Eat’n Park, or “The Sinkhole Which Consumes My Life” June 5, 2008

I’m finding it odd to realize that I really like my job. I am a greeter at a family restaurant. What about that is enjoyable? I certainly don’t like being on my feet for all those hours. I don’t really like smiling at people who are difficult and demanding and ornery and… you get the picture. And I don’t particularly enjoy running a register– though I can do it sufficiently quickly and painlessly so that the customer and I are both no worse for the transaction.

 

But no matter how I despise having to pause my day at three o’clock in the afternoon so that I can work a four-to-nine shift, and then come home tired and with no time to go do anything… I still manage to really enjoy myself at work.

 

I never realized how seating people in a restaurant is like one of those brain games where you have to shuffle everything around and make it all fit. And then every hour or so, you get to start all over with brand new pieces that have different shapes and demands. Plus on top of that, you have 9 or so waiters and waitresses that demand that you spread the customers evenly around the restaurant. They don’t really care that the last three parties wanted tables by the window, or that there are only two-seater booths in their section. They want you to seat somebody there, and they want it now.

 

Don’t even get me started on ‘credit tips’, which can apparently disappear into cyberspace if you hit the wrong button. And now there’s an angry waiter looming over you (it’s always the six-footer that gets his tip deleted…) demanding to know where his four dollar tip went, and how you got this job when you are so clearly incompetent.

 

But the people I work with are fun, and we laugh and joke and get along well. Even when I say something idiotic (Example: I’m standing there with a dustpan and I ask “Where do I dump this?” when there’s a trashcan not two feet from me. In my defense, I meant “Is there a certain trashcan I ought to dump this into?”) they don’t yell too much.

 

So it’s heigh-ho, heigh-ho, and off to work I go. Maybe today I’ll get to bring home some day-old Smiley cookies…

I’m beginning to realize that I’m crazy. June 4, 2008

This afternoon, I walked into my bathroom to take a shower. I set down my towel, glanced in the mirror, and proceeded to argue with myself at full volume. I held a one-sided conversation out loud, and the other half happened in my head. But the best part was that I held the same argument, with various minor differences, SEVERAL TIMES OVER.

 

The logical train of thought that led me to this display of utter lunacy was the course of the story that I am currently writing. I wanted to really flesh out the conversation-cum-argument that the characters are going to have. But I realized as I continued yelling at myself in the shower (again out loud AND in my head, simultaneously), that I probably look like I’m losing my mind. And possibly I am. But at least my characters will have well thought out, realistic, and well described arguments.

 

Oh the sacrifices writers make for their work.  

Story of my life: I don’t know what I’m doing. June 3, 2008

So this blogging thing is cool. Everybody and their dog has a blog where they rant and rave and complain and wax philosophic about life and the people in it.

 

So I figured, if Fluffy has a blog then I and my opposable thumbs should certainly get one. I mean, I can type. Doesn’t that grant me the right to my own little corner of the world wide web?

 

So I join the legion of dissatisfied, disillusioned, and disturbed, the malcontents and malevolent, and the few happy bloggers that manage to find their rose colored glasses on the bedside table each morning. (The rest of us just smash our alarm clocks and blindly stagger toward the shower.)

 

Honestly, I laugh at the idea that anyone but Miriam will be reading this. But hopefully I shall persevere, and maybe it’ll make a funny little keepsake to show my kids.

 

Oh, and hey Miriam. Love ya!