Thursday, January 21, 2010

Losing track of time

I suppose everyone of us has lost our concentration during the course of a day, while watching our favorite television program, or during those 'important' weekly business meetings.

With all the distractions that are available at any given moment during our daily lives, it comes as a welcome change the natural occurring incidents among co-workers and their offering to share their stories at the cost of personal humiliation.

The group of people that I work with are a constant source of material for me, most of which can be cleaned up and shared here with you.

Tommy is one of our more 'experienced' valve technicians and is our 'go-to' old timer for the occasional history lesson that involves the past 30 years of employees or the overall changes of the surrounding municipalities.

Having spent so many years working at the same chemical complex here in Southeast Texas, habits become second nature and becoming a morning person is easy to do with a steady job.

Tommy has shared on numerous occasions about his waking up before the alarm clock goes off, getting up, getting dressed thinking that he had over slept and tears around preparing to leave for work only to realize that he had been asleep for about 2 hours.

Just the other day...make that the other night, he woke up, dressed and left his house heading to the plant. Listening to the radio, the deejay gave the current time and temperature. Not believing the clock radio, he pulled his cell phone out for confirmation that in fact it was just after midnight.

He turned around and went back home and back to bed.

Just this past weekend, Tommy turned another year older. This birthday was a milestone for him as he was turning 70 years old. I have to tell you that Tommy is one of those active 70 year old individuals that still lead a very productive life.

One of our unique ways we celebrate our birthdays at work is by bringing something for the crew to enjoy during the day. Monday morning, Tommy arrived with one of those infamous Great American Cookies....and led off with a confession in front of the crew.

He had figured wrong and was not...had not turned 70. His wife had informed him the day before that he was in fact; only 69 years of age.

His argument was that he had been born a year before the attack on Pearl Harbor. Well almost a year, what's a few weeks right? December to January was closer to about 5 weeks short of exactly a year before the attack.

As a matter of fact, Tommy was born just 11 months before Pearl Harbor and had stated it so many times, he had himself believing that he was born in 1940. See what a difference a few weeks will make...it can actually take a year off of your life.

Happy 69th Birthday Tommy.

It just so happens, that my wedding anniversary falls on Tommy's birthday. Cindy and I celebrated 29 years of wedded bliss this past weekend.

For the record, I gave her the same card for the fourth straight year this year...and yes I bought a new card each year. Maybe I will tell you about that tradition in another posting.

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