Making a name

"CAR 25, TYLER. COPY?" I spoke into the CB radio with great enunciation and aplomb. I wanted to find out where my sparkies were and, not being well practised on the CB, was intent on being loud and clear.

"Um, you know his name is TySON, don't you?" my boss corrected me as he walked past.

Oh. Bum.

"Have I been calling you by the wrong name all week?" I later asked the man in question.

"Yes," Tyson laughed, his name clearly embroidered on his shirt. "It's been a great joke".

And so I have survived my first seven days at Yandi. I am quite sure that Tyson is not the only one I have wrongly identified in that time. There are so many guys here with such varied shifts that it's been a bit difficult to keep up. It doesn't help that it is Movember. I'll meet someone and think "Right. Jamie. I'll remember him as the one with the dodgy mo", only to later realise that they all have dodgy mos. In fact, it's like being in the desert with the Village People.

The people I am finding it easiest to remember are the ones that look like other people. Interestingly, there are quite a few of these here. For example, one guy reminds me of my Tasmanian friend Feebey, so in my head I think of him as the 'Feebey guy' (his real name is Louis). Then there is a guy that looks like Adam Savage from Mythbusters. So he is the 'Mythbusters man' (aka Peter), and so on.

Unfortunately I have also had a problem with this approach. You see the guy who shares my office looks uncannily like my old friend, Carl. He is the spitting image of him. A total doppleganger. So much so that I did a double-take when I first met him and all but said "What are you doing here, you old tart?". Fortunately this dude has darker hair so it's only every second or third time that I've had to stop myself. I'm itching to ask if he's related.

Anyway, today, with 'Can't Stop The Music' on high rotation in my head, I went out on a maintenance job to check that the safety stops were all working along the Overland Conveyor. This is a massive 6km long conveyor belt that basically just moves crushed rocks from one site to another. It runs alongside a creek bed which, although dry at the moment, has much more vegetation than the surrounds. It is also full of all sorts of lizards and snakes and things. Cool! When the wet season comes (which is today given the awesome thunderstorm that just rolled in) people apparently go fishing there. Check it out:

The dried up creek bed, soon to be filled.

The Overland Conveyor

That's me (well, my shadow) in the second one. I would have waved, but TySON was watching and he already thinks I'm a nutter. :D