Eight Hours Don't Make a Day

- Season 1

(1972)

We are introduced to a middle class family, where one son, Jochen, works in a tool factory and shares close comradeship with his colleagues.When he accidentally meets a young lady, Marion,who has an office advertising job, while going out to get alcohol for a family gathering, a love affair between them develops.

Jochen's grandmother spends time searching for an apartment they can afford with her new boyfriend Gregor, an elderly gentleman she has picked up in a park.When they run across a library space being abandoned by the town authorities, Oma comes up with the idea of taking it over as a kindergarten for the neighborhood kids who have no place to play except the street, and they become do it yourself squatters.

The closely knit comrades at Jochen's tool factory have hoped that one of their own, Franz, would be promoted, after some training, to replace the recently deceased foreman.But their office manager prefers to bring in an outsider, which causes tensions in the workplace.

Prodded by a visit from Marion's strict mother, Jochen plans to marry Marion.Whereas tensions growing between Monika and the overly bossy Harald lead Monika to consider divorce.Many of the characters we have come to know over the previous three episodes meet up, and pair off in interesting combinations, at a drunken party.

With the news the tool factory is relocating to a more remote part of town, Jochen and Marion ask if they can switch apartments with Kathe and Wolf, to be closer to their respective jobs.And with this new inconvenience, the workers at the factory decide to come up with a list of demands, including the impractical-sounding proposal that they arrange their own schedule rather than have it dictated to them by the bosses.