For those of you wishing you were back at work...

So last night I thought to do a MWN post for today's reader, but alas, the news was straight gloom and I was too tired to do the spelunking required to find.  But work today more than makes up for it, as I'm sure you will agree.  I will try to give you the perfect-world explanation of what SHOULD be happening, along with the real world "Oy, it hadda happen like this", moments.

Starting the day, we go to our respective cutting machines, me and my partner.  In the place of a freshly empty scrap fabric dumpster sitting between us, we have a mountain that was currently heaped 4 feet high and threatening to climb.  This is because our bright orange roll-around, which should have been emptied into the big dumpster outside Monday night, couldn't be so emptied because the big dumpster hadn't been dumped Friday or Saturday (currently working nooners on Saturday)- in fact I had had to climb into it and walk it down Saturday morning just to get Friday's in.  Our spanking new Plant Manager (let's call him 'Superman', due to an unfortunate and well-published photograph) believes this is because of our PPE area, staffed by temps, create a lot of waste.  (We won't tell him that when you hit busy season as we have, you don't really need the 16 hours OT to have two cutters create that much waste.)  He believes that once the PPE end winds down at the end of the week (down from "the end of the year and hopefully beyond" 2 weeks ago before millions of orders got cancelled for gowns), we won't be able to justify the extra hundred bucks for a third dump per week.  He also believes he will be able to talk to our VP into getting a compactor (My response: "Do you know how many PMs have told me they wanted to get a compactor?" Answer, 4 with Superman).  So we asked for a gaylord to put today's trash in.  Tune in in 3 hours to see how that went.

Oh, by the way, did I mention the VP is in plant today, along with his girl Friday and another dude from corporate?  You can see this will be fun today.

I came back with a couple of sheets of orders for REDACTED, our biggest customer companywide, supposedly serviced by the plant in Missouri that's located right next to it, but is hopelessly incompetent always swamped by them so badly it takes everyone at all three plants (down recently from 5, another brilliant decision) working OT to keep up and still try to keep up with our own customers.  The list, I noticed, is for orders dated PRIOR to the 130-odd orders I cut last week.  When I mentioned that, my boss (let's call her 'my boss') told me these were orders that the Wisconsin plant was supposed to be doing, but were hopelessly incompetent too swamped to complete.  I would start on them later.  I would need a roll of patch fabric for them, which my boss said the warehouse guy would be getting me soon, along with that gaylord.

Time passes, I grow sleepy.  The dumpster reaches a good 5 feet high now.  I have to stop and load 2 rolls of black fabric to finish off our customer (There technically was enough fabric on one to do the job- with 5 yards to spare- but as we are back to using the Chinese fabric, made by a vendor who is hopelessly incompetent who is the best price available, and thus I must plan on defects pushing me over the top.)

First break arrives, I am close to  cutting the Wisconsin/Missouri stuff- an order of 15 which don't require patch.  I tell Superman that we are still in need of the gaylord, as I am not about to try to hoist a bin full of scrap 5 feet to the top of a pile it won't stay on anyway.  He nods to boss, who says she just reminded warehouse guy (because my partner raised hell requested again).  I mention I still need the patch stuff.  Superman cuts into my break explaining all the trash stuff I told you in the first part- which, of course, I already knew.  I got some donettes to wake me up.

After break, I finish the our customer stuff- with no defects and a measlely 5 yards left on the first roll- and move on to the W/M stuff, of which I have one partial roll and then will have to load my rack.  Now, THIS roll has oil spots, burr lines, and assorted other defects (same fabric vendor, different color), and slows me down.  Also slowing me down is warehouse guy arriving with the gaylord, a plastic, fold-out type, which he leaves me to unfold.  Problem being, it came in from outside and is full of water.  I managed to get it open without getting wet- not sure how I managed that- but the floor, not so much.

One of the PPE people doubles as the morning cleaner, so I caught up with her and asked if she would bring herself and the company's one mop to our area to clean up.  She soon arrived with her mop- and since she severely misjudged the size of Lake Gaylord, without her bucket.  After bemusedly pushing it around for a couple minutes, even she figured, "This will take a bucket".

Sometime around 11, I reached that "load yer own fabric" point (NOTE:  Still no patch fabric, which requires a forklift).  Oh, and that reminds me, there was yet something else going on that factors in.  The way I understand it, our bending machine for canopy frames was putting a dent in the aluminum poles that "is only is visible if you knew where to look for it" (Needless to say, our biggest local customer found it).  They called in a tech to look at it, and using the forklift as a crane, he determined right where the problem was- and then, exacerbated it by breaking a plastic clip that would have to be custom made in (wait for it) Delaware.  At this moment, as I was putting my last roll up, and they were trying to determine the next move- with a rather large part suspended in mid air via forklift (yes we have but one)...


THAT'S when the lights started flickering.

Just a bank of fluorescents at first, then another, then our cutting machines.  Mine cuts off the table at the power breakers, but leaves my computers on.  My partner's table stayed on (but was making an odd noise that encouraged us to shut it off), but her computers started playing on-again, off again.  In the meantime, the plant had split in threes- 1/3 on, 1/3 off, 1/3 blinking so much I told Superman we should turn on Saturday Night Fever and dance.  By 11:30, Superman declared lunch while he waited for the electrician to arrive (BTW the electrician said that a similar 'brownout' had happened nearby yesterday, and it was the utility's problem, which would significantly extend the wait time).  Returning from lunch (done with one working microwave, which warehouse guy had moved to a functioning outlet and "was charging people five dollars to use"), we we told to 'clean our areas' while further waiting went on.  Here is what I did for the following 45 minutes:

Helped look for the source of a STRONG burnt-wire smell
Talked to various other employees
Stuck poles into the already overflowed plastic tip-out dumpster in order to load more into it without it all falling out (which I described as "Turning it from a sh!#pile into a sh!#pile standing at attention")
Counted up my covers cut this year- I might have topped the 2,000 mark today without the brownout
Swept the former "sh!tpile"
Watched warehouse guy- after they had finally lowered the part the forklift was carrying- unload 3 sewing machines from Wisconsin guy's van
Talked to more people

At this point, Superman took up one of my earlier ideas and sent my partner and I home.  Needless to say, the rest of the story involved a slice of cold pizza and a nap.