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    #51
    Originally posted by Incandenza View Post
    since I'm now 40 the prostate exams have started, so I've accepted that it's time for that part of my body being explored.
    These days that is tested by blood sample.

    As for there being no ice-cream in Africa, I suspect y'all are thinking of the absence of snow this Christmas time. Of course there's ice-cream in Africa. Granted, mostly in freezers in shops, but there are gelaterias, and lots of soft-serve.

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      #52
      I was thinking about this (not eating what we used to; not Greenlander's hours or Vietnamese ice cream vendors) earlier, and realised that because Missus SB has a couple of allergies I have, by default changed my diet. The weird thing is that although I find the idea or a restricted diet terrifying, almost completely eliminating shellfish and (an odd one) undercooked egg white has been utterly painless. They are small food groups, so perhaps my response would be different if it was wheat or meat or milk. It turns out, though, that I really am not upset to not eat lobster or 73 degree eggs. Which surprises me, thinking about it.

      The worst part is that in the US lots of people sneak shellfish in to all kinds of things - all kinds of asian things, of course, but also you find high-end restaurant menus with almost nothing shellfish free - and it seems odd for a country that has a large and visible Jewish population who you'd think would be very insistent on alternatives being readily available and on the ingredients being very visible.

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        #53
        Yeah. I've a good friend who's seriously allergic to shellfish. He works in movies so often eats from the food truck. Most of the time this is good quality and well labeled, but awhile back he ate deep fried fish, he mistook for deep fried chicken (they were side by side.) The staff freaked out, but knowing panic only makes his reaction worse, he just went and sat by himself until the ambulance arrived. It's a real minefield, he's used to it but I don't know if I could be.

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          #54
          I think peanut allergy is a bigger hazard than shellfish in most places, but I can see how there’d be unidentifiable shellfish in Asian-American food and a lot of SoCal food.

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            #55
            I work for a pretty big employer who have around a quarter of the UK ports business employing the best part of 3000 people. I won't mention them by name, but you should be able to work it out if you wish. A couple of workmates got threatened with disciplinary action for posting pictures of them outside a sister port a few years back so I remain guarded.

            However our outpost (and by that I mean the actual operations department not the associated office staff or management) of the empire consists of ten full time employees and a handful of folk on zero hours contracts so we don't feel part of it at all. Our union represetation is shite even though a handful of us are members of Unite. Every year on my Any Questions part of the pay ballot I mention working hours but nothing ever happens. With less than one per cent of the total workforce is it any wonder, though the amount of times they call me about life insurance leads me to feel ambivalent about them too. The only positive is that we're a dead tight team. Staff from other ports that do come our way are shocked at our antipathy towards our local management (last week they laid on a staff bbq before work and my oppo refused to speak work to any management until his official start time). We always refuse to do anything we're asked outside our work but our working hours remain shit. Considering we are officially a 24/7 port we are chronically under staffed. My oppo and me had a relief a couple of years back, but he's never been replaced and whereas before our manager could do our job and would help out, the present incumbent doesn't even understand our quayside hieroglyphics so is no use at all. My oppo had to work 17 days straight when I was on holiday last year - it won't happen again they said yet still no replacement to help us out. It's easy to piss him off though - I refuse to answer any calls or emails from him (or anyone outside my oppo) outside my rostered hour and it drives him mad. He never answers if ever have to call him at stupid o'clock or a rest day so I call that even.

            When I started my dad said I'd joined a great company. He'd worked for an independent port so knew a good thing when he saw it, but the fact of the matter is that my mentor who left a decade ago earned £5k more then than I do now, while the dockers, or port operators to use the modern parlance are still a couple of grand short of their forefathers earnings in 2005. Part of me resents them as they took share options and above inflation pay rises in lieu of terms and conditions, but it is still, believe it or not, an enjoyable place to work. Last night I was in for all of two hours of a rostered four hour shift and the best part of that was spent drinking coffee so I don't have it all bad.

            Look, thanks for all your concern, I'm certain my employers aren't breaking any rules, but I'm also certain they push them close. We get small victories over them all the time and it drives them mad.









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              #56
              Right, but you can digest ice cream, correct?

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                #57
                Thanks for sharing that Greenlander.

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                  #58
                  Port life sounds like a good life.

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