Tuckered Out.
I’m exhausted. It’s been a long month. It’s been a really long week and a half or so. I’m not even going to mention what a long and irritating year it’s been, except to say, damn will I be glad to see the back of 2006.
I seem to be running out of staff at the Restaurant Where I Work — down two waitresses, and what I have left either sucks or has two jobs and limited availability. For once, my back-of-house is in pretty decent shape, as long as the lot of them can manage not to get themselves fired for drinking on the job. I had heard that they were mixing screwdrivers back there, but I also knew that none of them were drinking to the point of even having a light buzz, let alone being drunk.
The Boss called me into the office the other day to inform me that the new dishwasher had ratted the boys out about the drinking (which is a laugh riot, considering that the new dishwasher spends his time smoking weed out the back door). I said I had smelled alcohol and made a few comments, as well as tested several of the boys’ drinks, but hadn’t caught anyone.
The Boss told me to keep checking drinks, and if I found anything, to send that person home, for the Boss to deal with later. Instead, I talked to my one dishwasher, who is related to one of my cooks, all of whom are friends. I told him, in a nutshell, “Look, I’m not yelling, I’m accusing, I’m not writing anyone up, and I’m not firing anyone. But, I know it’s going on, and you guys have been ratted out, so it needs to stop right now. I’m not losing my whole kitchen staff over something this stupid. Pass the word.”
As far as I can tell, it’s stopped. I hadn’t smelled alcohol on anyone in a couple of weeks, anyways.
Meanwhile, I’ve been short-handed on almost every shift I’ve worked, and on top of that, there’s been the Christmas decorating to do. The decorating is actually almost done — I busted that out in no time, but damn, am I worn out. It’s all climb up, climb down, lean over the table, lift, heft, tote, fix, fiddle — nothing difficult, but added up over the course of a night, man, I’m whipped. My back and legs have been killing me. All this in between helping the girls and doing extra side work, because there’s no one else to do it.
NaNoWriMo is about over with, and even though I’m nowhere near 50,000 words, I’m still pretty pleased with what I did. I’ll continue to work on the book. We’ll see where that goes. I continue to job hunt, but I’m not getting anywhere with it. I had a line on an office job, but apparently in the day it took me to do up and send out my resume, they posted an ad and got flooded with responses. Too much competition for too few jobs.
And on that note, I’ve got to go. I took a three-day weekend that I can’t really afford, but really, really need, and I have a ton of errands to run today, as well as house-cleaning, and possibly, Christmas baking to do.
November 29th, 2006 at 10:46 pm
It’s a shame that you can’t keep help. You’d think with so many looking for work that it wouldn’t be such a problem. You know, if it was closer for me I’d consider doing some time there myself. But I just can’t justify the travel time/gas cost…sorry. So, get some rest and do some baking…the gang loves that and when you get that kind of appreciation it just makes you feel better. See you soon. Love ya lots…..MOM
November 30th, 2006 at 3:32 am
Eh, you don’t want to work there. The frustrating thing about it is that it could be a good place, but isn’t, largely because of the owners and the boss. The owners are idiots, and the boss doesn’t care anymore.
The thing that gets me is that my girls keep going out and getting second jobs, limiting their availability, because they claim they can’t make any money at the restaurant. The other night, I only had one waitress, and had to take a few tables. I took four tables, and made two or three dollars on take-out orders and counter guys. My total take for the night, for that piddly bit of customers, was $20.00. The other waitress took all the other tables — we were pretty busy for one girl — and made $40.00 all night. What the — ? The money is out there, but these gals don’t seem to be able to figure out how to go get it. And it’s so simple. Bah. Makes me want to go back to waiting tables, just to show them how to do it.