Index: common.scm
==================================================================
--- common.scm
+++ common.scm
@@ -1880,11 +1880,11 @@
 		      (max maxload-in 0.5))) ;; so maxload must be greater than 0.5 for now BUG - FIXME?
 	 (first   (car loadavg))
 	 (next    (cadr loadavg))
 	 (adjload (* maxload (max 1 numcpus))) ;; possible bug where numcpus (or could be maxload) is zero, crude fallback is to at least use 1
 	 (loadjmp (- first next))
-         (adjwait (min (+ 300 (random 10)) (* (+ (random 10)(/ (- 1000 count) 10) waitdelay) (- first adjload) )  ))) ;; add some randomness to the time to break any alignment where netbatch dumps many jobs to machines simultaneously
+         (adjwait (min (+ 300 (random 10)) (abs (* (+ (random 10)(/ (- 1000 count) 10) waitdelay) (- first adjload) ))  ))) ;; add some randomness to the time to break any alignment where netbatch dumps many jobs to machines simultaneously
     (debug:print-info 1 *default-log-port* "Checking cpuload on " (or remote-host "localhost") ", maxload: " maxload
 		      ", load: " first ", adjload: " adjload ", loadjmp: " loadjmp)
     (cond
      ((and (> first adjload)
 	   (> count 0))