Ugh

Last night was twelve hours of absolute misery. I haven't slept in three days and I am having a kind of serious fight with #1. I definitely sat down in the ESL hot room and cried for a while.

Here's to better times tonight.

I am not an addict.

Knowing we had a safety meeting at the beginning of our shift, I stopped for coffee before work. I generally get some kind of coffee on my way to work as long as I have enough time, but I do not go to the same place everyday. Really, I don't.

There is a Tim Horton's around the corner from the plant and that is my most frequent caffeine-source, but even so, I am there twice a week at most. Usually, I go to the drive-thru and am already wearing my work uniform.

Today, I had gone out to dinner for my birthday and was wearing my street clothes. I went in to the Tim's because I had a lot of time to kill and a free coffee coupon (and because I didn't look like a gas station attendant for once!)

The manager not only recognized me, he knew my order before I said it.

I'm not sure if this means he's a stalker or I need to cut back...

Happy Birthday, RC

I made JB switch zones with me last night because I flat-out refused to check pudding on my birthday.

The pudding line didn't run all night. She did almost entirely nothing besides a couple of tank checks and plating.

I did bloaters, because who knows if she ever would have got to them. My zone was moderately busy all night oh and did I mention It's my birthday?! give me a break, dude.

Always double-check the schedule

I was in pudding and bag in a box last night. I had checked the schedule and thought nothing was supposed to run until Monday morning, as usual. I thought I'd have an easy if somewhat annoying night of doing dailys and weeklys and 48 hour and five day and tank checks...

I did, essentially, have that night. Plus the 4oz line was running. When I checked the schedule, I somehow overlooked this big ol' gelatin run that started early Sunday morning. Maybe it was from last week?

Gelatin is the number one easiest product to audit, but somehow when I have to deal with it, it keeps me busy and worse keeps me annoyed all night long.

Last of the 12s

Everyone in the lab was on twelve-hour shifts this week. I am a huge fan of this schedule, but it looks like I'm in the minority on that front so we won't be switching permanently.

Oh well. One benefit of working twelves is that it would simplify scheduling. Everyone would be on a normal rotating schedule with every other weekend off. (This also opens up the possibility that I may literally never see #1 again, which might be a good thing. Or not.)

A simpler schedule would be nice, since all of our supervisors are incapable of putting together a schedule that makes sense. I requested off next Friday and Saturday. My request was approved. It was clearly written on the calendar.

KS gave me Sunday and Saturday.

I pointed this out to CK. She rearranged things a little to give me off Friday. No problem. It did not occur to her and I needed to point it out that if I was off friday and Saturday, she would need to change it so that I was working Sunday and give someone else the day off.

Geniuses, all.

Hours spent testing pudding: 18/36

Being in pudding (sorry I mean workstation 3?) makes me unbelievably bitchy. I think I even (jokingly) told #1 he's fat.
I was about ready to smack another blender in the face yesterday and this morning I definitely yelled at JJ for being helpful when I was really busy.

Pudding turns me into a jerk. Twelve hour shifts of pudding...ugh.

Drunk driving is what I like to do, I like drunk driving with you

When I pulled into the parking lot today, I saw a good spot a little late and pulled in completely crooked.
I didn't bother adjusting, because I wanted to make sure I clocked in on time and there was a car on either side of me. I figured it was okay.

When DK came in he asked what my middle name is...his guess was "drives-drunk-to-work."
He continued to make fun of my poor parking the rest of the night to the point where I considered using one of my breaks just to go straighten out my car, but it wouldn't have helped, since he was already busy showing everyone the picture he had taken of it.

Murphy's law of FBs

Once the blenders have put all of the ingredients into a product and allowed it to mix for a while, we get a first check and calculate if anything needs to be added. Often, they leave out some water to make sure the solids aren't too low. It's a lot easier to add water than to take it out.

Since everything needs to be checked for micro problems, we collect plating samples when we do our first check. These are labeled with an FB number for "finished blend."

Most of the time, FB samples are gathered with the very first check. Usually the product needs to be standardized and rechecked.

If, however, you do not get an FB on your first check, the product will always always always be perfect. If you have to go back for your plating samples anyway, the product will not need a recheck.

Don't call me a sidekick

I was so bored last night that I was basically following MH around the plant when she had stuff to check on the other end.
This happened enough that when I actually had something to do and didn't escort her to the ct's for one of her checks, she was questioned as to my whereabouts.

Caution

You know how sometimes caution signs are a little unclear or funny? Like you can look up pictures on the Internet of funny caution signs and there are a huge number of them.

Apparently we don't have to go so far as the Internet to find these things... There is this one sign on the elopak filler which I think actually explains itself in words a little so you know what it means, which is that the machine uses uv radiation and not to expose your skin to it, but the picture is these wavy lines pointing at what is supposed to be a hand but looks kind of like a tree limb drawn by a second grader.

The best one, though, which JB discovered tonight, has no words on it and we've absolutely no idea what it means. It has three yellow caution triangles, each with a picture in it.

As we read it, the sign says lemons, clouds and no bugs.

Interpret for yourself.