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To: Heartlander

I got a job one summer while in college steam cleaning garbage trucks. I would put on a hazmat suit, climb inside one of these in the Texas heat and go to work with the steamer. At times I would be standing ankle deep in the putrid stinking water you have ever seen.

Several of us started working the same day. By the end of summer only two of the original summer hires were left. The rest had been tirned completely over twice. Many did not last the day.


7 posted on 04/06/2005 7:38:37 PM PDT by speed_addiction (Ninja's last words, "Hey guys. Watch me just flip out on that big dude over there!")
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To: speed_addiction

I used to work in a power generating plant, coal-fired. It wasn't bad 95% of the time. But to clean the boilers out when they are offline usually involved huge heavy denim monkey suits with face masks. It involved climbing into small holes barely as big as the distance from the inside of my elbow to my wrist. Very tight fit. Dragging an air hose with a three foot nozzle on the end. Oh, and a drop light, because it's completely pitch black.

Once inside, one tried not to get stuck, break the light, and run the nozzle between the water pipes to blow slag off that gets stuck on them. OH, did I mention the huge induced draft fans are on? To suck the debris out, of course, but there ya are in a wind tunnel, I'm guessing 40 mph air roaring through. This would break the light occasionally, as it floated around in there. The only communication with coworkers was tugging on the airhose.

This takes about an hour or so. Then one tries to wriggle back out, backwards. Then you roll over, and go back in to do the other side.

This took all morning. That took care of one access hole. There are several. Per boiler. It's a good thing I wasn't claustrophobic.

Washing soot out of your hair took four or five shampoo/lather/rinse cycles.

But I understand why so many of the maintenance people went out of their way to put on weight. They'd get too fat to fit.


15 posted on 04/06/2005 8:07:00 PM PDT by Big Giant Head (Barring all differences, they're identical.)
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To: speed_addiction
You may have me beat. My worst jobs: 1) picking up cigarette butts in a huge parking lot in the hot North Carolina summer sun. For breaks, I got to clean out garbage receptacles. 2) Working as a dishwasher in a very hot, very humid and sometimes very smelly North Carolina restaurant. I never knew how much fungus and how many rashes one could get in the nether regions until I had that job. I also learned that after you cut Jalapeno peppers you must wash your hands before your go to the restroom. I was in so much pain, my eyes bled.
3) Having my clients found "not guilty" even though I believe that they committed the crimes (some heinous like forcible rape with a minor victim) I just had to keep telling myself that the United States Constitution provides for the right to an attorney.
18 posted on 04/06/2005 9:06:01 PM PDT by Goldwater4ever (Aut Pax Aut Bellum)
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