I hate the idea of dying because of some stupid virus, but some of the changes as I have said have been pretty good, in the short term. I loved having the boys and Wife out of school for the spring term. It felt like we were finally a family all under the same roof and being able to slow down. I never did get the same option at work, we continued working, but for a time we were told we didn't have to hang around all night long. As soon as the workload was done that was going to be due the next day or so was done, we could leave for the night. This was so we could reduce the amount of time we interacted with each other, which sounded very reasonable.
Being how inventive I can be when given an opportunity to gain the system, I started working at a much faster pace so I could go home earlier and earlier. I am still an hourly employee so I am supposed to put in the full twelve hour shift that I work. I never minded but I was feeling run down there at the start of the year, so changing things up felt great. We have one main tool that is "our" tool and there is another identical tool in the lab room that belongs to our "parent" company, we share the lab space. Normally, we only use each others tool when our goes down, but they are both qualified to do each other's work. Naturally, once they announced we could leave as quickly as the work got done, I figured I could be twice as fast if I started running both tools at the same time. This is a bit of a pain as I have to remain on my feet most of the night, running back and forth, but if it means I could cut out that much faster, then so be it.
Management must have figured out we were enjoying ourselves too much, because even though the work is getting done on time, they decided we must go back to normal operating schedule and be there our full shifts. I didn't like hearing that, but then they announced we are moving forward with installing a new tool and we will be getting some new training on new techniques we will be offering and I am supposed to figure out how to be there to cross train. On top of all this, we have been inundated with work. Jobs from customers normally have 3-4 samples. One customer submitted identical jobs with sixteen samples apiece, and another with 10, all this on top of the normal work we see means we have been extra busy.
I don't even mind being there the full 12 hours if there is work, so this week has been blowing by. What pisses me off is the idea of some weeks we just don't have much work around and in the past I was supposed to keep myself busy. At one point, one of my other supervisors said "practice your technique". That was some pretty dumb advice when you consider that we prep the samples in an identical fashion day in and day out, this was in another part of our lab, and we have to be consistent, so making the same sample 3-4 times a night for ten years without hardly any problems and you want me to "practice my technique". Yeah, you get us more work that yields more money, I'll be waiting with Netflix on over here, thank you.
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