I have had lot of unusual jobs in my lifetime , from a wide verity of experience I could go on a long time with them . My last job was working for a big company making cardiac and carotid artery stents , and their installation components . Probably one of the most fun jobs I've had with real meaning . I've been a snow cat mechanic, and ran and repaired the air compressors and water pumps for snow making , worked on boats, wave runners, and built crane barges, domestic construction , Search and rescue (volunteer) , forest fire fighting, warehousman , construction, Air craft wind shield manufacturing, air compressor mechanic, small engine mechanic, electric motors, generators , machinist, welder, fabricator, and much more. I have quit and been laid off but never fired from a job and in each job gave 110% some more some less. Most of the time extra effort did not pay off but that is the illusion of the effort . Most employers do not respect the extra effort till you're gone and they are trying to replace you ,and you've managed to find something better in the meantime. If you are going to leave a job, have one waiting before you make the announcement.
A couple of odd ones never a truly weird one. First was working on a turf outfit near home during a summer while in highschool. The first half of the day the foreman and I wrestled irrigation around for one of those huge round irrigation system you can see on Google Earth. That was simple and interesting. Next we went to the edge of one of those perfectly flat 2000 acre fields and the foreman had us line up in the Texas summer afternoon. We basically did a dress right dress Army D&C maneuver where we were 1 arms length apart. The foreman instructed me and a dozen or so other workers to get on our knees and crawl the kilometer across the sod plucking weeds and swing around to come back what looked like a hundred passes. I got clarification and promptly told him to f-off and walked home. I got offered an ass whooping but the old man reconsidered. He didn't pay me for the 5 hours but I ran over his mailbox about a dozen times over the next few years so I figured we were even. Once I got a driver's license and a legal car I had a job in a Swiss seat inspecting paint jobs on water towers inside and out with a holiday detector. I'd wipe every weld with a wet sponge looking for pinholes in the paint (continuity). That was different. Bouncer in a topless bar for a year was eye opening......
Pretty much. I'd been inoculated for prostitution in the Army in Europe. It was a skilled trade there. The US version is exploitive. However, it ranges from semi-slavery of addicted whores to insane profits of superpredator concubines. All in the same establishments with avenues of advancement open for all. Danged confusing for a country boy......
What ever my dad said to do,starting at 9yrs old. Baling hay,feeding cows,and hauling hay all over the parish when I was 12. When I turned 9 he said it were time to learn to work. Always had a job. Still do what I can do at 76 yrs.
Spent most of my life in commercial diving, marine salvage, forensic diving, underwater welding and cutting, blasting, hot-tapping, dredging, whatever was required under sea but the most satisfying thing I have done is my present avocation, I write and play music.
It is what it was no more no less. Now come on give me some more super survivalist tough guy beer talk about what a bad dude you are
I participated in a couple of these in the form of fish-kill picker upper...lol I'm sure you've done some of this as well !!! Had a huge fish fry afterwards!
Been put on get this,Turtle watch Followed by Porpoises watch Seacowboy will know exactly what this means!
While I college gray hound walker at the dog track. Note: they ALL poop before running a race. Most of the time they poop in back before we walk them by the crowd and put them in their starting boxes. I know many people liked to bet on the ones they saw poop before the race but they ALL do. You just don’t usually see them.
When I did a job here at the Cannery, removing some 50 year old Pilings that were in the way of New Dock Construction.... The Pile Drivers had tried to pull them but broke them off 30Ft or so, above the MudLine.... So I got some 1# Booster Charges of PETN/TNT Mix and taped them to 30 Ft 2X2s... Then at low Tide, nailed one stick to each Piling Stub with the Charge, pushed down to the MudLine... Used Electric Caps, and strung all the Wires, in Parallel, back to a Lead Wire, going ashore, and waited for High Tide....; At High Tide, Hooked the Lead wire to a Vehicle Battery and touched off the Charges Nothing big happen at the surface but a few seconds later all the Piling Stubs floated up, severed right at the MudLine... and then as the tide turn to Ebe, there was a string of Tom Cod, and other fish, floating down the Inlet.... The Eagles had a feast, that day....
DOT MIL Time North Beaufort Sea ,,,Dropped on a frozen in the ice offshore stuck ARD Second WW Auxiliary repair dock D3011 .Auxiliary repair dock - Wikipedia All outside of the hull bolt on doors are on for over winter freeze up. I arrive with the Chief Engineer on a -20c frozen ship with snow and ice all over. First is to enter the ship, it's as cold as the ice ,once in Dark and down to engine room ,find the small 20Kw cat diesel. we got it fired after hrs , small lights on and got the compressors up spinning for tomorrow's work . Sleep on bunks in a frozen steel hull. Just two guys till the ship is up running with power. This ARD can power any ship it brings onboard.Second day we get the compressors up and air pressure up to spin the main engines up . 6 huge engines on the starboard side while the port side is full of machine shops , prop shops etc. Once we get one main genset / engine up , we will have lights and the start of heat in the engine room . Heat is Boilers . SSS that we will bring up after we get water locks checked and lubed.After a day of getting all other engines to spin and fire , bring online and test to pickup loads (small loads is all we have since the main stuff has not been opened yet ) and then there is the interesting part. the ARD has ballast tanks so it can sink to let a ship in the stern, pump water in and then when the ship that's to be lifted into dry dock , the pumps now empty the ballast tanks . Im to go into the pipe from the tank and check the valve seats and lube the gate's of the valve . I can't remember the amount of valves , but it was a week of cold wet shitty work , and hoping that the outer doors had not leaked and were still in place , doors were removed after valves lubed , Divers went down when the crew arrived . I did have a life line and in that line was comms .CE and i spent a few weeks getting the ARD up in the dark 24hrs a day frozen north . The DEW line was the closest hot food,and they didn't deliver !! Sloth Worst job I've ever done !!
When I was 19 and living on the Cape, I would ride around in an RV going from liquor store to liquor store trying to buy alcohol. The legal age was 21. Those RV people were really strange but they paid cash.
