Walking, Because Running Equals Death By Overwhelming Heat

Today’s Exploit:

I have been going for long walks lately. None quite as long as my eventful walk about a week ago, that one was 8.5 miles, I checked. 

However, with the heat and me being lazy, I have spent more time on long walks with a few bursts of running when I’m feeling super motivated. 

Other times I am far more interested in things like Speedy Gonzalez, here.

Or the endlessly boring, flat landscape.

And the baby cows that can’t decide if they want to play, or if I’m some horrible monster that is going to attack.

Also, last night I met the driver for the landowner. And had 4 other trucks stop to ask what I was doing and if I needed a ride. In the process of getting out of the road so that one of said trucks would not kill me I stepped on a thorn. The first one ever to go through my shoe and poke my foot. Stupid Texas plants and their pokeys.

Did you know that it takes 21,000 steps to walk 8.5 miles? And 12,000 to go 5.5? Yesterday I did 7.5 miles and that was 16,000 steps. 

Classic Love Stories Are Pathetic

Today’s Exploit:

I started reading Romeo and Juliet. So far I have understood about a quarter of what I’ve read and I’ve had to look up about 68.13 words. 

So far Romeo is completely consumed with love for someone he won’t name, and is pretty pathetic. Every other phrase is “Woe, is me”. 

Juliet has been asked to check out the suitor that has been talking to her dad, but she’s skeptical. 

As of right now, in the middle of Scene IV, it is nearly as pathetic a love story as Pride and Prejudice has been so far. And I still have not been able to bring myself to finish that one, yet. 

My Growing Family

Today’s Exploit:

My family has mutated and grown and shrunk and gone through many transformations this year.

I got Pete for Christmas, and the poor thing still has glitter stuck to him from the store. Then I got Jack from one of the roughnecks. Eventually I was motivated and put Pete and Jack in the new pots I’d gotten a while ago. 

Then I got this little guy, from the same roughneck. This little guy doesn’t have a name because it made me mad on the trip home because it bit me when I tried to throw a wrapper in the trash. 

So now it lives with H. because Klay really wanted a plant the last time he visited.

Myrtle and Maya have gotten several haircuts because I leave them in the SUPER hot sun for too many days without water.

I was even afraid I’d lost Myrtle for a while. She needs...something. I guess I need to break her into pieces so that I can add some real dirt to the pot, instead of a mess of roots.

And most recently, I have two new additions to my family. 

Allie has a baby and Pete has a baby. The babies do not yet have names, because they don’t have their own pots. 

Now I just have to figure out how they’ll fit into the crate with 2 new pots. 

I Was Just Trying to be Healthy!

We finally had rain!

Today’s Exploit:

Last night I went for a walk. I was going to see if a two-track along a fence line met up with a road on the other side of the property. 

Turns out it did. I had to wade through cows a few times, but mostly they’re noisy and smelly and only dangerous if you get between them and their babies who are rarely more than 3.123 feet away. Therefore, not something that is likely to happen. 

I walked and walked, and talked on the phone a bit, and walked some more. Then I came back to our main road near the gate guards. I talked to them about weather, and maybe their granddaughter - the one that they bring up every time I talk to them. 

Then I decided, Hey I still have some light, I’ll do another loop on this new path I’ve found.

About halfway into another loop I realized that this thing is about 4 miles long, and then I have another mile to go to get back to the rig. That means that I have 40 minutes of light and 3 miles to go (I have a very hard time walking faster than a 20 minute mile pace). And I’ve already done nearly 5 miles. Also, my toes are starting to chafe, my back is aching from actually standing with my shoulders back and I am very aware of that place where my shorts are touching my skin. Thankfully that ant bite finally stopped hurting.

Oh well, what can you do? Turning around to go back will take just as long as continuing forward. 

I got to the main road and picked up the pace, because packed gravel and dirt is far easier than cow cratered mud and scrub. The wind was nice and cool and the bugs were out. In force. Naturally the wind was aiming straight into my face, and the bugs were small. 

I walked through about 15 swarms that I could not see until they were pelting into my face and making their way down my shirt. 

The last mile and a half was spent spluttering and waving at the air in front of my face in an effort to divert the bugs around me, when I wasn’t doing that I was trying to brush them off every surface that they could possibly land on. 

I somehow managed to make it back to the rig before all the daylight was gone, scaring a couple whitetail deer and a couple unknown ungulates that were a bit larger (not that this means much, the deer here are minuscule). They were about the size of normal deer, but I could only see legs, the rest of their bodies were against a dark backdrop and I didn’t have enough light. 

The bugs had a large role in getting me moving, and I walked a total of 21002 steps and approximately 8.898 miles. I don’t want to move today because I have sneaky little chafe areas that walking normally or awkwardly does not relieve. Also my blisters think it’s funny to give me a nice twinge every so often, to be sure I don’t forget them. Good thing my job requires very little movement, I suppose.

Why Are the Classes So EASY?

It is so dry at this rig that the first turn from the rig has a puddle of dust. When I run I have a hard time finding solid ground to get around it. So every step I take makes a dust cloud worthy of a large explosion, and I have gritty toes for the next 3-5 miles.

Today’s Exploit:

I have been worried about one of my last classes for this Business program since I saw that it was worth 2 more points/credits/whatnot than the other classes. I was afraid it would be harder, take longer, require more effort.

And then it started. I had dreams about forgetting to write an essay for my high school English teacher. It was horrible. He pinched my arm.

I started one paper. It was less than a page. 

The next one was more than a page, but not by much.

The third one was 2 pages, because it used the second one as Part I. 

This class is easier than my introductory class that wanted me to set goals.

How is it worth more than the worthless English and Marketing classes I took?

The hardest part will be compiling 7 or so papers into a PowerPoint presentation.

I hate PowerPoint.

Business Law is definitely more complicated, but not by a lot. 

I suppose I should know by now that the class will not be particularly challenging, I have been doing this for over a year. Yet, somehow, I am always expecting a class more along the lines of those for Engineering. 

I wonder if all Business programs are this soft? 

I Saw a Monster

I’ve spent the past few nights having dreams/nightmares about forgetting assignments. They include my high school English teacher, Africa, forgetting homework over the weekend and papers that are supposed to require full reams of paper.  

I don’t know. 

Somehow this pertains to my worry over writing a 500 word paper about a “project”. I was never worried about the 1000 word paper on a subject that is completely new to me.

Today’s Exploit:

I have spent the past few years reading about Chupacabras and thinking that they are some version of the yeti or bigfoot. I don’t know why I thought that. I spend enough time complaining about the heat that I should have realized that a Texas ‘monster’ would not be covered in thick/extra long hair. 

But then I saw a doglike animal on my way to town from one of the rigs. It was extremely skinny, sort of Chihuahua-shaped but closer to 18inches tall, or so. Also, it’s ears were overly large and it’s ribs poked out.

I mentioned this to H. a few days later, because I’d come close to hitting the animal on my trip. The first thing he said was, “A chupacabra!” 

I was completely thrown, I thought it was a dog.

But evidently his version of the monster is a dog with extra long fangs, and mange.

Today I looked up some information on the chupacabra and found that, according to Wikipedia, they should be as big as a small bear, with vaguely alien looking eyes and spikes running down it’s spine. And they should have green lizard skin and three toes on each foot.

Who knows?

I may have seen a mythical monster.

Or I may have seen a sick dog with extra large ears.

Working Hard

I went for a bike ride with my sister and her roommates the other day. 

I need to go for more bike rides.

Today’s Exploit:

I found a new workout. It is hard.

I have done it twice. And then I had to get ready to go back to work. 

It consists of 6 or 7 moves and lots of reps. And it is timed.

My favorite and least favorite one is the Knees to Elbows one.

You hang from a pull up bar and pull your knees up to touch your elbows. When they get there your back should be parallel to the floor.  

I have yet to do one properly.

Spinach Explosion

I have a return customer for my cookies. I just wonder why the favorites seem to be kinds that I don’t like. That means that the extras are not particularly enjoyable.

Today’s Exploit:

I had a spinach explosion this morning. 

I was making a smoothie.

I have been making lots of smoothies this week. 

I’m beginning to consider myself a master.

Ok not really, but some have turned out pretty good. Especially the ones with blueberries and plums because they cover the color of the spinach.

This means that the smoothie is pink or purple rather than army green or gross brown.

Anyway, this morning I was trying to make my smoothie, and I had everything packed into my jar. I put it on the blender base and turned it on. 

The next thing I knew, spinach bits were all over the wall, the desk and my shirt. 

It took some thinking through the ensuing panic before I got myself together enough to hit the off button.

For as big a mess as it made there was still a surprising amount of spinach still in the jar. So I wiped it up and cleaned as much of the green off the wall as I could. And the smoothie still turned out to be drinkable, albeit with a bit of a mess around the rim, but still...

I Was Hit By Lightning

I think the rain might be never-ending. I don’t like it because it floods the road and I can’t run. It would be fine, but I didn’t bring an extra pair of shoes and putting on clammy shoes is gross. And blistery.

Today’s Exploit:

I WAS HIT BY LIGHTNING!

Ok, so maybe not so much me as the rig that I work on.

But it hit within 20.376 yards of me. And that's way too close for comfort.

During one of the, seemingly daily, storms we were expecting a light rain, with most of the violence of the storm passing on either side of us.

However, the storm had other plans and took us all off guard. 

I was standing by the DD’s desk and talking to Reed. 

Suddenly there was a blinding flash and dragon roaring outside.

The dragon made the electricity flicker and one of the computers go SNAP!

While I was watching the computer to see if I needed to hit the floor to avoid shrapnel the dragon flamed and roared again.

And then some rain started.  And by “some” I mean “a torrent”. 

Matt ran back inside and yelled that I needed to check my equipment because they lost the monitor and the rig computers were down.

I didn’t really want to go outside, because the dragon was probably hiding behind the door, but I did anyway.

The lightning killed one of my computers and confused my signal receiver.  I had to make the other computer pick up the slack (and now it is running extra slow). And we had to call for a backup signal receiver because the computer would crash every time we started the demodulation program. 

Then the truck bringing the backup parts wouldn’t drive down the rig road because he was afraid of getting stuck.

Eventually we got things patched together enough to finish the job, but it’s sketchy.