Early Risers.

[grandadbob]

My father worked for the same company from the time he left school, until the time he retired.  Something that is pretty much unheard of these days.

 

 

 

I managed that although we went through a couple of takeovers by larger groups and lost our original name. Since I retired 9 years ago they've sold that part of the group yet again. Most of my old friends & colleagues if still alive are either retired or redundant. I only know of two who are still working for them and they didn't join from school.

[New Haven Neil]

Morning world.

 

Sorry to hear about the SiL's situation Gordon.  I know what it feels like, having been made redundant unexpectedly earlier in my working life.  It's not a nice feeling.

 

Once again, our team and my role is about to be reviewed, this seems to happen every five minutes nowadays to attempt to save a fiver (and the review costs a lot more of course....), together with the workload issues you speak of!  The worrying thing is here is so much quieter than the UK, so what it is now like over there doesn't bear thinking about.  It certainly reminds me why I left NHS management in the UK, the stresses were intolerable.

 

On a brighter note, it's sunny, although awfully windy on Fraggle Rock.

[Happy Hippo]

SWMBO just giving me news of a bridge collapse in the States, a runway closed at Heathrow with an aircraft in trouble, and a Russian earthquake.

 

Is there a Good News Channel yet?

No ,but there is good news for ERs!

 

I'm away until Sunday, so you will be spared my inane dribblings.

 

Regards

 

Richard

[The Stationmaster]

Morning all,

 

Less then wonderful weather with lots of rain promised today but sunshine for tomorrow and Sunday is irrelevant as far as I'm concerned as long as the roads to Stoke Mandeville are clear.

 

Sorry to hear about SiL Gordon - alas it's the way the world has gone and it's not nice; it took Rob 6 months to get a paid job once he'd finished his MA course as everybody in local radio and smaller concerns expects new comers to work for nothing 'to gain experience' and when he did get a paid job it was a permanent (despite what he was promised) 6 day a week early turn which did his health no good as the employers were a bunch of shysters.  He seems to be better placed now in what we thought was a recruitment type company but he actually spends a lot of his time managing their contract and staff for the Waitrose distribution centre at Bracknell - better money than Southall, goes to work on the train and a 5 day week plus on call but he does get 5 weeks paid holiday.  So there some decent jobs about if you strike lucky.

 

In my 'big railway' career I was redundant 6 or 7 times in 34 years but fortunately it was usually not a problem finding another job although the pre-privatisation reorganisations in 1992 and '94 were major and worrying upheavals for many of us and in my case involved the life changing impact of moving from broad gauge territory to the land of the 3rd rail although the impact wasn't so bad as I effectively did it in two steps.

 

Have a good day folks and may you downpours be little ones.

Edited May 24, 2013 by The Stationmaster

[southern42]

Morning all

 

Dull grey, wet and windy just for a change.

 

Snap to some of it!  There are a few bits of blue sky coming and going, sun seemingly shining elsewhere in the distance, and it has dried up but for how long? 

So, no wall to wall sunshine as on the Met Office chart - though the sun symbol is on the extremities of landfall.  Everyone heading for the beach?  Not bl00ming likely!  The bravehearted dog walkers and birdwatchers, maybe?  Tourists?  They'll be on their way tonight for the Bank Holiday weekend to enjoy the glorious forecast - but watch out for Monday's rain in the far west.

 

Hope you enjoy your day.

Polly

[AndrewC]

Ok, some good news.

 

Its Friday before a bank holiday. I'm off most of next week for SWMBO's birthday. We're just going to stick a pin in a map and vanish for a few days. My son is just popping across the road for toasted bacon & egg sarnies as I type this. Finally had my biopsy results from the hospital. All is good in the plumbing dept.

[Gruffalo]

Perhaps a somewhat jaundiced view but in the days when we didn't have a raft of HR Managers or Finance Directors, didn't we have a more stable working environment? In some ways, those two business strings seem to need to knock over the card house routinely to appear to justify their existence. I was made redundant at 58 after doing more than 20 years for the same outfit (and my employers being sold on 7 times in that period), it was worrying as I could't afford to take a pension then. I am very glad I set up on my own but I am lucky that I have marketable skills with little competition. My son is struggling to do something that provides a stable income so I can sympathise with anyone who's offspring are affected as Gordon and family are.

[Gruffalo]

Ok, some good news.

 

Its Friday before a bank holiday. I'm off most of next week for SWMBO's birthday. We're just going to stick a pin in a map and vanish for a few days. My son is just popping across the road for toasted bacon & egg sarnies as I type this. Finally had my biopsy results from the hospital. All is good in the plumbing dept.

Glad to hear that Andrew, no doubt that is a load off your mind!

[trisonic]

I haven't spent a lot of time in what I would call "normal" employment but did have my moments in the late sixties. One thing I noticed about the big "jobs for life" type companies back then was that a lot of people really did NOT have much to do.....

 

I'm not surprised at all by the changes.

 

Best, Pete.

[beast66606]

Dave,

Cajon Pass should be a fairly easy drive I think. Carries the BNSF southern transcon - mostly double track but some triple track, 90 trains per day approx (70 BNSF, 20 UP). Most of them will be 1.2 mile long Intermodal Double Stacks.

 

 

I've just been looking at some photos taken there - 8)

[The Stationmaster]

Perhaps a somewhat jaundiced view but in the days when we didn't have a raft of HR Managers or Finance Directors, didn't we have a more stable working environment? In some ways, those two business strings seem to need to knock over the card house routinely to appear to justify their existence. I was made redundant at 58 after doing more than 20 years for the same outfit (and my employers being sold on 7 times in that period), it was worrying as I could't afford to take a pension then. I am very glad I set up on my own but I am lucky that I have marketable skills with little competition. My son is struggling to do something that provides a stable income so I can sympathise with anyone who's offspring are affected as Gordon and family are.

I think the thing with lots of us more mature folk is that we would be so busy criticising lots of the modern methods and ways of doing things that many employers would be glad not to have us around (probably because in many instances they're afraid of our knowedge rather than fed up with hearing us).

 

In many respects I was very lucky as after a couple of health scares I was given a chance to become part of a small reorganisation which eliminated my job although my big regret that it was 3 years earlier than I had planned to eliminate it so I 'retired' at the grand old age of 52 on a substantially reduced (but then somewhat reinflated) pension and immediately got some interesting occasional consultancy work with a signal engineering company and that even got me to Australia a couple of times.  So 'early retirement' needn't all be bad but those of us 'of an age' also tend to have the advantage of good pension arrangements from properly managed funds which is another stark contrast with the situation youngsters are in today.

[AndrewC]

Talking about jobs and such. I heard from an old friend the other day. We started out at "the phone company" now known as Telus, 33 years ago next month. She's finally retiring having been offered a decent package to "p*ss off and don't come back". I left to go back to school in 88. My accrued pension then funded my education.

 

Swings and roundabouts in the IT world ever since. No such thing as a job for life there. The most curious part is the HR pendulum. It seems to swing from one extreme to another every 4-5 years. When I graduated nobody was hiring. It was all contract work. No head count meant my pay came out of the department's operating costs. No different than the photocopier's lease agreement. A few years later the industry was panicking about "flight risk" and the need to retain people with the right skill set. Contracts vanished to be replaced with permanent positions. Everyone suddenly was offered a permanent job or the door. Then it swung back as companies needed to cut the head count again for the accountants. Back and forth this went. 12 contracts. 4 of which became permanent positions. 6 permanent positions that led to 4 redundancies. At the moment in the UK it seems the accountants are winning again as every recruiting company (aka pimp) that has contacted me in the past year is desperate to fill fixed term contracts. Very few permanent positions out there.

[roundhouse]

I have only been in permanent employment.

 

Current co. doesnt like contract / agency except for very brief periods of holiday cover etc.

 

At the moment there is a lull in work but any day that could change to being over stretched and I suspect that will happen when I get back off my Summer hols!!

[Debs.]

Why do all these things have to be amplified so much?  No wonder people are strung up these days.

 

Indeed.......e.g: a phrase I`ve heard exchanged countless-times during Tv. reports: "Just how bad is the chaos?"

[Tony_S]

Indeed.......e.g: a phrase I`ve heard exchanged countless-times during Tv. reports: "Just how bad is the chaos?"

I should imagine tension is rising in Benfleet, major incidents in 893 and 1667. Only another few hundred years to go before another one is due.

[trisonic]

I've just been looking at some photos taken there - 8)

This location looks "user friendly"........

 

http://images.cajonpassrails.com/2010-2019/2012/Cajon-2012-09-03/25218655_ZSSmsN#!i=2069738040&k=GVhHX5L

 

 

"Bog on Wheels"

 

Best, Pete.

[roundhouse]

This location looks "user friendly"........

 

http://images.cajonpassrails.com/2010-2019/2012/Cajon-2012-09-03/25218655_ZSSmsN#!i=2069738040&k=GVhHX5L

 

 

"Bog on Wheels"

 

Best, Pete.

Theres one at Santa Barbara too but I wouldnt recommend it as it often has a queue of homelees people outside it!

 

Dont forget Fullerton station as a hotspot for railroad activity plus there is a cafe with seating on the platform.

 

Ian

Edited May 24, 2013 by roundhouse

[trisonic]

Fullerton, yes great place. Also where Leo Fender made Fender Guitars!

 

Best, Pete.

[trisonic]

Let's face it; what kind of person bothers towing a Portaloo/Johnny on the Spot to the middle of the freaking desert????????

 

Best, Pete.

[Donw]

I accept that things seem pretty bad these days. But it fluctuates. At one stage I was out of a job and times were hard. The Benefit office gave me 4weeks to find a job that suited me before is was take this or lose your benefit. Later I was lucky and offered redundancy/early retirement on good terms. My father worked for the same firm all his life apart from the three years sent to fit the ###### in the far east (much more risky than losing your job) go back another generation and it was tough. My maternal Grandfather came back from the trenches full of shrapnel and one eye missing jobs were very scare and during the depression it got worse. When he thought he had turned the corner Mr Hitler caused a loss of all their possesions and a re-location. The other grandfather fared better but as a foreman had to be there to open up and went home when the last one left with  no overtime. As a nation we have had a better time than most and rather overpaid ourselves this has made a lot of the jobs go overseas which doesn't help much. I never had to fight in any war, that has been a real plus as far as I can see.

Don

 

edit obviously J a p s are letter that shouldn't be together apolgies if anyone is offended.

Edited May 24, 2013 by Donw

[45156]

Afternoon All

 

Caught up - bummer news from Gordon but in this day and age, it is just about par for the course.  As far as summary unemployement is concerned, I too have suffered that indignity, as I have mentioned here on a few occasions.

 

Odd thing happened at my place of work today, as I hadn't been keeping an eye on the comings and goings or forthcoming events, so was a bit surprised to see that I was talking about the company's new sports TV service, was just telling a customer who one of the anchormen was, and looked across the room to see the named individual looking in my direction having just heard his name - came across to my desk just too late to have a chat with the customer on the phone as he was just ending his call - I'd have loved to hear the response of a TV sport fan (I'm not) to be greeted by Jake Humphries during his phone call.  He then spent a few minutes chatting to me before we all had to go to the meeting room to hear him outline at first hand how the new channels are being set up etc.  He had a really cheeky sense of humour, and even came across well to the non sports fans - I hadn't even realised that he was due to visit (no idea how I didn't).  He came across as very down to earth and some of my younger colleagues just uttered "cool".

 

Dinner's nearly ready - I must try harder to get logged on when the cooker's not in action.

 

Regards to All

Stewart

Edited May 24, 2013 by 45156

[BoD]

Don't quote me on this ......

 

....... but ........

 

..........the sun has just broken through the cloud.

[trisonic]

The sun always shines on the righteous, BoD....

 

Best, Pete.

[BoD]

That probably explains why it has rained on me for the last six months then.

[NGT6 1315]

That probably explains why it has rained on me for the last six months then.

 

But then I figure you have turned around and become righteous now. Better late than never!