day 12

this is really late, but i'll do it like it was today.

today, i worked with damon. we finished a basement for a family. i accidentally drilled an outside hole in the wrong spot (whoops!). it was too high, but fortunately, we made it work.

in the afternoon, we headed one block away to a new house and started on that. we finished the upstairs and started on the main floor. the painters showed up to paint the doors of the house and i recognized them! it was gt custom paint owned by grant stauter and travis punke. i went to high school with them. grant was one year ahead of me and travis was two.

day 11

today started a little later and a little slower. i was supposed to meet neal at a house at 7:30 in a subdivision about a mile from my place. he was getting the supplies we needed for the house. he finally showed up around 10:00. springfield electric didn't have the supplies ready so rick sent him to do something small at another house so i just stripped all the wires to prepare them for outlets/switches/whatever. we finished the top floor and main floor by two and headed off to a finished house that just wasn't selling so the realtor decided to finish the basement to help it sell. neal left me then and i finished trimming out the basement around 4:30 and headed home!

day 10

today was a little short. i started at seven out at brookridge apartments and nailed on boxes on the bottom floor for a couple hours. the rest of the day, i pulled home runs upstairs. the morning was not enjoyable since i didn't have any caffeine and i fought a headache all morning. i got some caffeine and painkillers at lunch and i felt much better until the dest started settling into my lungs. i finished pulling home runs for the first four apartments (half of the upstairs) and then left at 3:30.

new thing today: i got to drill out some holes! that hole hog is a beast to use and it spits wood chips everywhere, especially in my eyes.

day 9

today wasn't very enjoyable. i don't know why, but i was just in a bad mood. luke and i were the only ones that showed up at the house in white eagle; neal called in sick and he's the only one of us that knows how to wire up stack switches. so luke and i did all that we could including pulling home runs down to the basement and finishing tying the first floor. luke then left aroung eleven to go to class and i was left alone. i ended up sweeping the whole place, but had no way to pick it up so i left it in one huge pile.

after lunch, i met aaron (another electrician who followed from wm masters) at a house just off airport road just south of raab road. i ended up pulling home runs and tv cable and phone lines on the second floor for him. since i started at six, i went home at four. ahhhhhhhhhhh.........

day 8

today i spent time in two places. i started the morning roughing in apartments just southeast of state farm south. i had to wait almost an hour for nate to show up and show me what to do. all morning was spent nailing on boxes: 1 gang, 2 gang, 3 gang, 1 gang beta, 2 gang beta. then shortly after lunch, rick comes over to me and says, "i'm going to send you over to help your idiot brother." so i went over to a house in white eagle subdivision to help luke and neal rough in a house.

one of the venting guys (for masters bros) saw me and said, "neal! when did you get here?" so i was like, "um, i'm not neal" and then he realized his mistake and was like, "neal's got a mini-me" so i was all, "well, not a mini-you because we don't look anything alike, more like a mini-neal" and he laughed. ah, good times, good times.

day 7

i can hardly believe it's been over a week! so far, i've learned a lot about roughing in, but today was a change in that luke and i stayed in bloomington and just trimmed out a house. it was a two-bedroom house with garage. we almost finished it in a day. it should take him an hour or two to finish tomorrow. it was nice to get home before six, but neal still had to go to peoria to finish the first building. they had only started to put the roof on the second building so it won't be ready for us until next mid-week so i get to stay in bloomington until then!

injury update: i've lost count at how many nicks and scratches i have. most of them are on my hands, but my calves have their fair share too. i also have a few bruised fingers from hitting them instead of staples. ouch.

day 6

pretty much waited for materials mostly. they ended up only delivering half the materias that we needed and some materials that we didn't even order. big things done today were pulling the big aluminum ser cables from the main panel to each unit panel and putting on putty pads (bleh!). tomorrow the unit panels and hopefully the rest of our materials will come. should be done with this building by the end of wednesday!

day 5

not much to talk about today except that we had an addition to our crew. luke hoerr is now helping out at least until school starts for him. we all worked on the first floor today. i spent the entire morning pulling home run wires for two units. the afternoon was spent entirely tying in outlets and switches. we ran out of wire though so we weren't able to finish the units. hopefully springfield electric will deliver what we need tomorrow morning.

injury update: i hit two of my fingers while using my klein pliers as a hammer. it hurt a lot. i counted at least twenty little nicks on my hands (mostly my right). i'm really starting to feel like a blue-collar worker.

day 4

today wasn't bad. it was bad in that it was a saturday, but ok otherwise. it went by pretty fast. we finished pulling wire for the second floor and then tied in all the boxes. that was pretty much the whole day. we also pulled wire for the doorbells.

the good part about working this much is that i'll have lots of overtime coming to me because the pay week goes from thursday to wednesday. i get my first master bros check before i get my last university of illinois check! weird how that works out.

on monday, we get luke hoerr to join the crew and help us out. rick wants us to finish the first building by tuesday. i'm not sure what all is left, but i think we can do it.

unfortunately, stupid blogspot resizes all pictures and it's not big enough for my screen resolution so i've got to find another way to change the background to david's modified version. i'll figure it out later when i have more time.

day 3

today actually went pretty fast! i was busy the whole time. i finished the outlets in the loft and started pulling home run wires on the second floor. i took a break from pulling wire long enough to do some outlets and switches in the one unit i had already pulled wire for. that was the whole day.

apparently, i look like a real electrician who know what he's doing. one construction guy asked me the difference between the white wires and yellow wires. i told him the yellow ones are bigger to carry more amps. i was impressed with myself. another construction guy asked if he could nail a brace near some of my wires. i told him it was ok and he said "you're the electrician." i felt like i belonged! but not quite, because my feet were hurting again by the end of the day despite my brand new new balance shoes. maybe they just need to be broken in; shouldn't take long.

injury update: i received two bloody nicks today. one on my right middle finger where i nicked a metal joist hanger and one on my left index finger where i cut myself with my wire cutters. i used electrican's band-aids: electrical tape.

day 2

today went better. i actually did some real electrician stuff. while waiting for our supplies to get delivered, we marked the studs where the boxes will be placed. we finally got our supplies for the first building (of ten) around mid-morning and then we separated everything we would need at first and put it in the van and everything else we stored in the trailer.

after lunch, we nailed boxes to the studs hence my right arm is extremely tired. after that, i fetched some wire from the trailer and we pulled wire for the loft. wire in a roll is pretty heavy!
we only pulled the wire for the loft because the second floor was pretty crowded. then we started wiring the boxes. neal did the switches and i started on outlets. i'm starting to feel like a real electrician!

wow, that doesn't seem like much work for ten hours. we did spend a lot of time waiting for supplies. plus nailing boxes and pulling wire takes some time too! well, i'm exhausted. i keep going to bed early, hoping that it will help. tonight i plan on going to bed at ten, which is less than an hour from now. goodbye social life.

first day

today was my first day as an electrician. it was a looooong day. i didn't really do much electrician stuff, probably because i don't know how to do much electrician stuff.

i started the day out digging a hole and then a trench to connect the hole to a piece of conduit. i then ran some wire through the conduit and trench and then backfilled the trench. neal and i then filled the hole (with the wire sticking up) with concrete. doesn't seem very electrician. BUT THEN, i hooked up some outlets and put in some under cabinet lights. that was the morning. the afternoon was spent cleaning off grey pipe (they were very muddy) with paper towels; waiting for the contractor to dig a ditch; and gluing the pipes together and laying them in the ditch.

not at all the way i expected it to go for my first day. the rain made things very messy and i did not enjoy that very much. tomorrow i get to start roughing in an apartment building. there are going to be ten buildings (for this phase) each with eight units so i'll probably be there for awhile. i have also decided that i don't make a great blue-collar worker. not that i'm too good for it; turns out i'm not strong enough for it (hey! i'm an engineer!).

new job stuff: i've been talking to someone in minneapolis about an engineering job. turns out, i'd start in the shop (making $14-$15/hr) putting electrical panels together. in about two or three years, i could move up to an engineer and design panels for industrial machines. it takes a mix of mechanical engineering, electrical engineering and computer science. it sounds like something i would enjoy, but i'm not sure if i want to wait for two or three years to be an engineer. my latest correspondence leads me to believe the job is mine if i want it, but i'm still praying about it.