Will that bloody bunny slow down already!!
Yip. It amazes me how it point blankly refuses to slow down.
The “fun” part of December is a month end in the middle of the month. I am a creature of habit as far as work goes and generally schedule stuff over the weeks of the month. Given that I do not schedule a month end in the middle of the month, it takes a bit of additional planning to get it done.
Friday was my day to get stuck in and make like a punch clerk. What I did not account for was a 4 hour meeting at one of the mines which killed all time until 1pm and another afternoon meeting with another client on progress of all the fun orders we have got from them. Couple this with all the expats been down south, commissioning at our refrigeration plant in Obuasi and planning for the job at our new client 5 hours to the North West.
I got stuck in to input clerk stuff at around 3 and once again the 5pm “we shall shut JDE down to do a day end” got me. No worries – I have Saturday and Sunday to kill the rest of the stuff.
Nope – at 5:15pm see email from said new client requesting a contract kick off meeting at 10.00 am the following day. Call me silly, but if you are going to request a meeting, 24 hours notice is always a good option.
What that did mean was it was too late to set off and sleep in Obuasi to cut the trip down to 3 hours, and I was looking at a 4am wake up to make it to the meeting in time. Peeved? Yup - I was peeved, but hey – what the client wants, the client gets….. call me a prostitute!
Saturday was a 4am wake up – much cursing and the road was hit at 4:30. Now you all know how I feel about night driving in this wonderful country, with the narrow roads, trucks that only have hi beam and drive in the middle of the road and of course the pedestrians.
What I missed out in all of that is the farking mist in the mornings. I could not believe how thick it was and the fact that it endured most of the journey with a few breaks in-between. Despite all this, I managed to make the mine at 9:15. (after stopping at a shop to buy an energy drink when I found myself falling asleep at around 7am)
Meeting was cordial and quite relaxed, and everyone seems comfortable they know what we/they are doing. I did however sneak a look at some S curves on the wall and made a mental note that everyone on site was way behind.
Our small little site office looked good and the newly painted plant worked well from an image perspective. Now it remains to see if the job can kick off properly on Monday.
The lads then advised me of a shorter route home via Bibiani. Once I found Bibiani I knew my way home. However…….
There is 92 km of dirt road from there to here. Said road is populated by logging trucks and small villages. While overtaking one of said log trucks which was kicking up enough dust to make the Sahara vanish, I “made inappropriate contact with a farking monster pothole” A week before I am due to go home, a week when I have a shite load of stuff to do and I am holding on with white knuckles to a steering wheel, with the nose and arse of my car doing the point in the air number, a bloody large log truck on my right and jungle on my left.
So: Instead of my car been serviced while I am away – it is now been serviced and repaired. “Insert swearwords here”
Jerome – site manager from Obuasi came over to Tarkwa yesterday and we were to burn some ostrich steaks marinated in Mustard Seed, Coconut milk and chilli chutney. Jerome was kind enough to find a bottle of Capitan’s in Obuasi to resolve the fact you cannot find Captains in any of the regular shops in Tarkwa.
Once again – plans were changed when Rudi phoned and we ended up at Erik’s house with the Ostrich steaks as starters and a wonderful lamb knuckle potjie as a main course. The captain was dealt a mortal blow!
To cap off a great vehicle night – on the way home I had a blow out and realised how bloody stupid the design of the Pajero is. In order to jack up the rear wheel, you need to almost get right underneath the car to find the jacking point. (yup I had to consult the manual as we spent a while looking for a hard spot to jack the car up.)
I slept well last night…. I slept very well last night.
I am going to take a shotgun to that bunny
The “fun” part of December is a month end in the middle of the month. I am a creature of habit as far as work goes and generally schedule stuff over the weeks of the month. Given that I do not schedule a month end in the middle of the month, it takes a bit of additional planning to get it done.
Friday was my day to get stuck in and make like a punch clerk. What I did not account for was a 4 hour meeting at one of the mines which killed all time until 1pm and another afternoon meeting with another client on progress of all the fun orders we have got from them. Couple this with all the expats been down south, commissioning at our refrigeration plant in Obuasi and planning for the job at our new client 5 hours to the North West.
I got stuck in to input clerk stuff at around 3 and once again the 5pm “we shall shut JDE down to do a day end” got me. No worries – I have Saturday and Sunday to kill the rest of the stuff.
Nope – at 5:15pm see email from said new client requesting a contract kick off meeting at 10.00 am the following day. Call me silly, but if you are going to request a meeting, 24 hours notice is always a good option.
What that did mean was it was too late to set off and sleep in Obuasi to cut the trip down to 3 hours, and I was looking at a 4am wake up to make it to the meeting in time. Peeved? Yup - I was peeved, but hey – what the client wants, the client gets….. call me a prostitute!
Saturday was a 4am wake up – much cursing and the road was hit at 4:30. Now you all know how I feel about night driving in this wonderful country, with the narrow roads, trucks that only have hi beam and drive in the middle of the road and of course the pedestrians.
What I missed out in all of that is the farking mist in the mornings. I could not believe how thick it was and the fact that it endured most of the journey with a few breaks in-between. Despite all this, I managed to make the mine at 9:15. (after stopping at a shop to buy an energy drink when I found myself falling asleep at around 7am)
Meeting was cordial and quite relaxed, and everyone seems comfortable they know what we/they are doing. I did however sneak a look at some S curves on the wall and made a mental note that everyone on site was way behind.
Our small little site office looked good and the newly painted plant worked well from an image perspective. Now it remains to see if the job can kick off properly on Monday.
The lads then advised me of a shorter route home via Bibiani. Once I found Bibiani I knew my way home. However…….
There is 92 km of dirt road from there to here. Said road is populated by logging trucks and small villages. While overtaking one of said log trucks which was kicking up enough dust to make the Sahara vanish, I “made inappropriate contact with a farking monster pothole” A week before I am due to go home, a week when I have a shite load of stuff to do and I am holding on with white knuckles to a steering wheel, with the nose and arse of my car doing the point in the air number, a bloody large log truck on my right and jungle on my left.
So: Instead of my car been serviced while I am away – it is now been serviced and repaired. “Insert swearwords here”
Jerome – site manager from Obuasi came over to Tarkwa yesterday and we were to burn some ostrich steaks marinated in Mustard Seed, Coconut milk and chilli chutney. Jerome was kind enough to find a bottle of Capitan’s in Obuasi to resolve the fact you cannot find Captains in any of the regular shops in Tarkwa.
Once again – plans were changed when Rudi phoned and we ended up at Erik’s house with the Ostrich steaks as starters and a wonderful lamb knuckle potjie as a main course. The captain was dealt a mortal blow!
To cap off a great vehicle night – on the way home I had a blow out and realised how bloody stupid the design of the Pajero is. In order to jack up the rear wheel, you need to almost get right underneath the car to find the jacking point. (yup I had to consult the manual as we spent a while looking for a hard spot to jack the car up.)
I slept well last night…. I slept very well last night.
I am going to take a shotgun to that bunny
1 Comments:
I had a good chuckle, you actually read the manual?
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