| Saturday, 7-30-05. Sunny and warm | |||
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Today was my "weekend." I tried in vain to finish all my important errands before leaving tomorrow for a two-week business trip for branches in southern California. We'll be moving from area to area every couple of days, but I'm looking forward to seeing Alli at some point.
Work last week was intense turned up to 11. The schedule had us going to sites in the central valley every day. It was always at least 105 degrees, and I averaged 300 miles of round-trip driving every day. I'm almost starting to get used to the ever-present cobwebs laden with 20-year-old dust that leave a sort of film on your skin that you feel you can never quite wash off. Measuring for ceiling plans is so fun! German word of the day: Schlamm (m) - Sludge |
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| Thursday, 7-21-05. Furnace-like and cloudless | |||
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Today we wrapped up the Fresno trip by visiting a branch in Hanford, CA (and also finishing work at the branch in Selma), where I was greeted by a large cockroach while measuring the men's bathroom. Cockroach and 110-degree heat aside, I'll always remember Hanford as a nice town. Some of the buildings downtown are pretty top-notch, ornate early 20th-century structures.
German word of the day: Angenehm - To please |
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| Tuesday, 7-19-05. Hot like the ninth level of hell | |||
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How many times in my life will I have to wake up at 5 am to drive to Fresno? After today, hopefully none. When we arrived just before lunchtime, it was already 108 Fahrenheit. The hotel we were provided with was slightly less than adequate, as the A/C bearly creaked along, and our manic-depressive teammate Tony was propositioned by a prostitute at the front gate. Oh yes, and it's in the middle of the ghetto. I read an article just before we went on this trip about how Fresno is considered to be one of the worst designed cities in California, and I can verify that this is the definitive truth. Excluding the sterile urban-renewal downtown (which actually does have one or two very nice older high-rises), Fresno is mostly a giant patchwork of barren boulevards, urban sprawl, and decaying strip malls. I look forward to being home on Thursday.
German word of the day: Verfall (m) - Decay |
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| Thursday, 7-14-05. Roasting like what would become a bag of ballpark peanuts | |||
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Our latest schedule has demanded that we go to locales out in the valley and the east bay lately, so I've been putting my A/C through its paces. Things have started to become a little more solid in our survey process and how we work with each other, so the stress of the job has gone down a notch.
Unfortunately, tonight I received a letter from the college with what might quickly turn out to be devastating news regarding my loans. I need to talk to some folks on campus, but it's looking like I might have to duck out of college for a semester and work to pay the bills. Just when I thought this year couldn't possibly be any worse... joy. At this point, everything is basically riding on whether or not I can get federal work-study. I already have a job lined up in the architecture department, so hopefully everything will line up and be good to go after a few inquiries. German word of the day: Bucht (f) - Bay |
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| Saturday, 7-9-05. Sunny and warm | |||
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My job has proved to be a bit of a workout. My ankles and leg muscles have been rather sore from our little jaunt to Nevada on Thursday, which required a bit more sprinting and crouching than normal due to the strict schedule. Today, however, I took an active part in being inactive. After spending most of the day watching TV, I put on some nice clothes and went to my new favorite sushi place to do some sketching. They gave me nigiri instead of maki, but I didn't mind too much. Like an idiot, however, I forgot my wallet in my other pair of pants. They let me come back after I left my sketchbook there as collateral.
German word of the day: Anpassen - to adjust |
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| Thursday, 7-7-05. Chilly and insanely hot, depending on location | |||
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I knew my summer job wouldn't be easy, but I'm not sure I could've ever imagined it would've reached the degree of challenge that it has, presently.
Having woken up at the mind-scraping time of 4:45 am to fly out of Oakland at 8:40, I somehow managed to not notice/forget the measuring tapes we use on the jobs back in the car, which I parked about five blocks up the hill from the BART station. Three sprints and 20 minutes later, we got on a train over to the Oakland Airport. I was freaking out a bit by then, as we were so behind schedule that if we made it on our plane it would be a miracle. The shuttle from the station moved at a snail's pace, we were sent to the wrong check-in line twice, we had to cut in the mile-long security line, I forgot about and had to give up my $50 pocket knife, and we had to sprint to the gate (which just had to be at the very end of the terminal wing). Maybe it was the fact that, for once, I didn't silently pray for the positive energy of the universe to give a boost, but we actually got on the plane. After the sweat-inducing stress of the morning BART trip and flight to Reno, I rented a nice car and I tried to keep us to my prescribed work/driving schedule as much as possible. Our second site was in the thriving metropolis of Yerington, NV, where we were greeted by 110-degree heat and piles of dead beetles on the sidewalks from a recent infestation. No, I'm not exaggerating, there were actual piles. We somehow managed to get everything done, though the readability of our quick site drawings (since we had no plans) suffered immensely. The BART station in Oakland was freezing from the wind, and dinner was eventually consumed at 11 pm. German word of the day: Herausfordernd - Challenging |
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