Trucks come, Trucks go

So after a couple of weeks, we are ending this Frac Job and have just been notified by the "Company Man" that we will be retained for the next job.  I am finishing a long night of countless sand trucks in and out.  Really this has not been all that unpleasant and is the rythm that Lisa and I set up.  She functions best during the day, and myself, well I am a night owl. Tonight the temperature is in the low forties with a brisk North wind and I am very grateful for the Catalytic heater this trailer came equipped with since we tend to leave the door open for access purposes Even though there are several trucks an hour to check in, there is also quite of bit of time for reflection.  Tonight I am thinking how we have dodged the bullet so to speak on the serious weather that has come through here lately.  I talked about Corrizzo Springs last week receiving a foot of rain.  Had we been paid in a more timely manner we probably would have been there instead of here.

But it was this monster that we got lucky with


I took a picture of the television screen in our trailer fully expecting that we would receive some of the storm, if not all of it.  My expectation was not what it turned out to be.  This storm flooded out many people in both Austin and San Antonio  and caused several deaths. We were fortunate in that I wound up watching from some twenty to thirty miles away.  Unbelievably we did not get a drop that night. 

Something else I did not realize about this business is the transient nature.  We have been here only a week.  Apparently enough time to complete a twenty stage Frac.  Tack a day or two on each end to bring in and set up equipment and then take it down and done.  We are either released or moved to another location.  I am also amazed that almost to a man, folks that work in this business can be found working at any hour day or night.  Certainly not unusual to be talking to someone at 3:30 AM, when the last time you saw him was sometime yesterday afternoon.   Then I realized the same could be said about me.

Of course if I had my druthers!

I have discovered a few filters and if the cars were not so noticeably modern, this pic could have been out of the fifties.  Speaking of, though I would be considerably older, I suspect Port Aransas would have been a great place back then.

I have to confess I do not know what kind of birds these are.  I think some kind of Crane.  The reason I am including this pic is because when I first seen them this morning, I was convinced because of their size that they were some kind of large flightless bird.  like an Ostrich.  They really look that big.  This is telephoto from about a third, to half mile away.

For much of my life, I have realized that there exist those whose artistic talents far exceed even what I could appreciate.  However, I have always been one who could appreciate someone else's.  Chris Hopkins, a one time drinking buddy, and excellent human being along with his lovely wife Jan long before he became famous used to show me his stuff.  Course back in the day he was way in to Hobbits and stuff. (I figure he also owes me for a dislocated shoulder for failing to tell me how good a wrestler he was). This is a copyright problem so nobody tell him Okay.  But wow.  Though I haven't seen him in over thirty years he is one of those guys I feel privileged to have known. Would have been interesting to go back in time and share an Absinthe with Van Gogh right? My buddy Jeff who claims to read this blog will know what I am talking about right bud?






And



My final thought tonight in between darting in and out of the cold letting the tanker trucks through the gate,  is that in 7 more months I will have the good fortune to turn sixty.  Pretty big milestone right?  And I realized these past few months that in all of those years most of the way I made my living was by working at night (remember "Night Owl" )getting home at two or three in the morning.  Consequently, I rarely watched a Sunrise.  A Sunrise is different by far from a Sunset.  Though I appreciate every one of either I am around for, it has been the Sunrise that has fascinated me of late. It is the expectation of the day. The clear crisp air, dew or frost, birdsong, coffee taste and smell and a hundred other things realized through the senses that I have not been familiar with most of my life that thoroughly enhance the beauty of the rising sun.  Leastways since I was sixteen and getting up early to move sprinkler pipe.  And finally I am thankful that every day I get to experience these things with Lisa, the love of my life.  Yup. Life at times has it's drawbacks.  But for now, It'll do.