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Last week I had a sore throat that pretty much was mildly annoying for an entire week. I was beginning to think that was all that was going to happen, and then on my midnight-to-6am Thursday morning shift I started getting a runny nose. I warned my boss that I might be calling in that night depending on how I'm feeling, and he didn't seem too concerned because the mill's not putting out any loads and we didn't have much scrap paper to take up there, and the company's gotten really stiff on paying even just one person to wait for something to do.
I woke up Thursday afternoon and felt a little worse, and was running a fever. I debated calling in because I hate calling in when I'm not sure how I'm going to be feeling later on, but the mill is still swine-flu-paranoid and have signs up saying they won't let anyone in that's experienced certain symptoms, so I call in anyway. Good thing I did because I felt worse and worse as the night wore on.
Friday night I'm feeling a bit better, so I start getting ready to go in. Boss calls and asks if I want another night off. Work is still slow, so I say another day off to rest and get well isn't going to hurt me.
Today I call him when I get up and he says he's not sure what's going on and will get in touch with me. If I don't hear from him just go on in. I grab a much-needed shower and when I get out, my mother-in-law gives me his message. Nothing to do today, he's calling both me and my co-worker off tonight.
So that means on my next paycheck I will have a grand total of 6 hours, when I'm used to 42 hours. I'm not too worried because I have savings to help out if necessary, but I may just be able to work around one bad week. I wish our company offered us sick time, though; would make things like this a lot easier. But while the desk workers that could very easily work through a mild cold get their sick time, those of us in the labor intensive jobs that have to meet a quota that we'd be unable to meet if we can't, you know, breathe...screw us.
I woke up Thursday afternoon and felt a little worse, and was running a fever. I debated calling in because I hate calling in when I'm not sure how I'm going to be feeling later on, but the mill is still swine-flu-paranoid and have signs up saying they won't let anyone in that's experienced certain symptoms, so I call in anyway. Good thing I did because I felt worse and worse as the night wore on.
Friday night I'm feeling a bit better, so I start getting ready to go in. Boss calls and asks if I want another night off. Work is still slow, so I say another day off to rest and get well isn't going to hurt me.
Today I call him when I get up and he says he's not sure what's going on and will get in touch with me. If I don't hear from him just go on in. I grab a much-needed shower and when I get out, my mother-in-law gives me his message. Nothing to do today, he's calling both me and my co-worker off tonight.
So that means on my next paycheck I will have a grand total of 6 hours, when I'm used to 42 hours. I'm not too worried because I have savings to help out if necessary, but I may just be able to work around one bad week. I wish our company offered us sick time, though; would make things like this a lot easier. But while the desk workers that could very easily work through a mild cold get their sick time, those of us in the labor intensive jobs that have to meet a quota that we'd be unable to meet if we can't, you know, breathe...screw us.