Neville

Saturday, before we left for the day, Group Leader Fernando told me to come in at 5 AM this morning.  Over time, junk starts to accumulate on the line.  Extra headers and adapter tubes, extra boxes, trash that should have been thrown out, and the like.  He and I (and one of the forklift drivers) were going to come in early and get it all cleaned up and stuff. 

I show up at 5, and guess who isn't there.  Yep.  Sigh...I start cleaning up and getting ready for the day.  Along about 6, Fernando drags his sorry behind into work.  He's very apologetic, explaining that he didn't have electricity at his house.  "Do you know how scary it is to take a shower in the dark?" he asks.

I just stood there, mouth open, dumbfounded for a moment, then I blurted out, "How did you make it in the Army for 20 years if you're afraid of the dark???" 

He just laughed and shook his head.  But he brought me juice

and doughnuts

"As an appeasement," he said. 

So, I called him Neville Chamberlain for the rest of the day. 

For those of you who went to public school, Neville Chamberlain was the prime minister of England during the 1930s whose policies of appeasement allowed Hitler to run roughshod over most of Europe. 

It's actually kind of nice to have someone around who gets my historical references.  An insult kind of loses its punch when you have to explain who "der fuhrer" is. But that's a different story for a different day. 

A few weeks ago, Group Leader Fernando decided he was going to try to trip me up. 

"You're kind of studious of history," he said.  "Let's see if you get this.  I'm Adolph Hitler." 

He indicated an area about a foot square inside my work area (which I have semi-jokingly dubbed a "Fernando Free Zone"), and said, "All I want is this little area here.  That's it.  Just this little area." 

I walked to the edge of my work station, stood toe to toe with him, looked him dead in the eye, and I said,

NO

"No?  I can't have this little bitty area here?" 

I crossed my arms and said again, "No.  If just one person had stood up to Hitler, he never would have been able to amass such power.  He would have never been able to conquer most of Europe." 

(As my awesome hunk of pure awesomeness that is my imaginary boyfriend Bill Whittle says, if a high school marching band had stood in the road blocking his way, Hitler would have turned around and gone home.  Bill also says that 15 Texans with rifles could take over California without firing a shot.) 

Group Leader Fernando nodded and walked away.  Later, as I added my name to the quality board, I wrote "NOT Neville Chamberlain."  Fernando just laughed and shook his finger at me. 

In other news, Cody is no longer in the floater pool.  Supervisor Ronnie is back from vacation, and has given him a permanent position.  Well, for the rest of the summer that is.  He is going to be working on Former Group Leader Rod's line building coils.  I asked Cody about it, and he said, "That's got to be the easiest job in the entire plant." 

So, yeah, things are working out for him. 

I told Supervisor Ronnie that Cody is a good worker, and Ronnie said, "Like his mama." 

Oh, that makes me so proud.