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Ever use this excuse for being late
Posted by holy-cow on December 9, 2017 at 5:12 amWas about 10 minutes late today when meeting up with my coworker. Explained the reason as: Had to stop to check out a nice-looking five bottom Allis-Chalmers plow that is for sale.
Saying there was a traffic jam would not have been believable.
andy-bruner replied 6 years, 2 months ago 19 Members · 26 Replies- 26 Replies
You better have a lot of tractor…..
When I ran the crews out of the Division office up north I had a couple of employees that also kept agricultural and livestock interests where they lived nearby. If there had been some bad weather the night before we all had to wait until all the cows got rounded up before one or the other would eventually show up.
We were slow for a while and I sent the crews to the maintenance yard to grab a couple of rolls of barbed wire, posts and ties. They spent about a day and a half helping fix and tighten up fence. It was worth the time spent because the tardiness caused by “rounding up cows” dropped significantly after that. Yes they were in State trucks. I probably could have done jail time for it.
Just one of the many examples of why I made a horrible government employee. ?
- Posted by: paden cash
When I ran the crews out of the Division office up north I had a couple of employees that also kept agricultural and livestock interests where they lived nearby. If there had been some bad weather the night before we all had to wait until all the cows got rounded up before one or the other would eventually show up.
We were slow for a while and I sent the crews to the maintenance yard to grab a couple of rolls of barbed wire, posts and ties. They spent about a day and a half helping fix and tighten up fence. It was worth the time spent because the tardiness caused by “rounding up cows” dropped significantly after that. Yes they were in State trucks. I probably could have done jail time for it.
Just one of the many examples of why I made a horrible government employee. ?
I hope everyone has a great day; I know I will! Worked with a guy who was talking about his fence being washed out in a creek. Asked him when he was gonna fix it. He said “I ain’t worried about it. My cows know where the fence is s’posed to be”.
When I first started surveying it was all construction work. The party chief was a neighbor that lived about 3 miles down the road, so I just drove to his house and rode the company truck from there. He had a bunch of hogs in an old stable on the way to his house and about half the time the truck was there. Sometimes I’d stop, sometimes not. Occasionally it would be a half hour before he was ready to go. So there were a lot of “had to feed the hogs” reasons for being late.
My favorite all time excuse from an employee:
My wife is too drunk to blow in the interlock so my truck wont start. I didn’t need to ask why he couldnt…
Oh, my!! Think I’ll pass on hiring that guy………………or his wife.
- Posted by: holy cow
Oh, my!! Think I’ll pass on hiring that guy………………or his wife.
I hired an experienced applicant that had failed to explain he had a suspended DL. Since his duties as Iman didn’t require him to regularly operate a vehicle, I went ahead and kept him around. He was a great employee otherwise…
I finally did some digging and found out his license had been suspended for several instances of aggravated road-rage. This was really eye-opening since he seemed like a quiet and reserved individual. When I asked him about it he just simply said “he was working through some stuff”… (wtf?!) My insurance carrier made me sign documentation that specific employee would NEVER be in control of ANY company vehicle.
He worked for me for about three years and was dyn-o-mite on construction layout. Never had a problem at all with him. Go figger.
Had an employee whose Grandmother died 5 times in 3 years……. ?
Must have been from a large family. ? ? ?
Maybe both parents had been married several times.
I had an office guy who was chronically late. He lived 10 minutes from the office, I lived 45 minutes away and had to cross the downtown area on my way. I was always there by 7:00 Am. He would come up with all kinds of excuses, one of my favorites was when he came in about 11 AM and said he could not find his daughter’s other sock. I believe his problem was staying up all night on the computer gaming or something, but never confirmed that. Smart guy, likeable, but had to let him go because of his tardiness. That was 25 years ago, we are still friends, I run across him every now and then.
I once had a co-worker a number of years ago who was chronically late. One day I called him out on it, and he got quite mouthy in return. Since I’m in the public sector and couldn’t fire him on the spot, the best I could do was have him reassigned for justifiable reasons. Our field work was winding down considerably at that time, so reassignment it was.
I don’t mind someone being late on occasion, but punctuality is nonetheless very highly important IMO no matter what.
The only superior evidence is that which you haven’t yet found.- Posted by: holy cow
Must have been from a large family. ? ? ?
Maybe both parents had been married several times.
Probably so. However the deceased always seemed to “conveniently” have their funerals on the Monday’s following Friday’s paycheck. ?
Had an office manager at my old company give me some shade about calling out sick on a Friday (2nd sick day in 5 years, mind you; not that they ever recognized that in a review)
Said “Well you know, Wayne, its statistical fact that 40% of all sick days fall on a Monday or Friday”
Given the blank look on his face I don’t think could do the math in his head.
I have to admit it took me a minute to get it 🙂
I remember one of the first things I was taught when I started my first surveying job in Phoenix in the summer (read ??hot, start early?) was ??just don??t do any math in your head.?
I don??t know if this was great advice or if it has made me mentally lazy, but I always have a calculator out even for simple math. I sometimes try in my head but still check with the calculator and give myself a pat on the back if I get it right.
Another thing I learned on that job was from talking to my crew partner about thinking of moving to Colorado to the mountains… he said ??this is America man, do whatever the f*** you want?
Then I moved to Colorado about two weeks later… those were good times
Funny, but not true. You must take into account the actual number of occurrences of each week day being a work day. There are a number of times each year where Monday is not a work day. Thanksgiving takes out a Thursday and, for some, a Friday. So, in 2018 the number is closer to 38.5 percent using 45 Mondays, 51 Tuesdays, 50 Wednesdays, 51 Thursdays and 50 Fridays.
I had a co-worker years ago that would show up at least twice a week with serious hang-over related symptoms. He was young and single and I just assumed he liked to hunt for short-term companionship in the beer joints and bars.
After a year or two we got to be good friends and he was helping me build an addition to my house on the weekends. He would show up at 6 or 7 AM on Saturday or Sunday all bright eyed and bushytailed. I had to ask if he had given up the “night life”.
No he hadn’t. But he explained he tired quickly of spending his free time (weekends) nursing hang-overs. He had made the conscious effort to party during the week and “give the hang-over to the boss”. That’s why he would show up at work looking worse for wear. This left his weekends open for productive things he enjoyed.
I’m not sure I totally agreed with his logic, but it was at least well thought out.
- Posted by: paden cash
I’m not sure I totally agreed with his logic, but it was at least well thought out.
- Posted by: Doug CrawfordPosted by: paden cash
I’m not sure I totally agreed with his logic, but it was at least well thought out.
Slightly off-topic, but in the early 90’s while travelling in Africa I met a fellow recent engineering graduate from England and we discussed the similarities of odd-ball students between my NZ and her UK experience. She won out though with a story of a chap in her first year class that decided he was going to attend and fully participate in every party that he could physically get to, but to fund it he needed to cut back on food expenses, so his ingenious plan was to mash up weetbix and milk and make trays of biscuits that he could eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The net result, so she said, was that he became one of the very few people in recent years to get scurvy in England.
- Posted by: Richard ImriePosted by: Doug CrawfordPosted by: paden cash
I’m not sure I totally agreed with his logic, but it was at least well thought out.
Slightly off-topic, but in the early 90’s while travelling in Africa I met a fellow recent engineering graduate from England and we discussed the similarities of odd-ball students between my NZ and her UK experience. She won out though with a story of a chap in her first year class that decided he was going to attend and fully participate in every party that he could physically get to, but to fund it he needed to cut back on food expenses, so his ingenious plan was to mash up weetbix and milk and make trays of biscuits that he could eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The net result, so she said, was that he became one of the very few people in recent years to get scurvy in England.
I can remember some hard times when a good meal was a few days away. But it was always due to poor pay and irresponsible money management…not by choice like the chap you mentioned!
I do remember scraping together enough pennies to sit at a local restaurant with a cup of coffee. When nobody was looking I would fill my pockets up with little packets of ketchup, little coffee creamers and prepackaged saltine crackers from the condiment table. Once back home I could make the finest homemade “tomato soup” that money couldn’t buy…with all the crackers I wanted.
btw – I had to Google “Weet-Bix”…and it doesn’t appear too appetizing. In this hemisphere we would call that stuff either “Shredded Wheat” or “Grape-Nuts”. Neither of which tastes any better than a handful of dried grass. ?
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