When you say "Children," do you mean the customers, or...?
As some of you may know, I was less than impressed when I interviewed for this per diem cashier job at the mall. The manager, we’ll call her Mrs. Mugly, asked me about three vague questions (“how do you handle pressure?”) and let me get about four words in (“well, I’ve worked in a lot of fast-paced environments so--”) before moving randomly on to something else (“good, and what’s your availability?”). There was no mention of diversity/harassment/sensitivity/etc training, not that I expected much, working at the mall. The only mention of register or product training was “can you come in 4-9:30 on the 29th?” I said sure, and do you need me to sign something today? “No, we’ll do that on that same Monday. Wear a black top, and anything but sneakers. See you then, bye!” I wrote it down on my magical calendar while we were both in the back room, and then I went home.
I went in today and announced I was there for my first day. The cashier ignored me for a few minutes before jerking her head towards a lady coming out of the back room. I reinstated my announcement. She told me to wait and skittered back behind the wall.
Okay. That’s normal.
The assistant manager-we’ll call her Mrs. Fugly- came out a few minutes later to inform me that Mugly wasn’t around, and if she had hired me, she hadn’t told anyone else about it. What she could do was take down my name and number, but until Mugly came back tomorrow there wasn’t a whole lot she could do for me.
Oh, really? Because I came for an interview a couple weeks ago, and she told me to come back these hours. Could we maybe call her? I don’t mind hanging around and waiting.
Yeah, we called already. I left her a message, but trust me, she won’t call back tonight.
Okay. That amount of confidence in your manager is also totally normal.
That's some real good communication, right there. Hire someone and not mention it even to your assistant manager at all during the next TWELVE DAYS, even though the new hire has hours that Monday. So, I considered that as strike two against this store, and went and bought some pretty shirts on clearance at a less stupid store.
Went home, did some chores, thought about cleaning my room some more. Checked my random voicemail. It was Mrs. Fugly! She was calling to scold me for wasting my gas and coming into the store. She talked to Mrs. Mugly, you see, and Mrs. Mugly told her that what I was supposed to do was call today and get my schedule for the rest of the week so that I could start training! Mrs. Fugly figures the mix-up is forgivable, but, I’d better call to talk to Mrs. Mugly tomorrow to see what’s happening.
Uh. Yeah?
I counted that as strike three. Since then, I've wondered how she made up a schedule for me without even talking to me, especially since I told her my availability will vary day to day until mid July when my store closes down. So, that's like a bonus strike.
The hardware store in Killingworth called me back. Not sure how I feel about that. I still have Tuesday Morning for another couple weeks, though, and Walmart (fulltime temp, REAL paychecks) decided to stop waiting for Bryce (my personal reference that they apparently desperately needed) to pick up his phone and just hire me without his telling them how amazing I am. So I have to get a drug test and I’m in. There’s also Levi’s, where I need one more four-hour shift of training before they put me on the schedule for real. Do I NEED this per diem mall job? Not particularly.
Which, by the way, is a NICE FEELING.