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8:58 p.m. - 2005-03-23 Getting Down to the Gnats Ass(or maybe it's the Ham's Ass)I work with an office full of Engineers. They can engineer fantastic machines and systems that do all kinds of amazing things; but ask them to participate in engineering a new procedure to follow, assuring that the data we put into our computer is accurate, and it's like pulling teeth. These guys can be professional and serious; then, in a heartbeat, they break down into a bunch of little boys tangling with each other like a litter of puppys. In a meeting the other day, Greg was asked why he didn't want to do something a certain way. "Because Kevin will find a way to F it all up." he said. "That's because you suck." said Kevin. "I don't suck, you suck" Greg responded back. The meeting broke down and digressed into a friendly bantering as to who sucked the most then Joe pulled everyone back to the discussion. One thing discussed in the meeting was how one engineer was going to collect the time sheets from the shop employees and hand them into me so I could enter them into the computer and apply the hours worked to the correct job. We need this information to be accurate for job costing purposes and the owner wants daily time sheets handed in. Greg has been running this company for 9 years and has been doing things the same way without interruption for all 9 years. He resents the idea of spending the time and paperwork to get down to what he calls "The Gnats Ass". Whenever there is a discussion of a new procedure so we can cost a job more accurately he says, "Well, if you want to get down to the Gnat's Ass......." Today Greg, John and I had another discussion about the time sheets. Greg was throwing a fit about having to do something a new way and was coming up with all kinds of groundless reasons why we couldn't do them that way. That is when I told him THE HAM STORY. I had to listen to THE HAM STORY about 10 times per day when Chander bought Central Pallet and I detested it....here I was re-telling it to Greg and John, however, I left out the Hundu accent A young woman was making her first ham. Her mother taught her that in order to make the ham, she had to cut off 3 inches from the butt of the ham, place the ham in the pan, then place the butt next to the main part of the ham. The young woman asked her Mother why they had to cut the butt off the ham. The girl then asked her Grandma why they made the ham that way, Moral of the story: Just because you have always done something a certain way doesn't mean you have to continue to do it that way. Greg just stared at me blinking. Finally, after some more discussion, head shaking and arm waving, we reached a compromise between the new way of doing things and the old. "We'll get this ham cooked one way or the other." I said jokingly "Hell, I'd eat the ham's ass cold and cook the rest of it." said John "I'd leave the ham's ass attached and pour a can of 7 up over it." said Greg By this time our little meeting had started to break up. Kevin walked by and the three of them joined up and started down the hallway. "You wouldn't get me to eat the ass of a ham." said Kevin Somewhere in the back of the office, Joe's voice piped up, "Are you guys talking about Greg's ass?" Men or boys????? You decide! P. I. Yarnsmith
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