No Mo' Stow

The Sunday after Thanksgiving all the Camperforce folks were told we'd be leaving stowing and heading for gift wrap for the balance of our time at Amazon.

Yikes!

We'd heard horror stories about gift wrap---standing in one place for hours on end.

But, Amazon was prepared. The official night shift for the rest of the peak season is 57.5 hours per week (6:30 pm to 6:30 am with 1/2 hour unpaid for lunch) five days per week. Camperforce is only required to do 50 hours per week and anything over that is voluntary. But, if we do the 57.5, in addition to OT pay, we'll each get a $100 Visa gift card per week that we work the full shift. That got people pretty excited.

Turns out that gift wrap isn't as bad as we expected. Even though the shift is longer, it's not as physically demanding. Standing in one place for long periods gets painful but no one has complained when I've stopped to walk around a bit. Plus, we get two full days off. The last few weeks we've been working 5 10 hour shifts and then a half shift on Friday, but now we work a couple more hours and have a longer break.

Plus, it's only for two more weeks.

Chris and I spend most of our time processing rather than wrapping. Let's say you ordered three gifts to be wrapped and a couple things for yourself all in one order to be sent to your house. All those items are put on a cart, I scan everything and then decide if the gift wrapped items ought to go in a gift box (things that would be difficult to wrap like clothing or stuff in those hard plastic packages like a razor or remote control), then put it all in a box for shipping and send it down the line to be wrapped.

Now...here's the funny part. We have to build the shipping boxes (after figuring out which size to use, which can be tricky). The tape that seals the boxes comes out of a machine pre-measured and it's wet like wallpaper. So, imagine holding a wobbly unsecured box in one hand, hitting the button on the machine for the tape and it comes spitting out.

It's like a toaster that shoots wet wallpaper.

You have to catch it mid-flight because if it lands on the counter, it's a big mess.

If you are wrestling with a box and happen to hit the button, it will also shoot out a warm gooey strip of tape.

So the next time you get a package from Amazon, appreciate the tape!