No Such Thing As Untrainable???

Let me start out by saying how smart my friends are. Three week in a row winners at Trivia. I do need to say I wasn't over joyed at the booing session. Jealous snobs!

I'm old so I've worked a lot of years already. I somehow always manage to end up in the position of training others. People either train well, or they don't. It's all in their willingness to learn. I can usually tell if someone is just going through the motions and really doesn't care. You have the one's that are nervous of every move they make. Then you have the "I got it, I don't need you" people. Some people just take a little longer to catch on but once they grasp it, then they do well. It's funny when I tell them to give it time and all of a sudden it will click. What we do isn't that hard but it can also be a chain reaction. The group I work with now all work well together, all help each other out. Between another girl and I we've trained everyone on the line in the past year.

We have now come to training who we refer to as Dorey (finding Nemo). She's a nice girl but it took a long time to train her in the other 3 areas of the line. In order for Dorey to get a wage increase she must now learn to operate the machine. A few weeks ago I was given that task. Now this girl has been on this line for 9 months so you would think she knows what's going on. Quite wrong. She's knows her own little world of her own little work area. Don't get me wrong, she is all about doing everything right. To the point that she will ask the same questions every day.
I worked with her on operating the machine for one week. Nothing sunk in. I asked another guy to work with her just to see if he could get through...one day. On to the next guy...4 hours and he was ready to pull his shiny thick Korean hair out of his head. In his broken English he told me " THis is shit...she can't learn, I think she is , how you say...untrainable." I almost peed my pants laughing so hard. This poor guy was a nervous wreck. I asked him if he could try again tomorrow and after rolling his eyes he said "She will forget everything by tomorrow". This is most likely true. She sure does put a lot of effort into not being able to remember things from day to day. That's the problem here...a lot of effort with no results. This girl went as far as putting a post-it note saying "Stop" on the stop button so she would remember where it was. Untrainable or not?

White Death

I was leaving work today when I was told to watch out for "White Death" tonight. I chuckled to the guy who said it to me and then had to listen to him for 5 minutes ,while almost in tears ,complaining how they canceled a basketball game he was going to attend. I need to learn to keep going when funky comments are made. I dislike the weather we've been given this winter just as much as the next guy but I'll be damned if it's going to ruin my life. This guy was upset. When I asked if it was a Bucks or Marquette game he replied that it was his son's High School Basketball game. Not that it wasn't an important event. He was upset because they rescheduled it for this weekend and he has other plans. Guess it's not that important than right?

Another chapter in the saga of brother-in-law has opened. He's been having some stomach pains for the past week or so. They spent 7 hours in the emergency room on Saturday just to be sent home with some medicine to clear his bowels. At 5am Monday they were back in the ER and at 7pm last night they removed his appendix. The guy is in some pain as there is infection from this all inside the cavities including the shunt they put in to drain his brain fluid. Now it's a waiting game again. They started him out on some hefty antiobiotics hoping this will clear the infection but the shunt is plastic which will probably need to be replaced. They want to clear the infection before changing it. Hopefully...yes the good doctor said hopefuly, the infection will not travel to his brain. When he said that my sister-in-law and I both looked at each other and must have had the same thought. This guy has had every issue they hoped wouldn't happen. It'll happen. The simple operation to remove the appendix which would have him home in a day has now been stretched out to 7-10 days.

On a lighter note, today was the first day in about a month that we actually ran a full day of production. Despite the fact that we had no boxes to put our produced rolls into we ran anyway. I think I will begin to follow the strict morale of "It's not my problem". Let's see how much of a raise that'll get me.

Mourning is Over

I took some good advice on Monday and did not watch the news or look at the newspaper. No one who called me Monday discussed the Packers. By the time I went back to work on Tuesday it was out of everyone's system. There is one guy who is still brooding over it. I think he may have lost some big money.

I have been in a football pool at work for several years now. I've always won a fair amount of times. This year sucked. I won 1 pre-season game, 1 instant and one regular season game total. I'm hoping the Superbowl is my last chance to recoupe my weekly contribution. This guy at work has made an excel sheet and I told him he should graph it out as I'm sure that my name would be way beyond in the red. On a lighter note I did win $$ from another pool several times so in the long run I am ahead.

Like our friend STB we make trips to my husbands mother's house to shovel. Why, you ask? Because my sister-in-laws lazy kids that live downstairs need a swift kick in the ass. This has been a problem for several years now. When we lived in the unit below her my kids who were much younger than her's would shovel, no problem. The next family that moved in took care of it. These kids are just plain lazy and uncaring. Mom-in-law walks with a cane and they will clear a path wide enough for a rabbit to get through. What is bothersome is that she carts one to school every day and the 19 year old boy to work. The other morning rather than get a free ride to work by shoveling so she could get to the garage he took a cab. This boy had $20.00 to blow on a cab for a job that would have taken him 15 mintues tops. We've all been over there and proded their lazy butts outside. Last Christmas I even purchased shovels for them (a sore subject on their part). At least this year they stopped calling to find out when Arnie would be over with the snowblower. We used to keep one at their house but it was destroyed when they left the dogs chain on the sidewalk and ran it over with the snowblower. No cost to them to repair. I'm just trying to figure out how these kids just have a plain lack of respect for their grandmother who does so much for them. I see a butt kicking coming on! Who's got my back?

He Needs To Move

Yes, it's cold outside. We live in Wisconsin where it's cold every winter. The last few years we've been robbed of a true fall season. It's hot and then all of a sudden it's frigid. This year I do believe we had our fall in late November and for a few days earlier in January.

Every year for the past five or so years I've listened to my husband complain about winter and how he needs to move to a warmer climate. I'm pretty sure he has a five year plan to move to Arizona. Then I know for sure that from May until October I'll have to listen to "It's fucking hot out there". I know the perfect plan would be to live there from November until late April and here for the summer months, but that's not in the cards unless we win the lottery. Like I said, that's not in the cards.
In the past we talked about moving there but I'm not sure that's what I want. My parents made the move about 15 years ago. They were going to give it a year. I know my dad would move back here in a heartbeat as he misses all of us. My mom is a person who cannot change from her routine. I can remember she had a cleaning schedule and to a tee washed the floors at the same time, on the same day forever.
She has a hard time adjusting whenever they come up to visit and I swear she's packing to go home as soon as she unpacks. It's nice out there but I'm not sure it's where I want to live. It's always nice to visit another place and I know we've all thought about moving elsewhere, but would that change once you set up house and possibly had to work?

We had an invite to my son's house for dinner tonight. A good time was had. He's quite the cook and made some great Mexican food. Gas boy is downstairs now wallowing in his fumes. While at my son's I opted to take on Dylan in Madden 08. I don't want to get picked on but I'm not real familiar with PS2 or We or any of the newer game systems. The last time I played any of that stuff was when the kids still lived at home. So this little snot thinks he's going to forget to show me a few things. I get sacked and this little voice says " oops Grandma I forgot to show you that". When we were leaving I told him to pack up the game and system and I would take it home over the weekend and practice my skills. This kids face turned green. His dad said get the stuff for your Grandma. I had to remind him of all the things he got from my house in the past 8 years. In the end I couldn't do it. By the time I got it down pat there would be a new system anyway.

Hope everyone stays warm this weekend. Dress well for the deep freeze!

We Rock!

First place in the Team Trivia! $50.00 richer. Thanks to the stainless steel answer by Ben and the dipstick help from my hubbie. Could use a little help with the sports but we managed to win. We won't talk about scratching Arthur from the answers and loosing a few points.
Got to sample a new snack sample which I have to say was mighty tasty. Fried mac & cheese squares.
What more can you ask for..bucket night, a trivia win and a tasty snack.

Boring, Boring, Boring

Our line at work has been down since last week. We've been unable to run due to:
#1- lack of materials
#2- technical work being done to our line
#3- lack of knowledge by the technician doing the work.

In the 7 years I've worked there it was normal to have a lull once or twice a year. This was the time they spent cleaning, painting and doing inventory. We've now run out of things to clean. My new job this week is to go over Work Instructions and safety items. The problem is that there is one computer out on the floor to be used by several people. I could use the one in the office but that would entail walking back and forth to the line a million times a day to review these work instructions with others. I don't mind an idle day once in a while but this is not going to end until maybe Monday. We were urged to take vacation days but who the hell is going to take a week off in January unless they have the money to go some where warm? I'm telling you, I am in the wrong industry.

Chef Arnie whipped up some yummy home made pizzas yesterday. In the midst of cooking one of them my brand new pizza stone broke in the oven. Thankfully the pizza was saved. The stone has been quickly replaced by Pampered Chef but I'm a little nervous about trying it again.

Although I appreciate when my husband cooks I chuckle at the mess he makes. I can cook a full meal and contain the mess. He's got shit spread out all over the place. It more so looks like a war zone when he's cooking. He also cannot be disturbed. There's a lot of thinking that goes into making a meal. So I left him alone yesterday. I proceeded to complete the painting project I started Sunday. He was home by 3:10 and started right in. At 515 I had to question the estimated time of delivery to the table. The downside being that I was hungry. My orange and jello I ate at 1130 wasn't holding me over. I just wanted one fricken slice of pizza. By 530 it was done. Although good, the crust was just a little to crispy for my liking.
He did also attempt a small pie pan sized stuffed pizza. He needs work with that. I look forward to his next attempt.

Things To Do When You Can't Sleep

Every once in awhile I can't sleep. I can't blame it on my husbands snoring as since he lost weight he is now pretty much a silent sleeper. I'm one of those people who can't have it completly quiet as then I hear every small noise in the house. So I usually have the tv or radio on. Once I fall asleep I'm good unless something wakes me up. I'm screwed then as I have a hard time falling back to sleep. Then I wander around. I get up get a drink of water, look outside, play a computer game, attempt to do something that will tire me out and get me back to sleep. Sometimes I just give up and stay awake. Tonight (or should I say ) this morning I flicked through tv programs. Watched a few paid programs and wondered how many of these people really used the so called product they're trying to sell. Then I got to True Life where I watched 3 poverty stricken teens. Half way through the show I was becomming irate with the stupidity of all 3 of them. Here's a clue..not one of them had a job!. One girl was living with a bunch of people who constantly stole what little money she had. Duh...bank. She had a waitress job but dropped a joint in front of her boss and he fired her. Duh...leave that shit at home, don't take it to work. Case #2- boy on probation trying to get into the Army. Parents are poor and being evicted. Boy really giving it a shot at studying for his GED to get into the army. Hello...you're on probation for 2 years. Get a job, study and try the army when you're off probation. I had enough of that show and flicked over to............Leave It To Beaver, where I learned the importance of telling the truth rather than sneaking around. That friend of his "Gilbert" tried to lead him toward a life of crime. Ward busted him out before he could get any further. June was proud and Wally tried to suck up to Ward as usual.
I shall now attempt to get back to sleep.

Enough Already

In my eyes a headach should not last longer than it takes the medication you took for it to work. Sometimes it's 10-15 minutes after I pop a few asprin or whatever. Last night while packing away Christmas items I had one come one. The one where you see spots. The "drop everything and run for the medicine cabinet one". Three hours later I still had it. By 11pm the spots went away but the dull ache was still there. That is how I woke up this morning. Re-medicated on went on my way. At least the spots were gone. This continued through out my day. Everytime I bent over or turned my head the dull ache was there. At lunch I popped a few asprin from the Company medicine chest and threw in a sinus tab for good measure. How bad could it be. By 2pm it was gone. It sucks working 7 of your 8 hour day with a nagging ache.

I've become so skilled as a painter that I can now phone paint. We took a little trip to Menards Sunday morning for a few things. Paint was not on the list. My husband should know better than to leave me alone to long at Menards. Ideas pop into my head. I roamed around the home decorating area and read a few brochures that were laying around. I bought 3 gallons of paint. He's lucky that he came along when he did or right now he'd be ripping up carpet and installing flooring. I was going to put off the painting but when I got home and felt a little bored I dragged out the stuff and began to paint my dining room. One stoke and the phone rang. Stupidly I did not look at the caller ID first. I winced when I heard the voice of my former roomie and good friend. This girl can talk! There is no cutting her off. So I listened, commented every once in awhile and proceeded to paint my entire dining room while on the phone. She was a little shocked when 2 1/2 hours later she said "I suppose I should let you go so you can paint" and I broke the news to her that I was already washing brushes. I have a hallway to paint...I may just call her this weekend.