Was a long week...

I'm sure glad it's the weekend. Worked 4 10 hour days and 6 1/2 hours on Friday. Sadly only 2 1/2 of that is overtime due to some dumb employment laws here. It's hard trying to explain to people, that work in an office, that doing physical work(even if it's skilled labour) for long hours isn't the same as working long hours in an office sitting at a desk. I've been crawling around on the floor, contorting my body around stuff to weld and getting a few good burns from overhead welding. The foreman seems quite happy with my work. Another week and I hope to go up to the proper journeyman rate. It's obvious I have a lot more experience than the apprentice they hired, at the same rate, so I hope I get fair compensation. My body isn't as flexible as it was 20 years ago though. I'm still looking for something better but I'm sure tired after this week. Dave

I think it's great your man enought to stick with it.I have work in some ell holes in the past and it's not easy. Don't think my body would take it nowdays.

I don't agree, I used to think that
I have done both
and have had days in a office
that were more stressful and
busy, that made me more tired
than any 12 hour shift could have.

When I was an apprentice I went to school 1 day every other week. The school day we had 1 hour lunch breaks and got out 1/2 hour earlier. Yet I was more tired after a school day than I was after a day working on a construction job.

Dusty

You mean that by now they haven't recognized your super-intellegence and far superior management and organizational skills and promoted you to the head office?

WOW!!!!!!!!! A 46 1/2 hour week. Must be tough. For better than 40 years, my typical work week was 55 hours..........except for the 2-3 months per year when it was 80-plus hours.

I've noticed that. If I put in a good day working in my shop or working around the farm, I'm not as tired in the evening as when I spend the day sitting on my butt staring at a computer screen all day.

If you think that is a hell hole try working on sewer lift ststions for 30 years.

What Goose said. You should try sitting at a desk and computer for 50+ hrs a week.

When I was working construction, my body was dead tired, but my mind was still fresh. I could do a bunch of things after work. Now, my mind is shot at the end of the day and I have no desire to do anything, even if I have some physical energy.

On top of that, I don't get paid time and a half for overtime since I'm a "professional." And on top of that, the company expects us to only fill out time for 40hrs of work. Any additional time on the job is considered necessary for our work but not billable to our cusotmers. And, we're excpected to be on call at all times for customer support.

This cow is just about milked dry. Yes, I'll be looking for another job when the economy and options improve.

Isn't anything over 40hrs overtime?A lot of times what the boss says is very different from state law.I had a company that was screwing us all out of ot intill 1 guy got fired and went to the labor board,we all got check's for what they owed us.It was a car dealership and they said because of the union contract we did not get ot.State of NJ said otherwise.After that,they made us punch out after 40 hours.Then we said if we got hurt on the job and was punched out it could be a problem with workmans comp.Soon after that,you went home after 40hrs because the boss was not willing to pay ot.

Some people whine about everything

Try dairy farming.
46 hr weeks would be like being on vacation.
No overtime pay period.

Yep BTDT back years ago when I did welding for a living. That is just one more reason I'm retired some how the bad back and twisting and bending just does not work any more. Ya some times it seems that the young guy just out of school get the better pay because he has paper to back what he knows but doing it for years sure can let a guy know paper is good for one thing and that is when your done with sitting on the pot LOL. Yep I feel for you. Hey just go buy a case of beer sit back and have a few and you will forget about the week till Monday that is

(quoted from post at 00:21:55 10/23/10)It's hard trying to explain to people, that work in an office, that doing physical work(even if it's skilled labour) for long hours isn't the same as working long hours in an office sitting at a desk.

Click to expand...

Oh Dave I could tell you stories about office pukes until the cows come home! I spent the last 7-years of my career working in a construction job site office with those little college know it alls. Trust me they wouldn't know a hard days work if it ran over them. Most amount of people in an office I worked in was 25. 12-hours in an office is like 2 on the job site, I know I've been on both sides of the fence! I've pulled on rigging until I thought I was going to break my own wrist, swung 16-pound sledge hammer all day, but I gotta tell you when those darn file cabinet drawer stick, now that's a calamity!

Thanks. Welding is heavy hard work. I'd like to get back into a vessel shop. It's still hard work but they are much more organized and do things a lot more efficiently. The place I'm at kind of builds stuff as they go. If they don't have material, they'll just add it later rather than build the whole component complete. As an example, I built a platform for the top of a tank that will have checker plate and pockets for removeable railing. Any vessel shop I've ever worked in would build the platform complete with all the pockets and checker plate welded on. It's much easier to do seperate than after the platform is installed. This shop didn't have all the tubing for the pockets and are putting the checker plate and rest of the pockets on after. I think maybe because they don't have good blueprints for everything like vessel shops with in house engineers and draftsmen do. Yes I'm tired and my body aches. Dave

According to employment standards, anything over 8 hours a day or 44 hours per week is overtime, which ever is greater. It used to mean that someone could work 40 hours M-F and 4 hours on Sat. without overtime. As far as I thought 10 hours a day is greater than 8 so should be overtime. No, companies are now allowed to have what is called a condensed work week where they can get employee's to work 4 10's and a 4 hour shift Friday without paying overtime. Good companies work a 40 hour week and pay overtime after 8 hours a day. I think the condensed work week was originally for certain types of construction work but other companies get around it by saying they are in construction. It's a crock. Dave

I have yet to see an office worker get fired for miss spelling a word. But if a welder fails a UT or X-ray weld it's unemployment time.
Talk about stress, you know what stress is? I remember one time about 3 days before Christmas making UT welds on 24-inch pipe pile for a bridge abutment for the Army Corp of Engineers. It was pouring down rain, the rain was running down the inside the pipe, and out the joint, I was standing in about 2 feet of water inside a cofferdam, (no pumps). The foreman / company refused to build me a tent to protect the weld, the Army Corp inspector was watching me make the weld. Weld one pass, grind it back out because of all the holes. Finally the inspector seen enough, stormed off to the office! The foreman came out of the office rode the headache ball up to the top of the pile and placed some visqueen over the top of the pile, had a labor hold some more visqueen over me.
Stress is knowing your job could end and any minute, for any reason management sees fit too! :x

Don't forget there are those that feel they need and are entitled to a good portion of your paycheck because they didn't have the same oportunities that you have had.

Bawahhh
I have been pulling 6 Ten hour days a week since August in a work while occupied office, running conduit, fishing greenfeild (flexiable metal conduit) down the walls of each office that us electricians have to move the furniture in and then put it back some times we have to move it 3 and four times to set the conduit racks and install the pipe, I have 18 years senior to my oldest guy and us old timers are kicking these young punks butts, we get more done everyday than they do.
I can't get movers for the furniture due to the classification of the secure areas we are in.
When I get home I have to boot up the laptop and do time order materials and file lost time sheets for every room that we had to move the furniture in.
I came out of my cushey office job as a Project manager for this and I love being back in the feild working yes some nights I fall asleep doing paper work and go to bed at 7:00 other nights I am just sore So what
Back up at 4:00 AM and do it all over again the next day you dont hear me complain when I see my paycheck well at least untill I see that I paid over a grand in taxes for the week.
I love my job and I never complain unless I have a solution to fix the problem. Just found out they are sending me a huge crew with clearance next Saturday I had planned to take off for opening day of balck powder I will be at work at 5:30 AM sharp