Wow, I can't believe it's been almost a week since I've posted. Lots has happened since my supervisor stood in the department yelling at us, the main thing being that he got overridden by some higher up somewhere. We were supposed to have started our 4AM to "Until I say you can leave" shifts Monday, but Group Leader Shark came around Saturday and told us all to come in at 5:00 instead.
I swan, I wish they'd just pick a time and stick with it! The buttons on my alarm clock are going to get worn out at this rate.
Another big thing that happened Saturday was that sometime after lunch, I heard Not Cuz over in tubing chewing out Group Leader Shark. I didn't hear the entire conversation, but what I did hear went something like, "What is this? There are no headers! There are no legs! What's up with that?" Could it be that someone finally has the backbone to actually solve the problem -- which is tubing -- instead of just making the brazers their scapegoats? We've been saying that for years. We can't braze if we don't have any parts to braze.
There's more to it than that, too, in that tubing is constantly gaffing off what they should be doing on to the brazers. I'll give you a real- life example from a couple of weeks ago.
I had a 16 piece order I needed to braze. The first thing wrong with it was that there were only 15 headers in the bin. This should never, ever happen. Each order of headers goes through nine processes before it even gets to the brazers. They are
2. Bent
3. Punched
4. End Formed
5. Spin Closed
6. Re-rounded
7. Flo-drilled
8. Tap Fittings Brazed
9. Parts Staged
Every order should be getting counted at every single one of those processes. Everyone makes mistakes, or so our supervisors keep telling us, but that's why EVERYONE who handles those headers should be counting. That way, if the cutter makes a mistake, it'll be caught by the bender, not the brazer. If the puncher makes a mistake, it should be caught by the end former, not the brazer.
They all should be counting, but they don't, because they don't want to, and if there are any mistakes, the brazer will catch it anyway.
All that to say, I got an order that was one header short. So, I walked away from my brazing stand and over to the dispatcher's desk in tubing to order another header. I went back to my stand and continued working. Sometime later, a person from the end of the header line in tubing came to me and said, "I messed this header up. You need to go turn it in again."
Why me? Why the brazer? Couldn't she have turned it in? After all, she is the one who messed it up. Anyway, I walked away from my stand again and went back to the dispatcher's desk and ordered the header again. I went back to my stand and set up on another order while I waited for the part I needed.
That order had two adapter tubes that hadn't been bent. So, I walked away from my stand -- again -- and went all the way to the other side of the tubing department where the machine that bends those particular parts is located and asked the lady that works there to bend the parts for me.
While I was over there, the guy who runs the header cutter gestured to me, then handed me a straight tube of raw copper. What am I supposed to do with a straight tube of raw copper? I took the part and began walking towards the header line, when I noticed something wasn't quite right. I checked the part, and sure enough, he'd cut it the wrong length. I took it back to him and got him to cut me a tube of the correct length. Then I had to go over to the header line and argue with them -- which I don't know why they're going to argue and give me attitude. They're going to have to do the part anyway. I left it with them, then finally went back to my stand and began working on my next order.
All of that took about 15-20 minutes to straighten out, and all of it -- ALL of it -- should never have fallen upon the brazer to do. All we are supposed to do is stand there and braze. How many headers could I have gotten brazed in the time it took me to get one header cut? But now you understand why the powers that be don't want to fix tubing. It's so much easier to just blame the brazers for our production being low.
And now you understand why I'm so tired all the time.
In other news, I finally got that dreaded colonoscopy done. OK, it wasn't really that bad, or that dreaded. Once we got the transportation issue resolved, everything went pretty smoothly. Even the fasting part wasn't too bad. Let me tell you something, though. If you ever need to go on an all liquid diet, broth is your best friend, and jello runs a close second. I'd boiled the turkey carcass down after Thanksgiving, so I had a lot of broth in my freezer. The prep was pretty miserable, though. I had to do the traditional prep where you drink the gallon of stuff and it makes you poop. It didn't taste too bad, but by the time I was done, I was sick of chugging it all down.
I'd gone down Sunday and stayed with Cody and Brennan, which was the most convenient for all involved, but in a way, I wished I was home for all that...pooping. Then Monday, Brennan drove me to the GI place since it was her regular day off. Once we got there, everything went off without a hitch, and after it was over, Brennan took me to her favorite coffee place and bought me a S'mores frappe. It was delicious.
I'd planned on coming back Monday evening, but both of the kids urged me to stay one more night, because they'd told me not to drive until the next day. I'd thought I would be clear headed enough but realized I was still slurring my words pretty badly, so I took the better part of valor and did as they asked.
Anyway, we went back to their house and hung around watching TV until Cody got off work, then we went out to eat. I know I'm going to lose my Texan card over this, but the last few times I've gone to Whataburger, I've been pretty disappointed. The patty is thin and overcooked, and pretty dry. After we ate, we went to Academy, then to Dick's. Brennan had seen a jumpsuit she really liked and wanted to get it, but after seeing the price, she decided to order it off Amazon.
Then we went to Hobby Lobby and spent about an hour in there, just looking at stuff. I was pretty tired by then, so we just went by Kroger then back to their house.
Tuesday morning I got up, called in to work and used an emergency vacation day, and came on home. The plan was to fix my lawnmower, but when I got out and got my ratchet set out, I discovered the tools I needed were missing. In fact, most of the set is missing, which is to be expected after having had it for some 32 years. I'll just buy a new one when I go into town Friday.
Instead, I ground and began drying some more herbs, and took it easy for the rest of the day, watching TV and knitting yet another hat.
This morning, I was back to work, where my coworker told me that if I hadn't shown up today, she was going to put out an APB on me. But when I told her where I'd been, she totally didn't blame me for taking the extra day.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I greatly overestimated the amount of Jello I would need while on my liquid died, so I think I'll go have some now.
Laters.
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