Ultimatum

I've never felt so angry. I've never felt my blood physically boil inside me like I did tonight. Not ever have I hated a man so much, that I nearly swerved to hit him in my car as I drove home and he walked. Seriously, if I hadn't of been so sensible, he would now be dead and I would be locked up. But at least I'd be rid of the one man who I cannot stand to be around any longer.

You all know who it is. It's the blood-curdlingly annoying, snail-like slow, epileptic son of an asshole, I call The Wall. I have always held back of what I really hate about him in this blog, because I don't want to work myself up too much, but this morning, I can't possibly be more worked up after the night I have just experienced.

I'll start from the beginning of the night. 10pm, I was already in a bad mood. I had had too much sleep, (if that's possible), as I was knackered from the night before, so collapsed when I got home and woke up a whole 14 and a half hours later... I know, pure laziness. I figured I might be wide awake for the whole night, but it worked the complete opposite. I was so lethargic, felt so so tired and the night was long. So, 10pm, I was ready, the PM staff were ready to go but The Wall was nowhere to be seen. He usually cuts it fine, making excuses in the only way The Wall knows how, but today he was plain late. 15 minutes in fact, before he limped in, before... get this ... blaming me for his lateness.

I could not believe what I was hearing. Apparently, I was supposed to pick him up, which is absolute bullshit and I was the reason he had to walk. I would never offer him a lift, ever. I didn't mind he was late, it happens sometimes, I, along with the rest of the staff, would get over 15 minutes of lateness. However, to have the audacity to blame me for his disorganisation and crap timing is a step too far, and the others knew it aswell. I said, "Well that's clearly a lie", and he got a bollocking for being late, (which he might not have done had he kept his lying mouth shut), and was told to get on tills immediately.

I hate people lying to get me in trouble. I hated it when I was a school child, aged 8, being kept in detention for something I hadn't done, and I hate it just as much 11 years on in the world of work. I cannot, and will not, stand it, and I made my feelings known tonight as the PM manager did his bit. He agreed wholeheartedly with me, and The Wall's damaged reputation has taken another hit amongst the already impatient management.

This, however, is just the tip of the iceberg. The routine for the night, means I usually go and re-stock the chillers straight away to give me enough chance to complete everything before the papers come at 5am. On a Friday night, I would usually be needed twice on tills as the queues get a bit hot to handle. The maximum amount of times I have ever been needed is 4, and OK, it happens. Tonight? I was called to the tills a staggering 11 times, and most of these were not to serve customers. 3 times I was called to the tills to be asked to come round and serve free coffee to The Police. The first time I was asked, I said, "No, they can wait, I've got a lot to do". Did he get the message? No. Two more times he rang the bell and asked, and by the third time, I had lost the will and said:

"If you ring me once more to ask me this, I'm going to come round, make their coffee, make one extra and chuck it in your face, Understood?"

... I was furious. How can a man not get the message? The Police get FREE coffee. So they can bloody well wait for it. 3 more times, he rang the bell simply to ask if I could come round and get him some change out of the safe, which is right next to him and which he had the key for, and 1 time he rang the bell to ask me if I could make some coffee for HIM. I couldn't believe it, and simply said, "f*** off!" before walking back to my tasks, with the hyena-like laugh of The Wall loud in my ears. He has to do it on purpose. He has to.

I wasn't happy by this point. I was tired, annoyed at being blamed for his useless punctuality and frustrated at being summoned for the most pointless of things.

By the time I'd finished re-stocking the ludicrous amount of green trays for the chiller, it was 12:15am. Time to move on to returning the days unsold papers. A simple task on Fridays as I don't have to worry about returning the trays full of supplements aswell. This was OK. The Wall, despite talking to me which eventually turned into mumbling to himself as he learnt I was completely blanking him, just got on with serving customers and left me be. The way it should be.

Then it came on to the main task of the night. The bakery. The one bit that The Wall can't do because of his condition. Lately, because of his knee, he sits behind the tills, serving the customers, (which by this stage are restricted to taxi drivers and drunks), while I sift through the large amounts of baking and cooking to do for the morning. However, completely against the routine of the last few weeks, The Wall decides he's going to take it upon himself to go and re-stock the chillers. Something I have already done, and doesn't need to be done again. Upon being told this information, he simply mumbled something, and waltzed off. HOW CAN HE BE THIS STUPID?!! I told him a good few times that it didn't need to be done and even raised my voice to tell him he was being a prick, but to no avail. Off he went.

So, I was running backwards and forwards between baking and serving customers while The Wall did a job that had already been done, thus wasting valuable time which would come back to haunt come 6am. I'll get to that bit.

I had given up by this point. I just wanted to go home. He spent the next 2 hours re-stocking absolutely nothing, because I had done it all a couple of hours previously, and then complained when he said he didn't have enough time to re-stock the crisps and sweets. I stayed silent, scared that I would say something I would regret, and left him to try and do as much as possible. When it came to 5am, the papers arrived. Great! They're here early! Maybe, I can get out on time for once? Again, no. The Wall had other ideas and decided he was going to vanish for 20 minutes for no apparent reason, leaving me to finish off what little Bakery needed to be done and then manning the tills, watching the pile of papers wistfully, wishing I could be out there getting them done. After about 20 minutes, I had had enough and went out the back to look for him. I didn't care if customers came in and nicked half the stock, I just wanted to go home.

What welcomed me, was a fully grown man in the foetal position, shouting obscenities and whispering obscenities in equal quantities. Great. Exactly what I needed. One of the legendary fits, which meant I couldn't go out and do the papers until the manager turned up at 5:45.. And it's not as if I could get away with leaving half of them incomplete as it was The Goddess of All Evil. Luckily, I managed to get them completed by 6:35am, in which I went back into the office, dripping in sweat and my back in extreme pain, thanks to the large amount of hauling about this particular chore requires, only to see The Wall sitting in a chair looking rather shaken. I didn't care.

Now, what came next isn't for the faint-hearted.

The Goddess Of All Evil was looking as if she was in a bad mood. Not good. I could tell something was about to happen and, it wasn't a song and a dance. Time for some transcript...

G.O.A.E - "Tahir tells me that you were supposed to re-stock the crisps and sweets, is this correct?"

Me: "Well, no... I have to do the bakery, the chillers and the newspapers, I don't have time to do any of that, as I've said before.

G.O.A.E - "Well, they look shit and Tahir says you were doing them, so why are they not done?"

Me: "This is ridiculous. How many times do I have to say it? I cannot do all of the tasks, I do not have the time. He did them, and he didn't leave himself enough time because he insisted on doing the chiller, even though I had already done it!"

G.O.A.E - "This isn't good enough, the Territory Manager is coming in today, he can't see it like that"

Me: "Then bollock him for it, because I've had enough of being blamed for him being useless."

I stood up for myself and rightly so. I am fed up of being blamed for The Wall being rubbish at his job. Fed up of The Wall lying out of his back teeth to avoid facing the consequences of his laziness and fed up of the management defending a man they say they dislike and a man who puts me, himself, (not that I give a flying pig's shit about him), and the customers in danger time and time again by having epileptic fits in the middle of the night. It is not fair on me, it is not fair on the customers and it is highly dangerous at that time of day.

And to have the absolute cheek to try and palm off his laziness and incapability to do the job, on me, is incredibly unfair and I am not going to take much more of this.

Therefore, an ultimatum. If I have to experience another night like this, another situation in which I get bollocked for his uselessness after he blames me, or another one of his stupid fits which puts me, the store, or it's customers in danger, then it's either he goes...

Or I do.

I don't care anymore that I may well end up without a job. I don't care anymore that I may well end up where I was 8 months ago, with the parents telling me I'm useless and to go out and get a job and I don't care if the management try and persuade me otherwise. My patience has been exhausted to the absolute limit, and even me, who I feel has an incredibly high tolerance level, cannot take anymore of this terrible excuse for a human being.

Have a good day. And a good weekend.