changing it up

guess what? i actually have something worth writing about. or i actually feel like writing. one or both of those. so i got the apprenticeship for the plumbers and pipefitters union. i’m not sure what the last i wrote about in here about it was but i didn’t think i was going to get in because i was ranked so low, 40th out of like 66 or something. last year they took 37 so i figured i was on the outside looking in. there apparently is a lot of work around here so they ended up taking like 50 some people which is from what i’ve heard the largest new class of apprentices they’ve taken in awhile.

so i’m working for this company called ryan and associates that is based out of lincoln, nebraska and here in davenport. my roommate bryan says they’re the biggest contractor in our union here in the quad cities. well i did my orientation at ryan monday morning and they assigned to work at monsanto, which is like a farm chemicals and such production plant in muscatine, iowa which is about 50 minutes away from here. ryan keeps a crew of guys out there to do what they call T and M which stands for time and materials. basically they are just a maintenence crew and when monsanto decides something needs to be done related to plumbing or fitting or anything like that we’re the ones that do it. bryan says this is way more relaxed than working new construction and says it’s a good way for me to learn.

so the good news and bad news out of all this is that i’m making way more money. i was making $7.89 at lowe’s and this starts at $12.31 an hour. what sucks, at least for now, is that i have to get up at 20 to 5 so i can make it to the shop by 20 after 5 to catch a ride out there and instead of working 5 8 hour days we work 4 10’s so our actual shift is 630-5 so that means i’m gone from about 5 am-6 pm monday through thursday. it’s a nice tradeoff i suppose to get fridays off but i’m home and awake for only about 3 hours monday tuesday and wednesday nights. and once classes start at the end of august two nights a week i’m going to get up and go to work and as soon as i get home go to class and then get home and go immediately to bed. eh, i dunno.

my friends from lowe’s gave me a nice going away party saturday night at this bar that had karaoke. last friday when i was leaving work for the last time i was pretty sad. i got to know a lot of people really well there and had a lot of strong emotional attachments to the place and the people. but a lot of people came up and congratulated me and wished me good luck and i thought that was really nice because they actually cared about me.

anyway, enough for now.