The Daily Grind

[texasgirl]

If any of you actually think that I would say that you really don't know me.
I was quoting some moron on Facebook.

[95whtzr2]

likely story

[Mike]

Wow... what a poo-storm of bad work jojo lately. Last week's trip to dirty Jersey went long and I fought traffic all the way home. Normal 6-6.5 hour drive=11 hours.

Monday went to a local-ish customer down in Massachusetts and when assembling their new system, the paint fell off in giant chunks. The bare metal was covered in oil still. Sweet prep job powdercoating dude... Came back from that trip and got to the office around 3 or so. Found out shortly after that one of our guys called out sick and someone needed to take his spot. So yesterday evening was a mad rush of finding a flight, hotel, rental car and getting in contact with the customer to tell them the person we said would be coming a month ago isn't (gov't owned facility, they do security checks or something). That was fun. All in all a 12 hour day. So up stupidly early to fly into Chicago. Get to the lab, meet with the actual customer and get going with the job. A couple hours in I get a visit from the building manager. His daddy didn't hug him enough or something. About ripped my head off because I had my tool kit on the "wrong" side of the tape on the floor (it's a shared space, but no one mentioned this, nor was the other group even there). After that fun I find out that one of my pipes is either bent or somehow is not for this system because it doesn't fit at all. So now I'm stuck in limbo till they can make a new pipe in NH and get it out here via overnight shipping for Thursday without UPS wrecking it. Oh and now there is this whole risk of a hurricane hitting New England at the end of the week so flying home is an unknown right now.

[95whtzr2]

Awesome. Sounds like you and I work for the same company

I hate the security crap, I have had to do the same thing- I test airport runways occasionally, and depending on the size of the airport they want me to jump through hoops. Makes it even worse when someone can't go that was lined up for it- as you mentioned.

I luckily don't have to fly that often, usually I have to bring the equipment which is attached to a vehicle or trailer so I don't have the worries with flights/rentals but there are other things I would love to not have to deal with, GPS tracking/"How's my driving" stickers/trailer...

Good luck keeping your sanity! I am about to lose mine in Oklahoma, but I should be on my way home before labor day...

[Miles]

I left my house this morning at 6:15, to drive 71 miles to the Dallas Office. I finally got there.....at 8:20. Words cannot describe my frustration with traffic.

There was one wreck along the way, where two "people of color" decided to rear end each other as "they" often do (no lie....80% of the wrecks I've seen over the past 6 years of living in this sewer, involves a young woman "of color" ). Anyway, both vehicles had minimal damage, AND were both pulled safely to the shoulder. Why in God's Green Earth, it required THREE fire trucks, two bambalances, and about 9 squad cars, is beyond me. Both drivers were standing there beside their cars, and all the response people standing around sipping their morning coffee while leisurely leaning against the fire trucks watching the traffic go by????

This is almost always the standard flock of emergency personnel that come screaming to the aid....of a non-injured moron. Better safe than sorry I guess....but it honestly seems like a giant waste of our tax dollars. Could the initial emergency response person not access the situation upon arrival, and help determine the severity of the incident? Even with a very low impact accident, obviously nobody hurt, with BOTH cars on the shoulder......why oh why do they STILL feel it necessary to block off THREE lanes of traffic on a four lane highway with the fire engines, in the middle of morning rush hour traffic??? I'm sure there are a level of unknowns, and there is a protocol to follow.....but from the outside looking in, it looks completely retarded. Obviously safety for the emergency response personnel is very important, but it just seems to me that some type of logical thinking could come in to play somewhere along the line.

Okay, I'm done. Carry on.

[Mike]

Originally Posted by 95whtzr2

Awesome. Sounds like you and I work for the same company

I hate the security crap, I have had to do the same thing- I test airport runways occasionally, and depending on the size of the airport they want me to jump through hoops. Makes it even worse when someone can't go that was lined up for it- as you mentioned.

I luckily don't have to fly that often, usually I have to bring the equipment which is attached to a vehicle or trailer so I don't have the worries with flights/rentals but there are other things I would love to not have to deal with, GPS tracking/"How's my driving" stickers/trailer...

Good luck keeping your sanity! I am about to lose mine in Oklahoma, but I should be on my way home before labor day...

My brother used to work for a company that did lighting- traffic lights, street lights, etc. They got a contract to do runway lighting at Pease airport here in NH. One little thing though- there is also an Air National Guard wing based there. I guess it was some intense background checks to make that happen.

Funny thing about the "how's my driving" sticker-

My company has a box truck they use for picking up big stuff from vendors and for a while it was just a plain white box truck, but my manager ended up having it lettered. I was talking to him about it before hand and he said he was curious as to how much it would cost to have a small logo done on the windows of the Outback we use for more local trips. I asked him how much he likes getting phone calls from angry people, because that would be all that would come from lettering the Subaru. Thankfully it is still logo-less.

[95whtzr2]

I bought a magnet to cover up the sticker part of the way, it works great unless your boss happens to be behind you as you are leaving the gas station where you slapped it on after leaving the office...

Jeremy... you enjoy your coffee in your house and in your car, they enjoy it on the road... Next time throw something at them, hell everyone else around there does...

[dozer1530]

well just left for port arthur tx. gonna do some fishing and eaten lol

[Miles]

Having an awesome weekend with my boys!

Friday night we went to *watch* some 1/8th mile drag races. Yeah, that didn't last long before I realized I could run my junk for free! It was apparently a Fun Run night, so I thought what the heck. The boys watched right at the lights, and I lined up! Traction in the FWD GXP was horrendous, but I finally figured out to get a fairly decent launch. I beat a '95 C4 Vette, '07 BMW 750i and an AWD '06 Trail Blazer SS! The Bimmer was the closest race, but I got him by 2'10ths. My best run in the 1/8th mile was a 9.11 @ 75.8! That was with NO track prep, terrible traction and a full tank of gas. I just could not lay into it until about 40.

Yesterday, we went and checked out a few gun & knife stores around Ft. Worth, then headed to the old "Cowtown" part of downtown. We had a blast down there! Ate at some alley way diner called the "Love Shack". Awesome burgers, live music and very cold beverages! Kaleb rode a mechanical bull, while me & Kayson laughed our butt off! Late last night we went to some dirt track races, and got our ear drums blown out by the mini sprint cars. Had lots of fun though! Today, I think we're gonna go swimmin and rock climbing.

[Mike]

Street night is fun stuff. I had to pay for it up here but my Silverado did 16.6@86 in the quarter mile with an intake and exhaust. Best part of the night was from the two in front of me- one was a chick dressed like she just walked off the Fast and the Furious movie set, complete with a goofy looking Integra. Next to her was a F-250 diesel on 35" mud tires. She was pissing and moaning for like 30 minutes how she "was wasting her damn time next to this f'ing redneck truck" and so on. Kid with the Ford never said a word. They line up, lights go green, the Ford launched in 4WD, barked the tires, belched some black smoke and laid down a pass in the 13s, beating the hell out of Integra girl, who never came back.

[dozer1530]

any one from austin and down watch out big storms engulfing texas the next few days

[Mike]

Off to Friendly, WV this week. Looking at the map it seems that not too much goes on out there.

[Miles]

Originally Posted by dozer1530

any one from austin and down watch out big storms engulfing texas the next few days

I hope it makes it a few 100 miles further north of Austin! We need the rain.

[texasgirl]

Tornado and flash flood warnings here. I'm tired of rain! It needs to go somewhere else!

[Miles]

There are Tornado warnings and sirens going off here. However, we've really needed the rain. The ground has been so dry, it has huge cracks all over. It's been so dry, the foundation of my house is shifting and is what caused a water pipe to bust. So bring on the rain!! For a little while anyway...

[ynotortsac]

Originally Posted by Mike

Off to Friendly, WV this week. Looking at the map it seems that not too much goes on out there.

That's where I grew up. Yup, not much goes on there. At least not that you'd want to hear about.

Where in WV are you headed?



Edit.....

Oh. I get it now. The town is called Friendly.




Never heard of it.

[95whtzr2]

Originally Posted by Miles

There are Tornado warnings and sirens going off here. However, we've really needed the rain. The ground has been so dry, it has huge cracks all over. It's been so dry, the foundation of my house is shifting and is what caused a water pipe to bust. So bring on the rain!! For a little while anyway...

Do you ever water your foundation? I remember my dad buried ansoaker house around the foundation of our old house to combat those settling issues... About two or three times a week he would turn it on for about 30 minutes. Just a thought.

[Miles]

When I first moved into this house 6 years ago, my ex wife had me remove all of the landscaping because she didn't like it. In that process, I kept finding all this old stretchy hose buried all around the perimeter of the house. I didn't know why it was there....so I pulled it all up. Now I know.

[Zombie]

The idea of watering a foundation scares the shit out of me... I'd like to dig my perimeter up and install a weeping tile system like they use in Canada to take any and all moisture AWAY from the house.

So weird... we have to wick water away, some places have to add it...

And this really beats living in caves and hunting for food every day?

[Miles]

Un-freaking-believable. Early this morning, I heard what sounded like water running in the water pipes. However, no water was running in the house. No visible water on any floors either. I take a deep breath and call the same plumbing company. They come out and yep, another totally different water leak in the slab. After jack-hammering another hole in the middle of the hallway of my kids rooms, they find the leaking copper pipe once again inside the same concrete beam that the other one was leaking. Except it was about 6' down from it.

Their solution at this point is to cut open the same wall in Kaleb's bedroom, access the water manifold again, and just run Pex tubing up through the wall, through the attic, and back down to the kitchen sink, where that particular pipe goes. This would basically eliminate that cracked pipe altogether. Apparently, this is exactly how most homes are being plumbed nowadays.

I cannot win for losing here. It is beyond frustration.

[Kevin S]

Sorry to hear about that Jeremy.

But this video should make you LOL. Worth the 30 second advertisement at the beginning.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cfeTZNcA3g

[Miles]