$(*#$&@(*&&$##!!!!!

I'm so annoyed. No, I'm beyond annoyed. I will tell you why so you can be amazed, shocked and possibly angry like me. Oh yes, I will share my anger.

It all starts with two weeks ago. I asked for tomorrow (Super Bowl Sunday) off (obviously two weeks in advance), and was rewarded with working 6 days this week, one of them being Sunday. I was moderately annoyed since I asked for it off (in writing) and nobody talked to me about it, explained anything - nada. So I decided to call in sick. I'm only scheduled to work for 3 1/2 hours, I think they can live without me. And I'll call in the morning and give plenty of notice.

Fast forward to today. The other waitress (I came in at 7 p.m., she came in at 8 p.m.) "wasn't feeling good" and asked if she could go home early. She was scheduled to close, I'm scheduled until midnight. The supervisor said, "Let's see how things go..." At about 10 or 15 minutes before midnight, I asked this other waitress if she'd like to take a break before I left. She said yes. I saw her waiting a few more tables and finally she was gone. For a long, long time.

About a half an hour later, the supervisor comes up to me, visibly pissed. She informs me that the other waitress went home. Without telling anybody. She put her tray down somewhere, gave her "register" to one of the maintenance guys and told them to give it to the supervisor, and walked out the door.

Now here's the really crazy part: She's done it before. She just leaves. Without telling anybody. Just goes home.



What. The. Crap.

I ended up staying until 2:30 a.m. because the bartender was totally overwhelmed. I think I lost money because of people who bought drinks, (I pay the bartender, then when I take the drink to the customer, they pay me), but it took so long to get the drink out to them, they left...

One of the reasons I only work until midnight on Saturdays is because I go to church the next morning. And it took me a long time for them to start changing the schedule so I could have that! Persistence! So I won't be going to church tomorrow morning since it's just after 3 a.m. and I would have to get up at 8 a.m. I'm going to sleep!

At least I'll get to watch the Super Bowl with my neighbors and have fun! I don't feel bad for calling in sick. I'm sure they'll call somebody in if they need to. Maybe that other waitress.

On Being a Waitress

Sadness upon sadness, I have no pictures. And it's hard to get any pictures unless it's of a classroom, work (both which would be hard to explain) or the inside of my eyelids as I sleep.

School is going okay... however... I have exams coming up this week. One in math and one in geology. I'm not as worried about geology (which reminds me - I need to go print out the study guide.), but math is another matter altogether. And it's a strange way to take a test in my opinion. The exam is due BY Thursday. So we get our homework signed off (that we turned it all in) by the teacher, go to this testing room where they also have tutoring and stuff, sign in and they give us the test there. On our own time! Hmph.

Work is interesting. The really raunchy guys have been nicer to me for some reason. I guess they got tired of trying to "break" me. Either that, or it's the eye of the hurricane. Last night was fun (sarcasm! sarcasm!). After being told that I looked "really, really beautiful", another guy told me he knows lots of single guys that he works with. It is his mission to find me a guy. And he said they all make good money because they are carpenters. Hmph. I am, of course, skeptical. Him and his wife and her parents are regulars there. Something to aspire to.

When I left work last night (well, this morning a little after 3 a.m.) I saw a car parked near the door with their lights on and the driver's door open. I am careful, so I stared at the car while the bartender was waiting for me to leave. The I heard, "Ooooh, hoo-hoo-hoo...." She was sobbing. I told the bartender (who was holding the door open still), "There's somebody crying over there, do you want me to go over?" I figured if it were a girl, it would be better for me to go. He said, "Wait, is that Jenny (one of our waitresses)?" Then he went over and started talking to her. She had been drinking after her shift was over and got polluted.

An assist. manager came to the bar and started yelling for the bartender to get in there and hurry up (because she was late on her duties), so I shut the door on her. She had been pissing me off all day and that felt great. It might have shut kind of hard. hehehe.

She was compelled to come to the door then, cigarette hanging out of her long-nailed hand. She then starting yelling for Jenny to come in.
"Jenny. Come in. Jenny. Jenny! Jenny! Come in here! JENNY! We need to finish and get out of here! Jenny! Jenny!" AAAAARRRRRRGGGGG@!$@#)!
I wanted to turn pirate on her really bad.

Jenny would say, "I'm okayyyooooooo-hoo-hoooooo...."

She ended up going inside and I (finally) went home. Oh, the joys of waitressing. I only work until midnight tonight, thank goodness.

Work and school part II

Okay, I've had some sleep. So here's the good part of work:

Tips.

Actually, I like most of the people I work with, so that's good. That can be rare! Also, I get to have insurance as a part-time worker. I'm thinking about changing colleges after this term, to a larger college south of here. It has more opportunities, classes, etc. as well as a clinic and other perks that this college doesn't have. Plus, I could rent a cheaper apartment to save on costs. Here in the duplex, I pay $600 a month plus garbage, water and sewer. So I could obviously save somewhere else. I realize I could move in this town, but if I want to have more opportunities at a bigger college, I might as well do it all at once. There will also be more job opportunities as well.

So I'm thinking of staying on for a couple of months until I possibly move. I can suck it up, right? I'll just have to figure out what to do with the jerk customers. It's not in my nature to be a jerk back (unless I'm tired and cranky), so I'll have to be subtle yet effective. Hmmmmm....

3 a.m.

It's a little after 3 a.m. and I just got home. I learned a very important lesson today: Tips suck on the weekends. I really don't know why this is, but it's true. I had a lot of people today who just didn't tip at all. One of the bartenders confirmed that Saturday's are busy, but tips are not good.

Tomorrow (today) will be rough since it's New Year's Eve. I've been warned of the chaos that is about to ensue. We've been given permission to dress in the 70's style, so that should be fun. I think I'm going to feather my hair and wear too much eyeliner. Oh, and a really glossy lip gloss. I'm not sure what to do about the clothes just yet. I might have to make a run to Goodwill tomorrow if they're even open.

I'm tired and I have to go wash the smoke out of my hair now.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! God bless you!!!

Work continutes

New Year's Eve is coming soon... I'm a little afraid. I know it's going to be crazy. Last night I was in the bowling alley for a while and it was dead. I think it was family night or something - lots of kids and people drinking sodas. But, being a Friday night, I got put in the bar after a while and it really started picking up.

We have to mentally keep track of how much somebody has had to drink and watch them for signs of being overly intoxicated. You know, in all my time in the Navy, nobody ever cut my friends and I off. I don't think I've seen it done. Until last night. The guy was just being a jerk and got in another guy's face about something. He was a little scary and intimidating.

The bartender who said "no more" looks like he's 12 years old, but he stood his ground. Good for him! The guy's waitress was pretty unhappy about it. I think his whole party ended up leaving, so I'm sure that's why she was angry.

I served a group of Mexican guys who were really nice. I think I know why a lot of people up here shy away from anybody "foreign" looking, besides possible racial issues. I had at least three co-workers tell me, "They're really hard to understand. Did you take high school Spanish? Because they're hard to understand."

So they feel uncomfortable helping anybody who they don't think they can understand. Well, I had a hard time with a couple of words (especially in a loud bar - "sola" was actually soda), but we stumbled through it. And the guys had two designated drivers which was nice. One of them gave me a $10 tip! It's the most I've gotten at one time. I told them what I know in Spanish: Mi perro es gordo. My dog is fat. They laughed and pointed at each other, calling their friend their fat dog. Oh and I yelled, "Piso mojado!" too... "wet floor!". My Spanish.

There are some old men in there who get really drunk. I think that's a little sad. Drunkenness seems like it should be for the young... and then people grow out of it or something. I like it when they ask us to call them a cab though. One guy was there last night wearing a nice button shirt and tie. After a while, he was at BeerCon Level 4 though, dancing around and screaming because he was drinking Screaming Orgasms.

Oh, and there was karaoke last night. Do I really need to say anything about that? One of the bartenders sang "You Gotta Have Faith" (or is it just "Faith"?), but it's not the original version. It's a new (?) headbanger version where he sang a little and screamed the chorus "YOU GOTTA HAVE FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAITH!!!! SHUT THE F* UP!" Um, I've never heard that version. But it was interesting.

I work until 2 a.m. again tonight... I wonder if we'll have karaoke again.