First Day of Work

[tanarill]

And, as these things go, pretty good. I got in at seven, and had about half an hour to talk to my boss before I had to go off to meet the person who actually has technical charge of me, even though we don't work in the same building and we're probably not going to be much in contact.

I was told that I'd be going to see a plant later.

So then I went back to my cube and started hauling my equipment out of boxes. I'm kinda . . . wondering why they felt the need to give me a laptop, as I don't particularly need the mobility and I can't customize it. I mean, what's the point of a laptop if you don't have sysadmin access? But they pulled out all the stops and so I have an enormous monitor, plus brand-spankin' out-of-the-box new keyboard, mouse, and laptop docking station. Tomorrow, I get to go through the fun of banging on it until it works. And possibly calling India.

Then some of the other interns came and picked me up and we went to watch car be made.

And, well. You know those machines from The Matrix which are all clawlike to hold people in place while they injected things and added brain jacks and welded thing to people's spines? Those machines actually exist. I have seen them. Not, admittedly, installing brain jacks. But they were picking up and moving around whole sides of cars, and doing it to tolerances of millimeters. Elegant, big, powerful machines.

The factory itself had a very steampunk'd feel, or would have had there been a. more steam and b. less bright yellow paint. The yellow was everywhere. All the robots are yellow, all the forklifts are yellow, all the paths are in yellow, all the safety cages are in yellow. (Presumably, the cages are to keep the robots, which are bolted to the floor in, when the robot uprising happens.) But the huge steel pillars and the sense that you are a part of a working machine that doesn't care about you? Very steampunk'd. Maybe I should say more technopunk, because there were a lot of screens and fluorescent lights, too.

It takes about two and a half days to assemble a car start to finish, and one day of it is painting it. Cars have between three and six paint layers usually, and they all have to be applied in layers no thicker than, say, twenty thousandths of a millimeter. So it's precision stuff.

I was really kind of surprised to learn that the engine and powertrain go in last. I'd thought you build the car to go first, and then add the interior. But apparently not. And mostly it's people and not machines that put the interior in, bit by bit. The cars themselves move at a little slower than a walk, so while they're moving people can crawl all over them adding bits and bolting them on. The actual line squiggles in a series of U-shapes, a quarter of a mile long and maybe forty feet across. Long assembly line is long. And then the completed cars are set down by these giant claws of cradles and someone drives them off to do final alignment checks, and so on. It made me think of alligator mothers.

But I think the most surprising bit was how clean the whole place was. I mean, you don't particularly think of an automobile factory as top ten on the list of clean air environments, but even around the welding bots, I couldn't really smell the burnt-metal smell of welding. I could, oddly enough, smell cloves. And there was none of this shit where you get trash all over because someone is too lazy to throw things away. The whole place . . . worked.

Now all they have to do is replace the corrugated steel rooftop with a clear plexiglass one, and all will be well.

Title: Maru-Raba
Fandom: Taming of the Shrew
Rating: PG
Warnings: Kissing. Chaste kissing, but kissing.


V.

The thing about watching people be stupid about her sister was that it had given Katharina a keen appreciation for her decision not to be married. Only now she was, and people were still causing trouble over Bianca. At least no one had ever killed for her.

Although she nearly lost control over her laughter when Petruchio declared it was knavery to take another's name.

She watched the confusion with growing amusement. Vincentio, the one they'd met, was obviously the real one, but the man she'd met as Lucentio wasn't. The real Lucentio was the philosophy teacher, whom she'd bested in one debate and not wasted further time on. But if Bianca wanted someone to tell her sweet nothings and buy her nice things, she'd certainly found one.

Of course, no one noticed when Petruchio took her aside to kiss her. No one really noticed how much Katharina, at that moment, wanted to stubbornly refuse his kiss and go home. Except . . . Petruchio did, kissing her long and soft and sweet and, when he pulled back enough to speak, called her Kate and promised they'd leave as soon as this whole stupid charade was over.

Because then, the real fun could begin.


Hmm, that one came out a little . . . iunno. Sad? Nostalgic? One more day, at any rate and then they ride off into the sunset happily ever after. Or something. Anyway.

Supposedly, I'm going on a wind tunnel tour tomorrow. Whoo!