To Suffer or Not to Suffer -- Mon., July 2

One does not love a place the less for having suffered in it, unless it has been all suffering, nothing but suffering.

                                                            ~Jane Austen, novelist (1775-1817)

With two days behind us out of the oil fields, here are our perspectives/opinions on our gate guarding experience. 

Even though we suffered some, it was not all suffering. To describe it accurately, I would use the words adventurous, on-the-edge, different, hot, buggy, beautiful (sunsets, exotic animals, birds), available 24/7, disruptive, preoccupying, monopolizing, confining, but not boring. (Bob would say it was boring.)

Sure there was some suffering which included: H2S gas; heat; bug bites; bugs, mud and dust in the RV; blowing dust; remote location; flooding and gooey, slippery mud when it rained hard; company-provided generator problems; sand in the water; poor cell phone and internet connections; hard to get in exercise; no TV; feeling imprisoned (we couldn't leave to go anywhere TOGETHER unless we found someone to watch our gate--in two months it happened once).

Positives include: becoming part of a wonderful network of other gate guards (friends), bird watching, beautiful sunsets, no cost for site/water/electric/black water pump out, pays well for the amount of work you do, the oil field workers (for the most part) are polite and friendly, exceptional lightning storms, time to read, blog, watch DVDs, play games, your RV is your workplace (no commute). Did I mention making good friends and having their backs? Oh, and we didn't have any animals on the ranch so we didn't have to open and close the gate all the time.

Would we do it again? Yes. Would we do it differently? Probably. We'd make some requests about the type of gate we'd be guarding.

Welcome to new followers: The Back Porch View, Vicky at Full-Time RVing, Merikay at Merikay's Dream has Six Wheels, Mike at Mike and Pat's Travels, and Kittie at Kittie Howard. I started this blog to keep family and friends informed of our whereabouts AND to remember all the things we've seen, done, thought, experienced so we don't forget as we age. Now I have 55 followers who enjoy reading about our life. Thank you for journeying with us.

The requisite cat pics. Stop reading here if you don't like cat pics.

Remember...

There's always time for a catnap!

Breathe deep. (Look at them choppers!)

Keep yourself clean.

You can never be too clean. (Ha ha.)

Enjoy your week. 

Travel Bug out.

To Hell and Back -- Tues., June 26

Cotulla and Laredo, Texas:

Gate guarding is not all birds, antelope, flowers and rainbows. Here's a little of what the dark side looks like.

This morning I woke up to the smell of sulfur (H2S gas). I had a meltdown. Started crying and couldn't stop. For the past four to five days the wind has been blowing smelly gases from the work pad directly to our RV. The gas is heavier than air so it comes down off the pad to our RV which sits lower than the pad. Bob and I both have sore throats and stinging eyes. I wonder what it's doing to our long-term health.

Between the 100+ degree temperatures, the smell, and rarely getting away, I told Bob when he found me crying, "This is my vision of what hell is." I feel like there's no escape. That was about 10:00 a.m. I couldn't go back to sleep so I read until I fell asleep. Woke up at 1:00 p.m. The temperature outside was 102. Our refrigerator is still not cold and then the water pump on our company-provided generator trailer stopped working. It was all too much for me today.

Bob, bless his heart, could tell I was not a happy camper. He suggested I take a trip into San Antonio or Laredo to get away for a day. I was hesitant because our gate has become busier and I didn't want to leave him with part of my shift. He insisted. 

Once I got to thinking about it, my excitement level ramped up and my mood changed. I checked out movie theaters and times in San Antonio and Laredo. Laredo is a bit closer so I chose "Marvel's The Avengers" or "Men in Black 3." I was more interested in "The Avengers" but the timing of the movie didn't work out by the time I shook my booty into gear.

The drive to the movie theater in Laredo took about one hour and ten minutes from our gate. I made it in time for "Men in Black 3." When I bought my ticket, the guy at the counter said his friends thought MIB 3 was the best of the series. 

I hadn't had lunch, so I hit the snack stand and purchased Nestle's Buncha Crunch and a small root beer to abate and assuage my growly tummy until after the movie.

"Men in Black 3" was okay and had a touching ending, but no way, no how was it better than the first MIB! Clever scenes and lots of special effects made MIB 3 interesting, but the humor in the original MIB won hands down over this.

After the movie, in rapid succession, I spent money at Walmart, Target, a gas station (I bought gas for $3.11/gallon; saw it even cheaper at $3.07/gallon), and Subway. I didn't take time to get my car washed and vacuumed, but I know where a car wash is next time I (or we) go to Laredo. Overall, I found Laredo to be a nice town.

Tomorrow, Bob is going to Dairy Queen for lunch with the Gate Guard Guys. The wives/significant others thought it only fair that the men have good conversation and good food. So Bob will have his little get away. On Friday Bob is going to San Antonio for a Costco run. (Hopefully our refrigerator is repaired before then.)

Here's another thought for anyone thinking of gate guarding: Be sure you plan alone time. Two people spending so much time together in a confined space, makes it easy to get on each other's nerves.

Sure we love our spouses. As Bob says, on this job we're joined at the hip everywhere except bed. Being on duty 24/7, with each of us on a 12 hour shift, there's not much time for intimacy. It's come down to: be quick, be creative or miss out.

When I headed out of Laredo this evening, a huge thunderstorm glowered (origin of glower means "to be overcast") to the west. Added to that, the setting red-orb-of-a-sun made for a dramatic sunset. Didn't have my camera. The red sun had a few clouds in front of it. The clouds had a red lining from the sun behind them, PLUS streaming rain pulled down the clouds in dark gray wisps in front of the brilliant red sun. Very beautiful and dramatic.

About 15 miles out of Laredo on I-35 north, I saw a sign for a rest area and visitor information center. Since I was in need of the facilities, I pulled over. OMG! I thought I was headed for a fancy motel. The information center is a beautiful adobe building with a dome and lushly landscaped grounds complete with ponds, birds, pampas grass, trees, and a beautiful sculpture of Texas. (You can sure tell my mood has changed...we're back to birds, sunsets and landscapes.) Unfortunately the visitor center closed at 5:00 p.m., but the restrooms were open and clean. Whew.

The journey home went by fast with massive lightning flashes (in the distance) as entertainment. After I got back to the 5er, I continued to watch the lightning out of the dining room picture window. Flashes streamed from clouds to ground in big bolts. Other lightning flashed across the whole sky making intricate electrical abstract art. 

Throughout all the arcing, flashing and bolting, I hoped for rain to clean our vehicles, cool the air and tame the dust. No such luck. We received a few drops that made individual indents in the caliche dust, but no relief from the searing temperatures. As one of the truckers who came in tonight said, "We got 100 drops of rain."

At Kit and Jerry's site six miles down the road, their outdoor thermometer measured 111 degrees today. The oil rig crew on their site measured the temperature at 115. I wonder how hot hell is (if there is an actual hell).

My belief is we create our own heaven and hell in our mind and if we look at things differently we can change the outcome. Thank you so much Bob for reading my mind as to what I really needed and insisting I take a break. It made all the difference in changing my day from hellish to entertaining.

Travel Bug out.

Not the Best Day Gate Guarding -- Mon., June 25

Cotulla, Texas:

The tables have turned. Bob used to have all the traffic on day shift. For the past three days/nights the night shift traffic has exceeded the day traffic. I've had many tankers coming and going to Pad B. 

Pad B ground to a halt late tonight. There is no wind so they can't fill the tankers. Three tankers that arrived earlier are camping out on the road until the wind picks up. (Update Tuesday, 1:15 a.m.: The wind must have picked up as the tankers are now loading up.)

Just found out today that Pad A goes into production tomorrow. Tonight they've been bringing in huge tanks and a big command center, tarps, and lights. Tomorrow morning Bob is going to be a busy man.

For the past four days our site has had H2S gas releases and the red flag has been up continuously. We are downwind and downhill from the releases so it comes right at us. Our throats and eyes hurt. The inside of our 5er smells horrible when we come in from outside. With no breeze, I can't open the windows to air the 5er out. What to do? What to do? This is not good.

Weather: The temperature today was 102. Our air conditioners are working hard to keep indoors 78 degrees. The next few days are supposed to be hotter.

Black water tank: We don't know what happened, but the company that is supposed to empty our black water tank every other week quit coming. The company used to come automatically. For the past two cycles we've had to call our supervisor to make sure they send someone out to empty it.

The refrigerator: Absolutely no clue what's wrong with the fridge. Bob noticed today that the food didn't seem cold. The display panel on the front had a symbol that looked like a lower case n. We looked it up in our owner's manual. The manual instructions said to turn the refrigerator off and turn it back on, which we did. It seemed to be getting colder, but when I checked it a few minutes ago only the top shelf is cold. The rest of the refrigerator is warm. The freezer, on the other hand, seems normal.  Hmmm. I'm going to try repacking and rearranging the fridge. Maybe the cold isn't circulating properly.

What was good about today, you may ask. 

1. I had enough sleep.
2. Our mail came on time from our mail forwarding service.
3. We had tostadas for dinner. Mmmmm.
4. Not very many bugs rode in on me tonight.
5. The gate kept me busy.
6. We saw sable antelope grazing at the ranch across the road.
7. The scissor-tail flycatcher is now one of the regulars at our generator bird buffet. Hopefully it will be back tomorrow and will let me take a picture. It's skittish.
8. I finished reading "One Ranger: A Memoir," by H. Joaquin Jackson. Imagine a Texas Ranger tracking killers and thieves through the Texas brush, hear the stories and history of the Texas Rangers, their code of honor, and learn about their lives and their weapons...that is what this book is all about. Bob said it's almost like reading Ann Rule true crime books. Both of us enjoyed the walk back in time to a different era.
9. Hershey's Kisses milk chocolate is melting on my tongue.
10. It's cool inside, but I already mentioned that didn't I?
11. Had fun playing with the cats.

Oh, I forgot to mention. Last night Bob got up at midnight to run/walk for two hours. He's training for the Honolulu Marathon in December. At midnight it was 92 degrees. By the time he returned at 2:00 a.m. it was 86. Ugh!

Alarm Follow-up -- Fri., June 22

Cotulla, Texas:

Yesterday morning Bob made an excellent omelette for our breakfast--two eggs, mushrooms, green peppers, avocado topped with salsa.  I love it when he cooks. 

A couple of mornings ago Bob was up on top of the 5er washing the roof. Of course when you wash a thick layer of caliche dust off the roof, you then have to wash the rest of the 5er too. It looks so much better now.

We didn't get much sleep last night with the H2S alarms. The alarms stopped sounding after an hour and a half. 

Today, we had alarms again and terrible smells in and around our RV from the gas and oil. Even though the temperature was hovering at 100 degrees, we opened up all the doors and windows and turned on overhead exhaust fans in an attempt to remove the odor. My throat was sore by the late afternoon and I don't have a cold. I asked the workers coming in if there was a problem. I was told that there was a gas release and the workers right next to the well had to wear masks, but we were far enough away not to worry. Yeah, right. For me "far enough away" is about a mile, not 500'.

Our missing Priority Mail package was at the post office today! Yay. It was mailed to our last RV park (we had checked out of the park in late April) and had been there since May 11. I'm happy our stray package found its way to us.

Today, I did our laundry in Cotulla, then met a friend for lunch at JJ's Country Store restaurant. We had Mexican food. I had a combo plate with taco, chicken enchilada, pinto beans and rice. 

On the drive home from town, five or six cows were in/on the road, escapees from one of the ranches. 

Wildlife sighting: The roadrunner continues to procure its meals from under our 5er. Joining the roadrunner, but at a different seating time, was the red cardinal. On the way into town, I saw a scissor-tailed flycatcher.

Tonight, I was checking tankers in and out. I filled 2/3rds of the log sheet.

While at the laundromat, and again tonight between checking in tankers, I read "One Ranger," a biography about a Texas Ranger. Very interesting, historic and entertaining book. I'm about 1/3 of the way through it. The book brings to life the area we're living in. Thank you to Jerry for loaning us the books.

The cats were particularly playful today. Fun to watch them!

That's all for today.

Over and out.

Nerve Wracking Alarms! -- Fri., June 22

Cotulla, Texas:

Our wells are in the flowback stage. Huge flames are shooting out of the pipe. When our site's night safety man came on duty, he told us he would watch out for us if anything happened. 

At about 1:00 a.m....alarms, more alarms. Tonight, the H2S alarm and red light keep going off on the pad by our 5er. I made Bob get dressed in street clothes in case we have to leave. It's so dark out there I can't see which way the wind socks are going. No light towers are turned on near us on the pad. A light tower way far back in one corner away from us is on and our light tower is on, but our light tower faces the gate, not the pad. I'm scared. Don't know if I'll get much sleep tonight! It's 2:15 a.m. and the alarm has been going off intermittently for over an hour.

Tonight, Bowie was disturbed by the alarms and took a ringside seat to see the action..notice flames in background.

Weird posture for a cat.

"Stop with the pictures already. And could you do something about the alarms?"

Other than that, the day was normal. Bob made a trip to the post office. We are trying to track down a package that was sent to our last RV park in early May. Bob was able to get a tracking number on the package from our mail forwarding service which may help us find it. Today is laundry day. I will check the post office again when I'm in town.

Today was cloudy and cooler with possible thunderstorms in the forecast. (We didn't get any rain or thunderstorms for that matter.)

Wildlife sightings were impressive today. Two gray cottontails were hopping around. The roadrunners have decided underneath our 5er is the big bird "bug buffet." All day, the roadrunner(s) went under our stairs, grabbed bugs then headed into the brush. Very entertaining. The mockingbirds are out again, as well as the pyrrhuloxia. Every once in a while, we see big fat lizards running around outside our 5er. They like the bugs too.

More roadrunner pics:

Roadrunner with bug in bill.

Typical roadrunner stance. Note bug in bill.

  The mockingbird wanted a photo too.

Hopefully no more alarms go off and we can get some sleep!

Travel Bug out.

Consistency and H2S Gas -- Fri., June 1

Cotulla, Texas:

Lissa Coffey's Coffey Talk gives me things to think about. I subscribe to her blog and receive Wisdom News emails with thoughts for the day. Here's today's thought (used with Lissa's permission):

Consistency

"Consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead."

-Aldous Huxley

It is our nature to grow and to change. We evolve. We learn. Sometimes we shake things up with our new views and opinions - but that just promotes more growth. Sometimes we have to prune the dead branches from a tree in order for the new buds to have room to grow and for the tree to be healthy and thrive. We can prune away our outdated thinking, and leave room for expansion.

-Lissa Coffey

Whenever I ponder a subject, within a few days more information on that subject comes to me in various forms. It could be a quote, a website, a radio talk show, internet article, or conversation with a friend.

For example, over the past two months, I have been thinking about becoming a vegetarian and running marathons--two things I said I'd NEVER do. (Never say never, right?) I've been very consistent in my thinking about those two subjects. Things change, I change, others change.

While I am not yet ready to go completely vegetarian, I admit our diet needs to be healthier with more fresh fruits & vegetables and more fish. We have started eating quinoa (pronounced KEEN' wah) which both of us love and it's a good source of protein in grain form. We now use quinoa in place of whole wheat spaghetti when we make spaghetti. But I digress.

My point is, change is occurring in my thinking. In order to lose weight and be more healthy, change must occur in my diet and exercise. I've heard the saying, "Change or die." In the case of diet, this is literally true--especially with the increase in obesity, heart disease, diabetes, stroke--in our society. I do not wish to die yet. (I know, I know, there are some ways to die we can't change: accidents, plane crashes, suicide bombers, yadda, yadda. BUT if I can make a difference, by golly, I'm going to.)

Marathon running: I'm not ready to take up running, but I LOVE to walk, hike, dance and bike ride. It's hard for me to understand people who run marathons or do ultra-marathons. I'm working on understanding it. (Actually I've been working on it for a while since Bob has been running marathons for five years.) Good for them. It's not for everyone.

We humans are works in progress. Go with the flow more. Keep an open mind. Have long discussions with those you love. Keep learning, reading, thinking--whatever is is you do that will help you grow and change. I do and I hope it's changing me into a healthier, more open person.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Update on gate guarding: Yesterday I talked about hydrogen sulfide gas (H2S). Deadly after two breaths. 

 We started gate guarding one month ago, had very little training (the people here before us showed us how to fill out the logs), and no safety training at all. Imagine my surprise a couple of weeks ago when my friend Kit and I got to talking about H2S gas.

I said, "What is that?"

She said it's a deadly gas that's released from the wells on some sites. Kit & Jerry have been gate guarding for years. We had been told by our LOMA maintenance guy that if we smelled rotten eggs we immediately should go inside our RV and stay there. Wrong information! Kit said if there's an alarm, you should get out immediately in the opposite direction of where the wind sock is pointed. (All well sites actively drilling, coil tubing, etc., should have wind socks or long ribbons to show which way the wind is blowing.) [An aside: H2S gas is heavier than air, so it hugs the ground. If you are 50' away from the well and there is an escape of gas, if you were to strike a match and it ignited the H2S gas, the flame could travel back along the gas to the source and cause an explosion.]

Today, I had lunch with a new friend, Kathy, another LOMA gate guard. She and her husband have been gate guarding for two months. I asked her if they had training/safety training and they did not. Then I asked if she knew about H2S gas. She had never heard of it.

So, in the interest of full disclosure about the hazards of gate guarding, in case your company has never informed you or if you're thinking of working as an oil field gate guard, I offer you the information on H2S gas. Here's the link again from yesterday's blog hydrogen sulfide gas. Our oil field inner gate has a big warning sign with green, yellow, and red flag designations.

Sign at entrance to the Pad.

What makes this so relevant to us is the following: This morning the Safety Supervisor from Pad B knocked on the door of our 5er and told us they had a release of H2S gas at the well. They changed the flag from green to yellow. He told Bob the gas only made it 50' from the well and we weren't currently in any danger. The workers closest to the leak had to put on masks. We are only 500' from the well. If the flags go to red, we have to evacuate immediately. Scary!!!!!

Here is the information direct from the Safety Supervisor...if there is a leak/alarm/red flag to evacuate, look at the wind sock, go AWAY from the well perpendicular to the way the wind is blowing. That way you quickly leave the most dangerous area. Me, I'm going to run whichever way all the workers on the pad are running. They have safety meetings about this subject and MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheets), something LOMA never provided for us.

I don't know if other gate guarding companies omit this essential information. I am going to open a topic in MyOldRV.com Forums under the Forum: "Oil Field Gate Guard Q & A," Topic: "H2S--Hydrogen sulfide gas" to find out if other gate guard workers have been instructed about this deadly gas.

Consider this my public service announcement for gate guarders and gate guard wannabes. I think you need to understand your risks.

The other thing that happened this morning while I was sleeping (I don't know how I missed it), Bob said there was a big boom and the ground shook. The Safety Supervisor from earlier told Bob it wasn't Pad B, then the Safety Supervisor drove down to Pad A. It wasn't Pad A either. Not on this property. Makes me wonder where it did happen and what it was. I hope everyone around it is all right!

Flame pipe burns off H2S gas. (Some gas can still escape and be deadly, though.)

The Safety Supervisor told me this evening that no workers with beards are allowed on the Pad. Reason: If there is a deadly release of gas, the oxygen mask would not get a tight seal over a beard.

This job sounds more dangerous every day. My eyes are wide open (bugged out, really).

Bug-eyed Travel Bug out.