While I was at my office bitch job last week I tripped and fell down a couple of stairs. I banged up my wrist pretty good and also had massive bruises on my ribs. The day after that, I started coughing and getting feverish and generally being unwell.
When this doesn't let up for a week (and my chest is still in severe pain,) I get taken to the hospital and get a little X-ray done. Turns out two of my ribs are broken. I'm not talking a little greenstick fracture here, I'm talking about seriously, nastily, could-have-punctured-a-lung broken. I have no idea how that correlated to the fever and coughing, but the hospital guy told me it was possible there was some kind of infection in my chest, from the ribs, causing it. If the bruising and stitches weren't directly adjacent to a slightly, ahem, personal region, I'd take a photo so you could all see how badly I manage to injure myself without being assautled by drunks/horses/tourists/religious fanatic.
Anyway, the point of this is that the blog is going on a minor hiatus due to me being on very large doses of pain medication and antibiotics. Unless, in my semi-delirious state, I decide the story with the fanatic is worth telling, in which case something might come up over the next couple of days.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Slow Ride
I'd make a great stockman, if only I didn't have the Foghat song perpetually playing in my head.
Y'know, as much as I foresee bitching about working at horse riding centres, I really do love horses, and I'd love to get some kind of full-time with them. (I would not, however, like to live out the rest of my life in poverty, and so I'm going for my other dream--being paid to mess with peoples' heads.) Here's a brief history:
When I was oh, six or seven, my family lived for couple of years down by the racecourse in Melbourne (yes, that racecourse,) with a clear view to the exercise yards. To this day I retain a love affair with balanced, compact, good-looking thoroughbreds. Then we moved to my current hometown, and I started riding for the first time on small ponies. I competed in small local events, mostly barrel racing, and got a couple of third- and second-place ribbons (this is not hard--I was probably the only kid there who didn't own their own pony and actually made the most of every second I spent on a horse's back. Most of the others had $10000 purebred whatevers with $2000 saddles. I swear, something about parenthood makes a rich man into a retard...)
Then stuff happened, the family moved again, and I stopped riding, at around age 12. I picked it up again after another move, two years older, a foot taller, and rusty as hell. I also got my first job in the equine industry, cleaning shit out of the agistment barn to scrape away at the price of my lessons.
Due to illness I stopped riding for about six months when I was fifteen, then came back and found another job, at a different riding centre, where I could trail ride all day if I wanted to as long as I also babysat tourists. And this was where I discovered for the first time that I was actually a good rider. I have a good seat and soft hands, I give firm, clear commands to my horses, and I have never, ever lost my seat just because a horse was travelling at high speed. (I do have some great stories about the times I did eat the dirt, though, mostly my own fault.) And possibly the most important attribute for any horse-person--when I made a mistake, I bloody well learned from it. For a year or so I rode with a girl who refused to learn that the bleeding gashes left on her horse's sides were from her girth buckle being fucked up. Oy vey.
Anyway, since my skills mostly involve managing difficult (i.e. kicky/bitey/stompy/bucky/otherwise rude) horses and keeping my seat at a fast pace over reasonably rough terrain, I could always move to the Snowy Mountains and herd brumbies, or something... but to be honest, I'd settle for having a job that paid enough for me to keep a sound horse in a good stable to ride as often as I could.
I think I already mentioned my weakness for good thoroughbreds, but I also have a thing for the butt-ugliest ponies you ever did see, as long as they're sound. These examples are from Fugly Horse of the Day.
Tomorrow I'll write up some stories about my Epic Fails on horseback, I think. Or else about when I worked at the church. That had a surprising amount of hilarity involved in it. This is mostly just a quick post to remind myself that yes, I do have a blog, and I should update it sometimes.
Y'know, as much as I foresee bitching about working at horse riding centres, I really do love horses, and I'd love to get some kind of full-time with them. (I would not, however, like to live out the rest of my life in poverty, and so I'm going for my other dream--being paid to mess with peoples' heads.) Here's a brief history:
When I was oh, six or seven, my family lived for couple of years down by the racecourse in Melbourne (yes, that racecourse,) with a clear view to the exercise yards. To this day I retain a love affair with balanced, compact, good-looking thoroughbreds. Then we moved to my current hometown, and I started riding for the first time on small ponies. I competed in small local events, mostly barrel racing, and got a couple of third- and second-place ribbons (this is not hard--I was probably the only kid there who didn't own their own pony and actually made the most of every second I spent on a horse's back. Most of the others had $10000 purebred whatevers with $2000 saddles. I swear, something about parenthood makes a rich man into a retard...)
Then stuff happened, the family moved again, and I stopped riding, at around age 12. I picked it up again after another move, two years older, a foot taller, and rusty as hell. I also got my first job in the equine industry, cleaning shit out of the agistment barn to scrape away at the price of my lessons.
Due to illness I stopped riding for about six months when I was fifteen, then came back and found another job, at a different riding centre, where I could trail ride all day if I wanted to as long as I also babysat tourists. And this was where I discovered for the first time that I was actually a good rider. I have a good seat and soft hands, I give firm, clear commands to my horses, and I have never, ever lost my seat just because a horse was travelling at high speed. (I do have some great stories about the times I did eat the dirt, though, mostly my own fault.) And possibly the most important attribute for any horse-person--when I made a mistake, I bloody well learned from it. For a year or so I rode with a girl who refused to learn that the bleeding gashes left on her horse's sides were from her girth buckle being fucked up. Oy vey.
Anyway, since my skills mostly involve managing difficult (i.e. kicky/bitey/stompy/bucky/otherwise rude) horses and keeping my seat at a fast pace over reasonably rough terrain, I could always move to the Snowy Mountains and herd brumbies, or something... but to be honest, I'd settle for having a job that paid enough for me to keep a sound horse in a good stable to ride as often as I could.
I think I already mentioned my weakness for good thoroughbreds, but I also have a thing for the butt-ugliest ponies you ever did see, as long as they're sound. These examples are from Fugly Horse of the Day.
cow-hocked with lousy postureThey ain't ever gonna win a beauty contest, but those horses are just adorable. People don't understand why I think they're cute--well, I never understood how a pug or a sharpei is cute, either. Eh.
ugly head, short neck, no shoulders to speak of
long back, no butt, straight shoulders
I used to ride someone almost identical to this scruffy little bastard
Tomorrow I'll write up some stories about my Epic Fails on horseback, I think. Or else about when I worked at the church. That had a surprising amount of hilarity involved in it. This is mostly just a quick post to remind myself that yes, I do have a blog, and I should update it sometimes.
Monday, June 23, 2008
An Introduction To Dumb:
Most of the time--nearly all of the time, in fact--my customers are great. They're polite and respectful, or at the very least not unduly rude, and they don't dawdle during rush hour, and don't make ridiculous demands. Most of the time. At the fast food joint, for instance, I might serve 200+ customers in a shift, and of those, no more than five or six would make my life difficult. That means only 3% of the people who eat fast food are jackasses. (Sometimes there would be a much higher proportion, of course--but hey, sometimes the universe likes to take a shit on the corporate drudges of the world.)
The one exception to this rule was at the riding centre. I won't name it, for various reasons, but it mostly catered to tourists, showing them the beautiful Australian countryside. It was probably my most physically hands-on job, and also the one were I was most often run off my feet. There are several reasons for this, but largely it was because during any given hour, there would be
Oh yeah, the customers. If we're gonna talk about large, dangerous animals, I can't leave them out. Maybe it was because I took the 'intermediate' trail (the automatic spot for people who hadn't ridden with us before but claimed they had prior experience, and actually much, much closer to a 'beginner' trail than to an 'advanced' trail) but I dealt with riders who
Does anyone know about the thirty second rule? The one from the Big Chill? If not, well--it's hard to explain, so here is a practical example. Now, while some trail rides are filled up with people on their own or in pairs who're just looking for a ride, a lot of the time they're group bookings of five to ten people. And the staff at that centre could tell, thirty seconds after picking up the phone, if the group was going to be stupid.
Some warning signs in the very first phone conversation included:
"We're all very experienced riders," especially when repeated more than twice throughout the conversation. Good riders don't feel the need to assert their skills more than once.
"We were raised in (insert rural area here)"--people seem to think this gives them automatic riding skills. It doesn't. Oddly enough, when it's not tourists, it's rural or semi-rural people who toss out this line--city slickers know better.
"I've/we've been taught by the best instructors in the country!" This is never, ever true. You know how we know? Because we know exactly who the best instructors in the country are, and when we ask these people who exactly they were taught by, they stutter and stammer or get all defensive or state some name that we've never heard of.
"I've been riding my whole life." I have nothing against a little hyperbole, but this--especially when paired with one of the other warning signs--basically translates to "Quick! Give M a lunge whip!"
There were more--we had a list of them stapled to the desk next to the phone--but those were the most common ones. They showed up all the time, and they almost always indicated a group of people who would be at best severely exaggerating their own skills. At worst, it signalled a pack of lying, manipulative twats, who would completely ignore any instruction or regulation or safety in favour of pretending to be John Wayne. I especially hated it when a small group of morons got shunted in with some of my regulars. I loved riding with my regulars, showing them the cool half-hidden trails that led through rivers and thick forests--but I couldn't take them there when there were dumb riders in my group, because the dumb riders would try to do a Nazgul impersonation or some other kind of fuckwittery.
There will doubtless be several posts detailing the exploits of these fuckwits (somehow they managed to keep coming up with new and different ways of being stupid--this always astounded me,) but this is, for now, an introduction to them. And an acknowledgement, too; while there is a vast quantity of stupid in the world, most people are not part of it.
The one exception to this rule was at the riding centre. I won't name it, for various reasons, but it mostly catered to tourists, showing them the beautiful Australian countryside. It was probably my most physically hands-on job, and also the one were I was most often run off my feet. There are several reasons for this, but largely it was because during any given hour, there would be
- 20 horses on the trail
- 10 horses involved in lessons
- 30 horses being readied to go out for trails/lessons
- a whole herd of ponies for the kids
Oh yeah, the customers. If we're gonna talk about large, dangerous animals, I can't leave them out. Maybe it was because I took the 'intermediate' trail (the automatic spot for people who hadn't ridden with us before but claimed they had prior experience, and actually much, much closer to a 'beginner' trail than to an 'advanced' trail) but I dealt with riders who
- demanded a riding crop for a horse that responded to voice commands
- when given a riding crop, flailed it around and sometimes hit other riders with it
- tried to ride with spurs on
- tried to 'vault' onto the horse (i.e. mount from behind the horse)
- took off their helmets halfway through a ride
- took off their boots halfway through a ride
- let their horses eat while riding
- let their horses roll in the river (often with the rider still on board)
- stopped paying attention to the guides and went off on their own
- tried to get their horses to charge down hill
- dropped the reins halfway through a ride
- undid the saddle girth because it was 'getting in the way'
- let their horses kick and bite other horses/people
- ran their horses off short cliffs or into trees
Does anyone know about the thirty second rule? The one from the Big Chill? If not, well--it's hard to explain, so here is a practical example. Now, while some trail rides are filled up with people on their own or in pairs who're just looking for a ride, a lot of the time they're group bookings of five to ten people. And the staff at that centre could tell, thirty seconds after picking up the phone, if the group was going to be stupid.
Some warning signs in the very first phone conversation included:
"We're all very experienced riders," especially when repeated more than twice throughout the conversation. Good riders don't feel the need to assert their skills more than once.
"We were raised in (insert rural area here)"--people seem to think this gives them automatic riding skills. It doesn't. Oddly enough, when it's not tourists, it's rural or semi-rural people who toss out this line--city slickers know better.
"I've/we've been taught by the best instructors in the country!" This is never, ever true. You know how we know? Because we know exactly who the best instructors in the country are, and when we ask these people who exactly they were taught by, they stutter and stammer or get all defensive or state some name that we've never heard of.
"I've been riding my whole life." I have nothing against a little hyperbole, but this--especially when paired with one of the other warning signs--basically translates to "Quick! Give M a lunge whip!"
There were more--we had a list of them stapled to the desk next to the phone--but those were the most common ones. They showed up all the time, and they almost always indicated a group of people who would be at best severely exaggerating their own skills. At worst, it signalled a pack of lying, manipulative twats, who would completely ignore any instruction or regulation or safety in favour of pretending to be John Wayne. I especially hated it when a small group of morons got shunted in with some of my regulars. I loved riding with my regulars, showing them the cool half-hidden trails that led through rivers and thick forests--but I couldn't take them there when there were dumb riders in my group, because the dumb riders would try to do a Nazgul impersonation or some other kind of fuckwittery.
There will doubtless be several posts detailing the exploits of these fuckwits (somehow they managed to keep coming up with new and different ways of being stupid--this always astounded me,) but this is, for now, an introduction to them. And an acknowledgement, too; while there is a vast quantity of stupid in the world, most people are not part of it.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Subtle like a shovel to the face
Woo, exam season. How I loathe thee. Just one more to go, thank god--why they schedule exams on Saturday remains beyond me.
It seems like I have something of a penchant for finding myself in jobs that regularly require me to deal with people in less than idyllic circumstances while I'm carrying a large object that could potentially be used to inflict grievous bodily harm.
The guy over at Waiter Rant has his thousand yard waiter stare;
The guy over at Waiter Rant has his thousand yard waiter stare;
"A lightening bolt of stress flashes from the top of my head to the base of my spine. As my chakras begin to smoke, stomach acid vaults up my esophagus and starts filling my mouth with the taste of regurgitated lunchtime pizza. I’ve got cappuccinos to make and desserts to plate. If I don’t get my orders into the computer soon, I’ll go into the weeds and be destroyed. Swallowing hard, I channel all my frustration into my eyes and unleash my thousand yard waiter stare. The girl’s resistance, predictably, implodes." --The Waiter
"M, the reason you deal with them every time is because... well, because you can handle it better than (pansy-assed co-worker) can, and because you look like you're about to beat them all to death with your riding crop." --Markhor, former boss.Oh, and sometimes large metal sticks.
"Can you do the bins, M? Wait, wait--by taking up that stick, you are agreeing not to kill anyone. Okay? Don't kill anyone. Please don't kill anyone... stop smiling like that." --Jackal, my other former boss.Now, I'm not a violent person. I've never, ever gotten involved in a fist fight. I'm about as hard-assed as your average cream puff, and I'm not particularly intimidating to look at, either. But man, can I turn the menace on when I want to, and especially when I'm armed. I'd never actually hit a customer, of course. I'd lose my job--but they, as the saying goes, don't know that.
There were several jobs in which my purpose was occasionally to stand near a difficult customer with something solid slung over my shoulder; brooms, lunge whips, riding crops, metal things for crushing rubbish in case of sharps, shovels, crowbars--even a clothes hanger can look like a deadly weapon in my hands. Only with difficult customers, though. The nice ones are not exposed to my potential wrath, and the vast majority are nice. Even if they happen to see me while I'm holding a very long whip, they're usually pretty well unaffected by my aura of pure malice. This is a good thing, because if they were, I wouldn't have kept any of my jobs for very long.
Maybe it's not the startlingly proximity of me and a potential weapon that scares 'bad' customers. Maybe it's a primal fear thing, like the way dogs can sense approaching earthquakes. They hear me calmly explaining that our horses are very well trained and they need to take the spurs off their boots right now, please, but then they make eye contact and see that what I actually mean is "I would rather be dealing with anyone other than your malodorous self. In my mind, you are dying slowly and painfully. The only reason I'm being polite is because I'm entertaining the vague hope that it'll make you go away faster. My next recourse will be the thorough application of this object to your fat face."
...or maybe not. Maybe I'm just scary when I'm holding a shovel. It'd be more trouble than it's worth, anyway. Can you imagine the lawsuits if I went around breaking my new crops in on the clientele? Apparently Australia is the second most litigious country in the world now, after the good ole US of A.
Besides, I know what the going rate for a dominatrix in my city is. If you want my beatings, you pay by the hour.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
You're not the only one suffering.
I mentioned in my Twitter yesterday that the reason I like my office bitch job is that I don't have to clean up puke very often. There was a reason the subject came up, of course--one of my co-workers, a receptionist I'll call Sparrowhawk. Now, Sparrowhawk is a very lovely girl, but she is extremely reckless when it comes to her continuing state of employment, or indeed, physical health. She works Tuesdays through Fridays, and every time I've worked on a Tuesday morning--every time--she's gone out and gotten hammered on Monday night. Every Tuesday, without fail, she comes in with a hangover.
This isn't so bad, for the most part. Tuesday is not a busy day for the company I'm working for. People who are in a hurry call in on Monday, and people whose business can wait call in Wednesday or Thursday, so Tuesday is really the eye of the storm in our working week. It's a day for catching up on Monday and gearing up for the rest of the week. I think this may be why Sparrowhawk feels it's acceptable to come in hungover, or today... high as a kite.
I was filling out tax forms when she breezed in, whispered into my ear that she'd taken a load of ecstasy, strewed her belongings all over the table, and sat down on the carpet, rubbing it with her fingertips.
My thoughts at the time were: ????????????????????????
Anyway, the day progressed... fairly well, for a little while. Sparrowhawk discovered in herself a strange passion for rubbing up against things with interesting textures, but mostly she answered phones and filed documents without much trouble. This is actually an improvement. Most mornings, she sits there moaning about the state of her head for a while, half-heartedly shuffles some papers for a while, then texts her boyfriend to bring her some more panadol. For now she's almost acting like she's sober, which is a huge relief.
I stop glowering sullenly at her across the table, and gradually I also manage to stop waiting for the other shoe to drop. My thoughts stop saying things like Oh god, if she's going for the phone I'm going to scre--no? Oh. Well then... and settle down into their usual pattern: Boring. Boring. I will strangle that woman if she doesn't stop cracking her knuckles. Boring. Boring. Boring. That guy has such a cool surname. Boring. I wonder what the time is. Should I get Hanaichi's for lunch? Boring. Boring. Etc.
The only major problem occurred around, oh... eleven in the morning, or so. I was only about an hour and a half away from finishing my shift. I look up for a moment, and see Sparrowhawk frozen in mid-moment, file halfway inserted into a cabinet.
"You okay, Sparrowhawk?"
"I think I'm crashing," she said. She didn't sound alarmed or unwell or anything--it was just a matter of fact statement. It was still slightly disconcerting, though.
"Ah. Are you going to be all right?"
"Oh, yeah."
We went back to work. Ten minutes later, though--yep, you guessed it... quite suddenly, there's bits of half-digested food everywhere.
Lovely.
Now, I have experience dealing with puke. The church I used to clean also hosted Narcotics Anonymous, and we had the occasional withdrawal-induced vomiting to clean up. Drunks obviously managed to spew quite literally everywhere at the fast food joints. Even at the horse riding centres, first timers often got down, wobbly-legged, and staggered for the nearest bush--often not quite making it. I also own a dog, and as dogs are want to do, she occasionally upchucks somewhere inconvenient. But I hate dealing with vomit. Man do I hate it. More than any other bodily secretion, except for maybe, occasionally, shit. I think part of it is induced by the knowledge that vomit is only ever produced when you've ingested something you shouldn't, and I always wonder exactly what that might be. There are some truly disgusting options. You'd be surprised what people think they can get away with eating, especially when they're already pissed.
I think in Sparrowhawk's case, it was just a bad batch of E--but that didn't make the prospect of cleaning it up any more appealing. I got another coworker to help Sparrowhawk out, and marched to the storeroom with the gravitas of a funeral procession. Rubber gloves, plastic garbage bag, paper towels, disinfectant. This is a routine I know well and hate with a passion my countrymen normally reserve for New Zealand. Talk about hooker moments.
I clean it up, anyway, and cover the afflicted for and table with newspaper until the real cleaners can get to it with industrial-strength carpet cleaner. I finish my shift in a different office--the smell is almost enough to make me lose my breakfast, too. Sparrowhawk got to go home early, the lucky bitch. She owes me one hell of a favour; if she doesn't feel like paying up, I'm going to tell our boss she was high on the job and get her ass fired. Sounds harsh, but I'm sick of covering her ass when she shows up plastered or hungover, and I'm sick of essentially trying to pull two shifts at once because she's too fucking smashed to be useful. Let this be a lesson to you. It's your own fault if you show up drunk or high or hungover or otherwise useless, and you're gonna have to be prepared for the consequences.
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Hooker moments.
One of the things I do in my jobs, frequently, is have what I think of as a 'hooker moment.' These are the times where I'm working--usually about three quarters of the way through a long, especially shitty shift--and I stop and think thoughts along the lines of, "I could be doing something else right now. I could be a stripper. I could be a drug dealer. I could be a street-walking junkie in a third-world country. And it would still be better than this." Then I realise I'm full of shit and regain my zen.
This story is about the biggest hooker moment I have ever had.
When I was working at a fast food joint, I had minor hooker moments with alarming frequency. See, I worked at two different stores in the franchise, both at train stations. One was basically a direct link to nearly thirty pubs and clubs, and the other one was across the street from a twenty-four hour meth clinic. Most of my hours were night shifts, when, obviously, the meths and drunks were at their most active (and most inebriated.) I actually preferred serving meth heads to serving drunks, because the meth heads were at least fairly happy. The drunks ran the fucking gamut. Some of them were happy, some of them were delirious, some were sobbing, some were suicidal, some were projectile vomiting (just guess who got to clean that one up--in fact, all the jobs involving the dining room at night came to me, for various reasons,) and some were, of course, cranky sons of bitches.
Now, I don't hugely want to say which chain I worked for (I worked there for quite some time and didn't leave that long ago--in another couple of months it should be safe to say,) but all you really need to know for this story is that it was open 24-hours, and served, among other things, chicken burgers.
I'm lousy with remembering people's faces during a shift, but AngryDrunk stuck with me because he made a point of staying far, far too long while placing his order so he could call the black girl on the counter a nigga whore and the Asian boy working in the kitchen a job-stealing slant. For the record, that's a really, really good way to get unpleasant things added to your burger--spit, phlegm, and if the person making it is male and has enough time, well... We didn't, of course (there was a manager around who was very sensibly keeping a close eye on the food,) and in the end I served him with what I like to think of as composure. (Nb: My brand of composure is largely based on the thought that if I'm nice, he'll go away faster. Usually it works. However...)
I give AngryDrunk his order and he goes away. The drink machine runs out of that foul black sugar-and-tar mix they use to make soft drinks in fast food stores, so I go out back and change it, as well as doing a couple other little maintenance-y things. This takes maybe twenty minutes total--when I come back, AngryDrunk is leaning on my register. I was later told that he'd come back about a minute after I'd left, and waited out the full twenty minutes for me in silence. I can tell already that he ain't here for a free refill.
I go over to the register and take my sweet time setting it back up. Only when I have subliminated need to apply a preemptive punch to AngryDrunk's face do I look up, smile brightly, and say,
"How can I help you, sir?"
AngryDrunk grabs me by the wrist and glares at me. For a guy who should probably be comatose by now, he sure can talk fast--though it's hard to pick out the words through the slur.
"Thizzburgah," he proclaims, "tayzz lie SHIT."
Fortunately I have some experience in translating drunken-asshole-ese. I pry his fingers off my wrist with my free hand and say, "I'm sorry to hear that, sir. If you want, I can get my manager to re--" He decided he didn't want to let me finish the sentence, and grabbed my wrists again.
"Nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh, fex m'burgah, horrr!"
This next paragraph happened in a matter of about two and a half seconds:
AngryDrunk threw the burger at me. I dodged. He grabbed me and twisted my wrist, hard. I yelled. My manager stuck his head out. The other counter bitch came over to try and pry his hands off. The manager ran into his office to call the train station's security. Several muted "crr-ack" sounds come from the inside of my wrist.
Security eventually arrive and haul the man off--they restrain him by sitting on him--and an ambulance is called. My co-worker and one of the security guys both heard the sounds of my wrist breaking--as if that wasn't enough, it's swollen to about five times it's normal size, and is rapidly shading through red and into purple. I'm given a bucket of ice to put it in and a free large fries. The ambulance turns up, and the nice paramedics give me a big 'ole shot of painkillers once they'd loaded me into the van.
A trip to the ER and an x-ray later, it was found that my wrist was broken in four places. I got to wear a cast for about three weeks and a brace for some time after that. AngryDrunk got charged with assault (not specifically by me; the corporation that owned the fast food store did most of it, and took most of the payout from the civil case.) Believe it or not, I didn't quit that job for another year after that.
But I remember thinking grimly, as I sat in the back of an ambulance with my broken, distended wrist in my lap, "This would not have happened if I worked in a brothel."
This story is about the biggest hooker moment I have ever had.
When I was working at a fast food joint, I had minor hooker moments with alarming frequency. See, I worked at two different stores in the franchise, both at train stations. One was basically a direct link to nearly thirty pubs and clubs, and the other one was across the street from a twenty-four hour meth clinic. Most of my hours were night shifts, when, obviously, the meths and drunks were at their most active (and most inebriated.) I actually preferred serving meth heads to serving drunks, because the meth heads were at least fairly happy. The drunks ran the fucking gamut. Some of them were happy, some of them were delirious, some were sobbing, some were suicidal, some were projectile vomiting (just guess who got to clean that one up--in fact, all the jobs involving the dining room at night came to me, for various reasons,) and some were, of course, cranky sons of bitches.
Now, I don't hugely want to say which chain I worked for (I worked there for quite some time and didn't leave that long ago--in another couple of months it should be safe to say,) but all you really need to know for this story is that it was open 24-hours, and served, among other things, chicken burgers.
I'm lousy with remembering people's faces during a shift, but AngryDrunk stuck with me because he made a point of staying far, far too long while placing his order so he could call the black girl on the counter a nigga whore and the Asian boy working in the kitchen a job-stealing slant. For the record, that's a really, really good way to get unpleasant things added to your burger--spit, phlegm, and if the person making it is male and has enough time, well... We didn't, of course (there was a manager around who was very sensibly keeping a close eye on the food,) and in the end I served him with what I like to think of as composure. (Nb: My brand of composure is largely based on the thought that if I'm nice, he'll go away faster. Usually it works. However...)
I give AngryDrunk his order and he goes away. The drink machine runs out of that foul black sugar-and-tar mix they use to make soft drinks in fast food stores, so I go out back and change it, as well as doing a couple other little maintenance-y things. This takes maybe twenty minutes total--when I come back, AngryDrunk is leaning on my register. I was later told that he'd come back about a minute after I'd left, and waited out the full twenty minutes for me in silence. I can tell already that he ain't here for a free refill.
I go over to the register and take my sweet time setting it back up. Only when I have subliminated need to apply a preemptive punch to AngryDrunk's face do I look up, smile brightly, and say,
"How can I help you, sir?"
AngryDrunk grabs me by the wrist and glares at me. For a guy who should probably be comatose by now, he sure can talk fast--though it's hard to pick out the words through the slur.
"Thizzburgah," he proclaims, "tayzz lie SHIT."
Fortunately I have some experience in translating drunken-asshole-ese. I pry his fingers off my wrist with my free hand and say, "I'm sorry to hear that, sir. If you want, I can get my manager to re--" He decided he didn't want to let me finish the sentence, and grabbed my wrists again.
"Nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh, fex m'burgah, horrr!"
This next paragraph happened in a matter of about two and a half seconds:
AngryDrunk threw the burger at me. I dodged. He grabbed me and twisted my wrist, hard. I yelled. My manager stuck his head out. The other counter bitch came over to try and pry his hands off. The manager ran into his office to call the train station's security. Several muted "crr-ack" sounds come from the inside of my wrist.
Security eventually arrive and haul the man off--they restrain him by sitting on him--and an ambulance is called. My co-worker and one of the security guys both heard the sounds of my wrist breaking--as if that wasn't enough, it's swollen to about five times it's normal size, and is rapidly shading through red and into purple. I'm given a bucket of ice to put it in and a free large fries. The ambulance turns up, and the nice paramedics give me a big 'ole shot of painkillers once they'd loaded me into the van.
A trip to the ER and an x-ray later, it was found that my wrist was broken in four places. I got to wear a cast for about three weeks and a brace for some time after that. AngryDrunk got charged with assault (not specifically by me; the corporation that owned the fast food store did most of it, and took most of the payout from the civil case.) Believe it or not, I didn't quit that job for another year after that.
But I remember thinking grimly, as I sat in the back of an ambulance with my broken, distended wrist in my lap, "This would not have happened if I worked in a brothel."
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Testing, testing, one two three...
Let's see how this goes.
I can't promise this thing'll be updated regularly, if at all; my life has a tendancy towards the psychotic, even during the off-season. Basically, this blog is going to be devoted to me ranting about the shitty jobs I work, among other things.
Background: I'm an Australian university student, currently studying for my bachelor of psychology with honours. I'm almost one semester through, and working very, very hard to pay my own way. So far, I have:
I can't promise this thing'll be updated regularly, if at all; my life has a tendancy towards the psychotic, even during the off-season. Basically, this blog is going to be devoted to me ranting about the shitty jobs I work, among other things.
Background: I'm an Australian university student, currently studying for my bachelor of psychology with honours. I'm almost one semester through, and working very, very hard to pay my own way. So far, I have:
- been a counter bitch in one of the busiest fast food stores in my city
- been a shit-shoveller at a horse riding centre
- given guided trail rides to tourists, at a different horse riding centre
- been a janitor at a church
- packed books into boxes and mailed them to people
- worked on an assembly line in an incredibly dusty factory
- been a courier, for about two months
- worked in a (very, very low-budget) clothing retailer
- worked as an office bitch
The skills I've picked up from these jobs are many and varied. The last listing is my current job--filing, making up conference folders, getting important people coffee and donuts, occasionally answering phones, a little typing, and filling out tax forms, at speeds hummingbirds don't reach. I've been working there for about a month, just long enough for me to get the measure of the place and my first two paychecks. The pay's a lot better than it would be in, say, 'blue-collar' retail or fast food, but in exchange for having a comfortable paycheck and nice flexible hours, they will never let me work more than about 20 hours a week*; ergo, I kind of need to get a second job, to fill in that extra hundred bucks or so I should be making per week to pay off next semester's fees before the dreaded census date rolls around.
* Unless both the full-time office bitches call in sick and they really really need those contracts filed; then I might be able to sneak in an extra shift.
Hey--I'm working in a nice, air-conditioned office, and even though my feet are blistered and my fingers are usually bleeding by the end of a shift, it's still not as bad as the time a very drunk man broke my wrist (remind me to tell that story some time.) I'm not complaining--this is comparatively cushy. I just wish they'd let me work an extra couple of hours now and then.
Unfortunately with the astronomical price of petrol, my options for a second job are also limited by distance. In order of preference;
- retail - pet shop
- retail - clothing shop (I'd be aiming to move up the ladder, somewhat...)
- hospitality - there's a lot of restaurants around, one of them's bound to be hiring
- retail (?) - video rental
- retail - games/electronics
- food retail - there's gotta be 50 small bakers/delis/pie shops/specialty stores, all lined up down the main road.
- house cleaning - the most flexible hours ever, but dealing with agencies is a pain
- retail - book stores
That's about it. Obviously there are other options, but this is... the shortlist, if you will, of places who'll probably hire me quickly, pay me reasonably, and have hours I can work with.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have an exam tomorrow. I could probably be less prepared if I really, really tried.
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