Salamanders

This morning was our monthly safety meeting, held in the structural department fabrication shop, a building about 200 feet long by 100 feet wide and maybe 35 feet to the roof. 350 or so workers standing on the concrete and steel plate floor for 40 minutes listening to the company safety manager drone on with his cordless microphone. Or not listening (or not hearing) because either the mike wasn’t up to the task or his mike technique needs work, because it was impossible to hear anything he said except an occasional snippet. In one of these audible snippets he informed us that our eyes wouldn’t grow back if we lost them. (Did we think we were salamanders?) That was enough to satisfy me that I wasn’t missing anything by not being able to hear.

Starner, my supervisor, came back to work today after laying out Monday and Tuesday. He’s the one who last week lectured us on not missing time. Must have been some of his problems getting the best of him, because he showed no sign of being sick when I last saw him on Saturday, nor did he show any sign of being ill today.

Speaking of seeing him on Saturday, he did something strange. He was really pushing the part of the job that Vince has been working on, such that on Saturday he told me to help Vince rather than working my own job. Then, while I stood there, the two of them spent a long time reminiscing about an out of town job they had worked together, where Vince had paid a Hooters waitress $50 for her outfit - - top and shorts - - and how she had gone right then and there to the bathroom and changed out of them for him. What he did with these togs he didn’t say and I didn’t ask. But he insisted on pulling up a photo of himself with her on his cell phone. Well, this whole thing was weird - - both Vince with the Hooters outfit and Starner wasting all that time shooting the bull about it. During this same interlude, Starner showed that he, too, was no stranger to sexual weirdness. He was talking to Vince about doing something that required him to get into a tight spot, and Starner said by way of encouragement, "I could get in there with my 275 pounds," or something to that effect. Then he added, "and 50 pounds of dick." This comment came out of the clear blue. There were no women present (who he might have imagined to be interested in this information), and I’m reasonably sure Starner isn’t gay. Or maybe it was a delayed response to the Hooters discussion. Fortunately, Joe came in late Saturday and Starner put him with Vince. He sent me back to my own job.