I guess after reading my own post, it does seem to shed a bad light of laziness on myself and the trade in general. I guess my point was that at least a little knowledge was passed around during those bullshit sessions, and everyone worked together to get a job done. When I started 27 years ago, i was just a young kid, and had no say in how things were done. This was just the way things were, it was the old timers way of things. I assure you I was not lazy, I spent many hours before and after work honing my skills. You had to learn things after hours if you wanted to become a great mechanic, but during the work day, you did what you had to, so you could become part of the team. Yes, there were many times when an 8 hour work day was much less then 8 hours, yet the jobs were much cleaner, ran much better, and received much more attention then any I have seen since the onset of GPS and the 250 unit route. As I recall, there were a handful of bums, in every company, that did nothing but hang out in the coffee shop all day. they usually shuffled between companies, and everyone knew who they were. For the most part, the majority of the guys, even though they too would meet for coffee, were good men who earned their wage. I believe the managers knew the guys that had exceptional skills and what that brought to the company. These skills translated into an hour off here, or a couple there. and thats the way it was
