A Meme! Holy YAY!

A while a go Maria posted a mammoth meme that had to come out in a couple of parts. Now, I'm going to bust it up even further. Thirty questions? I haven't got the stamina to answer thirty questions
in one sitting? No way can I sqeeze out anywhere near that in one sitting, especially when for some answers I seem to be prone to a form of literary elephantosis.

So here we go. Maybe five a sitting? I'd say five a day, but that would mean giving up the snooze button time religiously. I can't commit to that with any certainty since the cold snap of the last week.

1) ONE OF YOUR SCARS. HOW DID YOU GET IT?

I have a scar on my head. It's this lumpy raised line that will never (as far as I know) go down. It feels funny when I scratch at it, which is often. The story...

I'd been seconded to do a quick pressure job for my absolute favourite of all superintendents, a gruff loud man by the name of Mick. He would grab you, march you to several points that he wanted cleaned up (that all look identical) and fuck off and leave you to it before you could even ask a question. If you cleaned the wrong area you got yelled at. He was a fantastic man who kept you on your toes by the minute.

Anyway, I found myself cleaning a few places in greasy crawlspaces on a time limit. Because there was nobody but me left after he dictated the job and fucked off, I took the rare liberty of taking my hardhat off while I crawled in and worked. I finished, crawled back out, and stood up too early - before the incline of the roof was actually high enough to stand up under. Consequently, I stood up under a set of grease injectors which have adjustment tabs and buried about a centimetre of one into my head.

Fuck that hurt I thought. Dickhead. I touched my head to feel if there was a bump and instead there was blood. Fuck. Fuckitty FUCK. First thing, I went for the bag of rags I'd been dragging around with me and plucked one out. I pressed it onto that patch on my head and then had a look. It came back red. Not just a little. A big, big patch of red.

It's okay I thought. Head wounds bleed far more than others. I'll go get a second opinion.

With that thought I made my move toward the exit out of the belly of the huge machine I was in, off to search for my supervisor at the time, and also my best mate. Cath'll look after it. She'll tell me I'm a dickhead and it's all fine. Head wounds just bleed a hell of alot, that's all..

So I'm on my way out around this big circular area, and who turns up? You guessed it. Mick. Fuck. He'll blow his brain at me. There he is, coming into my area of work, yelling out for me at the top of his lungs to see if the job is done. I leave the blood soaked rag on my head and whack my helmet over it to cover up the evidence. He checks my work, I breathe a releived thanks, Mick and hightail it the fuck out of there to find Cath.

Cath is having lunch in our work truck. I peel off my helmet and rag combination and tell her to look. She's a mother and a horserider. She's been there for all sorts of injuries. She pries my skull and pokes a bit before she turns to one of the other guys and says it's bad. Go get Mick. Oh, shame.

After that it was decided that I should go to the mine First Aid room. These guys rarely have any fun. They have to be there on call all day and all night, have all the training in the world, but really not much actually goes wrong. So when a case like mine comes in they pull out all the stops. I arrived with a rag on my head and walked out with a full under the chin and a few hundred times around bandage. They have remembered my face for the last few years (primarily, I think) because I made them take photos on my phone for me of just how ridiculous their over the top bandaging effort actually was. We laughed a lot despite the situation.

Next came the trip to Singleton hospital to get stitches. It's a reasonably large town, surrounded by industry and mining, with coal and money spewing out of every orifice. Yet this hospital reminds me of the one that was near the tiny little town I grew up in. It was small and pretty backward. The nurse unwrapped my ridiculously bandaged head. She poked around. She remarked that it would need stitches and disappeared for a while. When she came ambling back through the door she was holding a bit of paper, not the stainless steel bowl of accessories that I expected. There was no doctor following her. Oh, that's right. The doctor had already gone home for the day.

The piece of paper she gave me was a map to the nearest doctor's surgery. In there I spent a further several hours waiting (now in the company of my unpleasant boss) before a doctor pried open my already well clotted and dried wound. He put a stitch in and left me to it. The unpleasant boss stood by while I paid for the whole procedure.

Singleton Hospital? I mean, thank fuck a piece of machinery didn't fall on me. Thank fuck my hand wasn't severed. Who knows what the idea there would be? Here's a map to the nearest metal shop. They'll cut it off in the press for you.

2...

No way. I've written enough for today. That'll do.

Early Morning Wash Job

For work yesterday the Roster Gods granted me the pleasure of having to do a 4am Excavator wash. It's been ages since I've been rostered on to do one of those – I tend to get stuck elsewhere doing other things and miss out on all the fun.

And it is fun.

Alright, you get shit all over you. It's freezing at this time of year and you're pressure blasting with water – which means that you will be standing outside in a long sleeved shirt with two jackets over the top, two bright white sperm suits over that, both of their little white hoods up over your beanie adorned head and a hardhat on top. Looking like a slow moving marshmallow. And you will still be freezing. After three hours solid of pressure blasting, you will also be saturated even through all those layers.

But...

You're using a gun with 4000psi behind it. They're easy to hold when you're used to them, but there's still a kick that will send a beginner backwards. You get up there in the dark and carve away at the grease and mud covering this huge machine and work your way toward the dawn.

I had chunks of mud an inch thick and the size of a man's shoe blasting off the top of this machine in the path of my water gun. All around me there was destruction caused by me, and only me. Oh, therapy. It was brilliant. After the destruction and debris is blasted off the side and into the dark the machine emerges as clean, shiny, and - of course – overwhelmingly orange.

Somewhere near the end of all this comes the other bonus of the shift... Dawn. I love seeing the sky change shade by shade as I'm working. It comes as a surprise every time. I look up from my destructive path for a second and realise There's a tinge of blue to go with those stars now and it makes me smile. It carries with it this indescribable burst of energy and wonderment mixed together. It's exciting. It gives me this wonderful feeling of awe at the way the world works.

It also means I can see any bits I've missed before we hand the machine back to the service crew.

It's crap, it's dirty, it's freezing, and it has the remarkable property of reminding me that it's great to be alive.

To My Co-Workers:

Heading off to work to:

Well, to install some insulation...

But my real aim for the day is to keep a tally of how many lame Hey Vic, haven't seen you since last year! comments I can get.

Scumbag Phraseology

There are a few main phrases to be aware of as a Scumbag.

That’s What She Said - This can be used at any time as an interjection to a conversation. A show-stopping statement.

Vic (talking about a grease buildup) : Holy shit it’s hard.
Anonymous Scumbag: Yeah, that’s what she said.

I Fucked Me Back Ay - Often accompanied with hobbling actions, this is based on a worker who did not last very long at all in Scumbag Industries. A Dead Set Unit, who spent a night shift playing on some over-exaggerated injuries. Basically the guy got the site safety officer at the time involved and sent my stress levels through the roof in a few short seconds. The other guys picked up on this phrase and started using it to make me laugh about the entire episode.

From there it became a way of breaking the silence. The guy has long since been shuffled off, and I’m not sure whether half the workers really know the origin of the phrase. It’s just something we say to break the tension now.

Wanna hat? - [Why? ‘Cause you’re a cock]. There are lens cleaner wipes out where we Scumbags go, that are in little individual packets with the brand Uvex upon them. Somewhere along the lines a bored imagination took hold of this and ran, twisting them into a brand of condom. Usually the phrase Wanna hat? is accompanied with the action of reaching into the top pocket to fish one of these out and attempting to hand it to the person receiving the comment. Why? ‘Cause you’re a cock is most often implied in the statement and not needed to be said. Unless the person is a Dead Set Unit.

Watch this fuckin’ idiot - One from the self-proclaimed King Scumbag, this must be stated with rising volume and pitch. Out of respect one of his phrases has been appropriated into general usage. Originally to warn of an approaching idiot driver, the usage has broadened to include general workplace hazards as well.

What have you done for me lately? - This is what happens when a bunch of Scumbags get together socially. Out comes Eddie Murphy doing stand-up comedy with Raw, and we all have a new phrase to play with. This one is so new it’s guaranteed to almost make me wet myself laughing, or at least reduce me to tears.

Scumbag Lingo

It’s about time I introduced the world to some of the Scumbag lingo. We have our own way of speaking, derived by spending far too many hours together in sometimes extreme, other times extremely boring, and most often isolated conditions.

Scumbag - One who has earned the title through being a good worker and good person. This title is not just bestowed upon any old person who rocks up for a shift. You can depend upon a scumbag, you can have a laugh and you will look after each other no matter what.

Deadset, or, for more emphasis, Dead Set - Serious, absolutely true. For example: Dead Set, I fell over a rock with every bastard watching me. Another example can be displayed in the following conversation:
Vic: Deadset mate, he’s a fuckin’ idiot.
Anonymous Scumbag: Deadset?
Vic: Dead Set.

Translation:
Vic: Seriously, he’s an idiot.
Anonymous Scumbag: You’re serious?
Vic: Absolutely.

Unit - A worker who is most definitely not a Scumbag. This may apply for a small period of time, in humour, to a Scumbag who has done something idiotic. This may be phrased Dead Set you’re a fuckin’ unit, mate. A deadset unit.

Most often the term unit is used to describe those with little to no aptitude. They could be dumb, oblivious, dangerous or just downright lazy.

Festy Cheese Beanie - The worst of the worst. This term applies only to the opposition. It literally translates to “foreskin” and this translation has been described in great detail within earshot of the offending crew members, without their knowledge that this is actually how we refer to them. The Festy Cheese Beanies are inferior workers, with inferior knowledge and equipment. They have amazing amount of distaste bestowed upon them by the Scumbags.

Mad - Excellent, amazing, deadset awesome. Example: I found this Mad new way do the job.

Goggle Box - The fluttering of the eyelids upon a woman’s clitoris. This is a hypothetical sexual manoeuvre invented on a boring day, laughing at this term inscripted on a wash pad storage box. ”Check out her eyelashes! Vic, I bet she could give you a mad goggle box!”

Quote of the Day

Again, to Scumbag Queen, The Mole.

Aww cheese. Yum. I love cheese. It’s my favourite of all yellow foods.

Scumbag Muffins

A while back, the Scumbags were working 24/7 on a machine. This doesn’t normally happen, unless one is getting pulled apart for repair – a shutdown. Usually an engineering company gets pulled in to run the repairs and it goes full stick for about a month, maybe more. You get to know the people from the other companies because you’re all there day after day, night after night.

I was on night shift supervision the entire time. Four nights on, one off. As it happened, one night I was working away on a particularly tough job, right in front of the engineering foreman’s office. It’s never a place you want to have to work, because that area also houses the site safety supervisor and all other sorts of demons. This particular night, though, the engineering foreman wandered over near me, fiddled about with a tool and some air lines for a while and then came right over.

He’d hooked up something to make my job ten times easier. It was an air chisel – a cylindrical vibrating barrel that he told me with a grin not to get too excited about.

I handed it back at the end of the shift and thanked him. You owe me one he said, with a grin.

Shit. That was a priority job that I never would have finished before morning if it wasn’t for that tool. I think this means I’ll have to get in the kitchen. By the time I get home from this site I’ll get four hours sleep, get up and bake and come back to work. It has to be something quick and easy. Muffins!!.

It was a winner. I pulled the Scumbag crew up for a break around 11pm and the engineering foreman came over to tell me he’d already had four breaks just to have a muffin. They became a hit where I brought in trays (actually cooked by my flatmate instead) for pretty much the entire work site to get into.

Since then I’ve laid pretty low on the muffins. Last week, though, I decided to bake a whole bunch in my new sexy kitchen. I was up at three in the morning and baked enough for pretty much every worker in my company to get one. Plus a few left over to butter up the foremen at the site I’m working on currently.

Later that morning I clocked on at the work site and scuttled off to fill my travel mug with the first coffee of the day. While sipping away, I walked past the safety supervisor’s office. He’s a lovely, generous, loud guy who happens to be able to see a lot of the indoor activity from his office. Vic! he yells out. You shouldn’t need a coffee this early! You haven’t even started yet! I pulled up a section of his doorway and explained the muffin project. Turns out he fancies himself a bit of a cook, and has spent more on his kitchen than it cost to build the house. We challenged each other to a bake-off. Specifically muffins.

Two days later, doing the same travel mug filling run, he spotted me. The corridors are a hive of activity at that time of morning. There’s blokes everywhere getting work orders and paperwork signed, getting coffee and getting ready for a day in the field. Mr. Safety Man yells out to me through all this:

Oy VIC! When are we going to have our Muff-Off?

Quote of the Day

...goes to Scumbag worker The Mole.

”It’s more useful than a cucumber in a women’s prison.”

How to Clean Up Minor Grease & Oil Spills

Preparation time: 10 minutes, and two cigarettes.
Serves: At least six hours of continual work in various areas around a machine.

Ingredients:
2 cheap plastic buckets (1 without handle)
1 plastic bag
1 bag rags
1 scraper
1 pair incredibly cheap crappy leather gloves
1 pair degreasing gloves
1 sperm suit
degreaser

Method
1. While smoking first cigarette, prepare buckets. Insert plastic bag into bucket without handle and roll the edges under, so that the bag acts as a liner for the bucket. Put degreasing gloves and scraper in this prepared bucket. Pour degreaser into the other bucket with handle.

2. Finish cigarette, put on sperm suit and incredibly cheap crappy leather gloves. Stand, have conversation, and light second cigarette. Walk to machine.

3. Finish second cigarette and locate nearest spill within machine. Scrape excess spill with scraper and place bulk in lined bucket. Once excess is removed, take off incredibly cheap crappy leather gloves and replace with degreasing gloves.

4. Take one small rag, dunk it in degreaser and wring out the excess. Make sure this is done over the bucket so as to not make any more mess and conserve degreaser. Wipe over the spill area.
*Do not place used degreasing rag back in degreaser bucket. You can use this rag multiple times before it loses effectiveness on spills, at which point it should be discarded. A common mistake is to place the rag back into the degreaser and reuse it. This will only turn nice, clean degreaser into oily black slop.

5. Replace degreasing gloves with incredibly cheap leather gloves and dry area with clean, dry rag, leaving no streaks.

6. Take cigarette breaks as required.

7. Repeat degreasing/drying process if necessary, before moving on to find more spills.

IT’S NOT THAT HARD.

Hit, or Not Hit

Do you already know the latest stats joke?
Probably...

Three statisticians go hunting. When they see a rabbit, the first one shoots, missing it on the left. The second one shoots and misses it on the right.
The third one shouts: "We've hit it!"

Okay. So there's a bit of a point to all this. I was at Scumbag Headquarters (aka The Yard) the other day, wasting time as is the norm when you're on shift in The Yard. The resident old fart mechanic turned turned around at one point not realising I was behind him. He made a point of saying sorry to me.

What for? says Vic.

Well, I almost touched your breast when I swung around there.

Oh. I don't see my tits as a sexual thing at all. There annoying lumps of fat I'd rather do without. The guys just don't seem to be able to comprehend that though. So I come back with:

You know what the difference between almost touching a breast and being a fucking mile away is, don't you?

No? He says.

And to that I replied: Absolutely none. Whether you're a mile away or an inch away you still haven't touched, so who gives a fuck?

The Scumbags find Pebbles

Pebbles?
No, not of the small stone variety.
Of the large, decaying variety.

For some reason one of our scumbag teams was sent out to pressure clean a machine part - the crowd rack, or "sticks", which is the bit that the bucket is attached to - on Pebbles. We spent an hour sitting around waiting at the workshop for directions because nobody was sure where the hell it actually was. Finally, somebody who had been around for a while recalled where Pebbles was stashed. As it turned out she was over in a nicely deserted and overgrown back corner of the mine.



See? There's her name right up there above the driver's cab.

Three scumbags, a beautiful day, and a bunch of stuff that had been dumped. How much better can it get?



Exactly as the writing on the track frame says. What now?

There's another old shovel sitting around at a mine we go to. A while back I asked around about it. What's it sitting around there for? Parts? Scrap? Turns out the thing has been there for years and isn't able to be butchered for parts. To scrap it will cost too much. So... it just sits there gathering rust and mud. I guess eventually it'll become part of a hill.

At least Pebbles gets to watch the grass grow where she lies.

Welcome to Scumbag Industries

Work has been my social outlet for a long time now. The roster varies from day to day, and so does the work. Crews of varying number get sent out all the time, so it's almost pot luck who you end up with. Some weeks you'll spend sixteen hours a day with the same four people. Other weeks you'll turn up for work excited because you're rostered on with somebody you haven't seen for a month.

We call each other scumbags. It's been known to be yelled from truck windows to fellow workers. It's been known to be yelled on the street. It's our form of greeting. A term of endearment. We spend hours rammed into a truck like sardines to get too and from the mine sites. We drag our sorry arses into the yard at 4am to get ready for the day, where the conversation is thin and sleepy. We crawl into spaces that you can't even sit up in and scrape out bag after bag of grease and dirt and dinosaur shit. We share a beer on the way home, rammed into that four-wheel sardine can, sweaty, filthy and giving each other shit all the way.

A scumbag will liberate anything that is apparently "forgotten". I have a toolbag that I've only bought one item for. Everything else in there has been liberated. Relocated. Rehoused. Even the bag itself. That bag is my scumbag pride and joy. You want a tool for the job? I've more than likely got it. And if not? Well... I'll probably have it by the end of the day. Scumbag.