Work is...

Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666.
--Revelation 13:18

But the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who had performed the signs on its behalf. With these signs he had deluded those who had received the mark of the beast and worshiped its image. The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur.
--Revelation 19:20 (NIV)

At the industrial site where I work, there is a sulfuric acid plant. The first step of sulfuric acid production is to burn sulfur. That sounds pretty horrible, but the vast majority of the product of combustion is converted to sulfuric acid; only a little bit is emitted into the air.

When I've read Revelation in the Bible since I started working at this plant, the parts about the lake of burning sulfur always remind me of work. While we don't have a lake of burning sulfur there, we do have a pit of molten sulfur, and the sulfur gets pumped out of the pit to a furnace where it is burned.

Now I'm involved in a project involving a bunch of the plant's motors. This includes connecting them to a modern computerized control system instead of buttons on the control room panel. Every set of on / off switches on this control system needs a tag number, and one of these motors got the tag number HS-666. This motor runs a pump. This pump moves molten sulfur from the sulfur pit to the burner.

Conclusion: work is hell.

Theology and my job

Here's a post that talks someone's writing about what Martin Luther said about the "theology of glory" versus the "theology of the cross." (Yes, I'm writing about someone who wrote about someone who wrote about what someone else wrote. Quit your complaining. I sometimes write stuff without links to other stuff.)

Internet Monk: Glorious Ruin

(If that doesn't give enough background info, read up on "Theology of the cross" on Google or Wikipedia.)

Something kind of funny that I noticed: "The theology of glory is the natural default setting for human beings addicted to control and measurement." My title at work is "Process Control Engineer." My job revolves around control and automation. That includes designing computerized controls that will keep pressures, temperatures, flow rates, etc. fairly constant in an industrial plant. And you can't control what you can't measure. Therefore, my job is all about control and measurement.

I'm sure this isn't what this author is talking about, but it's kind of a funny connection. At least to this nerd.

But more seriously, who doesn't prefer "work to suffering, glory to the cross, strength to weakness, wisdom to folly, and, in general, good to evil" like Martin Luther's "theologian of glory"? It's so easy to run from suffering even if it seems to be for something worthwhile. And years of being a Christian still leave me with a weak grasp on what it means to follow Jesus and do good things without trying to earn God's favour, without that sense of obligation rather than simply out of love.

When Cathy goes on call

My wife is doing her medical residency, and that means she has to go on call at times (ranging anywhere from not at all to a couple times a week, depending on which rotation she's on). And for a medical resident, "call" means being at the hospital for at least 24 hours straight, sleeping if she's not busy, until the pager goes off.

The evening before call can be a full evening. She'll have three meals during her time away and prefers not to buy them at the hospital, so she packs a bunch of food in the evening. Maybe I try to help her out where I can or maybe I try to get something else done. But however it goes, there's less time to sit or walk together and just enjoy each other's presence.

The next morning we both leave for work, but my work day is a normal length. I come home to a quiet house--not unusual even on a non-call day, but today it stays quiet. I make myself some supper and have nobody to share it with. Later, maybe I get some stuff done around the house, or I get together with friends, or I do some grocery shopping. I'm more of an evening person than Cathy is, so I may stay up later than I normally would if she's home. Maybe I waste time on the internet. Sometimes I stay up later than I should. I may be more of an evening person than she is, but I'm not a big night person.

I fall asleep alone, wake up in the morning, and go to work. I know that sometime this morning, she will get off work and come home. She probably only got a few hours of sleep. But she doesn't sleep well in the mid-morning, so she saves the rest of her sleep for the afternoon.

When I get home from work, she's probably asleep still. I go to our bedroom and give her a kiss and she starts to wake up. After she wakes up, she holds me tight and gives me a kiss. Together we make supper and have some time for some good conversation. One or both of us may go out for some evening activities, but regardless, we do have some quality, relaxing time together.

Absence really does make the heart grow fonder.

The work fart

Hypothetical situation:

You share an office at work with one other person.  Your office mate is out of the room, but you don't know how long he'll be gone.  Maybe he went down the hall to ask someone a question and he'll be back any minute.  Maybe he's in a long meeting or even went to another building.  But you've got some gas building up and you'd like to let it out.  Your last fart was fairly stinky so you'd prefer not to let it out if your office mate is about to return.

What do you do?  How hard do you try to hold it in?  How long be for you give in and let it loose?

Night shifts

Tonight is my second night in a row sleeping at home. Before that I worked eight night shifts in a row. I was helping with starting up the sulphuric acid plant at work. We made a bunch of changes to the control system while it was shut down for maintenance, so they got me and another engineer to rotate shifts during startup to troubleshoot the control system and help the operators get used to the changes.

This was my first experience with consistent night shifts. (I helped with another plant startup last fall for about a night and a half, and those times weren't nearly as scheduled.) So here are a few of my thoughts:

I got to know some people a lot better. When a big part of our job is just to be there just in case someone needs help, interesting conversations can happen.

Sometimes it's nice to have some time when I don't really have to do anything and it's still considered work. Normally if I've got nothing to do on one project, I pull out a different project and work on it.

In twelve-hour shifts, especially when there are less people around for conversations, there is too much time with nothing to do.

Just like when I helped with that other startup last year, I got kind of tense waiting for stuff to happen. When I arrived on certain days, I didn't know exactly what time the most important stuff would be happening, and neither did the bosses. I need to learn to get less tense when things get delayed and I'm waiting around. I also didn't like not knowing how many nights I'd have to work.

I don't regret trying night shift, but I don't want to do it regularly.

Sympathy for the beaver

"All them birds and predators just take from the land, but the beaver always gives a dam."
--The Arrogant Worms

There's a buffer zone between the plant where I work and the nearest neighbourhood. The buffer zone is basically a park, but it's owned by the owners of the nearby plants. One day last week during my lunch break, I went for a walk with a co-worker, and we decided to walk down a trail that goes along a creek. As we got closer to the end with the beaver dam, we saw lots of freshly-cut trees lying on the ground, with lots of teeth marks where they were cut. The beavers had been busy.

When we got to the dam, we saw another co-worker. He showed us two beaver traps that had been set on the dam. (I'm not sure if they were set by the city government or by the company that owns the land.) He said a couple of beavers had been caught and killed earlier that week.

I couldn't help but be disappointed. They're killing our national animal! And then the less sympathetic side of me kicks in and reminds me that beavers are a pest when they're in a city. The co-worker who showed me the traps pointed out how few tall trees there are near that part of the creek, and he said it's because of years of beaver activity.

Maybe it's necessary to keep the beavers out of the city to keep the park in better shape, but I wish it wasn't necessary. Are these trees any more important than the ones they cut down to build the plants? Besides, I still think the area around the creek is beautiful even if all the trees are short. But maybe it would get a lot worse without any animal control around there, and maybe it's harder for predators to get into the city so beavers can naturally do more damage there.

Why life needs some messes

An empty stable stays clean, but no income comes from an empty stable.

--Proverbs 14:4 (NLT)