The drilling has begun. They fired up the big diesel engines that power the rig and started the drill spinning. We now have the steady roar of the rig running as well as our own generator.
The gate quiets down after 10:00pm or so and I can usually hit the sack for a few hours. Last night I had several vehicles dinging my driveway bell and they were all spaced about an hour apart. Doesn't leave much time for snoozing :-(.
No more snake reports today. Yay! Rudee doesn't like snakes and I can do without them. We came prepared with a small scoop shovel with a long handle that sits on the patio right next to the front door. I would rather get a gun and shoot these things but guns are frowned upon at drilling rigs so the shovel will be "weapon" of choice. Let's hope it doesn't come to that!
Tuesday and Thursday are "salesman" days and these are the only days the Company Man will take sales calls. Several salesman came in offering their companies services. I guess to be "politically correct" I should say "sales persons" since at least 1/2 of them were women :-)
Rudee was trying to wash dishes tonight and the flow of water slowed and then stopped. What's up with that? Since it was dark I grabbed a flashlight and headed for the water tank. Oh oh, tank is empty :-( I guess we were using more water than we thought or, more likely, the tank wasn't completely full when we left the yard last week. I called our supervisor Roger and told him we were a little thirsty and needed filled up :-). He said someone will be here tomorrow to top up the tanks. Our diesel fuel tank for the generator is down to about 30 gallons which shows we are going through about 10 gallons of diesel per day.
Our fresh water tank in the Montana was still 2/3 full so we will just use it until they fill the other one.
Yesterday was pay day! Whoo hoo, happy dance :-) My check is mailed to us so we rented a P.O. box in Cotulla the first day we were here. We have already gotten our first mail drop from the UPS store in Brownsburg and they are forwarding another batch to us this week. I'll probably go into town Friday afternoon to pick up the mail and some grocery items. Pizza Hut has a portable kitchen set up in the parking lot of the grocery store and they open their doors, well actually it's a "window", around 4:00pm so I may time things so that I can bring a hot pizza home for supper :-)
Cotulla is a small town in the middle of an oil boom and is trying to keep up. The grocery store is large and has a nice selection. The prices are a little higher than we are used too. Not a lot higher but 50 cents here and 75 cents there adds up pretty quick.
There are a couple of restaurants that some of our crew has been to and said they are pretty good. For fast food there is a Wendy's, McDonalds and a Dairy Queen.
The Ace Hardware is well stocked and is where we got our "snake shovel" :-). There are a couple of gas stations and that is about it for Cotulla.
There are all kinds of rumors flying on the RV forums that there is a large number of gate guards sitting around waiting for assignments. I have heard upwards of 30 just sitting in RV parks or at the company storage yard. I don't know if this is accurate or not and if it is, I have no idea how long it will be before they get a gate. Makes us feel pretty fortunate we are settled in here with a gate to guard.
The weather has been in the mid to upper 80's during the day and in the upper 60's at night. This is supposed to all change tomorrow with a predicted high of 66 and the low tomorrow night of 39. Brrrr. Guess I better keep my long johns handy! I'll keep you posted.
sounds like yall are doing great
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