He's chasing the lawnmower

DH has the weekend off, much to our surprise. Last summer, crisis by managment had everyone in the machine shop on mandatory overtime all summer long. DH worked a 32 day week in August. Morale was dreadful. Things got so bad that the robot committed suicide and actually pulled its own plug. I kid you not! During the winter, when weekends were crappy anyway and everyone could use a little extra Christmas cash, they sent people home for lack of work a few times. But for some reason, in the summer when people would like to take their kids camping on a weekend, or have a family picnic, maybe paint the house during these few weeks when the rain won't wash the wet paint away, maybe just do some yard work, mandatory overtime rears its ugly head. Is this a case of managerial malice, incompetance or is there some ebb and flow in the order / production chain that causes a bulge of work in the summer? In the summer, when the shop gets 110 inside because no fans could possibly cope with all those big machines cranking out thermal units 24 hours a day. In the winter, when it's colder than a dead eskimo, only half the equipment is running at any one time, you can see your breath in the air, and the lubricant is the consistency of vaseline. And of course, you realize it's cheaper for the company to pay everyone in the shop time and a half for two days a week than it would be to give another person a job and pay his/her benefits. God forbid they should employ another skilled blue-collar laborer while they can still squeeze the life out of the employees they already have.

Anyhow, we are looking forward to dinner on Hawaiian-style ribs at the Bamboo Grove tonight. I have him, and by golly, I'm gonna enjoy the ever-lovin' out of him! May you all have equally satisfactory Saturdays!