Two Moves in Two Weeks

A few days after my last post as we were doing laundry in Dickinson, Eric got a call from a Chinese man that he had contacted earlier regarding a job hauling frac sand. We had seen a crew loading the 1,500 kilo bags at the train depot and Eric tried to chat up the forklift driver who knew very little English but gave Eric a phone number. He enlisted the help of our daughter-in- law, who speaks Chinese, who referred us to her aunt who is fluent. Aunt Elaine called the number and made the introduction to the owner of Sea Pacific Inc. Turns out Mike speaks pretty good English and texts it really well. After about 15 exchanges, they struck and deal and we got the job! Thank you Julianna and Elaine for your help!

 I say we got the job because I have been serving as Eric’s co-pilot and swamper almost every day since then. Using our flatbed trailer we strap down sixteen bags as they are loaded, drive three miles then unstrap them and hold up the bag’s loops as the forklift removes them. The average turnaround time was just under an hour but team E got it down to 41 minutes so the boss loves us. The work is repetitive but quick paced and physical so the days fly by, plus it pays well. The only downside is the one hour commute each way on a very busy and dangerous stretch of highway.

 The only way to fix this problem is to move, so all last week we have been moving all of our stuff up north, storing much of it at Sea Pacific’s yard. Sadly, we are leaving behind our friend Joey and his family who have been so warm and kind to us. If it weren’t for Joey’s generosity and help, we may not have been able to last through the winter of sporadic work and slow-to-pay jobs. We will still see him from time to time but will miss our daily laughs and commiserations. Thank you, thank you, Joey!

 We will also leave behind our sun room which we will sorely miss. With the camper gone, Joey can wall off the east end and use the space for a work-out room or whatever else he wants. We are happy to give him a useful parting gift. While Eric works solo, I have been packing, cleaning and consolidating. I took apart the insulated skirting that we worked so hard to install. I find it is much easier to take things apart than put them together.

 Once we find a (semi) permanent spot in Williston, Eric is going to build a wooden bunkhouse type structure on skids so it can be moved. It will have loads of insulation , but be very basic and be over twice the size of the camper. No more sweating walls and freeze-locked doors! No matter what we did to insulate and ventilate the camper, we still had condensation issues which were damaging it. Considering we went through one of the mildest winters in ND history, I’d hate to see what a normal winter would do to our little rolling vacation home.

 Besides moving to Williston, we are also preparing for a trip home, then on to Seattle for Eric’s dad’s 90th birthday celebration. From there we will take the gooseneck trailer down to Portland to pick up bare-root trees for the nursery. After a few days at home, Eric will head back to NoDak with more equipment like the hydroseeder on board, making his round trip journey-slog over 3,000 miles with a total of eleven mountain passes,,,ugh. Then comes the hardest part of the oil boom experience—separation. I know it will be hard for both of us, but I try to imagine what spouses of deployed servicemen and women go through and am grateful that we can talk anytime we want and be together after a one or two day trip. Luckily we will both be super busy, so that will help. My North Dakota experience won’t end just because I’m not in the state. My other half will be here. It’s time to take a deep breath, finish packing and find out what is up the road.

 Scroll down to see some exciting action photos!

A few days after my last post as we were doing laundry in Dickinson, Eric got a call from a Chinese man that he had contacted earlier regarding a job hauling frac sand. We had seen a crew loading the 1,500 kilo bags at the train depot and Eric tried to chat up the forklift driver who knew very little English but gave Eric a phone number. He enlisted the help of our daughter-in- law, who speaks Chinese, who referred us to her aunt who is fluent. Aunt Elaine called the number and made the introduction to the owner of Sea Pacific Inc. Turns out Mike speaks pretty good English and texts it really well. After about 15 exchanges, they struck and deal and we got the job! Thank you Julianna and Elaine for your help! I say we got the job because I have been serving as Eric’s co-pilot and swamper almost every day since then. Using our flatbed trailer we strap down sixteen bags as they are loaded, drive three miles then unstrap them and hold up the bag’s loops as the forklift removes them. The average turnaround time was just under an hour but team E got it down to 41 minutes so the boss loves us. The work is repetitive but quick paced and physical so the days fly by, plus it pays well. The only downside is the one hour commute each way on a very busy and dangerous stretch of highway. The only way to fix this problem is to move, so all last week we have been moving all of our stuff up north, storing much of it at Sea Pacific’s yard. Sadly, we are leaving behind our friend Joey and his family who have been so warm and kind to us. If it weren’t for Joey’s generosity and help, we may not have been able to last through the winter of sporadic work and slow-to-pay jobs. We will still see him from time to time but will miss our daily laughs and commiserations. Thank you, thank you, Joey! We will also leave behind our sun room which we will sorely miss. With the camper gone, Joey can wall off the east end and use the space for a work-out room or whatever else he wants. We are happy to give him a useful parting gift. While Eric works solo, I have been packing, cleaning and consolidating. I took apart the insulated skirting that we worked so hard to install. I find it is much easier to take things apart than put them together. Once we find a (semi) permanent spot in Williston, Eric is going to build a wooden bunkhouse type structure on skids so it can be moved. It will have loads of insulation , but be very basic and be over twice the size of the camper. No more sweating walls and freeze-locked doors! No matter what we did to insulate and ventilate the camper, we still had condensation issues which were damaging it. Considering we went through one of the mildest winters in ND history, I’d hate to see what a normal winter would do to our little rolling vacation home. Besides moving to Williston, we are also preparing for a trip home, then on to Seattle for Eric’s dad’s 90th birthday celebration. From there we will take the gooseneck trailer down to Portland to pick up bare-root trees for the nursery. After a few days at home, Eric will head back to NoDak with more equipment like the hydroseeder on board, making his round trip journey-slog over 3,000 miles with a total of eleven mountain passes,,,ugh. Then comes the hardest part of the oil boom experience—separation. I know it will be hard for both of us, but I try to imagine what spouses of deployed servicemen and women go through and am grateful that we can talk anytime we want and be together after a one or two day trip. Luckily we will both be super busy, so that will help. My North Dakota experience won’t end just because I’m not in the state. My other half will be here. It’s time to take a deep breath, finish packing and find out what is up the road. Scroll down to see some exciting action photos!

Trader Joe's Product Reviews

Things have been quiet since my last post.   Eric’s work, like most people around here, has been sporadic, but rumblings of the ramp-up of spring are beginning to be heard in the distance.  If  I were home, I would be thrilled with the spare time, because I could find so many things to fill it up with, but here, I just feel unsettled.

  The best cure for that mopey feeling is exercise, so we have been running more, including a virtual run for Sherry Arnold.  Sherry was a math teacher in nearby Sydney, MT who was abducted while on her pre-dawn run.  Her cousin organized a run where people all over the world could run in her honor.   We ran 4 miles around Watford City on a clear Saturday that was 5 below zero when we started.  It was a little tough to start out, but felt just fine after we warmed up.  Photos and comments can be seen on Facebook Virtual run/walk for Sherry Arnold.  The turnout was huge and raised money for her two children.

The next day we headed out from the camper to a high point that turned out to be over five miles away over hill and dale.  There is so much more topography here than I expected, and the beauty of the grasslands is really growing on me.  It will never replace North Idaho, but I do appreciate it.

All that fresh air and exercise builds a mighty appetite and we are usually thinking of our next meal even as finish the current one.  I just finished using the last of the Trader Joe’s products that I brought to the camper, so here’s a review for all you TJ fans out there:

Marinated Lamb Tips—These were meant for the grill, which I don’t have, so I seared them in a hot skillet then pulled them at medium rare.  Served with the well-boiled, then thickened winey marinade and toasted polenta discs, they were tender and delicious.

Reduced Guilt Multigrain Pita Chips—With 40% less fat and 45% less sodium, you might think these would be tasteless, but they were positively addictive.  Eric and I mowed through the 6 oz bag in no time.

Peanut-filled Pretzels with No Salt Outside—The perfect snack to take along on a hike.  They still have enough salt baked in, but not on, the pretzel to be tasty, with the bonus of peanut-y protein.  Yum.

Condensed Cream of Portabella Soup—I expected this to be a step up from Campbell’s, and it was, but it still had that weird condensed soup taste.  Acceptable as a sauce fixer-upper, and the ingredients look a lot friendlier than the ones on the red can.  The 11 oz aseptic box is darn cute and camper-friendly, too.

Egg Pappardelle Pasta—If  you were served this pasta in a homey Italian restaurant with checkered tablecloths and a Chianti bottle candle holder, you would swear Noni was in the kitchen rolling it out with her grandmother’s rolling pin.  I served it with heart-healthy Shrimp Alfredo on Valentine’s Day (get the play on the theme?).  I know it is basically double wide fettuccini, but I love it so much more.

 

California Sun-Dried Tomatoes Julienne Cut—These are so handy to have in the pantry for jazzing up just about anything.  The other day I tucked them into grilled cheese sandwiches and Eric gave me that “you’re a goddess” look.  TJ’s product is tender and sweet, and I aspire to dry my tomatoes to be like theirs.

Peanut Satay Sauce—I browned some bone-in chicken thighs (no grill for satay) and glazed them with this sauce.  I know that satay sauce should have a little vinegar bite, but this was a bit sour for my taste, so I doctored it with a little agave syrup.  That did the trick, but I like homemade better.  Not bad, though, and I liked the texture of the peanuts.

General Tsao Stir Fry Sauce—This turned bargain boneless pork chops and some sliced veggies into a scrumptious one –pan dinner served over steaming brown rice.  Sure, the first ingredient is sugar, but that’s why it’s so good! Like all TJ labeled products, it has basically all normal stuff.

Mango Ginger Chutney—OK, I’m a big chutney fan, so I had big expectations from world-wise Trader Joe’s.  Well, I wasn’t disappointed.  Big chunks of tender mango, bits of red bell pepper, raisins and ginger with just enough vinegary syrup to hold it all together…oh, my.  Blows Major Gray’s out of the water.  Mixed with caramelized onions and served over seared pork tenderloin medallions, it was heaven!

Pumpkin Pancake and Waffle Mix—My friends and family know me as a pumpkin nut…I grow pumpkins, collect pumpkin tchotchkes, carve pumpkins, and, best of all, I cook pumpkins.  Making pumpkin pancakes easily in the camper sounded great.  These are simple to make with a few fresh ingredients.  I sprinkled them with chopped walnuts while they were on the grill and served them with pure maple syrup and ham steaks.  They are sooo good! I still have enough for two more breakfasts…maybe this Sunday!

Well, there you have it.  Trader Joe’s rocks, and now they are in Spokane, less than an hour from my house in Hayden.  I’ll be home soon, and ready for another pilgrimage to my favorite store.  Three and a half weeks and counting!

Time Well Spent

I’m so ashamed. I broke my promise.  I must redeem myself.  Looking back on my last post, and noticing it was over two weeks ago, I had to ask myself—what do I do with my time??  Lay around the camper watching soap operas? Nope.  Get my nails done and have thrice weekly sessions with my personal trainer?  I don’t think so.   Go to lunch with my girlfriends?  Sadly, no.  Actually, much of my time is taken up by the extra work that camper dwelling demands.

After the cold snap we had endured released its icy grip on us, we took advantage of the unseasonably warm weather that followed and set about building our “sun room”.  With the previously built pallet/plywood floor as a foundation, up went the 12x20 foot frame.  Eric found a discarded sliding door at the building center, and was able to repair it to perfect working order.  We now have an enclosed space attached to the camper that has Lexan walls and roof on the south side, solid walls and roof on the north and the slider on the west. With shelving and the soon to be completed insulated heated closet, we now have tripled our living and storage space.  On sunny days, the space gets so toasty, we need to leave the door open a bit.  Being able to move around and work in a bright, warm place is an incredible morale booster.

Without making special plans, my birthday turned out to be a fun one.  We went to T. Roosevelt Nat’l Park for a long run/walk and on the drive in were treated to a close-up of buffalo cows and yearlings grazing right next to the road.  They looked so unconcerned and gentle.  As we were running, there were two bulls up a hill from us.  With no trees in sight, we agreed to turn back rather than risk losing a footrace with charging buffalos.  The warm, sunny day was topped off with a steak dinner and coconut cake shared with our new friends Jeff and Karen from Alaska. 

 The next day Eric got a call to service a huge diesel generator north of Williston, and since I had no big plans, I volunteered to ride along. I grabbed several order forms for nursery-related items to keep me busy and off we went.  While Eric started working on the twelve cylinder beast, I stayed comfy in the truck pouring over plant descriptions and filling out forms.  When Eric needed my help I pulled on my trusty coveralls and became an “oiler” for a day, helping to get nearly 50 gallons of old oil out of, then the same amount of new oil into the machine.  After stops at the Laundromat and Walmart we finally got home after 9:00.  Ahhh, the coziness of it all.

Along with (sporadically) writing this blog, I have also been writing articles for our Huckleberry Nursery website—huckleberrynursery.com.  I spend a fair amount of time on these to ensure accuracy of the plant details and look at hundreds of photos to include in the articles.  I haven’t done this kind of writing since college, but I’m really enjoying it.  Maybe you will too.

Another thing I can spend hours on is recipes.  I am a member of several food websites and love to peruse them, sometimes randomly, other times with a specific purpose, like my latest one, Meatless Monday.   So far I have tried four recipes fromeatingwell.com—a strata, a Portobello sandwich, a black bean chili, and an eggplant/chickpea stew. They were all good, with the Portobello sandwich being our favorite and the eggplant dish warranting the comment from Eric, “needs meat”.  I intend to eat meatless at least once a week for the whole year and luckily my hubby is good with it, too.

We haven’t squandered the opportunity to enjoy the record smashing high temperatures here in NoDak.  Right out our door are miles and miles of hilly grazing land to run on along with little creeks and wetlands to explore.  We walked out onto a frozen pond to check out a muskrat den, speculating on what it must be like inside. Probably warm and serviceable, just like the camper.

On Super Bowl Sunday we drove out to a dammed-up section of the Missouri River and walked out on 18” thick ice.  We could hear the ice expanding and cracking and see deep fissures ¼” wide, which was a little alarming to this California girl, but Eric assured me we were safe.  There were ice fishermen and ice huts and pick-up trucks out there.  One group let us try our hands and auguring the ice, and it is harder than you would think!  No one was catching anything so we headed up to the bluffs for a wonderful run, until we got distracted by a slough filled with driftwood.  We poked around for quite some time, finding lots of treasures for yard art and a future furniture project.  Back home, we ran some more and did some strength work in our “gym” aka sun room.

 

We caught the second half of the game at a little bar in town which was non-smoking, had cheap beer, and free food brought in by the regulars, which was quite good.  The pheasant stew was rich and filling and went great with my Newcastle Ale.  Our team won (Yay!) and I won a black Absolut Vodka t-shirt that fit perfectly.  All in all, it was a great day.

There are only five weeks left until I return to Idaho, which I have mixed feelings about, because it means that Eric and I will be apart for long stretches of time.  We are both looking at this as an opportunity for personal growth and know we will get through it just fine.  That said, I’m still getting pretty excited to get back to my home, friends, family, cats, garden, work, stores, lakes, mountains…yeah, I love home. 

  

 Check out the photos below, the fog frost is really cool! 

Staying Warm

Wow, I can’t believe it has been two weeks since I posted!  I’ve been sort of busy, but mostly I just haven’t been in the mood.  Well, snap out of it, Elaine!! 

The second week of January was mostly taken up with helping out Eric while he was hauling frac sand.  Frac sand is what the drillers use to open up spaces in the shale so the oil can flow out of it.  It is not really sand, but tiny ceramic beads, about the size of poppy seeds.  They come in two ton totes from China and cost about $6,000 a tote.  He was shuttling loads from Sidney, MT to Watford City (where we are staying), a 110 mile round trip, sometimes getting up at 3:30 am to fit in four trips in a day.  This meant getting up and making breakfast, back to bed (or off to the coffee house), then meeting Eric with lunch or dinner and a visit while he waited to be unloaded.  Then the weather turned bitter cold and slowed down everything.

This brings me to what we’ve been doing pretty much the rest of the time—dealing with the cold.  It got down to 19 below zero, not counting the wind chill, bottoming out at around 40 below.  This causes diesel fuel to gel, gas lines to crack, and plumbing to burst, generally wreaking havoc everywhere.  Our equipment fared well, due to preparation, but the camper needed lots of attention.  Our camper is designed for cold weather, but for something like fall hunting camp, not this.  The water pump froze, as well as the black tank (sewage), and the gray water tank.  A hair dryer and electric heater thawed out the smaller black tank, thankfully, but the gray tank is still frozen.  I wash dishes into a pan and fling the used water out the door frontier style.  There are two forks and a spatula frozen into the ice outside (oops!)  Miraculously, the water pump thawed with no cracks, and Eric is working on the gray tank right now.

All this week I was feeling crummy and thought I had Eric’s cold, but the violent sneezing only happened at night.  Thinking allergies, I stripped the bed (more on that process another time).  The bottom of the mattress was frozen to the wooden platform, and when I peeled it loose, I discovered spots of black mold—lots of it.  No wonder we both felt terrible!  The bedding was washed with bleach.  We elevated the mattress and thawed, dried, and sprayed it down with bleach water then dried it again.  Voila!  No more symptoms.

Great, but how to prevent the moisture from re-occurring?  One word: insulation.  Now, ever since we parked this camper, we have been insulating it.  From foam board skirting to bubble wrap on the windows, we have done something like thirty separate projects to stay comfortable, making the camper look like a patchwork of pink and blue foam board along with aluminized foam, foam sheeting and R-22 fiberglass all held in place with plastic sheeting and several rolls of duct tape.  Not exactly elegant, but quite cozy with only one 1500 watt ceramic heater and limited use of the gas furnace.  The beauty of a tiny living space!

I will post much sooner next time, I promise!

Scroll down for a photo of our humble little home plus “North Dakota Still Life with Loader Tire”

Job Description: Swamper

This has been a busy week.  On Tuesday, I was up at 4:30 am, making breakfast for Eric and helping him get ready for a long workday driving flatbed.  I spent the day inside reading, surfing and napping.  Eventually I began to feel slothful which made me want to take a run. So at sunset, the least windy part of the day, I did a quick turn around the block (1.8 miles) and finished with some pushups and some ab work.  Much better!

Eric called from somewhere near the Canadian border to say he’d be really late.  Cook’s night off.  I had a salad and some canned soup—bleh.  Later Eric called to tell me he had another job up by Williston the next day at 6:30 am, so it didn’t make sense to drive all the way home just to turn around and drive back .  That’s the way work goes around here (not that I’m complaining!)

 The next day I was scheduled to work at 4pm but I wanted to have dinner ready.  I had a large batch of split pea soup in the crock pot and cornbread just about done at around1:00 when Eric called to see if I could drive the pickup   about two hours north so he could use it to pick up a loader to unload his trailer at a rig site. (The company he was driving for had a breakdown and would pay me to do it)  At more than double my barista wages, I said of course!  (The coffee house has been quiet anyway, and my boss rescheduled me.)  

It was a beautiful, sunny day to drive across the prairie.  Miles and miles of wheat stubble, frozen creeks and ponds, grain silos and farmhouses.  Scoria pits, pump jacks and drill rigs.  Old abandoned farmsteads, slowly succumbing to the ravages of wind and sun, rain and snow.  Herds of black cows were soaking up the sun and grazing happily.  I listened to classical music on NPR and snacked on popcorn and almond Snickers.  Happy, happy.

Due to bad signage and my horrible sense of direction, I missed a turn and added a few (OK, thirty some) miles to the trip.  Finally, I arrived in the tiny town of Ross, ND.  Eric led me to the drill rig, which is the first I’ve ever been right next to.  They are BIG.   He got a call that the breakdown was fixed, but they would pay for my time anyway.  With that we began to unstrap the load, and I gained a new job description: Swamper.  You got yer roughnecks, roustabouts and yer swampers.  The first two are drill rig laborers, the last is a trucker’s laborer.  I’ve helped Eric loading and unloading trucks for years in the nursery biz, so it’s the same work, just different stuff, with much better pay and a colorful name.  It was all fun and good on an unseasonably warm day.  We’ll see how I feel when the weather goes back to its awful self. 

We finally got home at around 10pm and there was the soup, thick but fixable. What a nice thing to come home to.  Eric worked 40 hours in two days with 3 ½ hours sleep.  I think he was asleep before his head hit the pillow.  Awww. 

What I Did for Christmas Vacation

 It was hard for us to feel very Christmasy, missing our kids and home and cats so much.  On Christmas Eve we went to T. Roosevelt National Park for a run, our first since we were back from Idaho.   A storm was predicted, so we hurried to finish before it got nasty.  We saw three buffalo, one ridge away, otherwise no exciting wildlife encounters. 

Christmas morning we had our traditional eggs Benedict.  I made the most perfect poached eggs of my life, probably because I was making four, not eight or twelve like I usually do.  I had to use whole wheat bagels (first time I’ve ever bought a Wonder Bread product), and sliced them into thin little rafts.  Using a camp toaster, I managed to get four of them to various stages of incineration before I got it right (see a photo of the smoky mess below).  I’ve always been bad at bread.  Our kids say the garlic bread is ready when the smoke alarm goes off.  J

Next, I prepped the pork roast for Michael Chiarello’s Forever Roasted Pork, a foolproof way to make an inexpensive pork shoulder into a succulent treat.  After the pumpkin pie came out, in went the roast for seven hours.  Then we set about building our “addition” onto the back of the camper.  This will more than double our space and give us a place for boot dryers, dry goods overstock, crockpot, along with space for workouts, yoga, and shedding dirty, stinky work clothes.

For the subfloor, we used cast-off pallets set on smoothed out soil, then for insulation, we used grass straw raked from the field next to us.  I felt like Laura Ingalls gathering great armloads of dry grass and stuffing it into the pallets.  Next, we pieced the plywood floor.  The wind was coming up, so I hurried into the camper to finish dinner while Eric screwed down the boards and battened down the hatches.

Joey came over and we tucked into our Christmas feast—pork roast smothered in caramelized onions, chopped salad, baked sweet potatoes, broccoli and pie.  We settled in for a long winter’s nap, but the shrieking wind prevented that.  It was predicted to gust to 62 mph, so at first light, Eric moved all the big equipment he could to surround the camper and slow the wind.  It helped, but the camper was still shaking and rocking.

Not ones to be cooped up, we geared up (ski goggles and heavy mittens included) and went for a run on the little dirt road by the camper.  It was blowing so hard, running felt like swimming upstream, so I considered it an amped up workout. 

The rest of the week we fitted construction in between work, meals and manageable weather.  Around here, you can finish almost any description of an outdoor activity with the phrase “in the howling wind”.  Seriously.   We spend a fair amount of time just making the camper more winter-ready, with projects like taping a large sheet of insulation and plastic over the “nose” of the bed area to stop the condensate from forming on the inside of cabinets and walls.  It has worked well.

New Years was quiet, we had E-Bs and Mimosas for brunch and took a nice long run.  While we had some good times last year, we are happy to say good riddance to 2011 and are looking forward to a much better year.  We wish the same for you.  Happy New Year!