Austina is back!

Today, I got to be a foreman without anyone around....Good feeling....
I went to Fred's farewell party, the last 20 mins of it. Saw Austina and Devon, both looked great.... probably will hang out with Austina & Gang for the new year...
I want a low-key celebration....I am tired and I need my peace and quiet.

He is back!

The holdiays were great, I got snowboarding gear and kitchen stuff that I don't care much.....Not much of a baker.

Christmas day!

Emily was playing with one of her presents.
I was happy to talk to Mikey.. he was so cute... he called.....what a GooD boY!
Richard called... Dave called....Happy Hannukah! Fiona called...Merry x'mas!
I had Ham, Bacon & Sausage! Interesting Christmas meal.........

Happy Birthday to Moquito!

Happy B! Mosquito

Hood trip

The view from the civic on the way up to Hood... so groovy...looks liked a fog hat.

Boringfish's backside from the top of the "Magic Mile" el. 7016' (east side).. it was pure thrill.. so magical.

Dave was getting ready for his magic run.

On the way down.

Magic Mile (west side).. the snow was soft... and I was the snow angel.

High fashion.....

I finally made it to the Hood before 2005 is history.... the rush was awesome...the nature was just plain beautiful and peaceful..hope you like the pictures.

Countdown: one more week to go till 2006!

Folks,

Work Week 52 is plain festive...Officialy work fiscal calender is over.

Mostly I was finishing up my 2005 PMP, my last white top run for 2005 and catching up with Horace before he left for vacation. A lot of last minute rushing...writing x'mas cards and holiday letters....4 day week is always rad, 2 more of those work weeks are on the way....

I have some projects in planning, hopefully, I will get them done. I will go to P-town and spend x' mas with the fam and it was nice to talk to the b-day gal. Go Mosquito!

I have been updating the blog... please go to the archive to check them out...I added a few things from March 05 on! Yeah baby.

Have a lovely Christmas everyone!
Have a peaceful, safe and great 2006!
Hope you all take the opportunity to hug a loved one, sit back, relax, and look at the sky today.

Boringfish

Santa, this is what I want.........not really!

Just for a thought!..A dorky biker chick.

Wing's B day Bash!

Freezing rain & snow in P-town!

Friday nite was fun!....
Saturday... cruz'g in the valley in search of W-Valley wineries with A... then P-town, jolly time!
Grandma: there is white ppl talking...why?
Boringfish: Yes granny.. I am having dinner in a restuarant.... I am ordering water...sorry
Sunday.... was wanting to go to Hood with Dave, then snow & freezing rain stopped me. It turned out not too bad cuz I just slept all day! Getting ready for another hectic week with process and foreman work....white top & PMP & DAFing are the bulk of it.. probably catching up with HH. 4 days week is always rad, no to mention free food from work all week long. Goodies from farmhouse and maint feast... JOY and fattening! 2 more work weeks... then the new year!

W-Valley Wineries

Friday... I finally will have a break!

The weather in C-town has been very chilly. ICY!

Things are on the upside again in my papermaker world. It turned out that the cull rolls that we made yesterday were salable for specific application. They will make coffee cup holder and box divider....

I finally feel great being a junior foreman..making contribution that impact production positively. They listened and excuted my ideas today...FGS, Sweet! Bill is fun to work with, he is so easy going. We had another incident with the polymer again this evening.. this time, the chemical froze! I think I handled the whole ordeal really well... at least I hope. I thinks foreman job is a piece of cake on a GOOD day. However, you never know when that is in a paper mill.

JK continued to be around... things are doing ok, I feel comfortable that I am being watched...This is just a heck of the week for a new guy to show up. We sure did hell to welcome him. Are we a bunch of fools? 36 hours boiler outage, 24 + hrs for PM2 and 12 hrs for PM3 & AFL downtime, contaminated condensate as filtrate in washer definitely was impressive.... black liquor pulp, pH 12 in HD6, foamy party in APM. I definitely put on lot of mileages to my feet, well my jaws dropped a lot too! The mill will need its healing time and get back to normality. White top could be a challenge.

Tonite was fun with A. I gonna miss him...or maybe NOT, if he won't call me from corn central... yeah... I am 'mafan'.
Weekend should be a blast.... no work......

Congru to Peter, he is getting married today, hurray!

FOAMy Bubble bath & SNOWING!

Just a quick log before I return to the world of paradise.

I showed up to work this morning to find that the mill was at a worser shape than it was as I left on my 14 hours day yesterday. It was liked we made pulp-snow in the mill. Everywhere, and (I mean it) was covered by FOAM... I soaped myself into the foam pool as there was my ONLY way to get into the machine building. AFL, PM3 were down already, then 6:10, PM2 went down as well....this is the worst week ever. we gonna make cull paper and be rid of all the bad stock all day long... no production at all! It all started from contaminated condensate.

JY made it to town yesterday, I finally got to introduce myself as we were trying to thread PM2 around 8. With the mill upset condition from the 2 weeks, it was a great way to impress your manager, and we all need to avoid the execution room and may as well start looking for employment somewhere else. So far, the impression from my peers was disappointing. Effective leadership is the concern!

W just announced permanent closure of 2 machines.... we need to reconsider our position in the organization.

It's snowing outside... Let's get a snapshot!.. Boy are we in trouble? Most outside equipment got frozen up! SF got a recordable injury because someone slipped and fell. Water on the ground turned to ice... we could skate out here! Clean up, clean up, clean up. The bugs in the pond are not doing so hot either, they have been swimming in pulp, foam and liquor!

Sweet hours!

It was another long day...14 hours...but I survived my first shut as a mini-F, I even completed my first lockbox at PM2 Quill Inspection & got a foreman lock key. (I probably will need to return that). We were losing steam and running out of stock, they have to shut AFL down for WL inventory, PM3 were making culls most of the afternoon (4 breaks)
The pic were taken outside the PM3 CR as I was on my way to Farmhouse lunch.... I was still in good spirit at that time. Barry was taking pics on the damage press ceramic shoe and he took a snapshot of me.... OH NO!

Tickle my Feet

First, work: I survived my 73 hour work week, and I feel very good about my performance, in spite of physical exhaustion. My 'B' crew day was alright. I was mostly puzzled about the direction of the mill because of the mill manager's announcement of his December retirement. Maintaining high morale is crucial in this kind of situation. My 'D' crew day was very good - I felt very confident, and enjoyed the busy foreman day. My 'C' crew started with a great learning experience -the machine was hay out twice with a total of more than 3 hours. Frustration, fatigue, rushing, definitely set in amongst my crew. It was stressful trying to get the machine rolling again. Thursday morning I got a chance to chat with Fred for a couple of minutes. He was complimenting me for doing a great job - that certainly eased some of my anxiety. I took a couple hours off on Friday to finish some process projects. Saturday was pretty good - things were running pretty well, and I felt I was doing well as a foreman. Now, the fun stuff...

Thursday my mom came down from P town to deliver me my uncle's used dining table. Very nice of them to do that for me. A got to meet with my mom as we all went out to dinner afterwards. Saturday afternoon I went hiking after work in McDonald Forest. It was good to catch the last of the daylight, before it got freezing. I am jealous that Dave got to go snowboarding on Sunday - I would have liked to go, but I was needed for some festivities in Portland - Wing's Birthday. We went shopping at our regular spots, Woodburn and Fry's - and we both spent some money. For dinner we met up with Sylvia without our designated waitee, and we pigged out at Todai. It was not as good as I remembered, but they did have some cake for the birthday girl. Austina is on her way to HK now. Have fun there! & party on.

Emily will be traveling back to huskies state for awhile. She is going miss her boy.

25F..(-4 c)... icy!

Happy Birthday to Wing!

Long Day, many more to come.

Today was my first "official" day shadowing the foreman - they get good exercise, and cover a lot of ground. Making the rounds, fixing problems, and always thinking 'saleable tons...saleable tons'. I had a thirteen hour day today, and that 13 hours consisted of a half hour lunch, two fifteen minute breaks, and a brief stop to use the phone (and another one for email). I am more tired than I expected, and I was planning on being pooped. On top of that I have been discouraged by the sudden retirement of our mill manager at the end of the month. I am more upset by his departure bacause he was a big piece of my introduction to Albany, and I felt that he was watching over me. The new manager, from OK, has already been announced. I had a chance to meet him on my job hunting trip, but I never did - I guess I will get my chance soon. Looks like changes have finally begun to touch Albany - we will see how this may change my training, and the general state of the mill. I have been making some big progress lately, and I hope he will not interfere with my advancement. Hopefully his W background will not clash with the leftover w folks.

Today we had an equipment shut, with lots of lockout and tagout, and a minor injury. The PM was doing poorly when I arrived, but at least I got some ideas for improvements from my talks with the tenders. My DAF was 'ill', not taking the wet strength well, and the poor thing was overwhelmed. There was a silo leak, a crack in #2 hiD and a number of leaks in the dryer section (apparently they think I am the only staff member small enough to fit in there with the moving rolls and high temps). Both winders were acting up - I don't totally understand the pump speed variation theory for energy saving. I attended the PM3 shut meeting, and my project on #3 HB was canned - it was too much trouble to add the jet vel. scanner rather than to do without. Tomorrow I will be meeting a new crew, I think I was well received today, and those will be my crew members for my foreman trial - hopefully they will help me along the way. In 30 days, I will be the person in charge - there is a huge amount to keep track of, and I think it might be a little overwhelming. Deep breath. Lots of safety talk, and it is hard to see how they can compensate foremen for the stress. I learned a little lesson about privacy... and how to be supportive of the crew in their daily ops.


I miss Emily! My doggie misses me! Emily is back in P town as of this weekend. She is going to get fat without enough exercise and eating too much human food. I went to Portland and spent time with my mother over the weekend. It was a good visit, and productive. Last friday I went to a play. It was a wordy play, but generally enjoyable.

Set back! Step back!

I had some conversations with my confidants over the weekend.....then I had some conversation with A tonight. I am NOT obsessed about what we have right now, but he sort of upset me. I wish things are simple and I am not jealous of some imaginery competitions.

I will write more later, probably after my first day in charge of the machine. I am anxious in all aspects of life... Need to calm down and slow down... Take a deep breathe.

Boringfish
PS. Early Happy Birthday to Abbie, Melvin, Sherry, Wing, Fiona & Pauline! Party on Dude and Dudettes!

Date Night

It's new for me to have one of this...
so another one tonight to a play at Albany theater.

Fake date/ real date...so complicated

Cutie!

Nov30


Yes..Emily is much prettier, she knows how to open her eyes and look at the photographer....


My lovely companions! Coffee is wearing his MJ's gloves.


Coffee and Boringfish in snowland, he is looking for big foot!


Coffee and Boringfish were smooching. Coffee: I am embarrassed that you caught me kissing her!


Techie Doggie! Smartie! Emily: I am a graduate.


Pic was taken on 10/26 by Wing. Emily and Boringfish were smooching. Boringfish: You look tasty!

Late August

Boringfish is trying to sort the jpegs from my trip to the South, found them and will post them at a later time: hush puppies, memphis ball game, AK, OK, TX & LA, CA....Yipee!--Please go to Archive May/05 .. It has been updated.

Dave & Chris

We miss you, Chris!