(no subject)
Holy shit today sucked.
It didn't suck like "I got fired" suck. Just "everything annoying all week happened in one day" suck.
We got in and discovered someone had added to the overflow in a call number we'd already shifted (nobody had warned us this might happen). The overflow is basically stuff that for whatever reason wasn't reshelved, so we have to integrate it as we shift that section. Stuff in a section that's already been shifted? We have to go back and find room for it. We're compacting as we shift, so there's not a whole lot of room when we're done with it. More than three or four linear inches potentially means we have to shift forward. We're double shelving, and the stuff in back comes before the stuff in front. So we have to unshelve and reshelve two or more shelves. Today's brand new overflow? About a linear foot. Not all in the same place, fortunately, so we didn't have to shift too much. But getting the new overflow interfiled into the old overflow so we don't miss anything later was a pain in the ass. It took nearly two hours for us to deal with everything and get back to where we left off last night.
We were one person down. The way we usually do it is there's one person working the shelf and one person working the cart, either putting onto the cart what the puller takes off the shelf or handing books to the shelver from the pull cart. Basically we work in two teams of two. With three people, the cart person (catcher/hander) has to switch between the puller and shelver, whoever needs help the most. Usually that means whoever is up on the ladder, since going up and down sucks rocks. For some reason the pullers and the shelvers were at the same point in the bookcases almost every time. (We're nearly three aisles apart at this point in the shifting/compacting project, BTW) So someone was always exhausting themselves dragging up and down the ladder. Depending on how packed the shelf is and how many linear inches you feel you can safely carry up and down, a shelf can take ten or more up and down trips. I need the ladder for the top five shelves.
I was pulling. By the end of the day I didn't even reach the point I had anticipated hitting by lunch. [facepalm] We average about three minutes a shelf, including running the carts, when all four of us are in.
I would like as many good doobie elf points as possible on this job in case the company asks for evals after our contract is up. Also in case the department gets an open job I could plausibly apply for. (or in case they decide to extend the contract, since there's no way we're going to finish shifting and shelve all the material being moved from the other library in the next two weeks. I'm not optimistic about us finishing just shifting, especially if we have more three-people days)
Then, even though we go out early enough for me to catch the early train out (trains on that line only run every twelve minutes, so missing the train has a verifiable impact on my commute), I ended up getting home later than usual. There was a fight on the train on the heavily-traveled line1 (in my car, right in front of me). It was all in Spanish and seemed to be mostly bravado, so I have no idea what was actually going on. One guy basically kicked another guy off the train. Two stops later, the train flat out stopped and we hung out at the station for ten minutes waiting for LAPD. Then the next train showed up. It was jammed already. They put us on it anyway. We had a "minister" who was very determined to declaim and expostulate on any one of several topics. Not quite as bad as the dude I sat across from yesterday, who conversed with the voices sporadically enough I couldn't tune him out and doze off, but still another straw on the camel's back. And I had to stand.
However, I think I found a route to cut about five minutes and a couple miles off my drive to and from2 the station.
1 I make a transfer downtown. The north-south line I take from home (ish. It's a ten mile drive to the station) is much more heavily-traveled than the line running from downtown to campus, so the trains run more frequently and are much more full. With E3 this week, it was extra-crowded.
2To and from have different times due to different traffic. I leave early enough in the morning people mostly aren't on the road yet, but I get back right in the middle of rush hour(s).
It didn't suck like "I got fired" suck. Just "everything annoying all week happened in one day" suck.
We got in and discovered someone had added to the overflow in a call number we'd already shifted (nobody had warned us this might happen). The overflow is basically stuff that for whatever reason wasn't reshelved, so we have to integrate it as we shift that section. Stuff in a section that's already been shifted? We have to go back and find room for it. We're compacting as we shift, so there's not a whole lot of room when we're done with it. More than three or four linear inches potentially means we have to shift forward. We're double shelving, and the stuff in back comes before the stuff in front. So we have to unshelve and reshelve two or more shelves. Today's brand new overflow? About a linear foot. Not all in the same place, fortunately, so we didn't have to shift too much. But getting the new overflow interfiled into the old overflow so we don't miss anything later was a pain in the ass. It took nearly two hours for us to deal with everything and get back to where we left off last night.
We were one person down. The way we usually do it is there's one person working the shelf and one person working the cart, either putting onto the cart what the puller takes off the shelf or handing books to the shelver from the pull cart. Basically we work in two teams of two. With three people, the cart person (catcher/hander) has to switch between the puller and shelver, whoever needs help the most. Usually that means whoever is up on the ladder, since going up and down sucks rocks. For some reason the pullers and the shelvers were at the same point in the bookcases almost every time. (We're nearly three aisles apart at this point in the shifting/compacting project, BTW) So someone was always exhausting themselves dragging up and down the ladder. Depending on how packed the shelf is and how many linear inches you feel you can safely carry up and down, a shelf can take ten or more up and down trips. I need the ladder for the top five shelves.
I was pulling. By the end of the day I didn't even reach the point I had anticipated hitting by lunch. [facepalm] We average about three minutes a shelf, including running the carts, when all four of us are in.
I would like as many good doobie elf points as possible on this job in case the company asks for evals after our contract is up. Also in case the department gets an open job I could plausibly apply for. (or in case they decide to extend the contract, since there's no way we're going to finish shifting and shelve all the material being moved from the other library in the next two weeks. I'm not optimistic about us finishing just shifting, especially if we have more three-people days)
Then, even though we go out early enough for me to catch the early train out (trains on that line only run every twelve minutes, so missing the train has a verifiable impact on my commute), I ended up getting home later than usual. There was a fight on the train on the heavily-traveled line1 (in my car, right in front of me). It was all in Spanish and seemed to be mostly bravado, so I have no idea what was actually going on. One guy basically kicked another guy off the train. Two stops later, the train flat out stopped and we hung out at the station for ten minutes waiting for LAPD. Then the next train showed up. It was jammed already. They put us on it anyway. We had a "minister" who was very determined to declaim and expostulate on any one of several topics. Not quite as bad as the dude I sat across from yesterday, who conversed with the voices sporadically enough I couldn't tune him out and doze off, but still another straw on the camel's back. And I had to stand.
However, I think I found a route to cut about five minutes and a couple miles off my drive to and from2 the station.
1 I make a transfer downtown. The north-south line I take from home (ish. It's a ten mile drive to the station) is much more heavily-traveled than the line running from downtown to campus, so the trains run more frequently and are much more full. With E3 this week, it was extra-crowded.
2To and from have different times due to different traffic. I leave early enough in the morning people mostly aren't on the road yet, but I get back right in the middle of rush hour(s).