OK, the original article was titled “To Pool or Not
to Pool” and was based on the concepts of “Dummy Variables” and “Heteroscedasticity”
with respect to the Trans-Alaska-Pipeline on the subject of “Quality” and you
ask how I got away with it? OK, that “Pool’s Gold” was written by a renowned
statistician named Baltagi, and that confusing word with “hetero” makes sense and
“refers
to the circumstance in which the variability of dumbness is unequal across the
range of variability of a second dummy that predicts dumbness” - a.k.a. Tweedle Dee Dumb & Tweedle Dee Dumber! OK,
the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company’s executive management when Captain Joe Hazelwood
radioed in that he was “hard aground and leaking some oil” back in 1989. But at
least I did get away with it, some 800-miles north of Bligh Reef, like a
five-finger discount in the candy store. It was so easy, just wait until the Permanent
Living Quarters’ “chow hall” bell rang as then it meant a ghost town around the
station - except for a lonely control room operator left behind to man the fort,
as a lower seniority means “leftovers”. For real, when the dinner bell rang, it
was “To Poop or Not to Poop” as I could take a crap on Migraine Rick’s office desk
and get away with it, as by now all witnesses that had sat around at the break
room table for the last 6-hours or so, well first come first serve. For real, a
daily ritual like stampede, don’t get in the way of a hungry gang of pipeline
operators. Look, “millwork ain't easy, millwork ain't hard, millwork
it ain't nothing but an awful boring job. I'm waiting on a daydream to take me
through the morning and put me in my coffee break where I can have a sandwich and
remember that it's me and my machine for the rest of the morning and the rest
of the afternoon and the rest of my life just an awful boring job” and that monotony lobotomy spell broken by Paulie “Stugots”
Cicero saying “let’s eat”. Life at Alyeska’s Pump Station#1 up at the beginning
of the 800-mile long Trans-Alaska-Pipeline reminded me of the Goodfellas! Especially
for the SCADA gang of thugs, as we got away with “theater she wrote”. And I was
my own boss, no one told me what to do or how to do it or when to do it, as I
was up north to bail Alyeska out of a bad situation. Tough, as the local station
management despised that fact that an outsider was interfering upon something
that the station had failed miserably at, and I didn’t ask for this duty I got
my marching orders from the “Owner Company” field auditors I had come to know
when stationed in Valdez. Alyeska was two different companies, the pipeline - needing
no introduction - and the “Marine Terminal”, where tankers were loaded up with
the “black gold”. And Alyeska fit that proverbial “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hide”
mentality in personality - yes “hide” I second that motion it is not a typo.
Now at the station camps up and down this pipeline in the Alaskan wilderness, the
PLQ invested in “chefs”, workers were treated like royalty come “food for
thought” and the reason gaining 50-lbs. on the gut girth during a career was a
valued added benefit on top of that retirement savings plan also swelling
out-of-control and giving in can’t take it with you a new lease on life! And
getting used to this free-for-all in a free lunch, we did not have the same
kind of luxury treatment in Valdez, a bag lunch would suffice as we also worked
instead of just sitting around trying to outbid the Two Chairs legacy. There
were many days down in Valdez, well no time for sitting down! That said,
station life was different and while the crew was engaged in a feeding frenzy,
time to “douche” the “composite sampler” jugs. OK, the “Turkey Baster” was soon
replaced with a piston pump with “quick disconnects” to make it easier for me
to sabotage the…drum roll please, tada the “Quality Bank”. It is
wherein the “Dummy Variables” and “heter-Helter Skelter” comes into play with
the Alaska oil scene and homoscedasticity makes a whole lot of unnecessary noise
about nothing - which means: All lies and jests, still a man hears
what he wants to hear and disregards the rest, lie la lie, lie la la la lie lie. See, came to be the days following the EXXON Valdez “Wreck”,
I realized my days were numbered, as I was considered a “vocal UNION supporter”
engaged in trying to force the Alyeska management in Valdez to address the “drunk’d”
tanker crews or else condone a “STRIKE” - Lech Walesa was our coach in "Solidarity" and we were ready for our very own Gdansk. They didn’t listen, and “Hard Aground”
became a reality before we had that opportunity to shut off the “spigot”, as
those in-kind rebel-rousers like me-self were dispersed away from the “STRIKE” zone
and the reason I was sent north. See, I was up north when the shat hit the fan
and…OK, that “STRIKE” before the “Wreck” would have been illegal as the “UNION”
election of the early 80s and in favor of “organized labor” to arrest the
drunks, it was conveniently placed on hold, so that would have meant a “work
slowdown” instead. Either way, that TAPS “Marine Terminal” was dead in the
water without the “I&E” when busy at lunch. It meant tankers could not be
loaded with “crude oil” and then driven away by those Captain Joes adamant that
a “DUI” is par for the course sailing through the Valdez “Narrows”. Damn it, we
never got the opportunity to make a contribution to STOP dead in its tracks the “I
abuse alcohol” calling of the Captains assigned to sail giant tankers filled
with “crude oil” out of the “Port of Valdez”. We tried and went despised by
Alyeska’s management, that it was just “boys being boys” as moving oil was the
only consideration. So here I was contemplating taking a shit on Ranger Rick’s
desk, but more important things to do in my spare time - plus that office
already smelled like "shit", as “Two Chairs” had visited his station manager slave
a few days back and that “feeces fromunder” smell was lingering about just like that
stubborn oil in Prince William Sound. Now as the station personal were busy “hold
the pickles” and burgering up, I was douching away tranquility and “spike
weeing” the “crude oil” samples used to compensate the owners of the North
Slope Prudhoe Bay oil for the “quality” of that oil. This “Quality” was as $lucrative$
as the oil commodity itself, with respect to how many barrels rolled down that
pipeline on any given day in the 2-million barrel hey-day times, an added bonus
potential of $200-Million exchanging hands at the “Quality Bank’s” fullest
potential to compensate a decrease in value to quality degradation from a producing
oil field mixing away the magic. We are talking additional $millions$ in
profits exchanged, based on the “quality” of the individual streams of oil that
entered Pump Station#1 - as compensation was necessary as once “comingled” together,
what you put in that pipeline is not what you should expect to receive at the
END. So a mechanism was designed to adjust the value of a barrel of oil based
on its “Quality”. Yes, very complicated issues employing many, many lawyers and
law firms and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission “courts” and threats if
not in “treatise” all the way up to the Supreme Court not to forget
interference by Alaska’s very own Congressional delegation - Senate Bill S.822
that gave “Big Oil” preferential treatment again! It was “Big Bucks” and the best
part, this “douche” plan of this rebel was to “rob Peter to pay Paulie”! And it
was not identifiable as any equipment “malfunction”, which meant it was not
reconcilable through investigation by the Alyeska Measurement Masterbaters, but
totally non-reconstructive if and when I got caught cooking the books…that
heteroscedasticity thing with the homoscedasticity mentality! My feeling, it
all came from down below from the same damn hole so all things considered equal
in my book of knowledge. I did not give a flying fuck rat’s ass, as I knew at
the time with my days and career numbered that Uncle Al was merely using my
talents until such time I trained a competent staff to take over the oversight
of the “Custody Transfer”. The what? It’s the cash register that accounts for
all the oil that is sent down the Trans-Alaska-Pipeline and we are talking
$billions$ since that “Oil In” back in 1977. So I “trumped” Alyeska, on a “mission”
that would someday “today” be it known what went on behind closed doors. “Mikey…there
was something in it for me, on my own”
time for the Godfather! And I am glad I realized I had at my fingertips the “power”
and “might” to throw a RIGID wrench into the “Big Picture” show, as this “Quality”
issue was using $million$ of dollars of Taxpayers’ resources to benefit a few. With
FERC, it is the longest running and costliest of “bitch sessions” needing a
referee, since 1984 and continues to waste resources at alarming rates. And it
didn’t end with the G-men, as our very own Alaska delegation passed laws to
protect “Big Oil”. Yes, Congress went involved on something they should have
minded their own damn business, or maybe listened to our demands to “Unionize”
in efforts to STOP drunk sea Captains from ramming a fully laden tanker “full throttle saloon” into the best known
worst nightmare navigational hazard in Prince William Sound. Look, for Lisa
Murkowski and Don Young to get involved when more important issues to contend
with, it was “Taxation without Representation” and I guess daddy dearest Frank
never taught nepotism Lisa on the fundamentals surrounding one of Alaska famous
“gold-diggers”, Mr. Jack Marler extraordinaire. So my ending chapter with
Alyeska, I fucked you over because you fucked me over…yes that proverbial eye-for-an-eye
and tooth-for-a-tooth but I had the bite and you lost sight of it all - as
eating was more important, or was if falling back to sleep when disaster strikes?
So here it is again in “black and right”, the “Quality Bank Composite Samplers”
at Pump Station#1 of the Trans-Alaska-Pipeline were purposely manipulated, heteroscedasticity
tainted with another producers oil in varying quantity “douches” enough to spoil
the fun, from 3/19/1989 through 1/7/1991. And the question is: To Fool or Not
to Fool!
