Imaginary Anecdote from Work

As the only person working at two different locations, I am in the unique position to keep my fellow employees informed about their coworkers whom they no longer get to see on a daily basis.  Of course, depending on me for gossip and rumors is like depending on the Cubs for World Series victories.  I am no longer eligible to win the award for the Least Informed Person in the Universe.  A few years ago the name of the trophy was changed to the Shane Samples Is Completely Oblivious Award in honor of my winning it every year of my adult life.  Now I just present the trophy at the awards ceremony, but don't ask me who's going to win this year.  I don't have a clue. In case you are wondering, Gully McGulibleson, unlike International Postal Worker of the Year, this award is not at all fictitious.

As soon as I got to the annex Wednesday night, a coworker asked me about the fight at the plant.  When he saw the blank look on my face, he remembered that I had not been there yet.  It turns out that there had been a skirmish at work that night.  There had been a meeting at the annex about it, but no names were mentioned.  One of my favorite things about my dual location work schedule is that I have not had to attend any meeting since before Labor Day.  Knowing that someone else might ask me about the fight, I began to craft a story about what might have happened.

You would appreciate this story more if you knew the subjects, so I will describe them for you as best I can.  Since I don't want to be accused of libel, I will change the names of the combatants.  In one corner is Wandog.  She is one of the most sour people I have ever met.  She doesn't actually have any real authority, but her job requires her to sometimes make announcements over the intercom which gives her an over inflated opinion of her importance.  In the other corner is Michael.  He is one of those people who thinks he is funnier than he actually is.  Because you only hear his funny stories, you also think he is funnier than he actually is.  He loves to play practical jokes on people especially if he gets a chance to lie in the process.  So imagine a fight between a man in his early farties against a woman in her mid fifties.  I didn't write the entire scene, just the ending.

When everyone finally stopped laughing long enough to pull Wandog off of Michael, he was lying in a puddle of his own blood and urine, crying and begging for mercy.

The only problem with this story was the lack of motive.  I was worried that this tale might not be believable, so I came up with an alternative.  Michael, a rabid Dallas Cowboy fan, was arguing with Tina, a die hard Pittsburgh Steeler fan, about which team had tougher fans.  One thing lead to another and then...

When everyone finally stopped laughing long enough to pull Tina off of Michael, he was lying in a puddle of his own blood and urine, crying and begging for mercy.  Proving once and for all, that all Cowboy fans are sissies.

I tried to come up with other scenarios, but I had nothing else as good as those.  Unfortunately no one asked me about the fight, so I did all that creative thinking for nothing, other than, my own entertainment.  So it turned out to be a very productive night of work.  Just in case you were wondering, I found out this morning that the fight was between opposing candidates for the upcoming union elections.

ps. On a completely unrelated note, the next time you see me thirty feet up in a tree, remind me that I have a camera in my pocket.

Career Advice

You should invent a time machine.  It would take quite a bit of science to accomplish this, so the less rational of my readers should disregard this advice.  After you build your time machine, you will have innumerable opportunities for both pleasure and profit.  I only ask one small favor in return for this advice.  Go back in time to last night any time between 10:30 and midnight.  When you hear me say, "I'm going to stay up a bit longer cause i'm not very sleepy," just go ahead and punch me in the face.

Dream Job

Last weekend the Source of All Questions asked me what my ideal work schedule would be. Naturally my immediate response was 11:30 - 1:00 every other Thursday. He then added the stipulation that, unlike him, I had to work a full schedule. I mentioned the 7 am to 3:30 pm that is available at my current job, which would be a nice alternative to my current shift. As is often the case, the conversation moved on in another direction before I could put much more thought into it. Since then I have come up with some shifts that I like better.

Option 1 - Working 40 hours straight. Tuesday 7am - Wednesday 11 pm. It would actually need to be later than 11:00 to make time for lunch or nap breaks. The advantage of this shift is getting work over with all at once and creating a very long weekend. The drawback is lack of sleep and exhaustion, if the work is difficult. I don't believe I could do my current job for farty hours straight.

Option 2 - 2 twenty hour days. Tuesday 7 am - Wednesday 3:30, Wednesday 9:30 am - Thursday 6 am. This is very similar to option 1, but with a six hour break in the middle of it. This would be less tiring but it would still take all day Thursday to recover from work.

Option 3 - 3 days schedule. Tuesday 7 am - 9 pm, Wednesday 7 am - 9 pm, Thursday 7 am - 8:30 pm. I have worked twelve hour shifts before, so I am sure I could handle 13.5 hour shifts. This would cut me back to a four day weekend, but allow for a normal sleeping pattern.

Option 4 - 4 ten hour shifts. 7 am - 5:30 pm Monday through Thursday. I had this job back in 1994 and is the only one of these options that could actually exist in the real world.

After much deliberation, I chose option 3. Now I just need to find an employer who will pay me to work that shift.

Go Cubs Go

My favorite football team, the Green Bay Packers, went 15-2 last season.  They had one loss in the regular season and one in the post season.  My favorite basketball team, the Murray State Racers, just ended a 31-2 season.  They lost one game in the regular season and one in the postseason.  So when that trend continues, the Chicago Cubs will put up a 172-2 record.  Even if the Cubs weren't going to be terrible this year, that would be a difficult record to achieve.  The Playstation version of the Cubs can't even win with that much regularity.  Though last year they did have an 11-1 postseason record.  Hopefully I will hear this song many times this season.