Tag Archives: Information on Dickinson North Dakota

How Cold Is It In North Dakota?

February 13, 2018Uncategorizeddriving in winter in North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, how cold is North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, living in North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

After having lived and worked in North Dakota since 2011, this Winter of 2017-2018 feels like the coldest to me.

On January 1, 2018 I had to drive past the town of Hettinger, North Dakota on my way to work in the very early morning, my job site was not far from there. The National Weather Service reported that at this time, Hettinger was the absolute coldest place on Earth, at -41 degrees Fahrenheit. Yes, the coldest place on Earth, go look it up, here is one link http://cool987fm.com/a-city-in-north-dakota-reached-the-coldest-temperature-on-earth-for-jan-1-2018/

When I got out of my truck that morning, it did not feel that bad, because it was absolutely still. However, you could tell that it was very cold.

Through December and January, we keep having these -17 degree Fahrenheit days, with some amount of wind, and it is just miserable. I don’t want to go to any store, I don’t want to go to the gym, I don’t want to go anywhere, for any reason. I just sit inside my apartment.

One of the reasons that I don’t want to go anywhere, is because of a lifetime of experience. I have had to work on a broken down vehicle in the snow, ice, and wind more than several times in the past, and I don’t want to ever have to do this again.

I have one extra vehicle at the apartment where I live, and in order not to take up a parking space in front of the building, I park it on the street. The rule in the City of Dickinson, is that you can’t leave a vehicle parked on the street for more than 48 hours. So every two days, I have to start and move my extra vehicle. When it is above 0 degrees, it starts fine. When it is below 0 degrees, I have to get my battery jump start box, and connect it to the vehicle battery to start it.

Walking out to my vehicle with thermal underwear on under my pants, a hoodie under my heavy winter jacket, and gloves on, wiping the snow off the windows and hood, trying to start it, opening the hood, picking up the battery jump box, making the battery cable connections, and getting back inside my vehicle, my fingers were too numb to feel the ignition key and hold on to it to turn the ignition.

From experience, like the one that I just described above about jump starting my vehicle, I know that this cold weather in North Dakota can be very, very dangerous. When you are outside in this weather, it does not take long, just a matter of minutes, before you can begin to have severe pain and numbness in your feet and hands. Even with gloves on, I began to have pain and numbness in my fingers, to where I could not feel or hold onto a car key.

Some North Dakotans would want to call “bullshit” on this. Let me tell you about this. A company that I have worked for in the past in North Dakota, called me at the beginning of February to ask if I could work for them 36 hours per week. I asked on what days, and I said no that I couldn’t, though I would like to. I said that a friend of mine, who has also worked for them in the past, needed a job, so I would call him, and try to get him to do it.

This friend of mine, who is older than me and has lived in Dickinson for his entire life, had just had a conversation with me where he was telling me, “It never bothered me to work out in the cold. I mean, you have to dress for it, but it never bothered me any.”

On his first or second day of work at this job that I told him about, where he had to spend 85% of his time in either the vehicle or a building, and only 15% of the time outside, he called me and talked to me for several minutes about how cold it was, how unbelievably cold it was, how horribly cold it was.

I want to conclude this blog post with a strong warning about some things that you need to do in North Dakota during the Winter. Everyone needs to dress for what the weather is outside, not what you expect it to be like in the vehicle you are riding in, or the building that you are going to. You may be involved in a vehicle accident or a vehicle break-down before you arrive at your destination, and may not have a warm or running vehicle to stay in.

Women, teenagers, and children in North Dakota have the bad habit of dressing for where they are going, like a warm building, business, or house, and they are very under-dressed for being outside. It is exactly the case, that they are expecting someone else to drive by and rescue them, or come and get them if they have an emergency. This is a bad idea.

If you own a vehicle, I recommend buying a good quality hand-carry battery jump box, one that is rated at least for 800 peak amps, to keep in your vehicle. These cost about $80, and they often have a built-in air compressor and emergency light. I have jump started other people’s vehicles and trucks about five times with mine, and about twenty times on my own vehicles and lawn mower.

Probably the most important thing to keep in your vehicle in the winter in North Dakota is a heavy sleeping bag. If your vehicle does break down in the winter in North Dakota, and you think that you might have to walk more than 1/8 mile in below 0 degree Fahrenheit weather, you should probably try to stay in your vehicle. Even if you were wearing thermal underwear, a heavy winter jacket, winter shoes, and winter gloves, you would become extremely cold after walking 1/8 of a mile.

A Fair Resolution To A Case Of Prostitution In Dickinson, North Dakota

February 13, 2018Uncategorizedattorney Robert Bolinske, escorts in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, prostitution in Dickinson North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

On November 7th and November 8th of 2017, I wrote three blog posts about “Police Corruption” and “Legal Entrapment” in North Dakota.

I was very, very angry about two specific cases of Legal Entrapment in North Dakota, one in Fargo and one in Dickinson, where police placed a fake advertisement on the internet for a woman offering sex. When men responded to the fake advertisement in order to arrange to meet the woman, at a later point in time, the police then made up the statement, that the fake woman was under 18 years of age.

Two men were arrested and charged with Patronizing a Minor for Commercial Sex Activity, a Class A felony punishable by 20 years in prison. Neither of the men who were charged, ever sought to contact an underage woman for sex to begin with, the police made the statement that the woman was under 18, at a later point in time, at which point both men then tried to break off contact.

For the case in Fargo, when it went to trial, the Cass County District Court Judge Susan Bailey, was asked by the defense attorney to allow the jury to consider not just the felony charge, but also the misdemeanor charge, and she allowed the jury to consider both charges. This resulted in the jury deciding on a verdict of guilty for a misdemeanor charge. This defendant was very fortunate that both the judge and the jury had a clear understanding of what had happened, and realized that a 20 year prison sentence was not warranted.

For the case in Dickinson which began in September of 2017, it began proceeding towards a felony jury trial, but by the end of January 2018, it was resolved by a plea agreement to a misdemeanor charge. The defendant was very fortunate that he did not receive the possible maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, which was a possibility.

I am writing this blog post, to again discuss prostitution in Dickinson, North Dakota, and to warn everyone about the police approach to prostitution in Dickinson, North Dakota. Just because the two defendants in the cases that I described above ended up with misdemeanors, does not mean that this is what anyone else should expect to happen.

The defendant in Dickinson, hired the attorney Robert Bolinske in Bismarck, the state capitol 100 miles to the east of Dickinson. Robert Bolinske may have been the best possible criminal defense attorney for this type of case in Dickinson, because he has one of the best reputations as a trial lawyer and defense attorney in the state.

An attorney like this, probably charges $250 per hour more or less, so for every 10 hours, that’s $2,500. To resolve this case after four months by reaching a plea agreement without going to trial, probably cost at least $5,000 in legal fees. If this case would have gone to trial, the legal fees probably would have been at least $10,000.

I am explaining this as a warning, with the way that the police in Dickinson place fake advertisements for prostitutes, and attempt to create enhanced charges when men try to meet the fake prostitute, you can expect to pay $5,000 to $10,000 to have any hope of not going to prison for 20 years.

Dermatologist Shortage In North Dakota

February 11, 2018UncategorizedDermatologists in North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, healthcare in Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Mark Ebertz MD, Mid Dakota Dermatology Clinic, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, Shortage of Dermatologists in North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, working in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

There is a shortage of Dermatologists in North Dakota. To get an appointment with a Dermatologist in the state capitol of Bismarck, there is a five to six month wait.

On January 25, 2018 I noticed that I had a new mole on my right shoulder. This mole was different than the other mole that I have had on my shoulder for the past thirty-two years, because this new mole appeared so suddenly, was dark in color, and it had a rough unhealthy looking surface.

From the television commercials that I have seen, and from reading about skin growths on the internet, I believed that this was very likely a melanoma. A melanoma can be benign or malignant, meaning noncancerous or cancerous. You need to have one checked right away, especially if it is dark in color, or has an irregular shape and appearance.

On February 2, I began searching for a Dermatologist in Dickinson, North Dakota and I found that there isn’t one. This is kind of bad, because Dickinson has a population of about 25,000 people, and it is the largest town in southwest North Dakota.

I found that the nearest Dermatologists were in the state capitol of Bismarck, 100 miles to the east of Dickinson. In Bismarck, there is the Mid Dakota Clinic of Dermatology with three Dermatologists, and two Nurse Practitioners. I thought to myself, “Good, this is exactly what I was looking for.”

I telephoned the Mid Dakota Clinic of Dermatology, and I requested an appointment with Mark Ebertz, MD. I was told, “Mark Ebertz is not accepting any new patients, you can choose to make an appointment with either of the two Nurse Practitioners, or one other MD, but their next available appointment is in August.”

I thought to myself, “February, March, April, May, June, July…that’s six months before I can even see a Dermatologist, and I need to get this melanoma mole looked at and removed right away!”

The administrative person at the Mid Dakota Clinic of Dermatology was not rude in any way, but I was very angry, and I ended the telephone call with her. I could not believe the absurdity of having a melanoma, and a Dermatology clinic wanting you to wait six months for an appointment. What kind of skin problem could a person have, that they could figure on waiting for six months to receive any kind of treatment?

I was very, very angry. I write and write about this, but I don’t think that I ever truly convince people how backwards North Dakota is. I thought about this for few minutes at the time, before continuing to try to find a Dermatologist in North Dakota.

I still want to give a big Fuck You!, to the Mid Dakota Clinic of Dermatology. I hope that Dr. Mark Ebertz has some kind of life threatening emergency, where he needs the police, fire department, or paramedics to show up, and they tell him, “We are kind of busy, we aren’t accepting new calls at this time.” Or anything that he needs done, everyone tells him, we can’t help you for six months.

I went on to telephone Sanford Health. I telephoned the Sanford Health in Dickinson, and they told me that they did not have a Dermatologist in Dickinson, to call the Sanford Health in Bismarck. I telephoned the Sanford Health in Bismarck, their Dermatology Clinic, and I was told that the earliest appointment that this particular clinic had was in April, but I could try calling their other Dermatology Clinic. At the second Sanford Health Dermatology Clinic, the next available appointment was in September.

I called an older relative of mine who had had a skin growth surgically removed from his shoulder, to ask him about it, how much did this cost? He said to me, “You can’t wait this long, you need to get this taken care of right away, it sounds like you are going to have to go to a different state to have this done.”

I looked up on the internet, a Dermatologist that I had seen in Idaho seven or eight years ago. This Dermatologist surgically removed a small carcinoma from under my eye for about $140, which required stitches. This was not a big deal for him, or difficult for him, and he did a very good job, not leaving any scar.

I telephoned his office in Idaho, and he had appointments available each week in February. I explained that I was working in North Dakota, and I could not get this taken care of in North Dakota. I explained that it was a twelve to fourteen hour drive one way to get there, I would have to drive there to get this melanoma removed, and then drive right back to North Dakota to return to work on time.

I e-mailed to the Dermatologist in Idaho, three photographs of my melanoma mole. I followed up with a phone call to the Dermatologist administrator, saying that I didn’t want a biopsy, and that I was not looking for a preliminary visit prior to surgery, that I needed to get this melanoma mole surgically removed, and then drive right back to North Dakota. The expected cost was $300 to $800, depending on how much they had to cut out.

I am not looking forward to this twelve to fourteen hour drive to Idaho, and the twelve to fourteen hour drive back to Dickinson, North Dakota. The gasoline cost alone will be $350. The weather this month has consistently been below 0 degrees Fahrenheit. I know that the interstates will be snowy and icy the whole way. If my vehicle breaks down, especially at night, I will be in a very dangerous situation, due to the extreme cold weather.

Ed’s Honey Company In Dickinson, North Dakota

January 27, 2018UncategorizedEd's Honey Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, local honey in Dickinson North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

In Dickinson, North Dakota, there is a local producer of honey, Ed’s Honey Company, that has been in business for more than fifty years. The easiest way to find and buy Ed’s Honey in Dickinson, is to go to one of the Family Fare grocery stores, and this local honey is there on the shelf with the other brands of non-local honey.

I am not interested in honey at all, I don’t care about honey, I only went looking for locally produced honey because it is supposed to contain small amounts of pollen from every plant growing in this area. Hence, taking a spoon full of locally produced honey every day, was supposed to be the same as taking allergy shots.

When I was in the Family Fare grocery store about one month ago, there was only one 5 lb jug of Ed’s Honey left. This was a lot of honey, but I didn’t care, I was glad to be able to find any at all. This honey was darker in color than what most people are probably used to seeing, it is more towards brown, and not golden or light in color.

I was only supposed to take one teaspoon full of it for my allergies, but I ate about one cup of it on the first day. This honey is very interesting and unique, to look at, pour, smell, and taste. It is the best honey that I have ever tasted. It is the most distinct, peculiar, unusual, and interesting thing that I have ever tasted. It is very, very strong, and potent, but not in an unpleasant way.

One of the reasons why this honey tastes different, is because it is made from the nectar of every flower growing in western North Dakota. These plants in western North Dakota, are probably different from the plants that grow in any other part of the world.

This honey probably tastes so strong, because it is 100% pure honey. I don’t know if this is “raw” honey or not. I don’t think that there is any processing done to it at all.

I would recommend to everyone living in western North Dakota, or passing through western North Dakota, to buy and try Ed’s Honey at least once. This honey is different than anything that you have tasted before.

Liking And Hating The Police In Dickinson, North Dakota

Sometimes I like, and sometimes I hate, the Police in Dickinson, North Dakota. I don’t want to be completely ungrateful, sometimes the Police in Dickinson are decent and helpful.

On average, I have some type of interaction with the Police in Dickinson, about once per month. In the five years that I have lived in Dickinson, I have never once had any trouble whatsoever or negative interaction with the Stark County Sheriff Deputies.

The only times that I have had to deal with the Stark County Sheriff Deputies, is when I have intentionally contacted them. In these instances, the Sheriff Deputies have been very helpful and cooperative. All the other times that I have been driving, working, and living in Dickinson, the Stark County Sheriff Deputies have seemed to completely ignore me, and leave me alone.

The complete opposite happens with the City of Dickinson Police. For the five years that I have lived in Dickinson, whenever I go anywhere, the Police watch me and follow me like I am a criminal involved in illegal activity. I have been sick and tired of this for the past four years.

There is very little to do in Dickinson, and very few place to go. One of the few things that you could do, would be to go out in the evening after work and have drinks with dinner at a restaurant or sports bar, but you can’t even do that because the Police in Dickinson are so eager and aggressive in stopping people for DUI.

I have totally given up on going to any bar in Dickinson, or any restaurant and having an alcohol drink, because the Police are determined that you are going to get a DUI. I feel like I can’t even drive anywhere in Dickinson without the Police wanting to follow me, stop me, and try to arrest me for something.

For instance, about six months ago I was sitting in a restaurant on Villard Street in Dickinson, and my neighbor who is in his 40s, was sitting with his wife and another couple at the table across from me. These two couples do not drink alcohol, use drugs, or act wild, they go to Church a couple of times each week, and they perform Church charity and volunteer work, which takes up much of their free time. They are always very sober people, I see them and I talk to them every other day.

My neighbor and his wife exited the restaurant parking lot onto Villard Street in their fairly nice truck, about two minutes before I did. When I pulled out onto Villard, I saw that my neighbor and his wife had been stopped by the Dickinson Police about four blocks away.

I stopped and asked my neighbor what was going on, and he said, “I have a headlight out on my truck, and the Police pulled me over for that, but they want to go through the whole have you been drinking routine, and run my driver’s license, check my insurance and registration, I’ll be O.K.”

I hate driving anywhere in Dickinson, because it is so predictable, that the Police are going to be right on you, follow you, and try to stop you for something, to try to get you for a DUI, or some other criminal charge. I got stopped by the Police in Dickinson on Villard Street last night, because I had a headlight out on my truck. This was just a reason to pull me over, to try to discover something else to charge me with.

I have thought about this, and I began to believe that each of the Dickinson Police officers want to make an arrest so bad, in order to keep their job, advance in their job, or be able to transfer to a different police department elsewhere. Unlike the Stark County Sheriff Deputies, who respond to calls or crimes that they witness, but otherwise leave people alone, the Dickinson Police are almost like they are stalking or hunting people just hoping to get them for something.

I am not going to re-write and re-tell the story from one of my previous blog posts, where the Drug Task Force in Dickinson had some undercover Police officers approach me in a bar and ask me again and again where they could buy drugs, so that they could arrest me for being a drug dealer.

Now having explained that I am tired of the Dickinson Police always acting like they want to get me for something when I am driving anywhere in Dickinson, I should probably also explain that I rely on and count on the Dickinson Police to show up when I call them.

Just off the top of my head, I can recall three different instances where a mentally disturbed criminal person went bezerk downtown in Dickinson and began attacking people, and I had to call 911. As an aside, these three people weren’t from Dickinson, they were recently arrived people, who immediately got into trouble repeatedly, and eventually had to either leave town or stay in jail.

One time I witnessed someone committing a certain type of theft in Dickinson, not petty theft, I called 911, described the situation, got in my vehicle, followed the person until the Dickinson Police could catch up, and they caught the person with the stolen property in his vehicle, and he confessed to stealing it.

I have had to call the Police about three or four times to where I live in Dickinson, most recently last week. A person that I did not recognize as a resident of my building, was passed out on the stairs at 3:00 a.m., not in a peaceful slumber, but as if he was too drugged or intoxicated to be able to get up or move.

When I have telephoned the Police in Dickinson, they usually arrive fairly quickly and handle the situation adequately, so I need to give the Police in Dickinson credit and show some appreciation.

I am facing a dilemma now, I have counted on the Dickinson Police to show up when I telephone them after witnessing a crime that has been committed or a crime that is still in progress, however I am sick of the Dickinson Police following me so that they can pull me over and try to arrest me for something.

I am starting to feel like Black people who live in inner cities, don’t trust the Police, don’t talk to the Police, don’t have anything to do with the Police, even if you see a crime being committed.

Dickinson North Dakota Is In A Transition Period

January 18, 2018Uncategorizedeconomy in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, housing in Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, oil boom in Dickinson North Dakota, oil boom over in Dickinson North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

It may be obvious to most of the people who are living here, that Dickinson, North Dakota is going through a transition period. However, people who live elsewhere in the United States have no way of knowing what is happening in Dickinson right now.

Dickinson, North Dakota experienced an Oil Boom that occurred from 2007 through 2014. This was Dickinson’s third Oil Boom. The first Oil Boom took place in the 1950s, and it was due to the discovery of oil in North Dakota. The second Oil Boom occurred from approximately 1978 through 1983. This third Oil Boom was due to advances in hydraulic fracturing and directional drilling technologies that allowed more profitable oil extraction in North Dakota.

What killed this third Oil Boom in North Dakota, was the price of oil dropping from over $100 per barrel down to $40 per barrel. When the price of oil was over $80 per barrel, it was profitable for oil companies to perform exploration, lease oil well sites, drill, and produce oil. When the price of oil was down around $40 per barrel, oil companies didn’t even want to pump very much of this oil out of the ground because they wouldn’t be making any profit from it.

Supposed reasons for the price of oil going from over $100 per barrel down to $40 per barrel, were over-production and over-supply in the U.S. It is more likely that the over-supply of oil and the price drop was due to intentional flooding of the oil market by OPEC producers in the Middle East.

The number of operating drill rigs in North Dakota went from over 200 during the Oil Boom, to less than 50 currently. Many oil field jobs went away. Less surveying, less road work, less site work, fencing, cattle guards, containment barriers, tank batteries, water hauling, sand hauling, drilling, directional drilling, fracturing, casing, wireline, work over, pump jacks, automation, controls, tanks, pipelines, welding, mechanics, electricians, roustabouts, truck drivers, less everything.

By the end of 2016, I would say that 60% to 80% of the oil field jobs had gone away. Most of the out-of-state workers returned to the states where they came from. It was not just that most of the oil field workers lost their jobs, could not get a replacement job, or could not get a job with overtime hours like they used to have, it was that all of the oil field workers knew that they could not afford the cost housing in North Dakota, and it was not very pleasant living in North Dakota because it was cold, there was no where to go, nothing to do, and there was a shortage of women.

Even by the end of 2014, after many new large apartment complexes and new hotels had been constructed in Western North Dakota, the cost of housing was still very high. In Dickinson, even up until the end of 2015, there was a large extended stay hotel on I-94 that had a banner advertisement on their building for rooms starting at $700 per week.

There was a lie going around the United States that everyone working in the oil field was making over $100,000 per year. This was far from being true. In the more than five years that I have lived here, I have only met three people who made more than $100,000 per year working in the oil field.

The $700 per week for the extended stay hotel room, most workers in Dickinson, who worked in retail, fast food, restaurants, or service industry, did not have a take home pay of $700 per week. The semi-skilled workers, construction workers, laborers, and roustabouts, had a take home pay of about $700 per week after taxes. This led to people sleeping in their cars at WalMart, sleeping in a tent in people’s backyards, and sleeping in the bushes where they could. This is not an exaggeration, I know all about this, myself and my friends lived like this.

Some of the cheapest old one-bedroom apartments, if you could even find one, rented for $1,500 per month, with one month’s rent security deposit, first month’s rent, and last month’s rent due at lease signing, that’s $4,500 due up front. Most of the workers who came to North Dakota did so out of economic desperation, and they didn’t have $4,500, which led to them sleeping in their cars at WalMart, the truck stop, etcetera.

I am re-telling all of this now, to paint the picture of why everyone who came to work in Western North Dakota during the Oil Boom, was so ready to leave when the Oil Boom was over. It was not just about jobs going away, it was about how unpleasant and difficult it had been living in North Dakota.

The lie had been told that everyone working in the oil field was making over $100,000 per year, in order to lure an abundance of workers to Western North Dakota, most of whom would be paid less than $16 per hour. These workers would fill the retail, fast food, restaurant, hospitality, and service worker jobs, but they would also fill every house, apartment, basement, cabin, trailer, hotel, and motel.

When the Oil Boom was over, all of the local people, the business owners and the property owners said, “Oh, it’s coming back. Hold on now, it’s coming back.” The kind of lying that got people from all over the U.S. to come to North Dakota looking for work, was now being done to try to keep everyone from leaving. But the Oil Boom didn’t come back, it was over.

By 2017, the occupancy rates at the newly completed large apartment complexes and the old apartment buildings, was approximately 50% or less. The occupancy rates at the RV parks, hotels, and motels, was approximately 20% or less. Rents began to decrease quite a bit, as there became competition amongst property owners and property managers to get tenants into their buildings. Home prices decreased also.

By 2016, some of the non-oil field businesses in Dickinson that I recall closing were, Wild Cat Pizza, Hobby Artz, Superior Laundry, The Pita Pit, and Evolution Fitness. By the end of 2017, some additional businesses that closed were Sears, JC Penny, one Family Fare grocery store location, Total Workforce Solutions, and the Elks Lodge vacated the upstairs of their own building to move into their basement.

By 2016, some of the few restaurants in Dickinson that had previously been open 24 hours, ceased staying open past midnight. For a time in 2016, all of the grocery stores and WalMart in Dickinson no longer stayed open 24 hours. Now WalMart does stay open 24 hours most of the time.

In 2016, many local young people who had graduated from high school in Dickinson or Dickinson State University during the Oil Boom and found employment right away, now had to move out of state to find employment in Montanna, South Dakota, Colorado, and Arizona.

By 2016, many entrepreneurs who had moved to Dickinson to start a business or a service during the Oil Boom, began closing down in order to move away and start over again in another state. By the end of 2017, there appeared to me to be another wave of entrepreneurs shutting down in Dickinson, to move away and start over elsewhere.

What inspired me to write this particular blog post about Dickinson going through a “Transition Period” right now, are two things. Three of the most visible and active members of the Dickinson community, three entrepreneurs, have recently announced on Facebook that they are moving away.

For these three people, I thought that Dickinson was their life-long home, they were so entrenched in everything, and so active in everything. It wasn’t until I read that they were leaving, and I then looked into everything that they were doing recently, that I realized that they had been trying to earn money doing several different jobs outside of what they normally do, in order to make money. I didn’t know that they were struggling, because I wasn’t paying attention.

In 2016 and 2017, I had to work at several different jobs outside of my normal job, in order to make enough money. Some of these jobs were physical labor jobs 12 hours per day, every day, for weeks. Some of these jobs were physical labor jobs for 15 hours per day, with an additional 2 hours of drive time each day. So I can understand that these three entrepreneurs were having a shortfall of money in Dickinson, because I have too, but I didn’t know that it had come to the point that they have to move away.

The second thing that inspired me to write this blog post about this “Transition Period” in Dickinson right now, is the theft and crime. In 2017, in Dickinson, there has been so much theft, crime, and drug overdoses.

In Dickinson this past year, there has been a great deal of vehicle, trailer, equipment, and tool thefts, again, and again. Thefts from businesses, homes, job sites, garages, and parked vehicles. Dickinson had very little theft prior to the Oil Boom, and even during the Oil Boom up until 2016. The theft in Dickinson now, is comparable to what goes on in a very bad neighborhood in Phoenix, Tampa, or Dallas.

There have been many drug overdoses in Dickinson this past year, with several fatalities. I can’t remember hearing about this amount of drug overdoses and fatalities during the Oil Boom, or anywhere else that I have ever lived.

What I think that the correlation is, between everything that I have described in this blog post, is that so many jobs have gone away in Dickinson, that people have coped by moving away immediately, moving away after trying to wait, moving away after trying to work additional jobs, staying and continuing to work multiple jobs, and other people cope by stealing and using illegal drugs.

Comments Today From A Local Reader In Dickinson, North Dakota

January 13, 2018Uncategorizedguide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Likename withheld

Below I have copied the comments that I received today from a local reader in Dickinson, North Dakota. I am cautioning you now, that these comments will probably be offensive and upsetting to most people.

The purpose for me copying these comments and showing them, is so that everyone can see the hostility, hatred, anger, resentment, and unfriendliness that there is in Dickinson towards people from out of state.

All the members of the Chamber of Commerce can smile for the camera, all the real estate agents shown in the property listing guides can smile for the camera, and the Catholic Priests can smile in thier photographs, but Dickinson, North Dakota is full of hatred.

Here are the comments, just from today:

We wonder why there is so much unrest in this country. It’s because of niggers like you.
Please leave. Obviously a retard that can’t hold a job and has nothing better to do with his time.
This idiot writes nothing but dog shit. Don’t like it here? LEAVE!! We don’t want your kind here anyway!!!!
Fuck u nig. Out of state people should go back where they came from LEAVE AND DO US ALL A FAVOR!!
Fuck u nig. Fuck all niggers in the ass dry.
Fuck u nig. Coons and spooks ruin the world.
Porch monkey. Just another dipshit black saying woe is me. Go back to where you came from.
U have no comments here other than your a dumb nigger.
I heard niggers fuck goats.
KKK. Just another dumb nigger lookin for a hand out get a real job.
KKK. Dumb nigger.
KKK. Dumb fuckin niggers take your porch monkey ass back to Africa before you run into one of us.
Just another nigger lookin to hang from a tree.

Even though you might think that this is despicable, the local person who wrote these comments actually did something that was helpful. If you asked and asked the local people in Dickinson, what they felt, and what they believed, they wouldn’t tell you. Because this commentor was confident about their anonymity, they went ahead and said what they thought.

I have been writing for several years that the local people in Dickinson are hateful, hostile, uncooperative, mean, not helpful, and undermining at work, especially to out of state workers. Now that you can see that this is true, please consider this when evaluating whether you want to live and work in Dickinson, North Dakota.

These Protests And Lawsuits Are Good For Dickinson, North Dakota

January 10, 2018Uncategorizedbeing Black in Dickinson North Dakota, Carlos Royal Dickinson North Dakota, David Armendariz Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, School Superintendent Doug Sullivan Dickinson North Dakota, working in Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

I am becoming more and more encouraged when I read the Dickinson Press newspaper or Google Local News, and I learn about more protests and lawsuits in Dickinson, North Dakota. I am glad that all different kinds of people in Dickinson are protesting, fighting, and bringing their mistreatment and grievances to light, where it becomes known, for everyone to see.

There is a well known quote by Edmund Burke, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

I am glad that the former City of Dickinson Streets Maintenance manager David Armendariz protested his dismissal. At the Civil Service Commission hearing, many facts came out, such as the City of Dickinson using recycled concrete for road base where Class V material was specified, 4 out of 5 of the past Civil Service Commission hearings arising from the Public Works Department, and who the Civil Service Commission were. This led me and probably other readers to more discoveries about the Civil Service Commission, former City Attorney Goos’ dismissal, and the Strom Center at Dickinson State University.
I am glad that Dickinson property owner Carlos Royal has created a GoFundMe page to raise funds to begin a class action lawsuit against the City of Dickinson.

Carlos Royal is attempting to raise $50,000 to challenge the city’s tax assessment process on behalf of “all the property owners in Dickinson who have over-assessed properties.” This led me and probably other readers to try to find out more about the City of Dickinson’s Tax Abatement Hearings.
It was a huge surprise and shock that Dickinson Public Schools Superintendent

Doug Sullivan presented a letter of resignation on Monday, January 8 to the School Board at the end of a regularly scheduled meeting. Doug Sullivan’s resignation came after the School Board approved a long list other resignations from longtime Dickinson Public Schools teachers and administrators. It appears to me that all of these teachers’ resignations coming at the same time is a protest response to something, that people in Dickinson should try to find out about.

Fortunately for the City of Dickinson, they just recently switched from having the City represented by an attorney from the Mackoff Kellogg law firm, to hiring a full-time City employee City Attorney Jan Murtha, who is probably on a fixed salary, so they won’t have to pay for hourly billing from a law firm.

Dickinson Public Schools Superintendent Doug Sullivan’s resignation seemed to me, to be like the song written by David Allen Coe, “Take this job and shove it!, I ain’t working here no more…”

But to me, who didn’t know what it was like to be treated like a Black person, until I came to work in Dickinson, here is what I think about protesting in Dickinson:

Stopping Theft And Crime In Dickinson, North Dakota

December 3, 2017Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, police in Dickinson North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Likename withheld

Today when I arrived home at my low rent apartment, I found that someone had parked in my parking space. I was angry about it, because I had to trim tree branches and clear out some debris in order to make this parking space at the far back corner of the parking lot that abuts neighbors’ backyards.

I didn’t know if somebody was fucking with me, because this has been my spot for months, this spot is away from all of the other parking spaces, everyone has picked their own spot, and there hasn’t been a parking dispute here for at least four months. I wanted to find out who did this, was this a new tenant, was this a visitor, was this unintentional, or was this intentional.

I was angry enough to yank this car out of this space with my truck, but I quickly realized that this would lead to retaliation against my truck. I knocked on a neighbor’s door who I thought might have parked this car there, but luckily they were not home.

I was going to leave a note on this car’s windshield saying that I had to clear out this space by trimming tree branches and moving debris, I had been parking here, and asking if they were a new resident, to call me. The way that this car was parked, it looked like it might not even be running. It was a very beat up car. It was parked back up against the side of the garage. The driver’s door was so close to the side of the garage, that I didn’t see how the driver could have even got out of the car if they had backed it in, they might have pushed it back.

I walked over to the car, to look at it, and I was very surprised and startled when someone got out of it. They were startled too, because apparently they were trying to hide. The person who got out of this car, he immediately started saying some lame, nonsense excuse about what he was doing. I asked him right away, if he had just moved in to these apartments, or if he was visiting someone. I could tell from his erratic nervous behavior that it was neither. He said that he lived in this area. Nothing that he was saying explained what he was doing here on this property, at the far back corner of the parking lot, backed in beside the end of the garage, like he was hiding.

This person said to me, hey, if you want your space that bad, I will leave. I got his vehicle license plate number and I walked away. To me, this is what it looks like when someone is getting ready to, or is in the process of going through other people’s vehicles in a parking lot in order to steal things.

I telephoned the Dickinson Police non-emergency number to explain what was going on, but the dispatcher at first was dismissing what I was saying, thinking that I was calling about someone taking my parking space. I tried to explain, “No, there is so much theft going on in Dickinson right now, and in the area that I live in, I think that this person is here to steal things, they don’t live here, they aren’t visiting anyone here, their story does not make any sense, and they don’t belong here.”

I gave the Dickinson Police dispatcher the vehicle license plate number, and I asked if they could send an officer over so that I could tell them what was going on. While I was waiting for the Police, I talked to some of my neighbors about what was going on, and they knew a little about this vehicle and the vehicle owner. He and his vehicle had been spotted at a suspected drug house in the area. We speculated that what he was doing here, involved either stealing or drugs.

When the Police Officer arrived within about ten minutes of me calling the non-emergency number, the Police Officer said that he knew, and the Police knew, who this person was, and that this was someone that the Police needed to be called about if he showed up at the apartment property again.

I gave the Police Officer the license plate number and a complete description of the vehicle, and some additional information about the vehicle that I got from the neighbors. I let the Police officer know that some of my neighbors had had items stolen from their vehicles in the recent past.

I know and my neighbors know, that if we find items missing from our vehicles later today or tomorrow, who it was that probably got into our vehicles. The Police now know, that this guy was caught recently in this neighborhood, parked behind a garage on private property, where he had no reason to be.

The reason that I am acting like this, is because me and my neighbors have had things stolen out of our vehicles recently, and there has been illegal drug activity at the apartments where we live in the recent past. If we don’t do something about the people who show up here and don’t belong here, the crime will just keep happening here.

Well Run Arby’s Restaurant In Dickinson, North Dakota

December 3, 2017UncategorizedArby's restaurant in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, restaurants in Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

I have lived in Dickinson, North Dakota for a little over five years now. I started this blog website approximately three years ago, mostly out of frustration with living in Dickinson. Living in Dickinson, there was very little to do, no where to go, the people were unfriendly, and the restaurants were all bad, especially the waitresses.

Of the nearly five hundred blog posts that I have written, most of them are complaining about Dickinson. About one year ago, I began to realize that one of the only places in Dickinson that I didn’t have any complaints about, was the Arby’s restaurant.

I began to realize that I never ever had a long wait in the drive through, or at the counter in Arby’s. No one ever got my order wrong in any way whatsoever. No employee ever irritated me, annoyed me, or did anything wrong. The food that I ordered was always good or O.K. I was never mischarged or given the wrong change. I never saw the employees loose their cool, bicker, squabble, or argue.

I began to think that nothing ever went wrong at this Arby’s because of the employees who worked there. How could this be, that each of these employees showed up to work, did their job, were pleasant, and got along with each other? No place else in Dickinson has employees like this, how did this happen?

There are a couple of nation-wide franchise restaurants in Dickinson that have nearly closed several times because they were unable to get employees, assistant managers, and managers that would show up to work and work competently. All businesses in Dickinson had a difficult time hiring and keeping competent employees during the Oil Boom that occurred from 2007 through 2014. How was this Arby’s restaurant able to hire and retain good employees?

The manager of the Arby’s restaurant in Dickinson, I believe that her name is Sarah. I think that the owners of this restaurant know that Sarah has done a very good job. I don’t know if the owners of this restaurant are aware of the turnover and employee chaos that all of the other restaurants in Dickinson have.

I don’t know exactly how Sarah does it. I think that she must have some unique ability to pick out and identify the good applicants from the bad ones. I don’t know how she can tell which applicants are going to show up every day, do their job, take their job seriously, be pleasant, and get along with everyone. All business owners and managers wish that they could pick the applicants that would be good long term employees, but hardly anyone can.

I noticed that the employees at this Arby’s restaurant are there to do their job. They always seem to be 100% focused on their job, and I don’t see many businesses where the employees are like this all the time. Especially in the restaurant business, I usually see employees who are thinking about and talking about everything but work, and acting like and saying out loud that they would rather be some place else.

Besides hiring good people, I would say that this Arby’s must have a good positive work environment. A work place that is fair, competent, organized, well managed, and pleasant. If it weren’t, they would have employee turnover, people not showing up for work, stressed out employees, and employees who were openly unhappy at work. But they don’t have any of this.

I hope that I don’t mess this restaurant up by writing a complimentary blog post about it.

New Gym “The Pit” In Dickinson, North Dakota

December 2, 2017Uncategorizedguide to Dickinson North Dakota, gyms in Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, The Pit gym Dickinson North Dakota, weight rooms in Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

Update 5/27/2018: When I first wrote this blog post article about the Pit Gym in December of 2017, I had a very positive and favorable opinion of this gym because it was the only weight room gym in town. I am not going to re-write my initial reaction, but I have added to the bottom of this blog post, a description of what I think is going to be a frustration for powerlifters and bodybuilders at this gym.

Approximately one month ago I was driving south on 10th Avenue East toward Villard when I saw a sign for the gym “The Pit” right next door to East End Towing. I have lived in Dickinson for a little over five years, and in this particular neighborhood for six months, and this was the first time that I ever saw that a gym was in this building.

I turned in to the parking lot, and I got out of my vehicle to look in the windows. The gym was mostly free weights, weight benches, and weight lifting racks. I had not seen a gym like this in years. Virtually all gyms in the United States have been transformed into “Fitness Centers” over the past 25 years in order to have a wider range of customers. The “Weight Rooms” are almost all gone now.

I thought for sure that the owner must be a Power Lifter, because who else would open a gym now with mostly free weights and weight lifting racks? I went inside, and there was a blond lady sitting at the desk, which was a surprise to me. I said, “I was expecting to see a guy at this gym, not a lady, this is a Weight Room.” She mostly understood what I meant, especially because her husband is a Power Lifter, but she probably didn’t like me saying it, because she is a Power Lifter too. This was probably Step #1 of me getting kicked out of this gym.

I talked to her probably longer than I should have, but I wanted to see if she and her husband had had the same experience as me at the West River Community Center. There are just so many people at the WRCC, and so many things going on, that it is difficult to get to the free weights and the weight racks at the WRCC.

For instance, I could plan on using one of the weight racks at the WRCC to safely do overhead press, squats, shrugs, or dead lifts, using 300 lbs or more, and all of the racks would be taken up by “Fitness People” who wanted to do multiple sets of lunges or bent over lifts using just the 45 lb bar, with no weights at all.

When I found out who her husband was, Dave Clem, I remembered seeing him at the WRCC many times. I believed that he probably wasn’t very happy with the “circus” at the WRCC, and it was no surprise to me that this was his gym. Dave is a Power Lifting competitor, and he currently holds several national Power Lifting records. He routinely squats 750 lbs at meets.

Membership at “The Pit” gym is $40 per month. If you are serious and goal oriented in Weight Training, Body Building, or Power Lifting, here are the advantages of this gym:

Multiple sets of dumbbell pairs, ranging in 5 lb increments from 5 lb to 100 lb, with no gaps. Four weight benches dedicated to the dumbbells.
Two heavy duty Power Lifting bench press benches. Adjacent weight plates to load 700 plus lbs.
Two heavy duty Power Lifting squat racks, with quick release bar rests, safety bars, and safety chains. Adjacent weight plates to load 700 plus lbs.
Dedicated dead lift platform, with bar jack for loading and unloading weight plates. Adjacent weight plates to load 700 plus lbs.
The walk from your car, to the weights that you want to use, is less than 75 feet, with no one, and no thing in your way. Going to the WRCC, is almost like going to an airport.
The Pit gym has 24 hour access. If you come during the day, or later in the evening, you will almost certainly have immediate and uninterrupted access to the weights, weight bench, or weight rack that you want to use.
At certain times during the week, Dave Clem and the Power Lifting team are training for squat, bench, and dead lift, and are watching and assisting in improving each other’s lifts.

Dave and Wendy Clem have a Power Lifting team that trains at The Pit gym. There is a large white competition board that lists each member’s weight class, competition record for squat, bench press, dead lift, totals, and personal best lifts. They encourage high school students to become involved in Power Lifting and they provide coaching.

At this gym, it is more goal oriented and results oriented. In Weight Training, Body Building, and Power Lifting, people are interested in increasing the weight used in lifts, increasing repetitions with weight, increasing the size and definition of muscle, and increasing strength in a measurable way. It is not like a “Fitness Center” where people dabble on a piece of equipment until they become bored or distracted, and then wander over to another piece of equipment and watch television on a monitor, not paying attention to what they are doing.

Change in my opinion of The Pit Gym 5/27/2018:

The whole reason for The Pit Gym to even exist in my opinion, was to provide access to heavy-duty, high weight capacity squat racks, bench press benches, dead-lift platform, incline leg press, and dumbbells in a way that the West River Community Center, and Anytime Fitness in Dickinson, North Dakota do not.

The West River Community Center is one of nicest fitness centers in the United States. It has two very large indoor swimming pools, one outdoor swimming pool, two tennis courts, four racketball courts, four basketball courts, a rock climbing wall, thirty pieces of cardiovascular equipment, and a weight room with squat racks, bench press benches, dead lift platform, and dumbbells, all for less money than The Pit Gym in Dickinson.

What the West River Community Center and the Anytime Fitness in Dickinson do not have, is an area for adult men to use heavy weight equipment, free from women and children.

At the West River Community Center in Dickinson, there are all kinds of things for women and children to do. Swim laps, use the water slide, play tennis, play racketball, climb on the rock climbing wall, play basketball, walk the track, run the track, do yoga or floor exercises, take an aerobics class, use thirty pieces of cardiovascular equipment, and even go do squats, bench press, dead lifts, with just the bar, with no weight, for as much as they want, for as long as they want.

The West River Community Center also has a day care for kids, and a very large women’s locker room with many lockers, toilets, and showers. The Anytime Fitness in Dickinson is also very large, with just as much cardiovascular equipment and weight lifting equipment as the West River Community Center. The Anytime Fitness has a women’s locker room with several toilets and showers.

The Pit Gym in Dickinson is small in size, approximately 35’x 50′. It has no women’s locker room, no women’s only bathroom, no shower, just one piece of cardiovascular equipment, no floor exercise area, and far less weight training equipment than either the West River Community Center or Anytime Fitness. The only thing that The Pit Gym has that what appealing to me, is the heavy-duty weight benches, squat racks, dead lift platform, and dumbbells, combined with the absence of women and children.

If you add women and children to The Pit Gym, and you have either a woman or a kid on the two squat racks, the two bench press benches, and using the dumbbells, The Pit Gym in my opinion is not worth going to.

I thought that Dave Clem the owner of The Pit Gym and a power lifting competitor, went through the trouble of finding a building to rent, and moved all of his heavy-duty, high weight capacity, power lifting training, exercise, and competition equipment into this building, so that people who wanted to lift and train with heavy weight, could do so without any conflict or interruption from the women and children at the West River Community Center or Anytime Fitness.

Yesterday, I went to The Pit Gym in Dickinson, and two young men had brought their two young girlfriends with them. The Pit Gym is very small, about 35’x 50′, there are only two squat racks, and two bench press benches. I got to use the squat rack that I wanted to use, but one of the young men’s girlfriends was talking a lot, and playing around, like this was their garage, an afternoon barbeque, or a social occasion. I was not as focused, or trying as hard as I should have been, I was distracted. The space is so small, that you can’t really escape how other people want to act, or what they want to do.

Soon, there was another young man that arrived with his young girlfriend. She was attractive, and was wearing training shorts, and a sports bras top. I became even more distracted, not just because this girl was attractive, but because she was talking on her phone, and talking about other things. Again, this was like a social occasion for her. And again, this gym is only about 35’x 50′, if other people want to talk about food, and what they want to go eat, you can’t help but hear them, which takes your mind off of what you are doing.

I realized that I was stopping short of where I should have in my exercises, because I was not paying attention to what I was doing. It was not just the distraction, it seems like there is a natural response to not completely disregard or ignore other people, as if this would be rude or impolite in a social situation. However, I was not looking for a social situation, I had intended to focus completely on my lifts, but I was not able to.

There was one bench press bench that I needed to use next, which was available, except one of the young women had left her head phones on the weight bar. What else would this bar be used for, other than to hang personal belongings on? I moved her head phones to the adjacent bench press bench. I was going to do behind the head pull over curls while laying on the bench, and this was the only bench with enough room to do this without hitting anything behind your head while laying down on the bench.

I didn’t realize that the young woman was going to use the adjacent bench press bench, to do bench presses with just the bar. I dragged the bench press bench that I was going to use, away from her, so that when I was doing behind the head curls while laying down, I would not hit her with the bar.

Lately, I would go up to 135 lb with behind the head curls, and in the past I was able to go up to 160 lbs. But today, I stopped at 105 lb, and left the gym before I was done with this exercise, and before I was done with the remainder of my exercises, because of these two women.

I did not want to continue with behind the head curls while laying down, for more sets with more weight, because I was worried about hitting the young woman with the bar, hurting her, and possibly losing my balance, and getting myself hurt too. I did not think that she knew the range of motion that I was going to make in this exercise, and I did not think that she understood how difficult this is to lower 135 lb behind your head and pull it back up using just your triceps.

My next exercise was going to be dumbbell flys, but the other young man and his girlfriend were socializing by the dumbbells and the dumbbell benches. I was concerned that I was not going to be able to make a maximum effort because of being distracted and not being able to entirely block out this couple. I was also concerned about being bumped into by the young woman who might not have understood the range of motion that I was going to make, possibly hurting her, and possibly losing my balance and hurting myself too.

In the 30 years that I have been going to gyms, I have always sought to go to weight room gyms where everyone uses heavy weights. At Anytime Fitness, the West River Community Center, or any gym where there are women and children, I have often had to stop what I am doing in the middle of a repetition, to avoid hitting or harming a woman or kid, that did not know the range of motion that I was going to make, or understand the amount of weight that I was moving.

For instance, in the past, I would train with 120 lb, 130 lb, and 140 lb dumbbells doing dumbbell presses. I could not use more than 100 lbs, at the West River Community Center, because women would come walking up beside you when you were on a bench, totally not understanding that this was 100 lb in each hand, that you were going to extend your arms completely in a press, and this movement was going to hurt them if they got in the way. And after five or six repetitions with 100 lb in each hand, they had better not be standing where a dumbbell could land on their feet. Women and children did not know, or understand, when you were lifting heavy weight.

In my opinion, there is absolutely no point, no reason whatsoever to join The Pit Gym in Dickinson if the owners Dave and Wendy Clem want this to be another fitness center with women and children. This gym will no longer offer anything that is any different from what the West River Community Center and the Anytime Fitness have to offer.

I have seen from my experience in going to many gyms over a 30 year period, that most women and children have no understanding or comprehension of an adult male making a maximum effort to lift the heaviest weight he can lift, for one or two repetitions, in an exercise where he can be severely injured or fail at the lift if he is distracted. Or, the understanding that they could be severely injured if they don’t move the fuck out of the way.

Here below are some examples with photographs:

What this guy below needs, is for someone else’s girlfriend to stand at the weight bench next to him, so that her leg gets broken when he puts down one of those 200 lb dumbbells. Maybe he should learn how to put them down gently, 200 lb each isn’t very much is it? That’s not that much more than 10 lb, is it?

DCIM101MEDIA

These two guys below, what they need is someone else’s girlfriend standing in front of them wearing a sports bras, and talking on her phone about where they are going to eat. Some kind of distraction is what they need, to cause them to fail in the lift and get hurt.

DCIM101MEDIA

All three of these guys up above need someone else’s kids running around them and bumping into them, to cause them to lose their balance so that they can fail in the lift and get hurt.

Today, in response to my updated blog posts, Wendy Clem, the wife of Dave Clem, wrote some comments. She completely disagrees with my opinion and my wish that her gym be oriented primarily towards men. She believes that her gym should be open to everyone.

Wendy wrote some comments saying that I was Chauvanistic. I agree on this, as far as my opinion on having one gym in Dickinson that is primarily for men. Wendy called me on the telephone, and said that if I came down there right now, she had two women in the gym who could kick my ass in the gym. I said that I would be right there.

When I got to the gym about fifteen minutes later, Wendy met me outside the gym with a refund of money. She wanted to tell me what she thought. I said where are these two women who can out lift me? I was introduced to a very large young woman who had just completed a 400 lb squat.

I said to the young woman, O.K., you have me beat on squat, I admit it. Let’s go do some 100 lb dumbbells. She wouldn’t do it. Then, I got told to leave the gym, and never come back.

Classification Of People In Dickinson, North Dakota

November 25, 2017Uncategorizedguide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what are people like in Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

In my previous blog post, I wrote about Bigfoot Hunter Tim “Coonbo” Baker and his classification of Bigfoot into at least four distinct species. Tim “Coonbo” Baker’s classification system helps to clear up confusion, misunderstandings, and arguments that have existed for over 100 years concerning Bigfoot. I thought, why not do the same thing for Dickinson?

Below I have created a classification system for people in Dickinson. This list is arranged in order from most common, to least common in Dickinson:

Local Catholics – Most common group of people in Dickinson. Usually of German or Ukranian ancestry. Typically unfriendly, uncooperative, not helpful, hostile, and mean. Adult males are difficult to get along with at work. Adult females usually sneer, scowl, glare, and tend to be overweight. Catholic children in Dickinson can be quite nasty, especially if they go to Trinity School.
Local Lutherans – Second most common group of people in Dickinson. Usually of Norwegian or Scandinavian ancestry. Typically helpful and friendly. Adult females expect their husbands to rake and mow the lawn, trim the trees and bushes, and clean the cars, house exterior, roof, windows, driveway, and sidewalk. Even though Lutheran women are notorious for their casseroles, the Lutheran men are skinny due to having to work all the time.
Local Methodists – Not very common in Dickinson. No one knows how they got here. They stay hidden and keep a low profile. If you meet a person who acts normal in Dickinson, they might be a Methodist.
Local Mormons – Not very common in Dickinson. They might have come from Illinois, Missouri, Idaho, or Utah. Adult males are usually good reliable employees. Adult females stay at home. Young unmarried females are nice and pleasant to a fault. Young unmarried males are annoying.
Local Non-Denominational and Other Christians – Any individual in this group could have come from anywhere. There is no telling what they will do, so don’t turn you back on them.
Red-Necks from the South – Much more common in Dickinson from 2008 through 2014 during the oil boom. Not very common in Dickinson now. Adult males tend to be overweight and they like to stare and look at everything to see what it is, whether it is a lawn sprinkler, squirrel, taco truck, any vehicle for sale, etc. Adult females in Dickinson are always “fixin to go to the store”.
People from Texas – Just as common and annoying now, as they were during the oil boom from 2008 through 2014. Adult males usually drive a Ford F250 4×4, faster and more erratically than necessary, like they would in Dallas or Houston. There is usually something wrong with someone who had to drive all the way from Texas in order to get a job in North Dakota. There are no women from Texas in Dickinson, they won’t come.
People from Coeur D’Alene – Just about everyone who left Coeur D’Alene, Idaho to come to work in Dickinson, has been or still is involved in illegal drugs. Adult males typically work for companies where there is no drug testing, like small construction companies or dangerous oil field service companies. Adult females typically work where there is no drug testing, mostly in restaurants and hotels. Vehicle license plates from the Coeur D’Alene area of Idaho, begin with the letter “K”. A good rule to remember is, “If it starts with the letter ‘K’, stay away”, whenever you see an Idaho license plate.

Come To Dickinson, North Dakota For Enlightenment And Spiritual Awakening

Come to Dickinson, North Dakota for Enlightenment and Spiritual Awakening. There is no need to travel to Nepal, Tibet, Sedona, or Sante Fe.

The Christian, Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, and Wicca religions have sects and followers that believe enlightenment and spiritual awakening can be reached through the practice of Asceticism. Asceticism involves abstinence from physical and sensual pleasures, renunciation of material possessions, and much time spent alone reflecting upon spiritual matters. Some Ascetics practice self-infliction of pain, making their body suffer, or maiming their body.

When you live in Dickinson, North Dakota, you will experience no earthly pleasures, no enjoyment of anything, no distraction of women and sex, and plenty of discomfort, suffering, pain, misery, and maiming.

Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, there is very little to do, and nowhere to go. There is a shortage of women, and a scarcity of attractive women. Living here, you will forego all forms of enjoyment. Many people in Dickinson experience and practice the abandonment of personal hygiene.

Self-infliction of pain comes when you go outside, live in a poorly insulated trailer, or go to work in Dickinson. Work in Dickinson involves co-workers who are mean, hostile, unfriendly, uncooperative, and undermining. Work in Dickinson consists of long hours outside in the cold performing physical labor which is dangerous. Co-workers assist with the infliction of pain, suffering, misery, and body maiming while at work.

The police in Dickinson are very helpful in making people’s lives even more ascetic, assisting with the deprivation of enjoyment, pleasure, money, and in providing confinement.

After living in Dickinson for approximately five years now, I have come to realize more about the Soul. Many people are familiar with out-of-body experiences, and/or astral projection, where it is believed that the Soul or Astral Body leaves the physical body at night during sleep under certain conditions, usually conditions of peace, quiet, and tranquility.

However, living in Dickinson, your Soul or Astral Body, will be trying to leave most of the time, even during the day. To a lay person, bystander, or an uninitiated person, the self-denial and self-infliction of pain practiced by the Ascetics might be seen as purification, dedication, devoutness, withdrawal from the world, and focusing inward, in order to achieve enlightenment. However, the constant condition of pain, suffering, misery, and unhappiness, causes the Soul or Astral Body to begin disassociating from the physical body.

With only my random thoughts and no intention, I would often find myself thinking of living in Dickinson as being like a Jew in a concentration camp. Especially at work, where I was cold, dirty, hungry, having to defecate on the ground, and being endangered and mistreated by hostile Germans, how could I not feel like a Jew in a concentration camp? I thought of the daily lives of the Jewish prisoners, the horrors and the torture that they had to endure. I had wondered before, and I began to wonder now, how does their physical body, Consciousness, Spirit, or Soul cope with torture, and at what point do these elements of a person shut down or leave?

I remembered a conversation that I had had in the past with an engineer who was much older than me, who said that he believed that when the body experiences physical pain to a certain point the Consciousness, Spirit, or Soul realizes that it is time to leave, and it vacates the body, rather than stay any longer. I also remembered a story that was told to me by a minister, who described the daily physical abuse that a child had experienced from his parents every day of his short life, that amounted to torture. One day, the child died. An autopsy was performed, but no cause of death could be found or determined. It was apparent that the child had been abused, but there was no injury that had caused his death. It was as if his Consciousness, Spirit, or Soul decided to go ahead and leave this physical body.

I will give an explanation of this from sources other than myself. From the website address http://www.sacredserpent.net/soul-retrieval.html, I have taken the following excerpt:

“As a rule soul loss occurs due to trauma. Children are most susceptible to soul loss, as they are more vulnerable than adults and still more connected to the world of spirit or Otherworld than most adults are. When a child gets abused or suffers great distress or unhappiness he or she will often instinctively try to escape to the Otherworld to flee from the pain and to find peace or happiness.

But soul loss affects not only children but people of all ages. Typical triggers for soul loss are accident, injury, shock, trauma or prolonged unhappiness. An event that triggers soul loss in one person may not cause soul loss in others with a similar experience. It depends on how severe the shock or suffering was felt from a subjective point of view….

Physical injury is not a prerequisite for soul loss. It is not unusual for people who were involved in a car accident but suffered no physical injuries whatsoever to have soul loss. The loud sound and the impact cause shock. Your soul thinks you are dying and “ejects”. It may come back later when the shock wears off, or part of it may stay out. Any severe shock can cause soul loss….

Only very severe and / or repeated trauma can cause total soul loss. The result of total soul loss would eventually be death, or at the very least coma.”

In the above excerpt, this was the first time that I have heard of partial or incomplete Soul loss, where one’s entire Soul does not disassociate during suffering or trauma. But the description of the circumstances of Soul loss were so clear, and the explanation was in conformity with what is written by others elsewhere, that I quoted this source.

The point that I wanted to make, is that people who have associated Out of Body Experiences and Astral Projection, where the Spirit or Soul leaves the physical body, with meditation, sleep, peace, and tranquility, they can come to Dickinson, North Dakota, live here for a while, and they can experience their Soul leaving their physical body all of the time.

Police Corruption In North Dakota

Law Enforcement in North Dakota is taking steps to make sure that North Dakota is the most corrupt, backward, dishonest, and lawless state. Instead of Law Enforcement taking pride in, defending, and upholding the Constitution, they are subverting it, and disregarding it. Instead of protecting citizens’ Civil Rights, they are violating citizens’ Civil Rights. Instead of enforcing laws, they are breaking laws, disregarding laws, and becoming the worst and most notorious criminals in North Dakota.

I will cite two recent Law Enforcement operations in North Dakota, that are almost identical to what the KGB used to do to political dissidents in Russia, East Germany, Cuba, and what corrupt dictators did in the Middle East, Africa, and South America to political opponents. It is appalling and reprehensible that Law Enforcement in North Dakota would try to carry out the same type of barbarity.

Recently, in Dickinson and in Fargo, North Dakota, Law Enforcement created an advertisement for an escort or prostitute, and placed this advertisement on internet websites. This was a fake advertisement, created by Law Enforcement to entice men to contact their fake escort or prostitute. In the advertisement, there was nothing mentioned about the escort being under the age of 18 years.

In Fargo, 42 year old business owner Dan Durr responded to the fake advertisement for a prostitute, and he made arrangements to meet at a location. When Dan Durr got to the location to meet the prostitute, he was then informed that the prostitute was under 18 years, and he drove away.

Law Enforcement knew that when they placed an advertisement for a prostitute, they would attract the attention of men who were desperate to have sex with a woman. They did not mention in the advertisement that the prostitute was under 18. When the men arrived to meet the prostitute and were informed that she was under 18 years, they thought that the men would be so desperate, that they wouldn’t care.

Dan Durr from Fargo thought that he was meeting an adult to have sex, and when he was informed that the prostitute was under 18 years, he drove away. The Fargo Police arrested him anyway, and they charged him with Patronizing a Minor for Commercial Sex Activity, a Class A felony punishable by 20 years in prison.

But remember, Dan Durr responded to a fake advertisement for a prostitute created by Law Enforcement, where it did not say that the prostitute was under 18. Law Enforcement lured men to meet who they thought was an adult prostitute. When the men arrived, they were informed that the prostitute was under 18 years. However, at no time was a minor ever involved whatsoever, the Police just made the statement that the prostitute was under 18 years when the men arrived.

Dan Durr’s case went to trial recently, and he was found guilty of hiring an individual to engage in sexual activity, a Class B misdemeanor. Dan Durr was found not guilty of the Class A felony charge of Patronizing a Minor for Commercial Sexual Activity.

I will give credit to the Cass County District Court Judge Susan Bailey, who was asked by Dan Durr’s defense attorney to allow the jury to consider not just the felony charge, but also the misdemeanor charge, and she allowed the jury to consider both charges. I wish that the judge would have taken the opportunity to admonish the prosecuting attorney and Law Enforcement for tactics that go beyond entrapment, and violate citizens Constitutional and Civil Rights, in attempt to make criminals out of ordinary citizens.

In criminal law, entrapment is a practice whereby Law Enforcement induces a person to commit a criminal offence that the person would have otherwise been unlikely or unwilling to commit. But this case goes much further than entrapment. Law Enforcement not only lured a citizen into committing a crime by placing an advertisement for a prostitute, which he might not have done if it were not for the advertisement, but then Law Enforcement started to create fictitious non-existent circumstances to enhance this crime that they lured this citizen into in the first place. Trying to make what would have been a Class B misdemeanor into a Class A felony punishable by 20 years in prison, by adding phony fictitious circumstances. Dan Durr never sought to meet a minor for sexual activity, nor was a minor ever present or involved in any way.

Additionally, and this is a very important point, when Dan Durr was informed that the prostitute was under 18 years, he drove away. Why did Law Enforcement try to charge Dan Durr with Patronizing a Minor for Commercial Sex Activity, a Class A felony, when he absolutely did not try to do this, and he immediately left when he was informed that the prostitute was under 18 years? Why did Law Enforcement seek to arrest and prosecute someone for a crime that they did not commit? Could anything be more corrupt than this?

The second case that I will cite, is almost identical to the one that I just described above. Manish M., 29 of Dickinson, has been charged with Patronizing a Minor for Commercial Sexual Activity, a Class A felony.

Here is an excerpt from an October 23, 2017 Dickinson Press article written by Sydney Mook:

“…M appeared in court with his attorney Robert Bolinske.

Stark County assistant state’s attorney, Amanda Engelstad, called Travis Leintz, a detective with the Dickinson Police Department, to testify during the hearing. Leintz said an ad was placed on Backpage.com with the help of an officer from Minnesota who specializes in human trafficking.

Manish allegedly responded to the ad via text message then allegedly exchanged messages with the officers who were acting as a 15-year-old girl. When the defendant asked for the girl’s age, the officers responded by saying “almost 16.” Manish allegedly responded multiple times that he would not have sex with someone who was under the age of 18 and said he did not want to get into trouble. However, he later agreed to meet the girl at the Motel 6 in Dickinson, Leintz said.

Manish later moved across the street to the McDonald’s parking lot where he was later arrested by officers.

Bolinske questioned Leintz about the original ad on Backpage.com, which stated the poster was 18 and said his client had originally said no to someone that was under the age of 18. Leintz said in order to post on Backpage.com, the poster must list 18 as their age.

Southwest Judge James Gion found there to be enough probable cause to move forward with the case.

Manish entered a not guilty plea to all charges.”

What is very troubling to me, is that the advertisement for the girl wanting to have sex, said that she was 18 years of age. When Manish asked the girl about her age, and she replied that she was almost 16, Manish responded that he would never have sex with someone under the age of 18.

It appears to me to be entrapment by Law Enforcement, to place an advertisement where the poster is listed as 18 years of age in order to lure Manish into communication, to then inform him that he is communicating with a minor, and to continue communicating with Manish and arrange a meeting with him, even after he has repeatedly said that he would never have sex with a minor because he does not want to get into trouble.

In other words, had Law Enforcement not placed a fake advertisement for an 18 year old girl wanting to hook up, then made up the story that she was under 18 years, then ignored Manish’s statements that he would not have sex with a minor, and continued to contact him anyway, caused Manish to be drawn into a possible meeting with a minor. At no time did Manish actually meet with a minor, because at no time was a minor involved. If Manish did actually ever meet with this minor, he might have continued to insist that he would never have sex with a minor.

Why are the Dickinson Police trying to charge Manish with Patronizing a Minor for Commercial Sex Activity? The fake advertisement that the Dickinson Police placed, said that the poster was 18 years old. The Dickinson Police drew Manish into this, even though he said that he did not want to have sex with a minor. Manish never did meet with a minor and agree to have sex. Why are they still charging him?

I think that the Dickinson Police have made a criminal out of someone who never intended to engage in criminal activity. The charges that Manish now faces, could lead to 20 years in prison. As far as criminal activity in Dickinson, I would much rather have my truck stolen or my apartment broken into, than have the Dickinson Police try to entrap me in one of their schemes like this one. Who is worse in Dickinson, the police or the criminals?

Update 2/12/2018:

I received an e-mail from Manish’s sister today, explaining that this court case has been resolved. She asked if there was anything that I could do, to not damage his name and reputation any further. I decided to remove his last name from my blog posts, because I believed that Manish was unjustly entrapped to begin with. However, I want these blog posts to remain on the internet, because I do not want this same thing to happen to anyone else.

Essential Information On Working And Living In Dickinson, North Dakota

November 2, 2017Uncategorizedguide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what are people like in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, working in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

I was an outsider to Dickinson, North Dakota. I have now lived and worked in Dickinson for 5-1/2 years. For the past three years, I have been writing about Dickinson on this blog website. After writing, thinking, discussing, and searching hard for answers, about why Dickinson is the way that it is, I finally think that I have the answers.

I have seen and experienced that the local people from Dickinson have hatred, hostility, bitterness, resentment, maliciousness, and malevolence for the non-local people who have come to Dickinson to work. Non-local people will experience this most profoundly at work in Dickinson.

I believe that one of the causes for the hatred of non-local people, was the Catholic Church here in Dickinson. The Catholic Church here in Dickinson, was probably the biggest social and cultural influence for many years. This Church did not teach kindness and helpfulness to others, but instead it taught foremost to protect one’s own family, Catholics, and the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church here in Dickinson instilled an attitude of elitism and the belief of superiority of one’s own family, Catholics, and the Catholic Church, above all other people.

Another cause for the hatred of non-local people in Dickinson, has been the oil boom that made some local families rich, while other local families remained poor. With it not seeming right to the local people to have hatred and resentment towards their local neighbors who became rich, the local people re-directed their anger and resentment toward the non-local people.

Another cause for the hatred of non-local people in Dickinson, has been that the local people have always had work as their main focus in life. In Dickinson, life has always been hard due to the very long and very cold winters. Work and surviving was the primary focus of people in Dickinson. Unlike other places in the United States where entertainment, recreation, and social activities were a big part of people’s lives, Dickinson never had this. In Dickinson, the local people’s identities, meaning, and purpose in life, was work.

During the oil boom that occurred in Dickinson from 2007 to 2014, and especially now that the oil boom is over and many jobs have recently gone away, the local people from Dickinson have been hostile, hateful, mean, uncooperative, and undermining to their non-local co-workers. It wasn’t until recently that I determined that the specific primary cause for this, was that local people from Dickinson get their identity, meaning, and purpose in life, from work.

Unlike other places in the United States where people have many different interests and things that are important in their lives, the local people from Dickinson have just one primary focus, that is their job. There is a shortage of women in Dickinson, and a scarcity of attractive women. There are not enough women to go around. The pursuit of romantic relationships is not common in Dickinson. There is not much reason for people to go out or socialize in Dickinson. Nor are there many places to go in Dickinson, or things to do.

The time that other people living in other places put into playing sports, exercising, recreation, entertainment, shopping, going out, socializing, dating, and having fun, the local people from Dickinson never had that, they just put all of their time into work. Work was their focus, meaning, identity, and purpose in life.

In summary, the local people from Dickinson are so hostile, hateful, unfriendly, bitter, resentful, malicious, malevolent, and undermining to non-local people because the Catholic Church has taught the local people to feel superior to others; there is anger and resentment over some local families becoming rich, and this anger is re-directed toward non-local people; the local people have only work as the meaning and purpose in their lives, the non-local co-workers are a threat to the local people from Dickinson in their only purpose and reason for living.

What this means for people from out of state who come to work in Dickinson, is that your local co-workers from Dickinson will try to get you to leave because you are a threat to their very existence and reason for living.

Thinking About A Normal Life In Dickinson, North Dakota

November 2, 2017Uncategorizedguide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, people in dickinson north dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, working in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

In my previous blog post, I wrote about going to a job in Dickinson, where they wanted me to stand and work on a two foot wide elevated platform from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. During this 15 hours of standing and working on this platform by myself, I had a lot of time to think. One of the things that I was thinking about, was that this is bullshit, and this is not normal.

Something else that I was thinking about, was what I wrote in my recent previous blog post titled “Jobs, Employment, and Working In Dickinson, North Dakota”. I wrote about local co-workers from Dickinson having hatred, hostility, bitterness, malevolence, maliciousness, and ill intentions towards their out of state co-workers in Dickinson.

These long work hours and remote locations, provide local co-workers from Dickinson abundant opportunity to conceive, plan, and carry out their ill intentions and meanness against their non-local co-workers.

I believe, that it is abnormal and deviant, to have extreme hatred towards others, to think up plans on how to harm others, and to carry out hostility, hatred, and maliciousness towards others. I think that it is abnormal and wrong, to try to hatch hateful plans against others at work.

If you have ever read about convicted criminals who have committed crimes of violence against other people, sometimes against people that they have never met, or if you have watched documentaries on these convicted criminals, it is most often the case that they had unbalanced, abnormal, anti-social lives. Often, they were reclusive, with no friends, no romantic relationships, no social activities or interaction, and they kept to themselves spending an inordinate amount of time on one thing. This describes life for most local workers from Dickinson.

In Dickinson, there is a shortage of women, and a scarcity of attractive women. There are not enough women to go around, and most of the women are not very attractive. In the past several years living in Dickinson, the people that I know and have worked with, none of them were pursuing women, or any romantic relationship. Because they were not pursuing women or any romantic relationship, there was often no reason for them to go out, go anywhere, or socialize.

There is not a lot to do in Dickinson. People do not have many things to look forward to. People in Dickinson spend way too much time working. It is like the time that other people in other places use for having fun, doing things that they like, and socializing, in Dickinson this time just gets applied to work. This is one reason why I think that the local people in Dickinson are so hateful, hostile, and resentful at work.

At this time in Dickinson, it may only be the workers from out of state, that know in other areas of the country, people “work to live”, they don’t “live to work”. In Florida where I am from, there were many fun things for people to do all year: Surf, sail, sailboard, water ski, jet ski, swim, scuba dive, boat, fish from boats, fish offshore, fish from bridges, fish from beaches, go crabbing, go clamming, go oystering, go shrimping, sun bathe, ride motorcycles, ride bikes, rollerblade, jog, walk, hike, play tennis, play golf, and more. People of all ages searched for and pursued romantic relationships.

In Florida, people loved to have fun, recreate, go shopping, socialize, go out to eat, and enjoy life. For most people in Florida, work was something that took time away from the things that they would rather be doing.

I will drop talking about Florida, and briefly use the example of another state, Arizona. There were many fun activities in Arizona that people could do all year. People in Arizona also liked to go shopping, socialize, and enjoy life. People in Arizona would have liked to have spent less time working, and more time doing the things that they liked to do outside of work.

In the Dickinson area, generations of people did not have fun things or fun activities to do. Life in the Dickinson area was very difficult. It was difficult just to survive due to the very long and very cold winters, and the barrenness of the land. There is still not a lot to do in Dickinson, and there is a scarcity of attractive women.

The local people from Dickinson, historically, culturally, and genetically, for generation after generation, they have gotten up way too early in the morning, sat in their dirty worn work clothes, smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee, talking and muttering about work for an hour, before there was even enough light outside to go do any work. In Dickinson, the local people like to try to “sneak up on work” or try to “get a head start on work”, when really they are just wasting time being miserable, and they don’t even know it.

In Arizona or Florida, an educated business owner would see this behavior, and put an end to it. He would probably say, “At the end of each day, that is the time to clean the garbage out of your work truck, to load the equipment and material that you will need for the following day onto your truck, and to inform the workers what they will be doing the following day. There is no need to get here at 4:00 a.m. or 5:00 a.m., 6:00 a.m. would be the earliest you would need to get here, it is not even daylight at 6:00 a.m. I want my employees to have a normal work-life balance. I don’t want my employees to get burned out, be unhappy, and be unproductive. Also, I am not going to pay overtime every week for people to get here at 5:00 a.m. half asleep, to sit around smoking, drinking coffee, and muttering.”

People in Dickinson spend way too much time at work. This is partly because the local people from Dickinson don’t have anything or don’t know of anything that they would rather be doing. The local people from Dickinson, the focus of their life is on work, even if they are just an oil field service worker. And I don’t mean their focus is on excellence. They just burrow in like a tick at their job.

They have got to get to their job early in the morning, smoke a certain amount of cigarettes, drink a certain amount of coffee, talk for a certain amount of time, and accomplish absolutely nothing for about one hour. Then it is load equipment and material, and go get fuel, when all of this could have been done the day before. In my observation, these activities are all attempts to make the work day longer than it needed to be.

There is not the pursuit of excellence, insight, innovation, growth, progression, or increased effectiveness of the local people at their job. Instead the local workers from Dickinson spend their time, energy, and mental faculties on trying to find something wrong with what their co-workers are doing, and trying to find ways to hinder and undermine their co-workers.

This is what I mean when I say that the local workers from Dickinson try to burrow in to their job like a tick. What they are doing is not particularly beneficial, helpful, or productive, it is sometimes counter productive. They have got to get to their job early, and stay there late, like they can’t let go of their job and go do something else. They don’t have anything else, their job is their life and their identity.

I think that this is another reason why the local people from Dickinson try to drive their co-workers away. This job is their entire life, their identity, and their purpose. Without this job they don’t have anywhere to go, anything to do, or any purpose in life. I think that this is abnormal and not a very good way to live your life.

Example Of Working In Dickinson, North Dakota

November 1, 2017Uncategorizedguide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what are people like in Dickinson North Dakota, working in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

In my previous blog post titled “Jobs, Employment, And Working In Dickinson, North Dakota”, I explained that local people from Dickinson are hostile, mean, malicious, and hateful to their non-local co-workers. I wrote some pretty harsh things in that blog post, but I stand by what I wrote, and I believe that what I wrote was truthful, honest, and accurate. Readers are probably wondering, where do I come up with this, how did I come to this conclusion? I will give one, recent example.

I agreed to do a job recently. I was not given a very accurate job description, or any kind of warning. I don’t think that there was any ill-intention in this, the people giving me the information did not know.

I had to drive about an hour from Dickinson to get to the job location. My job, was to climb up to a two foot wide platform, to work by myself, and to be just one part of the overall work operation.

There were three significant problems with this job: There was the requirement and expectation that I would be up on the platform, standing, for 15 hours; It was extremely cold and windy; There was not a railing on one side of the platform, and if I fell off this side, I would certainly die.

My thoughts were, “This is bullshit, this is fucked up.” I had worked at heights before, I had worked at dangerous jobs before, I had worked in the cold and wind before, but not for 15 hours straight.

According to OSHA, when you are working at heights like this, where you can fall to your death, it is required that there be a continuous railing of 42″ in height, or you are tied off with a safety harness and lanyard. There was no railing on one side, just steel that came up to knee height. The company did not have, offer, or want the person on the platform wearing a safety harness and lanyard. I have two safety harnesses, but I didn’t know that I would need to bring one, and I realized that they wouldn’t like me wearing one.

In this company’s and its employees’ “ignorance”, they just didn’t care to have a railing on one side of the platform, or have a safety harness for the person on the platform. Their opinion was, “What, just don’t fall off.” I asked what happened to the person who used to have this job before me, and they said they didn’t know what happened to him, he just didn’t come back.

It was very cold and windy on the elevated platform. I was wearing thermal underwear, FR pants, heavy hooded FR sweatshirt, heavy hooded winter jacket, and work gloves. After a couple of hours on the platform, I kept getting colder and colder. I had to climb down quickly, run to my vehicle, put on a second heavy winter jacket, run back, and quickly climb back up to the platform. I made it back up on top of the platform, just in time to do my part of the work process and not create a delay for everyone.

All day long, my hands were cold, my feet were cold, and I was generally cold. After about eight more hours, I had to climb down again, run, get a third winter jacket to tie around my waste, run, and climb back up the platform, just in time to do my part of the work process.

When it got dark at 6:00 p.m., I couldn’t see anything. I had to quickly climb down, and run to my vehicle to get a flashlight. This time, I just drove my vehicle over, and parked it next to a small tanker truck and other parked equipment.

During the day when I had to urinate, I would quickly climb down and urinate beside the parked equipment. At night, after it was dark, I would just urinate off the platform. If I had had to poop, I could not have run to the portable toilet and turned around and run back in time, let alone go in and sit down.

We worked until 9:30 p.m. that night. The longer that I worked, and the more tired that I became, the more careless, unworried, and not paying attention I became, plus it became dark. That is when I caught myself a few times almost falling off the one side of the platform without a railing.

After stopping on the drive home to get fuel in my vehicle, and going to the drive thru at McDonalds, it was approximately 11:15 p.m. when I got home. I slept for five hours, and then I had to get up and drive back to the job site by 6:00 a.m.

Do you think that I was looking forward to standing on that platform for another day from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., for 15 hours? In the cold and the wind. Where tripping, losing your balance, or not paying attention will result in you falling to your death. I never planned on working or living like this. This is not normal.

After several days of working like this, my local co-workers and work supervisor from Dickinson were not very nice or friendly to me. It was hard to do this job, and I did not delay the work once. It was like my work supervisor had a dislike and resentment for me. Even though I showed up on time, did my job all day long without complaining to anyone, didn’t get hurt, didn’t make a mistake, didn’t cause any kind of delay, my local Dickinson co-workers and local Dickinson work supervisor were determined to dislike me. They were just thinking and thinking, and hoping to be able to find fault with something I was doing, so that they could complain.

Jobs, Employment, And Working In Dickinson, North Dakota

November 1, 2017UncategorizedDickinson, North Dakota, employment in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what are people like in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota lilke, working in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

In many ways, the people in Dickinson are an open book. Their behavior, actions, beliefs, and motivations are so blatant, apparent, and un-hidden, that it is almost like observing children, primitive, or low functioning people.

It might also have something to do with my age, with me having seen all of these behaviors and scenarios in Dickinson, play out before in other places. Nevertheless, whenever I did see these types of things that occur in Dickinson in other places, I was painfully aware of the ignorance, stupidity, and backwardness of the perpetrators and accomplices.

In our private, personal, and social lives in Dickinson, we can retreat to our homes, families, and friends in order to get away from things, people, and situations that we don’t like. However, work is a part of our lives where we are forced to deal with things, people, and situations that we would have never voluntarily been involved with.

The Biggest Point, that I wish to make in this blog post, is that many bad, ignorant, backward, malicious, and ill-intentioned people in Dickinson, use work as the opportunity to act on and fulfill their desire to cause problems for others.

I am sorry that I have not previously been able to articulate this so clearly: There are many people in Dickinson who are uneducated, uncultured, untravelled, small minded, ignorant, close minded, bitter, hateful, malicious people. More so than any other place that I have ever lived. I am not saying this to be hateful, I am saying this to be truthful, honest, and accurate.

One of the reasons for the lack of education, ignorance, close mindedness, bitterness, hatefulness, and maliciousness, I believe, is the Catholic Church here in Dickinson. One of my readers tried to explain to me, that in oil field towns, the wind-falls that some families receive, while other families receive nothing, is something that inspires bitterness, resentment, and hatred. The families in the oil field towns that receive nothing, while their neighbors become rich, don’t feel right about taking their hatred out on local people, so they direct all of their anger, meanness, and hostility toward people from some place else.

It has been my experience in Dickinson, time after time, again and again, that local co-workers from Dickinson, have this horrible, not very hidden, intention of doing bad things to non-local co-workers. But, to be completely honest and accurate, there is often also something wrong with the people who could not get a job anywhere in Texas, Arizona, or New York, that came all of this way in order to be able to get a job.

The third and fourth elements or factors, that makes working in Dickinson a horrible and terrible experience, time after time, is the fact that the people in Dickinson have to work more than forty hours per week, and people do not have normal home lives here.

I believe, that one of the reasons why people get up to no good at work in Dickinson, is because they are working more than forty hours per week, and spending too much time at work. There is just too much time and opportunity for malicious, bitter, ignorant, hateful, mean people to conceive, hatch, and carry out their bad intentions towards others. Normal people are stuck way too long at work, with people who have evil intentions towards others.

I believe, another reason why people get up to hatching and carrying out their bad intentions towards others at work in Dickinson, is because they do not have a normal home life. There is a shortage of women in Dickinson, and a scarcity of attractive women. Many men in Dickinson do not have anyone to look forward to seeing, talking to, spending time with, or doing activities with. Plus, there is not a lot to do in Dickinson. Thus, you have ignorant, uneducated, untravelled, uncultured, close minded, malicious, bitter, hateful people, who have nothing better to do than think about harming other people at work, and the opportunity to cause other people harm at work, because everyone is working too many hours.

Dickinson, North Dakota Has Removed The Welcome Matt

October 26, 2017UncategorizedDickinson, North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, the Dickinson Rule, what are people like in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, working in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

In my previous two blog posts, I explained that Dickinson, North Dakota has removed the Welcome Matt, and I explained the reasons why. I will not go into these reasons again, instead I will explain what this means, more clearly and more plainly.

If you are living in a different state, and you are considering moving to Dickinson to work, I want to caution you, and give you some things to consider.

The local people in Dickinson do not like workers from out of state. They did not like out of state workers during the oil boom, and they dislike out of state workers even more now that the oil boom has gone away.

Many oil field jobs have gone away, local people are making less money, work hours have been reduced, and overtime hours have been reduced. Some local people have lost their jobs, and some local people are having difficulty in finding a new job. The winter work slow down is here, there will be fewer jobs, layoffs, and it will be much harder to find a job this winter in Dickinson.

During the oil boom, the local co-workers in Dickinson, were often hostile, hateful, uncooperative, mean, and undermining to out of state workers. Now, the local people in Dickinson not only hate out of state workers, they feel that out of state workers are a threat to them in preventing them from finding job, taking a job that could have gone to a local person, or keeping their job while a local person is laid off or fired.

I would not come to Dickinson now from out of state without having a good solid job offer, and a second or third prospective employer. Your prospective employer may be a good person, their management team may be good people, but once you get out to your office, counter, warehouse, truck, route, job site, or oil field, your local Dickinson co-workers may have other plans for you, specifically, you not being here.

In my previous two blog posts, I described something called the “Dickinson Rule”. What this means is, the local people in Dickinson have adopted this rule, where local people are given preference in hiring, promotion, work assignments, overtime, and should be the last people to be reprimanded, demoted, laid off, or fired. People from out of state, are not due equal treatment or fair treatment.

If you are a worker from out of state, be prepared to not receive complete instructions when required, not receive important information when necessary, be given incorrect instructions and information, be assigned faulty equipment, faulty equipment to not be repaired, to not be given the necessary tools, to not receive cooperation, to have your work performance reported as unsatisfactory, to not be paid for hours worked, and to not be paid as agreed. These things are the implementation and application of the “Dickinson Rule”.

I am going to try to write enough about this “Dickinson Rule”, so that company owners and company managers can fully understand and realize that this is happening. I believe that many company owners and managers have spotted some of these things, but I doubt that many of them are completely aware of everything that is going on. Further, I think that there are company owners and managers who do not care.

I also want to write enough about this “Dickinson Rule”, so that workers from out of state will know about this ahead of time. Workers from out of state can plan ahead, what they think that they would do in their particular work situation, when they don’t get cooperation, complete information, correct instructions, fully functioning equipment, all the necessary tools, pay for all hours worked, or the pay that was agreed upon.

One of the things that out of state workers can do, is say, “No, I don’t want to work for you company because of the Dickinson Rule.” If enough out of state workers call this out as their reason for not accepting a job offer, not coming to work, quitting and leaving, then company owners and managers may have to address this problem, and try to put an end to the implementation of the “Dickinson Rule” at their company.

Starting Over Writing About People In Dickinson, North Dakota

October 26, 2017Uncategorizedguide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, the Dickinson Rule, what are people like in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, working in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

I have lived in Dickinson, North Dakota since 2011. I have been writing blog posts about living in Dickinson for the past three years. I have been seeing such a significant change in the people in Dickinson during the past several months, that I believe a transition has occurred.

There was an oil boom in North Dakota from 2007 through 2014. In 2015, there was a sharp drop in the price of oil. The number of operating oil drill rigs decreased, work in the oil field slowed down, other businesses slowed down, and many out of state workers returned home to the states where they came from.

Dickinson became less crowded, less busy, quieter, and calmer. However, the attitude, outlook, mood, and behavior of people in Dickinson did not change that much from what it had been during the oil boom years of 2007 through 2014.

In 2015 and 2016, people in Dickinson wondered and speculated whether the oil boom would come back. People’s opinions would change daily depending on what they had heard, read, or what other people had persuaded them to believe. No matter what we thought, we were all waiting to see what actually happened.

In 2017, I believe that most people in Dickinson had concluded that the oil boom was not coming back, whether they admitted this out loud or not. Reaching this conclusion, every individual considered what this meant for them, how would this affect them.

In the Fall of 2017, it was like everyone in Dickinson had changed overnight. It was like they had all changed in unison, their attitudes, outlook, mood, and behavior.

In Dickinson every winter, there is a work slow down, and a work shut down. It becomes so cold, that it is difficult to work outside. It begins to snow, and the ground freezes. Farmers don’t do any work with their fields, construction companies can’t do many types of work because it isn’t practical, personal work projects and commercial work projects can’t be done due to the weather.

In the winter, there are fewer jobs, it is harder to find a job, there are fewer ways to make money, and it is harder to make money. It is a time of financial hardship for many people in Dickinson because they are not working. This year, as winter approached, people in Dickinson had already been thinking that the oil boom was over, and it wasn’t coming back.

I think that this is why, I saw a sudden universal change in everyone in Dickinson during the past couple of months. I think that everyone in Dickinson is preparing for hard times.

I wrote about this some in my previous blog post. For the past three years, I had been writing that the people from Dickinson were unfriendly, and that they did not like the workers who came from out of state during the oil boom to work in Dickinson. The unfriendliness, hostility, lack of cooperation, hatred, and undermining of out of state workers that I had written about for the past three years, all of sudden got worse and more severe.

What I thought was happening, was the local people from Dickinson had their wages reduced, hours reduced, overtime hours reduced, they had lost their job, or they were unable to get a job, and they felt that they had more of right to make money and earn a living than the workers who had come from out of state.

With the realization of the local people in Dickinson that the oil boom was not coming back, that there would be fewer and fewer jobs in the oil field, that winter is coming where there is a work shut down and reduced work, the local people from Dickinson universally decided all at once that their “benevolence” toward people from out of state was over.

Approximately one-half of the employers and companies in the Dickinson area, are not from Dickinson. Examples are: Menards, Wal-Mart, Runnings, Marathon Oil, Continental Oil, Whiting Oil, Tesoro Oil, Conoco Philips Oil, Lufkin, Halliburton, BJ, Nabors Drilling, Scull Construction, JE Dunn Construction, Knife River Construction, MDU, BNSF, Family Fare Grocery Store, Cash Wise Grocery Store, Sanford Health, St. Alelxius Health, and Dickinson State University.

However, even though approximately one-half of the employers and companies in the Dickinson area are not from Dickinson, some of these companies do pay attention to whether they are hiring local people from Dickinson, or non-local people. One reason why they pay attention to whether they are hiring local people from Dickinson, is because their management and their workers are from Dickinson, and these people already working at the company have collectively started enforcing the “Dickinson Rule”, whether the company owners wanted this or not.

Non locally owned companies in Dickinson that appear to try to hire mostly local people from Dickinson whenever possible are: Runnings, Whiting Oil, MDU, Family Fare Grocery Store, St. Alexius Health, and Dickinson State University.

Non locally owned companies in Dickinson that appear to have slight favoritism to hiring local people from Dickinson are: Marathon Oil, Continental Oil, Conoco Philips Oil. This slight favoritism may be because these oil companies want people who work in the field to be familiar with the area, knowledgeable about the area, and accustomed to the weather.

Non locally owned companies in Dickinson who appear to have no preference in hiring people based on where they are from: Menards, Wal-Mart, Tesoro Oil, Lufkin, Halliburton, BJ, Nabors Drilling, Scull Construction, JE Dunn Construction, Knife River Construction, BNSF, Cash Wise Grocery Store, and Sanford Health.

Because of the large amount of people that work at Menards, Wal-Mart, Tesoro Oil, Halliburton, BJ, Knife River Construction, Cash Wise, and Sanford Health, these businesses could not stay open if they tried to only hire people from Dickinson. For that matter, all the other non locally owned companies in Dickinson that have some preference for hiring local people from Dickinson, Runnings, Whiting, MDU, Family Fare, St. Alexuis Health, DSU, Marathon, Continental, and Conoco Philips could not stay open if they tried to only hire people from Dickinson.

The local people from Dickinson almost unanimously do not want people who are from out of state to be living in Dickinson now, but the non locally owned companies in Dickinson need the out of state workers in order to have enough employees to stay open and function.

The locally owned companies in Dickinson, they still have some out of state workers employed with their company. Several example are MBI, Nuverra, Winn Construction, Northern Improvement, and McDonalds. These companies would not have enough workers if they did not hire some people from out of state.

I believe that I just explained rather thoroughly up above, that both the non locally owned companies and the locally owned companies in Dickinson have had to hire workers from out of state in order to keep their businesses open and functioning. I explained that some of the non locally owned companies in Dickinson, do have a preference for hiring local people from Dickinson. Because some non locally owned companies have so many local people from Dickinson working in them, these local people at these companies have begun applying or enforcing the “Dickinson Rule” in hiring, and also in the work place.

The point that I want to make, the “Transition” that I believe occurred in 2017, the almost universal and unanimous change in the people in Dickinson that seemed to occur overnight, was the passing of the “Dickinson Rule” into law in Dickinson.

The “Dickinson Rule”, is that the local people from Dickinson are to be given preference in all things over people from out of state. The local people from Dickinson should be the first to be hired, the first to be promoted, the last to be reprimanded, the last to be demoted, the last to be let go, the last to be fired. In all dealings, business, financial, social, medical, religious, and enforcement of law, local people from Dickinson have precedence over people from out of state. People from out of state are not due equal treatment. Whenever and wherever possible, the people from out of state should be encouraged to leave Dickinson.