Homeward Bound!

So the woman from the office who does a lot of the admin came to me yesterday and said: "I can get you a flight out but it's to Hamilton and it leaves tomorrow not Thursday so the bad news is that you'll miss a couple of days of work." then she went on "are you ok with that?" I'm not sure how I answered but I think when I leapt into the air and clicked my heels while yelling "Yahooooooooo!!!" that she got the message. I would hate to spend the day sitting in camp and not getting paid but going home early I am just fine with. I need the break this time. I am sore all over and tired. Not sure why but it just happens to be. I am looking forward to lots of pillow time. I am looking forward to seeing a specialist about my tendinitis. And I need to see the dentist about that filling that fell out. But I am most excited to see how the tomato plants that I put into the ground last turn have grown. I love growing tomatoes. Call it an addiction but the grow well and smell nice when you brush up against them. And nothing tastes quite as good as a BLT sandwich with a tomato fresh from the vine! I think I will probably do some golfing and fishing as well. Of course with my arms hurting as they do I will need to buy new supports for each of them. But I love to golf so that falls into the 'must' category. I also love fishing and especially fly fishing so I will be trekking out to the rivers with my favorite fishing rod in hand. Not sure whether I will try for trout or for bass and pike but any fish will do! Hmmmmmmmnnn! So many things to do and so little time! When I was a boy my Dad and I used to fish a lot. During the long drives to the river we always talked excitedly about our strategy and what we were going to try differently. I would have big, full colour dreams of the fish that I was going to catch and would imagine them fighting at the end of my line! Inevitably the actual trips never lived up to the dreams which I conjured in advance. I think my trips home from Kearl lake are like that. Days like today I baste myself in sweet imaginings. Going home is always a good thing. But they never turn out exactly like the dreams. I'm ok with that of course. And at my age I can tell you that knowing this little truth doesn't take anything away from the sweetness of the dream that is my home. :)

Random thoughts...

Firstly and right off the hop I want to apologize for not writing yesterday. When I got on the bus Big Dale (or US Dale) sat next to me and we had a great conversation about self help, agreements to live by and of course about our kids. I really enjoyed the chat so I skipped blogging for a day. All good! Yesterday during the day my wife Julie sent me a photo of my daughter taken the night before heading into her high school prom. She is in a long white gown and is in the arms of her latests hunky boy toy. It's so hard to believe that just a short time ago she was a tiny little baby that I held in my arms. I know the boy in the picture is 6'3" and my Hailey appears not much shorter. God forbid they should have kids or the little ones would actually end up as big ones! Speaking of big ones I should be getting some pictures of my son Jak at some point today. He spent the last couple of days at Comic Con Toronto and in the spirit of cosplay he dressed as the character Ryu from the Street Fighter game. Apparently his costume and likeness was so good that they brought him in and did a photo shoot of him in costume. I can't wait to see the pics. Unlike his sister Jak was never small. When he was born he was three weeks early and still weighed 9lbs 3ounces. At six months he was 26 lbs and at a year he was 41 lbs. so rather than me rocking him to sleep I got him to rock me to sleep! Just kidding of course but whenever he asks me why I have such big arms I always answer: "because I had big babies." I still think that's pretty accurate! Switching gears for a minute it has gotten pretty warm these days at work. Yesterday I was flying in and fitti g wear plate in the bin with Jordy the Gypsie and Big Dale. Like me Dale is an older ironworking apprentice. He is a third year and is 49. Also like me he is in really good physical condition. Actually he is as big as a small mountain being 6'3" to 6'4" tall and weighing probably 240 lbs. he is in good shape and lifts a lot of weights but in spite of all that size his most memorable feature is his ever-present smile. Dale is a big, happy guy. So am I and so is Jordy. As a result we had a great day flying in 250lb iron wear plates and weld-tacking them into place. The biggest challenge we faced was immediately after lunch. We moved at that point to the west side of the east bin to do the plates at the 14,000 level and the sun was baking down on both us and on the wall. The metal in the walls held and radiated the heat so it was like working on hot black Tarmac in the middle of a sunny day. When I flipped my helmet down to grind or to weld the perspiration would run down the inside of my hard hat! Talk about brutal! But I loved the work and we had a great team thing going by then (the team included Spuds McIron who was rigging for us outside and also Adrian who was the guy operating the crane). Even with the heat it was a great day! I have to run so have a good day! :)

Fitting and Welding and Welding and Fitting

I was working with Jordy yesterday helping to fit up some wear plates. I like fitting as not two plates are the same. Jordy is a quasi gypsie/welder/surfing instructor slash, slash, slash. He is also lots of fun to work with. I'll tell you more about him a little later but first I want to tell you about the work we were doing. Inside the surge bins the walls are a double layer of steel. The first layer is the frame of the thing and the over the top of that is a layer of wear plates. Wear plates are designed to take the abuse of however many thousands of pounds of bitchumin-rich sand pressing and grinding against them every day of their working life. Eventually they wear out and the plant goes into shut-down mode while they are removed and replaced. Without them a new in would have to be built every year. So they are an important part of the process. You will recall (if you have been following this blog) that a few months ago I worked with JD, Alvin, Matti, Ryan and a few others fitting the lugs onto these same wear plates. Now the Ironworkers have 'flown them in' with the crane and they have been tacked in a couple of spots into place. But they have not been fitted to the steel walls that they will live on for the rest of their working lives. That is the job we are doing now using stick welding and a team of welders is following us completeing the process by doing a total weld out using flux core (wire) welding machines. We fit they weld. The process for Jordy and I starts with me using the tiger torch to heat the steel to 200 degrees plus. The tiger torch is a little propane flame thrower which is a god send in the winter but on hot summer days often seems hell-sent. I hit the corners first and then in a few inches because that is where Jordy tacks on the dogs and hammers in the wedges. Confused? Let me explain... No piece of metal is perfectly flat. We are fitting the wear plates over welded seams in the underlying plate and those seams aren't always perfect matchups either. But for the wire-feed welding guys to do their job successfully the plate must be snug to the underlying surface in a tight fit. Ever tried to bend a 3/4 in piece of steel plate? It is a tough thing to do. So the fitter uses a square piece of plate turned on its thin edge and with a small notch cut into one corner. He tacks this to the parent metal on the piece above, below or beside the piece being fitted so that it overhangs the place where the piece being fitted is not tight to the metal underneath. Then a wedge made from the same heavy plate metal is placed over the piece being fitted and into the notch. This wedge is probably about 9-12 inches long. It is then hammered under the notch in the dog forcing the metal beneath to flatten tight to the metal beneath. The fitter then tacks the piece to the parent metal holding it in place. He does this to every part of the plate that is not snug to the piece below often resulting in several dog and wedge combos being used on one plate. Once the piece is tacked in the wedges are knocked out of the dogs and the dogs are knocked of the plate and then the whole process is repeated on the next plate. Hopefully I have pre-heated that plate by now and while Jordy starts on the next one I go back to the one before and add some 'post heat' to the welds. There are good reasons for pre and post heating. In theory (keeping in mind that I am not yet an expert) pre heating accomplishes a lot. It first removes moisture from the surface of the plate making the weld stick better. It prepares the carbon atoms in the metal for bonding better by allowing hydrogen atoms in the metal to escape. Simply put it reduces the chance of the weld cracking. The post heat does the same thing as it gets the hydrogen atoms out which would otherwise crack the weld later when escaping from the carbon atoms. When the welds go on these huge metal plates it is like a big drum bing hit as it makes a deep 'bowang' sound. Well that's the process and I am out of time. I'll have to tell you about Jordy another day! :)

Keepin' it together....

I'm convinced I'm falling apart! It's ok. I mean I can still do my job no problem but I'm wondering what is going on here. When I was a teenager (I know that was 30 years ago) I would injure myself inadvertently all the time. Part of being born clumsy I guess. But in those days I could heal from anything in less than a week. Every Friday night I played football where inevitably I would injure myself. Every Friday night after the game when everyone else was out partying I was sitting in the hospital listening to a do for tell me that my season was over because of the latest wounds. And every Monday afternoon I was back on the field for practice all healed up! I remember one game where I fractured a leg, a jaw and a rib all in the first quarter of the game! None of those guys played again, lol! Just kidding. ;-) Nowadays my healing pattern seems perpetually stuck on the slow bus. I am pretty sure that if I had 't been doing competitive karate for all those years (I stopped at Christmas of last year) there is no way I could start into a career like this. I mean I have early onset arthritis in one ankle (that's from football for sure). I have a minor hernia that I need operated on. I developed tendinitis in my right arm so I had to start doing most things left handed. Now I can tell I am developing tendinitis in that one too! And just this morning one of my fillings fell out and landed in my bowl of Vector cereal!! The worst part is probably the fact that the biggest muscle on my body may very well be my prostate which is abnormally large. Aargh! Thank God for Avodart, lol! What makes me laugh the most about all these little maladies is that I couldn't care less! I love my job and I love my life. Things could definitely be worse. Far worse actually. Instead I medicate the prostate, wear a little brace on the right elbow, ignore the left elbow and eat an Aleve for breakfast each day to knock out the ankle. Everything else I just laugh my way through. I really do believe that laughter and attitude are the best medicine. I was watching a show on that little French Canadian girl who had the double lung transplant a couple of months ago. I started thinking that I am glad I am listed as an organ donor. It really is an incredible gift that you can give once you are personally done using your organs. I highly recommend it. But I do want them to leave something that can be burned and then tossed into a river somewhere. But what if they don't want my organs when I have finished with them? I mean after years of smoking I think the lungs would be pitched onto the reject pile. They work fine for me but anyone they planted them I would likely be stoned the rest of their life! At least they could use my liver. I think. Ok. Maybe scratch the liver. I've put a lot of miles on that sucker. A swimming pool of beer. Enough wine to wipe out a small village. Etc. so maybe the liver is out. But my kidneys... Oh. I had that weirdo virus I picked up in Africa. So I guess I'll be keeping that too. My eyes are...oh shit! Even I can't see out of them. Makes me wonder how I get up each morning! So what IS my best feature? It's certainly not my hair which abandoned ship a long time ago. I can't say it's my stunningly good looks either. Most likely it is my positive attitude and the good energy I work hard to share with those around me. I'm not saying the glass is half full (frankly I always thought it was the wrong size glass) but you really do create the weather that you live in and I choose sunshine! And when I do I find most other people shine right back. And that's why I am happy being happy. :)

Movin' on...

4 of the gang left yesterday. It was brutally fast with the first notice coming just before lunch. Then POOF they were gone before afternoon coffee. They weren't fired. They didn't quit either. Instead they took the transfer to Waiward's Jackpine location which is a high paying shutdown. I don't blame them but I will miss them. So I want to dedicate today's entry to them. 3 of the 4 were guys I knew well. Guys from our crew. Guys that are fun to work with. I will miss Matt 'the Legend' Turner the most. We started at the same time, sat together, flew home and back together and had a few adventures outside of our work life together. Matt is a welder and a good one which is why he was transferred so quickly. He sat across the table from me and was one of the usual gang of jokesters in our trailer. In the mornings he would meet us in the brass alley of east camp when we were starting our day. He is one of those happy go lucky types who can dish out the humor and take it too. Self dapracation was often raised to an art form with him. When Matt and I travelled together we had a lot of fun. He was one of the three amigos who got tossed from the plane in Winnipeg forcing us to drink all night long. I don't have much recollection after about 10:30pm so it was sort of like a scene from the movie The Hangover when I woke up! Another time when we flew to Ottawa and arrived at 3am we went to his place and between us split a 12 pack before I left at 4:45am! Happy trails there Matt. I do hope I see you again! Mike Whelan is another guy who started with us back at the end of January. He is another very competent welder. He is originally from Nova Scotia where he learned welding on everything from ships to buildings. Mike is one of those guys who always has five o'clock shadow. Even 10 minutes after he has shaved! Mike typically looked exactly the same every time you saw him as he had a favorite work sweatshirt over which he wore his spark-scarred welding jacked with the 3 snaps in the middle long having fallen off. Mike is another one of the good guys who you like to work with. My Tran was a senior welder who is from Vietnam. His English skills were not great unless you considered his friendly profanity. His favorite expression was: "Shit, shit fuuuuuck!" with the sound of the last syllable rising up in pitch towards the end. At least 2 of the welding inspectors told me that he was far and away the best welder on the crew. The one inspector told me how My had welded one of the outside bin corners where it goes both up and out and is jammed tightly between some corner plates. For a welder it was an awful job to be given and very difficult. But according to the inspector the work when completed looked as if it had been done in a shop by a machine! I will certainly miss him and his always happy disposition. The last guy to leave was one of the Jason B's from nightshift. He had been in our trailer on day shift for two days before the transfer. I say one of the Jason because at one point there were 3 of them! Imagine the poor inspectors trying to map whose weld was whose based on the initials that welders leave behind to mark their work. Though I didn't know him long he seemed like a nice guy. Way back when I started into this trade my nephew Jason told me: "Uncle Pete the best part of this job might be all the friends you make who stay friends for life." I certainly see what he meant! Take care boys and we'll see you on another site some day! :)

What-evvvvvverrrrrrrrrr!

Wanna hear a joke? There once was an ingenuity contest where they were comparing the skills of professionals from different occupations. Each round they brought in 3 professionals and gave them the same test. On this particular day they had an Astronomer, a molecular biologist and an Ironworker. Each person was given 3 balls of various sizes and was put into a room with the instructions to build something. After an hour the astronomer came out. He had the biggest ball in the center with the smaller two balls spinning around it in elliptical circles. 'This' said the astronomer proudly, 'is a solar system!' The judges were impressed as they equally were when the biologist came out. He had the big ball in the center with each of the two smaller balls sticking out symmetrically from the sides. 'A water molecule!' he announced. With the first two candidates doing so well the judges were anxious to see what the Ironworker would do. They waited. And they waited some more. Finally they opened the door to see what he was up to. One ball was broken. One was lost and one was in his lunchpail! God I love Ironworkers! Yesterday I was on cleaning crew but at one point had to move a large table made of steel plate from in the guts of the surge bin out onto the deck. It had been there a while and the surge had experienced a lot of growth since it was first put in there and the passageway out was far more narrow then it had been. Did I mention that the table was made of steel plate and weighed close to 400lbs? (I Agine my Superman voice here...) 'This looks like a job for Ironman!' of course Ironman was nowhere to be seen so I got my hulking Ironworker buddies to come and help. I have great faith that Ironworkers can do anything so I had no fears. We started by putting our shoulders to the back of the load and speeded it down the passageway until we hit the door frame. Thank god that frame was made of steel too or we would have destroyed it! But the table wouldn't go through. It was much taller than it was wide so turning it on its side wouldn't help! A conundrum to be sure! Having spent the past 3 months working with welders I suggested we get and Oxy Acetylene torch and cut it in two, push each half through the doorway, and weld it back together on the other side. I'll admit now that wasn't the best suggestion. Fortunately the Ironworkers ignored it! Being Ironworkers (which means they are a combination of Mcguiver and Mr. T) they looked around and found a steel pole to use as a lever. It didn't work. Then they found some wooden dunnage (6x6 wood used to hold heavy loads off the ground so that they can be picked up again without difficulty) and set it on the ground beside the bottom of the doorframe so that the table could slide out at a higher level than the moulding at the bottom of the frame which was stopping us. Again, it didn't work. Finally one of them noticed some short, round poles which we slid under the dunnage so that when we set the table on top of it we were easily able to roll the table out through the door. So what is my point? No matter what the problem is Ironworkers solve it. They work together and talk out their ideas so that the group IQ is higher than the sum of the parts. They work together as a team and they get the job done. And then they forget it and move on to the next problem. I am so glad to be an Ironworker! It reminded me of a story my Dad told me 30 odd years ago about the head of a fortune 500 company who gave a speech. He said the biggest mistake he ever made was leaving school in grade 5. Instead he should have left in grade 3 because by then he could add, subtract, multiply and divide as well as being able to read and write. Ironworkers have a higher educational requirement than that but it made me think how the best solutions are often the simplest. I used to teach grades 2 and 3. So I know for certain that 'simple machines' including levers, pulleys and rollers, are a taught in those grades. and with those simple tools, a couple of spud wrenches and a sleever bar Ironworkers have been building the world since the advent of using iron in building construction. So despite the tongue in cheek joke I started this out with I am glad to be a builder in a world made of iron! :)

Safety worst safety first

So today I am in a bit of a dud mood meaning that I don't feel like writing much. I think today I am going to take a bit of a swipe at safety people although I should point out in advance that safety folks come in two flavours and I only dislike one of them. The first group are former trades people who actually know what is going on where construction sites are concerned. Them I like. The other group are career failures who either took a safety course or had EI pay for it. This is the group which still thinks hammers come in both left and right handed. Today let's have some fun at their expense, kay? Yesterday was a beautiful day and so all the safety folks chose to be proactive in their jobs by wandering around our site pretending to be helpful. Our old Forman Mario made the point once that on a really shitty day we should pay them back by doing a tour of their offices. You know the drill, look at their trash can for garbage levels, check how high the paper stacks were and make solid recommendations such as using alcohol based hand creme before and after touching any keyboard. I always thought that was a great idea! The fact is that it started to look a bit like a snowstorm with all the white hats floating down on us. They follow the typical approach of moving about in little herds of 3-5. They would probably tell you it's for professional reasons but I think in reality it's because they are afraid of us. That and the fact that most of them haven't a clue what we are doing so they need witnesses of how 'safety conscious' they are when they do wondrous safety activities like checking to make sure that the fire extinguisher has been recently approved for use. I always laugh at this one because a little scan of the subcontractor list would show that no one approved to do that has visited our site so obviously it's us punching those little date holes. Or how about the safety tape? This is a program where every piece of equipment has to be inspected and then have a piece of colored tape wrapped on it to show we completed this task. There is a different color of tape every 3 months so we waste a lot of time changing the tape. Yes. It's us who change the tape. We do it so the the safety wonks will have something else to 'catch' when on their important little tours. In reality we check our tools every time we use them so when it's time to change the tape it is often just that... a tape change. We know the tool is safe as we checked it that morning when we started. We checked it after lunch. We checked it in the afternoon and again at the end of the day when we put it away. But if we didn't have to put tape on things then these non-construction people who wander around our sites wouldn't be able to tell a safe activity from a dangerous one. So we go along with it. Yesterday 3 of the wonks herded their way over to where I was sweeping. Two men and a woman. One of them immediately looked at the tag on the fire extinguisher. It bugged me so much that I decided to have some fun with them. 'Hi I'm Peter' I said politely approaching them. The woman started to remove her glove to shake my hand so I started to take mine off too but then I stopped. 'Hey wait a sec,' I said while pulling the glove back on 'This is a trick isn't it?' I asked. Not waiting for an answer I went on 'I know I'm not allowed to take my glove off while working and this IS working. The fact is I leave it on for most things now. Why just this morning while I was in the john having a dump I left it on to wipe bu that turned out kind of shitty!' The woman's eyes bugged out of her head and a shocked look appeared on her face. For my part I kept a straight face and extended my gloved hand towards her for a handshake. 'Don't worry, hon, I got most of it off...' In truth I have never seen a herd of safety tools beat such a hasty retreat. For the record I am a Union Ironworker. We are safe because we are professional and take our jobs seriously. No safety walk will ever improve that especially when the safety wonks involved have never actually worked on a construction site. Well unless you consider walking around looking at tape and fire extinguisher tags to be work! :)

Theeeeeyyyyy'rrreee baaaaack!

I can't tell you how weird it was to have most of the gang from front shift away and I equally can't tell you how glad I am that they are back! Of course I am going to try to tell you these things because that is the whole purpose of this blog now isn't it? Fun, fun and more fun! Where to start? In the absence of my shift-mates I have had a great time working with the French guys from New Brunswick. I have been doing honest-to-god ironwork and have been loving it. As a kid I absolutely loved the monkey bars and climbing trees and gymnastics so climbing the iron is pretty natural for me. Of course as a kid I didn't weight 220lbs and I wasn't wearing heavy boots, extra thick clothing, hard hat, fall arrest gear with two dog leashes around my neck! But I have always loved the climbing. And I love working as part of a team doing work that at first glance makes you think it can't be done. But I am quickly learning that Ironworkers can do anything. As one guy said yesterday do you know why Jesus was a carpenter? Because they hadn't invented iron yet! I concur! Now that my shift is back I will likely end up back with the welding crew. I am good with that too. When I am doing welding stuff I feel like its the best kind of work a person can do. Of course when I am doing Ironwork I feel the same about that. Ditto for planting tomatoes, lol! Maybe I just like good honest work and particularly when I am with a good team. Of course really decent pay helps as well. Maybe I'm just a happy person! Things will be a little different now at the site. Some people like Curt and Steve and Mike have left to do their next sessions of schooling on the road to becoming journeypersons. Greg has given up his white Foreman's hat a d is going back on the tools (ok for the record Greg always knew that was comi g and he NEVER wore a white hat). I liked Greg as a Foreman. I also like him as a welder. Either way I'm glad he didn't leave as he is fun and knows more thing about more things than most people I know. Kind of like a human encyclopedia with a wicked/dirty sense of humor. Spuds McIron, Bru, Big Pat, Emma and several others of my good friends are back. As I probably said in another entry these people are the voices of the choir that sings the song of life up here. That's a metaphor of course. I doubt any of them can actually sing. In fact one time Spuds was singing in the trailer and Bru asked her if she liked the song. When she answered with a 'yes' he responded tongue in cheek 'than why are you ruining it?' Yes we tease each other pretty hard! We are on the bus to work and it is early in the day. The sun is up and despite what I said earlier about choruses the only one you hear at the moment is the even and gentle breathing of the people who have dozed off. My friends are back and everything is falling back into the gentle and comfortable routine that marks working up in Kearl lake. Everything is as it should be. And I am content. :)

German and French

The other day while covering in at the toolcrib I was a little bored so I looked around and found a little work-related book to read through. It was the constitution for our International union that is centered in Washington, D.C. It spells out who can be in the union and what a hall needs to do to stay in the union. An interesting little book really. I managed to stay awake just long enough to read through the first two pages at which point my mind was going numb and I worried about slipping into a delirium! The first page of said constitution had some information which, frankly, surprised me! In article 1 subsection 3 it says that you cannot have membership in the union if you are a communist, a fascist or a nazi. No mention of the KKK of course but still. I may be a little niaive but wasn't one of the original knocks against unions that they were a move towards communism? Our country has Socialist parties such as the NDP and isn't socialism a slightly more democratic version of communism? I will have to look into this more as I am no political thinker and may have misunderstood the roots of these things but that one I did find slightly odd. Another slightly odd thing about subsection 3 was the bit about nazis. It's odd because our current employers built the gas chambers for goodness sakes! I am in no way accusing Thyssen Krupp of being nazi in any way but that is a significantly 'Nazi influenced' past! Of well, that stuff all happened close to 80 years ago and I guess qualifies as being what was rather than what is. I was thinking about all this while working away with three of my French Canadian buddies. One thing that I have really come to understand since working here is that not all French Canadians are alike. The ones I worked with yesterday for instance are from New Brunswick. Their French is from their Acadian ancestry and you can not assume that they like Quebecers much. Some do but lots don't. Then there are the French folks from places like Northern Ontario and apart from the language they have not a lot in common with the other two groups. Yet another French group are the Metis people of mixed French and Native ancestry. In a lot of their cases the 'mixing' took place a few generations ago and yet to this day many are still fluent in the French language. My pal Spuds McIron falls into this category. She rarely let's people know about her fluency though as she enjoys listening to what the other French guys are saying when they still think she can't understand what she is saying. Language and language acquisition has so much to do with idioms that it makes me wonder. Idioms are those things we say that don't actually translate officially. It's like when you say you are going to 'pinch a loaf' rather than saying you are going to evacuate your bowels (have a shit for the rest of us). These expressions have their roots and derive their meaning from a common cultural experience. That experience may. OT be shared across fairly isolated cultural groups like the Metis or the Acadians or the Francaphones from northern Ontario. So it made me wonder just how much these guys really understand of each other when they get flying along in their own language. The good news is that you can almost always tell someone who is a French speaker from their unique names. Lots of Jean-Guys or Pierre's or Elises. Not always though. Yesterday I was working with two very French guys. Their names are John Smith and Bruce McLaughlin. And of course Spuds McIron is actually Brittany. So in the magical world of construction nothing is as it appears and anything goes! And that's all fine with me. :)

Time in the Tool Crib

Terry runs the tool crib. For anyone reading this who doesn't know what a tool crib is I will tell you now. The tool crib is the place where you get all your tools for working from gloves to mag drills. Every large site has one and it is usually in a sea can (looks like a box car from a train) and the guy who runs it is usually an older, experienced Jman who knows every tool and how to use it. He also knows how to tell the difference between what he can fix or send out to be fixed and what should simply be tossed. On our site Terry is that guy. There is a sign on the front of our tool crib written graffiti style that says 'Don't feed the bear!' it may actually pre-date Terry as most tool crib guys tend to be grumpy. The reason for this is simple. The tool guy tries to keep his tool crib stocked but often the tools are either out or are on back order. So workers come in and bitch at him because they need something he hasn't got and of course it isn't his fault so he gets bitchy right back. Multiply this times seven days a week and times fifty two weeks in the year and the tool crib guy is often really bitchy! Not really his fault but it's usually pretty accurate. Crankiness aside the tool crib guy is usually one of the people who educate apprentices the most. Journeymen often do things to tease apprentices. I have heard of guys sent to the tool crib to get everything from skyhooks and buckets of steam to getting a 'cuddle'. When the unsuspecting apprentice arrives at the tool crib I suspect it is a pleasure unique only to toolcribbers when they get to spring the trap on the apprentice. I remember for instance an apprentice that I worked with as a laborer years ago. He was sent to the tool crib to get a cuddle. It had been explained to him that a cuddle was a clamping device that held two pieces of metal together. There was a line-up at the crib and that tool crib guy was not only cranky but was also a huge bear of a man. So eventually the apprentice arrived at the front of the line and asked for a cuddle. The big man said nothing for a second and then lifted the gate and embraced the apprentice in a gentle bear-hug while saying 'There there baby'. He then let go, went back through the gate and, smiling openly now yelled out 'anyone else want to cuddle?'. Of course everyone in the lineup laughed and the apprentice left red-faced. Later on that week the tool crib guy helped the apprentice get the Jman back. This time the crib wan't busy and the apprentice asked for a 'bucket of steam'. So the big toolcrib guy went and got a plastic bucket and wrote 'liquid steam - activate by adding hot air'. He then added an inch of water to the bottom and gave it to the apprentice while whispering something to him. A few minutes later the apprentice showed up where his Jman was with the bucket which surprised the guy no end. He had expected a red face and not a bucket. "What the fuck is that?" he asked incredulously. The apprentice turned the bucket so that the Jman could see the writing on it and said: "Bear says to get you to talk into it because you're so full of hot air it will be steam in no time!" Needless to say the kid was never sent for any further non-existent items! In reality you should NEVER tick off the tool crib guy. If he doesn't like you it is incredible how often he will be 'out of stock'. If he does like you he will usually either be in-stock or will have A valid idea on an alternative way to fix the problem. I am talking about the toolcrib today because yesterday our guy was away so I got to be in charge of the crib. It was a lot of fun... for about the first five minutes. Then it was boring. It reminded me of back when I was a laborer and I spent one of my first days watching vibrating steamroller (they aren't steam nowadays) and thinking what a great job that was. By fluke the operator was away the next day and the Foreman asked who wanted to run it. I felt really lucky when no one else wanted it and so I got picked. And it was a great job. For exactly five minutes. Then I discovered the hell that driving less than 3 miles an hour on a seriously vibrating machine can be! I spent the day with my kidneys so shaken up that I had to stop for a pee every five minutes! The tool crib is kind of like that except without the vibrating! Today as I was sitting on the bus I saw Terry the toolcrib guy board the bus. Was I ever happy to see him!!! :)

Front or Backshift and a how-to for washing machines

Well I just got back to camp last night and am still a little confused. You see we were always front shift. Then we had that 24 day shift and things got confusing. Most of our shift lives in either Edmonton or Calgary and there are lots of flights to those places. But for the few from our group like Matti the Legend and I who live out east it created a nightmare milk run to get home. So this go around they sent Matti and I home early so that we could be on the cheaper charter flights and everyone else left Sunday as usual. That means El Legendo and I aren't really on the front shift and we aren't really on back shift either. Add to that that our Foreman Greg decided to step down as Foreman and to go back on the tools and so we don't even know who to report too, lol! I am sure it will work itself out eventually! Of course at times like this you really miss your peeps! Peeps as in the people that are usually there and who are usually part of the group. As in the people whose voices make up the conversation of your workday. I wonder where they are today and what they will be up to. I am guessing Bryan from BC will be doing 'daddy time' with his cute little girls. Spuds McIron is back in town so she is no longer 'one of the boys' but instead has switched to her alter ego Brittany Anne who is a modern woman that loves manicures and pedicures and having little tiny flowers painted on her toe nails. Brew is likely home with his wife. He is Portugese so my guess is that he is either gardening or romancing the mrs. I don't know that for sure of course but when I had Portugese neighbors years ago that seemed to be how they spent their spare time, lol! Not too sure what Mike 'achie-breaky' Acorn is up to but he is such a funny guy that it is probably fun whatever it is. There are more of our crazy crew that I could mention but the only sure thing is that Matt and I will save their seats in the trailer until they get back. I am not sure if I ever mentioned the camp washing machines or not but they should definitely get some air time here. On each and every floor they have 3 washing machines and 4 dryers. They are free to use but are first come first serve. It strikes me as odd that every one of these machines are front loading when you consider how ergonomicaly unfriendly that is to the majority big men who live here and used the machines. I am guessing they were purchased by somebody who is short! Back at home my machine can do a full load of washing in 18 minutes but not the machines at Wapasu! These have multiple cycles the shortest of which is the 'quick wash' and takes 27 minutes to do the washing. Then it locks itself on spin mode which lasts at least 20 minutes. Every time your load looks to be done and rolls to a stop a moment later it hiccups back into motion going the other direction! There is no time listed for how long the spin cycle takes as I suspect even the manufacturers don't know! Then there are the mystical dryers. These babies work by sensing the humidity or something and then self adjusting their time. So when you first set it the thing says '48 minutes' but within 5 minutes it's down to saying '23 minutes'. So you go back to your room and return 23 minutes later to find it now says '40 minutes'!! Very frustrating to say the least. And hard to coordinate especially if you are at the very end of the hall as I was last turn so each walk down the hall and back takes a full five minutes just walking! Before we switched back to the 10 hour days from the 10:45 days we were never back early enough to get one of the washers until much later in the shift. It used to drive me nuts! Now when we get in I know that if I head straight to my room and immediately run to the laundry room then I can probably get a load in and can safely let it run while I head to the dining room, or to work out. Actually the cycle takes so long I could probably jog to Fort McMurray and back! A guy I flew with yesterday told me a secret regarding the washers. If you are on the first floor where the room next to the laundry room is the lounge you can put you washing in at 3:30am and then throw it into the dryer after work. Kind of a counter cyclical approach. It only works on the first floor though and not on the second or third floors as people live and sleep in the next room to the laundry room and they would be non-plused about the noise to be sure. You would then likely find your washing on the ground outside of the laundry room window! I have to run but thanks for reading! :)

Weary Traveller

My Dad always travelled a lot as part of his working routine so I swore one day that would NEVER be me!! A lot of good swearing does as I think about it only when traveling a long distance from or to work. This isn't the furthest that I have gone in search of a lucrative living mind you. I did work in various parts of Africa for a while. I also worked in Northern BC so this is really a pretty average travel distance for me. Still, I am pretty sure I wouldn't have chosen this. Life as a traveling Ironworker is kind of like being a turtle. You get used to carrying everything with you that you need. Everything into two suitcases. One if necessary. Everything you carry needs to be multipurpose so that you can squeeze every last bit of good out of it. It becomes first part of your strategy and then part of your routine. Stocking and restocking. Adjusting to the temperature variances. Making sure the two bags of stuff that you carry is the 'right' two bags worth. Always. Let me give you a for instance on this one. When I first started it was January and cold. Large heavy clothing dominated what I carried. I needed the 'layers'. But it's now over zero every day so I started removing and replacing items these past few trips. Gone are the lined coveralls and the heavy winter boots. Going are the ten or so long sleeved thermal underwear. Instead I went to the Salvation Army thrift shop and for about $50 I got around ten long sleeved tee shirts. I also bough 3 more pairs of pants (size 36) to replace those that I 'outgrew' while quitting smoking. Shop and swop! This is the life of the iron worker. I was fortunate to get my tomatoes into the ground while I was home. It required so rototilling which is a slow motion type of work that can only be enjoyed by someone who has done the same work using nothing but a shovel! While watching the rototilling work it's way through the garden I kept thinking about how it reminded me of pushing a football player with all his pads on by the feet while he doggie-paddled through the garden! But it made short work of the weeds that had overtaken the garden and served to mix the new bags of soil and manure in rather professional manner. This left the actual process of planting the tomato seedlings fairly easy so just under 4 rows went in! So now I'm back on the road heading back to work. Train from Oshawa to Toronto. Switch trains to Hamilton. Take 25 minute taxi ride to airport. Catch plane to Saskatoon. Fuel up and fly to Albian Airfield in Fort Mac. Catch the 1.5 hour bus back to camp. Check in and claim room. Drop travel bags and head out to bag storage facilities for camp. Take stored bags back to room and unpack. Collapse into bed till tomorrow morning at 4am and start getting ready for work. And so on. As much as I am not a huge fan of the traveling I do like my life which is good. It's good because I don't see any big change as things move forward. :)

Fathers and fathers and sons

I am home for my week off and I am burning the time well. I have golfed with both my father and with my son. I have spent quality time with my wife. I have put several more hours into this year's garden. I have visited my Mom and I have hung out with my daughter. And the trips isn't even over! Golf is very important to me. I am not particularly good at it. It it is fun for me and so has importance. When I was working in BC and was able to gold 12 months of the year I started to understand this new swing known as the stack and tilt. I started to feel a lot of confidence that if I aimed a certain direction that the ball would go there. But when I came back to Ontario we were so broke that I simply didn't golf. Now it is a year later and I am trying to relearn all those things that I had forgotten. In fact the last time out less than 20% of my shots were anywhere near where I aimed. To make matters worse when I went to the range the other day it was again a deplorble approximation of what my golf skills had been. But that's just golf, isn't it? Sometimes your 'eureka' moments don't happen when they should. I had been at the driving range and nothing had worked! Now I was at my Dad's trying to explain what was happening with my swing when it hit me what I was doing wrong. I wasn't keeping the right leg straight when going into the back swing. It seemed strange that I would realize that all these hours later and at the same time that I was planning a golf date with my Dad for the next day. But it happened. I simply knew what I had forgotten and I knew I would play better the next day. I just knew it!! So we went up to Shelter Valley Pines together ready to try something that was both old and new. You see the course used to be a 9 hole job but was now an 18 hole course where the order had been adjusted. To call this course 'hilly' would be an understatement! You are either shooting up or down but never straight! Lots of fun and a good test. Naturally my dad who has been playing at least weekly for several years AND who goes to Myrtle Beach each spring for a 'tune up' was his usual self which is to say a good golfer. Better than me for sure. But on one of the par 5s I hit a 270 yard tee shot (wind and slope aided) and followed that with a 270 yards 3 hybrid shot that landed right on the green and ten feet from the hole. I was putting for eagle!!! But I missed and only birdied the hole. All good and a testament to having serendipitous 'a-ha!' moments away from the course! I was also fortunate to golf with my son over the time off as well. It is very different golfing with Jak then it is with my Dad. For starters Jak doesn't particularly like golf so we have to use special rules. They include but are not limited to: 1) any wedge can be used including the 'hand-wedge' and the 'foot-wedge'. These can be used at any time. 2) The 'no score' rule which means we keep NO SCORE! 3) the 'screw this!' rule which says that when faced with extreme adversity you can simply say: "Screw this" and walk to the next hole! 4) the 'have another drink' rule which says if you are ever caught taking yourself too seriously then you.can say 'screw this' and move to the next hole. It seems kind of crazy but it works. With these rules in place my son and I enjoy playing golf together far more often! I have done lots of other things this turn. I have had a really good time. But for sheer mileage I sure got lots done this time around. See you on the flip side... ;-)

Mother's Day at home...

When you live away from home twice as much as you live at home it can often seem a little unreal. I woke up this morning beside the woman I have been with over 30 years. She was comfortable and familiar and when my eyes were squeezed tightly shut everything seemed as it was meant to be. It was when I opened my eyes that things became confusing. I am so tuned in to my routine in camp that life 'at home' often seems a foreign and surreal place to me. I am in the garden tent at the moment. I have been transplanting seedlings from the small space in the 'planter' cups up to 4" and 8" pots. The greens of my yard is so green that it seems foreign to my mind which is used to the redish gray of the limestone dust which covers Kearl Lake 24 hours a day. I am drinking white wine and am enveloped in the mothers-cuddle that is the warm breezes of spring. My God I am glad to be an Ironworker! I have no work to stress over, no reports due! This is the reason why the profession of ironworking is so great! I have done my work and enjoyed my money and now I can sit unharassed in my garden and play guilt free with my tomato seedlings. And the only thing that might 'come up' would do so courtesy of Cialis which is covered by my benefits!! There is lots of reason that I could be feeling angst but I feel none. Instead I see my wife working in between the bleeding hearts and the Hostas. She is wearing cut-off jeans like we wore together 25 years ago and she still looks good to me! I swish the white wine in the glass and think about transferring tomatoes from the seed planting first pot to the 4" pot I use for stage 2. And I smile at my wife and tha I God I am an Ironworker and as such can do my job and. Can be proud of my pay and enjoy my life unharassed. Thank God I Am an Ironworker!!

The eh(?)-team

Funny how conversation goes in the brass alley first thing in the morning. It started with me re-telling one of the stories told to me yesterday in our trailer. The guy had been telling us how when his ex found out that he had played around a bit on the side her response was to have a bonfire with all of his belongings. The gang in the alley enjoyed the story but it started a conversation on infidelity. Emma from the scaffolders said that if her boyfriend fooled around on her she should be able to do it to him. Then she added that she would never do that sort of thing though. So I guess she'd get herself a zippo and start a little vengeance fire like the other woman did! I am flying home tonight. I can't tell you how glad I am about that fact. I love my job but I have been worn out lately. I think that 24 we worked really took it out of me. I am fine at work and seem to have lots of energy but at night I fall into bed and just die! Mornings seem to be even worse as I have been waking up totally disoriented. Normally this isn't the case. So I will spend a week at home either sleeping or sitting in my tomato garden and will hopefully get my mojo back! Yesterday I was working with a couple of the younger apprentices. I like working with them but you couldn't find 2 more different guys if you tried. I have talked about big Mitch before in this blog. He is a big farm boy who recently turned 19. He likes working hard and non-stop. One day I decided to slow him down so I said: "Mitchy I am going to ask you a question and if you get it wrong we take a break but if you get it right we'll move these 30 45lb boxes of wire. What is the square root of pie?" Mitch looked at me and said: "it's 3.14 Knight now shut up and lets get working." "Actually Mitch I asked the wrong question. I meant to ask what is the Pythagorean theorem?" Mitchy shook his big head and replied: "A squared plus B squared equals C squared now pass me that god damned box!" of course he was smilingg while he said it because he knew I was shocked at his correct answers. Way to go Mitchy Mitch! Chris is 26 I think and is more like I would have been at that age. He is hyper and thin. He likes cigarettes and spitz sunflower seeds. He has a hard time keeping his focus when the job is overly repetitive but he works hard enough and is a nice kid. Unlike me he has two sleeves worth of tatoos to match his knuckle tatoos and his earlobes have holes in them big enough to hang his lunch bag from them. He is a little bit on the crazy side so I always enjoy his stories about things he has done back home. But totally different from Mitch! Foreman Greg got us working together yesterday. Actually Greg spotted me when I was coming up the back stairs to the surge deck and called out: "Peter Knight! Just the man I was looking for." Usually when a Foreman starts a sentence like that it ends with me saying 'Shit!' but Greg always puts me to work on interesting tasks and as a change is as good as a rest I was curious what he had in mind. He told me the job which was to remove all cables, hoses and electric cords that went through the gaps in the steel a the back of the building and to reroute them through the door frame so that the cladding guys could put the sheet metal up on the walls. Did I mention that my friend Greg can be a bit wordy? When he gets going he always kind of reminds me of Mark Twain who once said "Southerners speak music" or something like that. Greg speaks music too as he finds the most possible words to say something and then puts them together in an entertaining fashion. And then he sent me to get Mitchy and Chris and to fill them in on the job. Do you remember when you were in grade school and you played the telephone game? You all sit in a circle and the first person whispers something in the next persons ear and they pass it on until it finally comes back to the first person bearing no resemblance to the original statement? When you try to repeat something Greg says it is kind of like that. So ten minutes later when I was finishing telling the boys what I had been told I noticed their vacant looking eyes and hanging jaws and I knew I had failed in transmission. 'Did you get that?" I asked. "Eh?" They answered. So I took the two boys down to the wall itself. "We need to move those to there." I said. The light must have gone on in their eyes and away we went hauling cables and pulling cords. In what seemed like record time we were finished. At about the same time Greg showed up and said: "good job A team!" Embarrased I responded: "More like the eh-team I think." I don't think he got my point. But it was a good day and we enjoyed the different kind of task. All good. :)

Nicknames...

I always love watching hockey players in interviews when they are referring to other players. The hockey guys all have nicknames for each other and they have a pretty simple formula for how they make them. They shorten the name to one syllable and add a 'y' to the end. For example: (Interviewer)"So Bill I noticed you played well with Jordanovitch, Ponicorovsky and Alfredsson tonight. Do you think you'll get on the ice with them again tomorrow?" (Player) "uh ya Jim. When I am playing with Jordy, Pony and Alfy I really feel like I can fly on the ice..." It is such a simple method of picking nicknames that it is almost infallible even for the more Moronic of the hockey playing tribe. I have several nicknames here at work but I can tell you I never picked any of them. I do write 'Jedi' on most of my tools and equipment because my last name is 'Knight' but no one really calls me that. I did it because there is another Peter K here and our stuff would get mixed up otherwise. The other Peter K has 30+ years as an Ironworker and was one of my first Jmen that I worked with. I actually made up the name ironpete to describe him and not me. But when I was trying to set a name for this blog everything I chose was taken. So out of frustration I just through that one in and the rest was history. They do have nicknames for me though. Because I like to sit in the front seat of the bus some people call me 'front-seat Pete'. While I am sitting in the front seat I say 'hello' to everyone else as they board so I am also called 'Peter the greeter'. I don't mind either of those two at all. Someone was playing a prank on me and wrote 'Peter North' on my helmet. Mr. North is a porn star known for his ejaculatory prowess so I am often referred to as 'the interior decorator'. What ever! Some nicknames are time sensitive and refer to a condition. I have conjunctivitis in my eye at the moment so people are currently calling me 'pink-eye Pete'. Of course when my buddy Brian also got the same eye infection I started calling him 'Itchy' and he started calling me 'Scratchy' from the cat and mouse duo on the Simpson's television show. But I doubt either of those will last past the infection. There are other people here who have nicknames other than me. But you have to be careful to make sure it IS a nickname. I have a friend here who is a Cree man and when I first arrived I heard people calling him 'large'. He has very wide shoulders and a huge chest so I thought it was a nickname. I remember saying to someone: "that nickname doesn't quite cut it... I think you should be calling him extra-large!" which is when I found out that Large is actually his last nam and not a nickname. But as I heard him say one time: "I haven't been a large since grade 9." he is a good guy and I like working with him. For the record I just call him James. In our trailer most of the people have little nicknames that I call them. Some are of the hockey player variety like Mike Acorn who I call Ache-y (from a hey. Reamy heart actually). Some are just fun like when I call Bruno 'Brunoccio'. Matt 'the legend' Turner actually goes by 'Matti' most of the time. Wayne goes by 'Wayner'. And so on. I guess nicknames, when they are from friends, are terms of endearment. They are things we make up for our friends because we like them. Nicknames kind of tell everyone else 'this person is my friend'. So I never really care what people call me. I do think though about what some famous politician said once: "love me or hate me at least they know my name!" :)

Some birthday thoughts...

As you may have guessed today is my birthday. My 47th to be exact. I used to wonder when my parents and grandparents would say 'I don't feel any older than I did at 20'. Now I understand what they meant as apart from some aches and pains that seem to take forever to heal I don't feel that different from when I was 20 either. Ah when I was 20! I'm not even sure where I was at the time. It would have been 1985 so I was probably still at St. Mary's University in Halifax. My second year attending there and the first one where I passed more than I failed, lol! The following year I had transferred to the University of Guelph where I ultimately graduated with a degree in English and history. My first of 3 degrees! Hard to imagine but I still don't feel like much of a scholar. In honor of my birthday I am going to put in some highlights here. I hope you ca. Relate and maybe even enjoy. :) Stupidest thing I ever did and lived through: in my later 20s I worked for a development consulting company setting up offices in several African countries. I was in Uganda and went out to dinner where I met 2 Russians, an American and a Ugandan. We decided to have a drinking contest having shots and each time we finished a round the 'host' would change to the next guy in the group. We were drinking shots from the 'host's' country. So for the Russians we had vodka, for me Rye whiskey, for the American Bourbon and for the Ugandan we had Waragi. Waragi is Ugandan moonshine and it is lethal! In fact I blanked out after my first shot of it. But that isn't the stupid part. The stupid part was when I staggered back to my hotel through the middle of a Ugandan ghetto while wearing a Rolex watch! To this day I have no idea how I lived through that night! Most famous person I have ever met: when I was still in University my Dad and I went to a fly fishing school on the Deleware river in Pennsylvania. There were about 20 of us there as students and we sat and introduced ourselves. It went something like this: 'hi! I'm Peter. I'm a student.' (next guy) 'hi I'm Dan an accountant' (next guy) 'Hi I'm Bill. I'm an actor between jobs' (everybody laughed). It turned out that Bill the actor was William Hurt and that he had just won an Oscar for his role in Kiss of the Spiderwoman. Of course we didn't find that out until after he had left, lol. So no pictures! Biggest win: When Julie and I were in University together we were REALLY poor. One Christmas someone gave us a scratch and win lottery ticket and we won $4. We used that to buy 2 more tickets and both won $4. Letting it role we bought several more 'scratchers' and were having our usual fun playing 'what if'games while scratching. On the 3rd ticket we won $500! I almost died!! I was in total shock! I can honestly say based on that experience that if I were to ever win $1 million or more I would die of a heart attack. My second best win was a 5.5 foot Partridge fly rod when I was 13 that was a door prize. I am sure I made over 100,000 casts with that rod before it fell to pieces! My proudest moment: when he was 5 my son won the mini-king of the Lansdowne fair. He was so cute and confident dressed in his little suit. He won because of what he said during the 'question' session on stage which was part of the contest. When the person asking the questions asked him: "Where is your favorite place to go for vacation?" he got this great look of concentration on his face and then his face lit up. He grabbed the mic from the woman and said: "I like to go to my Gramma's because she makes the best cookies!!" every Gramma in the audience cheered and he won the contest. Me? I cried! ('cookie' or in his case 'gookie' was actually the first word my son learned. Most unique thing about me and mine?: my son and I saved a guy who had a heart attack at our karate club. I did the chest compressions and he helped set up the defibrillator. A couple of years later my daughter saved a mans life in a subway station when he had a heart attack. She gave CPR until the paramedics arrived with the defibrillator. I guess with a last name like Knight saving people comes naturally. Well I am almost at work so I have to go. You have a great day. I know I will! :)

Odds n' sods

To all those people who have just started reading my blog welcome to my Knightmare. I am not an authority on anything so don't quote me on anything. This blog is just my thoughts as blasted through my fingers using an iPhone with a stupid spellcheck. Enjoy yourself! Feel free to comment as I have enabled that function. Some of what you read here is true and sometimes I just make it up! But that's what blogs are for isn't it? We are coming to the end of the job for the old surge bin. Yesterday we spent most of the afternoon taking all of the extra cables and cords from the bin back down to Terry the tool crib guy. The idea is to leave 4 complete welding setups (so 4 suitcases or welding machines, 4 power cords, 4 co2 lines and 4 propane driven tiger torches). Apart for that everything must go. In some ways it was a sad process and in others good. I started in late January of this year (2012) when it was so cold that my breath would cause my moustache to freeze to the hair just below my bottom lip. So many welders and Ironworkers have come through the doors since then to work along side of us and then to disappear during a turnaround never to return. Others have come and stayed and are now friends as well as coworkers. And when we finally leave here we will be reunited with some and will lose track of others. Yesterday's weather was such a contrast to that which we started in. It was cool in the morning but above zero. Very nice to work in if you take the cool breeze out of the equation. By afternoon the wind had stopped and the temperature went up pretty close to 20 if not higher. It was so nice working in just a long sleeved shirt and pants. It was nice to sweat and not have it freeze and cause a chill. It was just a good day to feel good! But even as things were flowing along so nicely people were starting to leave for new jobs and opportunities. Tim the scaffolder is leaving today as hi brother-in-law from Calgary is apparently very sick. Dave the Ironworker and several others will be heading over to Syncrude to get that project started. In a few short days Curt and Steve will be leaving to take the last schooling required for completion of their ironworking apprenticeships. As with all things in life there is both joy and sadness. As the job shrinks so does our space. I guess one of the trailers is being taken away as we had 5-6 new guys relocate to our trailer. It is still a fun place to be but the dynamic has changed. Brian, Matti, Brunoccio, Ache-y and I still have our usual fun time at breaks but with all the new voices the conversation has changed. As with a things nothing stays the same. But it is still fun in there. I guess it makes sense that the change in our job is starting to happen at this time of year. It is spring after all and that is nature's time of change. The sun is now up when I awaken in the morning and is still shining down When I crawl exhausted into my bed. The colour green is being slowly painted into the landscape all around. Ice has left the tailing ponds and the ever present dust now replaces the constant slush of winter. Spring is just a nice time to be working in this trade. Although this place, Kear Lake, can be pretty desolate it will be a hard place to leave. What it represents is more than just the millions of pounds of steel that we forged into a surge bin. It represents hard work that in the common battle of life forged a lot of good and enduring friendships. The battle of man versus the elements. Yes, I will miss this place!

Work and Rework

Its funny the things that run through one's mind while grinding for hours in a row. For me I was thinking about how much grinding is the ironworking equivalent to what editing is for the writing process. Grinding cleans up the weld or metal joint or whatever. Editing cleans up the book, short story or poem. Grinding makes the metal beautiful to look at; shiny, polished and smooth. Editing does the same thing for writing. Having said that I never actually edit these blogs. I decided in advance that I wanted them to be a spontaneous example of what they refer to stream-of-consonsciousness writing. A direct link from my brain to yours. And so I will admit in advance that this blog is not a good example of what I am talking about. Grinding is the Ironworker-welder's first real skill. When we start we apprentices often hit the ground in the bolt shack putting nuts and bolts together or they put us on spark-watch (making sure that the welders or grinders who throw a lot of sparks don't burn people or start fires. But those things don't feel like skill jobs. The next thing we do is to fetch and carry whatever our Journeyman (Jman) wants or needs. Again, that doesn't feel like it takes much skill. After that we string and pull a lot of. Able. Not a terribly high skill requirement to do that. Eventually though, you are handed a grinder and pointed to some rough steel and finally you are learning an identifiable skill. Grinding is like the first few moves that you learn in the martial arts. As you will grind more than anything else you do during your career it becomes something that you are very familiar with. I took karate for 10 years with a young Asian guy named Koshin. He was exceptionally talented and beautiful to watch. He had more techniques for use in more situations than anyone else in our club. But when he was attacked on the street one day he simply blocked while side stepping and drove his knee into the guys midsection as the guy was following through wih the initial punch. Simple. Effective. And we learned all 3 of those things in the first few classes leading up to our yellow belt grading. How similar grinding is for the welder Ironworker. Every skilled ironworker not only started their careers with significant grinding work but are also still very capable of it and probably still grind regularly. I was chatting with our General Foreman Brad the other day and he was telling me how back when he started in the late 70s or early 80s he spent 3 months grinding out the inside of a tank working 10 hours a day! I watch big Wayne most days working on handrails up at the top of the surge bin. He is a fabulous welder and has been given the task of getting these handrails up and operational. He starts with the welding part but finishes always with some significant welding to clean up and pretty up the joints where he has welded the pieces together. When he is finished the joint is so perfect and smooth that it isn't distinguishable from the straight piece any more except because of the lack of paint. All good welders are good grinders first. So I focus on learning the tricks about grinding from the various Jmen. Things like which disk to use in different situations, what angle to hold the grinder at for various tasks and just as importantly how to use the grinder safely. I can see that grinding is the important finishing step to making our work beautiful. It is how we edit our work. It is our caulking and paint; our inside out block followed by a knee to the guts. It is our finisher. And because of those reasons I genuinely like grinding and work hard at doing whatever it takes to become better at it. I suspect the real key to grinding though is to do it over and over again. And so I happily grind away the metal while I grind away the hours. ((To Spuds McIron...get well. We all miss you!!))

So what is fair?

I work for a union because I believe in fairness. I know that not everything in life will or even can be fair but that is life and not work life. Unions you see were founded on the concept of 'a fair day's pay for a fair day's work'. To this day it is such an important concept a is still held closely and dearly by our members and in our halls. It is a fair concept to all. So what is fair? Fair is what is a reasonable expectation. Imagine for a minute that a company brings on some new employee. This fellow is young, strong and motivated by wanting not only to fit in but also to make money for his family. The company sees this and pushes the guy to work all out for his first week. As a result he produces more widgets than anyone else. The company then goes to the other employees and says 'if he can do it so can you' and so only those maintaining that guy's pace continue to get paid their previous salary. Some of those who can't do it get pay cuts and some of the older employees are let to. Unions protect us from this kind of thing. They keep the new guy from being forced to work through breaks and they keep the other members from losing their breaks when this guy does. Similarly women members are protected from being paid less when there is some task that men may do better than them. As an example in an earlier post I talked about Brittany (aka Spuds McIron) and how it was unreasonable to expect that at five feet tall she was going to be able to 'pull cable' that hangs in channels six and a half feet in the air. But she can still grind with the best of them and so deserves equal pay. Fair in this circumstance is judged by the concept of 'equal pay for work of equal value'. This same concept can also be applied to older members who may not move as fast or be able to lift as much as some of the younger workers but who often are the ones who transfer the concept of 'work smarter not harder'. You may be wondering where I am going with this rant of mine but instead of telling you that I will tell you where I am NOT going. I am not going to Syncrude. You see as members of our work team have finished up here and prepared themselves to go to Syncrude they have had to take a 'physical exam'. Not the kind your doctor gives you that involves a latex glove and you anal sphincter but a full on set of difficult physical tests. Stair climbing for extended periods of time, jogging for 6 or more minutes. Heavy lifting. And so on and so on. I find this to be completely offensive to the concept of 'fair' and to my union beliefs. It is simply offensive and devisive! It is unfair to our elder members as they likely won't pass the test and the. Won't get hired. It is offensive to our female members who were not born with the same base level of strength as the average male members (there are certainly exceptions). It is a plan designed to separate the membership into haves and have nots based on physical capability. And for all those reasons it is unfair! I sat and thought about which people would be eliminated. Y this screening process. My Foreman has 30+ years of experience but has a wonky shoulder due to an accident he suffered a few years ago. He is out! And yet his was the loud voice that has kept us all conscious of safety and its value. My first Journeyman, old Pete, would never pass the test so he is out. But Pete taught me and generations of apprentices how to work smart as opposed to hard. He taught me the self-centering bowline and how to be more effective when loading propane and CO2 tanks. Good he Pete! Alvin is a great welder who taught me so much about organization and how a stitch in time saves nine. I doubt he is going to make it on the treadmill! All good, key members of our team. All eliminated by this testing! So I won't be going to Syncrude. I won't take their physical. But I will do what is fair to all and will work elsewhere. Thank God not every company has such unfair tactics!

Separation anxiety and the Surge Bin

I noticed yesterday and again today that people have been getting a bit cranky around here. I have been pondering on this and trying to figure out why when we are about to be 'released' from 'Kearl Correctional'. And now when the sun is shining ut it is still cool in the morning making it nice to work in. As always I have some ideas and some of them may even be right. At least it will give me something to think about. Do you remember a few articles ago when I talked about how routine drive so many of us are? When a job closes down it is a huge change in routine. There is a stress test out there where they give stress points for various things that happen in your life and they are weighted to show which ones have the greatest impact. Losing your job happens to be right there after losing a loved one and public speaking. Now our situation is not quite so bad as we aren't getting fired but rather we are finishing one. But still that crazy element known as uncertainty lurks ever present in the background. Let's face it, people don't exactly love working up here. Most are here firstly for the money and secondly for the job satisfaction. And you home life would really have to suck if you like living in camp more than at home. But when you get past all of that this work is pretty secure if you follow the rules and keep catching the plane back at the end of the turnaround. Additionally the fact that you Have probably made friends with other 'inmates' is something hard to give up as well. The people you meet for breakfast. The group you get together with in the morning at brass alley. The ones you sit and shoot the shit with first thing in the morning your trailer crew and your immediate workmates. No they aren't your husband or your wife but after being here together every day for so very long they have become part of what keeps your psyche in balance. And so we subconsciously have a dread of missing them when we leave. Together the combined anticipation of the upcoming change is referred to by shrinks as separation anxiety (and here you thought separation anxiety was being nervous that your milk would turn into cottage cheese!). As this job moves closer and closer to completion the anxiety level will increase and bring the stress levels up with it. We will have a harder time joking with each other. We will read into each other's teasing and will see things that aren't there. When communicating with the ones back home we will be far more likely to get into a fight. All those parts of our regular routine, all of our normal beliefs and expectations (our 'norms') will begin to disappear into the confused mental state that sociologist Emile Durkheim referred to as 'anomy'. The good news is that if we know it's likely to get that way we can do things to ward it off. With our friends especially we need to think a little more before we react. That way rather than snapping at a joke or a tease we can tell ourselves 'why is that bothering me? Am I really offended or am I just stressing a bit too much?' I think I am going to look up some jokes online so that I have them handily in my mental pocket to pull out when the air starts to tighten up. But most of all I think I am going to try and tease my friends less as I value them all and I know that at times like this our thick skin gets thinner and our reactions or 'snap-backs' get faster. This has been a tough job but a fair one. I am going to miss it and the people who were the text or texture in the story a out this place. And before we leave here I am going to work hard at valuing and cherishing the people that made this potentially cold and lonely place warm and fun.

And who are you again?

I was in the airport on the way back to camp when a guy waved at me and said 'hey'. I didn't recognize him although something did look familiar so I said 'Hey' back. I hate to admit it but we rode on the plane together and then on the bus and even after what was probably 4 hours of side-by-side travel I still had no idea who he was. In fact it was only yesterday at work when I found out it was Pat from our crew and the only difference was that he had shaved off his beard. That and the fact that he wasn't dressed in his work gear. This little episode got me thinking about how much we actually recognize the other people from our crew. I mean, we have five senses but we aren't touching or tasting each other (there may be exceptions to this but that is fodder for another article). We rarely smell each other unless someone is a little vile. So that only leaves sight and sound. Of those two, failing a person having a distinctive accent, we humans tend to figure out who a person is by looking at their eyes. As construction workers in a safety oriented environment we are required to wear safety goggles and due to their reflective or dark nature they almost completely obscure the eyes. So what would you look at next in identifying a person? If it were a dead body the cops would look at the teeth but here at work they are often obscured by facial hair or whatever so this feature is about as useless as the person's voice unless the teeth (or lack of them) really stands out for you. The simple fact is that onsite we use a far more simple way of identifying each other. We simply read the name sticker on the front of the helmet. As these are handed out by the office as standard issue (mainly so the tool crib guy Terry knows who you are) it is usually a reliable indicator. And once you 'know' who a person is it must be human nature to stop looking or decifering any further. So having the name sticker on the helmet actually reduces the likelihood that you will recognize each other when outside of work. Even the name is not 100% reliable though. Some people get false name tags made up to catch you the way Bart Simpson used to catch Moe by saying a 'name' that when read quickly sounded like something else. JD's hard hat used to read 'Heywood Jablowme'. Another guy has 'Craven Morehead' on his. I used to have my name on my hard hat but someone replaced it with 'Peter North' who is the pornstar known affectionately as the interior decorator due to his copious quantities of ejaculate. Whatever! Although it is warm out now and so you see much more of a person's face it wasn't that way during the winter. This is an extremely cold place to work with the windchill often dropping it to the minus 40s so people really bundled up. On top of the oversized boots people wore long johns, pants and lined coveralls. They also wore multiple layers on the top usually with a heavy coat. On their heads everyone had on balaclava or face/neck warmers as well as the safety goggles and hard hat. So identification was virtually impossible. People looked bigger and people looked younger. As a result of people looking bigger and younger I completely messed up recognizing a couple of work mates who said hello to me in the camp halls. Every morning I would head out and have a cigarette with these guys who were disguised as knockoffs of the Michellin Man and so I formed an idea of what they would look like in their civilian dress. I can tell you I was wrong! The guy was short, thin and a lot further past 50 than I would have ever guessed! Another guy worked with us in the surge bin and he was a big happy guy. Was I ever shocked when I finally figured out it was cranky old Guy from our trailer. But now the warm weather is here. The layers that we used to wear have melted away with the snow. When we head for work it is in casual dress and our work garb is not much different. That being said I don't always match the person to the worker especially when that person has shaved off a substantial beard.