MY LIFE - FEBRUARY

Saturday, February 26, 2000

Today was a fun day. Three hours of sleep last night, a pounding headache this morning, and I really did not want to go to work at 9am. But I made myself get up. Actually, I don't know how I got up. Usually, I fall asleep, wake up at 8:15 panicking that I'm going to be late for work, rush around for 30 minutes, then leave, barely arriving on time. That's my normal routine. Today I was up by 7:40, dressed by 8:20 and actually had to waste a couple minutes before leaving. I got to work at around 8:50, which is when how I usually arrive. I'm normally five to ten minutes early.

I wasn't surprised to find that Dominique didn't show up again. I had pretty much written her off as gone when she hadn't come in three days this week that she was scheduled. Two times she called at 11:30 or later, the other time she never called. Very big no-no's. You can call off, but if you're scheduled to work at 9 like her, you had better call by 9:30 with a reason why. She didn't do this. I believe that she may have been sick, but still, it's your responsibility to inform your employer of why you won't be in. Everyone else can manage this, but she couldn't.

She called today at around 1:40 when I was gone for my lunch break to pick up food for Tom, Lenny, and me. She said she had a doctor's note and that she should be able to work. Lenny told her that she had essentially lost her job because she hadn't called off in either a timely manner or at all in some cases. She was apparently shocked over this and begged for her job back saying she would get kicked out if she didn't work. Lenny told her she should've thought about that before she screwed up.

I feel bad that's she lost her job and all, but not knowing if she was coming in or not is very distracting. Nothing gets done when you're short-handed, so her not showing up/calling off had been costing us dearly in the amount that we could do. I had to try to separate ad signs, write the pharmacy order, ring register, and help Tom keep up. Lenny had to open up, do the banking, set up the sale ends, finish up setting up Easter, and ring register. It's not a whole lot of fun.

Today actually went by pretty smoothly. It was busy, but nothing that couldn't be handled by one cashier. Lenny and I took turns ringing register so that we could each get the things done that we needed to get done. Tom was busy, but not more so than he was used to handling. In actuallity, we probably did better without Dominique showing up than if she had shown up. She would have been annoying, and although more would've gotten done, I'd probably have a bigger headache than the one I already had.

In any event, we have a new person starting next Monday who will hopefully work out at night. In the meantime, we'll have to find someone to work in the morning yet again. Until we do, I'll be ringing an awful lot. Oh well. Just hand me the gun and I'll take care of the rest.

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It has been very warm of late, prompting many people to rediscover that there is life outside of their house. Girls are out wearing tank tops and shorts (very dangerous for any guy who's gone three months without seeing anything like this) and guys are out in their fancy cars. Me? I'm just praying my car makes it to next Thursday. Saying it needs an exhaust is being charitable. It also needs an oil change and a tune-up, not to mention the small leak in the gas tank. It seems that the money I've managed to save back up is going to be gone shortly.

Anyway, I've liked this weather. I like driving with my windows open and I like it when it warms up a little bit after a long time of cold weather. Today was around 70°, right where I like it. However, I think it's kind of neat that in a couple of months when it's 90°, 70 will feel fairly cold. Hell, 50 will feel cold when the temperature drops a bit going into next week. Of course, the drop starts tomorrow, when I don't have to work.

Wednesday when I worked it was beautiful. Thursday was warm, but it rained. Naturally, I was off of work that day. Friday was another great day, but I worked. Today was great, but I again worked, but I got out at 5:30 and got to enjoy a little bit of it. Tomorrow when I'm off? Rain and cooler temperatures. At least Monday will be ugly too. I'll be working 1:30 until 10 and won't care the least.

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Tom is trying to find a way of getting me a Friday off because he feels I deserve it. That's great, but there's one snag that keeps me from getting Friday off. I always have to close on Friday because either Mike or Lenny is working in the morning because, well because I don't know. They don't work the next day usually if they work the morning, except for Lenny, who works every Saturday for a little bit. That leaves me to close up which is why I never get the damn day off.

That could change though. Tom is very good at lobbying and will probably find a way to get Lenny to either get his ass in or get Mike's ass in to close down for the day. I don't exactly care about getting Friday night off (I wouldn't have anything to do anyway), but if Tom wants me to get the night off every now and then, who am I to argue? It will not bother me in the least if I got the day off.

Also concerning work, in addition to closing down Tuesday, because of our new hire, I get to help train as well since she'll be working Tuesday night with no one else scheduled. Should prove to be a real good way of figuring out just how good she'll be. If I could only get these new people to stop picking on me from the get go. That's my trick. Of course, I spend so much time making fun of myself, they probably see it as normal. Mike doesn't help either. I swear, I'll kill him one of these days. Right after I beat him in NFL Blitz 2000 again.

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Still don't know when we'll be moving. We should know about a week in advance, but nothing is guaranteed as I told Lenny. He didn't seem to keen on the prospect of changing the schedule around at the last minute to work around us moving, but I need to be off the day we start to move. It's pretty self-explainatory why that is. Number one, I'm moving, which means my stuff has to move, which means I have to make sure everything goes smoothly. Secondly, I still don't know where the hell this house is. The move will probably be the first time I find out where this house is.

As usual, Lenny said that he'd have to look at the schedule and that he'd have to make sure he had someone closing. I told him that was fine, but he needed to understand that when I find out when we move, I must be off. No games, nothing. I will not show up if I'm scheduled. Either close yourself or have Mike close. Hell, I shouldn't be closing all the time anyway. But that's how it will have to be.

I'm starting to get a little nervous about moving now. It's about damn time too. You'd figure that I'd be shaking out of my clothes over moving, especially since I've never moved before that I can remember. Instead, I've been pretty relaxed of late, not worrying about what's going to happen. I'm in fairly good shape as far as packing up is concerned. I only have a few more things to pack up and then I'll be ready. Some of it won't be packed up until the day we move, but that's normal.

I don't really think about what things will be like. If I start to think about those things, I begin to instead think about the things that have happened. My dad's violent days, his drug problem, his alcoholism, the things that have gone wrong, stuff like that. I don't really think about anything else and then I feel that this move is right, that this move is necessary. I'm not worried about the drive to work and school, I'm not worried about leaving a neighborhood that I know so well, I'm not worried about moving.

I'm ready for this. I want to get things moving in the right direction. Let's do this.