Procrastinate

Part of my job was to be a troubleshooter after normal work hours.  People would call in complaining of an electrical problem they were having.  I would be expected to figure out what was causing the problem and of course fix it.  Over the years you learn from experience, common sense, and experimentation what is wrong and how to rectify it.  Several times I have found problems in their wiring  that more than likely would have caused their home to burn down.   One night a couple of  years ago a ticket came in with a blinking lights problem,  I drove there, diagnosed that the problem was inside their home.  They were advised of such, and that they needed to contact an electrician to further investigate and fix their problem.  I drove by there a few months later and saw the 19th century Queen Anne home burned to the ground.  I can only assume that the electrical problem didn't get fixed and started the home on fire.

Windmills, are they the new folly?

Are these the new folly, "the fool America" into thinking that it is green.  Oh, yes, they use the renewable resource.  Do you wonder if  the whole truth is out there.  What happens when the wind dies down or the wind is blowing to fast.  Windmill stops.   Does the power still come to your house?  How?  Are they an inexpensive form of power?  Is nuclear or coal, still cheaper?  Do you want to pay a higher price for electricity if you didn't know they were on the grid?   And how many have to be put up as a blight on the landscape before they have any significant impact on our electricity usage?

The tool chest

When I started working in 1972 the introduction of  a truck that could dig holes, set poles, hang transformers, and give a man a lift up to the work area had become commonplace.  You still need to have the ability to climb a pole and work in your hooks.  The top shelf on the right has rubber blankets,  line hose on the second shelf and fiberglass sticks on the third to deal with the high voltage.  On the door to the left is an assortment of drill bits for a power drill either run by 24 volts or 120 volts laying on the coiled yellow cords on the right.  A handline hangs next to a number of yellow nylon lifting slings.  Behind the rope and slings is an assortment of hoists, and rope blocks to help move conductors around on the pole.  In a bin next to this one is an assortment of grips for different sizes of conductor wires along with cutting tools and presses to make connections with other wires.  There are several more bins that carry mostly materials to build power lines that are overhead and undergound.

When the lights go out

When I come upon a street light it will extinguish and as I walk away it will come back on, so says a group known as 'SLIders'.  There are many people in the world who are SLIders,  true believers in their paranormal ability to turn off street lights.  
‘H' of Seattle in the USA wrote in with his experiences of SLI.
"When I encounter a lamp subject to my SLI, the lamp will extinguish every time I pass by it, without fail. This is, of course, subject to the lamp's being on in the first place. I have never experienced passing by a lamp, turning it off, then immediately turning around, passing it and subsequently turning it on. Occasionally I have turned them on, but this is probably no more than 5% of the total incidents. Each lamp has always (no exceptions) either gone on or off but never both. This occasionally occurs when a lamp happens to be on during daylight hours. I should state that when I encounter a lamp subject to my SLI, the phenomenon invariably occurs at each encounter "
I have to believe that many people exaggerate the truth to fit themselves. I too have experienced street lights turning off when I approach and coming back on. Sometimes I have to pull over and watch when it does. And when that happens I get into the bucket of the aerial lift and change the bulb that has come to the end of its useful life that signals me of its pending doom by blinking off and coming back on. Then I guarantee that no SLIder will be able to turn it off when they walk by it.

Call me if you need me

Here I sit in the middle of the night at a computer that relies on my job as a lineman for it to work. The phone is ringing now, each time it does it portends the end of my job and life as I used to know it. How does that happen you say. My job is a 24hr-7day a week job that requires my coming to work to repair something that has broken down on the electrical grid. It is a complex work culture that wraps around your life that ensnares a person into a virtual prison. A prison that limits your hobbies or interests or family bonding. One that keeps you home when a dance recital or your little guy's ball game is scheduled, dare you miss the call to go to work. If I decide to break away from that prison then I do it as a work release. I have to go back afterwards.