ConocoPhillips
Dear Family and Friends,
Welcome to this week's "Thoughtlet."
These words are my personal diary and a weekly review of ideas,
beliefs, thoughts, or words that will hopefully be of some
benefit to you: my children, my family, and my friends.
"There sure seems to be a lot going on in my life. And of course all that is going on seems to revolve around my three on-going chess challengers. Colby Cade made 12 moves, Rob made 4 moves, Roice made 8 moves, and there was one out of the blue turned down chess game this week. Roice killed me in a game he was playing with me, and went on to start another one. And all 24 of these chess moves, or an average of 3 2/3rds moves per day, were made at home, at Layton's office, on Randy and Kathyrn Shirts' Macintosh computer in Provo, or on Audrey or Joshua's computer in Salt Lake. Imagine, if you will, how this must seem to someone who was born in 1949, 30 years before serious personal computers, 35 years before serious cell phone usage, and 40 years before serious Internet distribution. It reminds me of Grandma Hafen talking about cars, and planes, and the transformation of her little town of St. George, Utah. And I can't even keep up my diary (i.e. these Thoughtlets).
Monday I woke up and did my exercises. There were four e-mails from Randy Bruner about prospect meetings. There was also a message from Jim Siebert about meeting with Wilkens Weather Technologies and AR Group on Tuesday, and other messages from and to and from Jim Siebert about the patent we are working on. There were also comments from Wulf about our upcoming ConocoPhillips Meeting. It was Wulf's opinion we should tell them it costs $850,000 per year for three years to participate in our study. There would be 20% or $170,000 go to the data provider, $120,000 to Richard Nehring for his database, $200,000 to Tobin for land ownership and well data, leaving $460,000 for 5 people for the first year. Of course, things never turn out as planned, remembering things absolutely never turn out unless they are planned. Somewhere in here I was at Layton's office for 5 1/2 hours, of which 2 hours were billable. I also sent a note to David Kessler about the note Jiafeng Yan had sent:
<![CDATA["David,
In Chinese culture this is an important invitation. I anticipate Jiafeng already has
some seismic processing work for you and is testing if you are interested enough to
participate in the conference. A couple of suggestions:
1. Respond and tell him if you have any interest in attending. Either way is fine,
although attending is better.
2. Tell him you are very interested in processing Chinese data.
3. Based on your conversations with me, you will only take on a Chinese project if
you are paid the full amount in advance. You need to decide if you will do a test
project for free. They will ask for this.
I've been going to write you for a several weeks, and have been very busy. I have
another Chinese friend, Jinming Zhou, has a much larger seismic processing company,
SinoGeo. They are planning on opening a U.S. operation. My thought is you might want
to use them to do preprocessing work. They do prestack depth also. However, they have
a lot of people (90) and equipment, and I anticipate their best contribution could be
through doing something for SeismicCity which is outside of your focus. If you are
interested, his contact information is: . . . .
Best Regards,
Roice
c: 713.542.2207"]]>
Tuesday morning, the 3rd of March I was up and did my exercises and was down on off of Westheimer and Briarpark drive for a joint presentation with Jim and Wulf to Jim's friends and former bosses at Wilkens Weather Technologies. It was a very interesting meeting. They said they are interested in investing in Dynamic Measurement LLC. They wanted to learn how it went with ConocoPhillips before making any commitments. The meeting with ConocoPhillips wasn't until Friday. There were a couple of more e-mails from Randy about prospect meetings. Joe Roberts called and had been out overselling DML to someone he met at a party, Randy Nickerson, the Chief Geophysicist at Sanchez. I attempted to cool Joe down. I really do not want to go out and sell smoke and mirrors to the whole industry. I would just like to see a partner willing to invest and help us develop our technologies. Right now I'm holding onto ConocoPhillips as that entity. When I got to Layton's office there was an e-mail from Bob Savely at NASA saying:
<![CDATA["Roice,
Any news? We will need to reassign our current Robonaut staff in May.
Robert T. (Bob) Savely
Chief Scientist Automation, Robotics, & Simulation Division
Engineering Directorate"]]>
I responded with:
<![CDATA["Dear Bob,
No news I've wanted to share.
Steve Trollope determined Robonaut was not mature enough for him to invest in at this
time. However, he has promised to point us in the direction of some other potential
investors. In the meantime, I have been pushing to get in front of a Galveston
resident that owns a deep sea drilling company. He lost a house in Ike, and "has
been very busy." In addition, our daughter is getting married next Wednesday,
the 11th, and we have a reception in Salt Lake on the 12th and at our house on the
14th, and we have been busy. Hopefully I will be able to meet the Galveston
connection during the last half of March.
Based on your note, and potential reassignment of team members, I will also make
contact with my friends at Halliburton, get them to sign a non-disclosure, and
find out if they have as much interest in this project as I anticipate they will.
I can not work on that until after the wedding though.
Thanks for your note. I will keep you informed of any progress.
Best Regards,
Roice
c: 713.542.2207"]]>
Melanie sent me the list of "101 Paces You Gotta See Before You're 12!" with a comment "You probably don't need this list anymore." It took me a couple of weeks to get it posted at http://grandkids.walden3d.com/twiki/bin/view/Main/PlacesToSee, it has been a couple of weeks since it was posted, and none of the Grandkids have entered any data yet, so Melanie, I think it is safe to say you were wrong about I don't need this list anymore.
On Wednesday morening I sent the following e-mail to Jiafeng:
<![CDATA["Jiafeng,
I have called your cell phone every morning this week and the message always says
you are unavailable. You have had the new contract from Geokinetics for a few
weeks now, and I want to find out if everything is in order and when we will be
able to close out the Tarim project.
On another subject, David Kessler and his wife came over for dinner Wednesday night.
He is interested in doing business in China. I forgot to ask if he is going to the
conference. It sounds like he is very busy. Because of the downturn in business
here he has lost two competitors and he is being very careful to keep his 9 employees
busy because he knows his company can also be shut down if he overextends. I do think
you have an opportunity to do some business with him. I'm not sure what I can do to
help, and I would be glad to ask questions for you and to report back to you, if
you want me to.
Thank you for sending me a status report and for telling how I can help you with
Seismic City.
Best Regards,
Roice
c: 713.542.2207"]]>
Frank Hamtak sent me a note which summarizes how some of my friends think I am a lot smarter than I am:
<![CDATA["Roice -
Have you been able to get involved in the nanotechnology research that is currently
targeting the energy industry? My first exposure to the AEC funding and the petroleum
consortium is from the Explorer - March 2009.
Frank"]]>
I responded I have read about it, and I don't really know much about how nanotech is being used or is planned to be used. I lost a swallow sheet, which is frustrating since I am so anal. After my exercises and reading the paper I went down to Layton's office. I worked on Wharton County a little, and spent most of the day was spent working on the ConocoPhillips presentation. Dan only wants me to work $8,000. per month, and at $150/hour this is 53 hours of work. Since I had already worked half of the next month, it was time to go slow. Of course, Layton is not charged when I work on my stuff, and he wants me to use the office he has provided to work on my own projects. It was about noon I got the following notice about visiting ConocoPhillips office:
<![CDATA["ROICE NELSON, your visit to ConocoPhillips on 3/6/2009 at 07:30:00 has been
registered by Tina Phillips. To expedite your entry, please have your photo
identification ready to present to security at the gated entrance upon arrival.
All business guests must check in at the reception desk before proceeding to the
meeting location.
ConocoPhillips headquarters is located at 600 N. Dairy Ashford, Houston, TX 77079.
The complex is on the north side of I-10 off Dairy Ashford. The visitor entry gate
is designated as Gate "B" and is the second gate east of N. Eldridge Parkway.
Should you have any questions regarding your visit please contact your host or the
ConocoPhillips registration desk at 281-293-1489. You may click the following
Google maps link for further details.]]>
http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=600+North+Dairy+Ashford+Houston,+TX++77079&ie=UTF8&z=15&ll=29.789036,-95.617533&spn=0.017058,0.041585&om=1&iwloc=addr
<![CDATA[ Thank you.
ConocoPhillips Visitor Reception"]]>
I also received a presentation on newly declassified photos of 911 from our Real Estate Agent in Cedar City, which I put with the David Devor presentations and sent him a copy of. (see http://www.walden3d.com//photos/Friends/Devor_David/presentations/090304_911_Aerial_Photos.pps. Russell Shirts sent the following funny note:
<![CDATA["Actual 'Letter to the Editor' from the February 5th edition of the Wichita Falls,
Texas Times Record News...
Dear IRS,
I am sorry to inform you that I will not be able to pay taxes owed April 15, but all
is not lost.
I have paid these taxes: accounts receivable tax, building permit tax, CDL tax,
cigarette tax, corporate income tax, dog license tax, federal income tax,
unemployment tax, gasoline tax, hunting license tax, fishing license tax,
waterfowl stamp tax, inheritance tax, inventory tax, liquor tax, luxury tax,
Medicare tax, city, school and county property tax (up 33 percent last 4 years),
real estate tax, social security tax, road usage tax, toll road tax, state and
city sales tax, recreational vehicle tax, state franchise tax, state unemployment
tax, telephone federal excise tax, telephone federal state and local surcharge tax,
telephone minimum usage surcharge tax, telephone state and local tax, utility tax,
vehicle license registration tax, capitol gains tax, lease severance tax, oil and
gas assessment tax, Colorado property tax, Texas, Colorado, Wyoming, Oklahoma and
New Mexico sales tax, and many more that I can't recall but I have run out of
space and money.
When you do not receive my check April 15, just know that it is an honest mistake.
Please treat me the same way you treated Congressmen Charles Rangle, Chris Dodd,
Barney Frank and ex-Congressman Tom Dashelle and, of course, your boss Timothy
Geithner. No penalties and no interest.
Sincerely,
Ed Barnett
Wichita Falls
P.S. I will make at least a partial payment as soon as I get my stimulus check."]]>
As a follow-up on my discussions with Mark Bashforth and Jeff Johnson I prepared The Brain display to the right to prepare for the meeting on Thursday afternoon. Nothing came of the meetings, other than they were very exciting. Mark has too many opportunities with a large payout on the front-end.
On Thursday we received our automatic check-in e-mail from Delta. Some few parts of travel are becoming better. And again, it seems like change is coming quicker than I can adapt. I did my exercises. The Chinese exercise Dr. Solis added to my routine seems to make me much tireder, which surprises me for such a simple exercise. Guess that is why he is a Doctor and my insurance company pays him the big bucks. There was a nice review of Wharton County opportunities with Dan, Clarke, and Randy. I created and evaluated some StratAmp displays on the small Wharton County 3-D. I also worked some more on ConocoPhillips presentation. In fact, shortly after I got home, Wulf showed up, as planned, and we ended up working on the presentation until 2:30 AM, including reworking it all and printing out a copy to leave with ConocoPhillips. I was very pleased with Wulf's contributions. There is no way I can do this kind of stuff on my own. My brain is not near big enough, nor do I have enough experience.
Friday morning I did not do my exercises, because I slept in as long as I could. I ate oatmeal with Wulf. He had never seen it fixed like I do, and seemed to like it. Jim Siebert arrived right on time and we left at 7:15 left for ConocoPhillips. Wulf followed us. It was a very good meeting with Kenneth M. Tubman, Ph.D. and key members of his team. They asked good questions and are obviously very bright. Les Denham was ill and was not able to attend the meeting with us. There was a problem getting their projector to work, and it turned out to be operator error. I should have caught it. Oh well! They asked for some time to think about what we presented, and promised to have an answer to us within a month. There have been a couple of e-mails, it has been over a month, and we do not have an answer. Oh well!
When I got home I sent a note to Bishop Harlan about a tithing check that did not clear. He sent a note to Mark Minor. Since I'm behind on writing these out, 4 weeks later Andrea found the check behind the files. Oh well. Quentin Reed sent a story which, as it says at the top, is delightful:
<![CDATA["(Supposedly written by a child, though I'm not so sure. It's delightful all the same.)
Judas Asparagus
(A child was asked to write a book report on the entire Bible.)
In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness,
and some gas. The Bible says, 'The Lord thy God is one, but I think He must be a lot
older than that.
Anyway, God said, 'Give me a light!' and someone did. Then God made the world. He split
the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because
mirrors hadn't been invented yet.
Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden
of Eden..... Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.
Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel.
Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be
like a million or something. One of the next important people was Noah, who was a
good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put
his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they
said they would have to take a rain check.
After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother,
Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob
had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat. Another important Bible
guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out
of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people.
These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable.
God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then he gave them His Top Ten
Commandments. These include: Don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's
stuff. Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother.
One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies.
Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.
After Joshua came David. He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot.
He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher
says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me.
After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of these was Jonah,
who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed up on the shore. There were also
some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.
After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of The New.
He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn too, because
my mom is always saying to me, 'Close the door! Were you born in a barn?' It would
be nice to say, 'As a matter of fact, I was.')
During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the
Democrats. Jesus also had twelve opossums. The worst one was Judas Asparagus.
Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him.
Jesus was a great man.
He healed many leopards and even preached to some Germans on the Mount. But the
Democrats and all those guys put Jesus on trial before Pontius the Pilot. Pilot
didn't stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead. Anyways, Jesus died
for our sins, then came back to life again. He went up to Heaven but will be back
at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution."]]>
This was good humor to hold me over from the natural letdown following the big push and presentation to ConcoPhillips and to get ready for the hassles of flying to Salt Lake. When we got to the Airport, I bought another book, since I enjoyed "The Bible of Clay" so much, which I had bought the last time we were at the Houston Airport (see 0908.html. This book is called "Sacred Stone" by Clive Cussler. I've read some of his books before, and he does a good job of telling a story. However, on the flight to Salt Lake I mostly slept, to make up for Thursday night's marathon. When we got to Salt Lake our bags were there and so we drove to Provo. Rachel did not answer phone, and so Andrea was worried. Turns out the phone just didn't ring. When we got to Randy and Kathryn's I checked my e-mail accounts at roicenelson@gmail.com and rnelson@walden3d.com. There were questions for us from Donna Covey about Walden 3-D's taxes. Isn't the Internet wonderful. These technologies we just take for granted.
Saturday morning we slept in. When I checked my e-mail there was a very flattering letter from Yan Dunshi, the former Chief Geologist of the Chinese Ministry of Petroleum, which I show to the right. I will talk about it, showing the translation, and sharing my response in Thoughtlet 0913.html. Ok, I'll repeat the key parts of the letter here too, because it sets the stage for how up I was for Rachel and Garrett's wedding activities (see also 0911.html). The last part of the letter says:
<![CDATA[". . .
I am willing to express my appreciation every time when it
reminds me what you've done for China's Oil Industry to
build up a top-of-the-world level team of seismic data
processing and interpretation.
I thank you for your support and help to my sons.
I appreciate that you treasure the friendship of two of us.
Your long time friend,
Yan Dunshi"]]>
Mr. Yan invented the Chinese oil industry. He was responsible for finding the first buried hills giant fields, which have fueled China's growth. He received a personal commendation from Chairman Mao. He personally gave the approval for every well drilled in China between about 1960 and 1995, which are in the tens of thousands of wells. I have never before personally seen anything like the words in this letter from someone of his stature. I guess you can tell I was very flattered. There was also a note about Choir from Katie Cloward. I wrote back and told her we were in Utah.
Andrea and I arrived at the Timpanogas Temple just as Rachel and Audrey and Garrett arrived. Kathryn had given me family names to do, and I ended up doing a name from Audrey and Joshua's family files. We did the sister names for Kathryn, and none of the brethren. There was a very good spirit in the temple. Rick (Eric) talked to Andrea and told her what a wonderful job he felt she did raising their children. To Andrea this was kind of like my letter from Mr. Yan. All of us went to a soup and sandwich place afterwards and I bought dinner. I felt good about the interactions with everyone. It was especially fun to play with and to watch Sophie. Joshua and Audrey are very good with her. It is obvious they have a lot of fun together. To bad I never learned how to do that with you kids. Oh well!
Sunday morning there was an e-mail from my sister Sara. She sent the following:
<![CDATA["Uncle Tony called. Jeff is back in St. George and will be deciding among three
options this week. The chemo has damaged his heart, liver and lungs already.
1) Do nothing, live l month to l year (but of course no one really knows)
2) Do chemo again, maybe extend to 2 years
3) Bone marrow transplant, maybe extend to 20 years, but again no one really knows
He'll go back to Salt Lake on Friday to visit with the doctors again. Glenn, Linda
and Connie were all in on the consultation with the doctors.
We hope things go well in Salt Lake. This is our last day with Des' mom before she
heads back to Ireland. We're all exhausted, but we've had a good visit. She was
glad to have met Andrea and the others at the shower. She's taking back the photos
and she was really impressed with the quilt and other things that Andrea made for Rachel.
Love,
Sara"]]>
There was also a note from Uncle Tony, who sent this:
<![CDATA["I'm having a hell of a time trying to send a multiple message so I'll try again
if you get more that one of the same thing just chock it up to stupid old age on
this end.
Buttons and I set up an account to help jeff with some of his financial problems of
which he has many at this time. The account is at Zions Bank and can be used at
any Zions Bank. The account is under his name and the number is #571 35778 9.
any donations would be appreciated.
Thanks
Tony"]]>
me got up and drove to Salt Lake to go to Church with Rachel and Garrett. We were early, and so I read from my book, "Sacred Stone." During the church services I captured a couple of possible stanzas for Prime Words:
<![CDATA["Perfection: I've met a lot of people
Not one of them
Couldn't be better
Even though many thought themselves perfect (a)
(a) Franklin Timothy Fenton, 2nd Counsor, Cottonwood 17th Student Ward Conference,
Salt Lake City, Utah, 09 Mar 2009.
Service: In the church
We serve where called
Neither seeking for
Nor turning down the call (a)
(a) Bishop Thackery quoting J. Ruben Clark, Cottonwood 17th Student Ward
Conference, Salt Lake City, Utah, 09 Mar 2009."]]>
Priesthood and Sunday School were both exceptional. The Ward Conference was the first time I've ever heard a Bishop tell the congregation that if there was something wrong in their lives they better get in and talk to him and clear it up or he would kick their butts.
After church we went with Rachel and Garrett to Garrett's parent's place for lunch. This was my first time to meet Garrett's Dad, Mike. I thoroughly enjoy Mike Olson. He is one of the best read individuals I think I have ever met. The conversation was natural, flowed, and he was very interested in my comments about things we talked about. I showed him some of the stuff I have put on the web, starting with the Peak Oil stuff. Mike is almost exactly opposite to me. He does not have a college degree. He is a union worker on the railroad. He exercises and is in great shape. However, he is also a lot like me. He spends a lot of time in Milford, has a dirt bike, and has spent hours riding all of the hills in The Rocky Range, where I did my Geology Field Camp. He loves to read, and typically has 30 books checked out from the library at any one time. It was a real treat to spend the afternoon talking wherever the conversation took us. I look forward to continuing these conversations over the coming years. We also went down the street a block to Joshua and Audrey's place and spent some time with Sophie. It was a great day, and a great week, even if we did not get a commitment from ConocoPhillips."
Since the 38th week of 1996 I have written a weekly "Thoughtlet"
(little statements of big thoughts which mean a lot to me).
Until the 43rd week of 2004 I sent these out as an e-mail. They
were intended to be big thoughts which mean a lot to me.
Over time the process evolved into a personal diary. These notes
were shared with my family because I know how important the
written word can be. Concerned about how easy it is to drift and
forget our roots and our potential among all of distractions of
daily life, I thought this was a good way to reach those I love.
It no longer feels right to send out an e-mail and "force" my kids
and my family to be aware of my life and struggles.
Everyone has their own life to lead, and their own struggles to
work through. I will continue this effort, and will continue to
make my notes publicly accessible (unless I learn of
misuse by someone who finds out about them, and then will
aggressively
pursue a legal remedy to copyright infringement and I will put the Thoughtlets
behind a password).
The index to download any of these Thoughtlets is at
http://www.walden3d.com/thoughtlets,
or you can e-mail me with
questions or requests at
rnelson@walden3d.com
(note if you are not on my e-mail "whitelist" you must send 2 e-mails
within 24 hours of each other in order for your e-mail to not be trashed).
With all my love,
Dad
(H. Roice Nelson, Jr.)