Ditch Digging

I get house projects to do while I am living here in my brother's basement. (I do get paid, but I still need to do them if I plan on continuing to live here) My last big assignment was to paint the fence, that took about 10 hours and I was hoping to know Karate afterwards. Sadly I was disappointed. I don't feel any quicker with my blocking than I did before. If only Pat Morita was here shouting at me while doing it, perhaps I would make sense of it all. Oh, I digress. So now my current house projects are digging a larger window well and painting the garage door. The window well project has been going on for almost a month now without any major progress. We had to remove the metal corrugated wall and then begin removing dirt on all sides then lift them up onto the deck and dump the dirt into a pile in the yard. This has been a MAJOR task. I swear I have moved about 2 tons of dirt with shovels and buckets; over my head or pulling them up a rope (no pulley system). My back aches and I tire easily being in a crouching position only using a shovel the length of my arm and a blade as big as my hand. I wonder how people ever were able to dig graves 6 feet deep, construct trenches in times of war, how prisoners escaped by digging tunnels, or how people use to dig pit latrines in the old days. My whole reason for digging this well is to be able to make part of the basement into a basement with an adequate escape route with a latter and all that. The window itself remains open day and night. This could be an excellent point of entry. To add to the hassle, Todd's kids love to crawl into the dirt and track mud all over my 'bedroom'. My cat, Faye, also thinks the dirt is fun and will walk over me while I sleep in my bed. I find paw prints on my shirts.
I just hope that all this dirt digging and lugging will be completed soon. I think I have just about had it.