Man in Tweed dot Com

Wherein the only work is done with a razor

This post was written by Mike

I finally managed to get called by the union the other day and, not surprisingly, started work. I’m on another industrial site, another co-generation plant, and with another company.

As with most industrial job sites, one spends the first day going through some form of orientation. These usually entail someone telling you where all the evacuation points are, a firm reminder to stay out of clearly marked areas (as in if you show up in these areas you will be fired), and a basic summary of the safety precautions specific to the site. The general contractor on this site has a very well done set of in-house videos that they use to convince you to work safely. The summary? Work safe or you, or someone else, will die. Seriously. These videos were very direct in the consequences of failing to follow safe practices.

That was the morning.

The afternoon was spent filling out forms, going for a walk, filling out more forms, and shaving. That’s right. Shaving. One of the issues on this site was that someone kicked up a fuss (rightfully so) about the air quality at the end of the day when the welders had been working for hours and no one had turned on the freaking fans. So we had to be fitted for respirators but no one realized it when the call for workers went out. As a result, the lot of us (about a dozen or so guys) waited for someone to drive to Walmart to buy some shaving cream and disposable razors so that we could shave our facial hair with cold water. Fun. Very fun. I still don’t think I look like myself. Mind you I now have a piece of paper that says I have a mask that fits.The fitting process involves a computer measuring the air movement around our face while we sit, stand, read something aloud, and bend over touching our knees.

So I’m at work again. Not that I did much the first day but I was paid so I obviously did something.