Friday, February 23, 2007
BE SURE TO PUNCH THE TIME CLOCK!
Brendalove@gmail.com
Just go ahead and sit there at your little desk, all smug and self-satisfied. You've worked hard to get where you are, haven't you? You think you have life by the balls, don't you?
I am here to tell you that the blue-collar American male has it much better than you.
You see, those blue-collars, they stick together. Nobody really knows what they're up to exactly, at any given time. But I was able to dig the real truth out of a 'squealer'. This particular blue-collar worker happens to work construction. Here is a typical day:
- Arrive at work at 7:30.
- Take biscuit orders from everyone on the crew.
- Head over to Bojangles and pick up the grub.
- Arrive back at jobsite about 7:55.
- Everyone eats till about 8:15 a.m.....after that, coffee and cigarettes.
- Now the real work begins...from 8:30 to 10:30, work is intense.
- At 10:30, its time to discuss the Duke game last night and tease ol' Goozlenator about his wife leaving him.
- At 10:45, you realize you are out of sandpaper. Never mind that you were NAILING anyway, you're out of sandpaper, dammit.
- You and a couple of best buds from the crew head over to Home Depot for supplies. Ol' Goozlenator has a joint with him, so all of you smoke it on the way back to the jobsite.
- Before arriving at the jobsite, all of you realize you're really really really hungry.
- You phone in to let the crew chief know that ya'll are just going to go ahead and go to lunch, since, you know, you're already out anyway.
- You and the boys head over to Hardee's. Between the four of you, you spend about $75.00 for lunch. Lots of fried chicken and Thickburgers.
- Once you're back in the truck, you realize you've eaten your buzz away, so you finish off Ol' Goozlenator's stash.
- Arrive back at the jobsite loaded out of your mind.
- Spend the next hour contemplating the physics of how a nail splits through the wood when you hammer it. You experiment with various hammering techniques and degrees of force when hitting the nail.
- 45 minutes later, you're out of nails. And Bubba down on the other beam breaks his hammer. Its time to go back to Home Depot.
- By unspoken agreement, you and Bubba head directly to the BP station, where you and he both buy 44 oz. Super Guzzler soft drinks. You hang out there at the BP for awhile, just chatting around with the cashier, Skeeter, and smoking a few cigarettes.
- You and Bubba finally make it to Home Depot.
- You finally make it back to the jobsite around 3:35. By now it is obvious that everyone else's lunch buzz has worn off, and everyone is feeling the fatigue. You carry a few boards from here to there, making a new pile in a new place. After about 10 minutes, you join your other co-workers in their fatigue complaints.
- Around 4:05, your boss says he reckons that good progress has been made today, to go on home and rest up, because tomorrow there will be a few pieces of sheetrock hung tomorrow.
- The entire crew heads en masse back to the BP station for take home 12 packs. You and Ol' Goozlenator stop off on a deserted back road to burn one before you head home to Wilma and the kids.
And what did YOU do today? Meetings, conference calls, spreadsheets and stress, you say?
But you DID get a Bojangles biscuit this morning? And you stopped off on the deserted back road after punching the time clock?
Sure, sure you did.
Posted by brendalove@gmail.com @ 12:41 PM
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