True story. Long story short. I was a lead press man in the printing industry when I was in my early twenties. A wife, three kids, I worked every hour possible.
It was a Baker - Perkins web offset five color press. 2,000 feet of paper a minute at top speed. Crew of six. One week I worked over sixty hours during a four day stretch. The fifth day, I woke up and jumped in the shower so I could haul ass back to the plant for another shift.
The hot water of the shower hit me like a ton of bricks. I beacame disoriented and it felt as if every muscle in my body was convulsing. I had chills that raced the spasms for domination of my body.
I was a f***** mess physically.
I called into work to tell my supervisor I was sick and wouldn't be in to work.
The bastard didn't ask why, but immediately launched his over sized self important ego into orbit and sounded as if the plant would have to close down and the U.S. economy would immediately tank if my sorry ass was not on the clock exactly as scheduled.
Being the humanitarian son of a bitch that he was, he FINALLY asked what the reason/excuse for my imminent absence was.
Totally pissed off at this point in our phone converation I replied, "My goldfish died and I need time off to to arrange their funeral".
And I hung up the phone. I returned to work a few days later, a legend to my crew. The Supe never said a word about my missing that day of work.
True story. So help me God.
That leads me to the point of this post. Here is the first good goldfish story I have heard since my own experience many years ago:
Teen Burglar Wants No Witnesses, Kills Goldfish
You know you are going to hell for lying to your boss like that! There is going to be demon goldfish with large teeth to rip your flesh for eternity.....yeah....thats what gonna happen to you.....
ReplyDeleteI shudder to think of whats going to happen to me!
ReplyDeleteWhat is it with the printing industry? I operated a Heidelburg press
ReplyDelete(only a 4 color) and when I called in regarding an "actual" death in the
family my foreman told me to come in the next day because as he put it
"there's nothing you can do for them now". Honest to God, 3 months later
his wife died suddenly, he never would look me in the eye again......
Spon,
ReplyDeleteIt's a weird freaking industry. One thing I left out of my post was the fact that my supervisor was color blind. I swear to God. Freaking legally color blind. Picture a customer rep standing at the press for a color ok on a make ready asking a color blind person if we could make the red a 'little more pink'. There were times I had to walk away to keep from laughing my ass off and getting fired.
p.s. and this was no fly by night operation. The plant was owned by R R Donnely. A Major player.
ReplyDeleteGreat story, Will! Life is no longer sacred, even for a burgling teen. They're just not afraid of anything anymore. Wasn't there a mystery story a long time ago that involved dead goldfish on the floor? Sherlock Holmes?
ReplyDeleteGeez, another printing story. I was out of college for 13 months at one point to earn enough money to go back. I went to work for Carl Gore Printing in Chicago. My uncle was a life long printer who worked his way up to General Manager. Gore Printing was large enough to occupy one square city block on the North Side. My uncle wanted me to learn the business as he only had a daughter with no interest in printing. I got to work in every department from the letter press room to the litho room with a couple of big 60 inch Miehle Goss Dexter 4 color lithography presses, to the bindery, to art layup, to the photo lab, to the litho plate burning room. I liked the photo lab the best because the old man who ran it was into soft core porn as we printed portions of a lot of men's magazines and he would bring out his favorite negatives when he was teaching me the complete film developing and printing process. He looked like everybody's grandfather, that is if you had a dirty old man for a grandfather. Anyway, it was a great experience that helped me develop a multitude of skills, not the least of which was photography as a hobby that I enjoy to this day.
ReplyDelete