Somebody's Soapbox

Sample Swagelok Fittings

Well, I have been tossing the idea around in my head about posting a blog.  I have been doing quite a bit of international traveling lately and I stumbled upon a soap box on the side of the road, so here I go.  Most of what I feel like writing about is things I have seen that are different or strange to me - for instance - Yesterday I saw a guy playing the game jacks using a bunch of spare Swagelok fittings.  Well, not the whole fittings, just the nuts on the end.  He was sitting quietly in his space with a bunch of these laid out in front of him, then he would pick one up, throw it in the air and attempt to pick up the rest of the fittings and then try to catch the one he threw in the air.  It intrigued me because I have not played jacks, or even thought about playing jacks, in probably 20 years.  Besides, each time I played jacks, I usually had more fun trying to get as many jacks spinning as I could before I was put in the corner for throwing the ball at my twin sister and giving her a bruise.  I have noticed that when I get bored, I usually find my self resorting to entertaining myself with some form of technology (iPod, iPhone, TV, YouTube, Facebook, etc.) however, this gentleman was quite content to just sit there and play with his jacks Swageloks.  I almost sat down and joined him, except I did not have any spare fittings to play with.  That, and the fact that it would not look good if a customer walked by and saw me blatantly wasting time.

I'm going to get off my soap box now.  Stay tuned, you can rest assured that I am going to leave it in a safe place, and I will return sometime.