Yeah... I've never understood the "customer is always right" method of business, especially when they aren't
Sometimes you meet some nice people. A group of European and Asian girls came through once, they were really nice and probably had the best manners out of anyone who got food there.
Okay, here's another thing. We mechanics occasionally needed to use a fork truck for various things (like moving large tanks of epoxy material). So I've been trained and certified on the proper operation of one. That's not the point though. One time me and another mechanic had to do something in the warehouse. He disappeared and I was doing the thing (don't remember exactly what it was). Then I hear him say "There we go!" and turn around to the hilarious sight of him spinning in place in a fork truck in the aisle between two of the racks. Oh, it was a sit in kind not a stand up kind. Anyway, he was just spinning in place giggling like a child. I burst out laughing. Driving fork trucks is really fun. Learning how to operate one actually help me drive a car better too. Edit: Oh, I guess I can explain that a bit for those who don't know much about fork trucks. They're really different from cars. They steer with the rear wheel and have an incredibly short turning radius. So when I say "spinning in place" I mean literally spinning in place.
Who? Me? A mechanic is very different from an engineer. An engineer could be a mechanic but a mechanic couldn't necessarily be an engineer. Mechanics maintain equipment whilst engineers design and build equipment. Being an engineer usually requires some kind of formal education but almost anyone can be a mechanic.
One time, during the first month of basic training, my group got the order to get ready to move out for shooting practice. Good soldiers as we were (not yet, actually), we got our uniforms in order and waited, since we were only told to get ready to move out, not to actually move out - for you civilians: In the military, you basically don't do anything unless ordered to do so, this includes eating and sleeping. Half an hour passed, then an hour, then two hours, we chat a bit, drink some coffee, have a couple cigs... then someone from another group knocked at our door and asked where the hell we were - mind you, a private fresh in the military just as we were. Dumbfounded, everyone looked at me (I was the 'room leader' since I was the first in the alphabet, meaning if something was wrong it was usually my fault.). I told him the story, and then the plot thickened: Turned out, we, and I mean the entire hallway, were forgotten. Apparently, it takes so little math to be an officer that the difference between 90 and 120 men means very little to them. The CO got screamed at by the bataillon commander for a couple minutes with words that would have warranted disciplinary action, and because shit obeys the laws of gravity he passed it on to the NCOs who then passed it on to us, mostly the room leaders, including me. Overall result: One weekend-service (i.e. not going home for the weekend) and an extra hour of running for all two days of the weekend for everyone involved but the CO.
Here's another story of me getting hurt (am I accident prone?). This was at a different job than the mechanic gig. I worked at a warehouse that distributed diet foods. Anyway, I was moving some boxes of some kind of oatmeal and my hand slipped. So I semi-crushed my pinkie and it bled everywhere.
