holllaaaa! the day starts at 8 and goes until 4:30. there are four stations, and you spend 30 minutes at each station. there are four of us working, one for each station, and then two floor managers i guess you would call them, who make sure everything runs smoothly, operate the forklift, and help if someone is falling a bit behind *cough ME cough*
i started at the divider station. the machine pushes forward 6 bottles, i grab a cardboard divider and stick it in between the bottles. then it pushes forward for the next person and 6 more come forward. repeat. for half an hour. it was slightly mindnumbing, but it gave me lots of time to ponder and think about lots of things, as i usually do.
half an hour later, i moved on to the next station, which is just on the opposite side of the conveyor, which is the boxing station. when the 6 bottles come forward with the divider in it, you put a box on them, then it gets moved forward to the machine that closes it. half an hour later, SWITCH!
then its packing onto a pallet. the closed up boxes slide down and you have to pack them onto a pallet in a special pattern so they don't fall. it took me a little bit to figure out the pattern, but by the second time around i got it! these boxes weigh 8 kilos, which is almost 18lbs. the first two layers are fine because the pallet is close to the ground, but by the time you are at the third and fourth, it is basically over my head, so i was getting quite the workout! i was seriously sweating like a mad man. they busted out a step for me so i could reach :) short people problems!
the last station is loading on the bottles. they come in this huge pallet thats wrapped with plastic in 4 layers (almost taller than me!) and you just put them on the conveyor. a lot of the guys who helped me could pick up three in each hand, but i can only pick up two in each hand haha! i only broke one bottle all day, so i was pretty stoked about that! lol
we get three breaks, one around 10:15-10:30, then lunch from 1:30 i think to 2 and then 3:15-3:30 and then we finish at 4:30! it was a super long day, and by the end of it i was pretty sore. i went to the work placement agency after to sign my contract and apparently i need steel toe boots which no one told me about, so i had to run around like a chicken with my head cut off 15 mins before all the stores closed to buy those... $200 later....
uggggh i hope i drop lots of shit on my toes so i get my moneys worth! haha anyways, after that i went to the bar bry works at and had a celebratory first day of work coke and some wedge fries but then had to leave pretty soon after because it started getting dark and my car has no lights, remember? baaaaahahhaa fmlfmlfml.
when i got home, i just unpacked all my crap, made my lunch for tomorrow and now its 8:20pm and i'm in bed writing this and then going to go to sleep! ahhhh i'm so tired. two more days! i have fridays off because they do maintenance on the machines on fridays, and weekends off too which is super nice :) they said the bottling will go until about mid november which is awesome! 87 days of farm work left! i'm going to have very strong arms when this is all done lmao!
ok bed time. round 2 tomorrow in my new boots! goodnight everyone <3
xoxo soph
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