It's been a slice but...

I might be a little scarce here for a while. My employer is getting nasty and has made serious cuts to our internet access. They actually dissabled Internet Explorer but I'm smarter than that and I've got it back. We've been forced to accept a "volunary" 10% pay cut and the only person who refused to "volunteer" is now mysteriously unemployed.

The company is in receivership and has been bought out; they are getting downright ruthless.

I used to be able to get quite a bit done at work when my printing press had a long run on it and there wasn't much to do, but what this means for me now is that the only quality computer time I'm going to get will be at home after work. And I'm so tied up with a backlog of raw processing from my Frontenac Park project that I can't spare the time time to hang out here or anywhere else for a while. I appreciate all the help that NPN has provided me and it has been very interesting.

Latter, maybe
Bob

Sorry to hear that, Bob. Been here done that as part of a newspaper corporation newsroom, so I sympathize. Good luck.

I find those tactics downright cruel. It is an unspoken rule for the 9to5er in the western world that there exists a certain amount of "downtime" in the work day. This is supposedly what makes the 35 year/9 to 5 thing somewhat tolerable. I'm sorry to hear about the new management's mean-spirited behaviour.

Scott

That is lame. The grind is mentally draining enough as is. I like how the Germans and Japanese are legally required to get three months off. Maybe our country needs to kick back a little and re-evaluate the purpose of life.

Hmm. I'm not sympathetic to your plight.

I run my own business. I put in much longer hours than most 9to5ers. I do not use the internet for NPN and similar personal pursuits when I am at work, except occasionally, after hours. I expect this of my employees, too. I too have other obligation in my personal time and other things to do with my computer, such as converting last weekend's RAW files.. So, I don't live at NPN.

Don't hold it against your employer, in receivership, to expect you to do what he's paying you for. If you want to spend more time at NPN, make the time on you own. It's a simple matter of priorities.

Richard said;

I like how the Germans and Japanese are legally required to get three months off. Maybe our country needs to kick back a little and re-evaluate the purpose of life.

Richard, I agree. The "all work and no relaxation" approach we take is not good for productivity or a person's health.

In reply to Buck, I agree that productive time should not be used for any other purpose however, the nature of my job is such that I often have 2 or 3 entire days when there is a long run on the press. It's a big press well suited to long runs and it can feed either sheet fed or roll fed. This means that there is literally nothing for me to do for up to 2 hours at a stretch if the press is running trouble free. I must be at the press to check on print quality occassionally, keep the ink fountains full and monitor the water level in the intercooler but this take about 10 minuits every hour or so. Renewing the feed pile is simply a matter of rolling a fresh skid of stock into the feeder and restarting the press. Same at the delivery end. I'm an excellent pressman with 35 years on these monsters having served my apprenticship and earned my journyman status and it's rare the my operation or setup of the machine results in a troublesome run ... I am simply not a sloppy craftsman. This is a skilled profession. My work day is 10 to 13 hour long and I usually work at least 5 days a week. That is somewhere around 60 hour a week and I am 60 years old. I'm not some whining kid who doesn't know what an honest day's work is. Each press has it's own computer with internet access via LAN and in view of all that you would begrudge me internet access while my press is happilly making the company $200.00 per hour with out the need for any more than the occassional supervision that I've already mentioned? I don't think so, Sir.

Robert, if your co-workers (or better still, boss) regularly take smoke breaks, then you could take up this matter with management

Bob, I've known a number of your kind at the several daily newspapers I worked for, and understand the ins and outs of what you've just explained. I DON'T miss working for a major news corporation, but I DO miss some of the friends I made in pressrooms. Best of luck to you.

No explanation necessary, Robert. My comment was out of line. I apologize for being rude.