kenv
Trail Wise!
Posts: 974 
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Post by kenv on May 17, 2017 10:23:57 GMT -8
As a teen I once hired on as a farm hand. Moved irrigation pipe all day long. That lasted a week before I came to my senses. Also cemented into my mind that I would go to college and get a degree. In retrospect, the most important week of my life.
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gabby
Trail Wise!
Posts: 4,539
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Post by gabby on May 17, 2017 10:33:45 GMT -8
As a teen I once hired on as a farm hand. Moved irrigation pipe all day long. That lasted a week before I came to my senses. Also cemented into my mind that I would go to college and get a degree. In retrospect, the most important week of my life. I think it was a month in a gravel pit sorting gravel that did it for me! |
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echo
Trail Wise!
Posts: 3,332 
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Post by echo on May 17, 2017 10:35:44 GMT -8
I worked for my grandfather from 12 to 16, he bought scrap metal and furs and hides and antlers and resold them. I skinned carcasses of every possible fur bearing animal, burned insulation off reader cable, stomped acres of old beer cans flat, hauled used car batteries around, sawed antlers off deer and elk skulls and removed the brains, used jack rabbit hides pickled in formaldehyde to make jackalope, dug the irony teeth out of Elk skulls. Stomped rock salt into mountains of deer hides 12 feet tall, Pulled quills from dead porcupine, and once bought a live bobcat and cared for it and my grandpa found a zoo to buy it.
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gabby
Trail Wise!
Posts: 4,539
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Post by gabby on May 17, 2017 10:37:37 GMT -8
I worked for my grandfather from 12 to 16, he bought scrap metal and furs and hides and antlers and resold them. I skinned carcasses of every possible fur bearing animal, burned insulation off reader cable, stomped acres of old beer cans flat, hauled used car batteries around, sawed antlers off deer and elk skulls and removed the brains, used jack rabbit hides pickled in formaldehyde to make jackalope, dug the irony teeth out of Elk skulls. Stomped rock salt into mountains of deer hides 12 feet tall, Pulled quills from dead porcupine, and once bought a live bobcat and cared for it and my grandpa found a zoo to buy it. ...so now you're absolutely ready for backpacking! :-) |
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tigger
Trail Wise!
Posts: 2,547
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Post by tigger on May 17, 2017 10:55:00 GMT -8
The cleanest and dirties job at the same time - I spent over a month on the Greenland Ice Sheet, digging pits and holes every day. I never showered or bathed the entire time. When we got off the ice sheet, that was THE best shower I've ever had.
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amaruq
Trail Wise!
Call me Little Spoon
Posts: 1,264
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Post by amaruq on May 18, 2017 5:00:16 GMT -8
I worked labour for my father's concrete and paving firm when I was in my teens. Hard work, sweat, dirt, and cement. The latter being the worst offender; hard on the skin.
In my career, I've entered into 50+ year old sewers for structural inspections. Thankfully the sense of smell is quickly overpowered and dulled. But the treasures can be rewarding or at the very least surprising: precious jewelry, shovels, masonry blocks, car batteries. Primarily, however, I find myself stuffing my 6'2" frame into tightest locations within the bellies of our small-diameter tunnel boring machines. They tend to be lined with mud, grease, thick and sticky polymer or other foaming agent, and copious quantities of hydraulic oil. With no washrooms down below the surface and no quick means back up, the water in the invert of the tunnel usually contains a little something extra...
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Post by ashepabst on May 18, 2017 5:32:31 GMT -8
i spent a summer working for a guy who had the maintenance contract at a UPS hub. I spent my days cleaning out the debris traps around the conveyor belt motors and where belts converged.
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rebeccad
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Writing like a maniac
Posts: 12,687
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Post by rebeccad on May 18, 2017 7:54:23 GMT -8
Not too many truly dirty jobs in my life, but I did enough in food service (from dish room to head cook) to know that can be pretty icky. But nothing in the kitchens was as gross as custodian work in a men's dorm at college. Yuck.
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VAN
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Posts: 133
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Post by VAN on May 18, 2017 12:27:30 GMT -8
Not really dirty perhaps, just not something most people have done. I worked as a hospice social worker and had to spend a lot of time with dead bodies. I'd get called in the middle of the night to pronounce death at a home or nursing home. I'd sit and wait, most often alone, until the funeral home would arrive. We'd complete some paperwork and they'd remove the body. I got to know the local guys from every funeral home due to it being such a regular occurrence. One time, we had a difficult time removing the rings from a lady's fingers. The daughter wanted them before the body would leave the house. We had to soap up her hands, and practically force them off. Looking back on it now, it was funny at 3am to see two men and me with soap all over our hands trying to help this poor lady be free of her gold rings. It was probably difficult and sad for the family. Another time, it took the funeral home almost 2 hours to get there and the family didn't want to stay in the room. The nurse and I sat and played cards while watching over the body. Nothing like a game of crazy 8's with a dead man.
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desert dweller
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Power to the Peaceful...Hate does not create.
Posts: 6,291
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Post by desert dweller on May 18, 2017 13:00:02 GMT -8
The nurse and I sat and played cards while watching over the body. Nothing like a game of crazy 8's with a dead man. That's quite a story, VAN. |
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Post by hikingtiger on May 19, 2017 9:11:05 GMT -8
Nothing like a game of crazy 8's with a dead man. Especially if the deceased is winning. |
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Post by cgaphiker on May 27, 2017 8:42:39 GMT -8
It wasn't my job, but my ex-wife got a job at a veterinary hospital two weeks before we got married. She had to feed and clean the various kennels, and the large animal barn. Twice a day on weekends and holidays. I of course helped her many, many, many times.  I saw a lot of animals in various degrees of distress. Awful stuff sometimes. I also saw some really cool stuff too. That was definitely a dirty job even if it wasn't mine. |
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tarol
Trail Wise!
Redding, CA
Posts: 582
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Post by tarol on May 29, 2017 12:35:20 GMT -8
I've helped out a few times cleaning up garbage with our rec techs - managed to stay away from pit toilet duties, though, lol Wouldn't want that job!
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Post by High Sierra Fan on May 30, 2017 3:03:43 GMT -8
I worked part time in a research lab that as one of my duties had me visiting a slaughterhouse to get samples. They especially needed some things from cows and as they were usually slaughtered first as they're big (usually retired dairy) I'd sometimes get there after they'd been processed. So I'd have to get into the trailer dump truck and walk around on the cargo of internal organs to locate what I needed.
Things got pretty messy up to about my knees....
As a summer lineman for Western Union I climbed creosote coated poles along railroad right of ways around NYC, not THAT was dirty.
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Post by bluefish on May 30, 2017 5:42:04 GMT -8
Hot tar roofing in Arizona. Choice: 3rd degree burns or heavy long sleeves in 100+ degree heat. Lots and lots of farm work, doing mechanical work in dairy and chicken barns. Try cleaning the dead birds out of cages with a 1,000 birds cackling their disapproval. Or crawling under an egg packing machine that has spewed 4-5" deep of broken eggs on the floor. Knee deep in cow manure is basically cake in comparison. Smell-wise, maybe burying dead cattle that had bloated up from the hot Owens Valley sun, after they had died from eating water hemlock along the river. When they burst open as you dragged them to a pit, even the view of the Sierra escarpment was not enough recompense. Honestly, I've been getting dirty on the job every day for the last 45 years, it really isn't much of a big deal anymore.
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