ABSENT MINDED THOUGHTS

ONE OF A KIND

Today a group of bloggers are mourning the passing of one of their own, Rob Smith AKA Acidman.

I came across his blog a little more than a year ago. I was beginning to get interested in blogging and was reading various blogs to see what was out there, looking for a bit of inspiration. Most of what I had read discouraged me a bit. Some of it was too intellectual, some of it was not intellectual enough. Some of it was too political or seemed to be trying to promote some political agenda, and some of it was just plain drivel.

Then I came across “GUT RUMBLES” and my outlook about blogging changed in an instant.
This man could be inspiring one moment and scary the next, but he always spoke his mind. He didn’t dance to anybodies tune, except his own.

I never had the pleasure of meeting Rob in person and have only exchanged one brief email (about Delbert McClinton of all things) with him, and he did link to this post once. I am only one of many who have never met Rob personally, but has been deeply touched by his writings.

There may be others with similar qualities, but Rob was ONE OF A KIND, unique and yet approachable.

To Sam, Quinton, and the rest of the family…I wish you all the best and offer my heart felt condolences.

posted by Mrite @ 5:18 PM 1 comments

PORTABLE TOILET SHORTAGE?

"Once a toilet has been used on a construction site, you don't want to put it anywhere but a construction site," she said. "You wouldn't take one of those toilets and send it to a wedding." (SOURCE).

There is a lot of truth in that quote that I have used for an opener. In fact I have a great deal of experience (most of it bad) with portable toilets found on construction sites.

I was a Millwright for 19yrs. I had to use those temporary facilities on a number of occasions. I have never been in one that I would consider to be “Martha Stewart” clean, but some are passable. However, those that are passable are rarely found on construction sites (unless they are fresh off the truck).

I can relate a number of bad PortOlet experiences, but I’ll only share two of them with you. It’s not that I mind talking about it, I just figure you have better things to do with your time than to read a detailed list of my 19yrs of PortOlet experiences.

One time involves being called out to a job one early July morning. I had been drinking all day and into the evening of the previous day. I probably had 3hrs sleep when I got the call to go to work.

So, hung-over and feeling like what one might find in a PortOlet, I drug my tired ass into a paper mill in North Florida. The temperature was already in the mid 80s by the time I got to the job site, and was well into the 90s by the time afternoon break had rolled around.

As bad as I was feeling I had naturally skipped breakfast and had only a couple of bites off of a sandwich and a jumbo glass of iced tea for lunch. After returning to work for a few minutes I felt the need to relieve myself of the jumbo tea which I had for lunch.

I made my way to the nearest PortOlet determined to relieve myself, return to work, get the job done, and head to the nearest beer store to self-medicate my aching head.

If the temperature outside is in the mid 90s, one can only imagine what the temperature is inside the confined quarters of a God-awful PortOlet. I knew there would be a rancid odor so I had prepared myself by taking in some good air (if there is such a thing in a paper mill) outside the facility and taking shallow breaths through my mouth inside the facility. This is a time honored method of breathing in such places that has served me well in the past.

I bravely opened the door and began my breathing exercise. Of course, the furnace like condition that hit me in the face as I opened the door was horrendous (but not unexpected). What took me by surprise was the huge, brown, anaconda like, monstrous turd, that was threatening to escape the confines of the small commode! It was as big as my forearm! How it got to such monstrous proportions I will never know, suffice it to say I have never seen anything (from a human source) like it before or since.

Naturally I gasped in surprise, and in so doing, I forgot all about my time-tested method for breathing. I got the smell, the heat, and a visual (that still gives me nightmares on occasion)… all at once! The iced tea I had ingested didn’t have to exit through the urinary tract, it came straight back up.

The next bad experience in a PortOlet happened on a pay day, of all days. I had been working for Milton Wood on a shutdown at the paper mill in Palatka. I had gotten paid and cashed my check at lunch. I was saving for a concert ticket (or something), but I also had to put some money away in the bank back home to cover some upcoming expenses.

So, I went into the PortOlet to answer natures call when I suddenly felt compelled to count and separate my money in the tiny cubical. My main reason for doing this was because it was private, I don’t like flashing my money around people and I had a small amount of privacy in the john.

I opened my wallet and begin to thumb through the tens, twenties, etc., when suddenly a loud knock on the PortOlet door startled me and caused me to loosen my grip on the wallet. With a sickening plop it left my hand and landed in the toilet!

I made a quick mental calculation of the money I had already counted through (about $600), weighed the consequences of possibly contracting Hepatitis (or God knows what) from doing what I knew had to be done, rolled up my shirt sleeve and stuck my hand right in! Surprisingly, my old LEVI’S Velcro surf wallet didn’t sink. My wallet was (for the most part) on top of the mass of toilet paper, turd, and urine.

I hurriedly opened the door nearly hitting the Iron Worker (who was standing outside) with it. He gave me a wide berth as I ran to one of the fire hoses and began to hose off my wallet, hand, and arm. I tried my best not to use that hand for the rest of the day, if it involved ANYTHING that might bring it into contact with my mouth. The rest of the day I smoked my cigs with my left hand, drank my soda at break with my left hand etc. I did this even after I had found some soap in the company break room.

Those are my two, most notable, bad experiences involving PortOlets. The only good thing (in this case good does not mean redeeming) that I have ever found about PortOlets is the graffiti that is left on the walls by shit-house pundit’s the world over.

I leave you with these words of wisdom found on the walls of a PortOlet years ago. I don’t recall which one of the many that I have visited they were in, but you can rest assured that they indeed came from a PortOlet wall…

“He can’t WELD and he can’t FIT
But the PORT-O-LET MAN knows his SHIT!”

Haven’t heard enough about PortOlets today…here’s more

posted by Mrite @ 12:34 PM 3 comments

The Worst Job Ever?

Alright, I know I shouldn’t complain. I mean; after all there are people who have worse jobs than I have at this time. Hell, there’s even people who don’t have any job at all. But as far as my experience goes, this job is the worst that I have worked so far.
To begin with, there is the ridiculously low wage I am receiving. It’s so low that I won’t reveal it, even in this protected post.

Yup, that’s right I’m writing this in protected mode. I don’t see myself with this employer much longer. He’s paying me under the table, so no taxes are coming out, but there’s no compensation for me if I get hurt or fired either. All that and I’m the one who will have to face the music with the IRS sooner or later. But fact is, if I keep working at this rate of pay I could legally go exempt for this year…you do the math on that one.

I’m working at least 12hrs a day for wages that migrant farm workers would turn their noses up at. I feel pretty sure that no illegal is gonna come take this job from me…that’s how bad it is.
Everybody (except me) drinks on the job.

Yesterday, the mechanic (shop manager) passed out drunk underneath a car he was working on. The job he was working on had been stretched out from 4hrs to 3 days. Another mechanic on the job finished up for the passed out mechanic and it still wasn’t done right. When the customer came in to pick up his vehicle, the owner wouldn’t let him take it out of the shop unless it was paid for. The guy and his wife were complaining (legitimately in my opinion), that they wanted to at least test drive the car before they paid for it. The owner (who remained in his office) said no. The couple called the Police (who have been up to this shop 7 times in the past 2 weeks), who in turn tried to mediate between the shop owner and the dissatisfied couple. The owner had the 20yr old girl who runs the office and the other shop outside talking to the Police and the couple. It was a big cluster f**k.

Finally the couple said they would pay with their credit card, and they were told the credit card machine was down, that it would have to be a cash transaction. I personally think that the owner has either lost his merchant account or he didn’t want the credit card company to dispute the bill. Either way, it’s just plain shitty on his part to pull some cockamamie, jack-leg, half-assed, Mickey Mouse, bull-shit!

That’s not the only thing going on there. The guy in charge of tire sales is a crooked bastard as well. I’ve graded used tires for 20yrs, going back to the days of grading casings for retreads. I’ve always graded conservatively, I believe that if one is to err he should do so on the side of caution. This jerk-off took a tire out of the discard pile I was grading. The tire looked good on the outside (it was a full-tread, low profile, 22in tire), but it was obviously ruined on the inside (the liner was ruined), making it a hazard to even inflate the tire on the tire machine…never mind running the damned thing on a car. He said in front of some of these young kids that he’s training… “I can get $100 for that tire.”

I told him that one of two things was gonna happen. 1) The tire was gonna blow up on the changer or 2) whatever gangsta he sold it to was gonna come back and put a cap in his dumb-ass and take his $100 back. I’ve lived in this neighborhood for 40yrs, most of the people I grew up with are either dead or in prison, there is a reason I’m not…I don’t intentionally set out to screw people, and if it happens unintentionally…I try to set it right. This place has a “no refund” policy. I can see that if you are doing your best to be on the up & up, but if you continually set out to screw people, somebody is gonna get their satisfaction back out of you.

The same mechanic that passed out under the car (he’s a nice guy, just a lush), has a crack-ho girl friend who was fighting another crack-ho on Main St, in front of the shop, the other day. That particular day a cop just happened to drive by and see the two drunk, coked out, whores rolling around on the sidewalk. How they kept from getting arrested, I’ll never know.

There’s more that has gone on since I’ve been there, but I don’t feel like going into it right now. Let’s just suffice it to say, that I’ll be lucky to make another week and when I leave… I have a good mind to call the DOT on their ass. I know where that screwed up tire (and bunch more like it are).

Does that make me a rat? Possibly, but remember what I said about satisfaction? Screw me and see if I don’t get some!

Oh…BTW: As pissed as I am about these low-life, crooked, no-good, bastards, I’m working for…It’s a rant about them…not you.

I LOVE YOU GUYS
Have a great weekend.

posted by Mrite @ 12:41 PM 1 comments

CHANGES

Boy what a week. There has been good news, bad news, and mediocre news in my world this week.

posted by Mrite @ 4:41 PM 5 comments