Productive

I've spent the past couple days working the finalization of a project. I'd spend a lot time on one line item, only to discover that I had to make up a conversion factor to balance the equation. It doesn't make sense at all, but it's acceptable. I'd go looking through all the supporting documents to make sense of it all, but it was pointless. My partner take care of the majority of the work.

Since my partner is taking the next two days off, I figured I should try to get as much work done as possible. But it's snowing hard, so all the technician were put on snow plow duty along with maintenance. There isn't that many people left in the office, so I'm severely lacking in motivation. I've basically been renaming and organizing my mp3 collection. This is something I've been wanting to do for a while, but haven't been able to without admin access to rewrite files on my external HD. I would use wikipedia for track listing, then I'll go on tangents to fill my head with trivia.

Besides labeling, I helped decorate the office xmas tree. Our administrative assistant and senior was decorating the whole office. I'm personally not a fan of decorations, mainly because I'm lazy. This is probably the first time I've decorated a xmas tree in 10 years

Admin

I finally got admin rights on my own computer. I finally found a problem that required me to have access. It took forever for our computer to realize what the problem. I knew immediately what it was, but he always ignores what I say. It took several calls to the district office for them to finally tell them that I need to be added to the admin list. I'm guessing that my explanations were all gibberish to him. There's a java-based database program that we use, and it requires write access to a text file. The program won't run if it can't log the time and date to this text file. I actually found a way around it by making a copy of the whole folder, but I didn't tell them that because I wanted access. Because of my limited access, I couldn't even write to my external drive. Now I can start installing things and I can bring this laptop with me instead of my desktop when I go to rotation.

Early

I thought there was another 7:30am pour this morning, so I came in early. I actually came in 10 minutes early, because I needed to fill my truck up with gas. I actually got to the plant before the batchman did. When he arrived he asked what was I doing there, and that there wasn't a pour until 9am. So returned back to the office, and the regular plant guy was back from vacation, so he took care of the pours.

I didn't do anything until 1pm, when we had an office meeting. Basically laid out the plans for the winter. He paired us up to final out some projects. Usually some senior employee that has worked on the project and someone to assist him. I get paired up with the other engineer on a LPA (local planning administration)project, which is something that no one in office work on, except for the previous LPA coordinator who retired several months ago. Plus neither one of us has ever finaled out a project. I have no idea where to even start. So we confronted our boss about this, because we will need help. He said that he thought it might be a problem since both of us are inexperienced, but he still paired us up. He thought it would work out somehow. The other engineer said that we're not a team like the others, we're two people stuck in a hell hole.

Something else that came from the meeting was the start of flex time. Everyone seems to prefer to start earlier and get off earlier. I opted for the 8:30am-5:00pm with a 30 minute lunch. I'm used to getting off at 5pm, and its what time my friends get off. Plus I would rather get an extra 30 minutes of sleep in the morning.

We also got a new employee today. He just transfered over from the north shop. Been working here for about 3 years. He's actually my age, but he already married and I think has a child. I met him on a prject once, and talked for a while, he's an alright guy. He even has the same headphones as I do.

napping

I'm enjoying coming into work at 6:30am to work in the concrete plant. There are long breaks in-between trucks, so for the first 2 hours, I nap there. Then when I'm good and rested, I play FFTA until about noon which is when they're done. I go home for lunch, then come back to the office at 1pm and kill 2.5 hours until it's quitting time.

Mistake

Today I had to come in at 6:30am to batch some concrete. There was supposed to be 3 pours, 7:30am, 9:30am, and 12:30pm. Right after we batched the 7:30am one, the batch man said it appeared that the other two pours were canceled. I waiting about 15 minutes then I called the inspector out on the job to confirm it. So by 8am, I was already done with work, and the office wouldn’t expect me back until after 1pm. I decided that I would go home to take a nap and play some Guitar Hero II. On the way home I had a lapse in judgment and decided to head back to the office. I was still mulling over my decision, and by the time I decided to go home again, I was too close to the office to turn around. I thought about the consequences, and there were none, plus in the office I just ended up sitting there. The only person that could have found out about the cancellation was boss. When I got back to the office, I found out that he had taken the day off. I almost turned around right there to go home. I sat in the office for 4 hours wishing I had gone home.

Since the batch plant is halfway between the office and my home, I was planning on going home for lunch, so I didn’t bring my lunch with me. I decided to go out and eat with a couple of friends. I took a nice long 2 hour lunch to make up for my missed opportunity to nap. The only benefit of coming into work at 6:30am is that I can leave at 3:30pm. I have to come in at 6:30am tomorrow too, but that all overtime. So as soon they’re done pouring concrete, I’m gone.

I'm back

I'm back from HQ in capitol to do my normal job, nothing. Other than my employee evaluation that I get every 3 months for some reason, I didn't do anything. Actually I got my schedule for my Certified Inspection Training. I'll be taking 9 different classes for 14 days over the course of 6 week starting mid-January. So I were to go back to HQ for the rest of my rotation it'll be in March, which is getting close to construction season. If Wichita was such a better place to live than Topeka, and if I had some more friends there, I would definitely transfer to HQ. Though if I stay with KDOT long enough I will eventually have to move there if I want to move up in the ranks. Something I'll have to consider once I get my professional license.

We're supposed to get the 10th off for Veteran's Day, but the county is still working, so they need someone to batch concrete. Since our normal batch guy is going on vacation starting on the 9th, I get to work. I don't mind working it, because it'll be overtime, and I'll be spending the whole time playing FFTA. I'll be the main batch guy until he returns on the 17th. So hopefully I can finally beat FFTA and get start on FFIII that comes out next week.