BYC Café

[ShrekDawg]

I tried my best to keep goats and did for a few years. It was always fun watching the kid goats romping and playing but contrary to the old saying goats do not eat everything. So I still had to mow the pasture to keep it from being too snakey. The goats running and playing in the field would turn up rocks that you wouldn't see which would ruin a mower blade. Constantly getting their heads unstuck out of the fence. I finally called it a day and sold them. Field does look a little empty though.
Thanks for the coffee. Nothing on the to do list today except put a new ignition switch on the mower. The old one is proving to be difficult coming off. Something to do with these old stiff hands I believe.

Oh wow that’s terrible! We have a lot of brush and wooded areas and weeds and stuff so I think I would put them in there instead of the grass part. I’m thinking I want sheep though too so I might get sheep instead or get both and put the sheep once the grass haha

 

[DobieLover]

Are they going to close the site you work at?

Most of it, yes.

 

[igorsMistress]

Hello, Cafe.
Not good morning.
The company that I work for has been acquired by TTM, the largest N. America PCB manufacturer. Asset transfer to begin next month with "shadowing" of key processes by TTM personnel for intellectual property transfer. Physical inventory transfer to occur beginning 4th Qtr.
Some current employees will either be made an offer to move to Chippewa Falls WI to the main fabrication plant or other TTM owns facilities. Some will also be offered positions at the current companies Endicott site and/or the Binghamton site.
Ra ra. Like it's even an option for me to drop everything and just move.
I'm going for my first mammogram today. Maybe I'll get even more great news from that.

Breathe and take it one step at a time. I know, easier said than done sometimes. You're a talented, smart woman. You can do this!

The smash and bash news will be good. Know it.

 

[Shadrach]

Most of it, yes.

Are any of the alternative sites withing traveling distance?
Do you know yet if they will offer you a place at one of the alternative sites?
I don't know how it works where you are but one really unpleasant ploy by large companies 'resizing' in the UK was to offer 'alternative sites' knowing full well that many of their employees were unable or reluctant to tear up roosts and move.
Some offered 'relocation packages' while some of the better companies paid redundancy payments and the level of such payments got set by negotiation.
Before I became a chicken minder and bucket boy I was an engineer and I represented the 'workforce' at just such negotiations. It wasn't pretty.

 

[Bunnylady]

Oh wow that’s annoying! Lol did he break anything?

Here a lot of them are disbudded but I’ve read some people say they think their horned goats are happier than the non horned ones. Guess the disbudded ones are always itching and rubbing (must be uncomfortable) and just seem more miserable.

Spike may have been "happier," but he sure used his horns to make the rest of us miserable. He demolished a 3-sided hay shelter by butting it; I said, "as much as you hate getting rained on, and you destroy the things that shelter you from the rain? I thought goats were supposed to be smart!" The "butt bars" were 2x4's mounted like a shelf just a little bit lower than the point where he was hitting the wall. A 1 1/2-inch board isn't a very satisfying target, and being set at that height, he was likely to bash his face into it if he tried to hit the wall above it. Took all the fun out of it . . . poor Spike.

I had to take the collars off my other goats; Spike learned how to slip a horn in their collars and drag them around. Daisy's legs were buckling when I intervened one time; he came that close to strangling her. I couldn't do anything about his nasty habit of ducking down and catching the other goats' legs in his horns. Though he never actually broke anyone's leg, it wasn't for lack of trying.

 

[sourland]

@DobieLover, CRAP ! There, I said it for you. Did this news come out of the blue ?

 

[DobieLover]

Are any of the alternative sites withing traveling distance?
Do you know yet if they will offer you a place at one of the alternative sites?
I don't know how it works where you are but one really unpleasant ploy by large companies 'resizing' in the UK was to offer 'alternative sites' knowing full well that many of their employees were unable or reluctant to tear up roosts and move.
Some offered 'relocation packages' while some of the better companies paid redundancy payments and the level of such payments got set by negotiation.
Before I became a chicken minder and bucket boy I was an engineer and I represented the 'workforce' at just such negotiations. It wasn't pretty.

That's pretty much the same practice here. None of the locations are within travel distance. No offers have been made with either company. I suppose I'll worry about it if the doors are going to close in a month and I still have nothing lined up. In the meantime, it's ever onward.

 

[DobieLover]

@DobieLover, CRAP ! There, I said it for you. Did this news come out of the blue ?

We all had our suspicions.
TTM bought Anaren, a company we make boards for. Then TTM supplied us with 2 laser drills because we were gated there from producing even more boards for Anaren.
I had seen our General Manager going through sectors with the Director of Engineering pulling together the physical inventory lists.
I'm hoping that I'll be offered a job with my current company as I'm a pretty cheap date, very flexible and have done a wide variety of work for them. I've saved the company 4x my annual salary in reworked boards already this year.

 

[ShrekDawg]

Spike may have been "happier," but he sure used his horns to make the rest of us miserable. He demolished a 3-sided hay shelter by butting it; I said, "as much as you hate getting rained on, and you destroy the things that shelter you from the rain? I thought goats were supposed to be smart!" The "butt bars" were 2x4's mounted like a shelf just a little bit lower than the point where he was hitting the wall. A 1 1/2-inch board isn't a very satisfying target, and being set at that height, he was likely to bash his face into it if he tried to hit the wall above it. Took all the fun out of it . . . poor Spike.

I had to take the collars off my other goats; Spike learned how to slip a horn in their collars and drag them around. Daisy's legs were buckling when I intervened one time; he came that close to strangling her. I couldn't do anything about his nasty habit of ducking down and catching the other goats' legs in his horns. Though he never actually broke anyone's leg, it wasn't for lack of trying.

Oh wow that is terrible!! The horns definitely don’t sound worth it haha although was Spike a buck? Bucks are more nasty anyway, right?

 

[Bunnylady]

Oh wow that is terrible!! The horns definitely don’t sound worth it haha although was Spike a buck? Bucks are more nasty anyway, right?

Spike was a mostly-dairy-breeds wether; tall and bony and named after Snoopy's brother.

DL, I sure hope someone has the sense to recognize what an asset you have been and makes the necessary effort to keep you in the company!