He’s Baacckk!
I talked to my friend Nick Russell this evening and he’s out of the hospital and doing . . . well, not fine, but he’s out of the hospital, anyway. He said he still doesn’t feel all that great, but he’s better.
He will be posting a short blog later tonight so head on over and check it out. Not right now, of course. Finish reading my blog first.
Glad you’re back home, Nick.
Well, after being told that they were finishing up the Flowback & Testing tomorrow (Thursday) and then we’d be down for 4 or 5 days before the Workover rig moved in, it all changed.
About 6am this morning, the Workover rig crew started streaming in. And our vehicle count went from about 35 a day to 60 vehicles today. Relatively a big jump, but still not real busy.
I went in to go to bed at 7am, and when I came back out about 11:30, the workover rig was up and a lot of the setup crew had started leaving.
About then I headed into Carthage to pick up lunch at Sonic. Jan wanted, as usual, one of their Regular Chile Cheese Coney’s, and I went with my usual, the New York Dog, but this time I asked for raw onions and not grilled like I got last time. I thought that maybe it was a mistake, but when I checked their website, Yep, they now put grilled onions on it.
In the past when I’ve gotten one it’s always had raw onions, and I don’t know why they changed. I’ve had New York Dogs IN New York, and never came witht the onions grilled. The raw ones provide the perfect little bit of crunch to go with the sauerkraut and the spicy mustard.
I will say this is one of the busiest Sonic’s I’ve seen, especially for a small town. They have a total of 36 stalls, and I had to drive all the way around to find an open one. And that 36 includes 6 new ones that they recently added off to the side. I’m assuming they’re new due to the cleanness of the concrete pad.
But even as busy as they were, they still got me my order faster than either Whataburger or Chicken Express, and I didn’t have to tell them 3 times, “No! I don’t want any lettuce.” In fact, from the time the speaker clicked off after taking my order, it was 5 and a half minutes until the car hop was at my window.
Now that’s fast.
After lunch I got out my Sear’s 150 psi Air Compressor to top off all my tires, the rig and the truck.
PORTER-CABLE 150 PSI Air Compressor
I bought mind from Sears, but they no longer sell them. They were apparently made for Sears by Porter-Cable, who now sells them under their own name. The only difference seems to be that my Sears’ one is red.
For the first year of our RV life, I aired up the coach tires by dragging out a 75’ air hose and plugging it into the coach air compressor connector. Then I would to start up the rig engine to get the job done. A real pain in the rear.
I don’t know about most other rigs, but we have an air connection in the front bay under the driver’s seat. It’s so that if the rig is being towed wheels down, the tow driver can hook his tow truck air system into the our rig’s to release the air brakes. There’s also one back in the engine compartment.
I knew that our tires would all be low because the last time they were aired up was in Prescott, AZ back in July, and the temps were running between 95 and 100°.
But now it was in the 40’s last night and the 50’s today, and every tire was 10 to 15 psi low, the difference being whether the tire was in the direct sun or not.
But rather than the usual 20 minutes it normally takes to air up all ten tires, it took off and on all afternoon. Because I could only be hunched over for so long before my back started screaming, and then it would take about 30 seconds before I could stand all the way up straight again.
I didn’t realize that getting old would be so painful.
Anyway, the reason I had to hunch over was so that I could hold the air chuck on the tire valve while I was adding air. And the reason I had to HOLD the air chuck on the valve was because my locking air chuck, the one on my Power Tank Tire Inflator decided that today was the day to quit working.
After 8 years, now it quits?
About the same time I bought the air compressor, I also purchased this Power Tank Heavy Duty Tire Inflator system.
And like the air compressor, it’s also been a real workhorse. Just lock the chuck on the valve stem, stand up, and add air by squeezing lever. Then when you release it, you can read the pressure on the very accurate gauge. Easy Peezy.
And quick. And no hunching over.
But now the locking air chuck on the inflator just would not lock. Hence the ‘hunching over’. If I’d known this this morning I could have picked one up in Carthage.
Oh well. It’s done and another thing checked off my ‘Leaving The Gate’ list.
So far tonight, it’s beginning to look like we may be back to a 12 hour gate again for a while. At least we were tonight.
The last vehicle out was the Company Man, who left a little after 6pm. Unfortunately he didn’t stop and tell Jan they were done for the day. So poor thing, she sat outside until about 8pm before giving up and coming inside.
The pad is completely dark with no activity at all. Our logs show five vehicles still in, but those are probably just big rigs with equipment (pumps, filters, separators, etc.) that will stay here the entire time.
So if this schedule holds for tomorrow night, Jan and I may get another night on the town in Carthage.
Hope so.
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Thought for the Day:
A committee is a life form with six or more legs and no brain. — Lazarus Long
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