Tales From Product (A)Isle: Aloha

(Author's note:  All post are now aggregated on a new page, Tales from Produce (A)Isle)

This past Thursday was my last night on Produce (A)Isle.

The time itself was not atypical of all the other closes I have had:  Do tomatoes and peppers.  Do bananas once, or at least twice.  Circle around to the other areas at least once.  Cull expired material and do the 50% mark downs for tomorrow's expiration.  Hum along with the piped in music (currently hits of the 50's and 60's, mostly Motown sound).  

My departure in and of itself will not create a ripple.  My boss did let me know he was genuinely sorry to see me go and had nothing but good feedback from me from (A)Isle coworkers, other coworkers, and management.  My fellow (A)Islers have wished me good luck and told me they will miss me - in fact, one, told me myself and one other were the only people that "got" closing. I will let whoever checks me out of the department tonight know.  But with the number of people that work at the store, my disappearance will likely cause little or no comment.  People come and go all the time.

As a surprise and lucky timing on my part, they handed out a $100 "Cost of Living" gift (Not a bonus; I was corrected by the Store Manager.  They do not give bonuses.) so I got to depart with crisp new $100 bill in my wallet.

This was a good job.

It was a good job for many reasons.  Some of them are very pragmatic - for example, having something of a second income helped both for things like being able to attend training in Japan without worrying about financing as well as having a little income coming in during Hammerfall 3.0. A standing 10% discount on in-house brands, occasionally having a 25% discount on in house brands. The fact that it kept me up and moving for anywhere from 6 to 20 hours a week, covering about 5 miles a night in steps. And in terms of pay, I had nothing to complain about:  Starting pay of $15.50 an hour, $0.50 raise after 3 months and - I just figured out - another $0.50 raise sometime in January or February of this year to a departing hourly rate of $16.50.  A 6% raise in approximately 9 months.  That seldom if ever happens in my "real" career life.  And not one, but two $100 "gifts".

In terms of stress there was almost none, especially once I got my feet under me and realized that the expectation was to do your best, but that was all that you could do.  I never had to face an e-mail inbox loaded with questions and required actions.  If we were out of something on the floor, I went to the back and looked - if we were out, we were out and there was nothing I could do.  The amount of difficult customers I experienced were minimal (2?  3?) compared to the number of people I interacted with.  Other than the stress of having to fill and tie balloons as we managed floral in their absence (which was a stress even up to my last night), it was a very even keel sort of position - always busy, seldom too busy.  

My coworkers were always pleasant.  My boss was great.  They always worked with my schedule without complaint and so I was able to travel (both back to The Ranch as well as to just go) without ever having to beg or cajole my way into another day off.

However, the biggest reason it was a good job had nothing to do with the conduct of the work itself.

Oftentimes in my primary field career (Quality), I am often plagued by the sense that I have secured the position through things that had nothing to do with me.  I am experienced enough to know that lots of things go into selecting a candidate just besides them being the "best" candidate.  Sometimes it is pay, sometimes it is location to the facility in site.  Sometimes it is desperation because they have been searching for months and not been able to find anyone everyone agrees on.  Many times I have felt I was "the lowest common denominator" for the selection instead of being the best candidate.

Produce (A)Isle was different.

I had nothing to offer for the application and interview, nothing other than years of keeping a job.  The interview, as I might have related, was scheduled for 30 minutes but took less than 10 minutes and during which we hardly talked about the job at all.  He "had a feeling".

For the first time in a long time, I felt like I got a job because I really was the best person.

If you have never had that happen, or it has been a long time since it happened, it is hard to describe what that does for your confidence.  The idea that you are selected because of your ability and not any "contributing factors" is immense.  The thought that "I went out and got that job.  I did it" is an amazing confidence boost.

Did that confidence boost help?  We will never know for sure of course, but I like to believe that the interview process for my new job in New Home 2.0 reflected that.  No, the fact that I was again applying for a job for which I was likely overqualified did not make me feel less enthusiastic about the job.  Yes, I had every reason to believe I could do that job as well as any other job I had done.  And no, essentially starting at the higher end of the lower end was not an issue.

The other thing this job reminded me of was flexibility - more specifically, that I can be flexible.  When a challenge presents itself, such as losing one's job, I am able to respond.  I can take action instead of sitting at home bemoaning my fate.  And I can be successful at it.

All of this, from a job handling fruits and vegetables.

I will keep my nametag in the glove box of my car as I have for months now, mostly as a good luck charm - but also as a "just in case".  After all, while I have every reason to believe and hope everything goes well in New Home 2.0, it is never a bad thing to keep your options - just in case.

And besides, where else am I going to gather such valuable knowledge such as being able to identify the readiness of an avocado for guacamole merely by a 10 second touch?

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Common Courtesy Edition

As I was thinking through my work search at Produce (A)Isle - and I have a lot of time to think - one thing that struck me was the fact that it is by far one of the most courteous environments I have worked in.  

This struck me as I was thinking about my job search and my past experiences in other companies - which, while not awful (for the most part), really do not rise to the same level.

In all my time there to date (7 months), I have only ever had one "unpleasant" customer - and legitimately he had found an issue (a discrepancy between the sign pricing and the label pricing on the shelf below it, although he was not particularly nice about it).  Other than that, everyone  - customers and fellow employees - has being, well, really polite. 

Contrary to what might be out there on the current relations between practically anyone out there, I have contact with a large swath of people from every conceivable backgrounds and many nationalities.  To a person, the request always starts with "Excuse me, Sir".

Now, maybe the grey hair and the slow shuffling around the shelves suggest I am not a quite in the now-current generation, but I have to admit I am a bit shocked by the level of courtesy shown to me by customers.

I contrast this with my industry work environments.

Not that they are impolite or discourteous on the face of them:  people on the whole generally ask permission and generally do not barge in on one.  But the conversations start less with the equivalent of "May I have a moment of your time?" and more "Hey, I have this problem/discussion point/story I need to resolve/run past you/ tell you to amuse you and make myself feel good".  And sometimes, not even the first name basis is used.  It becomes "Do you have a minute?" and barely waiting for an acknowledgement, the conversation is on.

They lack that moment of simple courtesy and respect.

Are they different environments?  Sure.  But it cannot be argued I am not dealing with a wide variety of people at Produce (A)Isle, including people as well educated and trained as those I deal with in the Biopharmaceutical/Medical Device Industry.  It seems that in one environment, the ability to interrupt and/or deal a bit nonchalantly with people is assumed; in the other it is not.

To be completely honest, some folks at Produce (A)Isle seem genuinely apologetic to interrupt me to find out where the celery is or do we have coconuts.  It is no problem, I tell them:  that really is part of my job.  

It does make me wonder though:  how far would the same sort of simple courtesy and respect go in all places, not just on sandy beach and under the waving palm trees of the (A)Isle?

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Keeping On Keeping On

 I have not written about Produce (A)Isle in a while - not because it has gone away, but simply because there has not been a lot to write about.

Part of the complication has simply been the holidays in general.  Travel to The Ranch cuts me out a week.  Additionally, when there are paid holidays like Christmas and New Year's, the regular employees need to have their guaranteed minimum hours -which means part-timers like myself lose hours.

The week before Christmas I only worked 12 hours, the week of Christmas 17 hours, then the week after Christmas 4.5 hours.  I then went to Old Home of course, which cuts all my hours.  Last week was another 17 hour week; this week is again 4.5 hours as I will be away starting Friday.

Additionally, we have just seen a drop in overall business.  It is a known cause:  the store is undergoing renovations which have taken significantly longer than anticipated; started in August of 2023 they were anticipated to complete by the end of October.  Here it is almost the end of January 2024 and they are not complete.  Predictably, people get tired of the confusion and the fact that items seem to be constantly moving to another place and choose another location.

In terms of the department itself (our remodels being long done now), we have effectively returned to the original configuration that was present when I started last May.  Apples and citrus fruits have been switched in their rows.  Apples continue to be featured along with mandarins.  No particular shortages, although the tomatoes this time of year are all hothouse grown and thus the palest shade of red I have seen.

In terms of longer term impact due to Hammerfall 3.0, I am not sure.  Obviously if I find a job outside of New Home that is not remote, it ends.  If I find a job in New Home but farther away, likely my hours will drop to 8 (Saturday close) as getting across town at quitting time is a nightmare.  If I get something that is remote, the current schedule could likely stay in place (although remote work seems more and more a remote possibility....thank you, thank you very much).

So a lot of uncertainty about the more distant future.  However, right up to that point I will keep working away, piling up the fruits and vegetables beneath waving palm trees on the sandy beaches.

As the saying goes, it is not much but it is honest work.

Produce (A)Isle and Economics

 Friday night when I opened my e-mail, one of the on-line bookstores I purchase from notified me that two books that were on my wish list were now available.

As it had been a fair time since I had been there - so long, in fact, that I did not remember which books it was talking about - I went there.  Sure enough, there they were:  a book on the Varangian Guard and a book on Orthodox Spirituality.  Adding them to the other book I had in the cart - also on the Varangian Guard - put my total at $42.80 (with tax but no shipping, as there is no shipping cost when the purchase is above $15.00).

I looked.  I entered my credit card information.  And then I started doing my Produce (A)Isle math.

My princely wage, as you might recall is now $16 an hour, which is 3% more than I started at 6 months ago (and, in percentage and amount, more than I anticipate receiving from my day job this year).  Technically I probably receive around $14.70 an hour after taxes. 

And so I did the math.  Those books would cost me 3 units (hours) of labor on Produce (A)Isle.

They are still sitting in the shopping cart.

I do not know why my mind somehow grasps this better as a unit of measure than my day job amount (which is more, to be perfectly honest).  I suspect it is because in common with most desk jobs there is not a sense of how much effort I am putting in for that salary - the pay is ultimately for results, not hours worked, and so the per hour amount can become meaningless when one spends a great deal more time working (at one time, I believe I calculated my salary at my previous employer to be almost the same no matter how I got promoted based on hours worked).  This is not the case on Produce (A)Isle:  I can clear understand how many banana boxes I have to move or salads I have to rack or bad fruit I have to pick out to get that amount of money.

Suddenly, every expense takes on a new meaning.

As a counter example, my training with The Berserker is approximately 8 units of labor on Produce (A)Isle every six weeks, or one Saturday workday.  In this case I consider it a valuable exchange for the knowledge and guidance (To be fair to myself, I do feel the same way about books and seldom if ever have told myself or a family member not to buy one).  But I clearly understand the cost of what I buying.

It also puts saving activities in perspective.  For example, I now spend about one hour a week darning socks.  Yesterday (today as I write this), I did 8 to 9 socks, one tabi sock for Iai, and my cheesecloth for yogurt.  Assuming the cost of tabi was the same as regular socks (it is not), I darned about $16 worth of clothing in an hour.  The labor/cash exchange was equal, excluding the exercise of the skill and the knowledge I put off spending the money one more week - which is not monetary but valuable. Last week I sewed the inside of my Produce (A)Isle jeans that were ripping on the inside seam. I am not sure how long it will hold (it has held to date), but a truly new pair of jeans would cost 3 units of Produce (A)Isle labor.  Even a used pair would cost 1 to 2 units of labor.  In that case I definitively came out ahead.

Applying this measure to everything makes all the difference. I have a standard by which I can measure the value of everything - yes, something things are an investment rather than an expense, but it helps with the initial spend (Depreciation of such things is beyond the limited use of this model - how do I put value on something like a generator [51.5 Labor Units] or a Pressure Canner [13.5 labor units]?).

It certainly seems to make saying "No" a great deal easier - after all, how many banana boxes do I really want to move to get that?

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Closing Alone

 We seem to have entered a lull on Produce (A)isle in business; this last week I was the only closer.  In one case I saw the person I was taking over for; in the other I was completely on my own.

Closing alone is, on the one hand, not a great deal different from closing with more employees.  It is helpful if the day shift has loaded up the shelves and bins so that there is less that I have to restock; I can get by with one main sweep of each area (with the exception of the tomatoes and bananas, of course).  Likely some things that could get done do not get done - although freaking myself out about this a bit, I have just accepted that there is only so much I  can do and I assume my manager knows it.

On the other hand, closing alone can be a very different experience.

The biggest sense is that you are alone - no, not alone in the store as obviously there are other employees in the store, but alone in your section.  Except for the occasional personal shopper, no-one really comes by.  It is as if the aisle ways that separate Produce from other departments were great water ways over which no-one can cross.  Even in my limited runs away - to the trash compactor and box compactor, to the back - it is if there is a bubble that exists, an invisibility screen that shields me from view.

As a person that tends towards introversion, it is not necessarily the worst thing in the world - after all, it is not as if I spend endless time talking with my coworkers - but given that I have a very part time schedule, it does very much leave one with the sense of being alone.

I presume as the holidays begin to kick into gear the work will scale up again (at least, I hope it does - if it does not, we have a separate set of issues) and evenings will begin to filled with some level of other employees.  But I do find it surprising - and potentially telling of modern employment life - that even in the midst of people and fellow employees, one can still very much get the sense of being alone.

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Days Of Music Past

 Readers may recall that approximately two months ago on Produce (A)Isle, we received an update (arguably an upgrade) in our music selection:  we moved from "Modern Pop Music" to Music of the 1980's ( e.g., music of my youth).

The change was welcome then and remains welcome.  It is nice to fill my mind with songs I can sing along to (at least in my head) as I bustle about the fruits and vegetables.  Generally speaking they are all upbeat songs as well, which does give a skip to my step upon occasion.

One of the fine things about any sort of nostalgia such as this is the remembering of things that had become crowded out of my mind.  Songs I have not thought of in 35 years pop back into my mind suddenly as if it were yesterday - and oddly enough, with almost all of the lyrics intact.  

A sub-genre that I had forgotten about but has made a strong reappearance into the lineup are what I will call the Romantic Rock Ballad.  I do not think that is an actual category, but the songs are similar enough in sound and sense and feeling that they serve to form their own genre:  wistful songs about unrequired love and plans to make said love requited filled with power chords, drums, and soaring melodies as we reach the apex.  REO Speedwagon, Survivor, Icehouse, Journey, Styx - they all find their place in the lexicon of my mind from so many years ago.

As I listen to this songs, they stir in me feelings of 40 + years ago, feelings I had somehow thought were dead:  that silly, hopeless romantic fellow that really believe in the lyrics of the songs.  It is nice to revisit those feelings - but it makes me sad as well.  Where, I wonder as those songs pass by, did that fellow go?

Oh, I know part of where he went.  The link above tells the tale, but the short version is that it got almost brutally ripped out of him, his heart hurled to the floor and broken. What was left...is largely what remains today.  Which has its own advantages certainly, but is also in some ways much less than that individual was.

He had hope.  He had a clear sight on nobility and romance and right, and seemed to really believe that the best could occur.  Almost belying my current state, he was far more of an optimist than I was.  He was also - if the reminiscing tells me anything - a sometimes more happier fellow.

It has taken me this long to realize I miss him.

Can he come back?  Hard to say really; 40 years is a long time to be away and even if he were back, would he be able to deal with the world and the situations that I find myself in with the same sort of aplomb and gung ho spirit that he had back then?  I do not really know.

I only know this:  when I hear those songs, something stirs in my heart, something I have not felt in more years than I care to admit.  Something beyond the ordinary that I live, something almost on a higher plane of existing, of being more alive than I feel 98% of the time anymore.  Something that makes me hungry for an existence above what I feel that life has become, a day to day grind in mediocrity and ambitions emptied of all but their practical aspects.

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: The Turning Of The Fruits

 One of the things I have become exposed to on the tropical beaches and gently waving palms of Product (A)Isle is the changing of the agricultural year as denoted by the fruits we feature and are on sale.

When I originally started working in earnest in July, cherries were the top of our list.  Throughout July and even into August, we went through 8 to 10 flats of cherries even during my limited shifts.  Most of the cherries were from Washington.  Some just came in boxes, their bags encased on white plastic bags, others came in artfully decorated boxes with full colour inserts telling us how these were carefully grown in an artisanal style.  

Perhaps unsurprisingly, our customers have no concern about the artisanal nature of cherries and are purely concerned with price.  Out went the bags of cherries with the inserts and decorated boxes to grace a recycle bin.

Cherries in turn gave way to stone fruits and their kin. Peaches and nectarines graced the coconut groves.  On the whole they are easier to deal with as they containers they mostly come in - black folding containers called IFCOs which undoubtedly stands for something I cannot remember - can be easily stacked on the tables and slanted shelves, and the cardboard boxes that the rest come in are easily manageable in terms of weight distribution - the fruits being more fragile than, say, onions, and are packaged accordingly.

One additional advantage of stone fruits:  unlike cherries, where the unwritten code seemed to be "it is okay to sample and spit your pit out on the floor", stone fruits are much too big to each sample and spit the pits to the side.  (We are still finding cherry pits on the floor under things from three months ago; my view of human nature on the whole remains as dismal as it ever was.)

Stone fruits have in turn given way to grapes and pears and apples.  These are more familiar fruits and timing to me as these were all grown in Old Home and local towns would have entire industries geared around them.  Most of the applies we have are the ones that we usually have throughout the year, although there are some specialties (Sweet Tango, Kanzi) which seem to have appeared.  At least three kinds of pears as well which I find amusing:  my memory of pears growing up was from a single tree that my mother faithfully canned for many years and of which I could not tell you the name.

What comes next?  Frankly, I have no idea - but that is one of the joys of this job among the many including no after work emails and being able to leave the job on the beaches and in the groves.  It is nice to have a job where more than likely the surprises are all actually pleasant and educational ones.

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Yes, We Have No Bananas (Actually, We Do)

 The two products we put out more than any others on Produce (A)Isle are roma tomatoes and bananas.

The banana that is the mainstay of the Western World is the Cavendish banana.  The history (here) of the Cavendish is interesting:  originally sent to William Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire in the 1830's, they were raised in his Greenhouse.  Originally the Cavendish was not the banana of choice:  this was the Gros Michel ("Big Mike"), which was the commercial mainstay of banana-dom until the 1950's, when it succumbed to a fungal disease called Panama Disease.  At the time it was believed that the Cavendish was resistant to Panama disease and thus entered production; as it turns out this may not be the case and the Cavendish Banana remains at risk.

As longer readers might recall, we saw bananas being grown in Costa Rica in 2021,  The blue bags are to help ripen them.

Bananas come in 40 lbs. boxes.  There are only two suppliers, at least to us: Del Monte and Dole.  There are two types, Organic and Regular Bananas.  Generally, organic bananas are about $0.14 more expensive a pound:

The 40 lbs. box contains four rows of banana bunches, an inner row on each side and an outer row fitting around it.  The rows are separated by plastic.  On the whole, a case of bananas will have been 16 and 20 bunches.

You would be shocked at the amount of bananas we sell.

I can easily refill the banana racks at least twice and possibly three times during a 5 hour shift:  one major loading which may consist of 10 to 12 cases and a second and third loading to fill in the gaps, each easily 4 to 6 cases - thus making the total number handled 18 to 24 cases of bananas at 40 lbs each.  

Let us just say my change in gyms has been adequately compensated for.  By a job.

Additionally, the bananas come in various stages of ripeness.  Some of the are a brilliant ripe yellow, some of them are a faded green to yellow, and some of them are almost pure green. There is no rhyme or reason to what comes: sometimes it seems like 100% yellow, sometimes almost all green.  

Balancing the various ripeness is a trick. The ripe ones obviously get over ripe much more quickly and so keeping them out and up front matters.  The green ones are often less attractive for eating, so too many means slower sales.

An ideal distribution on the rack is that the upper two rows (10' each, two sides) is all more ripe bananas and the bottom two racks are the more green bananas.  How many bunches of bananas are those?  Not sure as there is a lot of variability in bunch sizes, but it is a fair amount.

If you had asked me going into this job what one of my biggest tasks would be, I would not have said bananas - possibly because we do not eat a great many of them but also in that I had no idea how many other people ate them either.  And yet perhaps excluding Roma tomatoes, they remain the item I have to fuss the most about to make sure they are always full.

Or, you might say, I discovered that bananas have great a-peel...

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: The Locals

 When moves to any location for more than a short time, it is of great benefit to learn who the locals are.

The locals can take many forms:  The neighbors across the street.  The people that become regular as we shop at the same locations over an over.  The person walking their dog or running we see every morning and develop a nodding acquaintance with.  The service provider that becomes a regular.

On Produce (A)Isle, there are three kinds of locals.

The first are the Permanents.  These are small group - four at least, including my manager - that are full time employees on the (A)Isle.  They are guaranteed full time work (minimum of 34 hours a week) and generally open or work mid-day with perhaps a single closing shift ever week.

The second are the Part-Timers. I fall into this category and currently may be the only one, employees who work part-time but are 100% dedicated to produce.  Mostly we (I) fill evening and weekend shifts.  I have never met anyone in my status, but know that others are coming.

The third are the Floaters.  These are employees that are not specifically dedicated to single department but move from area to area:  checking, pharmacy, shopping, even produce.  There is a handful of these that work overlapping my hours, and over time a few of them have become effectively semi-permanent fixtures.

Produce (A)Isle is not merely named that because it consists of aisles.  In a very real way we are isolated from the rest of the store, even though there are no physical barriers.  Employees may come through do perform the in-store shopping function or (even less often) for their own shopping, but there is never really any relationship building.  If they cannot find something they ask, but scarcely will anyone strike up a conversation.  Even for those adjoining areas - Bakery, Deli, Floral - there are passing acquaintances at best.  And managers float in from time - always pleasant, always ready with a handshake, always ready for a brief conversation -but they, too, have tasks they need to be about.

I have no idea why this is.

Even within ourselves, we are largely isolated.  With two employees we split the work and touch bases on progress, but scarcely work near each other.  Anything beyond a very general "Hi, How is it going?" relationship seems to make things awkward. The Permanents are a little more conversational about such things but even then I often see them at the end of their shift:  they are ready to go home, not spend even more time in conversation at the end of their work day filling some kind of perceived need that I have.

Overall it is not a hindrance: after all, I am being paid to do a job.  But sometimes it can get a little lonely at 2100 in the evening, especially if I am closing on my own and have really had no interaction with anyone . 

It does not bear all the hallmarks of Robinson Crusoe's island, but sometimes feels just as lonely.

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Talk about Pop Music

 One thing that permeates my time on Produce (A)Isle is music.

Music pervades our shopping environment now.  It is piped into every store.  More and more in outdoor shopping situations, it pervades the atmosphere there as well as one crosses streets and strolls the sidewalks.  We are so used to it being everywhere that we tend to tune it out as we wander in and out of a store - in fact, it is probably more noticeable when it is not there.

One can tune it out with occasional visits.  On Produce (A)Isle, as with all the other stores, it is a constant background.

Presumably like most stores, we subscribe to a music service which pipes in a standard set of song genres, punctuated by store commercials.  I imagine there are several selections; ours when I first started was a modern sort of rock music station for which I knew none of the songs. 

Background music bores its way into your brain.  It is my constant companion as I move from sales floor to walk-in cooler to back room and back out.  Even if you do not like the songs - even if you hate the songs - you find yourself humming along or singing under your breath, often to your own annoyance.  The same is true of the commercial - after 100 times of the same commercial, you begin to find yourself reading along with the speaker (Our store has multiple hiring opportunities, in case you did not know).

The fact that makes the whole thing intolerable is when it is music you do not like.  Even as you pass through the 5 states of musical grief - Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance - you find yourself singing along, and not just at work either.  It fills your brain outside of the job as well, until driving to or from anything because a contest of "find something else to fill the brain with".

Our music changed about two weeks ago to music of the 1980's.  No-one is quite sure how it happened, but word on the street is that a higher up may or may not have made a suggestion based on a customer comment which may or may not have been an actual comment.  Regardless of where the request came from, the music is still there - but I enjoy singing along now and know the words to everything.

And then, when I am humming along blissfully, I shudder.  Christmas is coming.  I wonder how long until that music makes its appearance...

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: The Box Compactor

 We have a fairly small amount of equipment we use on Produce (A)Isle.  We have small two level/four wheeled carts we use for our general activities (top shelf is for produce, bottom shelf has a small metal box for water/wipes/bags and a space for a cardboard box for culls) and longer six wheel carts called "U-boats" that hold the bulk of the produce in boxes for wheeling in and out of the walk-in.  Occasionally we make use of a pallet jack.

And then, there is the Box Compactor.

The Box Compactor lives at the end of the back-end wall behind the main store, at the corner of the building.  It probably 8-10 feet long, blue, and 8 feet or so high.  The theory is that one puts the puts one's cardboard into the chamber.  At some point it is full enough that one pulls down the outer cage door which is engaged by a magnetic lock and turns the key.  A giant orange plate descends from the top and compacts everything into below it, then slowly comes up.  The cardboard is crushed and one can add more.  At some point (seemingly undefined; there is no mark in the interior of the unit nor is there a picture anywhere) the unit is "full" and as such, needs to be bundled up.  There is a list of responsible departments by day of the week for performing this task.

The unit has a lot of capacity but not endless capacity.  And people keep adding cardboard to the compactor.

I am sure you can see where this is going.

At some point, the unit is simply "topped off" and no more cardboard can reasonably go in.  But no-one shows up to take care of the issue.

I suspect everyone finds work arounds.  We do.  We flatten the cardboard, stack the cardboard on carts. Others will drop the cardboard off by the the unit, as if to leave a visual hint that it is full.  

This is one of those odd things that I am not sure what the protocol is on it.  There are no instructions for who to contact in the vent it is full other than "department"; and I am pretty sure the new guy popping in and asking about if cardboard is going to be pulled out is as welcome as being the closing manager suggesting there are just "a few" more things to do to get done before closing time.  

There is a system and an order to all companies, a system which is beyond the training one does upon arrival:  it is the secret system of "the way things actually work", the observed portions of human behavior that are not formally written down anywhere but are incredibly relevant.  These are the pecking orders and rituals and daily routines of the workplace that act as the social lubricant to make things work and get things done. It is the hidden codex, locked away that no-one sees when they first show up - like any good game, one has to find it through one's own adventures and missed guesses.

And so I continue my trip back to the corner, cardboard on my cart, wondering before I arrive if I will find a compactor empty or full. It may not be world ending suspense, but it certainly makes every trip back there something of an adventure.

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Closing Time

 The last part of the day of working produce takes on a schedule all its own.

The generalized procedure, if there were to be one written down, is to front the produce/packaged produce with especial attention to things like berries (strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries) which have two to three different "kinds" (regular, organic, hydroponic), bananas, roma tomatoes, and avocados, perform a random inventory check, a final floor sweep - all to be followed by a manager check.  Ideally we are out the door by 2200 or a bit before.

It is odd how, even after working there a short time, a schedule locks in.

At 2030 I start pulling in the onions except for a single bin of each variety (fruit fly issues). I will then sweep by the berries - if I have stacked pulled everything forward (ensuring the oldest is on the top and all the newer ones are back) it becomes an easy job of just pulling things to the fore and backfilling.  Bananas are usually filled two to three times during the shift, so perhaps some spot filling there as well.  Tomatoes and avocadoes are just pulling forward and adding to existing bins or putting a new one up.  If I am paired with someone else, they often do the inventory check.  Front the packaged products and sweeping is the final step.  

There are always some issues of course, like something being completely stripped out or a lack of a particular thing that means that whatever is left needs to be spread out to cover the space.  But largely the last 1.5 hours of the day have been the same, shift in and shift out.

It strikes me as interesting that this "schedule" has come together so quickly - to be fair, I am basing my work on the work of my coworkers that do things in an established manner and there are fixed tasks, but this is the most quickly that a schedule has established itself, especially since I am only working part time.  

Would that so many jobs had such straightforward adjustments.

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: The Basics

I have officially been working at Produce (A)Isle for approximately three weeks or so after my initial training and being turned out into the wild of the general work population.  To date I have been working closing shifts, which essentially consists of refilling bins of fruits and vegetables and getting things ready for the morning shift.  My usual start time is 1700 and I seldom stay beyond 2200.  As the shift is over four hours, I am allocated one 30 minute unpaid lunch and one 15 paid break (when was the last time that happened?).  My first 8 hour shift will have happened by the time of this post (Saturday afternoon and evening).

The work is not particularly taxing, either mentally or physically.  It consists of a fair amount of lifting and organizing:  sorting through bins and combining them while culling out the fruit/vegetables with issues, pulling out items from the walk-in cooler and restocking them, fronting products on shelves.  Most of the boxes are not very heavy, but some of the bins - onions and potatoes especially - can take a fair amount of effort to get on/off the display.  There is at least one partial inventory check (7 to 10 scans), sweeping, and out the door I go. 

The time tends to go quickly (even more quickly when you are alone and trying to get everything done) and to date I have never, ever had an idle moment.  The work is the sort that one can find engaging, busy with the hands and the mind sufficiently engaged that I can think about the state of the fruit/vegetable that I am working with as well as other issues or problems.

Some things I have initially noticed:

- We go through a ton of bananas, even on a 5 hour shift.  The banana shelf is probably 10 feet long with four rows divided between regular and organic; we easily have to refill it completely at least once and partially once or twice.

- Biggest sellers in Summer:  Roma tomatoes and avocados.

- The store is completely dependent on what is shipped and what you get is what you put out.  We were out of grapes for a week and cilantro almost that long.  No idea why.

- Organic fruit is generally 1) more costly; and 2) goes bad more quickly.

- Sometimes, the fruit comes in spoiled even before it makes it out to the floor.  Berries seem especially prone to this.

- Pro tip: The waxier your apples feel, the longer they have been there.

- Pro tip 2:  The best produce is not necessarily always in the back of the bin/row. It should not be assumed everything is rotated forward; sometimes things just get put on top.

Is it making a financial difference?  It is, in fact.  And while I am working a lot harder for money that even two months ago I would have made in a far shorter time, I find the job equally or even more rewarding - therapeutic, one might say.  There is something to just working a rhythm, answering customer questions and watching boxes get crushed in the compactor. 

It is not that there are not demands on me.  It is just that they are direct, resolvable, and I can go home every evening without a single piece of mental baggage.  And that may be the biggest benefit of all.