Saturday Night Fever
December is slowly coming to an end, and I think I'm ready for 2014 to arrive.
What my main hope is for the new year is this: that either I start getting better tipouts (because this seven bucks every two weeks thing is for the birds) or get cross-trained to go up to the bar or find a better server-type job where I can pocket some decent tips. I am trying to maintain cheerfulness but right now I'm too tired to really mince words much.
This morning was... not awesome at work, to put it mildly. I arrived a little bit before 7:30 and headed on into the building, arriving around the same time as Stasia. We went in and rejoiced that the kitchen was not FUBAR for a change, then went to clock in and get started on our day. The drink station was not trashed for a change, although I did have to reorganize slightly and refill ice and popcorn. I got the coffee started while Chase set to work getting the ice bins dealt with, and Stasia came by a few minutes after that looking miffed.
Turns out that at some point after the runners had left for the night, someone from the kitchen moved the sauces that were in one of the walk-ins to get to something... and then proceeded to not put the sauces back. Meaning we lost something like ten full tubs of the various sauces we need each day to get through a shift. And given that we send out ketchup with everything (the only things that don't get it are salads and pizzas because nearly every entree comes with fries) at least three of those tubs were highly needed. I know that I personally made two trays up of ketchup today but they were both gone completely by the time I left this afternoon.
So although we technically had enough runners to get through a breakfast shift (something like five, meaning one to run drink station, one to run drinks to theaters, one to do sauce expo in the kitchen, and two to run food) we wound up in a slump very early that we never really got out of. We had me on drink station, one of the younger runners running drinks, Tyler running food, and Chase and Stasia in the kitchen both making up sauces and trying to help expo breakfast as half our kitchen staff still can't get through a shift without a manager hovering. In their defense, however, we never actually ordered breakfast items during mock, which was probably a big mistake as no one in back of house was really ready for it. They're still learning, bless 'em.
By the time I left for the day, we had I think fifteen runners in the building, most of whom were just hovering around the drink station. The only people running food by 3 this afternoon were me, Tyler, Stasia, and one of our minor runners names Quillian who is a total sweetheart and just went wherever we aimed him. The other runner who busted his butt today was Dammy, who was in charge of helping bus the theaters and he was zipping up and down the halls when we had theaters letting out within ten minutes of one another. Boy can move, y'all.
Stasia and I both bounced around 3:40 or so, mostly due to being tired of all the younger runners copping attitudes with us when we asked them to run anything and hovering around the drink station chit-chatting instead of working. We both stopped off at the bar to say goodbye to our visiting trainer Alicia, who I know for sure I'm gonna miss like crazy. Our store is very short-staffed manager-wise, and Stasia practically pleaded with Alicia to consider transferring from her Kentucky store to work at ours. Alicia made some allusions to the fact that they've been keeping a close eye on who is actually working and who isn't, and that it may come to pass where some people will get moved up to official trainers and possibly management-level.
While that would be cool, I wouldn't mind just sticking at trainer. I really do wanna move up to the bar, and while I meant to talk to a manager today about possibly bypassing a stint as server to just go into the bar I never actually found a minute. See the above mention of losing a tonne of sauces and the need for any available runner to bust their humps on remaking what we no longer had.
At any rate, work is well past done for the day and I'm likely to sleep heavy tonight.
So now I'm just pushing through to the end of the year, which coincides with the end of my work week. I have another three days straight, two of those actual opening shifts of arriving before guests and one where I start when the first film begins seating, then two days off on Wednesday and Thursday. Depending on how things go (i.e. how much Forever Knight Yami and I watch when I get home on Tuesday), we might take a trek to my store and use my employee benefit of a free movie to finally see Frozen.
Crossposted from DreamWidth. Click here to see other replies to this post.
What my main hope is for the new year is this: that either I start getting better tipouts (because this seven bucks every two weeks thing is for the birds) or get cross-trained to go up to the bar or find a better server-type job where I can pocket some decent tips. I am trying to maintain cheerfulness but right now I'm too tired to really mince words much.
This morning was... not awesome at work, to put it mildly. I arrived a little bit before 7:30 and headed on into the building, arriving around the same time as Stasia. We went in and rejoiced that the kitchen was not FUBAR for a change, then went to clock in and get started on our day. The drink station was not trashed for a change, although I did have to reorganize slightly and refill ice and popcorn. I got the coffee started while Chase set to work getting the ice bins dealt with, and Stasia came by a few minutes after that looking miffed.
Turns out that at some point after the runners had left for the night, someone from the kitchen moved the sauces that were in one of the walk-ins to get to something... and then proceeded to not put the sauces back. Meaning we lost something like ten full tubs of the various sauces we need each day to get through a shift. And given that we send out ketchup with everything (the only things that don't get it are salads and pizzas because nearly every entree comes with fries) at least three of those tubs were highly needed. I know that I personally made two trays up of ketchup today but they were both gone completely by the time I left this afternoon.
So although we technically had enough runners to get through a breakfast shift (something like five, meaning one to run drink station, one to run drinks to theaters, one to do sauce expo in the kitchen, and two to run food) we wound up in a slump very early that we never really got out of. We had me on drink station, one of the younger runners running drinks, Tyler running food, and Chase and Stasia in the kitchen both making up sauces and trying to help expo breakfast as half our kitchen staff still can't get through a shift without a manager hovering. In their defense, however, we never actually ordered breakfast items during mock, which was probably a big mistake as no one in back of house was really ready for it. They're still learning, bless 'em.
By the time I left for the day, we had I think fifteen runners in the building, most of whom were just hovering around the drink station. The only people running food by 3 this afternoon were me, Tyler, Stasia, and one of our minor runners names Quillian who is a total sweetheart and just went wherever we aimed him. The other runner who busted his butt today was Dammy, who was in charge of helping bus the theaters and he was zipping up and down the halls when we had theaters letting out within ten minutes of one another. Boy can move, y'all.
Stasia and I both bounced around 3:40 or so, mostly due to being tired of all the younger runners copping attitudes with us when we asked them to run anything and hovering around the drink station chit-chatting instead of working. We both stopped off at the bar to say goodbye to our visiting trainer Alicia, who I know for sure I'm gonna miss like crazy. Our store is very short-staffed manager-wise, and Stasia practically pleaded with Alicia to consider transferring from her Kentucky store to work at ours. Alicia made some allusions to the fact that they've been keeping a close eye on who is actually working and who isn't, and that it may come to pass where some people will get moved up to official trainers and possibly management-level.
While that would be cool, I wouldn't mind just sticking at trainer. I really do wanna move up to the bar, and while I meant to talk to a manager today about possibly bypassing a stint as server to just go into the bar I never actually found a minute. See the above mention of losing a tonne of sauces and the need for any available runner to bust their humps on remaking what we no longer had.
At any rate, work is well past done for the day and I'm likely to sleep heavy tonight.
So now I'm just pushing through to the end of the year, which coincides with the end of my work week. I have another three days straight, two of those actual opening shifts of arriving before guests and one where I start when the first film begins seating, then two days off on Wednesday and Thursday. Depending on how things go (i.e. how much Forever Knight Yami and I watch when I get home on Tuesday), we might take a trek to my store and use my employee benefit of a free movie to finally see Frozen.
Crossposted from DreamWidth. Click here to see other replies to this post.