You see, I don't really care about overtime.  I don't really want to work 12 hours a day, 5 days a week, but I did that for a long, long time in the past and yes, I could eventually get used to it again - and the larger paychecks.

I came back to the yard today to find a - lot - of stuff to do.  It was already past 3 o'clock.  That's 9 hours already on the clock with more to do.  So, I get on the computer to see what's in there for tomorrow, then go discuss it with the salesman - he comes to our place a lot to get some work done - and about to go outside to start working on orders.

A contractor pulls into the yard.  This takes a while, not a huge order but enough to have to divert my time to  getting it done.  Back to work? Not quite.  Another contractor comes up to the now-locked front door.  I go and let him in.  Get done with him and then something else - I don't remember what - comes up.  I finally get to pulling the material off the truck and check all of the quantities and then print orders to pull for tomorrow morning.

So, this has been a typical day for a while now.

Rumors surfacing about sending drivers home after reaching 40 hours and bringing in temps (good luck with that - numerous reasons that wouldn't work out but too much to go into right now, almost my bedtime).  Management calling my manager to ask about why the OT hours.  On and on. I won't go into some of it considering this is the world wide web, needless to say if they want to cut our OT, they're going to have to bring in another worker into our store.

I was supposed to go to church tonight but getting home at just before 6 and the thing starting at 6:30? Nope.  I really wanted to go, but just not happening.  It's a bit after 8 and I am going to bed in a few minutes.

Company Christmas party on Saturday.  GM returned my email: I would prefer if you only brought 1 person with you.  That shot down having George and his girlfriend coming.  They're nice people, good conversationalists, they would have been fun to bring along.  It's his house, though.

Prince's haunches getting visibly worse.  I get sick at the thought of having to put him down.  He doesn't wince and is in no visible pain, but about the time that starts happening.....a trip to the vet will be in order.  He's not sick, like with cancer or something such as Coco had, he's just having trouble with his hind end and walking.  I am giving him glucosamine daily and am going to buy a bottle of the other stuff - the name of which escapes me right now - but that's about all you can do.  Unless a vet has some other ideas.  It's just a problem that large dogs can get.  Duke, on the other hand, a much larger dog, has no joint problems going at all.  I am also giving him the supplements.

I"m done.

G'nite.

ben

The operations manager finally forced the issue to allow a worker to come over to our branch yesterday and help get things in order.  The place was getting pretty chaotic.  We simply don't have the time for it.  That guy spent the entire day organizing things, putting stuff away and cleaning up.  It is, actually, a part of my job to do all of that.  No time for it.  Pulling orders and driving, that's what I do all day and "down-time" days are far and few between.  I am driving a very dirty truck - a thing I hate - but I don't have time to wash that, either and there are no truck wash outlets anywhere near our store's location and when I do go by one, well, that's all I have time to do: look over and wish I could stop and get it washed.

Oh well.  Company Christmas party on Saturday.  Not sure that I am going.  It's a very long drive and if I wanted to have a few drinks?  Not a happening event.  Driving home is the issue with that, even if I only have a few I am not comfortable driving and certainly not that far.  George - one of my tenants - and his girlfriend offered to drive me out there and enjoy the party with me.  The general manager said no.  Great.  People bring all kinds of people with them to these parties that do not work for the company and in many cases aren't even related to the person that brought them.

I'm leaning towards not going, but I won't really make that decision until Saturday.  If I feel like it, I will, if I don't, no biggies.

Switched insurance companies.  It was time to renew my insurance and a bigger payment. I decided to find out if I could find anything cheaper.  Yes, indeed, I did.  Up until 3 or 4 months ago, the rate had gone up to an all-time high of $249 per month. Then, out of the blue without my asking, they lowered the bill to $189 per month.  Then the renewal came and they informed me that my rate was going to go back up. Bunk.  My new rate is $152 per month. That's for 2 cars, full coverage on one of them and 2 drivers.  Caleb has done well to stay out of accidents and not get any tickets, though he was pulled over a while back for - what I don't know.  He got out of it, whatever it was.

Well, anyway, just a quick update.

Off to work.

G'day.

ben