Elisha Johnson

We go in at 5:30 am our foreman gives us the job number to clock into and then we head back to the machine room start the dust collector the auger screws and the rest of the equipment and let it warm up some while we start getting our blast suits and helmets on and new visors in the helmets and we he hooked the helmets up to our breather lines and we blast whatever it is we were instructed to wether it took 30 minuets or all day we always try to be as efficient as we can be with moveing the parts and full size tanks out of the blast room on to the painters so they can get painted and prepped to get shipped out and that’s our usual activities we’ll be in there 10hrs a day on longer days sometimes more if needed if there’s nothing to blast or not enough for both of us to be in there to blast we assist with the paint prep or washing the tanks useing the heavy machinery to get the next tank on the tracks and ready usually forklifts, indoor cranes and so on. It’s A little mixed and matches through the day but usually we’re in the blaster all day.

It was a seasonal position so I didn’t get to be there for very long but while I was there we would go in at 8am and very day was a little different some days we would in the electrical boxes other days the water and sugar usually very light on both of those but enough to learn something about them. We’d clean up the trails hiking chainsaws miles back to downed trees to remove them helping campers if they needed tables we would mow the big lawns and trim what needed it in the public and office spaces cleaning up the roads again removing trees from them when needed assisting the property managers around their homes in the park essentially everything down to cleaning the bathrooms and driving there dump trucks when it was needed. It all changed daily and we didn’t find out till we got there in the morning what we were doing but we always did it to the best of our abilities.

My day generally consisted of coming in at 8am first thing in the morning I’d make sure all the horses where fed and watered grained if there was any indicators a vet may need to be called I had my boss come over and confirm and so on and set up the schedule for putting the horses out then if I wasn’t the one there the previous day I’d check the tractor over make sure all was well with it keep up the maintenance ,oil changes ,cleaning the filters , and front screen if not then then I would do it at the end of the day and do the same for our side by side. Then I’d muck all the stalls on occasion since it was a foaling farm I’d stay overnight to watch the pregnant mares and assist with birthing their babies. Whenever we had heavier machines my boss and her husband would teach me as best they could how to use them the most common of which was a skid steer but it wasn’t very common for us to have them. I’d check in with the other employees and confirm their schedules when it was that time of the week and take the trash out that was how the week tended to go.