Being any sort of tradesperson must be really hard work. I don’t envy them in the slightest. Long days, tough conditions and really tricky problems to solve makes for stressful work – the type of work that if you’re not careful, could take years off your life. The reason I’m thinking about this instead of doing my own work is that there are commercial gas installers at our office right now.
I’m watching them fix the gas (I assume, I could be wrong because I have no idea about anything related to plumbing) and I just don’t know how they’re maintaining their morale. It’s extremely hot today and they’ve been standing under direct sunlight for hours. I’m feeling the heat and I’m just sitting in my comfortable private office with reverse cycle air conditioning. I feel really bad for the gas plumbers, if I’m being honest.
I wonder if they’re looking forward to the long weekend just as much as I am. I assume they are, if not more. See, this long weekend is going to be great because if you take an extra four days of annual leave, it works out that you get eleven days off in a row. How great is that? I saw that would be the case on the very first day back at work this year and immediately took those four days off. I needed to get in early so that I had guaranteed time off.
I wonder if it’s as competitive to get time off for employees of hot water repair companies servicing Melbourne as it is for general office workers in Melbourne. Maybe next time I get up to make myself a coffee with our fancy coffee machine I’ll ask the commercial plumbers if they’re looking forward to the long weekend and whether they have time off or not. I hope for their sake they do because working when most people have holidays would suck.