Christmas trip and Black Friday

A fun trip to the cave in Louisville with John and Linda!

John and Linda picked us up for a great day trip. We drove to Louisville, about a one and half hour drive, and had dinner in downtown at Bristol Bar and Grill. We arrive a few minutes before 5 and the lady asked if we had reservations. Of course not! It's not supper time yet! We did get a table. The waiter was talkative and knowledgable. The food was good, a little pricey and the atmosphere was sterile. These are my thoughts. Linda thought Ruby Tuesday's salmon was just as good and better priced. I believe most people prefer the Bardstown Rd. location. After our early supper we drove to the decorated caves. 25 bucks per car! We rolled down the windows, enjoyed the Christmas music as we drove thru the decorated sections. Did I mention, Linda brought libations to sip as we sang? Complete experience! The cave is huge. There are zip lines and trails to explore. They also offer RV and POD storage. It's crazy! My first drive thru cave decorated for Christmas.

Black Friday at Amazon SDF-1 is complete and in the history books. The created hype about the craziness of black friday whimpered by without much of a noise. I suppose in years past, it was just that, unbelievable crazy. For us, those in trans-ship, it was busy, not crazy-crazy. Gerard and I worked trans-ship, an area of ship-dock responsible for shipping out totes to other amazon fulfillment centers. Totes filled with products come down a conveyer and we scan the totes to determine the destination, and stack on pallets.  After the pallet is full, usually 20 or 25, the tote is saran-wrapped (by us). Let me tell you about that process, wrapping with saran wrap. The locals call it shrink wrapping, but it's saran wrap without shrinking. Go figure. The wrapping apparatus is a hand-held device, about 2 feet long and heavy when the wrap is full. I guess the wrap is twice the length of the one used in kitchens. The weight is what gets me...along with going around the pallet about 6 times. It's like the silly game of holding your forehead on a bat and spinning around and then attempting to walk. We must wrap a total of 6 revolutions, 3 on top and 3 on the middle to provide stability when moved and stacked on top of each other to load onto trailers. When the line is busy, a pallet is filled in 10 or so minutes. With multiple pallets, the dizziness is real. It did make me nauseated the other day and I went home at lunch. Walking thru the ship dock area on the way to break...alarms off everywhere. The noise made everyone look as they passed by. My poor camper friends working the dock came to the break room with sweat on their brows and sat down with sighs of relief. Mike and Barbara tell of calamity in trailers. Ed is speaking out on behalf of everyone, including the regular workers, about shortcomings. People applaud him, literally. The stories and memories we share. No regrets. We met great friends. Oh, and Jay and Bobby...tell it like it is.

J shift is mostly camperforce working Sunday thru Wednesday with a required overtime day Thursday. They changed our schedule the week of black friday and the following week. Not sure why. We are working 5 days in a row with Wednesday and Thursday off. So we had Thanksgiving day off. Then the 5 day trek begins. All shifts worked Black Friday, so the building was full, as was the parking lot. Start times have changed also to 6 to 4:30, unless you volunteer to work an hour extra. The regulars must work the extra, which amounts to 55 hour weeks expanding to 60 later. We rode bikes, because the weather was decent. The bike ride is about 3-4 minutes, down hill. Boy, it's a steep hill after work! I'm glad we chose this campground. Convenient, convenient, convenient. People like the others, but I like convenience while working Amazon.

The weather is typical wintery blah. Rainy, dreary and cold. Temps are in 50-60s now. We have experienced freezing at night, but good temps the last few days. Working on the dock can be cold. I have used hand warmers twice. They usually keep them available...sometimes. And it is getting dark about five. We go to work when it is dark and get home with about an hour of daylight left. We need light therapy!

Thanksgiving Day we feasted on traditional foods of ham, dressing, green beans, rice and gravy. I did not fuss over anything. I cooked everything that day. Dessert was chocolate chip cookies, baked right out of the package. We invited Ed over for a nice afternoon. He hails from Pennsylvania and rides his motorcycle to clear the Amazon alarm noise from his head. Gerard enjoyed football of course.

Saturday, the flat sorter was our area to work. It requires standing, placing poly-bags, label up onto the conveyor. Of course we inspect the packages for damage...It is repetitive motion, standing, and makes a loooooong day. Beats the crazy loading of trailers though. Basically,  pick your poison. Both can be demanding and unforgiving. Co-workers said Black Friday on the sorter was crazy. Because the packages 'stick' in the chute, a raker is needed. That is someone equipped with a long pole to dislodge packages to come on down the chute into a small holding area. So two people per lane are needed on busy days. Here's the deal...when it is busy, the packages flow continually without a raker. If a package sticks, the next load will dislodge it....The conveyer speed is set, so you can't load more than it will take.  Another comical note....they disconnected the alarms on each individual chute! Glory!!! Gerard and I wore ear plugs because of the high pitched annoying alarms. The alarm did not encourage you to work harder, if anything - it has the opposite effect. The alarms sound if packages obstruct the electric eye in the chute. It does not indicate a threatening problem. I really don't understand the purpose as it is now. But, I'm not there to improve any process. What do we know? There should be an alarm sound if the sorter quits working so people do not have to yell to notify someone. Geeze.

No more pictures. I'm tired. I should. I will. Maybe next time.

Work and Football, football and football

I feel that we have become Amazonians....but not permanent ones. October 12 was our first day and December 23 is to be our last-if we don't have something 'come up'. Thoughts are swimming around in our heads for sure. It has been an experience. We both read many RV'ers blogs about working seasonally for Amazon. It sounded like one of those things you just have to try yourself and figure out if it's a right fit. And Gerard is up to try anything...at least once. This may be our 'been there, done that' category. The jury is still out.

The location of SDF-1 is Campbellsville, KY in the heart of Kentucky. A small rural town filled with very nice people. Amazon is probably the largest employer. There is a Lowes, Walmart and a few fast food chains,DQ and Sonic. There is a Chick-fil-A located at Campbellsville University :)! The university is small, like Campbellsville, filled with eager students wanting to learn ;) We did buy a meal ticket for 61.00 for a total of 6 meals. The salad bar is great along with a variety of entrees. I think it's probably the best buy in town.

Gerard and I have been assigned to the ship dock, J shift which is Sunday thru Thursday with mandatory overtime on Thursday. We have worked 2 weeks of mandatory overtime, which is a total of 50 hours per week. I don't plan to work any more than that unless I knew we could work in Trans-Ship. Last week we trained in that area of ship-dock and we both like it. Basically, we palletize yellow totes of products onto a pallet, shrink wrap it, and transport it to the loading dock. I am proficient in operating a pallet jack and hand scanner now! We did receive very good training from Eric, our ambassador. Regular employees can volunteer to be ambassadors, which help the newbies with learning the ropes.
James trained us on ship dock to stack boxes forming a secure wall onto trailers and palletize boxes.  Building a box wall...similar to tetras...really. About a dozen box sizes fly down the conveyer and our job is to stack evenly, securely and level to form a wall. It takes a while to learn the box combinations that fit together. If you have 'time'....it comes together nicely. But...imagine 7368202 boxes in a few minutes, falling onto the floor, conveyers jamming, sirens going off, lights flashing....all signally the whole dock that you are way behind! Man, does it get stupid crazy on the ship dock.

So, we took 10 hours of unpaid time to travel to Memphis to watch NAVY beat unbeaten Memphis State. It didn't look good after the first drive...about 5 plays and 7 points on the board for the tigers. I thought it was going to be a long night. But, the mid-shipmen came thru with a win of 45-20. Friday night we stayed with Alex and Lianne, our son and daughter-in-love, in Franklin, Tennessee. We also dined at Soapapilllas for tasty Mexican food. I had a much deserved Margarita. I need more. Margaritas.

Bourbon Tasting

Kentucky colors and bourbon. Sounds like a good fit to me....time to experience the Bourbon Trail.

So we did just that at Maker's Mark Distillery in Loretto, KY.

About to explode with a rainbow of fall colors.

Loretto is about a 35 minute drive from Campbellsville and we were itching to do some exploring. Kentucky landscape is manicured with gently rolling hills. You can tell people have pride in their homes. There are a few horse farms in the area, but not large ones that I have seen along the interstate. And we have not made it to Lexington area, yet.

The Makers Mark tour costs 10 bucks a person at the door and we did not have a reservation. For more information check out the website here. We arrived around noon and joined a group of about 20 folks, which the guide had already began his spill, so we missed a little info, not much. 

Maker's Mark

The tour included a brief history of how and who, along with the 'mark' significance. It has been in the family a long time...sorry, I don't remember the details. I was more in tune with the process since it was my first hard liquor tour. The tour included tasting different stages of the mash fermentation. So imagine tasting corn mush with varying degrees of alcohol. Gritty corn taste if you don't get below the mushy stuff. I learned after watching a few swirl it out of the way to get just liquid on your finger. And it does not sound sanitary, right? I suppose the fermentation process kills all germs. I hope so anyway.

Mash.

Just poke in a finger and have a taste! No germs here!

Corn at its' finest. Right.

We were also shown the actual printing of the label on a primitive (by today's standard) hand press. A one person operation. I think I will turn mine into a Christmas ornament. I did not get a photo :(

Aging buildings.

Throughout the small town of Loretto, there are many-maybe 50 plus aging buildings, all painted black. Big business. The actual bottling process seemed small, but efficient for such an operation. They do actually hand dip the bottle in red wax. Each one is unique. At the end of the tour you can purchase an un-dipped bottle and do it yourself. We did not. Sadly for the bourbon industry, I am not a fan of the juice...only with a lot of coke added!

Work.

The tour included a tasting of 4 bourbons. The guide explained the proper way to taste, similar to beer and wine-in my opinion. Stick your nose in the glass, mouth open, breathe in, then swig a little. It still tastes like bourbon! The color is determined by the charred barrel, how long it ages, or stays in the barrel. If I chose to drink one, it would be the Makers Mark 46. It was the third most aged. You can see the color in the glasses.

This is what bourbon does to you.

Bourbon getting old inside.

The glassware collection displayed above...very beautiful.

And my favorite part of the tour!

Bourbon Balls!