Week 7- Cody Wales- Burlington Bees

Cody Wales
Monday, May 16, 2011
Burlington Bees

Well since the double header ran smoothly yesterday I thought coming in to work today at 10:00am was going to be a smooth and easy day. Boy was I wrong. I am beginning to think my days are getting worse and worse as the days go by. Do not get me wrong, I love my job; it is just the way things are beginning to be run. T.J., the guy that gets paid for this job, is getting lazier and lazier as the days go on. It is getting to the point where I run this place, even during the Bees games. Today I came into work and got straight started on my work. First thing I did was get everything together to fix the game mound and home plate area. Tony and I got started right away. We wanted today to run smooth so we worked together on getting everything perfect. Games mound and home plate area complete. Next was to fix the bullpen mounds. Tony was working with me this morning and we decided that we were going to make the bullpen mounds look just as good as the game mound. This morning was great because me and Tony finally clicked and found our routine working together. Once we got the mounds finished we went straight into our next task, edging the entire field. This includes the warning track and the infield skins. Of course after edging comes raking up the grass clippings. So to begin the morning T.J. told us a list of things that he wanted done today. The list was fairly long. We had to maintain the whole field. This includes mowing, edging, raking, sweeping the outfield, painting the foul lines over, dragging the warning track, cleaning up around the shop area, emptying the trash, to anything else that needs to be done. The thing about this is that T.J. gave us this list and then just leaves. He was gone for about two hours then comes back with Burger King and just eats in front of us, not offering us to go to lunch for anything. At this point it is already 1:00pm, usually lunch is at 11:30am or 12:00pm. So by this time I am getting frustrated and I can tell that Tony is getting frustrated as well. So we go on about our day like nothing is wrong. Like I said earlier me and Tony were working in sync with each other and our day was going smooth. Once we would finish a job we would walk back to the shop area and T.J. would be gone. He would stay gone for hours. Again, we still have not eaten lunch and T.J. is still gone. It is getting closer to 3:00pm and we only have two tasks left to complete for the day. We still have to drag the warning track and pick up grass clippings and paint the foul lines. So as time goes on I decide to take control and I tell Tony that we are cutting out and going to get lunch with or without permission from boss man. At 3:00pm we dip out and go get lunch. While at lunch Tony and I discuss what our day has consisted of and what we got to do to keep it going so smoothly. We got a plan together and headed back to work. Usually T.J. allows us an hour or so for lunch but today we were not on T.J.’s time we were on our own time. As long as we got our jobs done and done them correctly, we were satisfied. When we got back from lunch I finished dragging the warning track while Tony got the strings lined out for painting the fouls lines. Dragging was done and Tony had started on one line while I got started on the other. Tony and I were in such good sync today that it seemed like we would finish our jobs at the same time. Well now after a long day and super hard work, everything was finished. We sat back at the shop for a few and ran over our list for the day and made sure we covered everything and that it was done correctly and to the best of our abilities. Of course, everything was perfect. So as our day came to an end T.J. decides to show back up. He never said a word to us, no thank you good job or nothing. He grabbed the hose and started watering the infield, held up both hands indicating 10:00 bells. 10 bells means to be at work at 10:00 o’clock in the morning. Well I do not know what the tension was today between T.J. and us but whatever it was made Tony and I click and we still got everything done in time to get out of here before 5:00pm. Geez today was a tiring day plus the hours seemed mighty long but it was productive and well needed. Despite the fact Tony and I are the main ones that keep this park running, T.J. gets all the credit. Oh well, enough complaining again but I told you it was coming another time. I just had to get that off my chest. Monday down Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday to go, off on Friday and the rest of the weekend. Goodnight world, another update tomorrow! Hopefully another positive one!


Cody Wales
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Burlington Bees

Well I glad to start out this journal by saying that today went just as smooth as yesterday. I showed up at work at 10 bells just as T.J. insisted. For some reason Tony and I are clicking together now and realizing that we should not complain about what T.J. tells us to do and just do it, and do it to the best of our ability. I mean for the main part we are the ones maintaining the field and we are getting positive feedback. T.J. just gets all the credit. In the long run though, we all know who really did all the hard work. Anyways, today went good. We came in at 10 bells and got right to work. We knew what needed to be done today in order to get ready for the game and that is exactly what we did. As always first thing first I start out by mowing the infield and making sure the grass and skin are in perfect shape for a game. Since we did all the hard and important work yesterday it made today run more smoothly and easier. After the grass was cut Tony already had the warning track drugged and it was time to start on something we rarely have time for, rolling the field. When we rolled the field it means we actually get a roller out and draw the lines in the field to make it look pretty. So we start rolling the field around 11:00am. We figured we could have the field rolled by lunch time and after lunch we could finish the main work that needed to be completed by batting practice. The field was rolled and everything looked to be going in the right direction. By time the field was rolled it was 12:30 time for lunch. T.J. gave us the go ahead for a 30 minute lunch. Well I’m going to take this time to complain for Tony. Tony is just a volunteer for the organization. He was an intern here last year and decided he wanted more experience so decided to donate his time again this summer. To keep in mind Tony lives 15 minutes away from the stadium. For a 30 minute lunch that is not enough time for him to eat and get back. So he tells me he is going to take 45 minutes instead. I’m and not one bit mad at him for this. So I still take my 30 minutes and get back to work. Once I show us T.J. is not to be found, so I start on the all the work by myself. I try to do the things that I know need to be done for batting practice. I start pulling all the screens and batting cages out to the field and lining them up in order to be used. I take it upon myself and go in the club house and talk with the manager of the team and find out what kind of early work they are going to be doing, so I know what equipment to set out. Early work today is nothing special just a little early hitting and some PFP’s, pitcher’s fielding practice. So I got things set up for that and by that time Tony and T.J. was both back. Early work started and then straight into batting practice the team went. Usually during batting practice we get an hour break, but not today. Today it seemed like T.J. was in his mood again and started us a list of stuff to do during this time instead. So the list began with taking care of the nursery and cleaning behind the outfield wall. So I took that job while Tony took the job of cleaning up the shop area. I began the nursery with a quick push mow and little water. Remember the nursery is our extra sod that we have planted behind the outfield wall for our emergency repairs that we may have occurred on the playing field. After that was completed and the trash was picked up Tony was done cleaning and our hour break was already up. Now it was time to take everything down from batting practice and set up for the game. The usual duties for game prep took place. I chalked the lines, painted the plate and rubber, and helped water the field. Game set up complete, time to wash the bases and take a break for a change. At least that is what I thought, but no, T.J. made some new rules up and stated that all post game equipment had to be set up before we took our break. So we got everything set for post game which includes, mound clay made, rakes and equipment put in the gator, and 6th innings base change bases painted. That was complete and time for BREAK! After we ate we chilled for a bit and then it was time for 6th inning base change. This is something new we started to promote 6 month clean-up for a local dentist. Base changing was done, cleaned previous bases and relaxed until after the game. Post game routines went as usual. I was in charge of fixing home plate area and Tony took the mound. We got everything done in a decent amount of time and took care of covering the mound, plate, and bullpens before T.J. could finish dragging the skin. Took down the flag, killed the scoreboard, and cleaned the bases. Now it was time to wait on T.J. He was in one of those moods still so he gave us the thumbs up and we took off. We knew what time we have to be in, in the morning so off to the house we go. Goodnight, after another long and positive for ME on the diamond.
Cody Wales
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Burlington Bees

So another day passed and another day began. Came in to work at the usual 10 bells this morning and got started right away. The catch about today is that Tony was not available to work today because his grandfather passed away last week and the funeral was toady. Not mad at all. I knew that without Tony here today that T.J. had to pitch in and help out a little bit or things would not get done in time for the game tonight. First thing first you would think would be to mow the infield, but no, once again T.J. had a “special job” for me to do. We have this “pit” in the shop area that we wash everything into once we clean the equipment. Well as you can probably guess, it gets clogged up often and somebody has to be the once to clean that out. Well that person today was me! To complete this task you have take a shovel and scoop up the entire nasty gunk out of the hole and place it into the gator to be taken back to the dump pile. This was really nasty by the way. I suffered through it and got it finished. T.J. had me start on fixing the bullpen mounds while he took the time to help out and mow the infield grass and get it fixed for game play. It took me a total of two hours to fix the bullpen mounds alone. Once these were fixed it was already 12:30pm and time for me to take a lunch. Well once again I’m going to be out here until 11:00pm again I only get a 30 minute break. Once my lunch was over it was time to get back to work. I came back and started dragging. Once the warning track was drugged and everything else looked decent enough for game play, I was off to the club house again to figure out the early work schedule. This is something I am excited to do. During this time I get the opportunity to chat with the players and coaches a little bit. I can not complain too much because I have made quite a few friends throughout the team and staff doing this internship. I am sure once I leave here I will still have plenty of connections to vacate in the near future, and maybe even a few job opportunities. I found out that early work today was just base running and early hitting drills. This made my job a lot easier. All I had to do was set up for batting practice and I was done. So I figured T.J. would have me doing some odd job during this hour and 45 minute break that I had but his wife came to visit so he actually gave me the break of 45 minutes. I came back with an hour left of batting practice just incase they got done early and we could begin to set up for the game. Well Once I got back T.J. had a surprise for me, we had some help show up. This kid from the half-way house had some community service hours he had to complete, so we called him in. Lucky we did because I doubt T.J. and I could have complete pre game set up alone. So I got the privilege of showing this guy the steps to setting up for a game. He was not much help but it was better than nothing. I still chalked the lines, plated home plate and rubber, put in bases and help water the field. This guy was just helpful for carrying the equipment for me. He was eager to learn though, because he asked a lot of questions. I actually felt helpful because I could answer them all. Everything was set up and it was time to set up everything for the 6th inning base change and for post game routines. Well I gave this new guy that job. I told him everything to do and he did it with no question. That took a real chip off my shoulder and I got some relaxing time. Game time was over, with another win and time for another post game clean-up. Half-way house people are supposed to be back before 11:00pm so I had to get things done in a jiffy if I wanted the help. So I got the helper to help me with the heavy things first. We covered the bullpens, and then I got him to take down the flag, kill the scoreboard, and clean the bases while I fixed the mound and the home plate area. 11:00pm came and our help left but their was still work to do. While T.J. finished with the skin repairs, I cleaned all the equipment and tried to get a head start on tomorrow. We finished up with watering the field. During this task T.J. opened up to me and we talked about the last few days. He admitted to being what he called a “dick”. He said that he was just trying to make us step up our motivation to wanting to take over his field. In a way I understand this and I appreciate it but when he is complaining that we do not get task done in time and he is just sitting on his but, that does not help the cause. Anyways, watering was done, we got an in dept talk out of the way and was ready for bed and for another long day tomorrow. Goodnight!!!

Cody Wales
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Burlington Bees

Well we added another loss to the L column last night but that does not change the way things run around my job. I was back in again at 10 bells this morning to do it all over again. I was faced with some bad news first thing this morning; one of my buddies, A.J. Griffin, from the pitching staff got called up from Single-A Burlington to the Double-A Stockton team. This is bad news and good news at the same time because A.J. was one of my good buddies that I had gotten to know and now he is leaving but it is good news because he is stepping up the ladder to bigger and better things. I wish him the best of luck. Anyway, after hit with the bad news it was still back to work. At least today I got Tony back to help me. Today we tried something a little different. We continued to work together on the rebuilding the bullpen mounds but we split up and I did one side while he did the other and it made things run a little quicker. We got both bullpen mounds fixed in less the 45 minutes. I mean we got them done and they were fixed to perfection. After the mounds were fixed Tony started on the warning track and I started on the infield. Infield, check. Warning track, check. On to the next task which was pulling weeds out of the warning track. Something that is usually done on an off day, but T.J. figured it needed to be done for today’s game because it was community basket day, one of the busiest days of the year. Once the weeds were pulled it was on to lunch, my favorite part. Well it use to be when I got an hour or so for lunch where I could actually relax for a few. But now since lunch is only 30 minutes, I got enough time to get something quick to eat, eat, and then right back to work. We already knew what in store ahead of us for today’s early work, butting drills and a round of infield. So that means we can set most of the stuff up for batting practice and chill out for a few. Well we got about a 30 minute break between early work and batting practice. We set everything up for batting practice and got the equipment ready to get pre game going. Batting practice was over; we took down all the nets and screens and began on our pre game routine. I chalked the lines while Tony strung out the bases and fix the mound for pre game. Everything ran pretty smoothly through pre game today and we had extra time when we were finished to get a head start on cleaning the bases, getting things set up for the 6th inning skit, and getting things ready for post game set up. Game over, another win for the home team. With the team actually winning, it makes the job that much more fun. When you’re working for a winning team, not to mention the best team in the league, your co-workers are always in a better mood. Especially the general manager, if the team is winning he can not complain, too much! Post game clean up went just as well as any other night. We took everything slow and made sure we did it correctly. We covered up the mound and plate area and called it a night. T.J. is giving us Friday, Saturday, and Sunday off back to work on Monday for a Babe Ruth Little League game. Which is not too bad because we do not have to report in until 3:00pm to get the field ready by 5:30pm for a double header. Well another long week down and another ¾ of a season to go. Now it is time for a few days off before hitting it big next week. Goodnight!

Cody Wales
Friday, May 20, 2011
Burlington Bees

T.J. blessed us with an off day!

Cody Wales
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Burlington Bees

Once again, another off day.

Cody Wales
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Burlington Bees

We were off again today but back at it tomorrow at 3:00pm.