Well, I'm still here, and while it's another unexceptional day workwise, it's been a good chance to walk the HQ's decks in the heat of the day, when the metal is expanded, and look for leaks in the many, many connections, valves and fittings. Hydraulic fittings that are nicely sealed at 80 degrees start weeping oil at 95, in two cases here. Along with the expanded metal, I was able to crank down a touch with one of the cartoonishly long pipe wrenches we keep aboard, which should see that fitting truly sealed now, and possibly forever. I think rather than try to disconnect it now it might just be easier to sink the whole fuckin barge.
I've been cooking with a carbon steel pan lately. First time I'm aware of, and while I'm not sold on the whole "you can make it nonstick' schtick, as it seems my breakfast laughs at 3-4 rounds of seasoning the pan the day before, I actually like working with the pan. Even when I get stuff sticking, it ain't much and it comes off with an hour's soak in water, mostly. Where I no longer have a working thyroid, I'm pretty well limited to about 1500 calories a day unless I actually work out or get my ass kicked on deck, so I gotta make the calories count and cook well. And I have been. I made cilantro-lime chicken w/ carrots, broccoli and a touch of rice yesterday. Today is Steak, beets and a caesar salad w/o croutons. Breakfast, well, I eat well too. But that's pretty much it for the day, foodwise. No snacks, no 3rd meal. I'm in a careful calorie deficit at work, as I am too old to be too fat now, and seem to be losing about 1.5 lbs a week this year, so... progress.
I didn't get a science job I bid on, which is a bit of a bummer, as it looked like a fun project- creation of an artificial wetland in an office atrium space with a footprint that is too small to concentrate enough surface area to do the work intended (water filtration), but with a limited electrical budget allowing for moving things vertically... making a stackable series of artificial wetlands.
Anyhow, my 2-page proposal, with cost and energy budgeting listed, was apparently not enough. Truth be told, artificial wetlands are not my forte, but it did look fun, and it was in Texas, where I'd like to visit sometime, just not in Beaumont or Houston, where I always ended up before, and which always wasn't that much fun.
Well, next month there's an RFP going out for another gig, a little more up my alley.
I have a friend, now retired, who made a name for himself as a botanist specializing in using plants to pull heavy metals and other toxins out of otherwise arable soil. He basically seeded fields with weeds that had an affinity for certain contaminants, and then kept goats and let them eat the weeds. Twice a year the goats would come in, then the soil turned over and reseeded, rinse, repeat . Cost is about 5% of carting off the soil for incineration and interring in a sealed landfill but it takes a couple of years to work. And the goats don't live to a ripe old age, lol.
I don't know where it's a matter of no longer having the intellectual chops or just having a shorter attention span, but I like limiting myself to ideas that are helpful, that solve problems, but which can be reduced to fundamental concepts and carried out and expanded upon by anyone with a little time and experience, and not at a technician's level.
Well, in the meanwhile, I gots to go put the oil in the hole and turn the round things to make the oil go in the hole or not. Sadly, I am not being paid to wax orgasmic about the ideas people didn't want to pay me for this time.
No comments:
Post a Comment