Saturday, January 11, 2014

Light posting

not my photo. This was as close as a coworker could get his tugboat to the pier. 4000 hp was not enough to get through.
It's not that I'm feeling uninspired- we're getting slammed with cargo after cargo here at Hawsepiper's afloat global HQ/charity gynecology clinic. The most frequently uttered phrase these past 2 weeks has been "exactly where the fuck do they expect us to put this?" as we are at times not being given the opportunity to get rid of cargo before throwing more of it on top of or around the stuff we've already got on board. My bed is 5' in the air, so I'm not sleeping all that well, as we're at times sailing with a heavy list or insane forward trim to get the job done, and sleeping on a bed with a strong list on brings both messed up dreams and an increased chance of rolling out of the bunk.
 So it goes.

 Luckily for us, the recent cold snap froze our water supply, so we've been able to save time by not showering for a day or two back there, and then there was an ice plug in the gray water overboard discharge, so our poop tank overflowed, which smelled magical. At one point both of our main cargo pumps broke down simultaneously, too, so that happened.

 We've been dealing with the issues as they come up, and dealing well. We never had to turn down work, and duct tape, pressurized air and lots of hammering and cursing are keeping the oil moving.

    I finish on Tuesday. Maybe I can go home, maybe I'll go work somewhere else for a week first. Depends on how stupid I am.

4 comments:

Steve said...

Hello!

I saw your post on the apocalypsecometh about tugboat jobs. I'm a young man in Western WA, about an hours drive from Seattle and I very much like the idea of being away 2 weeks at a time for that kind of pay (or even longer, I just need to get out of the house!).

I have no experience with any of this seafaring stuff and I was wondering what kind of job title should I look under for scrubs such as myself when hunting for these jobs?

blowspittle said...

evidently, if you are trying to discourage us, you can see it is not working.
"global HQ/charity gynecology clinic"--so, I can leave my urine sample there? and where do I send the résumé?

Paul, Dammit! said...

Bowsprite, we'll have to work out the details first. The freelance gynecology clinic is shut down until I can get the other guys to either wear nitrile gloves or stop chewing their nails.

Steve said...

Hey Paul, could you answer my question of where to start my search for getting a boat job, what to look for, for an unskilled guy like me?