I bet you didn’t know there even was a sanctioned sabbatical for blogging, did you? Well, there is now because I said so.

I have been plenty busy since the last post. Not electrically busy, but still busy nonetheless.  I have discovered the whole “Facebook” phenomena. Scoff if you want, as I have always maintained that too much technology can be a bad thing, but I am a convert regarding this social networking site. I have found people from elementary, middle and high school days, past co-workers, extended family - and  I can keep in touch  with all of them in a few keystrokes. And I don’t mean by playing Farmtown or Plowville or whatever its called.

This past fall I was also tied up with organizing two electrical tech seminars for all of my company’s southern generation electrical staff. I have discovered that I have a knack for organizing, or maybe I just like ordering people around…

On a personal note I took a vacation and went to Las Vegas with a friend. She and some of her friends ran the Las Vegas Rock and Roll Marathon, which was the first time I have ever been a part of anything marathon-ish. It was really neat. There were around 40,000 people registered and those people brought their people, but it was organized chaos.  It almost inspired me to start running, ALMOST.  I met a woman there who had run a 100-mile marathon. It took her 28 hours to finish. I can’t even sleep for 28 hours. Plus it was delightful to text my friend Stephen and tell him I was standing outside on Dec. 7th at 9 am in a T-shirt with the sun shining down, and ask him what was HE was wearing. I know, I’m a monster.

This week I was entrusted with the task of opening the riparian valves at the spillway. Our spillway in Grand Rapids is approximately five kilometers away from the station and it has four gated sections. Section 2 has two riparian valves which when opened allow water from the forebay to spill into a dry river bed. We open up these valves every spring to allow the fish to spawn as a part of the Walleye Enhancement Program, and it remains open for approximately eight weeks.

A consulting company determines the rate of speed that the water should flow and we calculate how many inches to open the valves. At 150 cubic feet per second (CFS) only one riparian valve needed to be opened a total of 31 inches. If we needed to have 250 CFS we would fully open one valve and partially open the second valve to accommodate the correct amount of flow.

Our spillway is a formidable structure measuring 116 meters long and 21.4 meters high. The gates are about 13.5 meters tall and it has 66 steps from the deck to the bottom, trust me I counted!!!

This is the view from above the riparian valve.

One step at a time...

Here is the view of both riparian valves, from the bottom.

 

Okay, so if there was a Survivor of the blogging universe, I know the tribe would have spoken and totally kicked me off the island long ago. I apologize to my ever growing fan base, the both of you.

Hmm, what is new? It is now spring time and we are in full gear in terms of annual maintenance at my generating station. We have four units in Grand Rapids and first we worked on unit three. I unfortunately missed the majority of that maintenance due to a badly timed case of bronchitis. Unit four has already been out of service since April 16th and a lot of work has been completed.

The fire deluge testing in the generator pits and on the transformer deck is done, so if heaven forbid a blaze breaks out the detectors will activate and put out the fire. The list of tasks to be completed is still quite long, such as cavitation on the turbine blade and the hub, new headcover controls are to be installed, and general maintenance needs to be done to the governor system, pumps, motors and a thousand other things.

And the amazing part is that we should have all those thousand other little things done by the end of next week. Hopefully with no extra parts left over (I just hate when THAT happens!)

Tracy.

I haven’t said anything yet about one of the best traditions we have at my generating station! It’s our Friday night “Not pizza night” supper club.

A few years ago, my boss and I were talking about how some things can get in a rut very quickly. At our staff house, we have certain things for dinner on certain nights, steak night Sundays, prime rib night Tuesdays, and pizza night Fridays. I know, I know, it sounds very selfish that I am complaining about getting prime rib once a shift while I’m at work. But when you’ve been getting it for a couple of YEARS, it does tend to wear on you a little.

So we decided to forego Fridays’ pizza and take turns cooking for each other. We have had some really amazing things, like pork tenderloin, elk spaghetti, “kickin’ chicken”, moose steak, antelope, tuna casserole, fajitas, lasagna, Spanish chicken with pico del gallo, burgers, steaks and a whole bevy of other culinary wonders.

Some of the people who have participated are temporary workers just passing through, and others are here to stay. Like Fred, who sits at the table with a HUGE smile on his face and says every week, “I am the luckiest planner in the whole world.”

And I know what he means, because I feel very fortunate to have found this particular mix of guys that I work with. Fred makes one mean martini and D.W. makes a killer Caesar. Now who’s the lucky one, eh?

Do you ever wonder if you are making a difference?

I was talking to a pre-placement trainee and she was telling me that when she first showed up at the generating station she was quite intimidated. She had arrived at coffee time and was greeted by a front entrance full of men having coffee, talking, laughing and she said she felt like turning around and leaving because she felt out of place.

Needless to say she decided to stay and she is glad she did. She and I get along very well and she has proven herself to be smart, capable and funny. She told me that if she were the only female in the station she may have had second thoughts about being in a trade. Her confidence in her abilities is constantly growing and her desire to build a better life for herself and her family will her take her far.

She told me that I have made a difference to her, and it’s always nice to hear feedback like that, and I appreciate my job even more.

Hi there,

Does anyone even remember me? I apologize for my lack of blogging, but I have had a run of unfortunate circumstances lately.

This past November, I stepped on a small light bulb while I was changing into my coveralls at work. I got a small cut on the ball of my foot, and it could not heal because I was still walking around on it. The problem is that I am a diabetic and getting an ulcer on my foot can be a dangerous thing. The wound kept getting worse, and after seeing three different doctors, I went to an emergency room where an infectious diseases specialist took a look at my foot. He confirmed the infection hadn’t spread down to the bone, and he put my foot in a cast up to the knee. I was told that had the infection spread any further, my foot would have had to be partially amputated.

So here I am, finally back at work two months later with my foot intact, thank goodness. And I promise I’ll try not to grind my foot into any more glass… and maybe write a few more blogs for all of you faithful readers. (Okay mom?)

Tracy

Where oh where to begin since I last blogged?

Well at the beginning of October the company I work for experienced a labour disruption for the first time in its history. Our union held a vote and the vast majority of its union members voted to strike. We were picketing for four days until negotiations delivered an offer that the union agreed to take back to its members. I picketed at what used to be our head office, but is now being used as more of a satellite building, starting every day at 6:30 am. People!! I don’t even get up for WORK for six thirty in the morning, but this was important. That’s part of the joy of belonging to a union, believing in solidarity.

I haven’t seen what the new offer is yet, but hopefully it is something fair that everyone can live with because picketing in November doesn’t sound like it would be any fun.

Tracy.

Have I mentioned how much I hate painting? Although I’ve come to discover that its not the actual painting that I hate, it’s the prep work. The clearing out the room, the laying down of paper or drop cloths, the taping of trim,  the removing all outlet and switch covers, the taking down of light fixtures, and painting corners and ceilings, this is what I actually hate. The swooping across the room with the roller is a breeze.

And picking the colour!! When did this get so difficult? There’s only like half a million bajillion colours to pick from, and who the heck comes up with these names? There are like twelve names for one shade of yellow- straw hat, buttery dream, manila envelope, angel’s halo, french toast, morning sun, romance, etc…

And then once you figure what colour each room is going to be and that they don’t clash with each other, you breath a sigh of relief and think you are in the clear. Then the nice people behind the paint counter ask,  ”What kind of finish do you want on the walls?”  There’s flat, semi flat, semi matte,matte, eggshell, velvet, semi gloss, gloss, acrylic, latex and list goes on and on.

Painfully I became aware of the fact the I do not possess a colour-matching gene in my DNA. My mother does, (thankfully) so my house is not a kaleidoscope of weird mismatched colours.

This past week has been quite busy. And I got to do some really neat things. On Wednesday myself and Myles, another apprentice, got to operate the Genie manlift (or woman-lift) out at our local airport. We were assisting some of the telecontrol guys with putting up a new antenna and mast.  It was such a fantastic day for the weather, and we couldn’t remember the last time we got a sunburn in the middle of September.

Two telecontrol guys attaching the antenna.

I also was assigned to escort a Department of Labour worker named Bill to do his elevator inspections. I got to ride on top of the elevator car up and down several times, and even though I enjoyed it very much Bill seemed bored by it. And then I learned that he has been doing this for the past eighteen years.

Well it’s almost time for me to go home and pick up where I left off with the house reno’s. Busy busy busy…

Tracy.

Hi. I know, I know, it’s been about a hundred years since I’ve posted (okay, more like a few weeks) but I haven’t really been at work. I am on holidays. Four glorious weeks of holidays. And one normally associates holidays with long carefree summery days spent at the beach drinking slurpees, well let me tell you, those are NOT my holidays.

I am sadistically doing home reno’s. I am ripping all of the exterior walls down from the inside, pulling the sixty year old insulation out, having the spray foam insulation sprayed, then re-drywalling,  having new windows installed and having cultured stone bricked onto the front of the house. So that also means I have to re-tile the bathroom, buy a new tub surround, and re-paint upstairs and the main floor.  And have I mentioned how much I HATE painting?

But the one shining thing about all of this is my friend Kathy invited me out to Kenora for a couple of days. And THAT was wonderful, until I fell and broke my tailbone.

Tracy.