Back to the Salt Mines

Or Gold mines as it were. I am heading back to the seventh circle of hell. In lieu of a serious industrial accident I will be gone for 20 days from the face of civilization as you know it. No newspaper, no internet, no phones, for a news junkie like me you have no idea how hard this is. If I do get injured (god forbid, maybe) sue, sue sue, I have been ill equipped, ill advised and non trained. Make em show you the money. So when you get down on your knees tonight and thank the Lord for his guiding light pray I'll turn out right thank god for kids.

Lisa

What is the hardest thing about going away for 20 days? Leaving my wife. Pretty, nice, sweet and very nice to sleep with. I missed her very much on my last hitch and will even more this time. When things are at there very worst in the shithole of mine camp Nevada thoughts of her brought me through. I love ya baby.

Inconvenient?

I finally watched the famous documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" (HBO) Not bad, some very disputable science involved but it had some great points. Al Gore himself is a bit of a vindictive host, a major portion is related to his gut wrenching loss to George Bush. Gore is a bit of a enigma, I remember liking him as a presidential candidate back in the late 80s . I think he genuinely cares about the environment but he also loves his pseudo celebrity status as well. Is the planet doomed with CO emissions? maybe, probably, might be a minor footnote to a nuclear winter. I do believe this, no matter what the USA does it will be negated by the human swarms in India and China. Nobody cares about CO2 emissions when they are hungry.
I don't like to be cynical about the enviortment but that is hard to do. Even this shit job I currently have is evidence of a civilization gone bad. Gold prices have sent the economies in Nevada into a tizzy. 600, 700 maybe 800 an ounce? Boom time. Little shit towns like Elko, Winnemuca and Battle Mountain are flush with money and specultation. Of course the gold isn't in found in nuggets in pituresque streams, it is in the ground, small veins or maybe not even noticeable to the naked eye. So they process millions of tons of ore, using cyanide to leach the gold from the earth.
Think your immune from the orgy? Do you have any gold yourself? chains, rings, coins, investments. The pretty little ring on your gal's finger. Yea, all guilty.
I have been watching the core samples being drilled from 1200' in Tonkin Springs Nevada, yea there is gold. The price is going up. Get ya some. The Earth weeps.

Internet Boosheet

See my post on Lincoln? apparently he never said that. Don't believe anything you read. There is a lot of information out there, some good, some bad.

10 Days

My 10 days off is going by much faster than the days in Tonkin Springs Hellvada. I will be heading back for at least one more hitch there. Hopefully it will be the last, I told them I wasn't a fan of the camp there. When I was packing to leave for the first time mom was up here, she came for a visit and to see Bryant in the play 'The Importance of Being Earnest' Bry was awesome as a snooty Englishman. The play was good and I saw the first two nights but had to miss the third night to pack. I wasn't sure what I needed for 20 days of work and didn't know if I could do laundry or where I was going for that matter. So I packed more clothes than I needed and left stuff that I should have taken, learning curve the first time. After the play was over I had everything laid out on my bed and was starting to pack it up. Mom came in and sat down and started making pithy comments that were not helpful. I was going away for a long time and was stressed out a bit. She came up with one liners like 'Don't you wish you had got your college degree?' or "I bet you wish you hadn't quit your propane job" Another gem was "Well maybe you can loose some weight" She offered this advice " Look at this as a grand adventure" Oh it was an adventure all right just not a grand one.
When I was working the 12 hour night shift there I would sometimes drive a water truck up on top of a mountain there where I would dump loads of water into some tailing ponds. It took about an hour for it to drain out and I would shut off the truck and lay on my back on top of the tank and look at the stars. The night sky was incredible, no moon, clear as a bell. I haven't seen the stars like that for a long time. Orion was prominent in the night sky and I was able to pick out many constellations, it was very peaceful and the cool nights of the high Nevada deserts were quite beautiful. On that shift I saw the sunset and the sunrise. It was tough at times and by the 7th night I got kinda tired, hit the wall so to speak. But I survived it, me and Orion.

Abe Speaks

Take Note: Name Change

Hell has been renamed it will now be known as Tonkin Springs Nevada. I just spent 14 days there in a mine camp isolated from society and working my bag ass off. The work was long and hard (12 hours shifts everyday, the last 10 at night) but that was the easy part of it. We lived in trailers with no running water except for the 'main' single wide that everyone used for the kitchen and bathroom. It was the most disgusting abode I have ever seen. Take a crew of ten drillers and helpers and turn them loose on one bathroom and you will see the depths of humane depravity. The other trailers were new 28 foot camp trailers which would be nice if you had the family out for a nice camping trip, instead take 3 grown men with all of their gear and food for 20 days and it is way too small for anything. Despite reports that there was satellite tv, internet and phone it turned out that none of these were available. Cell phones didn't work unless you had a booster antenna and drove to the top of the mountain and then maybe you could get a signal. The boosters were 300 bucks and of course not available unless you could get to town which was not possible unless you had a vehicle. The closest town was Carlin about an hour and a half away. The crew was an assortment of losers, assholes and meth addicts just a delightful bunch to work, sleep, eat and live with 24 hours a day. Luckily I have mellowed out since I got home and I am totally sugar coating this whole thing. More later.

Winnemucca and Me

The real estate career is now on hiatus. Due to fiscal constraints, karma and bad attitudes I have been forced to accept employment with a drilling company. This company drills core samples in solid rock for customers all over the west. Their customer list includes mining companies, contractors and goverment agencies. Because I have a commercial drivers license I will be driving a Kenworth with a drill rig on it to the cultural epicenter of Winnemucca Nevada. My what a dream come true this will be. I have checked out the official town website for current events and found this . After I am there I will be assisting the drilling crews and engaging in some of the worst manual labor that still exists in the world today and working 12 hour shifts for 20 straight days with half of them being night shift. A quick check of the weather there revealed that despite being a godforsaken colorless, treeless desert it is just as cold there as it is here in North Idaho. Super. I don't believe my room at the Valu In has internet service so any report from me may well be never. Ohhhh shit.