Today was the 8Th day that I have been working for the Insurance Auto Auction, IAA. I capitalized the name so that you know that's actually the name of the business and not just where I was working. At this auto auction I have been driving cars through the bidding area, shrink wrapping open windows, fixing flat tires, jump starting auto's, tying up keys, sweeping floors, trimming trees, and even dusting.
On the 8Th day I went into work at 8am like I normally do, but this time I didn't really have anyone yet to report to. Since I am a temporary employee for the summer and a college student, the selection of places that I can work is pretty slimming. My boss showed up about 30 minutes later so I just stood around for 30 minutes. I really hate this because I feel useless and really want something to do.
After my boss finally arrived he told me that I needed to sweep the big bay area then help some other people out in the Yard. The Yard is where we keep the cars that are arriving departing, broken, fixed, driving... etc. The bay is where the cars roll through for the auction and were we put the cars that we are wrapping, and the motorcycles.
So the Sweeping took me about 2-3 hours, that must give you some sort of idea on how big this bay area actually is. I'm not the kind of person to just do a quick once over because I feel that if you do something you you should do it right the first time so that someone doesn't have to come back and do it again for you. Before I could get to the big broom sweeper all the cars had to be removed from the bay area. They use these big giant tractor looking things with huge forks on the front. Yes they are forklifts, but the only way to describe them is using the John Deer Reference.
So In the middle of my sweeping I was asked to stop and help out the guy in the yard securing Keys and shrink wrapping up the windows of the vehicles that don't go up or are broken out. There is allot of this, after all this is called the Insurance Auto Auction so most all of the cars are Totalled Vehicles. In the middle of that I get someone asking me to go break off some emblems from a few Geico cars, Trail Blazers to be exact, and give them to the Geico Guy in the office.
Now when I was in the middle of that I was asked to help find some cars that were in the yard because they needed to be moved up to the front for loading.
Finally I fished all of those tasks and I think is was about 12 or so, so I went to lunch. 1 hour. After Lunch I was asked to do a quick finish up on the sweeping job. As I mentioned earlier I don't really like doing things half way, but I went ahead and did it the way I had been asked.
Then I was asked to cover and Heat Wrap some cars for Hold. Now I have no idea why we are holding cars that are Totalled. I can see why we shrink wrap them, but not for hold. I learned a new technique using a Propane Heat guy to shrink wrap a car.
The first car was a pretty easy car to do, it was pretty much fully intact and didn't have a bunch of sharp edges or anything to pierce the Plastic Heat Wrap so it went pretty smoothly.
The second car on the other hand had no rear axle, the roof was caved in and the front window was shattered. There was a big dent in the side were is looked like the vehicle had been smashed. I started to look for a Vin number on this vehicle and couldn't open the drivers door, or see in the front window due to the busted glass every where. So I was told to just get the stock number and have one of the associates look it up for me in the front.
First I took the big giant plastic sheeting and fanned it over the car, pulled in in a few different Directions and - SLICE... I cut my Finger. There was a shard of glass sticking up that I couldn't see once I put this Big White Plastic sheet over it I was done for. At that Point I looked at my finger and thought, wow, I could have sliced that right off. But instead I only took a cut about an inch wide and and about and eighth deep. I went cleaned it up and grabbed a finger band aid so that I didn't bleed all over the place. Finished up with the Car, Using I heat gun to shrink up the plastic and tying the whole thing in place with wax twine.
So I finished that vehicle and then had to do another. This time the vehicle wasn't much of a vehicle at all it looked more like a totalled wreck that I'm pretty sure not many people would have survived. Toyota Camry, which I couldn't tell until I looked at the twisted mangled trunk that was about in the middle of this Garbage Heap of Metal. I twined it Wrapped it and Heat Gunned it... Next Thing I knew, it was 5pm and time to go home.
