Inventory

Once again it was time for annual inventory out at the plant, and once again it was the same old … we had a word for this when I was in the Navy which I will not utter here. 

I want to maintain my PG rating on the blog, you know.  

In other words, everything went as it usually does.  I keep saying people might not hate inventory so much if they would at least pretend to be organized, but they can't even do that.  And I desperately wish they'd give these counters some training!  But no, they just throw them out there and we card writers end up having to train them.  

The poor counter I ended up with...we were inventorying stacks of metal parts.  The way we normally do it is to measure the stack, then multiply by how many parts per inch.  Very simple, very easy, and it's always the same because all of the parts are the same thickness.  The counter I had said she didn't feel comfortable doing it that way, so she was hand counting every single stack of parts...and bear in mind, some of these stacks had 400-500 parts in them.  It took her like 30 minutes just to count the first stack.  By that time, I'd counted three stacks myself and had written up the cards for them.   

Eventually, Uncle Supervisor went over and had a talk with the counter, and things picked up after that.  We eventually got everything done, then I noticed Uncle Supervisor over replacing some of the cards I had written with the green Do Not Inventory cards.  I walked over and said, "You'd think they'd have a way for us to tell which ones we don't inventory before we write the cards.  I asked about it last year, and they said there's no way to know until the computer kicks the cards out.  To me, that's just..."

"Asinine," Uncle Supervisor interrupted. 

Laughing, I replied, "I was going to say unorganized, but that works, too!"  But that's how it is out there.  It's like they try to do things in the most chaotic way possible. 

I think the worst part about inventory is that you can't leave when you're done.  You have to stand around waiting for hours and hours.  I don't know about everyone else, but I definitely felt like I was being watched. 

That is a real photo I took.  I'm not exactly sure what was making that reflection, but it sure looked like a face to me. 

I thought it was funny.