Short Trip to Arkansas

This weekend we visited our good friends, Dick and Wanda, who live in Bella Vista, Arkansas.  They used to live in Wisconsin, and we met them about fifteen years ago when they joined the camping club we belonged to.

Several years ago they sold their home in Wisconsin and spent a year traveling in their motorhome. They found they really liked the Bella Vista area and bought a condo.

Bella Vista is a little over two hours from Coffeyville so we left Saturday early afternoon and came back last night. On Saturday afternoon they took us to Bentonville, Arkansas which is the headquarters of the Wal-Mart Corporation.

There is a Wal-Mart museum in downtown Bentonville located in the first Walton’s five and dime store which opened in 1950. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera so I only have a few pictures taken on my phone.

 

 

 

It was very interesting to learn about Sam Walton and how he and his brother built the Wal-Mart empire. I know there are a lot of Wal-Mart haters out there, but I must say I got the impression he was a nice guy, with good values and an excellent business sense. Since he opened his first Walton’s store in 1950, Wal-Mart has grown to 8,700 stores worldwide with gross sales of $450 billion in 2010.

Our next stop was the Crystal Bridges Art Museum building site. The museum is set to open on November 11. Alice Walton, daughter of Sam Walton, had the idea to built a museum of American art in Bentonville. The Wal-Mart Foundation has donated $1.2 billion to make her dream become a reality. It’s really quite something and will made Bentonville a destination for many tourists and art lovers.  I read that part of the donation was to ensure admission to the museum will be free.

There is a trail through a beautifully landscaped public garden to get to the viewing deck to see the museum. It’s a very impressive complex with two ponds formed by the Crystal Springs. Barbara Bush was there on Saturday for some type of special function prior to the opening of the museum. There was a police officer stationed at the viewing deck.

The fall colors were spectacular in Bella Vista. What a beautiful part of the country.

Saturday night we all felt a shaking sensation. Turns out there was an earthquake in Oklahoma, and we felt it in Arkansas. I’ll be interested to hear what people around here have to say about it.

On Sunday we played 18 holes of golf with Dick and Wanda. They belong to a couple of golf leagues so we were part of their outing. Kevin won $9 for the lowest net score. The skies were cloudy, but temps were in the 60s, so we had a pleasant day and a great time golfing with good friends.

After golf we went to a local pizza place, enjoyed some delicious pizza and watched the Packers beat the Chargers. We had no idea how many Packer fans there are in Arkansas.

Thanks Dick and Wanda for inviting us to visit. We had a terrific time!!

Don’t wish upon a star – Reach for one!

Technical Difficulties

This has been a week of technical problems. I had some eBooks on hold through the public library. I got an email on Sunday letting me know one of the books was available. That’s great as I has just finished a book.

I downloaded the book to my computer and they hooked up my Sony Reader to transfer the book. When I dragged and dropped the book to the Reader, it didn’t transfer and I got a message the program was not responding. I tried a few times, with the same result each time. As it was time for bed, I gave up and figured I’d deal with it on Monday morning.

When I turned on my computer on Monday morning, it wouldn’t start. I tried a safe mode start and some fixes I knew of, but it wouldn’t start no matter what I did. I have a four your old Toshiba laptop with Vista. I’ve never had a problem with it, but wondered if it would be worth fixing.

Since we’re in an unfamiliar area, I went online on Kevin’s computer and found a few places that do computer repair in the area. No one answered my calls, so I left a few messages. A young man named Mike who owns his own computer repair business in Independence, was the first to call me back. I told him the problem, and he said he would try to fix it. He also told me that Vista is a bear to work with. He even volunteered to pick it up at the RV park as he was driving right by.

He came by Monday afternoon before we left for work and said he’d have an answer for my the next day. We agreed he would call if the cost was over $55. Tuesday afternoon he called and said it was fixed. He offered to bring it back to us. The total cost with tax was $60. Mike sure knows his stuff and gave us great service.

Apparently, some spyware had gotten into my computer. I am pretty good about doing scans and being proactive to prevent this kind of thing, but this time they got me. Mike checked everything else out, and he said it all looked fine.

So, now the computer is working. I hooked up the Reader again, and still couldn’t get the book to transfer. I did a little troubleshooting online, and ended up uninstalling and reinstalling the program. Still no luck.

I emailed Sony and told them my problem. I couldn’t believe I had a response within an hour. They had me reformat the Reader itself. Still not working. I emailed them back and they told me I should call their customer service number because it was too complicated to handle via email.

We had to go to work, so that call had to wait until this morning. By now I’ve had two days with poor sleep, and I must admit I was a bit crabby about the whole thing. Kevin will confirm that :)

I called Sony Technical Support and told them of my problems. Jose had me to go a site where he could access my computer remotely. I could see everything he was doing. He did some checking and thought it was not the Reader, but something in the computer program or the connection. He had me switch the cord to another USB port. Still no luck. He asked me if I was using the cord that came with the Reader. I didn’t know. I found the box, and there was the cord that came with the Reader still in the box.

I had been using a cord that came with my cell phone to tether it to my laptop. It had been working fine, but apparently the cord had gone bad. I changed the cords, and presto! It worked!!!

I am so impressed with Sony’s service. Although my Reader was still under warranty, I was worried I wouldn’t be able to get any help figuring out what was wrong with it. The response from Sony was excellent.

So, now all the technical gadgets are working well again. I love technology; but when it’s not working, it can be so frustrating. I’m surprised I didn’t think of the cord as the problem. I knew about cords going bad, just never thought of it. I blame it on being tired.

Things at Amazon have been a little slow this week. They actually asked for volunteers to go home early last night, and were asking for people to not come in tonight. We’re here to earn money, so we don’t volunteer to leave. I think people are waiting for the Black Friday deals to start, and then the shopping frenzy will begin. We did end up getting sent home an hour early last Friday, but that’s not so bad.

The items I’ve been seeing a lot this week are a new book by David Baldacci and CDs by Susan Boyle and Michael Buble. I may be strange, but sometimes I wonder what the story is behind the orders. Is it a teacher ordering multiple copies of a book? Who are these people buying all the gourmet cat food? Is the person who ordered $180 worth of cake decorating books starting a business? Why are so many people buying cereal and peanut butter from Amazon? Is there a baby boom, because I sure am packing lots of baby stuff? I know, I’m strange.

It’s raining today which is a good thing. This area is very dry. It’s the first rain we’ve seen since before we left Wisconsin.

Don’t wish upon a star – Reach for one!

Little House on the Prairie in Kansas

I remember watching Little House on the Prairie when I was a girl. The TV show took place in Minnesota. I’m sure I read some or all of the books, but I don’t remember much about them.
So, I was surprised to find that there is a site about thirty miles from here where the Ingalls family lived for over a year from 1869 to 1871.

It’s just a little site in a rural area outside of Independence, Kansas. There is a reproduction of the cabin the Ingalls lived in, as well as a historic school and post office that were moved to the site from the surrounding area. The school is on the left, the post office in the middle, and the log cabin on the right.

Can you imagine a family of five living in this little cabin? I think it’s probably less square footage than our RV. And, we don’t have three children living with us.

There’s only one bed, so I’m thinking the children slept on mats on the floor.

Not a very comfortable looking chair.

There was a map that showed the places the Ingalls family lived. I didn’t realize how much they moved around. The lived in Wisconsin, Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota and North Dakota. I love finding these little out of the way places. This is someplace we never would have visited if we were living our old life. But, what the heck, since it was only thirty miles away, why not.
On the Amazon front, we finished our second week and have both received our first paychecks. Yeah! I have not gotten any response to my two emails regarding switching to days, so it looks like we are stuck on the night shift. While it’s not ideal, I’m managing and we’ll end us with some extra money for working nights, so it will have to do.
It’s interesting to see the many items people order. According to what we were told at orientation, Amazon’s business is up 60% over last year. So, I guess not everyone is hurting from the bad economy. We packed a lot of the new Steve Jobs and John Grisham books last week, as well as the Captain America DVD.
Last night, Amazon arranged for the party room at the local Pizza Hut, and invited seasonal camper workers to attend at your their expense. Our friends Janie and John are also working at Amazon, and they had just arrived on Thursday. So, the four of us went to the Pizza Hut gathering. There were more people than they had room for in the party room, so we ended up in a booth outside of the room.
We didn’t get to connect much with any of the other workampers, but we had a nice time with Janie and John and enjoyed a good meal together.
Tomorrow we start week three. Time is going fast. Before we know it, we’ll be done working, and have spending money in the bank.

Meeting Fellow Workampers

We’ve been off of work for four days in a row. I’m actually getting a little bored. I didn’t pull out any of my quilting stuff because we won’t have this kind of downtime again, so we’ve just been taking it easy. That’s a good thing, since tomorrow we start our next work week.

The weather has been fantastic. Highs near 80 degrees every day and mostly sunny. We had a little rain overnight, but nothing severe. We were fortunate that the storms went to our south. About an hour south of us they had baseball sized hail.

We’ve been taking walks around the campground every day to keep our feet in shape. While out walking, we’ve met a few other couples who are working at Amazon. I had read comments from two of them regarding working at Amazon on the RVDreams.com forum. We also met our youngest son’s girlfriend’s aunt and uncle, who are also full-time RVers. They got here two weeks before we did. Small world, isn’t it :)

On Friday night, we sat outside for a few hours and chatted with our next door neighbors. They’ve been fulltiming for about a year and have a toy hauler in which they haul their Harley Davidson motorcycle. Only the husband is working at Amazon. Did I mention that there are quite a few couples where only the husband is working? I was surprised by that.

It’s nice to meet other fulltimers. It’s a good opportunity to share information and learn from others. On Saturday there is a gathering for the Amazon Camperforce workers at the Pizza Hut in Coffeyville. We’re planning on attending.

We watched some Redbox movies this week, the latest Transformer release and Bridesmaids. We were a bit disappointed in Bridesmaids. It had it’s moments, but dragged in quite a few parts. Also, in my opinion, some of the intended humor was more ridiculous than it was funny.

The Green Bay Packers game is not on TV in this part of the country today. Kevin has his satellite radio all set up so he can listen to it. This is exactly why he got the service, can’t be missing those baseball and football games.

I’m cheering for the Texas Rangers to win the World Series. The Cardinals beat our Brewers, so they’re on my **** list!

Go Packers!!!!

Don’t wish upon a star – Reach for one!

One Down, Nine To Go

We survived our first week, nine to go.

As I said, it’s not as bad as I thought it would be. For me, the worst is adjusting to the night shift. I’m able to sleep between five and six hours before waking up. I normally am not one to take naps, but I did nap for about 30 minutes yesterday. We don’t plan on keeping this crazy sleep schedule on our days off. I hope to get a very good night’s sleep tonight :)

The second hardest thing is being on your feet for 10 hours. Packing on the line does give you the opportunity to move around a bit, so you’re not completely standing in one spot all the time. But, after the first 8 hours, my feet are pretty sore. However, the next morning I’m feeling fine again, just tired.

Time does go pretty fast. There’s always another order to pack. Last night we found out that two of the lines are for big orders. That involves preparing larger boxes and filling those orders. A lot of diapers, formula, and bulk food items. These lines seem to have the most problems. Because of the size of the items, they sometimes get stuck in a chute or go down the wrong one. So, you spend a lot of time looking for your items or getting help from the problem solving desk.

Each shift you work the first half of the shift on one line, and then they switch you to another one for the second half. It’s supposed to help keep everyone from doing the same repetitive motions. I definitely like the smaller order lines better. Working the big order lines involves much more bending and lifting.

It’s quite interesting to see some of the products Amazon sells. I’m surprised by the amount of food products, things like boxes of cereal, peanut butter and coffee are popular items. Also, lots of baby and electronic items. Many of the orders are for books. I noticed lots of religious books, maybe it’s a sign of the times. Some of the most unusual items have been some adult rated items. I packed a book called “Tickle His Pickle”. And yes, it’s  what you’re thinking :)  I also packed a box of adult playing cards. Kevin had an order for powdered peanut butter. We’ve never heard of that.

I’ve had quite a few comments on my last few posts with questions, so I’m going to try to answer them all. Our shifts are ten hours. Amazon is paying the full cost of our site. I was surprised to learn that quite a few of the couples here only have one of them working at the plant. Amazon still pays for the full site.

The first two nights I wore tennis shoes. Last night I wore my Merrell hiking shoes. They were a bit more comfortable because the soles are thicker. You are not allowed to wear toning shoes. They have been deemed to be a trip hazard. I have a pair of Avia toning tennis shoes, and they are the most comfortable shoes I’ve ever had. So, I was bummed that I couldn’t wear them. Kevin says his back and feet have not been hurting.

There are no pads on the floor on the lines because you have to roll your cart up and down the line to the chutes that have orders ready. There is an area called singles where you stand at a station and pack single items. There are mats in that area. We’ll probably have to work there at some point, as well. I think standing in one spot, even with a mat, would be harder. We’ll see.

Amazon has hired some returning workampers to be Seasonal Camper Coaches. There is a lady (I forgot her name) who has come around the last two nights and asked us how things are going. I told her about our problem of not getting the shift and job we thought we had signed up for. She said many people have the same complaint. She heard there was an HR meeting last week where it was decided the only way to get anything changed would be with a doctor’s excuse. So, I’m thinking we’re stuck with this shift. Of course, we could just leave. But, let’s face it. Everyone is here for the same reason, for the money. Between the two of us, we will make about $10,000 in 10 weeks. We feel the pay-off is worth it. So, we’re staying and will deal with it. After all, only 9 weeks to go :)

I’d like to welcome several new followers. It seems this Amazon topic is of interest to quite a few of you. I’ll keep giving you as much information as I can. Keep asking questions, so I know what you want to hear about.

Don’t wish upon a star – Reach for one!

We Survived Our First Night!

And, it wasn’t that bad!

We spent the first half of our shift getting trained. There was one other couple getting trained with us. Our trainer, Tammy, took us through a simulator program that showed us how to do the packaging job, and what problems might arise.

We’re in Crisplant where all of the orders get packaged. It’s quite amazing how it all works. I think this is the least favorite area to work because it is quite noisy. There are many different types of conveyors all over the place, creating lots of noise.

After our lunch break (I’ve never had lunch at 10:00 p.m. before), we were assigned to a line and began working for real. There are eight lines that run the length of the warehouse. The lines are split into sections, and you are assigned to a couple of sections. Each section has 24 chutes in it, 12 up and 12 down.

Conveyors are bringing orders to the chutes. You are assigned to a cart for certain sections of the line. The cart is equipped with a computer, boxes, tape, labels and packing materials.

The chutes have lights on them. When two lights are blinking, that’s a priority order and you do those first. When one light is blinking, you fill those orders as you can. So, you’re pushing your cart along your part of the line, stopping at the ones that have the flashing lights, and filling those orders. This allows you to not stand in one spot all of the time.

Each chute has a bar code with it. You scan the code, and the computer tells you what size box to use, and what items are in the order. Most of the time, the correct items are in the chute. If there’s anything missing, it’s usually in a chute nearby, and it’s because the conveyor dropped it down the wrong chute.

The tape machine has buttons coded to match the box codes. You push the button corresponding to the box you’re using, and it spits out the correct size packing tape, already wet. I had the most trouble getting the tape on some of the larger boxes. Kevin and I both wore gloves to keep from getting glue all over our hands.

They provide the gloves, as well as earplugs for the noise. I didn’t find the plant noise that bad. I put in the earphones when they started blasting music. There are a lot of young people working in this area, and they like their music loud :)

I hope this isn’t too confusing. I’m trying to explain it the best I can because many people have expressed an interest in how it works.

My feet and knees were quite tired and sore by the end of the night, but nothing I can’t deal with. I did take some ibuprofen about halfway through the night, and that helped. I went to bed at 4:30 a.m. and slept until 10:30 a.m. I took a Tylenol PM before going to bed because I was very worried I’d be up after only a few hours. Hopefully, after a few nights, my body clock will adjust.

So, while our job and hours are not what we were expecting, it’s not as bad as I thought it would be. We’ll be able to do it, and are making more money by working nights. If they are able to switch us to days, we’ll still take it. 

Our normal shift will be M, T, Th, and F from 5:00 p.m. to 3:30 a.m. This week because we had training on Sunday, we’re working M, T, and W. Then we’ll have a four day weekend before our regular shift starts next week.

We met quite a few members of the Camper Force (that’s what we’re called) last night. Most of them are not doing the job they thought they were getting. So, I think the hiring process was a bit misleading. Everyone seems to have a pretty good attitude about it. After all, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. And, face it, we’re all here for one reason. To make some decent money for a short period of time. Amazon even has a logo for us :)

I think it will be worth it. By working at Amazon, we’ll be able to enjoy the winter without working. We like that trade-off!

Don’t wish upon a star – Reach for one!

A Hitch in the Process

Yesterday was our orientation day at Amazon. We were told it would be from 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The first order of business was to take everyone’s picture for the ID tags. Then we walked through part of the warehouse to one of the training rooms.

There the group of 38 was split into two. Our group went on the two hour safety training tour. Everyone was given a radio with an earphone so we could hear our leader. That worked very well. He took us all around the warehouse, and showed us everything we needed to know about safety. He taught us how to be safe around the conveyor belts and fork lift trucks. We learned the correct way to push the carts, lift boxes, move pallets, pick up totes, etc. Most of it was common sense, but we got a good look at the warehouse. It’s huge, over one million square feet. Crisplant, which is the packing area for multi-item orders, was the loudest part of the plant due to a chain conveyor system that goes around overhead.

After we were done with the safety tour, we went back to the training room for lunch. They provided us with turkey and beef sandwiches, veggies and dip, and soda or water. It was simple but good. They raffled off a few prizes, tote bags, coffee mugs, shirts. We didn’t win.

After lunch the second group went on the safety tour, and we watched videos on harassment, diversity, business ethics, the usual HR stuff. We sat around for a few hours doing nothing while they got each person set up with passwords and checked documentation. This afternoon session seemed rather disorganized. There was paperwork to complete, and then we finally left at 6:30 p.m. We got paid for all hours we were there, so, although sitting around for a few hours with nothing to do was a bit annoying, it wasn’t all that bad.

We had a chance to talk to some of the other people. A few were returning. I was surprised they had to go through the whole orientation process again.

The hitch came when we were told what our jobs would be. They didn’t tell us until the end of the day after we had already done all of the rest of the process. We were told we would be working as packers in Crisplant on the night shift. WHAT????? That’s not at all what we thought we signed up for!

When we had our phone interview and were hired in April, we were asked what our preferences were. We told Paul, the interviewer, that we did not think we could stand in one place for 10 hours and would prefer walking. He suggested the picker job for us. We also told him we wanted to work days. Kevin and I both got the impression from that interview that we would be given the job of pickers on the day shift.

So, you can imagine that we were pretty shocked to find out that we were given the exact opposite of what we asked for. Paul was doing the training, so we talked to him about it. He said there must have been a mistake, but didn’t know if he could do anything about it at this time. He told us he would try to get us on days.

Those of you who know me, know that I am so not a night person. Working from 5:00 p.m. to 3:30 a.m. is going to be very hard for me. I have a very hard time sleeping during the day. We were also given the doughnut shift which is Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday. We would have preferred working four days in a row, so we could have three days off. Oh well, that’s not the worst. We can deal with that.

So, we start our night shift job today. I’m going to give it a try and hope that Paul can get us switched to days. Kevin is much more of a night person, so he thinks he can handle it. Time will tell, but I’m pretty bummed about all of this.

The good news is that the night shift gets paid $11.00 per hour rather than $10.50.

There was one other thing that was different than we were led to believe. When we were hired, we thought we would each get a $500 bonus if we stayed through Dec. 23rd. That’s not the case. You get a bonus of 50 cents per hour you work, if you stay until the end. That’s more like $250 to $300 per person depending on how much overtime there will be.

So, I’m not too thrilled about this turn of events. But, we drove all the way down here, and we are going to do our best to make it work for us. Who knows, maybe it wont’ be as bad as I think.

There are no phones or cameras allowed inside the plant, so I won’t be able to show you any pictures. Just believe me when I tell you it’s massive.

Don’t wish upon a star – Reach for one!