Day 6: Griffin On Board

The morning started off slow...me still without my orange sticker, and everyone else working inside the clean room. Brad and I stayed outside, receiving the grids (for the fans) that will eventually be installed in the ceiling. That's a tedious and boring job, cause we gotta get it lined up to go inside, and then cut it out of the shrink wrap. After that, we wheel it inside and then we wipe down, before it enters the inner chamber of the clean room. It takes forever in between grids, and Brad and I honestly fell asleep on our feet. I couldn't keep my eyes open and it was really creepy, since I've never been that tired and not been able to even sit down before.

It seemed like forever before the first break came, and Brad and I were so happy. I bought a Coke and we ate plenty of food to keep us awake. It was Griffin's first day today, but he wasn't done with orientation by the 9am break. Brady was gone too, cause he volunteered to translate for two new employees who only spoke spanish. He said he did alright, but had to talk around some things cause he didn't know the technical words in spanish. We all thought he was out of his mind when he offered to do it, as there were at least 2 people we know of that speak both languages fluently. He came out seemingly unscathed, so whatever. Our first break didn't last long enough and it was back to work.

Alex, our supervisor, sent us to work at the other pass-thru station, cleaning white tiles and pedestal heads for the workers expanding the platforms inside. It might have been the fact that we were all together, (Skye, Brad, Quinn and I...Brady showed up later) that made it go faster, but from 9:30 to 12:00 seemed infinitely shorter and more enjoyable--not to mention we actually stayed awake.

At lunch Griffin joined us and we talked and joked around, and we were all happy he'd decided to work with us. Lunch, although short, was much better than 9am break, and we left the lunchroom preparing Griffin for the crazy guy in the scissor-lift and everyone else we thought he should at least know about. By the way, the crazy guy in the scissor-lift, on Brad's first day as we were walking past, yelled down to Brad, "Hey Sunshine!" and we were like, "Uh...hello." Besides random stuff like that, he enjoys passing the time by just yelling...nothing specific--probably nothing more than a one-syllable random note. Brady calls him the Troll, just so you know. I forgot to mention the guy yesterday, who while we were passing hollered, "HEY!" like he wanted our attention, but when we turned to see what he wanted, he said "Hi." And that was it...

I lose track of the time we spend laughing about the crazy people we work with, but it's time well-spent...trust me.

Anyway, we prepared Griff for the experience ahead of him, and witnessed the afternoon "Stretch & Flex" firsthand. Always a good time, and in the running for the most enjoyable 5 minutes of our day. After the "Stretch & Flex" I went to ask Steve if he had gotten any more orange stickers. Unfortunately he hadn't, but Aaron was standing right there, and so Steve took Aaron's badge and ripped his sticker off, putting it onto mine. I felt bad for Aaron, who is kind of a right-hand man for someone. I dunno quite what his position is, but he sort of works with hiring through Brycon and associating with newer members. He's a cool guy and didn't mind. Now I have an orange sticker, except it's ghetto, cause it's like not even a whole sticker and it's in two pieces. I still have to find a new one, but odds are, I'll never get one.

After working a long time, while Brady went back to translate for the new workers in the Protocal Training session. Griffin went too, as he needed to be trained as well. Once he got back, I showed him around the workplace and told him just what we were doing. After a while, I finally got to gown up and go into the clean room. It's massive! And it's so cool inside--cool as in awesome, but also cold, since we need to keep fans going and keep it cool to maintain a low particle count. I helped wipe down tiles as we passed them through the station, and despite my minimal movement, it was unusually warm.

Jacob, an idiot friend of our idiot coworker, Colby, was forced to work with us, cleaning tiles. Alex brought him over and she told him to help. He wiped down like 3 and then disappeared for like 20 minutes. He randomely poked his head around the wall and said "I'm going to the bathroom, okay?" as if we really believed him...or cared. Then five minutes later Alex shows up looking for him. From what we gathered, he was not working like he should, and was giving her trouble before she placed him at our pass-thru. We told her that he had disappeared for like 20 minutes after wiping down a few tiles and then had told us he was going to the bathroom five minutes before she arrived. She looked perturbed and left. 10 minutes later she returned, asking us if we had a watch...we confirmed that we did, and she asked us to let her know what time he got back. Like 15 minutes passed and suddenly everyone was leaving the clean room. We were told that the particle count was way too high and that we needed to evacuate it immediately. The normal is like 65,000 particles or something like that. Skye said he had heard it was like 45,000 over...which is huge. Brady said he heard like 150,000 over, which is like...I dunno....just really not good, since it's like three times the regular count.

We thought it felt hot. Turns out the fans stopped working, and thus stopped ventilating. That was one of the problems, and we don't know if it was the only one or not. It was like 3:30 when we evacuated and were told to leave cause there was nothing left to do today. We got to go home a day early, but it was pretty crazy. Probably had something to do with Colby and Jacob...idiots. We're just waiting for them to get fired.

Great. My first day in the clean room was spoiled, but the blow was lessened by the fact that we got to go home an hour earlier. Woohoo! Today was good, I guess.


Quote of the Day:

"Almost all trolls are evil, Brady."
-Skye