The View from a Drawbridge

Tag: training

  • Traveling with Dogs

    My dogs march to the beat of their own drummers.

  • A Real Dog and Pony Show

    Seriously?

  • That Race Thing

    Recently I attended an all day seminar at work regarding race and racism. That’s one of the many beautiful things about living on the left coast. I doubt it would even occur to my former employers in Florida to allow us to have such training, let alone make it an annual event. I learned much…

  • Drawbridge FAQs

    So, there’s actually a person making the bridge open and close? Yep. I get that a lot. Nice to meet you. While there are some automated drawbridges out there (mostly railroad bridges in remote locations with little or no pedestrian traffic), the vast majority of drawbridges have a human operator. Safety is our primary concern,…

  • Bad Bridge! Bad!

    I’d say that working on a drawbridge is a very zen-like experience 95% of the time. Unfortunately, you never know when that 5% of pure chaos is going to rear up and bite you on the patootie. I had one of those days recently. I went to bed at 3am. No, I’m not a party…

  • A Crisis You’re Not Even Aware Of

    I just discovered that the last college I attended, Indian River State College, no longer offers the degree I earned there: Dental Laboratory Technology and Management. This is very sad news. It was the last school in Florida to offer that program. Now, if you’re a Floridian and want to study this subject, the closest…

  • The Cats of Mirikitani

    One of the things I love about being a City of Seattle employee is that I am required to do at least two hours of race and social justice training per year. As part of that this year, I had the distinct pleasure of viewing a documentary called The Cats of Mirikitani. In keeping with…

  • The Pitt Bull Question

    I hear it all the time. “Pit Bulls get a bum rap. I have one. They’re really sweet.” Believe me, I know what it’s like to love a dog beyond all reason. I prefer most dogs to most humans. At the risk of sounding horribly cliché, my dogs are, indeed, my best friends. And there’s…

  • The Gag Treatment

    When I was young, I was taught that if you have a puppy who likes to bite your hand, rather than pulling your hand away, you should push it ever so slightly further in. You don’t want to hurt the dog, of course, but if you make him kind of gag and spit out your…

  • Learning to Fall

    The other day at work I had Fall Prevention training. As a bridgetender, there will occasionally be moments where I’m called upon to work at a dangerous height, so this training is essential. The fact that I never received this type of instruction in my thirteen years as a bridgetender in Florida tells you everything…