Posted on 02/26/2011 1:38:34 PM PST by Squawk 8888
I’m not the wiener peeler, I’m the wiener peeler’s son, And I’m only peeling wieners, ‘Til the wiener peeler comes.
I apologize to pheasant pluckers’ sons everywhere for stealing their tongue-twister.
But who can resist when my Internet fairy, Irene, drops this job ad on my desk? “Get out your resume,” she purrs.
I pause in processing Moonlight Lady submissions, and take a boo.
“Full-time Wiener Peeler,” says the ad.
Wazzat? I ask. A red-hot stripper?
“No. As in weenie. It’s got you written all over it, ” says Irene, and she flutters off.
Well, I’m getting sick of grinding out daily columns like hamburger. So I read on.
“Opportunity. Excitement. Teamwork. Respect.
“At Maple Leaf Foods we are committed to attracting, rewarding and retaining talented people who are passionate about making a positive impact in their professional and personal lives every day.”
A noble mission. What better way to pursue it than as a bona fide full-time professional wiener peeler. The opening is at Maple Leafs’ hotdog plant in Hamilton.
Imagine the awe when you tell fellow partiers your occupation.
Picture the lineup of schools recruiting for career days.
The teachers may giggle, but the kids will scream for free samples.
You’re on Price Is Right and Drew Carey says, “What d’ya do for a living up in Canada, Mikey?”
I peel wieners, Drew.
“Good for you. Wiener peeler. Hmmm. reminds me, folks, get your pets spayed or neutered.”
Anyway, I check around and find yet another job opening at Maple Leaf. Wiener stuffer. Hit it ...
I’m not the wiener stuffer
I’m the wiener stuffer’s son
I’m only stuffing ...
(Ed. note: Stop that, you hotdogger, or we’ll make you pose for a picture like Gilles Duceppe in the silly hairnet.)
NO! Not that! I’ll do anything, boss.
The photo of Duceppe in a cheese factory was a body blow to the Bloc. He looked like a weenie. Un chien chaud. Un hotdog.
I wonder. How do wiener peelers and stuffers look? All dressed?
I call Linda Smith at Maple Leaf Foods and ask: What company wit came up with those job titles?
“They’re in the union contract,” she says. “They’re really a kind of food-processing operator.”
So machines do the actual stuffing and peeling. Thank God. I can’t imagine sitting there all day, fingers numb, going, “hundred thousand and one weenies, hundred thousand and two weenies, hundred thousand and ...”
The wiener stuffer fills the tubular collagen casings with hot dog sludge. Since you asked, the ooze typically comprises mechanically separated chicken, pork, beef, water, wheat gluten, salt, sodium phosphate, spice, dextrose, corn syrup solids, sodium erythorbate, garlic powder, onion powder, sodium nitrite and smoke.
If you need to ask what mechanically separated chicken is, don’t.
Or go eat a veggie burger.
Once the dogs have been divided and smoked and solidified, the wiener peeler removes the casings.
The stuffer and peeler look like hazmat officials or Apollo astronauts.
They wear blue rubber and plastic head to toe, with hairnet, hardhats and mask. Plus earmuffs. Yes. All those dogs barking.
The hirings, says Smith, are to gear up for summer, when 60% of wieners are sold.
What a great job, eh?
I assume you get to take home any bent, twisted or otherwise defective wieners.
And you’d be in the pantheon of careers with chicken sexer, pet food tester, bounty hunter, odor reader, fortune cookie writer, golf ball diver and newspaper hack.
Plus, you’re wrapped in a soft, warm union. The Brotherhood of Bun Fillers (BBF), or whatever it’s called.
I can picture the negotiations:
“We want a raise, a longer lunch, three weeks holiday, dental coverage and pension improvements.
“But hold the mustard.”
The problems are in configuring it or reconfiguring it: I am quite comfortable (and actually prefer) the day-to-day differences of Xubuntu over Windows, but when things go WORNG... it can be a headache (even for me) and there's no place to turn but the Internet.
And I have once in a while spent hours researching a sudden issue ("it comes up but there's no Panel -- why and how do I restore it?") that say that maybe Xubuntu is not yet something for somebody without local help.
Sad. It is SO close... Though I like it! I don't need the flash of Gnome and I've let go of superior (German) KDE; XFCE (Xubuntu) meets my needs. But until they fix the mess that is "administration", it's not for the masses.
The peanut butter sandwich cookies are Do-Si-Dos, and the chocolate-covered peanut butter ones are Tagalongs.
You may recall just after Christmas I was posting (over here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2642021/posts?page=77#77) about a network attached storage device I bought; such a thing may be just what you need. If/when your actual computer bites the dust, all of your valuable files WON’T be trapped on its hard drive.
You can attach such a device to any PC*, and many have two internal drives that the unit continuously keeps as “mirrors” of one another, so if one fails, all of your precious data is still 100% intact on the other drive.
Here’s the unit I bought.
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=290
Setup was easy, and since it shows up in Windows Explorer as a regular hard drive, there’s no learning curve to using it.
I moved ALL of my data folders onto it just as they had been on my PC, and I sleep at night knowing that all of the files I care about are backed up.
* - Many of these devices connect via USB, but some — like mine — need an Ethernet port to connect to; usually on a router somewhere between your computer and the cable coming in from your ISP. Shop for what suits your situation best.
I now have “local help.” What I need more than anything is to get an OS that will take the volumes of data that I need to input without making me crazy in the process.
The frustration comes in not being able to afford what I need.
Gosh. My needs are so much simpler than yours. And I am still not there...
I’m going to bed. It’s been a trying day. See you tomorrow.
Let me help you out. Do you know who said this?
"I may not agree with what you say, but I'll defend your right to die saying it."That was me.
Morgen...
Do si dos... Can I buy them online? I haven’t even checked it out.
What type of data are inputting?
Why do you need a different OS
OpenOffice is free and is a good replacement Microsoft office.
What is bad about being crazy?
Morning. Oh my cute kiteh!!!!
LOL, yes.
:)
Good afternoon! Some of us are going to the Home and Garden Show later, to look at things we’ll never buy like giant outdoor kitchens. Bill is in a snit because we’re making him come with us.
heheheh. Sounds like fun.
Bill is being extremely tiresome. He likes landscaping and home-improvement stuff, but it’s just terrible that he should have to drive to Charlotte (about 20 minutes) with his parents and sisters. Awful imposition on his dignity.
FYI: The package bunneh came, and did NOT stop along the way to nibble the GS Cookies. :o]
Most of my input is personal journals, personal history and genealogy, not only for myself but for other people as well. There are also a lot of business letters and family photos.
There are journals from about 20 years ago that need to be scanned into the hard drive. In other words, lots of paper stuff.
Using Open Office. It takes getting used to.
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