Good news, not so good news, and better news.
The good news is I seem to have dodged the layoff. For now.
The not-so-good news is that my hours for the month of February have been cut down to four days a week, a little over 30 hours. Unemployment can make up some of that, but not a lot. Will try to see if the temp agency can help me on weekends like they did during the holidays.
The better news? My precious, after being comatose and in pieces since August, is back up and running after a motherboard transplant. Now on those nights off when I’m wide awake at 4 in the morning I can retire to the front room with a working laptop so I don’t disturb Yes Dear’s sleep.
Note to people who might invest in a used Dell in the future: avoid Nvidia video chip equipped boards, they are highly prone to failure after overheating, and were once the subject of a recall. Since the chip is soldered to the board, the only way to replace it is to replace the whole board. I went out on eBay and bought a motherboard identical to the first except it had a less capable but more reliable Intel video chip. I don’t use my laptop for high-end gaming, so I figured it didn’t matter. After putting it in and putting it all back together I had to flash and update the BIOS so it would recognize it’s old components attached to it’s new brain, and spend an hour or so downloading Windows 7 updates. So far the patient seems to be doing fine, and everything in working order. Let’s hope it stays that way.
So how is everybody’s week starting out?
Congratulations, I’m sorry and Yay!
Are they cutting hours because of the economy or to dodge full time status because of obamacare? Sucks either way.
The economy, our biggest customer is hurting right now. Obamacare hasn’t kicked in here yet and our benefits are still pretty good, though I fully expect that to change by next year, assuming I’m still employed here (big “if”).
My fingers remain crossed that you only have reduced hours and NO LAYOFF! Send them to me if they try it. I’ll obamacare their butts into the local hospital. Or maybe just write them mean letters calling them names.