I'm at the airport right now... just picked up a paperback for the flight, John Standford's "Masked Prey".
Excerpt, bottom of page 9: "Stokes and Dunn had met on a construction job site. Dunn was a civil engineer, and had been leading a survey crew staking out the streets and drainage for a new subdivision over toward Gainesville. Stokes had been a shovel operator - the kind of shovel that had a wooden handle - and had peppered Dunn with questions about his thirteen-thousand-dollar surveyor's total station."
... Stokes tells Dunn about his love of shooting for a paragraph.
"After talking for a few minutes out on the job site, Dunn had concluded that even if Stokes could pull a trigger, the operation of a total station was beyond his intellectual reach"
I guffawed at this...
I'm thinking COOL... surveyor is going to be the good guy in this book!
Couple of pages go by, then description of Dunn's home, etc., then describing him... "... blond hair cut in a white sidewall, Dunn looked like a comic book Nazi. He wasn't a comic book anything and he definitely was not a Nazi - Nazis were more dumb guys like Stokes"...
"Dunn wasn't a Nazi, but he WAS a fascist."
Oh, geez... Surveyor a featured character and he's a FASCIST!
Sheesh...
Boarding soon... 6 hour flight for me to find out what happens to the fascist.
The author's ex-wife probably ran off with a surveyor for the weekend and never came back.
Just to clarify- the OP states ??Civil Engineer? - so that??s gonna tell you who the bad guy is really quick.... *takes cover*
But, it also says he was "leading a survey crew".?ÿ That sounds like responsible charge to me.?ÿ Probably one of those dopey double registrants who thinks he knows it all. ???? ?????ÿ
Dunn was a civil engineer, and had been leading a survey crew...
A work of fiction I see... ?????ÿ
But, it also says he was "leading a survey crew".?ÿ That sounds like responsible charge to me.?ÿ Probably one of those dopey double registrants who thinks he knows it all. ???? ?????ÿ
I've known civil engineers who became grand fathered Cali' land surveyors (1982) and a few were excellent colleagues, most were run of the mill, and a few were egregiously incompetent.?ÿ Time has passed and they've almost all passed or retired so it's a self limiting problem.?ÿ
I lost my love for fiction reading congressional reports..
I hope the OP is one of those folks who likes to read out aloud.?ÿ
What's a better cover for a serial killer prowling on rural lands? A surveyor using the access of entry law?ÿ to enter lands under the guise of doing a survey. No one would even notice a surveyor on the road side looking into the window of a far away house using his total station. I should pitch that story line to Lee Child for his next Reacher book.
?ÿ
Therein lies the problem.?ÿ People watch too many TV shows and movies where innocent looking workers are actually either the bad guys or the good guys.?ÿ That encourages them to cast a suspicious eye at workers simply doing what it is they do for work every day of the week.?ÿ I had a deputy roll up one day while I was standing at the total station in the middle of a very rural intersection with no co-worker or vehicle in sight.?ÿ He was looking for a jail escapee who had last been seen a few miles from where I happened to be.?ÿ That made for a stiff, but interesting, conversation.
A friend has asked me to point out that if it's a tale based around surveyors and engineers, there wont be any love interests or raunchy bits in it.
Surely you jest.?ÿ I remember a racy movie with subtitles where an engineer was at a party in the building where he lived and he was trying to pick up some hottie.?ÿ He suggested she follow him to his place and he would show her his slide rule.
that's a mathematician, a surveyor would be showing her his rod.
Update: Dunn, the civil engineer, was indeed a murderer.
In the end, he got what was coming to him for masquerading as a surveyor.
Yeah...the Board might be slow and clunky and at times incompetent, but they will eventually chew through the non hackers and scoff laws.....
????
