Chapter 5: Fixing a Flow switch/What really happened/Senior Prom.

Before we go into chapter five, here's a quick update on today.

Church was awesome.  So glad I went. I get to give a talk next week in church, which I'm super excited about (I'm one of those weird people who love to speak in church.)

After church, Chett and I went up to Ramanda Nash's house to fix my equipment.  Here's what happened:

So, last Monday, I set the guys up to work at Western Petroleum's truck yard in Tioga, ND.  After I got them set up to work, I went out to chase down a few sales. When I do sales, it means I drive out to some big trucking company, talk my way into their office, and convince a supervisor or someone in charge to let us wash their trucks. We negotiate prices, etc.  So on Monday, I went out to Cascade Tanks (a Colorado company) and nailed some work for us.  We were to go out the next day and hit out 20 tankers. These are big water tank trailers they use to transport production water, or drilling water, or fresh water in the oilfield.


Anyway, it was an extremely cold morning, and they wanted us on site at 7:30 AM.  When we arrived, it was about 7 degrees.  This is not a good temperature to be spraying things with water.  It took us several hours to actually get going, between un-thawing the water lines and getting the tank filled with fresh water.

After things were looking better, I let the guys take over, and I drove back to town (to get more chemicals).
They called me an hour or two later, saying that the burner had gone down.  The burner is the part of our trailer that heats the water as we're spraying.  The hot water is what really gets dirt and grime off of everything.  So if the burner is down, everything is down.  It killed the rest of the work week, until Friday night, I had an apostrophe.  You see, next to the burner power switch on the trailer, there are four indicator lights: Therm, Flow, Spark, Burn.  (http://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_200342903_200342903)

When everything is running correctly, all four lights are lit.  But if any one of the lights are out, the consequent ones would also be out.  When something goes wrong, you can pretty much guess which one is bad. In our case this week, the Flow light was out.  It finally occurred to me to check the flow switch, and maybe bypass it altogether. We did both. And it totally worked. I'm a boss.

Okay, Chapter 5

I don't really now how to start this one, but one of the things that comes to mind is why I was kind of an "over-achiever".  I did too much in high school. I was always too busy.  Perpetually stressed out and in a hurry. Wrestling, drama, orchestra, college classes, work, girlfriend, too much.

I wish I had taken more time to just enjoy life. I wish I had slacked off a little bit more. It took me a long time to realize that.  When I was younger, I watched as my sisters got into trouble.  Every single day in my house there was a huge fight, and it always seemed like it was because they had done something bad.  That's what I remember most about being younger.

 I remember my  mom crying at night in the kitchen, and how sometimes she would get so frustrated, she couldn't help but project some of that towards me and Reed. It got to where, even when I was doing well, it almost seemed like her anger and frustration was partially my fault. This only made me try harder and harder to become the better and best at anything. Maybe I thought it would make her happy. I thought it might make her less angry.  Then it became an approval thing.

 Well, all this kind of created a resentment towards my sisters that I carried around for a few years.  And then, I got over it. It was probably sometime in the middle of my senior year.

It was right around the time they moved out of the house. They moved about 30 miles away to the next town over, Vernal Utah.

After that, it seems we talked more, all four of us.  We even all went  to lunch one day, after Reed and I had beaten the crap out of each other (seriously, messed up fight).

We've since all become much better friends and siblings.  I absolutely love my sisters and I think the world of them both.  They have been so supportive of me in all I do.  I wouldn't trade them for the world, and I wouldn't change anything in the past, because it's made us all who we are today.

I love you, Anna and Emily, and I know Reed always has my back.

Well, here's a quick stupid story.

Senior prom.  I had a girlfriend, semi-serious relationship.  She was graduated. I was a senior.  My reasoning was that I should take a high school girl to prom, so that she wouldn't have to sit at home on prom night.  I figured it was the right thing to do, seeing as my actual girlfriend had already gone to prom 3 times...

This was the first of two big mistakes. That reasoning was stupid.

So I did the "right" thing, and asked a girl who was not my girlfriend, to the prom. Which brings me to the second big mistake. Not only did I take a girl who was not my girlfriend to prom, I picked the wrong other girl. I picked a girl, who had had a huge crush on me as long as I can remember (but to be fair, I had usually always had a crush on her too.) This girl also had a huge problem with my girlfriend/relationship (that's what I was told at the time, don't quote me on anything.)

So I'm taking this girl who's not my girlfriend, who hates my girlfriend and my girlfriend probably hates her too but acts like there's not a problem if the girl is ever over at her house hanging out with her little sister.  Got that? Yeah. I was setting myself up for a problem.

I saw Lee (my girlfriend at the time) at Prominade. This is where each couple goes out on stage, their names are announced, and people take pictures and make cat calls (usually red-neck women in the Basin do the cat calls). Anyway, I saw Lee. She would not even look at me, let alone speak to me or give me a hug.  I don't blame her. I'm surprised she didn't shoot me with a crossbow.

So, the dance was fun, but kind of jaded by the fact that my girlfriend wanted to murder me, and that as soon as the dance/night was over, the real fun was gonna begin. At this point, I don't remember all the consequent fights and arguments with Lee, but somehow, we ended up together. We probably even broke up for a few days over that one.

I don't think I made a lot of dumb mistakes in high school. But when I made one, it was big.
There are a lot more of those where that came from. I might stagger them between "Smooth things I did in high school."

If you remember this, and have some input as to what was going on, leave a comment about it!
Also, if there are any stories about high school and you want to know what happened, leave a comment.
Also, Keep telling me you like to read these, and I'll keep writing them. It's very good incentive. :)


Chapter 6: Crime and Punishment AKA My romantic life. I might get to it tomorrow night. Stay Tuned!