I design industrial controls. We release a new version of our product about once a year, so whenever they choose that to be is when we are busiest. More often than not they pick some time in the fall, but the date gets pushed back because we just can’t meet the overly ambitious schedules that management wants us to meet. They usually refuse to push back past the end of the year, which unfortunately means that we often end up really busy right around the xmas holidays.
We also tend to run opposite to everyone else’s schedules. A lot of manufacturing plants run 24/7, so the only time you get a chance to go in and change part of the plant is during a holiday when they shut down. We’re also busiest when the economy is in the dumper, because money for investing is cheap, and plants are often not at peak production and can afford to shut down for a week or two to install new equipment. We’re slowest when the economy is doing good and everyone else is busy.
36 years and still in commercial radio production. I must be nuts. Anyway we’re in our busy period and it is hectic. A busy Halloween/Thanksgiving/Christmas makes up for the lousy January/February. It’ll start slowing down about 2 weeks before Christmas when every commercial minute has been sold out and we have to turn the last-minute advertisers down.
I know how you feel! I remember many, many 12-18 hour days just trying to get the promos made. And the announcers going loopy from the retakes. And then there was the next day! I miss it, but I don’t miss it, ya know? Public radio is much more my speed nowadays. The field needs more people with 36 years’ experience. Ever consider a change?
At the moment I’m a slave to 1) Seniority that allows 3 weeks paid 2) a Fidelity 401(k) and 3) Blue Cross/Blue Shield. However, this is commercial broadcasting. It could all change tomorrow morning.
In the beginning the paycheck was local. Then the Telecommunications Act took effect. SOLD! The paychecks came from Hartford for awhile. SOLD! The paychecks came from Philadelphia for awhile. Throw in a couple of more SOLDS! and today the paychecks come from Santa Monica.
The paychecks have seen more of Amrica than I have!
I’m really about the same amount of busy all year.
Right now it’s roll out the sack around 8:30, check the email & stuff, go to a casino and have breakfast and coffee while I read an hour or so. Then it’s tear on down and pick up my buddy for some bowling. When I get home a couple of beers then some yard work, if the mood strikes. And if that isn’t enough in a few more weeks there will be enough snow to start using my season pass at Heavenly.
Next May will be brutal. A bunch of us are hitting the road for a month on our bikes. Then I get into the vacation season with Ms Hook which will take up most of June, July, and August.
In September it’ll be a week or so on a mule trip through some canyons in Utah with friends.
Of course then there’s the day to day fishing, hiking the hills around Tahoe, not to mention hours of hanging out that goes on 3-4 days a week.
And you damn kids think being retired means just lying around taking it easy.
Commercial Property Maintenance- Right now is busiest time of the year. Blowing out irrigation, getting stuff ready for winter, making sure contractors are doing their job, etc… Lots and lots of planning.
My busiest time of year is at the beginning of each semester.
I work in computer tech support for VT. Nobody bothers to update their computers during the break, because downloading multi-megabyte Windows patches over dialup is a pain in the ass. So they bring their computers over here, plug them into the network and get owned inside of five minutes. We’ve been better about getting update CDs to people, though, so that’s starting to change.
This sounds like my job (application development). The way I hear it, you can’t capitalize on the work done for a project unless you ship it in the same year the work was done, and that’s why there’s a big push to get stuff out at the end of the year.
ITS Department in a college: Busiest time is from mid-August until mid-October, getting ready for the return of the students and then dealing with their problems. There’s also a mini busy time in January, just before spring term. April and May are slow – things are winding down from the school year, but the students are still there, so we can’t work on upgrades and changes.
Actually, I used to work in a candy store and the busiest times were Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day.
For Halloween, people usually buy candy in bulk at grocery stores, pharmacies, or Costco-type places. There will be exceptions, of course, but that was my experience.
Day job: Property Management (Department Secretary)
Busiest time is the summer, starting in March/April, steadily building to a peak in August. We’re a university town, so students seek accomodation for September 1st, along with everyone else who wants to move in the summer, when, as Annie-Xmas points out, seems to be almost everyone.
We do non-apartment tenancy agreements on fixed terms, and the property managers like to have the terms end in the spring/summer, so if need be, re-renting is easier. So not only are we doing new rentals, I’m typing up a kajillion renewals and tracking them, too.
Slower now. Thank goodness. I was actually caught up for four minutes last Thursday!
Night job: writer
I’ve noticed calls for submissions have slowed a bit this time of year, something I’ll keep in mind for next year. Busy is when there are places I want to submit, and deadlines, and when I’ve actually got works in progress.
NaNoWriMo used to be insane for me, so November was busy. But this year I’m not even gonna try. It messed up Christmas too much; I just wasn’t ready for the holidays, and got really stressed out.
March seems like a long dull month, so I’m planning on a wordblitz for then on my own.
I work for a transcription company that primarily handles business conferences. We’ve got four busy seasons a year because we handle the quarterly earnings release conferences for hundreds of public companies, and except for a few outliers the majority of said conferences happen within a week or two of each other. Typically that’ll be January-February, April-May, July-August, and October-November. We’re right in the middle of it now. Ouch.
Reference librarian at a university - we also do instruction. Typically, we’re swamped from about the third week of the semester through the sixth or seventh.
Then towards the end of the semester when papers and projects are coming due and students who’ve postponed research until the last minute. But that’s not as crazy hectic as those weeks of instruction.
But right now we’re in the lull between the two parts of the semester.
I work in manufacturing and it’s pretty steady year round. A slight drop off at the end of the year as customers push out orders so they don’t have the inventory on their books at year end.
Here’s one I would have never thought of, my friend owns an upholostry shop. This is the start of his silly season. People want to spruce up for entertaining for the holidays.
I work for a financial printing company, our busiest time is the last two weeks of April, that’s when we print most of our Mutual Fund prospectuses (prospecti?). I’m not sure why it’s April, but I think it has something to do with SEC regs.?
Anyway, we outsource most of the work and my company sends me to other printing companies for QA/press checks. I’ve been sent to Missouri and went to Maryland in the last copule years. It’s good to just “get the hell out of Dodge” during busy season.
I work in Contracts and Procurement for a government agency and can attest to the truth of Misnomer’s statement. Renewing software licenses, maintenance agreements, and closing out or writing new contracts are activities always at a peak at fiscal year-end.