Friday, November 30, 2018

Alaska planning......

4:10 am - Friday - November 30th - Campbellsville, KY - 55º F, 93% humidity, wind 8 mph out of the west......raining, cloudy today with a forecast high of 58º F.

We had a brief few minutes Thursday morning where we saw the sun peaking through the clouds as it rose in the eastern sky (I posted a picture of this), but that was the last we saw of the sun the rest of the day.  It was not really very cold, it was just cloudy and blustery.  I went outside a few times, but I don't think TLE even ventured outside one time the entire day.  I puttered around in the trailer for about 45 minutes, but really had no purpose other than to putter.

Long naps abounded for me.....I remember at least three.....maybe there were four.....who knows for sure.  When I was conscious I spent a lot of time and rereading reading the blog entries of good friends Steven and Linda Dempsey (The Chouters...pronounced 'shooters') about their 2016 summer travels in Alaska.  I remember at the time of their trip I thought their formula for travel in Alaska was perfect and determined to try and duplicate most of their itinerary when we travel there this summer.  Of course, weather is a big factor in Alaska, and they were quite fortunate to have pretty much good weather wherever they traveled, especially in Denali.  They spent 5 days in Denali and had sunny days for three of them, so they were able to enjoy the spectacular scenery without cloud cover.  What we get will be left up to Mother Nature.  

We had planned to spend some time at Harden Coffee Thursday, but opted to just spend the entire day doing nothing, and girding ourselves for another 5 ten hour days.  Whether we work the 5th day, or not is in doubt as a number of shifts have had their 'MET' day cancelled.  Remember, MET stands for Mandatory Extra Time, and Tuesday is our 'MET' day.  It may be that our schedule of Friday through Monday (4 ten hour days) will somehow get all of their MET days, but that is yet to be determined.  Friends we have working on other shifts have had theirs cancelled.  One couple have had two in a row cancelled including this Friday for the second time in a row.  We will probably not know the fate of our MET day until sometime Monday around lunch time.

To be clear, we do not come to Amazon expecting overtime.  We make our financial plans based on 4 ten hour days each week, and then any overtime we get is considered a bonus.  In fact, we would be quite happy to just work our 4 ten hour days each week like we did at the Fernley, NV facility 4 years ago.  Many come here expecting to work 5-6 days a week every week, and garner a lot of overtime pay, then get disappointed when the MET does not materialize as frequently as they would like.  Overtime pay can be quite enticing.  For us it means an extra $400 (net) on our combined paychecks.  We net about $1,026 each Friday working the 4 ten hour days, so not really too bad, right?  But if we were to work two more days that would increase our weekly pay by almost $800.....quite a jump for just two more days!

It looks like we will have rain Friday, Saturday and into Sunday, but it will not matter much since we will be inside the concrete bunker close to 11 hours each work day.  The only change in our routine will be that we will probably go to work in the VW to avoid getting drenched on the way to and from work, otherwise it will be the usual......'wash, rinse, dry and repeat' for the next 4, or 5 days.

Thanks for stopping by!

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