Back in town..

Back in the Rock.. working.. maybe leaving again in a few hours.. I'll keep you posted.

Hear the hotel is really nice in Illinois. Can't wait.

Later

Not in Texas City anymore

Yeah, so we actually did get cut loose. Lovely feeling that was. And especially getting on the plane and leaving. Never knew how good it felt to leave a place. Like a huge weight lifted off my shouldars. But what really sucks is I got up to Austin to hang with the Licatino Family... and they are all studying and stuff. Man, it is great to not be in college anymore. Able to just hang out and watch them write paper and stuff.. HAHA..of course they didn't have to sit in an office for 4 weeks straight. Oh well.

Alright we are going to be driving back tomorrow.. I think it is going to be a lot of fun. Hanging out with friends, catching up, such a change from the routine of the past month. Little be nice..

Going to leave since people are watching me type this.. as I type.. sort of annoying.. knowing that she is critizing every mistake I make silently.. curse her.. yeah she knows who she is...

Later

Coming home

HOLY MOTHER OF ALL THAT IS HOLY AND GRILLED CHEESEY!!! I'm coming home. This rocks. I'll talk to everyone later. I have a flight at some point in the near future.. going to hang with Michael for one night.. (I was hoping for more, but whatever..) and then driving back tomorrow morning. Then maybe Formosa on monday.. that would rock..

Later

WOOHOO!!!!!

Just kidding...

Oh yeah, I'm not coming home. The idiots have decided to mess with me once again.. stupid idiots.

I'll keep you updated. Hopefully eventually someone will have some sense and figure out how not to be stupid. Until then, I'll be here indefinetely... maybe longer. If they continue with what they are doing now.. probably at least another month. Oh man, I hope they figure out how to make it work.

Later

HOLY CRAP!!

Yes, I know, very Peter Griffen like.. but it is completely justified. I have just found out they we might be getting cut loose in.. as little as an hour. Then I'm going to break new packing records for getting all this shit together. It is going to be awesome. 5 ARs and 5 MRs all in 1 pelican.. it'll be like some expensive game of tetris... but instead of little blocks, I'm working with really expensive equipment. Do I care if I break it? Of course not. Not after the hassle and everything that it has put me through. A pox on the creator of such things.. a pox on you! I'm just dreaming at anyone from rae would ever read this website.. but whatever.. they still suck ass.

Anyways, I need to get going on packing stuff.. and printing off the FINAL REPORTS. Holy crap.. ahh Seth MacFarlane.. you beautiful genius.

Later

Friday, nothing new, just bored...

Well Thanksgiving came and went. Sort of a wierd holiday.. celebrating feasting with the Native Americans after coming over to this country... only to later pretty much destroy their way of life. But you know.. whatever. It is easy to look back and see how stupid we were back then.. but I'm sure in 400 years the people then will look back and us and shake their heads in shame over us constantly subjugating to reclusive hamburger people who had originally come in peace. Hmm.. that doesn't really make much sense. What i'm trying to say is that hamburgers are really incredible intelligent forms of life and by eating them we are sealing our fate when their warships come. Can anyone tell that i've not had much sleep recently.

Anyways things are actually progressing with the tank. The lack of safety precautions down there really worries me.. but I'm up here, watching the monitors. So, well.. I hope no one gets hurt. And if they could pick it up a bit, that would be much appericated. So maybe I'll get out of Texas City today, once and for all. That would be lovely. Now that my bike is gone the weather of course becomes excellent. I wish I was riding right now. I think it is 70 and windy... perfect training weather. Well, that and it'll be even more fun to draft behind cars.

Anyways, I'm going to bail. At some turkey that was in the fridge, and now I'm tired. Really tired. Maybe I'll put my head down, just for a few seconds. Nothing bad could come of this.. no.

Later

Happy Turkey Day

Well.. it is Thanksgiving. And I'm thankful for.. wait.. let's not go there. I'm still working.. so after today, that makes.. 4 straight weeks of working. No weekends, no days off, 13 hours a day, 7 days a week. Love it.
All the plans that I tentatively made for thanksgiving, travel plans, eating plans, etc.. flew out the window when I showed up to work this morning. It will be at least 48 hours.. possibly more. No big deal. I had originally planned on being here for 6 weeks.. so I have my gym membership through the 15th of december.. but what really sucks is I sent off my bike and a lot of clothes. So now I'm going to have to go buy more socks. Yeah, that's right. I sent home most of my good boot socks. Stupid work getting my hopes up. I just hope there is a work-boot store somewhere in Galveston. I'm sure I can find anyone.
Anyways, I hope all of you have a great thanksgiving. Eat some extra mashed potatoes and gravy for me.

Later

Still working.. still working.

At least one more day.. maybe more. Stupid work. Stupid cav people being unable to do their job. Now we are waiting for pieces of equipment that they were supposed to show up with... but didn't. Stupid people forgetting what they are supposed to have.

Hopefully once that one piece gets here things will progress rapidly. Who knows though. No common swear can encompass the anger that I'm currently feeling. Perhaps I shall invent a new swear. FUCITCHORE... yes.. that'll work perfectly.

Later

Incompetence

Alright, so the vac operators are idiots. Things aren't progressing at all the way they were planned. The likelihood we will be out of here today, slim to nil. This causes plans for thanksgiving to.. go to shit. Yes that's right. I think I'm going to walk over to their little scrubber operation and smack the crap out of some of these guys. Then I'm going to hook the freaking hoses up and make this damn thing work. My hopes for going to Austin are sort of out the window.. unless they finish before 9 pm tonight.. which would rock. But if they don't... I might still be able to make it out to Port Arthur for tomorrow.. but I don't know. We'll see what happens.

Ok, I need to go kick some serious incompetent ass. Is it really so hard to do one's job correctly. To understand the things going on with your job. Freaking dumbasses.

Later

Stupid stupid technology

Ok, the item below is a ToxiPro personal monitor. We have two on site here at Texas City... and they are the most annoying things ever.


I'm just sick and tired of dealing with their crap. They have lots of good features, like being small, light and easy to calibrate, I can only assume effective in monitoring for what we are looking for. Anyways, they also have the capacity to datalog. Nice feature, unforunetely that is where the nice features end. First of all, the radios we use around here interfere with the sensor... sending your readings through the roof. So if you have it clipped to your vest, and you decide to contact someone on the radio.. it start going off. Very annoying. Also, the datalog collects this data and records it. So sometimes the data says that you were exposed to 10 ppm or something like that. That's bad. Also, downloading the little bastards is a pain. They interface with IR port on your computer. Which I guess is ok.. if the damn things worked. For some strang reason They decide to "unexpectedly terminate' your connection every time. And not at the same place.. no they tease you by downloading a little bit more each time.. UNTIL THEY TERMINATE ONCE AGAIN!!! This is very frustrating. Now the optimistic among you might say, "Why Dave, just keep trying until it'll finally download." Well you know, I have been for the past 2 freaking hours! So frustrating. I got so fed up I even called Biosystems to see if they knew about this problem and how to fix it. So I called, and the gentleman I talked to said.. "oh yeah, the old monitors don't communicate with laptops very well, do you have a desktop?" First of all, I didn't know laptops and desktops used different IR ports or frequencies. I mean.. IR is IR right? I've connected my laptop to a printer using IR before.. maybe laptops just use a different frequency.. whatever. But yeah.. you know when these monitors I have sitting in front of me were made.. september.. 2004! So in the last two months they have determined the monitors they has been making were bad and didn't work with laptops and have since made new ones that do. So I went and downloaded all their latest software and firmware. Guess what, these monitors have the latest things on them. So where does the problem arise? Maybe it is too bright in the room.. though my understanding of physics made me want to cry when I turned off the lights and over up the little transfering unit with a piece of paper in hopes it'll work better. Result: nothing. Second thing I tried. Notice the little translucent window in the top middle of the monitor.. yeah that is where the IR comes out.


(fear the mad paint skills)
Anyways that "window" is more like a doorway into HELL. It doesn't seem to very clear at all. So I thought, why not just take it apart and expose the IR LED to all the glory of the IR port on my laptop.

(picture might not be safe for work)
I was about to allow these two devices to make sweet sweet invisible love.. taking the cover off one of them.. sliding it up next to my laptop.. putting on some Barry White (this is all in the manual I swear..) and just for decency sake I did turn the lights down and left the room. Anyways, I came back.. and one of them decide that it didn't want to get it on. Not sure which one it was.. but one of them decided to leave.. and the other just sat there shooting its lonely IR beams into the night.
I'm currently downloading the Beta version of the software.. apparentely there is a glitch in the programing which turns off the IR in the ToxiPro unexpectedly and thus what was creating my errors. I don't know why they didn't just tell me that the first 3 times I called. Oh well. The download will be done soon, I'll be able to call the office and claim victory over the dreaded ToxiDevils.. not all will praise me. That or my boss will just be like, good job, here is your reward.. being ON CALL! Actually I'm not on call.. and I should be able to arrange a way to stay with some friend over the holidays. I'll make it work.

Barge is still loading.. I'll keep you posted.

Later

Barge is loading as I type.

Well the day has finally arrived. They are loading the barge right now. So if all goes well they should completely empty the tank sometime this afternoon/evening. Then probably tomorrow they are going to clean out the tank, and then cut us loose. I'm going to try and see if I can still make it out to Port Arthur to hang with Michael and his family.. that would be a lot of fun. If not and I'm forced to come to Little Rock, then I'll probably hit Heather's place for thanksgiving. Or maybe I'll get my tiphoon and bust it on down to Seans and ride some doctors into the ground. That would be fun. My legs still hurt.. tabata is a freaking genius.

gotta go pretend like I'm working.. or at least pretend to pretend.

Later

Barge Scedule

Alright.. here is the latest, and I know all of you have been waiting on the edge of your seats to find out about my life. Well, you are aren't you? Else, why are you here... anyways. The final barge is sceduled to dock at roughly 4am on the 23rd. Yes, that is correct, 11 hours away. We should be able to offload the tank in about 12 hours.. scrub it out in another 2.. then I guess.. that means we are done. I'm having trouble wrapping my mind around that. Leaving.. leaving Texas? I've been here for.. nearly 6 weeks total.. nearly 4 on this last run. I've become accustomed to sleeping in a hotel bed.. drying off with a hotel towel, am I the only one that hates those things? Anyways.. if this does end in the next 24 hours, it is really going to be wierd to come back to Arkansas. I'm not going to know how to function in normal society again. Like.. seeing people I want to talk to.. and not sitting on my ass for 13 hours a day.. everyday. What will a day off be like? So many questions.

Well, hope to see everyone in the next week or so. So close, yet it seems really far away.

later

Update on Texas Life

Well, the last Barge is scheduled for tomorrow. Likelihood it'll happen.. I'm going to give it 35%. I mean, it could happen, but it also could be that they don't want to come on a holiday week, and are going to postpone it for next week. When the sun rises tomorrow over the bay, and the barge is there.. coming in to dock. I'll believe it. When I show up tomorrow morning and the hoses are getting ready to pump off the last of this shit.. then I'll do my little dance. I'm supposed to ship some stuff off, but I don't have any forms, or envelopes. Sort of pisses me off. I would just go to a mail center, oh but wait I work during the hours that they are open. I might call my partner and have him pick me up some while he is coming here to relieve me. I think I filled out an online shipping label for one package.. I'm almost positive that I requested it be picked up at the same place I want it delivered. But who knows. I bet if I request a pick up at the hotel they'll take it to the right place.. hopefully. Stupid not having any forms or envelopes. Should have planned ahead and picked them up a few days ago.. but I didn't know I was out. Oh well.. life goes on.

Worked out like crazy last night. Legs still sore. They are more sore than I think I've ever had them. Need to squat more. Need to lift legs more. Gotta stop focusing so much on the upper body. I guess I've just become a typical gym rat. I have to resist hitting the bench first thing. Seems like that is what they always do. Of course I look like any idiot, doing all these wierd lifts.. but whatever. I'm stronger, faster, and more fit than probably anyone else in the gym. I know that might sound sort of boastful.. but you haven't see some of these people. Damn. Sure you can bench 300 pounds.. but let's see you run up some stairs. Of course, there are the exceptional athletes like Richard Green and John Saxton that make me look like a lightweight and can kick my ass in races. Not for long though... everything about the 2005 season is going to be different.

So hopefully one way or another I'll have some place to eat over Thanksgiving. Hope I know who is coming up here in the next few days so I can start grovelling and try to switch back to nights.

Alright.. props to Sean for his brilliant post about the beauty of drafting. Very insightful.

Later

Quick note

Everyone who reads this needs to check out the Bunny comic from this date. Very funny indeed.

Later

Saturday evening... still working.

Alright, work is almost through. Less than an hour to go. I think the pool is in my near future.. yes.. yes... that would be nice. No lifting today, but a nice long swim would be welcome relief for my currently destroyed muscles.

I think I'm going to have to get Half-Life 2 soon. I keep hearing really good things about it. And if you've played the game and think it would be funny to tell me something really important and thus spoil playing HL2 forever.. rest assured that my wrath shall know no bounds. I'm talking finger breaking, arm dislocating, eye gouging torture here. And everyone knows that I'm perfectly capable of doing that. And since Joey states this game "transcends 'gaming'" I'm very excited. Soon.

Work has been uneventful today. The rain died down, then came back, then died down, then came back.. I guess you get the picture. We get torrential downpours about every hour or so, and they last about 5 minutes. Very interesting. But I only got soaked coming to work. Had to get batteries. I love buy lots of batteries, the old ladies checking you out at Wal-Mart are always looking at you strangely. I need to come up with some good ideas to explain buying hundreds of dollars of batteries. Any ideas people? I've come up with a few, but I'm sure our combined intelligence will come up with some really good ideas. So, think people.. I want to freak out the people at stores when I buy the batteries. Joey.. I'm really relying on you here.. sicne I know you are going to go way over the top.. which is what I'm looking for.

Alright.. Joey is attempting to spoil the game for me as we speak.. all a ploy to get me to come out to AZ to kick his ass.. clever joey.. clever.

I'm outta here..
Later

Saturday.. rainy and depressing

So I awoke to crappy weather this morning. It was raining quite hard, streets were flooded, people were huddling under their umbrellas and some fool was building this huge wooden boat thing. But no, the weather is at the moment either not raining, as is the case now, or raining so hard I am worried the building is going to get flooded away. Working days isn't that bad when I don't have the option of working out. I really hope I get to switch back to nights when someone comes to replace my partner at the moment. That would be nice. Might even be able to make it to a friends place near here for Thanksgiving. But also, the barge is supposed to be back Sunday.. I know, that does seem funny. But who knows I might be out of here at the early part of next week. Logic would dictate that it won't be here anytime this week, and I won't be getting home until December. Either way, we'll see.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do today to pass the time. Palahniuk? Maybe.. that would be nice. Get some GYBE playing and read some. hmmm.. I got me some pistachios and I've been eating them like crazy. Lunch should be getting here soon and who knows, maybe I'll watch a movie or something. I wish I had more cycling movies, well actually I wish I had one cycling movie. Gotta get me down to Hastings and see if they have The Hard Road or something. Hmmm, cycling documenteries.. even better. :-)

Alright, I'm going to bust a move, the book is calling me. Come to me Diary.

later

Here is the scary cat that lives in the chemical facility. I think it has scary mutant powers. It cries all the time, and can fly. Seriously.

Updated Profile

Finally got a picture in my profile. Stupid profile, not wanting to do what I want right away.

Anyways, the barge filled up nice and fine today. Supposedly they are going to be back by sunday. Which means, I might be back by who knows monday? Holy crap that would rock. But I have a feeling that that isn't going to happen. We'll see. I think the client is finally starting to figure out that he is just burning money daily as we are sitting around down here. Oh well.. I'm not complaining.. much.

Hope to hit the gym tonight.. and then probably just crash. Though I might go see The Incredibles. I don't know though. I've been sleeping so well lately, don't want to try to cut into my sleep by staying up really late watching a movie by myself. Everyone has really liked it though, and I feel left out not having seen it. Who knows.

Let's see, what else is going on. Nothing much. I'm going to try to get a picture of the cat that lives in the plant on here eventually. I think I have the picture in my phone.. just need to download it.

Alright, I'm outta here.

Later

Excitement

Well, not really. Got some cross hits on one of our sensors this evening. Up to 32 ppm.. pretty exciting. First time we've got a hit in 2 weeks. WOOHOO.

So my evening wrapped up excitingly enough. What would be even better is if I had a sweet ass laptop here so I could play some half-life 2. Oh man, that would rock.

Ahh, time to pack up.. have you ever noticed how you change your speech patterns depending on the people you are around. I talk much differently around these guys here than I would around my friends. It is wierd. Am I the only one that does that? Makes me feel phoney.. and I think I spelled that wrong.. but I don't care.

Later

Laughing

Alright, so Jessica sent me this CD of a comic that she really likes. Dane Cook. Freaking funny guy. If you go to his website, linked above, you can listen to some of his clips. Very funny guy. Also a good way to pass time, Albino Black Sheep... lots of fun stuff to do there. Sort of a little like e-baum, but probably less popular.

Does anyone remember that program from way back when. That little program that would drop sheep all over your desktop. They would land on top of open windows, and run around doing fun stuff on your desktop. I remember that. I liked that program. I would always have a few running around on my computer. Then, I don't know, I got bored with them. Just wondering if anyone else remembered that program or if it was one of those things that wasn't really that popular.

Hmm, I could really go for some Mitch Hedberg right now.. it would be really awesome if someone would say, burn me a CD of his stuff so I can laugh even more. Actually any spoken word comedy is more than welcome. I like music and all, but you know, I'm enjoying listening to comedians at the moment. Sort of want to listen to more.

Food is almost here. One of the Haz-Mat guys is going to get it right now. I sort of am getting spoiled here. They get food for me everyday. Dang, this being waited on is going to end at some point. That is going to suck.

Alright, I'm going to go back to Dane Cook.. and laugh some more.

Later

Forgot

I was going to link this so people can see what makes me laugh so hard I cry. Everytime I watch it. Poor dumb fool.

Ebaum is a freaking genius. Another that falls into the genius category... Joey... for his blogging skills and away messages on AIM. who's the law and the lash? Well I guess I should really credit Chris Onsted for his genius. Shoot, there are a lot of people out there who are geniuses.. but Joey.. well Joey introduced me to Achewood.. and well.. he is a genius for that.

Later

End of the Day

Currently experiencing the worst headache ever. I guess swimming might not be happening tonight. Today is a rest day anyways, so I might just go rest. Maybe get some food on the way back, then just get a book and read until I fall asleep. Sounds like a good idea actually. Stupid freaking headache.

Saved Stuart from getting lost in St. Louis today.. who is the man? Oh yes, that is right, I'm da' man. Delorme and me got him to where he needed to go. I feel like freaking On Star right now.

Alright, going to go calibrate my personal monitor... no monitors went out today, which was awesome. Read a lot of Instant Classic comics. Pretty good. I like the art, and the writing is quite clever. Check it out if you got the chance.

Alright, I'm outta here.

later

Lottery Numbers and Pump Faults

So today has been very uneventful thus far. I'm currently helping one of the Haz-Mat guys pick lottery numbers. So, who knows, tomorrow I might be a multi-millionare. Of course, I don't want to break it to him that picking numbers that relate to birthdays really isn't going to win him any money. But you know, whatever. Odds are that he won't win.. but he can buy as many cards as he wants. I'm amazed how many people play the lottery, I mean the big hit this time is 126 million. That is just so tempting. Think of what you could do with 126 million dollars. Even after the gov't takes a big chunk out of it that is still a crap load of money.. probably 40-50 million if you opt to take the lump sum at the beginning, which you'd be crazy not to do. But still.. 40 million in your pocket.. what couldn't you do. New house, new car, new BIKES, travel some, take all your good friends with you.. that would be nice. Almost nice enough to want to spend a few bucks every day on. But let's think about it. You play lottery since you are what, 25.. spend 5 bucks a day on quick picks or using some theory of yours. Play 250 days a year... that's a 1250 a year right there. Say you play for the next 40 years of your life. 50,000.. that's a lot of money to waste on a dream. Now, suppose you invested 1250 a year every year for 25 years in a mutual fund, or an IRA, or something. Let's see, a modest calculation yields 491,774. Hmm, so you could throw away 50 grand trying to win something that you might not be able to ever see, or be guarenteed nearly half a million when you retire. Hmm, who knows. I'm sure the guy that wins the lottery would scoff at me. But have you ever met the person that won a lottery? I haven't, but I've met a lot of people who wished they had planned better for retirement.

Of course the above arguement takes a lot of things for granted. I mean, 5 dollars a day for 250 days a year.. that is a little excessive. And it is sort of fun to spend a few bucks on a few picks every now and again right? Well.. I personally won't be tossing money down tube.. but if I help someone pick the numbers, they win big, and give me.. say.. 1 million bucks. That's cool. I'll live with that. So if you ever want to hire a mathematician to pick your lottery numbers for you, in exchange for a percentage of your winnings, let me know. I'll guarentee that you win as much as the median player does. What is that? Zero?

Pumps have been faulting all morning. Well, not all morning, but enough to tick me off. It rained pretty badly yesterday, so I bagged all the pumps. Just a matter of time before we start getting faults. Luckily none happened to the new guy so I didn't get woken up in the middle of the night to explain how to reset a pump.

Anyways, I think I'm going to jam. Going to go watch some Bebop, waiting for pizza to get her for lunch. I love this job.. free food every day. Excellent.

Later

Wrapping it up for the day.

Report #3 is printing. It always seems to take the longest. The other guys in the "office" are discussing global politics and I'm just shaking my head. Some of the stuff they say makes me laugh. They are intelligent guys, just very opinionated. Great guys, sometimes they say really profound things. Of course, I was sort of surprised when I showed this one guy what google was, yeah he didn't know about google. Now he is constantly finding really interesting news stories from the BBC and other news sources. His opinion of the American news military has changed drastically in the last few weeks. It is amazing what free information can do to a guy. I mean, a few weeks ago he was talking about how we needed to be over there do to terrorism and stuff.. now he thinks that we are basically stealing the oil from them. Hmm, I wish everyone could just get on google, read some unbiased reports about what is going on in the world, and then have the power to make their own decision. Ahhh, I think a well-informed public should be the thing the gov't fears the most. I doubt they would like the average american to know how many US soliders have been injured over in Iraq. We always hear about the number of deaths, but what about injured. I think it's above 8000 at the moment. hmmm.. 8000 people injured, plus the 1000 plus that have got killed. You know, add that up, that's a small town somewhere. Now add up all the deaths from all sides.. well you know.. that is probably a few small towns. Oh well.. price of freedom right? I don't usually express my personal opinions.. but damn. Let's just take over the freaking world. I mean, we have an army that can do it right? And if we start getting deserters we can always just reinstate the draft. Let's do it. Make some really rich guys richer.. gas cheaper so fat people can drive their SUV right up to the front door of wal-mart and buy his genetically modified foods. Nothing wrong with that. Let's just get it over with. Let's nuke the freaking planet.. that'll make it all better.
Report's done printing. I'm going to go pack up my shit and try to work out my frustration at the gym. Right after work.. just like I like it.

Later peoples.

Half-Life 2

Anyone want to take bets on if HL2 is actualy going to come out tomorrow? I'm thinking no, though it is long past it's original release date. I remember drooling over videos of it nearly a year ago. Holy crap. This game had better kick so much ass or I'm going to give up on video games forever. Also, I think it is going to be time to upgrade my ol' computer. Thinking about a Voodoo laptop. Those look nice. Sort of want something small and portable, especially with my current job of sitting around in some office for hours on end by myself.

Oh yeah, Jennifer Garner is starring in a new movie "Elektra." I believe thist movie is going to rival Daredevil as worst comic book movie ever. When will they get it through their heads that, sure, some movies like X-men and Blade will rake in the millions and spawn sequels. But throwing a bunch of ninjas and a scantily clad Garner into a movie won't generate huge support. Wait, I just read what I typed. This movie is going to ROCK! Ninjas and scantily clad females should be in all movies. Seriously though, this movie is going to crash and burn like Daredevil.

Can you tell that I'm freaking BORED! 'Cause I am.

Later

Ok, so it wasn't the last day

So I'm still here, in wonderful Texas City... living in Galveston. Probably for another week or so. Really not that bad. I enjoy it here, the weather is crappy at the moment but I'll survive. I might go to the gym again tonight. Going in the evening is nice since there usually aren't that many people there. I've always been amazed that there will be more people at a gym when it opens (usually long before 6am) then there are when it is closing (usually around 9 or 10). I can understand this to some extent since working out usually pumps me up but I also sometimes have trouble getting the drive to go in the morning. It is true that it is also hard to convince one's self that after a hard day of work to go and lift weights or something. I find working out after work helps me work out a lot of my frustrations through gruesome physical activity. So I would suggest to all those reading this, yeah I know, like all three of you (thanks by the way) that you try working out in the evenings rather than the mornings. You'll already be up and you can get rid of that anger towards your boss through weights or those machines that I never use. I've also found that the more insecure people come in the evenings, while the more harcore gym snobs come in the mornings/weekends. So if you are worried about being mocked or scolded by some huge guy that has skinny legs (what is up with that anyways, yeah you can bench 400 pounds but you can't do a 100 pound calf raise.. dumbass) then go in the evening. Usually just a bunch of middle aged women trying to lose weight and a few skinny guys like myself who try not to make eye contact with other gym members. I'm sure there is a whole psychology behind when people come to a gym. One could almost write an essay about it. I would probably let Joey handle that since I don't really want to delve that deep into my own psyche.

Alright that seems to be enough ranting about the gym this morning. Work is going well, the barge should is here waiting in the harbor. Once the dock is open it'll come in and start the second to last transfer. Then when it gets back in 5 days I'll be gone. Hopefully before Thanksgiving I'll be out of here. WOOHOO! Though sort of sad, it is good, easy money.

Illiopilis starts up the week after Thanksgiving. So if I play my cards right, I won't h ave to be in the office ever again. That is sort of nice. I like this whole living on my own, while getting paid. Feels so different compared to college. Though I'm actually surfing the web more and doing less work than when I was in college. Which is quite amazing.

I discovered yesterday that Joey is supreme internet stalker. Finding phone numbers of people who were in early nineties Nickelodian shows. Sort of scary. I challenged him to find a picture of a mutual friend of ours... and like 4 minutes later he had it. So if you ever need some random picture, or information about anyone, from anywhere, just link on over to his site, drop him a line and he'll probably do it, just for the challenge of it all.

Alright, I should start printing things out. Take it easy everyone.

Later

Last day... maybe.

Alright, so today might be my last day. Of course, if you knew anything about the company I work for you wouldn't be surprised that I have no clue what's going on. They seem to enjoy keeping their employees in the dark about things.. such as travel plans. I would really like to know when I'm coming home. I have to pack a lot of stuff, get my bike packed and shipped off. So I'm going to be very ticked off when they call me tomorrow and say something along the lines of "yeah, you're coming back, in one hour your flight leaves." Or something like that. They piss me off so bad sometimes.

So the new guy that got sent down here. Slowest person I've ever worked with. Still can't finish the generating the report until at least an hour after he starts it.. so the responsibility for printing it out falls upon my shouldars. That sort of ticks me off. But I show up at our sceduled transition time, which by the way my boss says is "impossible" to change. And he isn't ready. So I just sit around twidling my thumbs while he slowly copys and pastes stuff from file to file. It is absolute agony. I wish I could just be the only person working here. Get me a cot and I could sleep in the freaking office here. Wake up to change out monitors or something. Wouldn't be too bad. We have a week to go. I could change out all the monitors, then go take a shower somewhere. Oh man.. that would rock. Working a 23 hour day.. talk about bank.

So yeah, I might be here until it is over, or I might be leaving tomorrow. Tempted to call my boss for confirmation about it, but really want him to show some managerial balls and do it himself. He should know how to manage people, but doesn't. So frustrating at times. Knowing that it could be so much better if just a few simple things changed. But oh well, I've felt that way at every company I've ever worked for. So maybe it is just me not being able to accept the half-assed way things are done, or maybe this is really as good as it gets. If that is the case, well, time to become a professional athlete since this worse than getting a tattoo removed with a cheese grater.

Alright, enough bitching from me. I'm going to try to hit the gym tonight, but might take today off too. If my partner gets here at the proper time to do a switch out, then I should have a good hour that I could lift. If he pulls another shitty thing like last night, then I won't be able to make it to the gym at all. If he is late again, oh I'm going to take a piece out of him. Hopefully work won't care if i beat the crap out of an idiot employee. And what really gets to me, is that he gets paid more than I do. I doubt he will ever be as competent at this job as I am, and that's what really gets me. He has years of "experience" and can't even pronounce chemical names correctly. WTF is all I have to say.

Ok, so I know I said no more bitching, so to hold up to that I believe I have to end this post.

Later

Last night shift?

Oh man, I'm getting switched over to day shifts, I guess tomorrow technically. I have to come in this afternoon and help train up the new guy and sort of hold his hand, then I get a night off. I'm sort of ticked since I was actively enjoying the sunlight hours, and now I won't get that pleasure. I'm going to try to convince the new guy to do shift changes around 9 or so, rather than the 7:30 since that'll give me an extra 90 minutes of riding time. Which is basically all I need. Joey suggested I bring my lights down here but I don't feel 100% confident on these roads to use my lights. Though that would be fun to ride like crazy in the dark. I can run in the evening after I get off work, bike before, and hit the gym when I can. Need to double check the hours and make sure that it is open late in the evening. If it is a gym worth its salt then it will be.

Getting the biking tan back. So nice to have a good solid tan line in the middle of November. I'm going to really have to tried to ride hard this morning, and long, so I incase I can't ride again while I'm here I'll have some sort of tan to hold me over. I miss having people ask me about it.. it was a badge of pride that I wore. Especially when teaching swim lessons, I'd often get, are you a farmer. So nice.

Ok, the reports are printing, the report I was proofing is finished. I've written all the e-mails that I was going to tonight. I guess I could calibrate up some instruments before I head off to ride my legs off. Planning on riding to the Northern end of the island today. Rode to East beach on Tuesday and took yesterday off. So I should have more than enough energy to get a few more miles past. Who knows how far it really is. I guess I'll find out the fun and exciting way.

Take it easy everyone. Keep on riding. And if it is raining where you are.. well.. keep on running or swimming.

Later

Barge has arrived!

Alright, the barge has arrived at Texas City. That means, possibly, that I'll be able to be home in at minimum 11 days. Though I'm guessing it won't be nearly that early. I'm thinking that it'll probably be early December before I'm back in Arkansas. Well, won't be so bad. The temperatures here in Galveston look like they are going to be nice for the next few weeks, and the riding is nice, the pool isn't so bad, and I like the gym. So I'm not too worried about it. Though it would be nice to be back in town with my friends, but I'll survive. Perhaps even come out in better shape.

Alright, not much else is going on at the moment. Watching Super Troopers, which is a fantastically funny movie. I remember when I first saw this movie. I believe I was in Jonesboro with Joey, and the first scene made me laugh so hard that I was in tears. Stayed that way for almost the rest of the movie. I'm eagerly awaiting Shaun of the Dead to come out since it pretty much did the same thing to me. Freaking hilarious.

Alright, I'm going to get outta here. Take it easy peoples.

Later

Drafting

Today have been a fantastic day. I rode my bike like crazy around Galveston. Still searching for the hot girls, I have come to believe that they don't exist here in Texas, or at least in this part. People I've meet at Hendrix prove that hot women come from Texas, but I've yet to find any. When I was coming back into town I got behind this car, and drafted it through most of the city. People were totally staring when I was kicking ass down the street. At one point a couple in a car passed and motioned for me to follow them.. I almost did, but they ended up turning almost immediately. Nearing the end of the road there was a stop sign, and I out sprinted the car too it. I don't think they knew we were racing, but I still kicked their ass.

At another point there was an RV.. but they weren't in the correct lane for me to draft, but I could have probably reached around 40 or so behind that thing. I think I was holding over 30 behind the car.. it was awesome. The other bikers around there don't seem to be doing it for anything but fun, while I guess I'm a little bit more hardcore. I wish I had the tiphoon here, I could really tear it up, doubt anyone around here has seen a tri-bike let alone the best one ever.

Work is going to be stupid tonight. Probably just going to watch some movies, play some Evil Genius at some point, surf the web. I still have trouble believe that I get paid for this. Such as easy job, it is just staying awake for 13 hours and not really leaving a room. It is more mental than anything else. All you have to do is believe that you can finish.

My friend Sean ran in a half-marathon and kicked some serious ass. You should go check out his page to see how he did. I think I heard his time, but he got 2nd in his age group and 22nd overall. Go Sean. Congrats.

Ok, I'm going to bust a move on outta here. Going to go listen to some music or call people or something.

Later

Real quick post

Oh yes, saturday morning. Bike wasn't there yesterday, so it might be there today. I'm probably going to go back to the hotel, eat a bowl of ceral, sleep for a bit, then see if I can't get the bike up and running. Maybe ride along the beach and show these Texas people riding is like. There seems to be a lot of riders in the Houston area and I'm sad that I can't get up there and do a group ride with them. That would be a lot of fun I think. I really want to start riding with groups again, maybe moving to Little Rock was a bad idea. Don't really want to ride with the Carve guys.

Work was actually busy tonight, yeah I know, go figure. Had hits on some stations all night, and kept getting stupid pump faults on the other side of the plant. So had to keep driving over there to reset the damn thing. Then I'd get back and another monitor would have gone down again. Stupid work, making me work. I just want to play Evil Genius more. That game rocks by the way.

Ok, time to do the reports. Going to probably do legs today, so I might have trouble getting up the stairs tonight.

Later

Lactic Acid

So I've been hitting the gym pretty hard lately. Trying more weight less reps and it has been tearing me up. I'm having trouble moving just about any appendage at the moment, my biceps are on fire, my back feels like someone has beat me with a stick repeatedly, the back of my legs hurt so bad I don't want to move. And I love it. Maybe it is just my masochist tendencies or something, but oh man do I love it. This type of pain is not annoying in any way. I feel so good when I try to walk up stair and my calves scream in protest. It makes me want to lift more. Call me crazy all you want, which I'm sure most people will, but there are people out there that understand me. You know who you are. I could go on, but what I think everyone who understands me would know what I would say.

So my bike should be sitting in the Holiday Inn's lobby when I get back in the morning. I'm sort of pissed since I don't have a bike pump here. I'm hoping wal-mart might carry a pump that has a gauge on it and the ability to pump up a presta valve. Though I'm thinking I'm going to have to find a bike shop in Galveston. I'm sure there are some, since Galveston seems like a pretty cool town and all cool towns have to have a bike shop. After I find a pump, I think I'll put my bike together, sleep, wake up early and rip up some roads. I don't know if it'll be worth it riding along the beach, I'd have to ride on a sidewalk, and that would feel wierd. But I'm sure there are roads somewhere with little traffic that I could ride for miles and miles on.

My friend Sean just started a blog, go check it out, he should be in with my other friends here in a few minutes.

Heard that I might be moving to days next week. I'm sort of confused if I like that or not. I mean, I love working nights, I don't really have to deal with anyone and I can work out in the days. But if I'm working days, that'll mean my bike riding time will be significantly cut short. I might be able to convince whoever is coming out to change up the shift change times to afford me a longer morning bike ride, or I might just stick with running and swimming. Though then I'd have sent my bike down here for only a week of riding. Which would be sort of unacceptable.

Talked to my boss tonight. He says that he would see no reason to bring someone in who wants to be in the field. So that means I'll get to stay here until, well until they need me back or it finishes. Hopefully I'll be able to stay here for another 4 weeks or so.. which would be nice. Maybe all the way through December, and then lots of apartments opening up next year. Which would be cool. Hoping to get a nice flat somewhere.. nice and large.. big enough for a pool table and all my bike paraphernalia. I've always wanted a pool table. That would be cool.

Just heard that the barges which is coming to get the stuff here might be 3 days out or so. Which means the 14 days trip is going to be more like 17 days or so.. maybe even three weeks. Which would be.. lets see.. (3 more trips) x (17 days) = 51 more days. That isn't even taking into account the day or so it takes to load the barge, or the fact that it isn't even here yet. I guess I'll find out more.. NEVER! But I don't care. Making money, having fun, working out... I love this job.

Alright, I'm going to run. Need to play some evil genius and catch up on e-mails. Sorry that I've been so bad about those lately. Though I think only three people ever view this site, still, I would like to pretend everyone I know (and some I don't) read this religiously.

Later

Rain, holy crap

There is a crap load of rain here in Texas. I'm not really enjoying it too much. My bike isn't here yet, though if it was I'd be even more pissed. Having to put out air monitors sucks, you get soaked, have to walk through flooded areas.. I'm just soaked. But i guess it could be worse. I mean, I could be stuck in an office or lab somewhere doing the same crap every day. I'm enjoying this job still. Tomorrow is a rest day for me so I get to take some nice time off. Sleep, eat, and relax. I got my exercise ball all inflated so I might go crazy on that. Going to try to find firefly, it isn't at the local walmart. I think there is a block buster around Galveston somewhere, maybe even a best buy. Or a Hastings type store. I'll have to check around before I leave here. maybe if I find a cheap external DVD player I'll pick that up too.. maybe if I can find a cheap external DVDR or something. Who knows.

I have about 6 minutes before I can start writing my reports for today. I hope everyone who reads this is going to get out and vote today. I really don't care who you vote for as long as you get out there and vote. I could go into great detail about who you should vote for, but I don't think anyone wants to hear any more about this. I like to imagine that tomorrow is going to decide who are next president is going to be but I have a feeling that another debacle will soon occur. I don't see why the person who gets more votes doesn't automatically become president. I mean, that would make more sense right. But then states like CA and FL would get all screwed up.. since many of their votes would be split. Such a stupid system. I just want it to be over, the excessive mud slinging and black and white commercials are getting to me. Hey, who knows, maybe another draft will happen. That would be cool, though I have a feeling the governement would really regret giving me a gun and the knowledge of how to use it.

Ok, I have to go start doing the only real thing I have to do all night. Go out and vote, and take it easy..

Later

Happy Nevada Day

For history buffs, and friends from Nevada, you'll realize that this post is a few hours too late to truly be about Nevada Day (Oct. 31) but you know, it'll have to do. Ever since moving from Nevada I've missed the great Nevada Day celebrations. Dressing up as ghost and ghouls, going around asking for candy. It was such a great feeling to know the rest of the country was celebrating with us. Actually what I really missed was getting the day off from school, knowing Hendrix, I probably wouldn't have gotten the day off from school anyways.

Work has been quite uneventful. For some reason the stations are staying up much longer and not requiring my much coveted battery changing ability. I think it is because we got rid of station 10. That might not have anything to do with it, but I can't imagine another reason why things would be working the way they are. I'm not complaining, just mentioning that I'm having a much harder time staying awake knowing that I only have maybe 1 unit to change in 13 hours. I only just changed out my first unit of the night at 0430, so that means I could have slept for a good 6 hours. But, I stayed awake. Read some Fast Food Nation and chatted with both Joey and Heather for quite a bit.

Joey seems really taken by the short lived TV series "Firefly." His choice in movies and TV shows at times has been poor, but I think in this case it'll be a good assumption that he knows whe he is talking about. So I might pick it up on DVD one of this nights and ask if I can keep my co-workers laptop. She has been working with CTEH longer, thus has a DVD player in her laptop. I'm hoping I get a new laptop soon. This one is nice and all, but I want more memory, and a plasma screen. As long as I'm dreaming, I guess I also want work to give me a huge raise. Well I have my fingers crossed.

Hung out for a while at Ebaum's World. Lots of funny stuff over there. But one can only look at humourous pictures for so long. I read a lot of Questionable Content last night. Well actually, I read all of their previous posts. It is a pretty funny comic with a long continous story line and character development. I sort of like that. I mean, comics like Sinfest and VGCats with their lack of any major continuation will always have a place in my heart, but it is refreshing to read what basically could be described as a graphic novel.

The gym in Galvaston is quite nice. Sort of a hole in the wall place, I don't think it'll ever be as hugely popular as say a 24 hours fitness or whatever, but it has it's charm. Lots of regulars and slightly older machines and weights. The pool is outdoors, which I'm not familar with swimming in. Backstroke is pretty hard when you can't swim in a straight line. The walls are also incredibly slippery, but I'll survive. Anyways, I'm really glad I picked it out of the other available gyms. I think I'll be able to achieve all of my fitness goals in no time.

I'm outta here. Maybe a monitor will go down and I'll get to do more work. Only 3 more hours to go.

Later