Blog 33 Being a Printer, Copier, and Collator

(My first official military job!) 

          Since I was already pre-qualified for an advanced medical class, no one knew how long I would be in San Diego. So, they gave us jobs that they normally have civilian employees doing, or jobs needed to be looked over by military people. They put me in the print shop. My boss wore civilian clothes, but he was a warrant officer. There was a seaman that was leaving soon. Another Third Class Petty Officer was already there and me.

            I had to learn how to use the old printer that you made an original copy on pink copy paper, run it through a special fluid that would make the pink part stay wet and the ink part would pick up the ink that was in a special spinner that pulled a new blank sheet through and only the ink would print on the new paper, thus making a copy. Different departments would bring letters or announcements that were only for military or civilians on base. Some days we would get maybe twenty-five with not too many copies, while sometimes, we would be swamped all day with papers that needed mass copies. 

           We had to sort the jobs in accordance to importance. Anything that came from the command office, always went to the head of the line. The only job that went ahead of it was a page called the (POD) Policy of the Day for the next day. It had a deadline to get out. Luckily, we had two printers. One was the “new” model. It went twice as fast as the old one. Many jobs had multiple pages that had to be (1) printed front and back, then (2) collated , and (3) stapled together. Once the seaman left, we flipped a coin to see who had to do them, (At least we were in the basement and got to play music all day.) Sometimes departments would need prints in bulk and/or printed and glued in fifty or more stacks. we had to send them out to a special Print Shop in town. 

            We, also, had to keep and distribute special forms used in the hospital or other departments. We were (officially) opened for distribution three mornings for a half day.(But, the forms could be gotten anytime they needed them,) The forms were named by letters and numbers to help people know what part of the base used them and their importance. (For example : the DOD1051 (fake). This was the Department of Defense form for something. By putting them in alphabetical, then numerical order in our shop, we could distribute them faster. It really sounds like a hard job, but I liked it. Jose, the boss, was hilarious and easy to work for. when we got busy, he would jump in and help. He took me to breakfast once to experience eggs and cow inners (?). He said it was the country’s best breakfast. I used to know the name of it. I think it was machaca(?).

(Extra Duty)

          Every fourth day we were given an extra eight hours of duty. If it was a weekend, you were given sixteen hours. My “friend” and I were given the Emergency Room and Hospital Admittance Office. (I HATED IT!!!!!) If someone came to the ER, they had certain forms to fill out and then we would type them and make a wristband. If they were being admitted to the hospital, we had to to go to their compartment in the ER, or if they were to have early admittance it was at the counter, and then type a triplicate admission, make a special wristband, and type a blue plastic card, like a credit card, to be used in the hospital.

           If the patient died or was brought in dead, we still had to admit them to the hospital, so they could be sent to the morgue. The Catch– if we could not get information off the patient’s information forms, we had to call their family to finish the forms. BUT, we could not call the family until we knew for sure that they had been notified of the death. This could take hours!!!! I will be telling a few stories that happened while I was on duty, just not now. I will tell them in the same blog as my incidences in the print shop. I want to talk about my scouts, my friends, my classmates at college taking Spanish, and a particular girlfriend. I know this makes this a small Blog, but anticipation is fun to pull on you. (tee hee)

• 3rd Mar 2018
• mylife
• 2 Comments
• Uncategorized