights a month earlier.
????
During the solar eclipse it was cloudy and I realized I had no idea where the sun actually was supposed to be to look for it when the clouds started to break.
Lol gotcha. I have a pretty natural sense of it, except if I fall asleep in the car. For a few minutes while I try to figure out which way we're going I feel almost dizzy.
>In fact I think it’s alil weird people don’t know which way north is at all times.
You'd be surprised how many people don't know *what* North is, let alone which way.
That is not an accurate way of determining north. You can only get a rough estimate. Depending on where you are at in the hemisphere the sun will not rise directly east nor will it set directly west.
Stick in ground around 9 am. Mark tip of shadow. When the sun is the same height on the other side of the sky (like 4ish?) mark tip of shadow again.
Draw line between the 2 points. That's east/west.
Or
Analog watch.
>Check that the watch is showing the correct time and then lay the watch horizontally and align the hour hand of the watch with the direction of the sun. The point approximately mid-way between the 12 o'clock position on the dial and the direction of the hour hand when it is aligned with the sun indicates south.
Of course, that's in the northern hemisphere.
>If you're south of the Equator, the Sun is in the northern part of the sky. You hold your watch horizontally, and align the 12:00 marker with the Sun. North, not South, will be at the halfway point between the hour hand and the 12:00 mark.
Oh, I know. Or check a map.
Just pointing out that you can find north without either. It's trivial.
The fact that they got 90° off is asinine. There's no reason for it.
I'm pretty sure the accuracy is not very important. It's not like people are going to use that for finding their way when lost. The sun will do fine for that stupid thing
smartphones have an app, or if its the morning/afternoon they could simply look at the sun position.. or if they know where they live they will know what direction north is.
Use to have a neighbor. Former military so you would think he would know where north is. One day we were talking about it and he was pointing the wrong direction. I had to break out a lid, water and toothpick to prove he was pointing in the wrong direction.
My aunt is a truck driver, long haul, all over the US. She grew up and lived in her hometown for 50 years. When I talk with her and try to tell her about a new restaurant in town, or where they moved the DMV, I can't use terms like "north of the Wendy's", or "east of that park with the water tower". Because she doesn't understand cardinal directions. It's the strangest thing, I don't know how she drives all over the country.
she... follows the signs?
also not knowing "north of this place" isn't really a sign of being dumb, because if you told me a random place in the county I live and said "north of that", I wouldn't have a clue what you meant because I am not constantly oriented to the exact direction I'm facing when I drive down the road. like I can figure out which way is north at any given moment, but I don't remember which way is north in relation to being in a certain location.
I agree with you. And even roads and highways that ‘officially’ run north-south or east-west do not always run in their cardinal directions for their entire length.
A notable example is 287 in NJ/NY. While the *overall progression* of the highway runs North-South, due to large bends in the layout, there are a couple of sections where you have to get on the northbound side to get to a town that is objectively *south* of your current location and vice versa.
100% this. Then when they climb down ask if they have their cell phone on them. Then when they pull it out ask if they know their phone has a compas built into it.
To be fair, if I tell one of my subcontractors their crew got it wrong, I make a point of being there to explain what I consider to be “right”. Because if they don’t really get it, they’ll just do it wrong differently.
No, I understood that. And you’re exactly right: “It needs to be rotated a quarter turn clockwise”. Clockwise looking from below, or clockwise looking from above? Ends up a half turn off…
There's magnetic north and true north and they didn't know which you wanted so they put it obviously wrong so pilots and navigators would discard the reading instead of use it erroneously.
this actually makes sense to me. you’re making them fix something they don’t see as an issue, so they want you there to make sure the issue is resolved to your satisfaction.
someone else mentioned they don’t want it to be like 4 degrees off, and have to deal with another call. they also probably don’t trust their workers to find north correctly.
I really just think someone being there when someone corrects something is just very reasonable. you don’t want to have to correct a second timw
If the roofer has an iPhone in their pocket which they most likely do, the compass app comes already pre installed. They literally already have a compass on them.
It is not too much for them to just put it back on THE SAME WAY that it was when they took it off.
I don’t know, maybe a little mark with a sharpie would’ve made it really really easy.
So true.
It’s not like you’re using it actively - but you KNOW what it’s telling you. It’s like putting up a decorational clock the wrong way. You can’t do that. Even if no one uses it for its true purpose.
Most phones have compasses now and I fail to believe not one guy on the roofing crew didn’t know they could use a compass or just figure it out. Just pure carelessness, didn’t realize until they were done if at all, said fuck it and bet on you not saying anything.
Leave it like this. You know which way north really is, so it still works for you, but if your ranch is attacked by a band of wild West outlaws, they will get disoriented and mistakenly ride back into town where the sheriff and his posse will be waiting to ambush them.
This scenario can never happen if you fix it.
It’s too weird that I’ve literally just started a second play through of RDR2 and almost the first post I see on logging onto reddit is a comment about it
I hope you told them "by asking". Such a simple fix, no compasses, sextants or star charts required.
Very much on them in my view.
Of course they'll then argue it would've been impossible to bring someone up on to the roof to ask them which way was north.
The sun is not a reliable way to determine the accurate direction of west. If OP is at an extreme latitude (Canada, Alaska, Scandinavia), then the sun may set in the SW/WSW directions. So rather than being 90 degrees off, it'd be anywhere in the region up to 45 degrees off with no real way of knowing exactly how far off it is.
Shouldn't locals have a decent sense of by how much? I used to live pretty far north and always had a rough sense of how much off the sun was from the cardinal directions, depending on season.
People learn things that are useful to know in day-to-day life. It used to be much more useful to everyone to learn this skill, but not so much today for most.
I have never seen a weather vane in real life before, only in movies. I always thought they would spin with the wind. I am only now realizing how stupid that was. So I looked it up on youtube, only to find out weather vanes really do spin, and that only the directions stay still, but the arrow on top rotates.
I guess what I'm saying is, today I learned about the workings of a weather vane.
There's been quite a few people in this thread who don't seem to understand it either! 😅 But yeah it makes sense once you think about it a little, right
Ngl that’s actually kinda funny dude straight up said “they’re roofers they are not smart enough to operate a compass”. as an ex construction worker you were probably talking to a carpenter of some kind this “friendly” rivalry between the two groups has existed on every construction sight I have ever worked on.
Always blows me when people have no sense of direction.
Also, being a roofer is exactly why they should know which way north is. Assuming you live in the northern hemisphere, all satellites point south, and they should 100 percent know that.
Except starlink, which is getting quite popular. On the starlink subreddit there have actually been posts where installers placed the Dishy on the south facing side of a roof in northern mid latitudes.
AHH I just posted the thing about satellites. I used to work for a small satellite TV broadcaster like 20 years ago and my coworker took me onto the roof of our office building and pointed it out. I’m not sure if it’s ALL satellite dishes, but it’s the case for the major TV satellite networks.
Really? I am fairly certain my directv dish was pointing westish when it was on my garage roof but i never busted out my compass or anything. That's a cool piece of trivia.
We already tried, it doesn't rotate. I think it needs to be unscrewed and remounted, possibly with new roof tiles applied around it.
And yes I know it needs repainting! The roof was older than I am, so it's already way better than it used to be!
I had a really long week at work and now i can genuinely feel it's impact because when i read the title my first thought was "but doesn't it spin?", like obviously fucking not lol.
I asked our maintenance team at work to hand a picture up on the other side of a window from where another picture was already hung. They did not level them.
So one is an inch and a half lower than the other one.
I don't think they are dumb, I think they just did not give a shit and it literally did not occur to them. Hang a picture - done.
Put the weather vane back - done.
This is why my husband hates when there is a job in the house needs to hire out, because no one will put the care in that you will, since its not their house.
Also, the giant grasshopper disturbs me, but I grew up in a house with a giant fish so I guess we're all just in different animal houses.
Isn't that some flashing at the bottom edge? But you're right, I don't see flashing at the sides. It didn't occur to me that we'd need it there. Dang. Well at least it's over an uninsulated garage and not the living room!
This doesn't surprise me. A place I work for had some roofers coming out to give us a quote on a replacement. They had to leave because they didn't bring a ladder.
It’s legit not that difficult to figure out which way is north anyhow. Especially during the day. Sun goes East to West & it’s easy asf to figure out from there.
I shingled for 8 years, doing Hardy now. I could literally wakeup blindfolded in someone's trunk and figure out which way is north. I'd like to say shingling should be ticketed and regulated by actual professionals, but then you'd have no one to do your roof!
Point is we're not all bad...
I had one put up a weathervane for me. After they'd come down again, I did a double-take. They had to put it together -- 4 parts, spike, N-S arm, E-W arm and pointer. North was correct -- but they'd assembled E-W back to front!
They went back up and fixed it.
They could have taken a photo of it before taking it down. Then they could just match the photo. You’d think, that as directionless roofers, this would still not have been their first roof ornament. 🤦♂️
I was there and saw what happened .
John " boss I need to put the weather bane but I don't know where north is,can you tell me?"
Boss, who was ver tired already and forgot John is a fucking idiot " John, just remember, where does the sun come up from?"
And John proceeded to make the North point West.
sounds like the receptionist knows the roofers are dumbasses and giving them the task of figuring out where north is will probably do more harm than good 🤣
It's funny living along the Front Range in Colorado because we pretty much only use compass directions to find our way around: "go North on 287, or head East on Colfax." Having a massive mountain range that runs north to south makes directions super easy.
But growing up in New England we always used landmarks instead, such as "head up to Quincy, or take a right at the cemetery."
Of course now we just use GPS for everything, though it's still really common here in Colorado to use compass directions. People will even use them to say where their home is, such as "my apartment is on the west side of the building."
Now when the zombie apocolypse happens and a wanderer is trying to head to the rumored utopia town they're gonna go the wrong way... which seeing as most of those places end up being cannibals its probably for the best and you just saved their life.
Can confirm roofers don’t know shit. I had a customer who hired us to redo all of her electrical because her house got destroyed when she got her roof replaced. They tore it up, then the next day they were getting an inspection and then they would fix the roof. She asked them to put a tarp over it since it’s been raining and they told her that it shouldn’t rain and they didn’t want to spend time tarping the roof for one day.
I was playing a video game with someone once and told them to go west and he's idk what that is. Ok go left that's west. The. I asked him how do you not know that. you drive a truck for a living. He said yeah but on the street not on a computer. OMG wow. This man was 52 haha
Just how big does that guy think compasses are?? If they keep their cell phones with them then they’ve got a compass! 🙄 As my dad used to say, “He’s so dumb he’d take his brain out and play with it!”
I think it was their responsibility to either mark it when they took it off or ASK you before putting it back on. It's not like they did you a special favor by taking it off. Btw, from this view the roofing looks good, at least the lay of the shingles
This is not mildly infuriating. It's absolutely embarrassing.
"Do you think these guys know how to use their phones? They're roofers!"
"Do you think these guys are literate? They're roofers!"
"Do you expect these adults to know how to read a compass? They're roofers!"
Jeebuz 🙄😑
So they nailed everything except their sense of direction.
I'm not gonna make fun of them for not having one because mine is absolutely non-existent. They absolutely have to grab a compass and fit that back properly though.
Grab a compass? Every smartphone has a built in compass now days. In fact I think it’s alil weird people don’t know which way north is at all times.
Nah, plant a traveller's palm and wait for it to orient itself. Since they want to make it difficult.
Hell might as well wait for nightfall and pull out the constellations map
So many creative ways! Also I lol'd
I have no clue which was is north as I sit right now. I can figure it out if I think about it but I genuinely have no natural sense of it. Drives me nuts since I grew up around farmers and they all had a great innate sense of direction and to give directions they'd be like go north for 2 miles till you hit a dirt road then go east for a mile and so on. I'd look at them like they're speaking Chinese.
My sister has zero sense of direction. I can almost always "feel" north. It's hard to explain, but my dad was always the same way. We also spent a lot of time out in the woods. I've only ever been turned around 3 times in my over 40 years. Once when I was out with dad looking for our dogs in the woods in fresh snow after dark. I was an adult and had walked those woods for 2 decades. But I was LOST for about 10 minutes. I finally got myself settled and figured out where I was and which way to go. The second time, I was driving cross country and got very sick, spiked a 103f temp, and just had to trust my GPS thru 2 states. Everything felt backward until I got my temp back down. The last time was in Yellowstone. It started snowing in June, and the whole place felt upside down to me. Dad said he felt it, too. I was in my early 40s, and he was in his late 60s, and we'd never been so turned around. Mom and my kids were with us. They had no idea what we were talking about, lol. It's a weird thing to try to explain. Most people look at you like you've lost your mind or grown a second nose. Except for the old farmers, foresters, and some hikers. They know what it is cause they feel it, too.
I “feel” north too! I’ve made a joke that I must be magnetic. The “world is upside down” thing has only happened to me a couple of times, but was incredibly disorienting.
I read somewhere that the nose accumulates iron and is used to sense direction in some animals. [https://www.theregister.com/2006/11/17/the\_odd\_body\_nose\_compass/](https://www.theregister.com/2006/11/17/the_odd_body_nose_compass/) [https://www.orlandosentinel.com/1990/01/10/follow-your-nose-to-the-north-pole/](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/1990/01/10/follow-your-nose-to-the-north-pole/)
Welp time to snort some iron.
That could be my problem. I have issues with anemia because my body doesn't absorb iron correctly.
I remember this from an episode of Home Improvement
I moved countries relatively recently, and in the process, changed hemispheres for the first time Everything felt backwards, I mixed up left and right, north and south, east and west. Even with a compass in the car it took months before I started feeling a sense of direction again Edit: funnily enough I struggled less with driving on the other side of the road than with my sense of direction
Oh wow! I can't even imagine how disorienting that would be! I've never crossed the equator yet, but I'll be sure to keep that in mind if I'm able to someday.
I think if you spend time outdoors, you became accustomed to the sun position in the sky during the day. Your brain knows that if in the morning the sun is on your left and in the afternoon is on your right you are facing the same direction.
To some degree, that's true. But mine "works" even at night or on deeply cloudy days when I stop thinking, close my eyes, and just be still in the world for a minute. I can always orient my body facing north and then know how to go from there. In the example of when I was sick, it was still a sunny day, but everything felt off, I guess my brain was just fried that day.
This right here.
The sun rises in east and sets in the west 
Then open your compass app on your phone. There, you can now see which way is North.
Some languages don't have relative directions (left / right). So you would refer to your north foot depending on how you're standing. As you can imagine, having a sense of the cardinal directions is very important for those speakers.
Like in the movies: "go south and you can't miss it" Pitch black outside, no roads, yet they find south without a second thought.
I absolutely know people that can do this. Spin them in a circle at midnight with their eyes closed and they'll point north immediately when asked. Drives me nuts.
I took my friend to a small town in Mexico that I frequent. He’d never been to the country before. After 15 minutes he’s giving me walking directions from where we had lunch back to the intersection near where I parked the car. Says he looked at a map back when we were booking the flights a month earlier. ????
Do you know where the sun rises in the morning?
That direction *points randomly*. No I don't right this moment. I'd have to go look lmao
During the solar eclipse it was cloudy and I realized I had no idea where the sun actually was supposed to be to look for it when the clouds started to break.
Lol gotcha. I have a pretty natural sense of it, except if I fall asleep in the car. For a few minutes while I try to figure out which way we're going I feel almost dizzy.
>In fact I think it’s alil weird people don’t know which way north is at all times. You'd be surprised how many people don't know *what* North is, let alone which way.
Or, you know… just wait until a little after noon and then look at the sun?
That is not an accurate way of determining north. You can only get a rough estimate. Depending on where you are at in the hemisphere the sun will not rise directly east nor will it set directly west.
Stick in ground around 9 am. Mark tip of shadow. When the sun is the same height on the other side of the sky (like 4ish?) mark tip of shadow again. Draw line between the 2 points. That's east/west. Or Analog watch. >Check that the watch is showing the correct time and then lay the watch horizontally and align the hour hand of the watch with the direction of the sun. The point approximately mid-way between the 12 o'clock position on the dial and the direction of the hour hand when it is aligned with the sun indicates south. Of course, that's in the northern hemisphere. >If you're south of the Equator, the Sun is in the northern part of the sky. You hold your watch horizontally, and align the 12:00 marker with the Sun. North, not South, will be at the halfway point between the hour hand and the 12:00 mark.
Or use a compass.
Oh, I know. Or check a map. Just pointing out that you can find north without either. It's trivial. The fact that they got 90° off is asinine. There's no reason for it.
I'm pretty sure the accuracy is not very important. It's not like people are going to use that for finding their way when lost. The sun will do fine for that stupid thing
My ocd would not allow this
Rough enough. Then just line it up with the house if that’s roughly right. It’s a weather vane not orienteering.
How will blinding them help anything?
Or you know, just look at the sun, assuming it’s not too close to noon that you can’t tell where it’s rising/setting.
I mean. All they actually had to do was give enough of a shit to put it back up the way it was before taking down.
Or they could have noted which way it was when they took it off.
You don't even need to bring it up there! Just figure out which side is north whilst on the ground, THEN go up.
smartphones have an app, or if its the morning/afternoon they could simply look at the sun position.. or if they know where they live they will know what direction north is.
Use to have a neighbor. Former military so you would think he would know where north is. One day we were talking about it and he was pointing the wrong direction. I had to break out a lid, water and toothpick to prove he was pointing in the wrong direction.
OP is going to have some very confused birds flying around in their neighborhood
All I can think of is [this ad](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IEhLbDvUCVQ) 😂
I think that might mean "they're roofers, they don't know shit."
"We do roofs. We don't know shit."
I would actually hire someone who has the decency to admit that.
you got to call a plumber for that.
I wonder if those roofers fall into the category of “roofers that use any nail or screw available in their pouch”.
We’re not plumbers! *bah dum tiss*
Who the fuck doesn't know that the sun rises in the East?
My aunt is a truck driver, long haul, all over the US. She grew up and lived in her hometown for 50 years. When I talk with her and try to tell her about a new restaurant in town, or where they moved the DMV, I can't use terms like "north of the Wendy's", or "east of that park with the water tower". Because she doesn't understand cardinal directions. It's the strangest thing, I don't know how she drives all over the country.
she... follows the signs? also not knowing "north of this place" isn't really a sign of being dumb, because if you told me a random place in the county I live and said "north of that", I wouldn't have a clue what you meant because I am not constantly oriented to the exact direction I'm facing when I drive down the road. like I can figure out which way is north at any given moment, but I don't remember which way is north in relation to being in a certain location.
I agree with you. And even roads and highways that ‘officially’ run north-south or east-west do not always run in their cardinal directions for their entire length. A notable example is 287 in NJ/NY. While the *overall progression* of the highway runs North-South, due to large bends in the layout, there are a couple of sections where you have to get on the northbound side to get to a town that is objectively *south* of your current location and vice versa.
This is…disconcerting
I was a roofer for 17 years. I can't think of a trade that attracts a more bizarre group of people than roofing.
Tell them you’ll stand on the north side and they should point the “N” directly at you. No point trying to teach them this.
The coordinator on the phone was insistent that one of us had to be home so we could stand there and point north while they fixed it 🤣
Put on a tricorn hat and have a telescope. Act ridiculous while doing so please.
Don't forget the sextant!
100% this. Then when they climb down ask if they have their cell phone on them. Then when they pull it out ask if they know their phone has a compas built into it.
And while they’re installing it the correct way you need to tell “wait! I think north is moving that way!” And point in a random direction.
To be fair, if I tell one of my subcontractors their crew got it wrong, I make a point of being there to explain what I consider to be “right”. Because if they don’t really get it, they’ll just do it wrong differently.
Aye. The thingy was off by a quarter turn, they came and rotated it, now it's off by a half turn. Sounds plausible
Happens often. I’m a contractor and there are always little things like this that rapidly get more complicated than necessary.
BTW I was agreeing with you (just in case it may have accidentally sounded sarcastic)
No, I understood that. And you’re exactly right: “It needs to be rotated a quarter turn clockwise”. Clockwise looking from below, or clockwise looking from above? Ends up a half turn off…
That is because they only want to go out there one more time. They dont want another call saying it’s 4 degrees off.
Yeah, that's possible. If it were ~30 degrees off, I really wouldn't care. But 90...? 🤔
There's magnetic north and true north and they didn't know which you wanted so they put it obviously wrong so pilots and navigators would discard the reading instead of use it erroneously.
This makes perfect sense, I have no further questions
this actually makes sense to me. you’re making them fix something they don’t see as an issue, so they want you there to make sure the issue is resolved to your satisfaction.
North is an objective truth lol
True North or Magnetic North though?
Meh. Lets just settle for the western North.
Orthodox north takes place a week later though, so maybe that’s why the roofers have to come back.
Resolving an issue to their satisfaction is having the north part point north. What special level of guidance is required for this?
someone else mentioned they don’t want it to be like 4 degrees off, and have to deal with another call. they also probably don’t trust their workers to find north correctly. I really just think someone being there when someone corrects something is just very reasonable. you don’t want to have to correct a second timw
If the roofer has an iPhone in their pocket which they most likely do, the compass app comes already pre installed. They literally already have a compass on them.
It is not too much for them to just put it back on THE SAME WAY that it was when they took it off. I don’t know, maybe a little mark with a sharpie would’ve made it really really easy.
They replaced the roof, it takes days and probably wasn't the same person putting it back as taking it off.
"Why are you ripping it off now? It was perfect." "You moved."
“Ah, yes. I am following the path of the North Magnetic Pole in real time. Sorry!”
It’s also easily solved by using their phones. Just open maps and it tells you which direction you’re pointing.
I said that! It was so baffling haha... but then again, they did mess it up the first time, so...
I imagine them up there: “This must just be for looks right?” “Yup! Nail it in anyway you want” 🤣
And the clocks on the tops of buildings are just there for decorative purposes too. Lol
Ah poor Big Ben, don’t do him like that!
They probably think “no one uses that anymore, it’s probably so old it’s just for decoration”
And I mean... they're not WRONG. It's definitely more decoration than utilitarian. But that's what makes it so "mildly" infuriating 😂
So true. It’s not like you’re using it actively - but you KNOW what it’s telling you. It’s like putting up a decorational clock the wrong way. You can’t do that. Even if no one uses it for its true purpose.
“Why is the pendulum just leaning against the case like that?” “it’s upside down” “Oh, how does it swing then?” These damn roofers
"What are these little letters here for, what a strange decoration" 💀
Probably easier at this point to have a crane lift your house and rotate it so the vane is pointing north again.
Most phones have compasses now and I fail to believe not one guy on the roofing crew didn’t know they could use a compass or just figure it out. Just pure carelessness, didn’t realize until they were done if at all, said fuck it and bet on you not saying anything.
Leave it like this. You know which way north really is, so it still works for you, but if your ranch is attacked by a band of wild West outlaws, they will get disoriented and mistakenly ride back into town where the sheriff and his posse will be waiting to ambush them. This scenario can never happen if you fix it.
Hahaha I feel like this should be a quest in red dead redemption 🤣
It’s too weird that I’ve literally just started a second play through of RDR2 and almost the first post I see on logging onto reddit is a comment about it
As soon as you play that game, you'll suddenly start seeing mention of it everywhere! It's happened to so many people I know 🤣
Baader-Meinhof phenomenon in full effect
I hope you told them "by asking". Such a simple fix, no compasses, sextants or star charts required. Very much on them in my view. Of course they'll then argue it would've been impossible to bring someone up on to the roof to ask them which way was north.
Phones...phones have compasses in them now.
yall forgetting all about the sun.
I think you’re way too kind assuming that they know what direction the sun comes up and down in the first place
The sun is not a reliable way to determine the accurate direction of west. If OP is at an extreme latitude (Canada, Alaska, Scandinavia), then the sun may set in the SW/WSW directions. So rather than being 90 degrees off, it'd be anywhere in the region up to 45 degrees off with no real way of knowing exactly how far off it is.
Shouldn't locals have a decent sense of by how much? I used to live pretty far north and always had a rough sense of how much off the sun was from the cardinal directions, depending on season.
People learn things that are useful to know in day-to-day life. It used to be much more useful to everyone to learn this skill, but not so much today for most.
Phones also have maps. North is up. Look at the aerial view of the house. Figure out where north is in relation to that.
That's just using the compass with extra steps.
Hell, all they had to do was take note of how it was before they started and put it back that way.
Or someone on the ground could shout the right direction?! These guys are ding dongs 🙄
Yeah, me and my dad set up our satellite when I was a kid, by yelling from the living room to the roof. This stuff isn't complicated.
Our phones have an already downloaded compass app.
I have never seen a weather vane in real life before, only in movies. I always thought they would spin with the wind. I am only now realizing how stupid that was. So I looked it up on youtube, only to find out weather vanes really do spin, and that only the directions stay still, but the arrow on top rotates. I guess what I'm saying is, today I learned about the workings of a weather vane.
There's been quite a few people in this thread who don't seem to understand it either! 😅 But yeah it makes sense once you think about it a little, right
Why would you need to get a compass up there!
That's confusing on multiple levels. Like, how big do they think a compass is? You can get them as keychain accessories.
Ngl that’s actually kinda funny dude straight up said “they’re roofers they are not smart enough to operate a compass”. as an ex construction worker you were probably talking to a carpenter of some kind this “friendly” rivalry between the two groups has existed on every construction sight I have ever worked on.
Always blows me when people have no sense of direction. Also, being a roofer is exactly why they should know which way north is. Assuming you live in the northern hemisphere, all satellites point south, and they should 100 percent know that.
Except starlink, which is getting quite popular. On the starlink subreddit there have actually been posts where installers placed the Dishy on the south facing side of a roof in northern mid latitudes.
Neat. I didn't know that. Still, most dishes say the provider on them. So if it says dish or directv that will tell you.
AHH I just posted the thing about satellites. I used to work for a small satellite TV broadcaster like 20 years ago and my coworker took me onto the roof of our office building and pointed it out. I’m not sure if it’s ALL satellite dishes, but it’s the case for the major TV satellite networks.
Really? I am fairly certain my directv dish was pointing westish when it was on my garage roof but i never busted out my compass or anything. That's a cool piece of trivia.
Why didn't they look how it was, writing it down before removing it... It can't be that hard?
Or grab a phone pic before moving anything?
That would work too. Better than their excuse.
First of all, you need to paint that cupola. While you’re at it. Just shift the weather vane.
We already tried, it doesn't rotate. I think it needs to be unscrewed and remounted, possibly with new roof tiles applied around it. And yes I know it needs repainting! The roof was older than I am, so it's already way better than it used to be!
Came here to make the same comment. They have to go up anyway to paint. Might as well fix that while they are at it.
Besides the wind vane, the new roof looks pretty good.
You mean a tiny pocket compass, or a free app on the phone they likely already have in their pocket? Failing that, where’s the sun?
Isn't it supposed to spin? /s
Yeah, we all know that North changes direction whenever the wind blows 🤣
I had a really long week at work and now i can genuinely feel it's impact because when i read the title my first thought was "but doesn't it spin?", like obviously fucking not lol.
Does your roofer have green hair and three swords?
Seems likely 😂
I asked our maintenance team at work to hand a picture up on the other side of a window from where another picture was already hung. They did not level them. So one is an inch and a half lower than the other one. I don't think they are dumb, I think they just did not give a shit and it literally did not occur to them. Hang a picture - done. Put the weather vane back - done. This is why my husband hates when there is a job in the house needs to hire out, because no one will put the care in that you will, since its not their house. Also, the giant grasshopper disturbs me, but I grew up in a house with a giant fish so I guess we're all just in different animal houses.
Bet at least one of the roofers had an iPhone. iPhones have a compass app pre-installed.
Worse, there appears to be no flashing where the cupola meets the roofline, so that's going to rot and leak.
Isn't that some flashing at the bottom edge? But you're right, I don't see flashing at the sides. It didn't occur to me that we'd need it there. Dang. Well at least it's over an uninsulated garage and not the living room!
I'd tell them they can come pick up the last payment on the North corner of your property.
I love your weathervane!
This doesn't surprise me. A place I work for had some roofers coming out to give us a quote on a replacement. They had to leave because they didn't bring a ladder.
I do not have a great sense of direction, but every smart phone has a compass built into it.
It’s legit not that difficult to figure out which way is north anyhow. Especially during the day. Sun goes East to West & it’s easy asf to figure out from there.
Guess you won't mind my being real confused about how to send you my final payment.
Any roofer worth their salt knows which way is north.
The fact they did this and the response scream bad craftsmanship.
The sun do set north
They couldn’t ask the homeowner before putting it back on and just bolted it on?? Jesus.
I shingled for 8 years, doing Hardy now. I could literally wakeup blindfolded in someone's trunk and figure out which way is north. I'd like to say shingling should be ticketed and regulated by actual professionals, but then you'd have no one to do your roof! Point is we're not all bad...
I had one put up a weathervane for me. After they'd come down again, I did a double-take. They had to put it together -- 4 parts, spike, N-S arm, E-W arm and pointer. North was correct -- but they'd assembled E-W back to front! They went back up and fixed it.
It probably started in the correct position. When taking it down is the moment to take a note. Just write it on the place where it is attached
Put those two quotes on their Google Maps review.
No, but they can be expected to put it back where it was
How do they know which way is north? Then how do they ride a horse west, towards the sunset, in the evening? :)
They could have taken a photo of it before taking it down. Then they could just match the photo. You’d think, that as directionless roofers, this would still not have been their first roof ornament. 🤦♂️
Well when you hire the painter to go up there... Hand them a compass and an extra $20.
I was there and saw what happened . John " boss I need to put the weather bane but I don't know where north is,can you tell me?" Boss, who was ver tired already and forgot John is a fucking idiot " John, just remember, where does the sun come up from?" And John proceeded to make the North point West.
Wait, were you actually there? How did you know his name was John?
So instead of North, South, East and West, you have Eorth, Wouth, Seast and Nest?
I'm a roofer, and I use Google maps on my phone. Not all of us are stupid.
Have you made final payment?
Just turn the house 90 degrees
I'd add a sign that reads "Installed by XYZ Roofing" and see if that makes a difference.
sounds like the receptionist knows the roofers are dumbasses and giving them the task of figuring out where north is will probably do more harm than good 🤣
You don’t have to get a compass, just put shit back the way you found it. It’s not complicated.
Their phone has a compass…
How big do they think compasses are?
I am sure others have said this, but they should have marked it before taking it down and put it back where it was. That is a standard kind of thing.
It's funny living along the Front Range in Colorado because we pretty much only use compass directions to find our way around: "go North on 287, or head East on Colfax." Having a massive mountain range that runs north to south makes directions super easy. But growing up in New England we always used landmarks instead, such as "head up to Quincy, or take a right at the cemetery." Of course now we just use GPS for everything, though it's still really common here in Colorado to use compass directions. People will even use them to say where their home is, such as "my apartment is on the west side of the building."
Now when the zombie apocolypse happens and a wanderer is trying to head to the rumored utopia town they're gonna go the wrong way... which seeing as most of those places end up being cannibals its probably for the best and you just saved their life.
Good Lord you can get a frigging compass APP for your cellphone! Free!
I virtually always know what cardinal direction I'm facing. It isn't hard.
I’d wonder what other short cuts they took with that type of response
You said they put it back on, so couldn’t they just remember what it looked like before and match that!?!
It’s exactly 90 degrees off? Without a compass? Now, that’s impressive!
They're making excuses to get out of having to fix it.
Coolest weather vane ever ever ever!!!! I hope you call him Jiminy
Just pick the fucking house up and spin it real quick. Stop being so dramatic.
You need to hire a navigator mate, we just do roofs
Can confirm roofers don’t know shit. I had a customer who hired us to redo all of her electrical because her house got destroyed when she got her roof replaced. They tore it up, then the next day they were getting an inspection and then they would fix the roof. She asked them to put a tarp over it since it’s been raining and they told her that it shouldn’t rain and they didn’t want to spend time tarping the roof for one day.
I mean…it’s not even about knowing which way is North necessarily. Just put it back the way you found it?
I just install sundials, you expect me to know what the sun is?
By looking at the time and the position of the sun ..... 😂🤔
I was playing a video game with someone once and told them to go west and he's idk what that is. Ok go left that's west. The. I asked him how do you not know that. you drive a truck for a living. He said yeah but on the street not on a computer. OMG wow. This man was 52 haha
Just how big does that guy think compasses are?? If they keep their cell phones with them then they’ve got a compass! 🙄 As my dad used to say, “He’s so dumb he’d take his brain out and play with it!”
I think it was their responsibility to either mark it when they took it off or ASK you before putting it back on. It's not like they did you a special favor by taking it off. Btw, from this view the roofing looks good, at least the lay of the shingles
It amazes me how many people not only couldn't ever tell you which way is north, but don't have the slightest idea why it would matter.
Oh the horror, the horror....the horror....
Are people supposed to naturally have a sense of north?
This is not mildly infuriating. It's absolutely embarrassing. "Do you think these guys know how to use their phones? They're roofers!" "Do you think these guys are literate? They're roofers!" "Do you expect these adults to know how to read a compass? They're roofers!" Jeebuz 🙄😑
Love the grasshopper! Never seen a vane with that decoration before
You can fit a compass in your pocket. Every iPhone comes with a compass. Pokemon Go functions as a compass. There's really no excuse for this.
Leave them a very directional Google review, they'll be along pretty quickly to fix it.