So this will be my last entry in the Work, Work, Work Edition of my blog. Gee, I've been working on it since June or July, I can't remember how long ago it was. We have come to the last job I've had up to this point. After graduating from Penn College in 2007 I finally broke into the world of graphic design in October 2007 at a place called Brodart. My main job was to work on the catalog during the summer and then other things throughout the rest of the year such as trade show signage, brochures, flyers, logos, labels, and a bunch of other stuff. It really wasn't the most creative job, it was a lot of production work, but it was good experience.
There's not really much to say about this job to be honest with you, I didn't really like it all that much. I got along great with my co-workers though. The one thing we could always talk about was the show "LOST". I also got to listen to music and podcasts until my boss said we couldn't listen to anything anymore because none of the other departments are allowed to listen to music. So that really sucked when that happened. I listened to about 20 different podcasts every week and it was the only thing that really helped me get through my day, and then it was gone.
My boss and I didn't have a very good working relationship. She never approached me about anything, never gave me anything to do. I would ask her and she would say, "I'll find something for you to do", so I would go back to my desk and wait for something, but I was never given anything to do. And when I would get a project to work on I would get it done quickly and then have nothing to do again. I would be busy during catalog season, but after that, nothing. My boss seemed to avoid me like the plague, she would make small talk with my other co-workers and tell them they were doing a good job, but I would never hear anything like that. The only time she ever said anything to me was if I messed up and then I'd get an earful.
One time she called me into her office and she chewed me out about something and then asked if I had anything to say. I told her that the only thing I ever hear from her is negativity and that she never tells me when I do a good job. I though I would have atleast heard some positive feedback when the marketing team chose my designs out of everyone else's three times in a row. Nope, nothing. Then she told me she would work on that.
I started working on a logo shortly after that. I must have made well over a hundred different designs on that logo. She never asked to see them. I put them in her mailbox but I never got any feedback on them. She just went back to avoiding me like the plague again. But then she called me into her office again a couple weeks after I had told her about her negative attitude. I was let go. I guess that's what you get for telling the truth.
I was never rude or nasty to her, but she was not a nice person at all. I'm sorry I'm talking about someone this way, I know it's not right, I know she probably has issues and maybe I should be praying for her instead of venting all of this on this blog. But I will say she's not the worst boss I ever had. Atleast she never called me on the phone and yelled at me while I was lying on a hospital bed.
Sorry to end this series of posts on such a downer, but it was one of the worst jobs I've ever had and it's mostly because of the boss I had at that job. I didn't exactly like the work all that much, but I didn't really mind it either. I guess I could share one story that's pretty funny though.
I got an e-mail from one of the IT guys, it was an e-mail that went to all the employees. I can't remember exactly what it said, but it went something along the lines of: "The system is going to be down for a few hours today, sorry for the incontinence." If you don't know what incontinence means, then click on it. I usually ate lunch with that particular IT worker so I printed out the definition to incontinence and showed it to him. By lunch time he knew he used the wrong word, but he didn't know what it meant until I showed him. He thought it was funny, he's the kind of guy that can laugh at himself.
Well, I'm glad I'm done with this series of blogs. Now I feel I can get back to just blogging about whatever comes to mind. Some of my favorite blogs are just random ramblings of other people.
I am still unemployed and I have been since July. Please keep me in your prayers. Thank you.
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Monday, November 9, 2009
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
WWWE: Hotel, Motel, Holiday Inn
So after my six years at Hope Enterprises was over I became a banquet server at the Holiday Inn in Williamsport, PA. Not only did I have to serve at wedding receptions and other types of banquets, I also had to set up all the tables and chairs in the banquet rooms. I hated it. Fortunately, the evening bellman was leaving soon so I got the position after he left. I loved it! I would definitely have to say this was one of my favorite jobs. You meet a lot of interesting people while working in a hotel. I got to meet some celebrities as well. Every year we would get some former baseball players and coaches who have been inducted into Major Leagues Baseball's Hall of Fame for a golf tournament just before the Little League World Series started every August. I met the Goo Goo Dolls, The Blue Oyster Cult (you know, the "more cowbell" band), and a comedian named Eric O'Shea. After Eric was finished with his act he asked me to drive him to a Chinese restaurant and we had a good conversation.
I had a variety of things to do as a bellman. My main duties were walking the hallways and making sure everything was tidy, picking up guests and flight crews at the airport, taking amenities to guests rooms when the asked for them: toothbrushes, pillows, refridgerators, etc. and picking on the front desk staff. Ok, that last one wasn't one of my duties, but I made it a part of my job. I also had to help out different departments in the hotel. I helped housekeeping fold towels, keep the pool stocked with towels, and once in awhile I had to change a room...not fun. I helped in the banquet department by taking a bottle of champagne in a bucket of ice to the bride and groom's room during the reception, plus I helped with the banquets once in awhile since I started as a server. I helped the restaurant by keeping the coffee urns filled at the front lobby of the hotel and running to the grocery store for food and other items they needed. I helped the front desk staff by checking guests in and answering the phone. It was a pretty busy job but I enjoyed it.
One of the worst parts of the job though was when a bus full of tourists came and I had to unload the entire bus and make sure all the luggage got to the right rooms. I usually had to take up to 15 or more luggage carts fully loaded and take all the luggage to the rooms. On my last night working at the hotel before I started my new job I was stacking some luggage on a cart when one of the bags came down on my hand. I pulled my hand out and it hurt. The steel casing that holds the retractable handle on a piece of luggage had crushed my hand. I went to the front desk and told them that someone else was going to have to finish unloading the luggage. When they asked me why I showed them my hand, it had swollen and my thumb was twitching uncontrollably. Nothing was broken fortunately, I just put some ice on it for awhile and then I was able to finish unloading the luggage a little while later.
So that's what I did at the Holiday Inn. But this blog post wouldn't be complete without me sharing some stories about my adventures as a bellman. Believe me, if you need to find some interesting stories to tell, work at a hotel for awhile.
Like I mentioned before, I used to pick up flight crews at the airport every night. Most flight crews consisted of two pilots and one flight attendant. I guess you could say I picked up a lot of flight attendants, ha ha.....yea, that's not funny, sorry. Anyway, one Halloween night I picked up a flight crew and one of them was wearing a hockey mask like Jason Voorhees.
When I saw him I said to him, "I'm so glad you finally found a respectable line of work instead of going around and killing people." He just kind of stared at me for a moment, it was kind of creepy.
Another time we had some guests staying with us from Texas. They were doing some construction job in the area. One of them came up to me with a piece of paper in his hand and said "Can you take us here?" I looked at the paper and it was an advertisement for the local strip club. I told him I was sorry that I couldn't because it was against our policy to take people to bars or anything of that nature. The guy didn't give me a hard time or anything he was just upset I couldn't take him and his friends there. Later that evening I was walking the hallways making sure everything was in order when I was paged on my walkie-talkie. The manager on duty said, "Could you please come and get the naked man out of the pool." My reply was, "Ummm.....". Then one of the front desk people said, "Don't worry, she'll have some people help you" which was good because I didn't really want to do this on my own. So about four of us were walking towards the pool when the man came out of the pool room. It was one of the Texans. He was wearing nothing except for his cowboy hat which he was using to cover himself. He apologized and went to his room.
I had to make an audio clip for this next one:
Okay, last story, it's a good one. It was late at night and the restaurant staff had all gone home for the night so the kitchen was empty. I went back there to use the service elevator so I could patrol the hallways. There was a man walking around in the kitchen. It was obvious that he was extremely inebriated. He was carrying around the plunger that we keep in the service elevator. I approached him and asked if I could help him. He said he was trying to find his room. I asked him what his room number was and he told me. So I got him back on the elevator and there were a few unused cigarettes on the floor of the elevator. He had tried to take one out to light it but was way too uncoordinated at the time to do so. As we got off the elevator he was still carrying the plunger and I asked him if he needed it for anything. He told me he didn't so I asked him to give it to me and I put it back on the elevator. I took him to the room he told me he was staying in and he tried using his key card on the door but it didn't work. I had a master key card that opened any hotel room and I was about to use it when I realized that maybe the room he told me wasn't his. So I used my walkie-talkie to page the front desk staff to ask what room this man was staying in. I asked the man his name and I'm glad he was aware enough to remember his own name. The front desk staff looked him up and told me his room was on the next floor. So he had the last two numbers right, he just had the floor number wrong. I walked him up to his room and told him to get a good night's rest.
So those were just some of the things I got to experience while working in a hotel. A lot of randomness and unpredictability. It was a fun job and I was sad to go, but I was about to start my career in graphic design. So I'll talk about that next time.
I had a variety of things to do as a bellman. My main duties were walking the hallways and making sure everything was tidy, picking up guests and flight crews at the airport, taking amenities to guests rooms when the asked for them: toothbrushes, pillows, refridgerators, etc. and picking on the front desk staff. Ok, that last one wasn't one of my duties, but I made it a part of my job. I also had to help out different departments in the hotel. I helped housekeeping fold towels, keep the pool stocked with towels, and once in awhile I had to change a room...not fun. I helped in the banquet department by taking a bottle of champagne in a bucket of ice to the bride and groom's room during the reception, plus I helped with the banquets once in awhile since I started as a server. I helped the restaurant by keeping the coffee urns filled at the front lobby of the hotel and running to the grocery store for food and other items they needed. I helped the front desk staff by checking guests in and answering the phone. It was a pretty busy job but I enjoyed it.
One of the worst parts of the job though was when a bus full of tourists came and I had to unload the entire bus and make sure all the luggage got to the right rooms. I usually had to take up to 15 or more luggage carts fully loaded and take all the luggage to the rooms. On my last night working at the hotel before I started my new job I was stacking some luggage on a cart when one of the bags came down on my hand. I pulled my hand out and it hurt. The steel casing that holds the retractable handle on a piece of luggage had crushed my hand. I went to the front desk and told them that someone else was going to have to finish unloading the luggage. When they asked me why I showed them my hand, it had swollen and my thumb was twitching uncontrollably. Nothing was broken fortunately, I just put some ice on it for awhile and then I was able to finish unloading the luggage a little while later.
So that's what I did at the Holiday Inn. But this blog post wouldn't be complete without me sharing some stories about my adventures as a bellman. Believe me, if you need to find some interesting stories to tell, work at a hotel for awhile.
Like I mentioned before, I used to pick up flight crews at the airport every night. Most flight crews consisted of two pilots and one flight attendant. I guess you could say I picked up a lot of flight attendants, ha ha.....yea, that's not funny, sorry. Anyway, one Halloween night I picked up a flight crew and one of them was wearing a hockey mask like Jason Voorhees.
When I saw him I said to him, "I'm so glad you finally found a respectable line of work instead of going around and killing people." He just kind of stared at me for a moment, it was kind of creepy.
Another time we had some guests staying with us from Texas. They were doing some construction job in the area. One of them came up to me with a piece of paper in his hand and said "Can you take us here?" I looked at the paper and it was an advertisement for the local strip club. I told him I was sorry that I couldn't because it was against our policy to take people to bars or anything of that nature. The guy didn't give me a hard time or anything he was just upset I couldn't take him and his friends there. Later that evening I was walking the hallways making sure everything was in order when I was paged on my walkie-talkie. The manager on duty said, "Could you please come and get the naked man out of the pool." My reply was, "Ummm.....". Then one of the front desk people said, "Don't worry, she'll have some people help you" which was good because I didn't really want to do this on my own. So about four of us were walking towards the pool when the man came out of the pool room. It was one of the Texans. He was wearing nothing except for his cowboy hat which he was using to cover himself. He apologized and went to his room.
I had to make an audio clip for this next one:
Okay, last story, it's a good one. It was late at night and the restaurant staff had all gone home for the night so the kitchen was empty. I went back there to use the service elevator so I could patrol the hallways. There was a man walking around in the kitchen. It was obvious that he was extremely inebriated. He was carrying around the plunger that we keep in the service elevator. I approached him and asked if I could help him. He said he was trying to find his room. I asked him what his room number was and he told me. So I got him back on the elevator and there were a few unused cigarettes on the floor of the elevator. He had tried to take one out to light it but was way too uncoordinated at the time to do so. As we got off the elevator he was still carrying the plunger and I asked him if he needed it for anything. He told me he didn't so I asked him to give it to me and I put it back on the elevator. I took him to the room he told me he was staying in and he tried using his key card on the door but it didn't work. I had a master key card that opened any hotel room and I was about to use it when I realized that maybe the room he told me wasn't his. So I used my walkie-talkie to page the front desk staff to ask what room this man was staying in. I asked the man his name and I'm glad he was aware enough to remember his own name. The front desk staff looked him up and told me his room was on the next floor. So he had the last two numbers right, he just had the floor number wrong. I walked him up to his room and told him to get a good night's rest.
So those were just some of the things I got to experience while working in a hotel. A lot of randomness and unpredictability. It was a fun job and I was sad to go, but I was about to start my career in graphic design. So I'll talk about that next time.
Friday, October 9, 2009
WWWE: Six Years of Hope - Part VI
Sorry it's taken me so long to get through this but this will be the final installation of Six Years of Hope. We last left off where I was asked to work at another house temporarily with a very aggressive individual because I would rather deal with that than deal with the manager of the house I was currently working in.
There were four things this particular individual would obsess over. They are hats, balls, paper, and bags. If he saw any of these items he had to have them and would mow over anyone to get them. So we couldn't really take him out in public unless we went to a park and prayed to God nobody at the park had any of those four items. He had to take him out because we couldn't keep him cooped-up in the house all day. I remember I came into work one morning and he was sitting very calmly in a recliner holding two brooms, one in each hand. The staff that worked overnight told us "We think he's trying to row a boat." I just said "Okay". Then there were times when he'd get very aggressive towards the staff or his housemates and he would have to be wrestled to the ground until he calmed down. He's not a bad guy by any means, he doesn't know any better when he does these things, it's just how he's been wired I guess.
The time eventually came when they found a new place for him to live. He now has his own space in the bottom floor of a house and staff work with him one-on-one and I've heard that it's a much better situation now. I think he is a very territorial person and that's why he would often terrorize his housemates. So with him gone, that meant it was time for me to go back to the other house I was working at. But I didn't want to go back. It was then that I made a very bold move. I talked to the director who ran both the houses and told her flat out that I wanted to stay at the house I was currently at and if I am made to go back to the other house I would quit. Guess what, it actually worked!
So after this agressive individual moved out, another moved in, so there were a total of three residents in this house. I'll talk briefly about each one of them.
We'll call the first one Rich. Rich likes to shake his head back and forth (kind of like he's saying "no") so he has a really large neck from doing this. We're not sure why he does this, but the manager of the house said he gets a head rush from doing it. Personally I can't stand it when I get a head rush because it hurts, but apparently this guy liked it. He is also deaf and he has a device placed under his mattress on his bet that vibrates when the fire alarm goes off. One night I stayed to cover third shift. We were able to sleep during third shift so that was a good thing. But this particular night the assistant manager came it and pulled the fire alarm for a fire drill. I guess we were due for a third shift fire drill, I just wished she wouldn't have picked the night that I was doing third shift. So I got two of the residents out the door, but when I got Rich up, he decided that he was going to go into the kitchen and get himself a glass of milk. So that fire drill didn't go so well. He could be kind of sneaky sometimes and try to sneak drinks and food. His parents took him home over the weekend every week so he is well taken care of. Plus it was nice to have one less person at the house on the weekends.
The next person we'll call Dave. Dave was the new guy that came after the aggressive guy left. He is a very quiet person and has dementia. It could be difficult to get him to do things or interact with staff or his other housemates. He didn't do to well on outings either. We tried horse therapy with him, but he would never get on the horse, but he would help walk it around the track. Most of the time he would stand in the hallway. We'd ask him if he wanted to sit down but he would usually say "No". The only two things that he did well was eat and sleep. He loved ice cream and he didn't talk much, but the word he said most was "pajamas" meaning he wanted to put on his pajamas and go to bed. We tried in so many ways to try to reach him, but there are some people that just can't be reached. Perhaps they have found a way since I've left, but we tried everything.
Then the third resident we'll call Gary. Gary was retired from the day program that Rich and Dave went to every weekday. I would often work with him in the mornings. I would take him to the park to see the ducks and the geese and we'd often times go for rides in the vans. He liked it when we took the back roads so he could see the cows. He liked to say "MOO!" when we saw the cows. He went to a senior center on Fridays for lunch, but he usually didn't like it. He used to when I first started working there, but then he didn't seem to like it as much after awhile. He loved to watch stand-up comedy. I don't know if he understood what the comedians were saying but he laughed anytime the crowd laughed. His favorite comedian was Larry the Cable Guy. He also loved to watch America's Funniest Home Videos. He was always a real joy to work with even though he did have his "moments" once in awhile. He could be really grumpy sometimes.
My career at Hope Enterprises ended at that house. One day while I was at school one of my classmates looked at me and said "You don't look so good." I told her "I don't feel so good." I told my professor that I wasn't feeling well and I left. I made an appointment with my doctor and met with her a few hours later. After checking me over she found three different things wrong with me, two of them related to stress. She asked me where I worked and she suggested I find a new job. The average employee lasts about three years at Hope unless they move up in the ranks. I had been there for over six years by this time. In the meantime I was able to cut my hours back and it really helped reduce the stress I was going through. I had enough sick time and vacation hours to make up for the hours I was missing.
I went back to my doctor a few weeks later and she decided to run an EKG on me. She didn't like the results. She said that I may be heading for a heart attack and she referred me to a specialist about getting a pacemaker. A PACEMAKER? AT THE AGE OF 27? ARE YOU KIDDING ME? So I went to see this specialist and he gave me a clean bill of health. He said that it was normal for someone who was in my position for my heart to be in the condition it was. I was working a full time job and going to college. He did say that I have an abnormal heart beat and said it wouldn't effect me until I was much older.
A few weeks after all this happened I was able to find another job and my time was done at Hope. I had a lot of good times and a lot of bad times and I was glad I was finished there. And I'm glad I'm done blogging about this job.
There were four things this particular individual would obsess over. They are hats, balls, paper, and bags. If he saw any of these items he had to have them and would mow over anyone to get them. So we couldn't really take him out in public unless we went to a park and prayed to God nobody at the park had any of those four items. He had to take him out because we couldn't keep him cooped-up in the house all day. I remember I came into work one morning and he was sitting very calmly in a recliner holding two brooms, one in each hand. The staff that worked overnight told us "We think he's trying to row a boat." I just said "Okay". Then there were times when he'd get very aggressive towards the staff or his housemates and he would have to be wrestled to the ground until he calmed down. He's not a bad guy by any means, he doesn't know any better when he does these things, it's just how he's been wired I guess.
The time eventually came when they found a new place for him to live. He now has his own space in the bottom floor of a house and staff work with him one-on-one and I've heard that it's a much better situation now. I think he is a very territorial person and that's why he would often terrorize his housemates. So with him gone, that meant it was time for me to go back to the other house I was working at. But I didn't want to go back. It was then that I made a very bold move. I talked to the director who ran both the houses and told her flat out that I wanted to stay at the house I was currently at and if I am made to go back to the other house I would quit. Guess what, it actually worked!
So after this agressive individual moved out, another moved in, so there were a total of three residents in this house. I'll talk briefly about each one of them.
We'll call the first one Rich. Rich likes to shake his head back and forth (kind of like he's saying "no") so he has a really large neck from doing this. We're not sure why he does this, but the manager of the house said he gets a head rush from doing it. Personally I can't stand it when I get a head rush because it hurts, but apparently this guy liked it. He is also deaf and he has a device placed under his mattress on his bet that vibrates when the fire alarm goes off. One night I stayed to cover third shift. We were able to sleep during third shift so that was a good thing. But this particular night the assistant manager came it and pulled the fire alarm for a fire drill. I guess we were due for a third shift fire drill, I just wished she wouldn't have picked the night that I was doing third shift. So I got two of the residents out the door, but when I got Rich up, he decided that he was going to go into the kitchen and get himself a glass of milk. So that fire drill didn't go so well. He could be kind of sneaky sometimes and try to sneak drinks and food. His parents took him home over the weekend every week so he is well taken care of. Plus it was nice to have one less person at the house on the weekends.
The next person we'll call Dave. Dave was the new guy that came after the aggressive guy left. He is a very quiet person and has dementia. It could be difficult to get him to do things or interact with staff or his other housemates. He didn't do to well on outings either. We tried horse therapy with him, but he would never get on the horse, but he would help walk it around the track. Most of the time he would stand in the hallway. We'd ask him if he wanted to sit down but he would usually say "No". The only two things that he did well was eat and sleep. He loved ice cream and he didn't talk much, but the word he said most was "pajamas" meaning he wanted to put on his pajamas and go to bed. We tried in so many ways to try to reach him, but there are some people that just can't be reached. Perhaps they have found a way since I've left, but we tried everything.
Then the third resident we'll call Gary. Gary was retired from the day program that Rich and Dave went to every weekday. I would often work with him in the mornings. I would take him to the park to see the ducks and the geese and we'd often times go for rides in the vans. He liked it when we took the back roads so he could see the cows. He liked to say "MOO!" when we saw the cows. He went to a senior center on Fridays for lunch, but he usually didn't like it. He used to when I first started working there, but then he didn't seem to like it as much after awhile. He loved to watch stand-up comedy. I don't know if he understood what the comedians were saying but he laughed anytime the crowd laughed. His favorite comedian was Larry the Cable Guy. He also loved to watch America's Funniest Home Videos. He was always a real joy to work with even though he did have his "moments" once in awhile. He could be really grumpy sometimes.
My career at Hope Enterprises ended at that house. One day while I was at school one of my classmates looked at me and said "You don't look so good." I told her "I don't feel so good." I told my professor that I wasn't feeling well and I left. I made an appointment with my doctor and met with her a few hours later. After checking me over she found three different things wrong with me, two of them related to stress. She asked me where I worked and she suggested I find a new job. The average employee lasts about three years at Hope unless they move up in the ranks. I had been there for over six years by this time. In the meantime I was able to cut my hours back and it really helped reduce the stress I was going through. I had enough sick time and vacation hours to make up for the hours I was missing.
I went back to my doctor a few weeks later and she decided to run an EKG on me. She didn't like the results. She said that I may be heading for a heart attack and she referred me to a specialist about getting a pacemaker. A PACEMAKER? AT THE AGE OF 27? ARE YOU KIDDING ME? So I went to see this specialist and he gave me a clean bill of health. He said that it was normal for someone who was in my position for my heart to be in the condition it was. I was working a full time job and going to college. He did say that I have an abnormal heart beat and said it wouldn't effect me until I was much older.
A few weeks after all this happened I was able to find another job and my time was done at Hope. I had a lot of good times and a lot of bad times and I was glad I was finished there. And I'm glad I'm done blogging about this job.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
WWWE: Six Years of Hope - Part V
So once again I was transferred to a different house. This house had four residents crammed into one little tiny house which was probably only big enough for two people to live in. This was also the first house in which only one staff member was there during a shift so it was different being the only one looking after four people rather than two or three staff. Of course there would be additional staff to do outings, but for the most part it was just one staff per shift. I guess they never heard of the buddy system. Seriously, what would happen if that one staff that's working gets hurt and is rendered unconscious? They probably would have more staff on, but they are only given so much money by the state so I guess they have to do what they have to do.
The residents at this house were pretty calm. None of them really had any behavioral issues. I think the worst thing was one of them liked to try to raid the fridge or cupboards to try and sneak some food. I talk a little bit about each of the residents.
The one that liked to sneak food, we'll call him Rob. Rob is a pretty friendly guy. He enjoys watching the news and he would occasionally go to the mall where the local news station had a news room. His favorite news anchor reported from that room. He also likes listening to his Johnny Cash CDs. He would usually visit his mother on the weekends.
The next guy who we'll call Mark was the oldest living resident at Hope at the time. He was a good guy, but he could be a little grumpy sometimes. I had never seen him do this, but one of my co-workers there told me he was known to flip the bird at traffic lights when they turned red. He spent most of his time watching TV and looking at books and magazines.
The third guy we'll call Rick. He didn't actually have mental retardation or mental health issues so I'm not quite sure how he ended up at Hope. He was the nicest person though. He liked to tell jokes and have conversations with staff. It was kind of hard to understand him, he talked very low most of the time and he stuttered a lot. He had just had a stroke before I worked there and before that I was told that he spoke very clearly. He also enjoyed watching TV, reading the paper, and doing puzzles.
The last one we'll call Don. He was very short and wore big glasses. He kind of reminded me of that turtle from the old Bugs Bunny cartoons. He likes to tell stories and joke around. Don actually wasn't at the house much. His dad took him home on the weekends and on Wednesday nights. He needed insulin shots every day. I had never given shots before so I was nervous about giving them. I took a training and practiced on a ball with the syringe and needle. The day came for me to give my first shot to Don. He gave me a little pep talk and said "C'mon Dan, you can do it!" I was nervous, but he wasn't, he had gotten these shots twice a day for a long, long time so he was used to it.
All the residents in this house were great. I was in my busiest semester at college, so things were pretty rough and stressful, and on top of that, the manager of the house I was working in was the absolute worst boss I have ever had in my life. Believe me, putting the words "absolute worst" in italics doesn't do it any justice. Now, I don't like to say bad things about people, so I won't. But if you happen to be a manager, or a boss of any kind, here are some tips to follow:
1) When one of your employees messes up and you're giving them a lecture about it don't ever use the phrase "That's a no-no." It's very condescending and will most likely piss off the employee.
2) If you need to call off and need one of your staff to fill in for you, don't whine and complain when they can't make it in especially if you have denied them time off when they were sick and treated them like crap.
3) If one of your staff calls because they just got backed into by a semi-truck while they were sitting in their car, one of the first things you should say are "Are you okay?" or "I'm sorry to hear that, do you need someone to take your shift?" You're first question should never be "Well, when can you come in?" in a very stern and uncaring voice.
4) The most important thing you need to remember is that if one of your employees has to be taken to the hospital because he/she passed out and a relative calls in to tell you they won't be in that day do not, I repeat DO NOT CALL THE HOSPITAL LATER AFTER YOUR EMPLOYEE HAS REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS AND YELL AT THEM FOR MISSING WORK WHILE THEY ARE LYING IN A HOSPITAL BED!!!
Follow these simple tips and you can avoid becoming the worst boss in the universe.
So yea, it was not a happy time there. After working there for a few months I was asked to substitute at another group home. They were trying to gather up all the male staff they could to work at this group home because they had just gotten a new resident that was very physically aggressive especially toward female staff. I had worked with him before when I subbed at another house a few times. So I jumped at the chance to work at that other house for awhile. Because I would rather work at a house with a resident who might try to rip my face off than work with the manager at the house I was currently at. Says a lot about a person doesn't it?
Yes, I know I'm supposed to show grace and forgiveness to everyone, but there are just some people that get under my skin and she happened to be one of them. Sorry, I'm not Jesus, I'm not perfect.
But anyway, that's the worst of my time there at Hope. I'll have one more for you next time, and then I have two more jobs to tell you about after that and we'll be done with the Work, Work, Work Edition (WWWE) here at Blogity-blah-blah-blog.
The residents at this house were pretty calm. None of them really had any behavioral issues. I think the worst thing was one of them liked to try to raid the fridge or cupboards to try and sneak some food. I talk a little bit about each of the residents.
The one that liked to sneak food, we'll call him Rob. Rob is a pretty friendly guy. He enjoys watching the news and he would occasionally go to the mall where the local news station had a news room. His favorite news anchor reported from that room. He also likes listening to his Johnny Cash CDs. He would usually visit his mother on the weekends.
The next guy who we'll call Mark was the oldest living resident at Hope at the time. He was a good guy, but he could be a little grumpy sometimes. I had never seen him do this, but one of my co-workers there told me he was known to flip the bird at traffic lights when they turned red. He spent most of his time watching TV and looking at books and magazines.
The third guy we'll call Rick. He didn't actually have mental retardation or mental health issues so I'm not quite sure how he ended up at Hope. He was the nicest person though. He liked to tell jokes and have conversations with staff. It was kind of hard to understand him, he talked very low most of the time and he stuttered a lot. He had just had a stroke before I worked there and before that I was told that he spoke very clearly. He also enjoyed watching TV, reading the paper, and doing puzzles.
The last one we'll call Don. He was very short and wore big glasses. He kind of reminded me of that turtle from the old Bugs Bunny cartoons. He likes to tell stories and joke around. Don actually wasn't at the house much. His dad took him home on the weekends and on Wednesday nights. He needed insulin shots every day. I had never given shots before so I was nervous about giving them. I took a training and practiced on a ball with the syringe and needle. The day came for me to give my first shot to Don. He gave me a little pep talk and said "C'mon Dan, you can do it!" I was nervous, but he wasn't, he had gotten these shots twice a day for a long, long time so he was used to it.
All the residents in this house were great. I was in my busiest semester at college, so things were pretty rough and stressful, and on top of that, the manager of the house I was working in was the absolute worst boss I have ever had in my life. Believe me, putting the words "absolute worst" in italics doesn't do it any justice. Now, I don't like to say bad things about people, so I won't. But if you happen to be a manager, or a boss of any kind, here are some tips to follow:
1) When one of your employees messes up and you're giving them a lecture about it don't ever use the phrase "That's a no-no." It's very condescending and will most likely piss off the employee.
2) If you need to call off and need one of your staff to fill in for you, don't whine and complain when they can't make it in especially if you have denied them time off when they were sick and treated them like crap.
3) If one of your staff calls because they just got backed into by a semi-truck while they were sitting in their car, one of the first things you should say are "Are you okay?" or "I'm sorry to hear that, do you need someone to take your shift?" You're first question should never be "Well, when can you come in?" in a very stern and uncaring voice.
4) The most important thing you need to remember is that if one of your employees has to be taken to the hospital because he/she passed out and a relative calls in to tell you they won't be in that day do not, I repeat DO NOT CALL THE HOSPITAL LATER AFTER YOUR EMPLOYEE HAS REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS AND YELL AT THEM FOR MISSING WORK WHILE THEY ARE LYING IN A HOSPITAL BED!!!
Follow these simple tips and you can avoid becoming the worst boss in the universe.
So yea, it was not a happy time there. After working there for a few months I was asked to substitute at another group home. They were trying to gather up all the male staff they could to work at this group home because they had just gotten a new resident that was very physically aggressive especially toward female staff. I had worked with him before when I subbed at another house a few times. So I jumped at the chance to work at that other house for awhile. Because I would rather work at a house with a resident who might try to rip my face off than work with the manager at the house I was currently at. Says a lot about a person doesn't it?
Yes, I know I'm supposed to show grace and forgiveness to everyone, but there are just some people that get under my skin and she happened to be one of them. Sorry, I'm not Jesus, I'm not perfect.
But anyway, that's the worst of my time there at Hope. I'll have one more for you next time, and then I have two more jobs to tell you about after that and we'll be done with the Work, Work, Work Edition (WWWE) here at Blogity-blah-blah-blog.
Monday, September 21, 2009
WWWE: Six Years of Hope - Part IV
Let's see...last time I talked about the house I was transferred to and I talked about all but one of the residents that live there. Today I'd like to talk about the sixth resident at that house, his name is Chris. Chris is one of the most unique people I've ever met. He's autistic and one of his hobbies is to collect DVDs and VHS tapes. Let's just say he has a lot of them. He remembers just about everything you tell him about yourself or about others. Don't ever tell secrets around him though, it won't stay a secret for too long :)
Chris is able to go out into the community on his own, he just let's his staff know where he's going and when he'll be back. He's very independent. I still keep in touch with Chris to this day. He enjoys coming to Valley Mosaic with me once in awhile. I usually go to his birthday party every year as well. And there's always one thing he wants for Christmas and his birthday, a DVD. He has so many he could open his own video rental store. Almost every time I talk to him on the phone, one of the first statements out of his mouth is "I'm watching a movie".
I'm going to do something new here at Blogity-blah-blah-blog. I have recorded a bunch of messages left by Chris on my answering machine and I have compiled them together in groups of five messages. I thought I would share these with everyone. I've edited them though so all revealing information has been left out such as his last name, phone number, address, etc. so it doesn't interfere with any confidentiality. There will be more where this came from, but I now present to you, Calls from Chris: Part One.
Chris is able to go out into the community on his own, he just let's his staff know where he's going and when he'll be back. He's very independent. I still keep in touch with Chris to this day. He enjoys coming to Valley Mosaic with me once in awhile. I usually go to his birthday party every year as well. And there's always one thing he wants for Christmas and his birthday, a DVD. He has so many he could open his own video rental store. Almost every time I talk to him on the phone, one of the first statements out of his mouth is "I'm watching a movie".
I'm going to do something new here at Blogity-blah-blah-blog. I have recorded a bunch of messages left by Chris on my answering machine and I have compiled them together in groups of five messages. I thought I would share these with everyone. I've edited them though so all revealing information has been left out such as his last name, phone number, address, etc. so it doesn't interfere with any confidentiality. There will be more where this came from, but I now present to you, Calls from Chris: Part One.
Friday, September 18, 2009
WWWE: Six Years of Hope - Part III
So my time came to an end at the first group home I worked at. I was transferred to another home which housed six residents, three men and three women. The residents at this house are able to do many things on their own unlike the first house I worked in. Most of them could talk and carry on a conversation pretty well. Two of the men are deaf but could communicate through sign language and they even had a deaf staff member who could communicate well with them. They could all feed themselves and they all had their own hobbies and activities they liked to do.
One of the women liked to hang around the staff most of the time and talk to them. She had a good sense of humor and would sarcastically call some of the female staff "Miss America". Actually all the staff were female except for me.
One of the deaf guys that lived there liked to try and sneak food out of the refrigerator when no one was looking. He was also on a community outing plan that allowed him to go to the local bar for one drink of beer every payday. So every time he got his check he would yell "BEER!" Of course he got outside more than just once every two weeks. It's just that the state requires we do "plans" for the residents.
Another one of the women is very high functioning and probably had more mental health issues rather than mental retardation. She kind of reminded me of Lisa Simpson, she had the same laugh as her. She is one of the more independent residents and has a job outside of Hope Enterprises. Many of the residents at Hope work at Hope's warehouse doing multiple jobs for different companies which keep their skills in practice. The residents that are unable to work or even perform simple tasks attend a day program which is a lot like day care. I mentioned it a couple posts ago I think.
The other deaf resident liked to spend his free time playing Donkey Kong Country on his Super Nintendo. He liked to watch video tapes too. One time he brought me one that wasn't working right. Part of the tape had been damaged. So I took it apart and fixed it for him. That was a big mistake because after that he handed me a bunch of other tapes. Another thing he enjoyed doing was mimicking gestures and facial expressions he would see in movies. He kind of reminded me of a silent movie actor like Charlie Chaplin or something like that.
The third woman who lived there moved in just a few days after I started working at the house. She has a lot of energy. We'd play soccer in the backyard and she would wear me out. One time she wanted to go rollerskating at the YMCA. She was a big girl and I thought it was a bad idea, but she really wanted to go. I was a little nervous about it because I though she was going to end up in the ER or perhaps I would end up in the ER. But she did pretty good. She fell once but she was okay. She's actually lost a lot of weight since then and last time I heard, she was engaged to marry another resident at Hope.
I have one more resident to talk about but I'll save that for next time. I wish I had more stories about the other residents but I was only at the house for about a month and then they decided they wanted to transfer me again. The other staff were apparently uncomfortable with having me, a male staff there. It's unfortunate that there is a lot of sexism in the work place. There are a lot of women who have to put up with it in a workplace that has mostly male employees. I had to put up with it in a place that had mostly female employees. I was at the other end of the spectrum in a sense. But all this transferring to different houses started making me feel unwanted. So I'll talk about the sixth resident in my next post and then the post after that will include the absolute worst boss ever. See you next time!
One of the women liked to hang around the staff most of the time and talk to them. She had a good sense of humor and would sarcastically call some of the female staff "Miss America". Actually all the staff were female except for me.
One of the deaf guys that lived there liked to try and sneak food out of the refrigerator when no one was looking. He was also on a community outing plan that allowed him to go to the local bar for one drink of beer every payday. So every time he got his check he would yell "BEER!" Of course he got outside more than just once every two weeks. It's just that the state requires we do "plans" for the residents.
Another one of the women is very high functioning and probably had more mental health issues rather than mental retardation. She kind of reminded me of Lisa Simpson, she had the same laugh as her. She is one of the more independent residents and has a job outside of Hope Enterprises. Many of the residents at Hope work at Hope's warehouse doing multiple jobs for different companies which keep their skills in practice. The residents that are unable to work or even perform simple tasks attend a day program which is a lot like day care. I mentioned it a couple posts ago I think.
The other deaf resident liked to spend his free time playing Donkey Kong Country on his Super Nintendo. He liked to watch video tapes too. One time he brought me one that wasn't working right. Part of the tape had been damaged. So I took it apart and fixed it for him. That was a big mistake because after that he handed me a bunch of other tapes. Another thing he enjoyed doing was mimicking gestures and facial expressions he would see in movies. He kind of reminded me of a silent movie actor like Charlie Chaplin or something like that.
The third woman who lived there moved in just a few days after I started working at the house. She has a lot of energy. We'd play soccer in the backyard and she would wear me out. One time she wanted to go rollerskating at the YMCA. She was a big girl and I thought it was a bad idea, but she really wanted to go. I was a little nervous about it because I though she was going to end up in the ER or perhaps I would end up in the ER. But she did pretty good. She fell once but she was okay. She's actually lost a lot of weight since then and last time I heard, she was engaged to marry another resident at Hope.
I have one more resident to talk about but I'll save that for next time. I wish I had more stories about the other residents but I was only at the house for about a month and then they decided they wanted to transfer me again. The other staff were apparently uncomfortable with having me, a male staff there. It's unfortunate that there is a lot of sexism in the work place. There are a lot of women who have to put up with it in a workplace that has mostly male employees. I had to put up with it in a place that had mostly female employees. I was at the other end of the spectrum in a sense. But all this transferring to different houses started making me feel unwanted. So I'll talk about the sixth resident in my next post and then the post after that will include the absolute worst boss ever. See you next time!
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
WWWE: Six Years of Hope - Part II
I'll just pick up where I left off last time. I had been talking about one of the group homes I worked in. I worked in four homes altogether throughout my six years at Hope Enterprises, but I spent the first three years working at the house I've been talking about.
Each of the guys I took care of all attended a day program where they did different activities throughout the day to keep them busy so they weren't just sitting at home all the time. We would regularly have outings in the evenings as well. We'd take them to things like softball games, restaurants, Dairy Queen, the park, and other places like that.
Sometimes we would get nasty looks from people when we took the guys out. Unfortunately, older generations were told when they were young that if they had a child with mental retardation that they should just lock them up in the attic or basement because they have no feelings and feel no pain. This is so far from the truth and it's unfortunate that people actually believed these things. I know from experience that individuals with mental retardation do feel pain, and they do have feelings. In fact I think that they understand more about love than any of us so-called "normal" people could ever know.
On the other hand, many times when we took the guys out for dinner people would come up to us who were working and tell us how much they appreciate what we do. I always heard people tell me that it takes a special kind of person to do that job and that they could never do anything like that. I just tell them, give it a try, there's really nothing special about me that allows me to do this job, you just kind of do it.
Near the end of my first three years at Hope some bad things happened. One Sunday morning I got a call. It was my manager, he told me that John* passed away in his sleep. I was scheduled to work that day, I knew it was going to be hard. When I went in to work my other co-workers were sitting at the kitchen table talking about John and remembering him. Some of the girls I worked with taught him how do dance and sing "Shake Your Booty". His favorite song that he liked to sing was "You Are My Sunshine". I still think of him every time I hear that song.
Not even two weeks later a new resident moved in. I wished they would have let more time pass, we weren't ready for someone to move into John's old room. Then not too long after that our manager was fired. When the new manager came she decided that she needed new staff so those of us who had been working there together for the past three years and had formed a solid team and were like family were scattered and transferred to work in different group homes. We were all happy where we were and that was all over.
Sorry to end this one on such a downer, but it was one of the hardest times of my life. It really was like a family separating. I held a grudge and felt very bitter and angry at the new manager for a long time. Then as if things weren't bad enough she started coming to my church a few years later. It was awkward. We would say hi to each other and talk a little bit, but never brought up what happened years earlier. Then one day after church she pulled me aside and said she had to talk to me in private. She poured her heart out apologizing to me for what happened a few years ago. She said she was a different person then and a day hasn't gone by where she hasn't regretted what she did. I forgave her, but I also had to ask for her forgiveness. I didn't like it when she came and changed everything at work. I thought of her as a tyrant and a dictator. So I asked for her forgiveness and she forgave me as well.
There will be more to this story later. I will talk about the other group homes I've worked in.
*Just a reminder, I didn't use the real names of the people I've been talking about.
Each of the guys I took care of all attended a day program where they did different activities throughout the day to keep them busy so they weren't just sitting at home all the time. We would regularly have outings in the evenings as well. We'd take them to things like softball games, restaurants, Dairy Queen, the park, and other places like that.
Sometimes we would get nasty looks from people when we took the guys out. Unfortunately, older generations were told when they were young that if they had a child with mental retardation that they should just lock them up in the attic or basement because they have no feelings and feel no pain. This is so far from the truth and it's unfortunate that people actually believed these things. I know from experience that individuals with mental retardation do feel pain, and they do have feelings. In fact I think that they understand more about love than any of us so-called "normal" people could ever know.
On the other hand, many times when we took the guys out for dinner people would come up to us who were working and tell us how much they appreciate what we do. I always heard people tell me that it takes a special kind of person to do that job and that they could never do anything like that. I just tell them, give it a try, there's really nothing special about me that allows me to do this job, you just kind of do it.
Near the end of my first three years at Hope some bad things happened. One Sunday morning I got a call. It was my manager, he told me that John* passed away in his sleep. I was scheduled to work that day, I knew it was going to be hard. When I went in to work my other co-workers were sitting at the kitchen table talking about John and remembering him. Some of the girls I worked with taught him how do dance and sing "Shake Your Booty". His favorite song that he liked to sing was "You Are My Sunshine". I still think of him every time I hear that song.
Not even two weeks later a new resident moved in. I wished they would have let more time pass, we weren't ready for someone to move into John's old room. Then not too long after that our manager was fired. When the new manager came she decided that she needed new staff so those of us who had been working there together for the past three years and had formed a solid team and were like family were scattered and transferred to work in different group homes. We were all happy where we were and that was all over.
Sorry to end this one on such a downer, but it was one of the hardest times of my life. It really was like a family separating. I held a grudge and felt very bitter and angry at the new manager for a long time. Then as if things weren't bad enough she started coming to my church a few years later. It was awkward. We would say hi to each other and talk a little bit, but never brought up what happened years earlier. Then one day after church she pulled me aside and said she had to talk to me in private. She poured her heart out apologizing to me for what happened a few years ago. She said she was a different person then and a day hasn't gone by where she hasn't regretted what she did. I forgave her, but I also had to ask for her forgiveness. I didn't like it when she came and changed everything at work. I thought of her as a tyrant and a dictator. So I asked for her forgiveness and she forgave me as well.
There will be more to this story later. I will talk about the other group homes I've worked in.
*Just a reminder, I didn't use the real names of the people I've been talking about.
Friday, September 11, 2009
WWWE: Six Years of Hope - Part I
Things have been pretty busy lately. I'm still looking for new job but I have been doing a sales job on the side for a little extra money while collecting unemployment. This week has been busy because we are at a county fair all day everyday this week. I'm not feeling to well today so I decided to take the day off. So now that I have some time, I think it's time I got back into something I've been putting off for a few weeks now. I'm getting back into the WWWE or Work, Work, Work, Edition of this blog. I had started it awhile back when I still had themes for each day of the week. The WWWE was part of Story Time Tuesday on my blog. So I last left off when I was working at Blockbuster Video. So now I will talk about a place I worked at called Hope Enterprises.
Hope Enterprises is an organization that employs people to take care of individuals who are mentally and/or physically challenged. I worked in four different group homes over the course of six years. I'll talk about the first house I worked in. I worked at that house for three years. I took care of four different individuals at that house. I have to be careful about what I say due to confidentiality so I won't give out any names or locations. This particular job is going to take awhile to talk about, so I'll have to span it out over multiple days. So today I thought I would tell a story or two about each of the four individuals I took care of.
The first guy, we'll call him Bill, even though that's not his real name, has profound mental retardation, autism, he couldn't talk, and he was prone to have seizures. He also has pica which is a disorder in which the individual likes to eat things other than what's normally edible. There was an episode of Ripley's Believe it or Not in which there was a story about a woman who had pica and she liked to eat dirt. Bill seemed to like cloth. He would chew on his shirt all the time. He also had bibs he would wear around his neck and he'd chew on those too. We had to keep a close eye on him obviously. He liked to wander into the kitchen a lot and try to grab things to put in his mouth. I wasn't at work on the day this particular incident happened but it's pretty funny. Two of my co-workers were occupied with two of the other residents so they couldn't keep an eye on Bill. When my co-workers were finished with what they were doing they came back into the living room and saw Bill with what looked like chocolate all over his hands and mouth. There was a trail of this chocolate leading from Bill sitting on the couch, all the way into the kitchen to the tray of uncooked brownie batter. Bill had walked into the kitchen and grabbed two handfuls of brownie batter and trailed it back to the kitchen. I thought it was hilarious when they told me about it even though they didn't find it too funny, they had to clean up the mess.
We'll call the second guy Kevin. I know you're not supposed to pick favorites, but Kevin was my favorite. He always had a smile on his face and he would always laugh. He also had profound mental retardation and he was non-verbal. For the most part he remained stationary in his recliner and didn't move around too much. Of course we did physical therapy with him and had him walk out to the dinner table and take him out to Dairy Queen and other places, but for the most part he didn't walk around on his own free will. But every once in awhile he would get out of his chair and he would either walk around the house or roll around on the floor. It wasn't always a good thing because he would do this for days and even throughout the night non-stop. You could see that he was tired, but something in his mind made him keep on going. They said he was being manic when he did this. When he was manic like this it was the only time he wouldn't smile or laugh. Kevin had the ability to brighten anyone's day though. Everyone he came in contact with was always happy to see him. On days when he wasn't smiling or laughing and just sitting in his recliner I would always try to find ways to make him laugh and I didn't stop until he did.
The third guy who we'll call Steve also had profound mental retardation, multiple sclerosis, and obsessive compulsive disorder. He was also non-verbal but he was smart enough to understand what people told him and he could do simple tasks when asked. Actually he was much smarter than he allowed people to think he was. He may not have been able to take care of himself, but Steve was very intelligent in other things, like playing jokes on people. Due to his OCD he would constantly rearrange things in the living room to the way he liked it. No pillows could be on the floor, in fact, nothing could be on the floor except for furniture. He also liked to unplug things, lamps, the TV, etc. This became a real problem sometimes, but he didn't do it too often. I took him to the grocery store one time and he ended up wetting his pants while we were there. Fortunately one of the employees of the store was very cooperative and he said he had a lot of respect for what I did for a living. So Steve did #1 in aisle two which is much better than #2 in aisle one. I mentioned earlier that he like to play jokes on people. One time I made myself a sandwich on a bun and set it on the end table in the living room and then I went back into the kitchen to get something. When I came back the top part of my bun was gone. Steve was sitting on the other side of the room laughing and I could see that his tongue was yellow from the mustard that was on my sandwich. The funniest thing he did I can laugh at now, but at the time I wasn't laughing. I was getting ready to go home one night, but I couldn't find my car keys. I looked all over the house for them. When I was searching Steve's room he started laughing. I had a feeling he knew what was going on, but since he couldn't talk he couldn't tell me, not that he would if he could. I was convinced that I had lost them so I called for a ride home. The next day at work one of my co-workers came up to me and said "Are these your keys?" She had my keys and I asked her where she found them. "They were in my purse, and I have a good idea how they got there." Yes, it was Steve. He put them in her purse the day before and her shift was over before mine was, so she ended up going home with my keys in her purse, not knowing it at the time. Good old Steve.
The last guy we will call John. John was higher functioning than his three other housemates. He had severe mental retardation, autism, and OCD. He was also a very big guy weighing in at 32o pounds. He pretty much had his own space in the basement with his own bathroom and a living room with a TV, but he liked to be upstairs with everyone else most of the time. He was very pleasant but he had a habit of bopping his housemates over the head with a closed fist. He didn't do it to be mean, it was part of his OCD. We would try to stop him or lighten the blow by placing our hands on top of the head of the person he was hitting. He didn't usually hit hard, but sometimes it was enough to give you a headache. Yes, he used to get me when I first started working there. I would try to distract him when he wanted to hit me. One time he tried so I told him to sing the theme song for the Flintstones (John could sing almost and theme song for any TV show). He sang the last line of the song and then yelled out a big "HO!" and bopped me over the head. After a little while I finally put my foot down and let him know he wasn't going to bop me over the head anymore. He backed away from people who stood up to him. But his housemates didn't really have the ability to stand up to him so that's why John would always go after them. His other housemates usually laughed at him when they got bopped over the head, for some reason it was funny to them.
There are so many more stories I could tell you about these four individuals and I think I will talk more about them later. I've said enough for today.
Hope Enterprises is an organization that employs people to take care of individuals who are mentally and/or physically challenged. I worked in four different group homes over the course of six years. I'll talk about the first house I worked in. I worked at that house for three years. I took care of four different individuals at that house. I have to be careful about what I say due to confidentiality so I won't give out any names or locations. This particular job is going to take awhile to talk about, so I'll have to span it out over multiple days. So today I thought I would tell a story or two about each of the four individuals I took care of.
The first guy, we'll call him Bill, even though that's not his real name, has profound mental retardation, autism, he couldn't talk, and he was prone to have seizures. He also has pica which is a disorder in which the individual likes to eat things other than what's normally edible. There was an episode of Ripley's Believe it or Not in which there was a story about a woman who had pica and she liked to eat dirt. Bill seemed to like cloth. He would chew on his shirt all the time. He also had bibs he would wear around his neck and he'd chew on those too. We had to keep a close eye on him obviously. He liked to wander into the kitchen a lot and try to grab things to put in his mouth. I wasn't at work on the day this particular incident happened but it's pretty funny. Two of my co-workers were occupied with two of the other residents so they couldn't keep an eye on Bill. When my co-workers were finished with what they were doing they came back into the living room and saw Bill with what looked like chocolate all over his hands and mouth. There was a trail of this chocolate leading from Bill sitting on the couch, all the way into the kitchen to the tray of uncooked brownie batter. Bill had walked into the kitchen and grabbed two handfuls of brownie batter and trailed it back to the kitchen. I thought it was hilarious when they told me about it even though they didn't find it too funny, they had to clean up the mess.
We'll call the second guy Kevin. I know you're not supposed to pick favorites, but Kevin was my favorite. He always had a smile on his face and he would always laugh. He also had profound mental retardation and he was non-verbal. For the most part he remained stationary in his recliner and didn't move around too much. Of course we did physical therapy with him and had him walk out to the dinner table and take him out to Dairy Queen and other places, but for the most part he didn't walk around on his own free will. But every once in awhile he would get out of his chair and he would either walk around the house or roll around on the floor. It wasn't always a good thing because he would do this for days and even throughout the night non-stop. You could see that he was tired, but something in his mind made him keep on going. They said he was being manic when he did this. When he was manic like this it was the only time he wouldn't smile or laugh. Kevin had the ability to brighten anyone's day though. Everyone he came in contact with was always happy to see him. On days when he wasn't smiling or laughing and just sitting in his recliner I would always try to find ways to make him laugh and I didn't stop until he did.
The third guy who we'll call Steve also had profound mental retardation, multiple sclerosis, and obsessive compulsive disorder. He was also non-verbal but he was smart enough to understand what people told him and he could do simple tasks when asked. Actually he was much smarter than he allowed people to think he was. He may not have been able to take care of himself, but Steve was very intelligent in other things, like playing jokes on people. Due to his OCD he would constantly rearrange things in the living room to the way he liked it. No pillows could be on the floor, in fact, nothing could be on the floor except for furniture. He also liked to unplug things, lamps, the TV, etc. This became a real problem sometimes, but he didn't do it too often. I took him to the grocery store one time and he ended up wetting his pants while we were there. Fortunately one of the employees of the store was very cooperative and he said he had a lot of respect for what I did for a living. So Steve did #1 in aisle two which is much better than #2 in aisle one. I mentioned earlier that he like to play jokes on people. One time I made myself a sandwich on a bun and set it on the end table in the living room and then I went back into the kitchen to get something. When I came back the top part of my bun was gone. Steve was sitting on the other side of the room laughing and I could see that his tongue was yellow from the mustard that was on my sandwich. The funniest thing he did I can laugh at now, but at the time I wasn't laughing. I was getting ready to go home one night, but I couldn't find my car keys. I looked all over the house for them. When I was searching Steve's room he started laughing. I had a feeling he knew what was going on, but since he couldn't talk he couldn't tell me, not that he would if he could. I was convinced that I had lost them so I called for a ride home. The next day at work one of my co-workers came up to me and said "Are these your keys?" She had my keys and I asked her where she found them. "They were in my purse, and I have a good idea how they got there." Yes, it was Steve. He put them in her purse the day before and her shift was over before mine was, so she ended up going home with my keys in her purse, not knowing it at the time. Good old Steve.
The last guy we will call John. John was higher functioning than his three other housemates. He had severe mental retardation, autism, and OCD. He was also a very big guy weighing in at 32o pounds. He pretty much had his own space in the basement with his own bathroom and a living room with a TV, but he liked to be upstairs with everyone else most of the time. He was very pleasant but he had a habit of bopping his housemates over the head with a closed fist. He didn't do it to be mean, it was part of his OCD. We would try to stop him or lighten the blow by placing our hands on top of the head of the person he was hitting. He didn't usually hit hard, but sometimes it was enough to give you a headache. Yes, he used to get me when I first started working there. I would try to distract him when he wanted to hit me. One time he tried so I told him to sing the theme song for the Flintstones (John could sing almost and theme song for any TV show). He sang the last line of the song and then yelled out a big "HO!" and bopped me over the head. After a little while I finally put my foot down and let him know he wasn't going to bop me over the head anymore. He backed away from people who stood up to him. But his housemates didn't really have the ability to stand up to him so that's why John would always go after them. His other housemates usually laughed at him when they got bopped over the head, for some reason it was funny to them.
There are so many more stories I could tell you about these four individuals and I think I will talk more about them later. I've said enough for today.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Hope Hill ~ Day 5,6, and 7
Day 5 ~ Finishing Up the Fence
We kept working on the fence all morning, we were getting closer and closer to getting it finished. We did as much as we could before lunch. Then we met with the girls again. They were playing basketball outside during their recreation time. Then we played them in a game of softball. We weren't trying to hit the ball over the fence or anything, but we gave them some good competition. They were making their own rules up too. One time I was running from first to second base and one of the girls grabbed hold of me (she was a big girl too) and said "You're not going to second!" So then I was tagged out. It was funny. After the game I went up to her, shook her hand and told her it was a good play even though I don't think they would allow that in a real game. It was good to get out and be active with them rather than doing arts and crafts with them all day. After dinner we went back to the fence one more time and we finally finished it!
And it made the cows happy.
Day 6 ~ Water Balloons!
We had a big surprise for the girls on Friday. We had water balloons and squirt guns. It took us hours to fill up hundreds of water balloons and they were all gone in less than ten minutes.
But there was plenty of water to keep refilling the squirt guns. The girls had a blast with it. Most of these girls probably never got to play with squirt guns or throw a water balloon at somebody before. I was glad we were able to give them that experience. Then there were those who had buckets and coolers full of water dumped on them. I think it was probably the most fun some of them had ever had. I was glad to be a part of it. We had to say goodbye to the girls after that. A lot of them were really sad we had to go. We were all sad we had to leave soon. That evening we built a campfire and sat around it. We had some S'mores.
Day 7 ~ Departure
It seems that every time our church has a mission trip something bad happens to one of the vans. Fortunately for this trip the only thing that happened was one of the vans had to be jump started before we left. Even though we were all tired and sore from the week, we didn't want to leave. It's hard to go, to get back into the normal routine of life after an experience like that. I worked on a slideshow most of the way home that would be shown in church the following week. We stopped at a Ponderosa to eat on the way home, it was alright. The trip home didn't seem as long as the trip there, but even the trip there didn't seem that long. I hope I can go back again next year.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Hope Hill ~ Day 3 and 4
Day 3 ~ Water, Water Everywhere
The third day we went back to the fence to chip away more paint and apply new paint which I think was actually tar. But soon after we started some dark clouds came rolling in. After a few drops of rain started falling, our team leader came down the hill with the truck to take us back to the bunk house. Soon after it started pouring heavier than I've ever seen rain pour down. There was a lot of lightning and loud claps of thunder. We stayed inside most of the morning just relaxing. The power went out in the bunk house for awhile. At noon we met up with the girls again. Another person on our team shared her life story with the girls. Then they did another art project where the girls painted on stones that had been painted white. One one side they painted words and images of the negative things that happened in their lives. On the other side they painted what they wanted their lives to be like in the future. The idea for the white stone comes from Revelation 2:17: "Let the person who is able to hear, listen and follow what the Spirit proclaims to all the churches. To the one who conquers through faithfulness even unto death, I will feed you with hidden manna and give you a white stone. Upon this stone, a new name is engraved. No one knows this name except for its recipient." After the girls painted on the stones and had a chance to dry, they were placed outside the chapel among some of the flowers and plants that grew there.
That evening we had to clear some weeds away from a grape vine. The vine didn't even have a lattice or an arbor to grow on. We got all those weeds cleared out of there though. After that we went back to the bunk house to get as much rest as we could for the next day.
Day 4 ~ Back to Work
The rain wasn't so bad on Wednesday. We went down to a storage barn to separate the junk from the good stuff. All the junk went to the trash heap while all the good stuff was consolidated into a large barn.
On Wednesday, they have a chapel service at the school. most of the girls at the school attend this every week. There was a guy and a girl who came to lead the group in a couple worship songs. Then one of our team members gave a message. Then the girls had to go back to their classes. Shortly after all this happened, the little ten year old girl was attacked by two large white dogs pictured below:
No, she wasn't really attacked, unless you consider getting covered in doggy slobber an attack. They were the nicest dogs. We did another arts and crafts project with the girls after the chapel service. They were given small notebooks to use as journals, but since the notebooks were spiral-bound they couldn't be given to the girls. But then we worked something out, we took all the metal coils out of the notebooks and tied them together using ribbon. You see, the girls at the school can't have anything that they might use to harm themselves or others. That includes the metal wiring on a notebook. So when we altered them they were able to keep the notebooks. They spent time doing artwork on the covers of the notebooks.
Later that evening we went into town for more supplies and I had to pick a few things up as well. I got a chance to call my mom and my girlfriend while we were in cell phone range. While we were at Wal-Mart I was walking around with two of the girls that were on the trip. The one accidentally walked into the mens' room. When she noticed she was in the wrong place she started to walk out just as someone else was walking into the mens' room. She looked at him and said "I don't know where I am." It was hilarious. Then I was walking through the womens' clothing section with them because one of them needed socks. Two of them went around the corner to look at more socks and I saw a pair that looked really soft so I touched them. I said "Those are nice" as I peeked around the corner to tell them. They weren't there, but there was a girl standing there I didn't know who was looking at bras. That was a little embarrassing. After Wal-Mart, we stopped by Dairy Queen for some treats. Look at how determined we are:
After we finished up a DQ, we went back to the bunk house to turn in for the night. But when we got there we found out we had a little more work to do. Our leader and his son had gone over to the cafeteria to wax the floor. So we went over to help by moving all the furniture and everything else back into the cafeteria. It ended up being a pretty late night, we didn't finish until midnight.
I'll have the rest of the story up later, hopefully tomorrow.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Hope Hill ~ Day 1 and 2
I'd like to talk about the mission trip I went on a couple weeks ago to the Hope Hill School in Hope, Kentucky. I might take the next 2 or 3 days to talk about it since there is so much to talk about. I'll section it off into the 7 days we were there. I'll tell you a little bit about the school first. Hope Hill is a school for teenage girls between the ages of 12 and 17 who have been abandoned, abused, or may have been into drugs and alcohol. Many of the girls have behaviors and can lash out violently or verbally. I've never seen it in the two years I've gone there, they're usually well behaved when work camps come, especially if the work camp is there to spend some time with the girls and do activities with them. The goal of Hope Hill is to give these girls a second chance at life, to try to turn them around so the don't end up dead or in jail. The program is Christ centered. There is a chapel at the school and the girls are encouraged to attend, but not forced. About 85% of the students attend. There is also a Bible study during the week and about 50% of the girls go to that.
Day 1 ~ The Arrival
We packed up our two church vans with supplies and luggage and started out around 7am. It's a 7 hour trip. I spent most of the time in a sleeping bag in the back seat because the air conditioning was blasting. I spent the time getting to know my teammates better, working on my laptop, reading my Bible and Relevant Magazine, and messing around with my cell phone. When we arrived we got unpacked, pictured above is the bunk house we stayed in. Some of the team members wanted to walk around the campus. I was there the year before so I gave them a tour. I told them about all the different buildings on campus and showed them the horses. They have a horse therapy program at the school.
After the tour we went back to the bunk house and just unwound from the long trip. We played some board games and read from some journals that people who have stayed in the bunk house have written in. There were some funny entries left in there, mostly by some teenage kids. One entry said: "Dear Journal, These last few days have been very weird. First yesterday Hillary got run over by a van and went to the hospital but nothing was broken, and I'm really glad nothing was because me and her were best friend for six years until middle school, but were still good friends. Then after that, the second bathroom in ours got flooded and then leaked through the wall into our room and got all over our stuff. That was bad plus today we looked at horses and one of them bit Rachel on the arm. And now its bruised. Plus its been raining pretty much everyday, all day. But I think God does everything for a reason and I'm glad that I got to come here. It should be all uphill from here. I feel that God brought us here for a reason and is doing his work. This is a very blessed place. I hope to come back next year. Bye." I think my favorite part is where she said "It should all be uphill from here." That's hilarious.
Day 2 ~ The Work Begins
We met the groundskeeper, Andy, to find out what jobs he had for us to do. The first job he had for us was to scrape the old paint off a fence and then repaint it. He told us we should have it done by noon. Here's the fence:
Noon? Oh, he must have meant noon next Thursday. I just want to say we were not done by noon. By the way, there are about 5 or 6 more sections of the fence that go out of frame to the right. But we did finish it before the trip was over as well as many other jobs I'll talk about later. We worked on the fence for a few hours and then went back to the bunk house for lunch. Then we met up with the girls at the school in the cafeteria. There were 45 girls attending the school at the time. One of our team members told her story about her life, it was pretty heart-wrenching. At one time her 10 year old daughter who came with us got up and gave her a hug while she was talking. All the girls at the school gave a big "Awwwwww." It was so sweet. That little 10 year old girl was the heart and soul of the trip, she got along with the girls at the school very well and she made a lot of friends. After the talk we did an art project with the girls, we tie-dyed bandannas. I wish we could have spent more time with the girls at the school but we only had limited time each day. We worked on the fence a little while longer and then went back to the bunk house to eat dinner and play some games and talk for awhile before going to bed.
I'll continue this story tomorrow.
Monday, July 27, 2009
WWWE: I Made $20!
So after I left the Shoe Dept. I found a job only a couple miles from my apartment. I worked for Blockbuster Video in York, PA. There were about five Blockbuster Video stores at the time in York, I worked at the one on the corner or George St. and Rt. 30 just in case you were wondering.
The cool thing about this job was that we could rent five movies a week for free! We also got to rent movies two weeks before their release date. The uncool thing was how I got tricked into working on Christmas. When I interviewed for the job, the manager told me we had to work at least two holidays out of the year. I told her I wanted Christmas and Easter off and she said that was okay. It was around Thanksgiving of 1998 when I was supposed to start working there. The manager told me that I didn't have to start working until after Thanksgiving so that it wouldn't count as one of my holidays off. I thought it was a good idea. So I started working after Thanksgiving. I told the manager what days I wanted off for Christmas so I would have enough time to go home to see my family. She said that's going to be a problem and I asked her why. She reminded me that she told me in the interview I had to work at least two holidays in a year. Then she said there are only two holidays left this year, Christmas and New Year's Eve. Not only did she tell me in the interview that I could have Christmas off, but she made it sound like a good idea to start after Thanksgiving. See, if I would have started before and worked on Thanksgiving I could have had Christmas off and worked on New Year's Eve. That's how I was tricked into working on Christmas. I was still able to go home and see my family for a couple days before Christmas, but what my boss did was just conniving and evil.
Fortunately, the big wigs in the company like conniving and evil managers so they promoted her to become the manager of a different Blockbuster and her replacement at our store was really cool. We got along great. Everyone who worked there was pretty cool. There was a kiddie section in the store close to where the cash registers were and when it was late we would put on movies that we liked, but still with a PG rating like Labyrinth or Star Wars, and we would watch them from the front counter.
One night I was working with one of the assistant managers and we were bored, really bored. The guy I was working with was only about 5'3" and he said "I bet you can't do this" and he jumped straight up and onto the counter. The height of the counter was almost at my chest. I figured if he could do it, I could do it. So I hopped right up there and I did it! But I landed on just the tips of my toes and I started to lose my balance. Both my feet came right out from under me and I came down on both my shins on the corner of the counter. It hurt so bad I just started laughing. I sat in a chair and started rubbing my shins. I looked at the assistant manager, he looked horrified and he told me he would pay me for a new pair of pants. I asked him why. I looked down and my one pant leg was soaked with blood. I didn't even know I was bleeding at first. So I went to the back room and cleaned it up. It was pretty sore for the next few days, but the bloodstain came out of the pants and I made $20! I don't think I would ever try doing something like that again though. To this day I still have a little white indented circle on my right leg.
It was fun working there, I was even voted employee of the month twice while I was there. But the time finally came where I had to move back home to Jersey Shore, PA. It was sad leaving that place, but I was able to transfer to the Blockbuster Video in Williamsport, PA. It wasn't as much fun working there as it was in York. It was the only Blockbuster Video in Williamsport so it was very busy. Usually on a Friday and Saturday night I would work an 8 hour shift and not even get a chance to leave my cash register because the line was never-ending, and this was with four registers open! It was busy! People around here have nothing better to do I guess. I don't have to many memorable moments from working at the Williamsport Blockbuster so I think I'll end it here. It will probably take a few posts to talk about my next job since there are a lot of stories to tell about that one. Till next time, adios!
The cool thing about this job was that we could rent five movies a week for free! We also got to rent movies two weeks before their release date. The uncool thing was how I got tricked into working on Christmas. When I interviewed for the job, the manager told me we had to work at least two holidays out of the year. I told her I wanted Christmas and Easter off and she said that was okay. It was around Thanksgiving of 1998 when I was supposed to start working there. The manager told me that I didn't have to start working until after Thanksgiving so that it wouldn't count as one of my holidays off. I thought it was a good idea. So I started working after Thanksgiving. I told the manager what days I wanted off for Christmas so I would have enough time to go home to see my family. She said that's going to be a problem and I asked her why. She reminded me that she told me in the interview I had to work at least two holidays in a year. Then she said there are only two holidays left this year, Christmas and New Year's Eve. Not only did she tell me in the interview that I could have Christmas off, but she made it sound like a good idea to start after Thanksgiving. See, if I would have started before and worked on Thanksgiving I could have had Christmas off and worked on New Year's Eve. That's how I was tricked into working on Christmas. I was still able to go home and see my family for a couple days before Christmas, but what my boss did was just conniving and evil.
Fortunately, the big wigs in the company like conniving and evil managers so they promoted her to become the manager of a different Blockbuster and her replacement at our store was really cool. We got along great. Everyone who worked there was pretty cool. There was a kiddie section in the store close to where the cash registers were and when it was late we would put on movies that we liked, but still with a PG rating like Labyrinth or Star Wars, and we would watch them from the front counter.
One night I was working with one of the assistant managers and we were bored, really bored. The guy I was working with was only about 5'3" and he said "I bet you can't do this" and he jumped straight up and onto the counter. The height of the counter was almost at my chest. I figured if he could do it, I could do it. So I hopped right up there and I did it! But I landed on just the tips of my toes and I started to lose my balance. Both my feet came right out from under me and I came down on both my shins on the corner of the counter. It hurt so bad I just started laughing. I sat in a chair and started rubbing my shins. I looked at the assistant manager, he looked horrified and he told me he would pay me for a new pair of pants. I asked him why. I looked down and my one pant leg was soaked with blood. I didn't even know I was bleeding at first. So I went to the back room and cleaned it up. It was pretty sore for the next few days, but the bloodstain came out of the pants and I made $20! I don't think I would ever try doing something like that again though. To this day I still have a little white indented circle on my right leg.
It was fun working there, I was even voted employee of the month twice while I was there. But the time finally came where I had to move back home to Jersey Shore, PA. It was sad leaving that place, but I was able to transfer to the Blockbuster Video in Williamsport, PA. It wasn't as much fun working there as it was in York. It was the only Blockbuster Video in Williamsport so it was very busy. Usually on a Friday and Saturday night I would work an 8 hour shift and not even get a chance to leave my cash register because the line was never-ending, and this was with four registers open! It was busy! People around here have nothing better to do I guess. I don't have to many memorable moments from working at the Williamsport Blockbuster so I think I'll end it here. It will probably take a few posts to talk about my next job since there are a lot of stories to tell about that one. Till next time, adios!
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Story Time Tuesday ~ WWWE: It's All Natural
Job #5 was at a health food store called Freshlife, and you probably thought I was going to say McDonald's or Burger King based on the photo above. This was one of my favorite jobs. My job was to fill bags with nuts, dried fruit, rice, beans, granola, etc. to the right weight it and put it out on the shelves. I had other duties as well like straightening up the shelves, taking inventory, and shipping things out. I was introduced to a lot of different foods. I ate an ice cream sandwich made of tofu and it tasted like a real ice cream sandwich, it even had the same texture. I tried a Boca burger topped with garden fresh tomatoes, lettuce, Nayonaise, Fakin Bacon, and a slice of rice cheese. It was pretty good! I forget what kind of ketchup was on it but it was also a healthy alternative. They had a soda called China Cola that I liked too.
It was a great job, all my co-workers were great and my boss was one of the best bosses I've ever had. She was tough and made sure we did our jobs, but at the same time she was compassionate and understood if we were going through a rough time and was always cooperative if we needed time off. She definitely wasn't cold and uncomprimising like so many other employers I've had.
I made a really great friend while working there. His name is Ryan and he was the stockroom manager. We both worked back in the stock room so we got to talk all day. I was at a point in my life where I had just come to the realization of who Jesus Christ was, what he meant to me, and what he did for everyone. I was "on fire" which is a phrase a lot of Christians like to use. But I was very cocky and arrogant which is a trap that a lot of newbie Christians fall into. Ryan was also a believer but he showed me that I needed to mellow out a little and that I couldn't go around acting like I was better than everyone just because I was a follower of Christ. He taught me so much. Of course, years later I again fell into the trap of becoming a cocky, arrogant, self-righteous, (insert your own adjective here) of a person again. I recovered from that as well and I've talked about it before...just click here.
Ryan and I became really good friends. Cheesy music would play throughout the store and there was some that sounded like the background music from an episode of "The Dukes of Hazzard". So Ryan and I would act like we were narrating an episode just like Waylon Jennings. We'd say stuff like "Now them Duke boys had gotten themselves into a heap of trouble. Boss Hogg was gonna get em' this time, I reckon." We were weird.
A few of us from work were going to see "Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery" at the theater one Saturday, but Ryan never showed up. I called and he didn't answer his phone. He wasn't at work the following Monday either. I received a call from him Monday after work. It was hard to understand what he was saying but what had happened was he went to a river lot party on Friday night and he took his dog with him. When he let his dog out of the car it ran up to two men and one of the men kicked Ryan's dog. Ryan came up to them and said "Kick my dog again and I'm going to kick you." Both of the men attacked Ryan and left him in pretty bad shape. He was bruised all over and his jaw was broken, it had to be wired shut.
Ryan came back a few days later and he looked horrible. He could only drink through a straw, so he drank a lot of smoothies. One day at work he said to me through his wired jaw, "When I get this stuff off, you and me are going to Burger King!" I agreed. I can't remember how long he had to have his jaw wired shut, but I think it was a month or two. He lost about 40 pounds, and he didn't have much weight on him to lose in the first place. We did what he said and we went to Burger King shortly after he had the wires taken off. Over time he gained back all the weight he had lost, and then some. Ryan's dog was okay too. He would bring him to work everyday and tie him out back. His name was Newman, named after the character from Seinfeld, I think. Ryan liked to call him "Sweet Sir Newman".
I got to know a few of the other people that worked there too. I used to carpool to work with a girl named Shelly. We would often repeat lines from Chris Farley and David Spade movies like "Black Sheep" and "Tommy Boy". There was a woman who worked there named Gail and she did a lot of community outreach stuff. We had her as a guest speaker at Valley Mosaic one time. Then there was an older lady who kept on calling me Dennis. I corrected her the first few times, but she would keep on calling me Dennis, so I let it go. It was like the episode of "Friends" that Chris Parnell from SNL guest starred on and thought Chandler's name was Toby.
The time finally came for me to leave that job because I would be moving to York, PA soon to go to college. They threw me a going away party at Pizza Hut. It was funny to see all these people who I thought were vegans and vegetarians ripping into Meat Lovers pizzas, it was awesome. I invited a friend along. I told Ryan that my friend looked like Drew Carey. The day after the going away party, I stopped by to visit Ryan at work and I said, "Did you think my friend looked like Drew Carey?" He said "Drew Carey? I thought you said Jim Carrey. I was trying to figure out all night how the heck he even came close to looking like Jim Carrey."
Ryan and I kept in touch for awhile. A few weeks after moving to York, I received a phone call. The person on phone said in a really stern voice "Is this Daniel Lewis?" I said "Yes." Then the person said "I heard you had girls in your apartment." Then he started laughing and I knew then it was Ryan. He continued to work at Freshlife and I would be sure to stop by and visit whenever I was in town. I lost contact with him when he quit his job there and I haven't really seen him since. There was one time though when I was at the courthouse in Williamsport and I saw him walking onto an elevator. I got his attention and he saw me and waved just as the elevator doors were shutting. That was the last time I saw him, it was about six years ago.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Story Time Tuesday ~ WWWE: They Called Me Zorro
I worked at my fourth job for only a few months. It was a third shift factory job for Woolrich Inc. My job title: Fabric Cutter. You know, cutter has a nice ring to it for a job title, but when you put the word fabric in front of it, it loses something. I was given a belt that I had to wear, kind of like tool belt. Its main purpose was to hold the pair of shears we used on the job. All they had left was a left-handed belt (it'll make sense in a moment) so the holster for the shears was on my left side. So when ever I'd take my shears out it looked like I was unsheathing a sword and when I put them away it looked like I was putting a sword back in its sheath. That's why they called me Zorro. It sounds better than Fabric Cutter. If you're curled up under one of those signature red and black Woolrich blankets, there's a slim chance that I cut the fabric for it. Just think of me whenever you use it.
I didn't quite get the respect that someone nicknamed Zorro would typically get though. The people I worked with were, well, I don't want to stereotype them by using a particular word, but if they could relate to the things that Jeff Foxworthy says, they might be one. Man, that was a roundabout way of saying redneck, oops!
I got along pretty well with my co-workers there but there was one guy who seemed to have anger management issues. There are control boxes that hang from above for the cranes we used for picking up the large rolls of fabric and this guy decided one night to swing the crane controls at my head. He missed and I asked him what that was all about and he said he was just joking around and if he really wanted to he would have hit me. I don't know though, the control box came pretty darn close to my head. I let it go, if he would have done it again I probably would have gone to my supervisor about it. It never happened again fortunately.
It was hard getting used to working third shift from 11pm to 7am. One guy had been doing it for over 30 years and he said he still wasn't used to it. I thought it would be a good shift to work because I could do something in the morning after work and then sleep in the afternoon if I wanted to or sleep in the morning and do something in the evening. But it didn't work that way. After work I would unwind by playing a video game and I would usually fall asleep while doing that and take a short power nap and then I would wake up within an hour or less and the TV screen would usually say "Game Over" or "You Died". I wouldn't be tired for the rest of the day, not until it was time to go to work anyway. So one night as I was holding the fabric down on the table my co-worker rolled it out on a table that seemed like it was half the length of a football field. As he rolled it out I decided to put my head down on the fabric until he came back, it was soft. Next thing I know, I look up and my co-worker is standing there looking at me and he said, "Uh, you ready?" I had dozed off for a moment, whoops.
Another night one of my co-workers was using a machine that helps with the fabric cutting process and he asked me to get the oil pan because the machine was going to need an oil change. He sent me to our supervisor to ask him where it was. So I asked him and he told me to ask another person, that person told me to ask another person, then I figured it out, he was playing a prank on me and everyone else knew what was going on. I didn't realize at first that the machine was electric. I felt like such an idiot, but hey it was 2 o'clock in the morning, I was too tired to notice it ran on electric.
Third shift was reeking havoc on my sleep schedule. My weekends were pretty messed up. I'd get off Friday morning at 7am and I'd try to stay up all day and go to bed at a normal time, but then I'd fall asleep around 6pm and wake up on Saturday at 3am. It sucked. What the heck do you do at 3am? Watch infomercials? Blah. Fortunately another place I applied to was hiring and they gave me a call. I'll talk about job #5 next week. ¡Adiós amigos!
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Story Time Tuesday ~ WWWE: Playing with Knives
Job #3 was a job I took on while I still worked at Weis Markets. While looking in the paper for a new job, I saw one that looked good. Little did I know I was getting roped into a door-to-door sales job. Well, it wasn't really door-to-door, but I did have to set up my own appointments by calling people. What I was selling was cutlery, it was very good cutlery and they had a good guarantee, but they were expensive. I think the main set was $1200 and that was about 13 years ago, I don't know how much they cost now. It came with about 8 different knives and then 8 steak knives in a big wooden block. You may have seen this set of knives given away as a door prize on the gameshow, The Price is Right for the three contestants at the end of the show that don't make it on stage.
The deal was that we were paid $10 dollars per appointment and we made 10% commission on whatever we sold. Once I sold a certain amount, it would move up to 15% and so on. So when I received my first check I thought I was going to be making some big bucks. But I was wrong. My first check only had my commission on it. So I went to our weekly meeting and I brought it up. My supervisor told me that I had to do at least 40 appointments in a month to get the $10 dollars per appointment. He had neglected to tell me that earlier. So basically I would have had to quit my other job and devote my life to selling knives to make any money. It was such a scam. I didn't do it for too long after that. I found out a few years later that they dropped that rule and they paid people for every appointment, no matter how many they had and it's close to $20 per appointment now. Jerks!
We had to do some weird stuff to show how strong the knives were during our demonstrations. We used one knife to cut through a rope, and another to slice through a stack of hard leather. Seriously though, it went through it like butter. Another thing we had to do was make what was called a corkscrew penny. We had a pair of shears and we would actually cut around the edge of a penny so that the edge we cut off would corkscrew. Here, watch this video if you don't understand what I'm talking about:
No, that's not me in the video. That video was posted by a YouTube user called Larlarz. Thanks Larlarz!
Now I'm pretty sure that defacing money is a federal offense. In fact now that I remember it, one of the other sales people brought that up at one of our meetings and our supervisor told us that since we are cutting around the edge of the penny and not into Abe Lincoln's face we weren't "technically" defacing it. Hardy har-har. I think the corkscrew penny is stupid anyway, you'd have to be the Incredible Hulk to get a cork out of a bottle with that thing.
I decided to make my first appointment with my dad for practice. When I tried making the corkscrew penny, I was about halfway through and it flew out of my hand and whizzed past my dad's head. Needless to say I didn't make the corkscrew penny at any of my other demonstrations, so I just made one and showed it to people after that little incident. Also at my first demonstration I wondered just how sharp the knives were so I picked up the chef's knife and just barely touched the blade with my thumb and it cut me. It wasn't a big cut, but it was like a paper cut. So yes, they are sharp.
So I set up appointments with family members, friends, and some other people I knew, but after that I thought it would be a little strange to go into someone's house I didn't really know and show them a bunch of knives. Plus I'm not really much of a salesman. I couldn't sell a bucket of water to a man who's on fire. So that job just kind of fizzled out. I stopped making appointments, I stopped going to the weekly meetings, and I made just enough money to pay for the kit that I used to do my demonstrations.
Within the span of time that I was selling knives I quit my job at Weis Markets and got another job which I will talk about next week.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Story Time Tuesday ~ WWWE: Softball Doughnuts
I spent some time unemployed between my paper route and my next job, but that's okay since I was still in high school and living with my parents. My second job was at Weis Markets which is a grocery store chain here in Pennsylvania. I'm not sure if it has branched out into other states but I'm sure there are a few in the surrounding states. It was my job to clean the bakery after all the bakers had left. Sugar, flour, and hardened dough were everywhere by the time I arrived at work.
It was my job to scrape and clean off the tables. Wash all the trays, utensils, and huge 40lb. steel mixing bowls, and sweep and mop the floors. Once a month I had to clean the walk-in cooler, so I had to move everything out, hose the place down and then move everything back in. I liked it when the hot hose water hit the cool floor of the cooler and the place would become full of steam, it was like being in a sauna. So those were my job duties for the most part. Once in awhile a customer would ask me to write on a cake for them. These were people who weren't too picky since I wasn't very good a writing with a bag of icing. But at least it was readable, and Cake Wrecks wouldn't be around for another ten years or more, so I was safe. I also took cake orders as well.
One time I took a cake order for a deaf couple. I don't know sign language, but they were very patient and we were able to communicate pretty well since they were able to point at what they wanted and were able to know what I was saying since they could read lips. I have an uncle who is deaf, so that helped too since I was used to being around someone with a hearing disability.
In addition the the walk-in cooler, there was also a walk-in freezer, and on oven that was big enough to stand in. The oven would still be warm while I was working. So if I needed a break and I was too hot, I could stand in the cooler and cool off. If I was too cold, I could stand in the oven, which kind of freaked me out a little, but it was nice and toasty.
One day I bought a can of Coke and it was warm, so I stuck it in the walk-in freezer for a few moments to let it cool. I forgot about it though and it wasn't until the next day that I remembered I had put it in there. I thought I was going to be in trouble when I went into work, but nobody said anything. I looked in the freezer under the rack where I put the can of Coke. The bottom of the can had gone from concave to convex and the Coke had exploded out of the can all over the wall, but just underneath the rack so it wasn't a huge mess and no one must have noticed. So I cleaned it up and made sure never to do that again.
I called this post "Softball Doughnuts" because a friend of mine who also worked at Weis's used to come back to the bakery and we would make our own doughnut creations. The one we liked best was when we took a doughnut and filled it with cream until it was about the size of a softball, hence the name, softball donut. It probably had about four times the amount of cream as a regular filled donut. Yummy. Something like that would probably make me really sick now though, blah.
My favorite memory of working there was the time I played a prank on a friend who came to visit me at work. I gave her a tour of the bakery and then I showed her the walk-in cooler. When she wasn't looking I shut the door and acted like it shut on its own. Then with a panicked look on my face I told her that we couldn't get out from the inside once the door had shut and that we'll probably have to wait until morning to be let out. She bought it for a few minutes until she realized how dumb it would be do design a walk-in freezer that didn't have a way out, so she opened the door. I was such a dork back then. Sometimes I still am.
Come back next week when I'll talk about job #3. Tell me about things that happened at your jobs in the comments.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
