MakePeace, A PBX Hike

manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
8,673
2,586
60
millville nj
www.youtube.com
Forgot to share one of the joys, yes, joys of pulling ticks after a day working in the woods. When I was living and working in KY, the company owner was a total jerk. If he was being nice, you knew it wasn't just to be nice but because he was going to benefit. Well, being a surveyor, one will make mistakes, miss something on a survey, or whatever. This guy would always make it a point to call, give you hell and then hang up. The worst part is he was a book surveyor with very little field experience.
This is where the joy of ticks come it. We were always working late, especially in summer. He would be gone, so, yours truly would proceed to his office and remove ticks. Yes, they had had a long hard day so I figured they needed a nice comfy chair to enjoy. This was a regular thing for me, not mistakes, but always with the tick removal. It was a small victory, but sometimes, you just have to take them where you can get them.
I had a very irritating boss once.me and a coworker raised mosquitoes from larvae gathered off barrel lids outside that held rain water.We put them in beakers and covered them with saran wrap till the larvae hatched and became skeeters hanging on the underside of the wrap.I then took the beaker out and slid it up iunder his desk and then slit the wrap.he would slap all day.I asked him what was wrong.he said these damn mosquitoes keep coming in through the windows and getting me:)I had a friend that worked with me that dropped a yellowjacket he had stunned down his collar unnoticed to him.It stung the crap out of him.I was not quite that bold but we all watched him stomping the wasp and had quite a laugh.It was very mean but he was very irritating.
 
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manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
8,673
2,586
60
millville nj
www.youtube.com
I was a surveyor for about 24 years. I took two classes at my HS (Eastern Regional, Gibbsboro). The funny thing is, I didn't feel like taking woodshop but wanted to take a trades elective. The bonus was we had class across from the lunchroom and got a locker there.
I got a call right after I graduated from a friend who was working as a draftsman for a surveyor and told me they needed a rodman. $4.00 and hour to do title surveys half the day and be a gopher for the second half...how could I pass that kinda cash up? I worked for that company for 10 years until they went under in the recession of the early 90's. Good guys but terrible business men. DuBois & Martin.
Worked for about 6 months for Churchill, got fired sort of on purpose because I had a party chief who was a miserable bastard and ended up in the best company I ever worked for, Gallante Associates. We had offices in Williamstown and Galloway. That's when I got to do some serious piney surveying. Galloway was pretty undeveloped when we started working for Hovnanian. All that retirement housing makes me fear for those woods now.
The prettiest place to survey was definitely Kentucky. We did a proposed power line easement that ran 11 miles from a dam on the Ohio river to a small power station. Along with traversing, we had to topo a 300' wide swath for that whole distance. Beautiful country but sometimes the people were a little scary. Had more guns pointed at me in KY than I ever did in NJ.
This is why I follow your hikes so closely. I can feel the briars, remember looking up in the trees and telling ourselves, yeah, it's beginning to open up ahead...when it wasn't.
If I had it to do over again, I'd have gone to college and become a history teacher and hooked up with a surveyor for the summers. It's a great weight loss system.
I have family in KY in lawrence county where the big sandy meets the ohio.I know what you mean by mean hillbillies,odd the hillbillies in WV seem to be nicer generally.My gr grandad got busted shining back in the 20's and was offered to get out of jail if he gave his property to the state and left state so he did and moved to WV.I've studied the areas history well for genealogical purposes and there was quite a lot of vicious things that went on in that area during and after the civil war.lawless stuff and my kin were right in the middle of it,now dads kin were quakers from pa and NJ,they modified my bad makeup to an extent:)
 

RednekF350

Piney
Feb 20, 2004
5,057
3,328
Pestletown, N.J.
I was a surveyor for about 24 years. I took two classes at my HS (Eastern Regional, Gibbsboro). The funny thing is, I didn't feel like taking woodshop but wanted to take a trades elective. The bonus was we had class across from the lunchroom and got a locker there.

Holy s--- Jay, you and I went to the same school. Your mom and my mom were both moms !
I took the two year survey class at Eastern in 1975 and 1976. I worked two summers as a transitman for the late Gene Conway while in high school and worked 4 summers for Sippel and Masteller as a transitman while I was in college.

It was the greatest summer job in the world. I was in the big woods all day back then because those were the days of the huge residential outbounds and topos. I did transit and tape boundaries for Alluvium, Sturbidge Lakes, Sherry Lynn Woods and the Alluvium offshoots, The Woods of Alluvium, Whitehall and others.
Using a a bulletproof 20" K&E Paragon and a 100' Lufkin with tension handles we got the same results that modern guns achieve today. It just took longer. A lot longer.

After college, I was hired at my current company as an environmental specialist and I received my surveyors license in 1990.
Now, with the economic downturn, I still do my environmental and land use planning work but I am also the field crew when we have fieldwork. We do municipal engineering so the bulk of my surveying work is road topo and construction layout.

Not too many interesting outbounds and corner searching these days.

.
 

Teegate

Administrator
Site Administrator
Sep 17, 2002
25,957
8,704
I took a few classes from ............ Rednek .......... one last week :D

Guy
 
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jburd641

Explorer
Jan 16, 2008
410
22
Port Charlotte, Fl.
Holy s--- Jay, you and I went to the same school. Your mom and my mom were both moms !
I took the two year survey class at Eastern in 1975 and 1976. I worked two summers as a transitman for the late Gene Conway while in high school and worked 4 summers for Sippel and Masteller as a transitman while I was in college.

It was the greatest summer job in the world. I was in the big woods all day back then because those were the days of the huge residential outbounds and topos. I did transit and tape boundaries for Alluvium, Sturbidge Lakes, Sherry Lynn Woods and the Alluvium offshoots, The Woods of Alluvium, Whitehall and others.
Using a a bulletproof 20" K&E Paragon and a 100' Lufkin with tension handles we got the same results that modern guns achieve today. It just took longer. A lot longer.

After college, I was hired at my current company as an environmental specialist and I received my surveyors license in 1990.
Now, with the economic downturn, I still do my environmental and land use planning work but I am also the field crew when we have fieldwork. We do municipal engineering so the bulk of my surveying work is road topo and construction layout.

Not too many interesting outbounds and corner searching these days.

.
I thought you had gone to Eastern. I actually found out that Mr. Munn committed suicide through you, I believe. That guy gave me and a friend detention for playing dots during surveying II (a repeat of Surveying I). Made us come and watch his JV soccer game.
Believe it or not, I left DuBois & Martin to work for Gene Conway for a summer but wasn't ready to be a crew chief, especially when he told me, if there's a problem during a survey, get on a knee and pray. He was really into his religion but the real problem was I wasn't ready for the responsibility. Of course, at the time, I blamed Gene. He was way too into my personal life but that's another story.
I tried college but have to admit, I sucked at math. I never continued with school but did try going in the nineties. Of course, that was the best time ever during my surveying life so, school came second. Classes got blown off because of being on sites until 6 or 7 at times or just working down in Galloway and classes were at Blackwood U.
I never sat for the test, being afraid of my lack of math skills. I could lay out curb around a curve on an offset, reduce a traverse, do curves and whatever I needed but I never had confidence enough to take the test. I have to say though, Mike Gallante gave me some serious confidence. He pulled me into his office on day when he could see I was very stressed and asked me why I was worried. I told him, if I screw something up, it could cost him a lot of money. He told me, let him worry, the worst thing that could happen to me was I could get fired. It was just surveying, not brain surgery. I always kept that in mind and it was the best advice anyone ever gave me as far as work. That's why, when I went to KY, I didn't put up with an overbearing boss. The funny thing was, he liked that. He still got the tick treatment for being such a jerk to everyone.
Lots of great traversing in Kentucky. I'm sure you would have loved it. Saw everything there, BIG snakes, deer running on a hillside while you were standing on the hillside across from them. Bobcats, eagles, turkey, coyotes, and one you could really appreciate, Rednecks galore!
I also found the best black lab anyone could ever have. Sorry, but surveying is in my blood and I tend to blather on about it, best job ever.
 

jburd641

Explorer
Jan 16, 2008
410
22
Port Charlotte, Fl.
I have family in KY in lawrence county where the big sandy meets the ohio.I know what you mean by mean hillbillies,odd the hillbillies in WV seem to be nicer generally.My gr grandad got busted shining back in the 20's and was offered to get out of jail if he gave his property to the state and left state so he did and moved to WV.I've studied the areas history well for genealogical purposes and there was quite a lot of vicious things that went on in that area during and after the civil war.lawless stuff and my kin were right in the middle of it,now dads kin were quakers from pa and NJ,they modified my bad makeup to an extent:)

Al, I was in western KY. Sort of like saying it's the southern part. Every town would have a festival of some sort at different times of the year. My town, Princeton, had a tobacco festival. It was a huge crop but anyway, some towns seemed like an excuse to wave their rebel flags and display their racism, seriously. The klan would openly hand out fliers on corners.
The missus and I went to a civil war reenactment that almost got my ribs busted. It was in a nothing town named Sacramento in McClean county I think. Well, they had klan t-shirts for sale, people wearing them proudly, things like that. Well, this reenactment was Nathan Bedford Forrest's first cavalry engagement, so they had cannons, and about 200 cavalry reenactors. There was a line of trees between the "battlefield" and the camp so, they had to ride right in front of the crowd to get on the field. First came the Confederates to applause, hooting, whistling, all that stuff. Then came the Union, and, being from NJ, quiet isn't a trait of mine. I yelled out "Here come the good guys!!!" Well, I no sooner finished saying that than my girlfriend elbows me in the ribs as hard as she can. Nearly busted my ribs. Funny now but not the smartest thing I could have done.

Western KY was hard at first to get used to the terrain but I couldn't even imagine ever surveying in Eastern KY. We had serious swamps to traverse right through and 300 foot elevation changes in pretty short distances. I had a tough time trying to teach some of the young kids that when a traverse point was set on a hill during the winter, it wasn't wise to set the next sight line through bare tree branches. Hard to cut line 100' up in a tree. I imagine, as much as you enjoy the Pines, you must love KY and WV.
 

jburd641

Explorer
Jan 16, 2008
410
22
Port Charlotte, Fl.
Remind me never to get on your bad side, Jay.
I really like the subtle revenge. Irritation can be very sweet even if you don't get to see it happen. When I first started working for him, we used walkie talkies that never worked to contact the office while we were in the field. He used to get furious when I'd call saying "Kirk to Enterprise, Kirk to enterprise, come in Spock." Then came the phones and a new form of torture...after he would hang up abruptly, I'd call back and say "we must have gotten cut off." Made him crazy but it made me feel pretty good.
Is it obvious I miss surveying?
 

bobpbx

Piney
Staff member
Oct 25, 2002
14,674
4,851
Pines; Bamber area
He told me, let him worry, the worst thing that could happen to me was I could get fired.

Ugh...I could think of nothing worse than that. It is not just the lost of money to me, but the stigma of failure. My whole life would never be the same. But, I realize everyone is different. For some, it may not bother them.
 

jburd641

Explorer
Jan 16, 2008
410
22
Port Charlotte, Fl.
Ugh...I could think of nothing worse than that. It is not just the lost of money to me, but the stigma of failure. My whole life would never be the same. But, I realize everyone is different. For some, it may not bother them.
The reason he said that was he knew I was stressing as if the entire company was at risk with every stake and tack I set. It was holding me back and Mike knew it. It was absolutely the best thing he ever could have said to me at the time and I'll be forever grateful, it actually changed my life, believe it or not.
 

Boyd

Administrator
Staff member
Site Administrator
Jul 31, 2004
9,828
3,010
Ben's Branch, Stephen Creek
This was a regular thing for me, not mistakes, but always with the tick removal. It was a small victory, but sometimes, you just have to take them where you can get them.

Yeah, and wouldn't it have been great if your boss also got Lyme disease from those ticks? :rolleyes:
 

manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
8,673
2,586
60
millville nj
www.youtube.com
Al, I was in western KY. Sort of like saying it's the southern part. Every town would have a festival of some sort at different times of the year. My town, Princeton, had a tobacco festival. It was a huge crop but anyway, some towns seemed like an excuse to wave their rebel flags and display their racism, seriously. The klan would openly hand out fliers on corners.
The missus and I went to a civil war reenactment that almost got my ribs busted. It was in a nothing town named Sacramento in McClean county I think. Well, they had klan t-shirts for sale, people wearing them proudly, things like that. Well, this reenactment was Nathan Bedford Forrest's first cavalry engagement, so they had cannons, and about 200 cavalry reenactors. There was a line of trees between the "battlefield" and the camp so, they had to ride right in front of the crowd to get on the field. First came the Confederates to applause, hooting, whistling, all that stuff. Then came the Union, and, being from NJ, quiet isn't a trait of mine. I yelled out "Here come the good guys!!!" Well, I no sooner finished saying that than my girlfriend elbows me in the ribs as hard as she can. Nearly busted my ribs. Funny now but not the smartest thing I could have done.

Western KY was hard at first to get used to the terrain but I couldn't even imagine ever surveying in Eastern KY. We had serious swamps to traverse right through and 300 foot elevation changes in pretty short distances. I had a tough time trying to teach some of the young kids that when a traverse point was set on a hill during the winter, it wasn't wise to set the next sight line through bare tree branches. Hard to cut line 100' up in a tree. I imagine, as much as you enjoy the Pines, you must love KY and WV.
Heck there is a guy here in Millville that up till a few years ago handed out Klan literature one day a year at the Millville post office.He's been doing it since the 80's,he finally went to jail for something when he got out he changed his tune.I think he got beat up real bad.he is huge,6 ft 7 and about 400lbs.A big sissy,started crap with me on the B one day,bad mouthed Momma.I pulled up in front of his house and the coward refused to come out,called the cops on me,another cb'er told me they were on the way and i pulled out,went around the block just as they were pulling into the spot I just vacated,close call.Back then i was 33 and 190lbs,he was same age and the size mentioned above,like I said a big coward.
I love wv and ky,used to be a big caver before Momma supersized me.I'm also a civil war buff and while I'm glad the union was preserved and think slavery quite an embarrassment for a country where all men were created equal I do tend to sympathize with rebels mainly because I'm no big fan of being told what to do by an overbearing government and the knowledge that while misguided most southerners the poor ones anyway fought because they were invaded.They calim the war solved the question of wether secesh was legal.I think it was leagl to secede as it was also within the norths right to try and stop it.Might makes right but nothing is solved permanently.Secesh may be tried again someday but probably not a sectional secesh but a dividing of political systems.Conservative vs liberal,I see it coming.
Al
 

bobpbx

Piney
Staff member
Oct 25, 2002
14,674
4,851
Pines; Bamber area
I do tend to sympathize with rebels mainly because I'm no big fan of being told what to do by an overbearing government and the knowledge that while misguided most southerners the poor ones anyway fought because they were invaded.

They deserved invasion after firing on Fort Sumter and seizing US government property. Most of the poor fought because the rich landed-gentry told them they were having their rights taken from them. In short, they were used. President Lincoln never recognized the secession as legitimate, much to his credit.
 

manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
8,673
2,586
60
millville nj
www.youtube.com
There were no laws on the books or anything stating that secession was illegal.They every right to try since it was never specified that once your in your stuck there but then again the north had a right to try and stop em. I believe the north won because they had a better cause not to mention more people and better weaponry and more rsources but I always will have sympathy for anyone who tells uncle Sam to kiss off when he gets too big.The only probl;em was is that Uncle Sam was right to stnad against slavery and I believe that is the only reason that the north won when it comes odwn to it.God cares not one whit about secession or lack thereof but what we were doing to another race had to stop.We paid in blood for it.If the south had of freed the slaves early on then they may have won but then what would have been the point of secession anyway?North and sout were guilty of slavery,not just the south but they held the bigger blame.
 

manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
8,673
2,586
60
millville nj
www.youtube.com
My moms moms family in KY used the war to settle personal scores.They were Rebels and my gr gr granddad disappeared at the very end of the war and it appears it was a revenge killing to get even with him for a murder he was in on earlier in the war.He was a guerilla and by order of Lincoln they were fare game with no trial and no questions asked so there was never any great inquiry as to what happened to him.There was actually family in the union camp too and they fought each other more from old hatreds then any allegiance to one side or the other.Moms Dads sisde in WV were equally divided.Now Dads side here in NJ were solid yanks had one uncle lose and the regain the Codori barn prior to and after Picketts charge,he was cavalry and then a gr gr gr grand dad was infantry and charged Marye's heights at Fredricksburg,It's a wonder he even lived through that.
I think Lincoln was the greatest president ever and am glad he was there for the occasion.The rebs had a bad cause against a mostly good government so I'm glad the secesh didn't succeed on the other hand revolution is in our blood and I can see it on the horizon again.The south may not do it again but the nation may split again over political ideologies as we seem to be already split in half by such every election. The British were not aware of a problem till there were dead redcoats on the ground,probably be the same way next time too.
 
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