Oh, and the reason you can’t or shouldn’t change light bulbs yourself at work anymore is that there is an arc flash possibility (sparks and stuff) and broken glass issues that only us professionals are capable of dealing with.
Basically, if there’s a spark or a flash or broken glass we’re trained to totally run like girls in the opposite direction. Whereas the normal person will probably just end up dead or something.
It’s an OSHA thing now, yes, changing a bulb is now regulated by OSHA.
It’s nice to have a chuckle this early in the morning, thanks.
Sayeth FourPaws, “I know I may be going out on a limb here, but … you could always change it yourself?”
Are you insane?!!!
Then they win, man! That’s the whole point of these round-a-bout ways to get simple things done. If you realize how much trouble it is and do it yourself or just ignore the problem, they win!’
You say I have to submit a work order in triplicate to the 14th floor? I’ll fill it out by hand and walk one up EVERY FUCKING DAY until it’s fixed.
Oh, and you f-ing pay me to do it.
And thus, civilization slowly grinded to a halt.
END
I submitted this post to my supervisor, who passed it along to the Grammar Dept. who held three meetings (including one lunch meeting, total catering bill of $675.00 owing to the fact that two members of the Grammar Dept. are vegetarian and one is diabetic, so they needed lots of special order stuff). After these meetings, they formed a committee, who met two additional times.
It was decided that the above post should read “ground to a halt”.
You have 30 days from receipt of this notice to self-correct the post. If you fail to do that, a permanent mark will go on your employment record, and the post will be passed along to the Legal Dept. to see if they wish to make official, legal changes.
Perfect opportunity to post something I wrote about 6 years ago during my first year in Japan. I used to write newsletter/essay type stuff for my family and friends back home.
How Many Japanese Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb?
Sounds like the beginning of a joke, right? This actually happened right in front of me. I swear I am not making this up.
I went to the Prefectural Hall one morning to meet my supervisor for a little shopping trip. I had been looking for some things I just couldn’t buy anywhere in my area and he was going to be my native guide. While I waited, I noticed a couple of Japanese maintenance workers looking at something in the ceiling. I could tell that they were maintenance workers because they dressed like maintenance workers.
Japanese have a mania for dressing the part. Each segment of society and social group has an official unofficial-uniform. You can even recognize the different brands of non-conformists by the relatively similar costume they all conform to. The Japanese uniform for Construction Workers seems to be hard-hats (regardless of the absence in some cases of anything to fall on their heads), really baggy pants almost like hakama (think aikido or kendo skirt/pants) and tabi split-toed boots, while Maintenance Workers dress in coveralls (with the company logo on them, of course), hard hats, and tabi boots.
These two guys (one looked like the other’s supervisor, judging from his age and the way the younger deferred to him) discussed the problem for a while, then trotted off. They jogged back shortly with three other guys, one of whom carried a ladder, another a clipboard, and the third a large flood-style lightbulb.
The younger of the original two now also carried a clipboard. The guy with the ladder set it up, adjusted it, and then made sure the legs were perfectly aligned with the tiles on the floor. He then held one of the legs while the supervisor climbed up. When Boss was halfway up, the one holding the lightbulb, who was now also supporting the opposite leg of the ladder, handed the lightbulb to him.
As the Boss climbed up, he was talking the whole time. I couldn’t hear what he was saying exactly, because I was a little too far away to make out much, and the space echoed pretty fiercely. The two Peons with clipboards were furiously scribbling on their pads, looking up frequently to see what Boss was doing. Not that they needed to, since I guessed he was giving a step-by-step description of “proper” ladder climbing.
Boss reached the top, carefully put the new lightbulb in a thigh pocket of his coveralls, and unscrewed the old bulb, talking the whole time. Meanwhile the two Ladder Supporters looked on in awe at his lightbulb changing expertise and finesse. Maybe he’ll start his own school of lightbulb changing: denkyû no dô (The Way of the Lightbulb). The Peons scribbled what I began to suspect were verbatim notes.
He finally unscrewed the old lightbulb, transferred it to his other thigh pocket, and retrieved the fresh bulb, still babbling on in machine-gun Japanese. Peons 1 and 2 chicken-scratched like their lives depended on it while the Supporters did a very convincing impression of a rapt audience. Who knows, maybe they were completely into his speech on the recommended lightbulb turning grip and technique, or whatever he was talking about. I half expected Boss to hold the bulb in the socket and holler to the Supporters downstairs to pick up the ladder and start turning it to screw in the bulb, but he decided to skip the hazing and screwed it in by hand, carefully and methodically.
He checked one more time to make sure that yes, the light that blinded him when he finished screwing the lightbulb in was indeed from a functioning bulb, and then proceeded down the ladder, talking the whole way. When he reached the bottom, he produced the faulty bulb and they all examined it closely, like a doctor would the victim of a rare tropical disease. There was much nodding and frowning. Boss made several comments, which Peons dutifully scribbled down on their clipboards.
Then the Supporters packed up the ladder, each grabbed an end, and trotted after Boss who led the way, deceased bulb in hand, as the Peons trailed behind the Supporters, carrying their clipboards with reverence. I’m sure they wrote about 5 pages of notes, which they probably filed and cross-indexed for easy reference in case they ever need to replace a lightbulb, should it have the audacity to die on their shift.
If they have truly sincere Japanese hearts, they will probably disembowel themselves immediately thereafter for not noticing that the bulb was close to burning out. Come to think of it, there is probably a light-changing schedule that they follow. There’s a schedule for everything else in Japan. I would not be surprised in the least if I was invited to an informal picnic and was handed an itinerary upon arrival.
This is how those ethnic jokes get started, you know.
All right, all right; have it your way:
*And thus, civilization slowly ground to a halt.
END*
I should pay more attention when I post at work…
Walks away in shame.
And by the way, the union does not care if you do their jobs. It only cares if you do them for so long and so thoroughly that they lose the jobs. As long as your employer has to employ the same number of engineers or bulb-changers or whatever as before, then it matters not to them who actually changes bulbs; even better for them if they don’t have to, so they can spend the morning drinking coffee at the Dunkin Donuts. Why yes, I have worked in a unionized workplace; why do you ask?
We’ll have to convene another committee to decide whether the “thus” in your sentence should be changed to “hence”.
I’ll let you know by the end of the fiscal year.