I'm Thinking About Work Too Much
6/18/2

Today, Leafy transferred up to The Hill. This is actually a move down in coolness in my opinion. He�s no longer Environmental, no longer Administration. But they have a much better snack machine up there.

It has microwave popcorn in it and the coke machine doesn�t freeze their drinks.

So, if he�s gone today, what happened yesterday? He brought a few feet thick of papers and binders and dumped them on me. All the work that me and Labman used to do, which was transferred to Leafy when the position was created has now come back on me.

I now have more responsibilities than I�ve ever had. And it frankly sucks that I can�t relegate this stuff out.

How much of it has to do with money? All but the locates [putting paint on the ground letting construction people know they can dig there].

Locates are actually kind of fun until the heat index gets above 100F or takes you into some place loaded with ticks. The two I did yesterday were really rather simple. Walk up to a pole with a yellow ribbon on it and write the word OK on the ground in paint.

I�m sure you�ve seen this kind of stuff around in your city. Anytime there is a utility change you get this stuff all over. Allow me to decode it for you:

Yellow Ribbon on pole = I�m the electrical dept and I�m going to replace this pole.

Yellow Ribbon on stake = I�m the electrical dept and I�m going to put a pole here.

Yellow Ribbon on crooked stake = I�m electrical and I�m putting in a support wire

Yellow Paint = I�m the gas company indicating where my utils are.

White Paint = I�m the guy who�s going to dig. What�s going on under here?

Blue Paint = I�m the water and here are my utils

Green Paint = I�m sanitary sewer and here are my utils

Red Paint = I�m electrical and here are my utils

Orange Paint = Either Phone or Cable. BS means Bellsouth. Too much paint means Cable [in our area].

I�ve also seen black paint used as an eraser, but since the ground isn�t black, it looks rather funny. If you ever see OK in any of those colors, it means there is nothing there.

Some utilities are deeper than others, but as a general rule, unless you are in a very old part of town in a very big city, nothing goes under 20 feet deep. There is a bit of layering but for the most part most of the utilities like the three to six feet deep area and it get�s horrible in places.

My personal theory about why the cable company puts so much paint down is that they only put their lines about a foot down. In fact, in your yard, I bet they don�t put the cable running from your junction box to your house under two inches. The problem with orange paint is that in the Hot Alabama Sun it will fade it to white in about three days if they are using the fluorescent paint, which they just love.

Basically, I�ve been thinking about work too much since it�s not the same old same old for me anymore. I�m actually having to learn stuff that I�ve never seen. Now, I�ve poked around the Utilities Database before, just looking up stuff, but I�ve never actually changed billing info, and now that�s part of what I do. It�s a little freaky when you�re on the ADJO screen.

I�ve been playing Top Gear Daredevil, which despite what the critics say ROCKS. Aisai has been playing the downloaded shockwave game from Willy Wonka, Nerd Garden, or something like that.

Aisai�s getting burned out it seems with the school and work. Hey, after this term only eight more and you got your paper.

We had a birthday party last night for Mac, my nephew. I took the camcorder and took a lot of footage. I missed the part when the dog barfed.

Man, I just have bad luck.