Change, comfort, and complacency

I’m thinking this will be the last post for this month and around the first of next month I will share another installment with regards to the Streak Era. Perhaps this post will somewhat lead into what that post will be about.

Anyway lately I’ve been thinking a lot about my time at The Show. Sometimes the negative feelings crop up but then I go back to the time I’m living in currently. Perhaps my time there at “The $h!tshow” lead me to the time I’m living in currently.

This month has proven to be a significant month in recent history. And one significance of this month was finally finding a job to leave The Show. I know it can’t be stressed this month eight years ago my decision was to finally leave the cinema behind. My nightmare was to still be working there up to my fifth anniversary there and left behind by people I had considered allies. Not all of them were however also note that changes were going on around me and I was stuck.

That changed when Gotham Bank finally handed me a job offer. And while I was somewhat apprehensive, I accepted the offer and decided it was time to leave. I could’ve stayed, perhaps there was a wish they would insist that I shouldn’t leave. Some of my coworkers were emphasizing that perhaps keep this job and work at the bank to make more money. My answer to that was fcuk this place.

Aside from the trial as a bank teller for almost a month and a half I’m better off moving on. It was time to go, I had to show that I could find another job and move on from mgmt who in trying to admonish me tried to make it seem like that job was such a better deal compared to others. That sounds like the sales pitch of someone who probably was themselves miserable at The $h!tshow.

Anyway the main goal of the Streak Era was to find another job. In October 2014 that goal was finally achieved and it leads me to another era which lasted until October 2017. During that month yours truly faced the Climax of the Reign of Error at the Hole. The end of the Streak Era was what I was working towards, however, the “Climax” was unexpected. That moment represented the unexpected loss of a job that had given me great confidence after the trial at both Gotham briefly and The Show long term.

Specially with The Show and the Hole the ongoing issue was comfort and complacency. I had comfort at The Show, the drama was draining yet I was comfortable. Not comfortable with the drama nor the compensation though the situation. I knew who were likely against me and for the most part who were for me. From mgmt to coworkers, and the people who created issues I tried to avoid them with varying degrees of success. By the time of my departure it seemed nothing was ever going to go in my direction. Perhaps someone up there wanted me out for reasons really unknown to me other than perhaps I ticked them off or just because it was the easiest thing they could do.

Perhaps they were just shocked that I had found a job and had finally opted to put in my two-weeks notice aka my victory lap. Who knows they weren’t keeping me around and I was taking this important step to move forward to take on a much better role. Perhaps take up a bump in pay and the opportunity to take on some benefits. I could stay and hope for the best, however, what if things don’t change for the better.

As for the Hole I would call that a case of complacency. What I didn’t expect to happen did. And as with The Show what happened here also involved mgmt. However, I have to own my part of it. They made my attendance an issue and there was a mgmt change and for the person I’ve often referred to “Ruthless” on this blog was not someone I could ever do right with. And let me just say with what happened to him later I can laugh somewhat about the climax later.

Another thing I might note that I was blocked from doing what I hoped to do during that rather difficult year as it turned out. I had someone hanging around looking for an opportunity and essentially waiting for me to fail and rubbed it in once I did. That was complacency and it hit me hard and it bounced me back out of a place that I latched onto after going through leaving The Show and losing my job at that bank.

The primary lesson here is if you’re unhappy about your situation it’s up to you to do something about it. Standing around won’t change your situation and hoping for the best won’t insure that it won’t turn out for the best. Also never be too comfortable or complacent. Never assume that your “position” will not be challenged.

Both working to change your situation and not being comfortable or complacent are very difficult tasks but necessary. This is why I wrote this post.

I depended on someone else with whom I really wasn’t on the same page to deliver me a position to leave The Show. At the end of the day I have to do most of the work and not only did they leave it to me to do the work they worried me about things I really had no interest in. They admonished me as if I failed in whatever I do like….wait for it….a disappointed father. Their keen interest didn’t result in a job offer and their advice and following it to the letter also didn’t result in a job offer.

And I hope that in looking for a better position I won’t do as a colleague had done once things started to turn for me. I won’t hope someone fails and that I’ll blow it up once they do. However, I want the best opportunity for me to open up and even if it doesn’t go my way I hope for the best for others. It’s not worth rubbing in someone’s face their own mistakes.

And of course if I’m not happy try very hard to execute any potential plan to move forward and make a change. You don’t have to be stuck somewhere that you’re no longer happy and never assume that out of nowhere the situation just won’t change for the worst.

As for the next Streak Era post, I will discuss the plan for that period of time. What was I working on in the long run? Did my initial plan work? See you in November!

November 2017

This month I had two interviews after the Climax of the Reign of Error. Both were with the national theater chain and especially the cinema that’s referred to as the Dine-in Show I formerly worked for the previous year 2016. Neither one panned out as far as a job.

One hiring manager for the Dine-In Show seemed a bit funny speaking with a former coworker there who in spite of my statements noticed that the hiring manager jotted down in his noted my “limited availability”. To be honest that wasn’t a good interview and neither was the other one I had with a cinema that was closest to the Hole. The manager there was a difficult read though as always I kept up my optimism.

Remember what I have been talking about for most of 2021. Earlier in ’17 I had to hear a relatively insistent barrage of Anthony telling me that “if you come to Finer Foods you’d make more money”. One time I snapped at him because even after talking learning buying he still found a way to inject that quote in the convo. Of course there were two other instances where he found a way to bring this up, the last time was during the time where he wanted to borrow some money asking out of nowhere “are you thinking about JUMPING SHIP YET?”

To be fair I’m not sure where this was coming from. And I’m sure that his campaign which started long before Fresh Foods and even Finer’s started making some changes had to have been out of not really being able to let go of what happened about three years earlier when he tried to get me on at his store. It was very strange to have to explain myself again and I had difficulty explaining myself to him years earlier because he was more determined to $h!t on me for not doing everything possible to get an interview let alone get a job. Really oblivious to the fact that it’s hard to worry a hiring if they’ve just immediately showed you how much of a priority you were.

Anyway, after leaving the Hole I had applied to a few outposts for Finer’s and even a few subsidiaries. Just like a few years earlier when I did actually interview with Finer’s at a hiring office on the north side of town it seemed like there were some extra steps to even get an interview. They wanted me to call some number in order to schedule an interview. Well allow me to be irresponsible here, but I’m so glad I saved my money and even the last bit of compensation from Fresh to have no sense of urgency to have to work at Finer’s.

Another thing to consider is that unlike the streak era where Anthony wanted to be all over me finding a job away from The Show – even going so far to try to offer advice that wasn’t very conducive to me finding a job elsewhere – that I didn’t want to involve him. That’s why I had a communications blackout with him in the first place because I really didn’t want to tell him about the climax. I didn’t want him to know about the drama and how it consumed me and hear his own negative opinions about it.

Besides now I wanted to find something else and while at that point it wasn’t about making it to the next level I also knew his job leads likely won’t be that great. They weren’t great in the first place and in thinking about the references episode I got the feeling he would find a way to hold me back.

Another consideration with the Finer’s deal was the difficulty in getting hired back in 2014. Anthony’s insistence on me going to his store and the difficulty with that and his own response to what happened. It was enough for me to back away although later on he still tried to get me back to that. It was strange and odd and perhaps just his way of going back to the past because he never fully was able to let it go.

I feel as if from the summer of ’17 through the holidays after the climax just set the tone for the blackout and ultimately me cutting ties to the man I know refer to as the Fiend. My situationship with him hardly was of any major benefit to me. It might have helped get me an interview to be a cinema mgr or even his insistence might have helped me stay focused on leaving The Show. At the same time it was a lot of negativity and retreads and even some bad leads and worse still we just were never going to be on the same page.

He always had his own ideas which he thought was a better idea as evidenced by his earlier comment before that campaign that “I think you’ll like Finer’s better!” I rejected that immediately only for him to throw in the money deal. Which I can’t tell you for certain if he was right.

Could it be the union? I’ve heard the union for Finer’s isn’t that great. I always though make more money means negotiating and Anthony had sold himself as a great negotiator and found out that his pay wasn’t that much better than mine. I mean just about $100 or $200 more than mine which causes me to think is he getting any benefits because I know he doesn’t care about benefits. And it causes me to wonder if he was lying about going to Finer’s for benefits for his own son – which he borrowed money that summer for.

I suppose for me while I was still at Fresh Foods I didn’t have a concept of how much “more” money Finer’s could offer to pay me. In reality I wasn’t interested but who knows they would have to offer some game changing money that for whatever reason Ant wasn’t getting when he was working for them.

At least for me before the climax the bet I was making was that a new position in buying would get me closer to that game changing money. We also saw how that worked out although I was working towards that Ant turned around and started talking about jumping ship. Like I said we were on entirely two different pages and we just were never going to be even remotely on the same planet.

Anyway to round this up I was looking at cinemas, retail, temp agencies or even transportation. I was looking at railroads especially, wouldn’t mind being a conductor or engineer and I do like to travel. Of course I know about the scheduling it probably could be a struggle.

Imagine being called up at any time to go to work. Sometimes it might be daytime or sometimes it might be nighttime. And transportation runs 24/7 although now is probably a good time to get into that industry as I know truck drivers are in demand. Who knows the air, rail and shipping industries are looking for people too. Hopefully that will involve game changing money as well.

Meanwhile as far as November 2017 goes I just had to stay optimistic….

March 2015

At this point I was working at the Hole for just about 2 months. I didn’t know that soon I’ll be working “full-time” for the first time in life. The transition wasn’t too difficult, however, I was in a different environment than expected. Or was I?

What I was doing at a grocery store wasn’t terribly different than for example a theater concession stand. Just a bit more prep work and certainly a clearer idea of what’s expected. The products weren’t as limited as a cinema – you know popcorn, candy, hot dogs, etc. However, I had to get used to what I was doing and when I first started looking at a jobs with Fresh Foods my inclination was to be at the front end ringing up customer groceries.

Either way, I had to do another call with the state’s unemployment officials in March ’15 as Gotham Bank had filed an appeal after benefits were approved even if it was just for no more than three weeks – from the time I got let go from that branch in December ’14 to orientation at Fresh in January ’15. As it was termed I got benefits with an initial payout then after continuing to register weekly for regular payouts after that. It wasn’t much but for a brief time I had some income coming, and still no overhead. 😛

The initial process was easy and under the guidance of a friend – no not the Friend I never told him directly what happened with the bank. There were no direct documentation that I had to sign just a lot of verbal warnings and what not. I think the only main warning I got was not from anyone in mgmt or otherwise any standing but from co-worker. And I had to guess at the final act which I was never told directly. When Ed and Stan pulled me into the office Ed fired off a number of offenses which I could easily categorize as issues with attendance (specifically tardies) and performance as a teller. A list of things that allowed him to determine that he just didn’t like what he sees. Made sure to reference the probationary period for Gotham which was about 90 days, and I was just about halfway through that once things ran their course there.

So I guessed at what the final straw had been, I made sure to tell them what I had been told. Correctly I guessed one particular incident that happened that helped Ed make up his mind about my job there. I get a letter approving my benefits saying I was not at fault and the friend based on some of what I had been telling him determined that my training was an issue. Then again I will admit I was incompetent and uneasy in that role and as stated as time went on and didn’t get on well in my new role yours truly began to dread coming to work at that branch everyday…

For the record the hearing over the phone for the appeal had been cancelled I got a phone call for it the day it was supposed to happen. Actually in a fit of pretending to be my brother who hadn’t seen lived with us for over a decade I took a message that Gotham had rescinded their appeal. If the appeal from Gotham had gone through I’d have to repay that money and thankfully at that time it wasn’t necessary.

I had read up on the company and how they handled unemployment claims. It seemed they contested all unemployment claims and if they lost they will appeal. I had the unfortunately issue of being unable to find my schedule from the bank because in the initial phone call which was before my orientation for the Hole from what the agent told me over the phone there was some discrepancies as far as when that final act occurred. If I remembered the date the agent had told me correctly I wasn’t even at work that day and looked at a copy of my schedule from the bank still in my possession. If the appeal was rescinded I didn’t have to prove that.

However, one thing I could say for Ed one time he pulled me in the office and he got his dates wrong. While he was going to get me on something that given day, he was trying to mention something that we talked about on another day in the office and it was all wrong. I demonstrated that I do remember what we talked about everytime he wanted to talk $h!t to yours truly. Right or wrong Ed seemed to have some arrogance about him and this was not the first time nor the last time I encountered this from a manager. Problem is when they want to get you on something there isn’t much to say about it on my end and was still on the defensive in the long run….

Regardless smooth sailing in the new year at the new job. We started off with a decent crew in the beginning. A few we lost for a variety of reasons probably attendance related or otherwise just realized this wasn’t for them. However, I viewed my new job and company as yet another new beginning. Besides the hot shot job at the bank didn’t work out and that was supposed to be something of a new beginning from The Show.

Oh, yeah I like to talk about the big money years. Well 2015 was the start and it’s basically ongoing even with the hiccup that came later. Minimum wage in Illinois back in 2014 was still $8.25/hr. When I moved over to the bank I went up to about $3.25 more per hour than the hourly wage offered at The Show which was minimum wage. However starting off at Gotham the position was only 20 hrs a week and yes there were opportunities to add to your paycheck i.e. make referrals and never felt too comfortable doing that at the time. I think on Gotham’s version of a social network I saw there doing this for a year would get me, basically I wouldn’t make more money than I had made at The Show. Basically under my minimum goal of making $20K/year, my yearly income assuming no changes would still be roughly in the $10K/year range.

However at the Hole as time goes on that year, I get benefits mainly health insurance and dental. Also a raise after six months, and especially being lifted up into full-time status which means overtime and working up to 40 hrs a week I would ultimately reach that $20K/year goal in 2015. As far as benefits that would wait until a bit later I didn’t immediately get benefits or was unsophisticated about the company’s processes as far as enrolling in benefits once I became full-time. However, by the end of the year I’d get there.

After a couple of years of the streak era, I was going to achieve some of the minimum goals I had from roughly the start. A job with benefits and at a minimum make $20K/year.

One final drop – revisit

Hot hoopty!

I’m revisiting the post I wrote around this time last year to consider this something of a milestone. It’s been over three years since I really last talked to Anthony the hustler. The events of this month three years ago – or in 2017 – marked the last real time I talked to him as a friend. It took some other events to cause me to reconsider our “situationship” however this month essentially marked the beginning of the end.

I called back to some of the events of this period of time in a pair of posts earlier this year. I noted his insistence on mention a certain character who I will close the character arc on him in the near future. And also Ant’s need to all the sudden expect me to chase money and consider working elsewhere in spite of how things had been going at the Hole during that period of time.

Well it took things going in a downward direction back in the latter half of ’17 which really caused me to blackout any communications with the Hustler. I was in no mood for any begging and I definitely had no intention of tell him my own sob story about how it all went wrong at that time. I just knew as I wrote that post last year also that I’d be even more depressed about it once it did come out.

It took me many years to realize at least with the Hustler trying to become part of my space, that yours truly was really under attack by him. It was unlike anything I really experienced the out of line personal questions, early requests for money, and even his seeming inability to realize I was backing off. Some of this I can recognize he knew what he was doing in some of these instances, for him it was an attempt at establishing a mentorship but as time goes on I view this as yours truly was a target for him. I fell right for the trap.

The red flags were flying all around the longer I maintained contact – essentially I’ve known him for the better part of nine years at this point. I like to believe the best in people and for a time I did believe the best in him. However, I know what it all lead to and I’m very glad that it’s over.

I must also add yes, I did write a post two months ago that I have no further stories to tell about him and that it’s probably time to stop talking about him on this blog. I recognize that I had broken that promise. In this instance it was necessary to note a milestone that seemed very unthinkable over three years ago.

Finally it must be noted that I’ve made some online efforts to cut any attempt at contact. While I haven’t blocked him from calling he hasn’t hit my phone since Christmas Day. If blocked any attempt at communication through facebook though it may be possible he could try to comment on those statuses he can actually see. I blocked him on twitter (which he doesn’t seem to use anymore), instagram (which aside from a few likes on some of my posts there he rarely seemed to use it), and even linked in (which he also seemed to rarely use). Time will tell if he’s finally gotten the hint, however, I’m trying not to be complacent.

The lesson with that individual is that he came around because he needed something. I found myself recognize how much he tried to chase me around once he made his purpose known. So I realize in this I made some mistakes, it causes me to realize that in dealing with people like him yours truly just has to be more forceful in keeping someone like this out of my space.

May I meet people who truly belong in my space.

Familiarity

Although I answered HarleyQ in the recent post when she asked the question about transferring out of my comfort zone it caused me to want to further expand that post. I went from talking about changing jobs and remaining comfortable and complacent in the roles I have accepted so far to considering whether or not I should leave my hometown.

In my answer I liken this to changing jobs (on my own terms) back in October ’14. The time to have left in reality was over two years ago before and I was very gungho for that, however, in my mind I needed a job to leave for. I had to work for that for over two years until I finally got a job offer to leave for.

I told a senior manager at The Show that I was leaving. At that moment I believed that was the right thing to do upon getting the job offer to go to Gotham Bank, there was hardly anything there for me to stay. I knew the job which was my comfort level and I knew some of the workers, especially the ones I felt that I could work with and the ones who were trouble. Although some of the managers were beginning to move on I knew them too for good or for bad. I left a job of almost five years with great familiarity, however, I knew it was stagnation no reason to think I would grow there.

There lies the catch-22 I was leaving the familiarity and taking on a role where I had no familiarity. A new environment does wonders, then again the new environment is the unknown and once I did turn in my two weeks with that aforementioned senior manager I did so with trepidation. Did I really want to leave?

Although I knew it was the right thing perhaps in a way I wasn’t really set to go. I made those decisions turned in my notice and never asked the rescind it. Your’s truly was still somewhat unsure about what I was doing. Even then once I realized it wasn’t working out in the long run, I had also decided it would be a failure if I tried to get my job back at The Show.

As far as transferring out of my comfort zone I feel as if I may have that same hesitation. To leave the familiar is hard. I know the Chicago area for the most part leaving would be hard. I chose going to Mission College because where it was located it had decent public transit, but it was still an unfamiliar land.

I also consider my elderly mother who’s going through some of her current health challenges. We’ve occasionally discussed the possibility that I could take on a job outside of the Chicago area. Nothing serious comes of it, however, there are a few options I’ve noted where yours truly would want to go.

Iowa?

The pic I used in that last post I used a search term Iowa. It seems like an unlikely new direction for me, and especially for a state I’ve only passed through a handful of times. Most of us know Iowa as a place of agriculture, college football and even minor league baseball. I could find a decent sized city and be OK because it’s unthinkable to live in the sticks.

Someone suggested Georgia where Mission (not a real school but does represent my alma mater) is located and I basically just balked. Everyone is moving to Georgia and yours truly would rather start trends not follow them. 😛

Either way making a physical move to another city or another state is a difficult undertaking. Especially difficult without having a plan that could include a job or even a school to attend.

As always something under consideration for now.

“Showed me up”

Alright let’s try this again! This very post got deleted because I had failed to save this on the wordpress app and closed it out. As a result an older unedited version overwrote the post that was published. Dang it!

I found myself telling this story recently after arriving at my two year anniversary of my “retcon” at Fresh Foods. I started with the company over five years ago and have seen so many changes which also included my 6 mos. hiatus.

At some point during my first summer in 2015 with the company I ran into a man who’ll be dubbed Harrison or Harry. For the remainder of this post we will call this individual Harry as in real life he shorted his real first name to the first three letters. It was sort of cool how he identified himself it was simple and short. In some respects it help to somewhat reinforce his personality as I saw it at the time.

The first time I recall Harry was when I arrived for my night shift and probably within an hour or so he was going home for the day. He and another young man was there helping us out from another store. In fact the store I often shopped at when I still worked at The Show. There would be another shift where I’d have to work with Harry.

I had opened our deli case one morning and doing my usual routine. We often put product in the case and it takes us a minute to garnish. I’m usually a minimalist when garnishing however my learning curve with that wasn’t that good I’ll admit. Perhaps it’s not good to admit that my goal is to do just enough and make minimum effort to make the product look good.

So I opened that particular morning and I see Harry come in past the department. He may well have peeped the case on the way in. He reports to our department and then I see him go to the front of the case and he’s grabbing items from the back. In my head I’m thinking what is he doing. What he was doing is he was going to work re-garnishing the case to his standards. It just wasn’t good enough for him.

Once he was done he went and got one of the supervisors who was in the kitchen behind us. Then one of the assistant mgrs walked by he was so impressed he took out his iPhone and snapped some shots of the case. And then he came and pulled me aside not only to show-off the wonderful job he just did for yours truly, he also wanted me to know this is how you’re supposed to garnish. That man just showed me up, he just had to!

Harry just couldn’t resist taking this one opportunity to show off his skills. He often spoke not only to our management to show off what he did, he even talked to even store management. Look at this wonderful job I did and did it all by myself!

I’m going to give him his due though he does a great job and takes the effort to present the food. Yours truly just did what he knew to do at the time, however, was Harry the right teacher? I find that he just likes to bust you out if it wasn’t done the way he thinks it should be. Not so sure that’s a good thing to insure people learn the lessons you want them to learn in the long run.

Because Harry just enjoyed showing off his skills and was shamelessly promoting I just had to ask him why wasn’t he in mgmt. His only response was to state that it’s in the cards. Another coworker who experienced behavior I considered very hyper at the time just thought that Harry was just too comfortable in the role he had to go for a higher position like that. I could read his actions as that of a person who was taking control of a situation, however, he really doesn’t seek a position with those real responsibilities.

The next episode I remember where he really made a spectacle was one day he designed to rearrange the deli area to his liking. The people who already knew him working with him for years noted themselves that he’s trying to turn our department into the department he worked at his own store. However, what he did at this point wasn’t entirely wrong my issue was how he went about it.

I would say his goal was to make our workspace more efficient and he was going to fix it. He was empowering himself to make the changes that he deemed necessary to make. He rearranged the furniture and got upset when he saw the filth behind the furniture. Harry had enough of a sense of entitlement to try to get a supervisor to look at this. At this point he was just looking for something to complain about.

He tried to tell one of our assistant managers of what he saw and that mgr took Harry to the back for a quick word. One of the supervisors – actually Larry who later got promoted to dept mgr for my now old dept at the Hole – showed no sense of urgency when Harry got up in arms over the dirt. By my eyes, I got the idea that he was finally giving our dept mgmt a headache in that time.

I had later heard little things about Harry such as he got himself to the point where if he wanted some OT he never had to call our store to ask, he could just come in. That lasted until he did come in one day and mgmt told him they had no more OT to offer him. So it seemed we could expect to see him at least once a week and then at some point we hardly ever saw him again. I would go to his store sometimes and see him working with me usually avoiding him. I don’t characterize our interactions as clashing, but our styles weren’t going to mesh. He might stress himself out, however, based upon how he was it was nutty working with him. Although admittedly I picked him brain on somethings, however, did a lousy job implementing them. Yours truly was still learning.

I was gone from Fresh Foods for six months and not long before the “reign of error” I saw that Harry had finally left his home store and found a position at another Fresh store in another state. Once I returned I couldn’t find him on Fresh’s social network and that likely means he’s no longer with the company. I suppose that mgmt opportunity never materialized for him or he didn’t want it anyway.

Once I arrived at my new assignment after my brief hiatus I asked a couple of colleagues whom I figured worked with Harry about him. Only one agreed that he could be annoying, however, I told both about his behavior. One was a bit more open about how he was as a coworker, the other hardly commented. They both were unsure about what happened with him later, one even thought he got promoted to a supervisor.

Hmmmm, while it’s great that he can show what he can really do in that role I get the idea he would be an absolute headache for not only the people he’ll supervise, but the mgmt team as well. From what I can tell through my own digging he never rose to that role, however, only he knows and I have no inkling to talk to him in the near future.

I just wanted to add that in passing two women at work were talking about him one day years ago. One lady not from my department though helped us out occasionally could not remember his name was talking with one of my dept’s supervisor about how he was busting his moves on her but she already knew it wasn’t going to work. Saying some key words like he didn’t work at the Hole, but another location and the supervisor asked “Harry?”. They both agreed that he was making some bad moves as far as how he related to the women he worked with even briefly.

This guy made a change

I can somewhat relate to this video where a man who had at one point in his life worked a high pressure job making $80K per year and then decided to downshift. He went from working such a job and letting go of his condo and house and job to an apartment riding a bike to work at a grocery store three days a week. He got tired of the rat race and left it behind working for eleven years.

This is one of those videos that probably doesn’t fit here, however, I wanted to share it anyway. It likely belongs on the new blog that I want to start.

Pizza

For the first time in a longtime I tried something new at work. It was something that yours truly had been working on for years at Fresh Foods but the opportunities weren’t presenting themselves. Nor was I willing to just take the “bull by the horns” and go for it.

I made some pizzas at work. To be honest the four pizzas produced recently weren’t the first ever made with my hands. Still yours truly feels as if I’ve made quite an accomplishment recently not even achieved during my time at the Hole.

The other pizzas ever made with my two hands occurred earlier during my time at the Hole and then later once I arrived at my current assignment. The only concern is would I be able to handle the rush during a “normal” business day as it could be very stressful for anyone who has worked pizza. Also at this moment my concern is over whether or not it’s possible to handle a custom order for a pizza. Regardless, it’s hard to say that I have an out as far as making pizzas now.

Keith – whom I formerly worked with at The Show – even chimed in on my snapchat that my beautifully crafted pieces of culinary artwork looked like something from The Show. The pizzas sold at my old job were shipped pre-made and frozen – definitely not freshly made not matter how often customers at concessions insisted on a “fresh” pizza. My only response to which he agreed was that the pizza I made was better than what you’d get at The Show. 😛

As always I continue to change and grow and learn new things!

Enough

There were a few post I had in mind for this month that I hoped to have shared with you last month. And then it was decided that they’re not important. One reason for this is basically writer’s block another reason is continuing a circus of years past that I realize it’s draining to even discuss.

I wanted to tell you about more about the drama from a few years ago Anthony the hustler’s push to get me to work at his Finer Foods store. He might have pushed and stayed on topic and even convinced me to do it his way. To be fair, I wasn’t entirely comfortable with it and it failed. He can turn around and assign blame, however, in my mind when I expected an interview and ultimately a job yours truly got neither.

In the long run it doesn’t matter since I found another job elsewhere later that year – over six years ago. The irony was that he wanted me to cold call some connection he picked up – and who knows if it was a real connection – that would enable me to enter a job that “suited me“. I definitely wasn’t very comfortable with that and without his or anyone else’s help I got the job that “suited me” until it didn’t.

And last month I wrote a post about him beginning his “campaign” – “come over here to Finers you’d make more money” – while things hummed along at the Hole…before the Reign of Error.

However, my epiphany is that I need to move on. Surely for those of you who continued to follow this, it’s a conclusion you’ve long realized. And the many posts about this person have always trended towards the negative. Those stories only serve to really bleed together with very little to distinguish any of them other than a different story but same conclusion.

I often like to say that I’ve had the greatest sense of peace since the last time I spoke or saw him. It feels as if I told a lie, the peace comes from ending communications or better yet not giving a response to his increasingly rare yet persistent attempts at contact. The peace I don’t feel is that he got very close and I treated him as a friend only to realize years later that our situationship was very unequal. It served him the best and served me the least in reality.

At this point I’m hoping this post will be the last time he will be mentioned here. For this blog it’s probably enough of this very uninteresting soap opera that unfolded over the years. I often said if he tries any attempt at contact it won’t be broadcast news but I’ll let you know. Now my goal is to put this situation into the back of my mind where it belongs and turn my attention to things that will better yours truly.

Update

I often refer to me years – and two different stints – with Fresh Foods as the big money years. Then the bug hit us and the business had to adjust to the pandemic. The hours have gotten a tad more erratic in recent weeks. I’m not like it at all.

Earlier last month full-timers got hit with the policy that we’d have to be available for at least 70% of a store’s operating hours. And the added threat of possibly losing hours which two people confided in me about. One of those people I don’t see as particularly versatile as this seem to stick to one job and show no interest in learning anything else about the department.

Indeed and I’m keeping this in mind that this person seems to have things going on at work. They want to limit the times they can work – not necessarily what they do at work – in light of what’s going on at home. I think what would help them out is expanding beyond what they have done since I’ve started there. If this was my advice it’s unsolicited and just need to steer clear of that. However this bug hit us and that person hasn’t said anything else about it.

Another person actually started doing receiving more than I have in recent years. And view him as having the least to complain about, they don’t like the idea of a job “owning” a worker. However, if they’re concerned about their availability I see their solution – and had offered unsolicited advice to them – perhaps they need to find a buy/receive job. More often than not that’s guaranteed early hours do your ordering, receiving, and replenishing and then go home.

They’re not complaining as much as they had been, however, we have the added concern of this bug and we have some more problems. Our boss sent an email recently with regards to scheduling and hours letting us know we’re making less sales than normal. Suggested a few things like taking some hours in new departments, taking an extra day off or a whole week off, or even taking some hours at another store. Then it got me thinking.

I often liked to say that it’s more likely that I will return to the Hole than return to The Show. Yes, they are two different industries and right now The Show is closed so no return as of now is even possible. But what if I could help out my old department at the Hole and it leads to returning for good. Of course what I realize in that situation is that given the many changes as far as personnel there are many changes.

Another thing in consideration is that while grocery is an essential business as of now and many stores are still hiring there isn’t as much hiring given the current circumstances. I get the opportunity to learn a different department and how they do things and saw a job that could be of interest which is in another department but is a buy/receive position. So once I send this e-mail some big picture thinking is involved and besides this is a period of change & growth.

Regardless, this bug going around where I hear there is some progress – though not enough so that the world can go back to some form of normal – is causing us to adjust far more than we may be comfortable with. My goal right now is to just take advantage.