The pressure was supposed to be on today at the "berp". A few weeks of supposed hard graft and vigorous cleaning and tidying, around serving the not so mountaneous amount of customers that come through the doors these days. The duty managers, (apart from Cool Will of course, who doesn't give a damn, remember?), have been on an extra vigilant watch to see if everyone is doing there jobs properly, almost to unbelievable proportions when it comes to The Goddess of All Evil, who had a fit when she found out the young lad I worked with on Sunday night hadn't done a thing. He was from another store, why should he care?
Anyway. There must be a reason why the managers have, all of a sudden, taken an interest in their jobs, and you'd be right. There was. Today, between 1pm and 3pm, we were to be visited by no more and no less than 44 potential investors who were looking to buy the site. No jobs were being affected, nothing physical was changing to the site, just fat cats wanting to expand their collection with a petrol forecourt. "Nothing out of the ordinary" apparently. For 3 weeks solid, staff who were on shift had been cleaning under displays, cleaning under tills, cleaning mars bars, cleaning chillers, cleaning wine covers, cleaning cracks in the walls, cleaning customer's faces... The place was sparkling like a palace made of crystal. I arrived at work, half an hour early, as I had wanted to discuss the possibility, (or if you look at it from my point of the view, the certainty) of the fact that I couldn't work the Tuesday night shift next week, (more on that later), but when I got there, I was greeted by no duty manager, but an RTM, (Retail Territory Manager), who was awaiting the party of investors. Sesiri Jayasena his name is, (no, not Sanath Jayasuriya, the famous Sri Lankan batsman), and he nodded in my direction with the air of a man that means business. He is a nasty piece of work though. I have only met him twice, and once, he had a go at me for standing behind a till when I could of been, "doing something productive" and the 2nd time, he completely blanked me as I greeted him. As he nodded in my direction today, my mind flashed back to that moment, but thought today wasn't the time to repay karma, and acknowledged his greeting with a simple, "Hello".
10 minutes in to my long 8-hour afternoon shift, a HUGE coach pulled up outside the station. This could only be one thing. As I looked outside, a procession of people, wearing Hi-Vi's filed off the coach. One... Two...Three...Four....Five.... That's it. No more than 5. We had been promised 22 in this first party, but only 5 had been bothered to turn up, and after they wandered around the store for a few minutes, with one dopey looking lady taking a couple of photographs, which had not been sanctioned, they filed back on to their coach again. All the cleaning, the preperation, the berating of managers on staff, and for what? For some bald men and a woman who looked disgusted at the very thought of wearing a yellow-coloured jacket to come and have a nosey round the fresh bread. How stupid.
Exactly one hour later, the exact same thing happened. A huge coach, with only 6 people on it, pulled in and dropped off a group of bored looking middle-aged morons, one of which came to my till and demanded he be given the winning EuroMillions ticket, into the store. They did nothing but stand by the door and speak to the RTM. After that, (they hadn't even looked round for 2 minutes), they were back on the coach. What a waste of time, and preperation, and as the final coach pulled away, I got ready to settle down on Till 2 and work my way through customer after customer, with the only consolation being that I was able to offer EuroMillions tickets with a £139million jackpot, which was sort of fun.. But I was glad to be going home at 10pm.
Before any of this happened though, I received a letter in the post. It outlined the schedule for the upcoming Enrolment Day for University, (Weds 21st September), and it said I needed to be at the college for 9.20am.. Ah. I knew already that I had been given the Tuesday night shift, so some serious negotiating or fighting needed to be done to get me off that! I had looked at train times already, and the latest one I can possibly get is 5:58am, 2 minutes before the end of a usual night shift. Oh well. University is much, much more important than the "berp" these days, so the management will have to either like it or lump it. I have warned them that I will not be coming in that night, and whether they choose to find cover or not, is none of my business. I shall be gone, forever!*
Now the time is 02:26, and I actually have a busy(ish) day tomorrow, (or today, depending on how you look at it!) I promised Kettle I would do a bit of a nostalgia trip with him, and have lunch with him at "Pinnnerrrrrssssss", before he shoots off to work, before I jet off into town for what will be an intriguing meeting with the Beds on Sunday. Now. I won't explain why I'm having a meeting with the Beds on Sunday, as I may ruin a surprise, but I can assure you it isn't a job interview and that I am not in any sort of trouble. A couple of you know what it's about, but most of you don't. I will probably update you tomorrow on that. All this before another poker night at Magic Man's, with usually a lot of fun and laughs along the way!
Have I left that on a bit of a cliffhanger? Ah well! Until tomorrow then!
*Yes I know. Admittedly, I said I had left "forever" last time, and I will probably be the first to agree, that I will no doubt end up back in that store throughout the time I'm at home in the "in-betweeny" bits of University. I could do with the money though, right?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment