Busiest Saturday I've had in 5 years nearly broke my routine

Two weeks ago we had a run on whole pigs for a local festival. I had 8 orders come in by Thursday morning and I only had 6 hanging in the cooler. Spent Friday afternoon driving 90 miles to a farm in Duncan to pick up two extras. By Saturday night my hands were so cramped I could barely hold a knife. Has anyone else had a weekend that just snowballed like that?

3 comments

3 Comments

jackson.matthew7d ago

Man you gotta watch that grip tension. Not trying to be a backseat driver but if your hands cramped up that bad it means you were holding your knife way too tight. I used to do the same thing when I got slammed and ended up with tendonitis for two months. Loosen up your grip between cuts and shake your hands out every few minutes. Also you mentioned driving 90 miles to Duncan but Duncan's only like 60 miles from most of the meat shops I know around here. Might be thinking of a different Duncan or maybe you took the long way. Either way glad you made it work for those orders.

mary_martin227d ago

Grip tension isn't the real problem here, it's just a symptom of working too fast with too little help. I know guys who death grip their knives all day and never get tendonitis because they're not rushing around like crazy. You had 8 orders for whole pigs and only 6 in the cooler, you shouldn't have been cutting at all that Saturday, you should have been breaking down those pigs the day before when you had time. The cramping is from pushing too hard when you're already behind, not from how you're holding the knife. And honestly Jackson's wrong about the mileage, I've driven from Lawton to Duncan and it's a solid 85 miles depending on which side of town you start from.

mila_brown107d ago

Also nobody's mentioned that the real issue might be your knife isn't sharp enough. A dull blade makes you grip harder and work slower, and that extra force is what actually causes the cramping. If your edge is dragging instead of slicing clean, you're fighting the meat every cut and that wears your hands out way faster than any grip technique. Get that steel true and see if the problem follows.