We've all the heard the excuse, "The dog ate my homework." A friend of mine actually tried using this old standby in a high-school English class. Unfortunately for him, he forgot what a small town we lived in and his parents were friends with the English teacher, who happened to know he did not in fact own a dog.

Recently, as I was submitting an advertisement to the local paper for some seasonal help, I started thinking of the old dog-ate-my-homework saying in a bit of a different light. I started thinking about all the excuses I've been given over the years by employees trying to explain or justify an absence. Somehow, the dog-eating-my-homework line seemed quite fitting.

More Excuses

But let me point out that I'm very lucky in that I have a terrific group of full-time employees on my staff — eight hard-working and dedicated individuals. With this core group, along with the assistant superintendent, the mechanic and myself, we have to add only five or six seasonal people every spring. Sounds easy, right?

Easy, however, it has never been. Filling out the crew every spring is one of the hardest things I do in the course of a year. Well, actually, the initial filling out of the crew is not usually that hard. An ad in the local paper in March usually elicits a good response and I'm able to hire five or six people from the field. However, those five or six — as good as they seem each year when I hire them — rarely work out.

More Excuses

On average, I'd say one or two may make it through the summer — and that's a generous forecast. Ultimately, I end up running another ad in June once the last of this initial group fizzles out. The second ad doesn't garner as much response, and usually I'm forced to hire the two or three stragglers who come in.

This second group, again, has a low batting average — below the Mendoza line for all you baseball fans. Sometimes, a third ad is needed in August, just to get through to October and past aerification. If this third ad brings in more than one or two, it is deemed a success. In fact, I'm downright giddy if the person I hire from this third ad makes it six weeks.

Why the employees don't tend to last is the stuff of another article altogether. But what I wanted to address here in this article was the incredible array of excuses I get each year from these people who try to explain missing work.

Now, I'm not saying all of these excuses have not been legitimate (excuse me why I clear my throat), but one tends to develop a certain intuition, if you will, regarding when someone is being truthful and when your chain is getting yanked. The pattern is almost always the same. The employee places a sick call about three or four days into the job. Then he makes another sick call a few days later. A third sick call, about a week later, gets a little more creative. And then there's the infamous fourth call, when an employee knows he has to come up with something good. The fourth call is usually an incredibly detailed tale of misfortune and bad luck. It is ultimately this fourth call that tends to lead certain superintendents to contemplate the state of today's youth and where this country is headed.