6/2/07

I've spent the past three days in town without shoes, pants, a change of underwear or a toothbrush and I can say with great assurance that I wish to spend no more time there.  The sunset greeting my return atop fresh memories of "civilization" have fortified my confidence in career choice.

I awoke on Thursday (I think it was Thursday, my concept of days has receded to a vague outline with little bearing on day to day reality) to the news that I would be accompanying our fearless leader to town. We sent several shipping containers from Seattle in April with most of our supplies for the season, including: fifteen thousand pounds of lumber, a seven thousand dollar Costco run (you should have seen the looks we got as we corralled thirty five of the big flat orange carts stacked with various essentials), a Kubota tractor complete with backhoe, auger, box blade and brush box, four brand new Carolina skiff sixteen foot jon boats, nine new weatherports and four thousand dollars worth of new power tools. As a result we have been making daily runs to town on the tide with our new, massive dropgate jetboat. Someone has to be in town loading the materials from the container, into vehicles and having it all ready to go when the boat arrives. I did not realize I would be the one staying in town until after we had left the dock and, as a result, I was grossly unprepared. Foremost on my list of items lacking were shoes and pants. I did have waders and boots, but the idea of working, driving and eating in them for three days did not exactly appeal.  Besides this was probably the last opportunity to hit up a bar for until mid-September.  The only bar I've ever gone to in waders is the Murray in Livingston and that was beacause I was already too drunk from a day on the river to care. I was able to secure some too-tight shoes and oversided pants at the house in town so it worked out but these are the sort of problems that are easily solved with basic communication.  It pisses me off.

Life in town breaks down like this. The phone begins to ring at four in the morning (this is because people on the east coast either don't realize where we are or don't understand time zones). At seven I begin answering the slew of calls from clients, prospective clients, my boss on his sat phone, his wife trying to figure out where the hell he is, my boss calling back and instructing me not to inform his wife of his whereabouts, telemarketers and the occasional wrong number for good measure. By nine I'm on my way to the shipping container to unload two van loads worth of equipment, having already picked up whatever other supplies they called me from camp requesting. At two(ish) the boat arrives and we scramble to get it loaded before the tide starts to recede, then I meet him at the gas docks to help him get fueled up for the return trip. Come five I'm exhausted and wind up going to the one bar in town and spending far more money than I earned in the course of the day and get home just about the time the phones start ringing again. Like I said; town sucks.

6/4/07

Home sweet weatherport.

Back in camp, I am glad to spend ten to thirteen hours a day, carrying lumber, building walkways, fixing boats and painting cabins...okay that last one is a lie. I hate painting cabins, but I really don't mind the rest of it. I finish my days sore and ready for sleep and wake up tired, but not hungover and broke. Best of all my weatherport is completed. Yes my glorified tent on the hill is erected and I am currently laying on my bed.  'Bed' might be a misrepresentation of the item.  It is a plywood platform with a foam pad, a sheet, a pillow and my down sleeping bag.  Despite what it lacks in traditional comfort, I have had no trouble sleeping on it.