Are you asleep yet?

It only happened once, and then she griped about it all the way home.

Forgot the backsight.

Forgot to email that drawing before going home.

Forgot to call the client like you said you would.

Forgot to get supplies for the field job tomorrow.

Forgot to charge the batteries.

Forgot to....

?ÿ

?ÿ

It is a wonder we get any sleep at all.

Too frequently mine turn to things connected to my volunteer service on boards.?ÿ Last night's worry related to our rural water district.?ÿ We discovered yesterday that an 80+ year-old lady had a major leak at a rental house where her recently deceased son had been living.?ÿ This was a HUGE leak that somehow no one noticed, including our maintenance guy.?ÿ This month's bill for water is more than $5000.

I never left a backsight but I did leave a 200' chrome clad highway chain between the rails on a railroad track one time, NOT thrown.?ÿ Either there had been no trains overnight or the chain was too heavy to be lifted, either way it was still there the next day.

Andy

back when i was booking shots for my luddite boss who refused the concept of a DC, i'd regularly wake up in the middle of the night with transposition night terrors.

Left the field book full of notes laying in a road ditch one late afternoon.?ÿ About 10:00 p.m. I went looking for it and could not find it.?ÿ Thought and thought and thought some more and realized the last time I definitely remembered seeing it was when I dropped it in the grass while rolling the tape after taking several references on a quarter corner monument.?ÿ It was snowing heavily with very wet snow, so I bundled up, hopped in the vehicle and drove to where I had last seen it.?ÿ It was there under about two inches of very wet snow.?ÿ I was able to shake off most of the snow and put it near the car heater for drying on the trip back home.?ÿ Thankfully the ink did not run.?ÿ Yes, ink.?ÿ I always work in ink.?ÿ Don't tell the survey gods who insist pencil only should be used with no erasures.

It?ÿ happened to me exactly as Wendell's cartoon. Went back and got it in my PJ's at midnight.

Don't get me started. Left my base station right next to the road. Woke up out of a sound sleep and remembered it. Got up bright and early raced out there and it was still sitting there sending out data. Wasted a lottery buying day!

I once did a little job in Daly City (just south of San Francisco), wrapped up in time to get on the road home (hour and half with light traffic, which only happens in a narrow mid-day window) and headed to another little job a few miles from my office.?ÿ Got out the gun, went to grab the prism pole and to my horror remembered that I left it leaned up against a building wall in Daly City.?ÿ Packed up, and with a mournful dread headed back to Daly City to fetch the pole and prism.?ÿ 2-1/2 hours there and 2-1/2 hours back, mostly through heavy slow-and-go traffic.

It would have made financial sense to just leave it there and buy a new pole and prism, but I get attached to my tools and usually end up customizing them in some fashion.?ÿ ?ÿAnd I hate losing things.?ÿ The torturous drive was my way of punishing myself for being forgetful.

Our subconscious brain is ALWAYS on.?ÿ I remember having a HARD time trying to solve a problem when I was in engineering school.?ÿ I've always been an early riser and went to bed early, after about 9 or 10 my brain just slows down.?ÿ I fought that problem for about three hours and finally said to myself, I'll get up early tomorrow and hit it again.?ÿ About 3 or so I sat straight up in bed (scared the heck out of my wife) knowing exactly how to solve it.?ÿ I went to my desk and within 20 minutes or so I had the solution.

Our family has had a farm in South Georgia for about 150 years.?ÿ Part of the farm was a country store that had a safe in it.?ÿ When my great uncle, who owned the store, died no one knew where the combination had been.?ÿ My mother had the same thing happen to her.?ÿ She "dreamt" that the combination was written in the back of an old ledger book that Uncle Sam's widow still had.?ÿ Sure enough, there it was, and the safe was opened.?ÿ Nothing of any value except to his family.

Andy

I did indeed forget a backsight, on Rocket Range Road at Edwards AFB. My son drove out to get it, still safe. Not much traffic out there. I know the exact date because it was the night someone murdered O. J.'s ex-wife.?ÿ

Loaded up the gear years ago after finishing off a simple lot survey.?ÿ Drove to the other side of town to start on another.?ÿ Hear the helper asking where's the screw handle thingy??ÿ The connector to fasten the instrument to the tripod was nowhere to be found.?ÿ Reloaded everything, drove to the other side of town, looked around a bit where we had been parked and found it.?ÿ Decided to take a short break.?ÿ I could envision some dog thinking it was an odd looking bone and burying it somewhere.?ÿ Or like the dog in the TV commercial that shows up at the door with the top half of a woman's swimsuit in his mouth.

I was packing up one day and got interrupted by a neighbor of the property I was on.?ÿ I kept putting away things while distracted and eventually got on the road.?ÿ I only got a couple miles before I realized the data collector was nowhere to be seen, but the last thing I remembered was setting it on the back bumper.?ÿ I went back to the site and it was nowhere to be found, drove up and down the road a couple times and nothing.?ÿ Eventually I checked the back seat and it had slipped between the equipment cases that I must have set it on.?ÿ Huge, huge relief.?ÿ That taught me to slow down a little bit, at least in this part of the day.

Posted by: @holy-cow

I always work in ink.

I do too!

@dougie

Have worked crossword puzzles in ink since I was a teenager and sudokus since I knew they existed.?ÿ Does that suggest I am anal retentive or whatever the psychologist's term is for such perfectionism?

Had a crew on a over night trip leave the instrument in the parking lot of the Motel. 60 miles later they turned around to retrieve it. Luckily the motel folks had dragged it in for them.

The worst though is the call from a construction guy "there is a problem out here" and you can't get there until the next day. Note: It usually is their issue, but my ulcers don't know that!?ÿ

Posted by: @holy-cow

anal retentive

Working in the middle of the Mojave desert and on a small hill I found a back sight setup, Leica brand. It had been there long enough the paint had been sand blasted off the legs facing in the direction of the prevailing wind. Either is wasn't worth the drive back to get it, as Jim Frame said above, or the crew couldn't remember where they left it.?ÿI still wondered how long it had been sitting on the hill.

@dougie

After reading this I am also totally confused: