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Jim Mackell
05-12-2015, 3:06 PM
So I'm down in Maryland helping my son with a Murphy bed project. We go to the closest lumber yard "84" and check out their plywood. Priced OK but they don't offer panel saw cuts to break down the full sheets. Off to Lowes. Prices slightly less than 84. Load the cart and wheel over to the cutting station. First couple of sheets break down just fine. 24 inches, 32 inches, etc. Last 2 sheets need to be ripped at 31 3/8. Operator takes long hard look at tape measure and then asks how to find the 3/8 mark.

Well, at least I know if I have to come out of retirement someday, I can always work at Lowes!

PS Murphy bed came out OK!

Jim Koepke
05-12-2015, 3:21 PM
Well, at least I know if I have to come out of retirement someday, I can always work at Lowes!

Maybe some of us old retirees would do the world a favor by coming out of retirement as teachers.

jtk

daryl moses
05-12-2015, 3:54 PM
Operator takes long hard look at tape measure and then asks how to find the 3/8 mark.

!
That's pretty sad.
I had problems in school with fractions when I was a kid. My dad got me a job in a furniture Mfg. for a summer job when I was 16. One of the requirements for the job was knowing how to read a tape measure and a set of calipers. All of a sudden it clicked, reading a rule is fractions!! I learned more that summer about math than I did in 10 years of school.

Chris Padilla
05-12-2015, 4:29 PM
I would have said, "Right next to the 7/16" mark!" :D

However, I'll give kudos to the kid for asking so as to cut things correctly.

Jerry Thompson
05-12-2015, 4:50 PM
My 16 y.o. grandson can't read a map. I have told adults jokes with famous people as the butt of the joke and they have never heard of them. But then again I see and hear about stars and I have no idea who they are.
I can't read a map either, unless I use a magnifier.

Brian Tymchak
05-12-2015, 5:18 PM
Hmm, at my local HD, I had some plywood cut down last year, they had a posted policy that their cuts can be +/- 1/8".

Now maybe I understand why...

Jerome Stanek
05-12-2015, 5:32 PM
When I worked for a ceiling company the bosses sons would help out doing the cuts for us we would call down 11 and 5 meaning 11 5/8 and they would call back how many marks is that.

Lee Schierer
05-12-2015, 6:31 PM
At least he asked before making the cut and sending you home with the wrong dimensioned piece.

Malcolm Schweizer
05-12-2015, 6:40 PM
My wife Is a college professor and has students come to her class that don't know how to read a ruler or add simple fractions like 1/4 + 1/8.

Wade Lippman
05-12-2015, 7:15 PM
I always get them cut oversized just to get them home and then saw them properly. It is a lot less hassle.

68% of registered US voters can't find Belgium on a standard globe.

George Bokros
05-12-2015, 7:16 PM
My wife worked in grocery store and some of the young kids that were cashiering could not make change if the register didn't tell them how much to give to the customer.

Mike Chance in Iowa
05-12-2015, 7:30 PM
My wife worked in grocery store and some of the young kids that were cashiering could not make change if the register didn't tell them how much to give to the customer.

It's not just kids. I still run into adults that can't make change at stores! It seems few people teach their employees to hand the customer the coins first, then the paper. That way, you can accurately count up the money, as well as the customer can easily close their hand over the change without creating a funnel and spilling their coins all over.

As for the Lowe's employee ... I give the employee a gold star for having the courage to ask how to do it and caring enough to want to do it right.

John Conklin
05-12-2015, 7:52 PM
I design huge industrial facilities for a living and our project administrators practically beg us to not use fractions less than 1/2", 1/4" if absolutely necessary. And the workers are described as "trained craftsman".

Jim Matthews
05-12-2015, 8:32 PM
You can find somebody at Lowes to help you? Hardly the standard "uppa heya".

Pat Barry
05-12-2015, 8:52 PM
...Last 2 sheets need to be ripped at 31 3/8. Operator takes long hard look at tape measure and then asks how to find the 3/8 mark.
Thank goodness you were able to find someone else there who could help!

julian abram
05-12-2015, 10:10 PM
At least he asked before he ripped it. :)

Dave Lehnert
05-12-2015, 10:47 PM
I ran a retail Garden center for a big box local chain for years.
We use to have bagged mulch priced everyday for $1.99. The gas station down the street had a big sign "Mulch 4 bags for $10" Not a day went by that at least one customer would walk in and ask "Will you match their price"

Curt Harms
05-13-2015, 8:15 AM
Hmm, at my local HD, I had some plywood cut down last year, they had a posted policy that their cuts can be +/- 1/8".

Now maybe I understand why...

When I've had plywood cut at Home Depot, 1/8" was not enough to clean up the chipping & tearout.

Curt Harms
05-13-2015, 8:18 AM
..................................
As for the Lowe's employee ... I give the employee a gold star for having the courage to ask how to do it and caring enough to want to do it right.

+1 As long as that young person is humble enough to ask and chooses the right people to ask he/she will do okay..

Shawn Pachlhofer
05-13-2015, 11:03 AM
I ran a retail Garden center for a big box local chain for years.
We use to have bagged mulch priced everyday for $1.99. The gas station down the street had a big sign "Mulch 4 bags for $10" Not a day went by that at least one customer would walk in and ask "Will you match their price"
"Yessir, I sure will...I'll even give you 10% off their price"

:D

Steve Peterson
05-13-2015, 12:22 PM
The Lowes near me makes the customer mark the cut. They hand you the tape measure and pencil. If the mark is off, it is your own fault.

The blade is probably 10 years old and they just power it through, so the chipout is horrible. You need to cut everything oversized and trim it down later.

Steve

Kev Williams
05-13-2015, 8:52 PM
A few years ago I bought another used engraver, and I had no more serial or parallel ports to plug into.
The motherboard had room for a couple, so I head off to Radio Shack. The kid working was about 18
years old, prime age for being computer savvy-- I thought.

I told him I needed a couple of PCI LPT ports.
"What's an LPT port?"

My other favorite sign of the dumb-times: Grocery stores that have stuff priced "10 for $10"...

As I get older, I know why they do it... ;)

Chuck Wintle
05-14-2015, 7:39 AM
So I'm down in Maryland helping my son with a Murphy bed project. We go to the closest lumber yard "84" and check out their plywood. Priced OK but they don't offer panel saw cuts to break down the full sheets. Off to Lowes. Prices slightly less than 84. Load the cart and wheel over to the cutting station. First couple of sheets break down just fine. 24 inches, 32 inches, etc. Last 2 sheets need to be ripped at 31 3/8. Operator takes long hard look at tape measure and then asks how to find the 3/8 mark.

Well, at least I know if I have to come out of retirement someday, I can always work at Lowes!

PS Murphy bed came out OK!

on the good side the employee knew enough to pick up a tape measure. The intent to do a good job was there. Unlike an employee I saw once in a bike shop trying to accurately measure a bike axle with a flat ruler and eyeballing the measurement. I was going to suggest a caliper should be used.

Jim Mackell
05-14-2015, 4:45 PM
As many of you commented, at least he asked. He was polite and so was I. Showed him the 1/2 and 1/4 marks and explained that the smaller intervals were the 1/8 marks. You could see the light dawn in his eyes. I was surprised and posted this here not to demean the employee. Just to prove, as so many others have done before me, that the BORG's aren't known for employee training.

Mel Fulks
05-14-2015, 5:44 PM
There is a most attractive woman now working at MY Lowes. Don't know if she is there as a traveling efficiency expert or
what. But she knows everything and is cheerful and helpful, looks happy as an enlightened one. Made me a key the other
day. Brain surgeon could not work with more concentration. Finished off with delightful flourish of the wire brush; first time I have ever had a key made and KNEW it was going to live....I mean work perfectly. Going to mention her to the manager next time I'm there. If she is still there.