So, finally, this coming week, they are going to install everything. It was detailed as one trackhoe with a large bucket on it digging a wide enough trench to put the sewer lines, water lines and electrical all in the same trench.  I've never really heard of or seen any contractors doing this before so I was a little iffy about that.  Water and electricity don't mix and in all the years I went to job sites delivering pipe, they always put sewer lines in a separate trench away from the water.  

But, who am I to say anything? It will definitely be easy enough to find the utilities if there's ever any problem, I'm sure it saves on labor costs only having to dig one trench, so there it is.

I stopped by the property on the way home this morning from the Oklahoma run and determined that they probably should move the telephone pole to a different location and go straight back with however many poles they think it needs.  Probably 3 of them doing it that way, otherwise it will have to be 4.  I doubt there is any savings tho going the 3 route since the original pole would have to be moved.  Okay, I said I have determined they probably should move the pole to a different location, I actually am not decided and I'm going to have to go out there and stand there for a while and just look at it and think about future projects that I may entail for the front portion and whether those poles would be in the way of that. 

The power company requires a 30 foot easement for the poles.  Now, I guess I could go out and buy my own poles, install them and then have them wire them up.  I don't think they could require an easement with that setup.  However, I'm not necessarily flush with money now that installation costs have gone way up and I suspect I can get a payment plan from the power company instead of having to dish out a bnch of cash all at once.  

I really have no idea how the power company will treat this. Will it be pay up front for all of it? A payment plan? Or do they install them for free and expect the return in power usage payments will eventually pay for it? A person "in the know" suggested the latter is true.  I don't know, but I will definitely be asking questions.  

One thing is for certain: I won't be able to meet with him on Monday.  I will be on my way to Brownsville.  So, I'm going out there tomorrow morning - when it's much cooler outside - and mark the potential routes for poles and I will take pics so I can discuss with him over the phone while he's out there. Unless he requires me to be out there, then it will have to be canceled and moved to another date.  

I think  I can say thankfully, I have the rest of today off which is more than half the day and all of tomorrow off.  I don't know how that happens when a driver quits and the work he was doing is now available.  But, I think we had too many drivers to begin with.  Well, obviously we do or they would have had me working.  Oh wait. Forgot, I looked at my 70 hour clock this morning, I might have had enough left to do an Oklahoma, but definitely not enough to do a Brownsville run.  

Any new drivers they bring in to our division are not local drivers. They have to either recruit them as OTR drivers or the driver has to move to our area.  I can say that with authority because other local tanker operations going into the same loading plant cannot find local drivers either.  They are all hired. One company hasn't been able to find a local driver for over 2 years.  My days of OTR are, hopefully anyway, over as far as having to be out on the road for weeks at a time.  

Another driver who is quitting said I should apply with a local oil/saltwater hauling company.  They're 2 cities over from me and have openings for local work, home every day.  However, I suspect it's night work and I'm definitely not good with that.  

Well, I don't want to go on too long with this, I need a haircut and go grocery shopping.

G'day