At the risk of imitating the Monty Python Four Yorkshiremen routine, I was stunned by how plush the rig was compared to my experiences as a derrick man on an offshore rig in the Gulf of Mexico in 1975. %.50 an hour, time-and-a-half after eight hours, and we once worked 36 straight hours. Five minute break in the morning, ten minute break for lunch. That was it. A far cry from college, which I had left for a year to see the real world. A great if dangerous, dirty, extremely loud experience with the hardest working, most racist people I'd ever met.

Inkstained, not all rigs are like what was described in the article. I worked in the Gulf from 2000-2003 and from what I saw the rigs range from what she described to something so dirty and awful that you were scared to touch the sheets. On some rigs the showers were so disgusting that I actually felt cleaner before the shower! I would take my own pillow case out with me and slept in long pants and a long sleeve shirt for warmth as well as to not have to touch the bedding too much. And you don't always have a private shower, most of the time it's community. What was described in this article barely scratches the surface of life on a rig. Try spending 30 days straight out there isolated from your friends and family, tired, covered in mud and pipe-dope half the time and then tell me if you would still call it a 'vacation'. Although I do think if more people experienced it they would have a greater appreciation for the time, work, and money involved in getting the oil/gas out of the ground. Have you ever seen 'Oil, Sweat, and Rigs'? My fiance still works offshore and he and I watch that show and are amazed at the way it portrays what goes on out there. Some of it is accurate, but not all. One last thing, I disagree that the people on a rig are the most racist people you'll meet. Yes, some of them are racist, but people from all walks of life are racist. I would say you'd be hard pressed to find a more colorful group of people anywhere else though. I learned about coon-hunting and fishing and fence building and seismic surveying and the list goes on and on. It was an interesting experience that I am glad I had, but would never want to do it again.

clspet, thanks for putting things in perspective. As for racism, I should have been clearer: My six months offshore in the Gulf was my first experience with Southern working class whites, people who worked offshore because they couldn't make a living as farmers. They happened to dislike blacks in general, with very occasional exceptions. They were quite open about it--and about not liking Yankees like me as a group. I don't mean to suggest that all whites who work offshore are that way. This was a long time ago, when racism was probably more open in the Deep South than it is today. Whatever their views, I nevertheless felt proud to be accepted by them because they worked like dogs.