Fall Schedule

So I thought I'd pop in mid-summer to tell you that I've received my regular schedule for the months of August through December and my first two official weeks of work are up. My first day back at work for the fall semester is Thursday, August 19. It looks like I'm doing about 20 hours a week serving French fries, cooking stir fry orders, and cleaning up the salad and dessert bars because the customers are so insanely messy. Just like I did all of last year. Oh well, at least I don't have to stress about learning a new job routine because I've already been there for a year. I just have to be able to balance this job with 18 credits of classes. I think that's going to be the hard part.

Anyway, like I said, on my first day back, I'm working an evening shift and then on Friday and Saturday I'll be working split shifts, so in those three days, I'll have a full 20 hours for that entire week. That's good because then I'll have a head start on getting money into my bank account (ha ha).

Alright, see ya in the fall...

Goodbye For Now!

Goodbye to my workplace! I will be back in August for another awesome year of flipping burgers, babysitting customers, and burning my hands on the fryers. W00t!!!

Love always,
KC

Oh What A Night

What a night. I got to be the dishwasher's bitch. Nothing screams Thirsty Thursday like oversized wet dish gloves, 200 degree water, slippery floors, a stack of bowls being knocked over and almost shattering all over the floor, and a stabbing hunger pang because I hadn't eaten all day.

My bad.

Not to mention I had to listen to crappy music because the radio was set to the country station. So I had to listen to country music for four.......fucking......hours..... It was driving me fucking insane. I HATE COUNTRY MUSIC. I would rather listen to NOTHING than listen to COUNTRY. UGH...*vomits*

It was good too, because my manager let me and some of the other dish slaves leave early, about twenty minutes early, maybe because we were a bit slower than usual. It was really sweet of him. :) And it was my record for how early I was allowed to leave post-dinner slam. WOO HOO!

Tomorrow morning I'm gonna be the Kunoichi Cook again (officially, because I never really stop being so, ever). And since it's Friday, I'm gonna set the radio to NOT COUNTRY and kick the lunch rush's ass.

Watch me own that grill like nobody's business.

KC

Post-April Fool's Day

The managers at work thought it would be funny to write the customer count as twice what it actually was on April 1st. I thought it was pretty funny too, once I realized it was only a joke.

This weekend was boring. BORING. Everyone went home for Easter weekend so we were dead. Saturday night I spent unloading dishes. It was the only time I can ever remember being one of three people in the dish room. One guy loaded and two of us unloaded. On a normal night, we have at least twice that. I doubt that sort of thing will happen again for quite a long time. I'm only glad I was in the dish room. There are plenty of other things I could have been stuck doing that would have been far, far worse. :(

This morning I was cooking during the typical Monday lunch rush and my boss gave me a compliment about how I was keeping my work space really neat. That made me happy. I have been working really hard lately to keep the grill cleaner throughout the day because otherwise I have to go through hell trying to get all the crap off of it at once before I leave in the afternoon. It's definitely worth keeping up on it.

Looks like I'll be the dishwasher's bitch again on Thursday night. Favorite place on earth. ;)

KC

Work is...Play???

These past few weeks, work has been treating me pretty well. Don't get me wrong, it's still stressful, there are still lines of customers out the door, burnt French fries, food all over the floor, and a very perturbed Kunoichi Cook, but I think I am at least beginning to cope with it better.

Could it be that I LIKE going to work now because it's actually FUN sometimes????

Wowwwwww........

A Good Day At Work? For Real?

There were so many reasons why today could have sucked majorly. For one thing, we've had unusually warm weather this past weekend, but they left the heat on at work. At least, that's why we all suspect it's so much hotter than usual. I felt like I was going to hyperventilate on Friday. Today I found I was holding my breath a lot because I was having trouble breathing. I was sweating more than usual. It was terrible. I was working right over the grill for most of my shift and it was just awful. I walked into the kitchen every chance I got and stood by the ice machine. Who knew the KITCHEN would make me feel better? I almost asked to go take a quick break as I felt like I might pass out, but thankfully I didn't.

Despite that, I had a good day. I'm starting to learn to just relax and chill out. As a result, I was happier and did a better job, got along better with the customers, was able to clean the grill in between orders and not get too overwhelmed. Not once did I think about running into the dish room to hide. This is a very unique experience for me during Monday and Friday lunch rushes.

I feel like I can go back to work on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday and not feel anxious. Normally I don't except when I line cook for lunch; in fact, most of the time I look forward to going. I guess I should consider myself lucky. =-)

Special thanks to all my buddies on RHU.com for helping me out! You guys are truly the greatest.

A Recipe for Disaster

On Monday night, I had the privilege of working in a new area that I hadn't worked in previously. I spent my Monday making pannini sandwiches and wraps for people. We didn't get very busy, and my coworker was really awesome. The night went quickly too, so I had an overall good experience. I just have to bitch about one thing though (because that's what I do). =)

When customers place their orders, they take a slip of paper and circle what they want: what type of bread / wrap they want, what they want on it (Italian, turkey & bacon, etc.,) and any special instructions (no sauce, extra tomatoes, etc.) This is where disaster strikes. The first thing they need to do is circle "for here" or "to go" but about a third of them leave this blank (a few people write "to go" under the special instructions: it drives me nuts but at least they wrote it at all), and a whole bunch of people don't even write their names. So then I have to yell out their orders and when they come up expecting their food, I have to ask if they want it for here or to go and they have to wait for me to get their sandwich out of the oven and put it in the correct packaging.

It's really not that big of a deal, but after a while it starts driving me insane. People, all you have to do is fill out a little slip of paper! Do not over complicate this too!!!

Quotes From Tonight's Work

First Coworker: "Hey, how are you doing tonight?"
Me: "I'm great!"
First Coworker: "Well, we'll fix that!"

Every time I'm the Dishwasher Bitch, that's how we greet each other. :D

--

Second Coworker: "I'm just not really doing anything. Not moving that fast."
Me: "Is it that quiet out there? Nothing to do?"
Second Coworker: "No, it's about normal. I'm still not moving that fast."

--

And of course, tonight we dish crew members couldn't decide what radio station to listen to, country or classic rock / oldies. So we put one stereo on one side of the dish room to country, and the other to classic rock. Two different stations playing at the same time. Another coworker came in to get something and said, "What the fuck are you guys listening to?!!!??"

Ahh, work! Such bliss!

Jobs I Could Never Do

This one goes out to my friends on retailhellunderground.com. I am a servant of that genius site, always.

I made a list of jobs in which I don't think I'd ever be able to survive. Enjoy.

In no particular order:

1) Grocery stores. I hate grocery shopping and these places are the last places that I'd want to hang out. I'd be way too tempted to tell people to go to aisle sixteen for the mouthwash they were looking for that is actually located in aisle four. Plus, which position would I even be good at? I'd be having too much fun "accidentally" running into people's cars with the shopping carts I'm supposed to bring back to be able to perform my job properly. Grocery stores are out.

2) Walmart. HELL NO. It's bad enough being a customer there and having to look at and listen to the other customers that never graduated from the eighth grade so they can't read and can't count (well I guess that's why). Plus, with the stories I've heard, Walmart treats their employees like garbage.

3) Restaurants as a server. I simply do NOT have enough patience for this position. If my ability to make money (tips) depends on my patience, then I won't be making much money! I am quite sure they would fire me after a week because I'd surely have stabbed a customer by then! Not only that, but I'm also very uncoordinated so I'd probably be dropping people's food. Then I'd have to listen to customers' bitch fits about their food being dropped and how they have to wait and then I don't get a tip. FUCK THAT SHIT. Let me wash dishes in the back! I'd rather burn my hand to the bone than deal with boneheads all night long!

I'm happy where I work, right where I am. I just keep thinking to myself that at least I am separated from people by a counter so the true psychos can't attack me and I can't attack them if they drive me to insanity. I do want to keep my job, after all. I work with some of the chillest people around. =)

Why Can't I Work Here?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bS79YzlFuL8

Best clip from the best movie EVER!

We All Should Get These

On cafepress.com you can custom design your own stuff so I did this. I don't have the cash to actually buy it, but I had a lot of fun with this one.

Initially I was going to put some kind of clipart on it but then I figured it speaks for itself.

Inspired by one of my all-time favorite movies: Waiting.

The Unintentional Generosity of Customers

Greetings! Tonight I had a very good time at work. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood, maybe because it's almost Friday. And it was a very exhausting night as I was in charge of running stuff back and forth to the salad bars and, essentially, getting a work out. However, it all paid off at the end of the night.

Upon closing time, I set out to begin wiping the vast quantity of tables. Many customers were still eating, which meant that I and my two helping coworkers had to skip those tables (obviously) and come back later. Most tables were relatively tidy. But of course, these are customers we are talking about here, and most of them can be total slobs. Hence, I had to run trays full of food, including bowls of melted ice cream, half-eaten salads, and mostly full coffee mugs, to the dish room because the customers were too lazy and apparently this is what I get paid to do. Jerks.

It all paid off in the end though, because by the time I got to the last row of tables, I found a bunch of trash and two small cardboard boxes marked "carepackages.com" I looked inside and what did I find? A bag of Doritos, a bag of Chips Ahoy cookies, smarties, chocolate, Mr. Goodbars, and some peanut chewy bars. Free food!!!! And nowhere in the rules does it say I can't take non-work prepared food that has been rejected by lazy customers. I took it back to my locker before finishing up the closing procedures as part of my commission for cleaning up their ice cream, empty dishes, paper napkins on the floors, etc.

I even gave one of the chewy bars to a coworker because I don't like them but he does! :-)

Funny how sometimes the customers try to be rude slobs but end up feeding a starving employee by accident. ;)

Monday Mayhem

Why do people need to order such weird shit? I worked a split shift on Monday, so that meant I got to spend one shift cooking burgers and the other cooking stir fry. Working one shift alone can test my patience to the breaking point, but two? Here's how my adventuresome day progresses:

Customer: Yeah, I want a mushroom Swiss.

I start making it.

Customer: No, I want American cheese.

I throw away the Swiss cheese I assumed was required and grab a slice of American.

Customer: No, I need bacon on that too.

I throw the American cheese away as well, solely out of frustration, add the bacon, and then a new slice of cheese.

Customer comes back five minutes after she leaves with her burger.

Customer: Yeah, I need mustard.

At this point I am about ready to throw my spatula across the dining room. Somehow I'm expected to read fucking minds while getting paid not even $8.00 an hour. Somehow, even though a mushroom Swiss burger is a burger with mushrooms and Swiss cheese on top, I'm expected to know that when you ordered a mushroom Swiss burger, you REALLY wanted a BACON CHEESEBURGER with AMERICAN CHEESE and MUSHROOMS added. Good grief.

Keep in mind that this shit happens nonstop during a lunch rush, making me want to kill someone, namely, myself.

On Monday night it was better, mostly because I got to work with one of my friends and it's generally a more laid-back setting than the other place. We got to turn up the radio and stand back by the grills talking while we were waiting for customer orders to come through.

I do have a few messages for said customers, however. Mainly:

STOP THROWING OUT THE RECEIPTS!!!! Technically we don't have to give you your food when you come to pick it up because you have zero evidence that you actually paid. I just give it to you anyway and yell at you for it so I don't have to deal with temper tantrums.

STOP BEING ANNOYING ABOUT YOUR ORDERS!!! I don't like giving you rice in a separate container. It throws off our entire awesome system. Why would you order just shrimp with no sauce, rice or vegetables??? You're paying the full price for it. Oh well, it's your money, not mine.

READ THE NUMBERS WHEN YOU COME TO PICK UP YOUR FOOD!!!! You don't even have to read any words, just match the number on your receipt with the number on your box of food! But because you people keep grabbing the wrong orders, I or one of my coworkers has to make sure everyone grabs the right order! One of these days a vegetarian customer is going to open up a box full of steaming hot shrimp and learn their lesson (and I'm going to laugh my ass off as I bet money this has actually happened before).

Cleaning a steaming hot grill at the end of the night, with hot soapy water and all kinds of nasty, disgusting, greasy shit is like the icing on the cake. My hands are on fire but I just scrub as quickly as I can, grit my teeth, and bear the pain because the sooner I can see myself in that grill surface, the sooner I can go the fuck home and do it again tomorrow.

The Things I Love

I think I better post an optimistic entry, since most of these blog entries are going to turn out to be bitch fits. ;)

These are things I love about my job. I thought I'd list some of them here so I can still find a reason to go to work every day.

1) The regular customers. We get quite a few, considering they're all college kids and they come to the commons for lunch every day. I know some by their faces and they get the exact same thing every day.

2) My awesome coworkers. They can make any nightmare rush seem okay. I have some who actively and willingly seek out to help me in my moments of greatest need. You know, the moments when you want to literally rip your fucking hair out and scream?

3) Good music. We turn on the radio. You wouldn't believe how much listening to awesome music can change your work day.

4) Having a manager say something nice about you. Last week one of the managers said to me, "You're such a good worker," and he sounded completely sincere. It made my day!

5) Free drinks (and French fries if you're sneaky) and discounted meals. It makes it worth it to work there when you know the customers paid an outrageous price to get the same thing. ;)

Today is Saturday and I am sleeping the fuck in and ENJOYING MY DAY OFF!!! ;-D

First Entry - Tuesday Night Shenanigans

Greetings from me, the Kunoichi Cook. I will explain where the nickname comes from at some point, but first, I wanted to talk about my adventures on Tuesday night.

On Tuesday night, I worked the dinner shift as a Dishwasher Bitch. If you've ever slaved away cleaning filthy dishes before, you'll know what that entails. Loud, hot, messy working conditions, and that doesn't even include a description of how DANGEROUS that place is. Wet floors, burning hot water, sharp objects, people running all over the place. I am a total butterfingers, so this is not really the best place for me to be. Ever. But alas, I am the Dishwasher Bitch tonight, so I must find a way to survive.

I have a question that I need answered. What happens when the dishwasher breaks??? We had this happen. There came a loud grinding sound from deep within and the entire conveyor belt-like system came to an immediate halt. The Dishroom Guys all came running, ripping open the doors on the sides of the machine and trying to figure out what was wrong. I kept working on washing my huge pile of silverware, hoping that they'd fix it soon or we'd be there into the early morning hours washing back-ups of the dishes and silverware that couldn't go through.

Luckily, Dishroom Guys did manage to fix it within about 2 minutes so we didn't really suffer. But I wonder - what happens when the dishwasher actually breaks down for good? Has it ever happened before? Would they close the dining hall?? HA HA...more likely they'd get "volunteers" to stay late and clean up the mess.

As slaves, we often find ourselves in miserable jobs that have rules and regulations. Now, sometimes these rules make sense. They have a purpose. Then, for every good rule, we have [at least] one stupid one that negates the good one. And then there are [sometimes] ways around the stupid rules.

Example time!

* Anyone with long hair must wear it pulled back. This makes sense. No one wants hair in their food or food in their hair. Good rule!

* Employees must tuck in their work shirts. We need to look presentable to the customers. Because, you know, I just spilled tomato juice all over me, sprayed myself with mayo, and got grill grease all over the front of my shirt. Tucking in my shirt will ensure I look presentable! Stupid rule!

* To get around this stupid rule, I usually wear an apron (unless I'm cashiering). No one will tell you to tuck in your shirt if you have an apron on, and this way you won't get grease and shit all over your shirt. Practicality! I love it!

---

* Employees must wear vinyl gloves while handling customer food. Okay, that makes sense. Sort of. It only really means anything if you change your gloves a lot, which none of us do. So...good rule?

* Cooks must wear vinyl gloves while working on the grills. I truly do not understand this one. Grills kill germs. Ugh...this is just so pointless, I don't even understand it...Stupid rule!

* Use tongs while line serving and do not touch the food. Then why the fuck do we need to wear these awful, powder-filled gloves??? Stupid rule!!!

* There's no way around the glove thing. Sorry!

---

Now, for two stupid, pointless rules in the dishroom!

* Employees must wear white fabric heat-resistant gloves (does not apply to those loading the dishwasher). This is pointless in so many ways.
- First of all, those gloves are only "heat-resistant" if they don't get wet. They're great for people filling food on the lines, but in the dishroom, if you get your hands wet (which you WILL), then you WILL get burned. Badly!

- They feel disgusting when they get wet, so you have to change these gloves every five minutes to get rid of that nasty feeling and to prevent being burned (near impossible). This is hard to do when you have dishes flying by or a back-up of silverware and you can't walk away!!!!

- These gloves come in one size - HUGE. If you have small hands like me, it doesn't work well. Try adding an inch of length to your fingers and then sorting a pile of silverware. AGGRAVATION.

* When sorting silverware, place knives blade down in the bins, but forks are tongs facing up, and spoons facing up. W...t...f??? They're butter knives!!!! They're not going to cut you!!! But...ever been poked real hard on the tip of your finger by a fork??? It fucking hurts! Spoons should be the only thing with the handles down.

I think I seriously need to rewrite some rules, because clearly these were written by people who have never worked in food services before!

The good things about being a Dishwasher Bitch: awesome blaring music, blowing fans that keep you cool, awesome coworkers (usually), and NO CUSTOMERS. Yyyyyyes! *pumps fist*

I have a great rule I'd like to make!

The Rule: Dishwasher Bitches and Slaves can do whatever the fuck they want.

The Reason: It's the dishroom. It fucking sucks.

~ Always lookin' out for my fellow slaves,
The Kunoichi Cook