Quote: (03-29-2012 01:37 AM)teh_skeeze Wrote:
While large crab ships are "making a business of it" the season only lasts 8 weeks or so between King and Ophelia. Deck hands can make 40-75k, depending on the boat. Then they go home, play with their kids, have siesta with their wives, then go into town to sip wine and play guitar with their amigos. Same idea, much larger scale.
Ya, that seasonal work life can be a good way to go. You can't just jump into that industry, as I understand it though, as the licenses are limited and the catch is under quota. There are a few such quota industries around the world where the families that own the monopolies really pull big money.
I've lived a seasonal work life myself, but with a twist. In Canada in some areas it's common to work for the minimum 20 weeks the first year, 10 the second, at a high paying job, such as tree planting, and earn a high unemployment insurance the rest of the year. Some consider it morally reprehensible, and it certainly is sucking at the teat of the taxpayer. I used the funds to live as a meditating hermit for some of the year, or live in meditation centers. Some tree planters are incredible athletes, dibbling in as many as 100 trays of spruce per day, whereas a beginner might put in 20, and a hard seasoned worker be satisfied with a long hard day putting in 40. I eventually worked up to big numbers - hitting 50, even 60, then up to 80 and maybe even had a few 100 tray days if the ground was good, but it blew my back out and didn't do much good for my legs either. It's the hardest most grueling work imaginable.
But seasonal.
I work more now, but prefer my current lifestyle. Man, those 20 weeks were a grind.
Ah the memories. Heaven to a tree planter is an old farmers field turned to pasture in early spring, before the black flies come out. Hell is a rocky hill with nothing but moss and mineral soil covered in uncleared deadfall in the full breezeless heat of early summer with an army of blackflies trying to find your earlobes.