He Did What???

I completely understand the focus on safety in natural resources industries.  It’s a dangerous business and constant vigilance is necessary.  Being office rather than field based, I’m often subjected to the oddities that result from this culture.  Sitting at a desk rather than on a rig or in a pit means that the heaviest machinery I come in contact with is the car or bus on my commute to and from work, my keyboard and my calculator.  Unlike our field counterparts who have safety shares involving possible life or death situations, or severe injury at the very least, my co-workers and I talk about the ‘danger’ of knives in the kitchen, light bulbs out in the stairwell and tripping hazards from open desk drawers and purses left on the floor.

Today’s safety share, based on an actual recorded injury in the office, takes the cake though.  An anonymous colleague got a paper cut in his eye when removing a poster from the wall.  No joke.  We’ve been advised to consider wearing safety glasses when posting or removing papers from walls.  I’m contemplating hanging this by the copy machine:

Let’s Just Ignore that Friends are Supposed to be a Reflection of Oneself

This morning’s instant message conversation with Julz:

Me:  I can’t really be bothered to cook for myself.

Julz: Cooking is never an option unless someone else is doing it… you have to takeout dinner and then slowly work your way down to cereal.

Me:  Complementing a cereal dinner with a nice bottle or two of wine always makes me feel better about it.

Julz:  If you’re doing a white based cereal, then match it with a nice white wine.  If you’re going a more wholemeal cereal, then a red would do the trick.  Maybe a nice merlot.

Me:  I like your cereal wine pairing.  You could be a sommelier.

Julz:  Don’t forget the dessert wine; it’s a really a nice way to cap off a cereal meal.  For a good dessert wine that goes with all cereal types, try Nobel One.

Me:  Is it cane cut or moscato or something else?

Julz:  It has alcohol and is sweet.

Me:  Maybe you shouldn’t change careers quite yet.  Now I could use some wine though and it’s not even 10:00 AM.

Julz: Well, it’s 10:00 PM in New York.

Me: Thanks Julz, I like the way you think.

Julz: No probs.

BYO Rifle, Not Beer

Recent trips taken by friends and colleagues from Perth:

• Drinking and sunbathing in Bali
• Drinking and catching up with friends in Sydney
• Hiking Machu Picchu
• Drinking and clubbing in Hong Kong
• Drinking and sleeping in Bangkok
• Aerial feral hog hunting in Queensland*

*I was going to make a crack that only in Australia would someone take a week of vacation to shoot feral hogs from a helicopter but apparently it's very popular in Texas.  The Texas State Legislature passed 'the pork chopper' bill this spring which makes it legal, as of September 1st, for sport hunters to rent the gunner seat on a helicopter to shoot wild hogs and coyotes.  And apparently bookings for gunner seats are going quickly.  There is a huge amount of enthusiasm in Australia and Texas to temper out of control feral hog populations.  H, let's not move to Texas.  Unless of course my birthday mercenary can ride shotgun while I shoot feral hogs.  Yee haw.

 

Image courtesy of Eric Lewis via http://www.texasmonthly.com/2011-08-01/webextra10.php

Dear Spell Check, I Am Not a Terrorist

Dear spell check,

I may have a mercenary and a white Toyota HiLux on my wish list (and an unhealthy love of The Unit), but that doesn’t mean that I appreciate your auto corrections that pepper my e-mails with the following in place of my name and those of my friends:

• Taliban
• Warlord
• Bullet
• Amen

I’m an American expat in Australia for goodness sake.  Who do you think I’m writing to/about?  I fill my days with Excel spreadsheets and PowerPoint presentations.  Just because my extracurricular conversations include helicopters, facilitation payments, various nonsexual ways to employ a hooker, assorted ways one’s wife will find out that one’s rotation isn’t actually six weeks on, two weeks off but 6 weeks on, four weeks off, and how much money one can fit in a money belt for third world travel, it doesn’t mean that I’m totally nuts.  I’m not a jihadist, I just spend too much time in and around the oilfield. 

How [Not] to Prepare Your Travel Documents

It's amazing what comes up during the course of a normal dinner conversation in the world that H and I have found ourselves living in. The other night we were out to dinner with some friends and instead of the usual conversations around politics, the state of the financial markets and upcoming vacation plans, H and I learned how to accidentally bribe a government official.

One of our friends shared a story from a business trip he had taken to what I'll refer to as an anonymous banana republic gone sour under military rule. He disembarked from his flight, queued at customs and handed over his passport, in its case, to the customs' official. The customs' official thumbed through it for a few moments before stamping it and handing it back. The guy's boss went next and after the customs' official paged through his passport, he started grilling him with questions. Our friend took the twenty minute delay to check out his new passport stamp and found that A$50 that he had stuck in the back of his case, along with various frequent flier cards and other scraps of paper, was now gone. Apparently the cash, and not the appropriate visa, which his boss was also in possession of, had smoothed his entry into the country. A$50 will get you 90% of a case of beer, a steak dinner for one, lawn seats at a cricket match or a question free entry into an anonymous Latin American country. I wonder what else this admission fee includes.