Thursday, October 14, 2004

Random Grumblings

My first night on afternoon shift went off without a hitch, and I forgot how much easier my job is on this shift. The "younger" people are on afternoons, and while not all of them are, most are more computer literate then their more "mature" counterparts on days.

I had to go to this shift because the person who covers that shift was kicked off the job because of seniority. I am more of a coordinator of the system between shifts, with a dedicated person on days and another on afternoons.

The seniority thing is one of the downfalls of a union. This guy is really bright and adds a lot of talent to this job. It they could give me a high seniority person with as much intelligence and with his skills, I'd be happy. They've tried before, and all I get it people that think it's an off the line job so they don't have to do anything and it must be easy.

It is far from easy. High pressure, high stress doesn't even cover it. If you don't know what you are doing, you can potentially cost the company to lose $15,000 about every 45 seconds. The higher seniority people that they bring me usually last about a week before they go back to whatever they were doing before.

It's a shame, and a waste of my time. They finally gave me the low seniority person when I had to go work on the launch of the new vehicles, and they had no choice but to get someone who knew what the hell they were doing. Now they just want to boot him out, because they know they can.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.............

In other news I took a picture of my neighbors house finally, as they didn't seem to be around when I got up this morning/afternoon.



This pic just doesn't do their decorating job justice, as you don't see the lights that are strung all over that wrap around porch, and you don't see their big honking garage that has images of witches flying projected all over it and orange lights strung everywhere on it. I've gotta get a night shot, which may be difficult considering I roll in from work around 6 in the morning now...

I will admit that I do have porch envy when it comes to these folks. It wraps all the way around their house. They are meticulous when it comes to their home, and it always looks immaculate.

That is probably another reason why they think I am the anti-christ. While my house has never bordered in white trash land, sometimes it got a bit much to take care of while working 84-98 hours a week. Now my nephew lives with me, so those problems are over.

They still hate me, and I must admit, I gave them a lot of reasons to feel that way when I was just a young punk. The first day I moved in, they came over to greet the new neighbors. I answered the door, and they asked if my Mom was home. That was the beginning of the end.

Speaking of my nephew, we had a long talk when I got home at 6 am (Yes! I said 6 am!) about this whole his girlfriend wants to get engaged and have babies and all that junk even though he is in school with just a little job for spending money blah blah blah...

I tried to talk logically to him without screaming, "RUN!! RUN AWAY!" He's a bright kid, so I don't think he's going to fall for this little ploy. I thought women were supposed to be more advanced these days?? Leave it to my nephew to find the one stuck in the freakin' 50's.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Annie, repairing anything electrical on cars now is a positive nightmare. I used to cry like a little girl with a skinned knee when I had to do electrical repair at work.

Before cars relied on computers so heavily, you could get a wire that was crimped a bit or a plug that wasn't totally seated and it would affect all that much.

Now, any little thing can make the whole electrical system go haywire.

The weight thing is true when it comes to airbags. Any vehicle worth anything has that now, so that the airbags don't blow the person right out of the car.

When I used to repair them, I sat on a box full of tools, as I wasn't near heavy enough. Sometimes common sense isn't all that common, eh?