I work out!

It is official.  I started training for my first half marathon on Monday.  I was worried about training out here because it is about a half hour drive to the nearest gym and in the winter I don't want to be driving everyday.  I decided to purchase a treadmill.  I wanted to get an old one that I can just leave behind when I change careers.  I found one on Craigslist.  Chris picked it up and brought it out for me.  I think it was made in the 70's.  It is old, ugly, and if I go too fast the speed starts wavering.  This picture actually makes it look way nicer then it is!  I told Chris that I was hoping it would fold up.  He said that when this treadmill was made, that technology did not exist! 

As I am running, this is what I sing...
I'm too sexy for my treadmill
Too sexy for my treadmill
Treadmill's going to break down

I'm too sexy for my shirt
Too sexy for my shirt
So sexy it hurts

And I'm too sexy for my safety goggles
Too sexy for my safety goggles, New York and Japan

And I'm too sexy for your FRC's (fire resistant clothing)
Too sexy for your FRC's
The way I'm disco dancing

I'm a model, you know what I mean
And I do my little run on the treadmill,
On the catwalk, on the catwalk, yeah
And I do my little turn on the catwalk

I'm too sexy for my Escape (es-cop-ee' like on finding nemo)
Too sexy for my Escape
Too sexy by far

And I'm too sexy for my hard hat
Too sexy for my hard hat
Whatcha think about that?

And I'm a model, you know what I mean
And I do my little turn on the catwalk (there is something on the rig called a catwalk..so this fits!)
Yeah,on the treadmill, on the treadmill, yeah
And I shake my little tush on the catwalk
(repeat)

I'm too sexy for my cat (bailey)
Too sexy for my cat
Poor pussy, poor pussy cat

And I'm too sexy for my bedazzled steele toed boots
Too sexy for my boots
boot's going to leave me

And I'm too sexy for this song.

This is neat-O burrit-O!

"Mystery city caught on camera from space revealed to be massive Midwest oil field.  As the camera hovers hundreds of miles above the earth, major cities can be seen by identifying the patches of light.  In once particular stretch of video, several major Midwest cities like Bismarck , Sioux Falls, and Minneapolis can be seen.  Ken Paulman noticed something else, another massive city to the west that he couldn't identify, brightly lit as the camera passed over.  It's the lights from the Bakken oil field in North Dakota.  The Bakken is reportedly one of the largest oil fields in the world, covering about 200,000 square miles in North Dakota, Montana, and Canada."

BAD IDEA

I worked for 44 days straight, 12 hour shifts, had 6 days off, and am now back at it.  I have been working for 15 days and today I just couldn't take it anymore!  I decided to paint my toenails and fingernails.  As I was painting, the MWD sat down on the couch beside me in our work shack.  A few minutes later, he was sawing logs.  I looked at the directional driller and he nodded his head.  It was time to pull the ultimate Dena prank!  I looked back at the sleeping MWD and both of his hands were exposed.  I started painting a light pink color on each of his nails ever so lightly so he didn't wake up.  I had to stop every few seconds to let out a giggle.  I got all 10 done and what a great feeling!  A few minutes later, he woke up.  He proceeded to send out all of his reports on the computer, cook breakfast, and text on his phone for about an hour without noticing the pink nail polish.  Let's just say, when he finally noticed...there was hell to pay!  I was on the alert!  Nothing was going to get by me.  I reach for my coffee cup, and what do you know...he has spiked my coffee.  Not with alcohol, but with HOT SAUCE!  Dena pranks=BAD IDEA!

Spanksgiving

The oil field never sleeps.  In my year and three months of working for the oil field I had a rig shut down for 4 hours.  The reason they shut down is because the roads were so snowed in that an ambulance could not get onto our location if we needed one.  Other then that, we work around the clock, day and night, weekends, and holidays.  I have actually forgotten what it is like to be in a good mood on Friday because the weekend is in sight and the feeling of dread on a Sunday night because you have to go back to work the next morning. 

Last year I worked Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years!  This year I had to work Thanksgiving again.  I decided that I was going to cook a huge Thanksgiving meal for all the guys out here because I was craving turkey, stuffing, and tators!  There were a few superintendents from Oxy in the neighborhood that stopped by as well.  All in all, I ended up cooking for a total of 40 people or so.  It was a lot of work but ended up pretty darn tasty.

The company men appreciated the meal so much that the next day I got a dozen roses delivered on the rig.  It was pretty funny and kind of embarrassing.  I am assuming flowers to not get delivered to rig sights very often.  I wonder if I would be a man if they still would of delivered flowers?  hmmmm...... Another thought...why do we not have any vases out here on location?  I had to use a water pitcher. 

Making out in the shower!

Have you ever arrived home after a 20 minute drive and hardly remember the drive?  This happens to all of us and known as a subconscious trance.  I feel in my job I sometimes do the same thing over and over again that I find myself in a subconscious trance.  For instance, one of my daily duties is sending out a morning report and an afternoon report.  In this report we document a bunch of data and the last part is writing out what occurred in the last 12 hours.  We get some of this information from the tour sheet which is written by the driller and roughnecks.  The other day I was in a subconscious trance and just copying word for word from the tour sheet to my morning report.  I was just about to e-mail my morning report when I jumped out of the trance and literally laughed out loud.  Here is what the daily tour sheet said.

Should I stay or should I go?

We have had our first snow falls of the year in the past week or so.  Here is a picture taken up by Stanley of those that do not know how to drive when a little snow falls.  In a 6 mile span there was over 70 vehicles in the ditch! Lucky I have my Ford Escape (which I prefer to pronounce as Es-cop-ee' like on Finding Nemo). 

Change

I know I know...I have been a terrible "blogger" lately!  I have a few blogs that I have fallen behind on my reading as well!  This blog is about change.  Lately there has been a lot of change going on our here.  First of all, the weather.  The days are getting colder and shorter.  I come to work in the dark and leave work in the dark.  Our rough necks have been dropping off like flies (is that the saying?  I am not good with sayings, but that would fill a whole other blog).  As soon as the temperature dropped into the 70's the tough boys from down south stayed down south.  We have had people coming and going!  Speaking of going, I headed up to a job near Stanley, ND.  Stanley used to be a very small little town in North Western, North Dakota.  I decided when I got to town that I needed my coffee fix and had to use the restroom (the bad part to being a coffee addict!)  I drove around the whole entire gas station and could not find a single parking spot.  There was a line of about 20 vehicles that were waiting to fill up their tanks with gas.  Good think I had a full tank!  I finally just parked across the street and walked in, used the potty, grabbed some coffee and went to pay.  I noticed instead of only having 2 tills they now had at least 6 tills.  Each line had 5 or more people standing in it.  As I looked even more closely, I realized I was the only woman in the whole entire store!  Eeesh!

Never a dull moment!

On a regular basis, my friends and family say, "Never a dull moment when Dena is around."  I believe this story is perfect evidence for why they say this!

Let's start off with a little oil field lesson.  When we drill the lateral it is not always a perfect horizontal zone.  If it was, we would say that our inclination is 90 degrees.  We would continue to drill at 90 degrees of inclination for the 10,000' of the lateral.  This would be in a perfect world.  Since we do not live in a perfect world, the inclination is constantly changing.  If the formation tends to curve upward, we would say it is something over 90 degrees (90.1, 90.2, 90.3, etc.)  If it is tilting downward, we would say it has an inclination of 89.9, 89.8, etc.  Usually these numbers do not go more then a full degree in either direction. 

We have to keep our motor and bit going in the correct direction up and down in the lateral and keep us in the "pay zone".  So if we have an up dip of 90.5 (our formation is dipping upward) and need to come up in the zone or formation, we would need our bit to travel at a 90.6 or higher.  Does that make sense?  If not, give me a call! ha j/k!

Well a few days ago, our dip went up dramatically and we had to come up in zone.  We were having troubles coming up, so they ended up having to take extreme measures!  Well..when it was all said and done, our inclination OF THE BIT was a 97.77 degrees inclination!!!!  This is unheard of and got us into trouble!!  I called into the office and my boss (thanks Felipe) made this for me!

Pretty hilarious!

Because of this super high inclination, we ended up bursting into the shale and that is not a good thing.  Our office on the wellsite was very stressed out!  I had to get up at 3 AM and figure out the plan forward.  First, we had to run out and catch samples every few minutes to verify that we had gone into the shale.  Once we did this, we then had have multiple conference calls to figure out all the options of moving ahead.  It took ALL day and I was stressed to the max. 

I came back into the work shack and walked by the garbage.  I saw there were coffee grounds from earlier that day and a thought entered my mind.  I grabbed a pinch, sneakily put them on a slide, and pretended to freak out when I looked at them under the microscope.  I had my night hand "take a look" and he could not for the life of him figure out what the sample was.  Like I said before, I do not love rocks, but I work with people who do.  Well this particular young man does love rocks.  It was so funny watching him in dismay by the fact that he did not know this rock.  He used the term squishy to describe it! NEVER A DULL MOMENT WITH ME!

Flare

Oil tends to pool right below pockets of gas.  This is what a rig that has gas looks like!  This was our flare the other day!  Grab the mallows! S'more time!

SLOGAN

"YOUR HOLE IS MY GOAL"

Traffic...UGH!

As I mentioned in my bio..this area used to be quiet.  If you had to pass, you could drive in the wrong lane for miles.  If you drove at night, you never had to turn your brights down.  The street I grew up on never had a stop sign.  Now I sit for 5 minutes at our newly installed stop sign just trying to get on main street!  Attached is a picture I took driving into town.  I had to go 45 on the highway...what is the point of passing?!

Life is crap...Life is good.

I saw a few T-shirts on my last days off that I thought were hilarious.  They apply to my job because ...

A) I am addicted to coffee

B) I'd rather be fishing then working (and that is saying A LOT!) Don't tell my dad, but fishing is not my most favorite hobby!

 C) I could definitely go for a beer after we finish this well!   It has been a stressful one!

OK...now that we know life is crap, it can also be good!  This morning, like all other mornings,

I watched the sunrise.  It was sureal.  Here is my view from my work shack...LIFE IS GOOD!

That's what she said...

I apologize to my mother in advance for this blog...Ky, this is for you! :)

Things that are discussed on the rig that I want to yell "THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID" when they are done talking.

1) We will need to ream the hole.
2) Pull the nipple.
3) Nipple up
4) Nipple down
5) Pull out of the hole
6) What would you like your pump strokes set at?
7) The hole diameter is...
8) Strokes per minute are...
9) Let's wait for bottoms up!
10) The rate of penetration is...
11) Hole depth
12) Don't forget to lubricate.
13) What is the pipe size?
14) Don't forget to use protection.
15) Rotating rubber head.


More to come!

Work Shack

I have officially started my second job as a lead geologist.  I was super excited when I got to work to see we had gotten a new command center (which is the shack the MWD, DD, and I work out of).  A reminder: the MWD controls the tools that bring data back to our offices and the DD basically does the calculations to build the curve.  Back to my new work shack...It has a kitchen and a bathroom!  YAY!  Last hole we had to use the bathroom AKA outhouse and share it with the roughnecks.  I held my pee all day!  I would NOT go in there.  My other option was to pee outside, which I also did not do (even though I am a professional squatter!)  Reminder: I work 12 hour days and start at a quarter to 5 in the morning.  It is so hard to go to bed early because the sun is out until 9:30 pm.  So needless to say, I have been pretty tired at work lately.  I noticed this sign was posted right by the door in our work shack...I don't know about you, but I think it is suggesting I can nap at work! :)

Shopping

It is funny how when things change in your life, your shopping experiences change as well.  When I was in college my favorite stores would of been Maurices, Herbergers, JC Penney, American Eagle, etc.  When I bought my first house, my favorite store to shop in was Home Depot!  I would ask for gift certificates to Home Depot for Christmas and Birthday presents! 

On a different note, I spent a weekend with my little sister a few weeks ago.  Her and I have a pretty good fashion sense (that I believe we got from our mom)!  I have been working now on the oil rigs for approximately 10 months.  I still try and keep up in the fashion world but it gets harder and harder to do!  Here are some examples:

My lil sis looked at me and said, "I like your shirt."  I replied, "Thanks, I got it for $3 at Walmart." (Not sure what I would do if I did not have a Walmart close by.)
An hour later she said, "I love your sunglasses."  I replied, "Thanks, I got them at Cenex." (I am officially shopping at gas stations!)
The other day, a friend made a comment that they like my hat.  I replied, "Thanks, I got it at Runnings." Runnings Fleet Farm!  Runnings Fleet Farm is my new favorite store to shop in...what is happening to me?!?!!?!?!

Smells

There are all sorts of smells on the oil field. 
1) Diesel:  I use diesel to clean my samples.  Diesel, being made up of non polar molecules, will dissolve the "alike" non polar drilling fluid that is contaminating our samples, leaving us with clean rocks to analyze!  I have a bucket full of diesel just sitting in my work shack and oh does it smell!

2) Rough necks: This spring we had a terrible storm in May.  The towns of Watford City, Williston, New Town and many others did not have power for days!  This in turn denied the opportunity for our roughnecks to shower for 5 days!  At the beginning of every shift, we have a safety meeting that is located in a very small room with lots of people (including all the rough necks) crammed inside!  I can describe the smell given off by these boys as a mixture of BO, 5 day old bacon grease (from the last breakfast they cooked), diesel, rotten eggs, the grease that is accumulating on their hair, chew, cigarette smoke, sweat, and morning breathe.

3)  There is a certain smell that the rig gives off and I can't describe it.  It is a faint smell but even after I wash my clothes, I can still smell it on them.  I wash my rig clothes, box them up, and store them in the garage on my days off!

4) Lately, the smell of grilling has made it's appearance!  Summer is finally here and our new shacks have built in grills!  Yummm!

5)  Coffee:  There is A LOT of coffee that is drank out here!  Early mornings + long shifts= not a lot of sleep= lots of coffee!

6) Cigarette smoke:  One guy I work with smokes at least two packs a day.  He coughs like he is coughing up chunks of his lungs.  I refreshed my memory on how to do CPR, just in case! (Not really sure if I want to do mouth to mouth if it comes down to it!)

7) Lastly, this made me chuckle.  I got a call from our safety guy asking if I had an extra box of sample bags that another rig could borrow and replace.  I said I sure did!  15 minutes later he stopped by to pick them up...side track for a minute:  This is the first rig where I actually work with another girl!  She is the MDW and works days just like me.  Most of the time it is just her and I in the work shack all day long.  OK back to the story.  This safety guy comes in, I hand him the box of sample bags, we all chat a bit, and he leaves.  He doesn't just leave the room, but he also leaves behind a very POWERFUL smell of CK1.  Remember that cologne from like the 1990's!!!  UFF DA!  We had to open the windows because it was SO strong! 

If you look to the right...just type in your email address and you will be notified when I have a new post! :)  Have a great day!

Purse

The other day my purse broke!  I was racking my brain to figure out a way to fix it.  Luckily, I had some zip ties in my office.  Before I started this job, I had never used a zip tie.  Now these lovely little inventions are part of my "essential items" list.  Attached is a picture of my repaired purse!



The Arrows are not part of my purse!



My brand new shack!

I am almost officially done with my very first job as a lead.  We are about half way done with the lateral part of the well.  In case you didn't know, we drill straight down about 10,000 feet, then drill a curve, then drill horizontally for about 10,000 feet.  I am the lead geologist for this brand spankin new well by Oxy.  I am going to post some pictures of my very own living shack.  It is brand new and super fancy!!!

Hard Wood Floors!

Stainless Steele Appliances!

Leather Couch and Surround Sound!

HUGE Flat Screen TV!

The un-made Bunkbeds!  Sorry mom...

Another flat screen TV in bedroom.

Shower and toilet

Vanity

Yo!

Click HERE!
I put together a word document on what my job actually entails.  It is kinda long, but has lots of cool pictures! :)  Check it out!

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