I'm serious, I won't mind if you don't want to. it's just a lot of my whining anyway. I'm not really even expecting a response

ok

so, this morning, we had about half the normal business. it stayed slow up until about 7(PM). my last break was scheduled for 7:30. people started to come faster and faster, and for some unexplained reason, I ended up as the only cashier for the entire south half.

I got my break at about 7:55. I might have had it sooner, but people do not understand that, when the light is off, I'm closing down. policy is, if you have customers, you finish with them before you leave unless you have a replacement. I didn't. and I didn't want to tell them that they had to go to the other end and wait in longer lines anyway. so, at my first opportunity, I made a break for it

when I came back, they put me and the not-so-Speedy (20> items, supposedly) Checkout. by that time, all the people that should have come during the first part of the day seemed to all be piling in at the same time. I had to call for change 3 or 4 times, and I went through several customers each time before they could get around to me because everyone was busy and needed help or change. and every so often, I'd get a foreign customer that didn't seem to understand the 20 items or less part of the sign, so that sucked.

and about every other customer just stood there and watched me, instead of loading their own bags. so, I had to come around and load their carts for them so I could do the rest of their items. the nicer ones realized that that's what THEY should have been doing after the first time I came around...not a whole lot of customers are nice.

and besides that, in the speedy checkout, you rarely go over $100 dollars, but more than a third of the people used $100 bills, not helping my change problem. and I had enough $20 bills that they were hardly fitting in their slot any more, thanks to the people buying less than $10 worth of stuff. at the same time, I ran out of $10 bill and quarters long before I left.

and then, when it was time for me to leave, people had just started to slow down a bit. I had to call the CSM (cashier manager, basically) to tell him I need to leave in 5 minutes. he's a nice enough guy, but it seemed to be a struggle for him to keep clean language at that point. he told me to finish line and go, because you need approval way in advance for overtime at WM. I was forced to stay for about 10 minutes after my shift because of that stupid rules and my unwillingness to send people to another 3-5 person line. so, I'm probably going to get a "verbal coaching" (sounds so innocent, doesn't it?) about unapproved overtime

and to top it all off, for the hour and thirty-some minutes I was at the Speedy Checkout, I was next to the self checkouts. I'm going to have nightmares about that stupid voice with the "please scan your first item now" and "please check your cart for any additional items" and "select payment type now"

and one of my last few customers decided not to buy two huge pillows, each about as big and me curled up into fetal position (which coincidently, is just what I felt like doing) so I had to work around those until they gave me their cart to leave them in.

the good news is, I discovered something new about myself. I have several nervous tics. now, I'm a nearly stress-free guy. probably moreso than is normal for someone going into college, maybe even more than is healthy. bottom line: the closest I had ever come to being that stressed out is in a serious chess game with someone good. I joke about eye twitching quite often (ask MM or aiscool), but I've never had it happen to me before. it did at least twice today. not a comforting feeling at all. also, every time I had to wait for something like a check processing or a printing receipt, I'd fiddle with anything and everything. my favorite seemed to be the little latch that lets you lift the cover to the scanner for cleaning or whatever. finally, after I clocked out, I started snapping random cadences (small shout-out to marching band members still putting up with this post) so loud and hard that both my hands started hurting before I made myself stop.

that's it. my worst day out of the almost three weeks I've been there so far. good news is, I got paid for the first time today, so I'm $300-some up on my college savings than I was yesterday.

Wow, that's pretty hectic 0.0

Personally, I can never remember a time that I've ever been stressed out, but I get nervous alot, and for some reason, I'll lock my arm vertically, and with my other hand, scratch it like crazy. I remember the first day I joined my school's team, I came home, and if I just touched my arm, it would hurt like hell because I scratched it so much xD

You do what you have to as long as it means there's something better around the corner I suppose. Good luck with the "verbal coaching" :'(

lol, I've put up with enough misguided teacher 'verbal coachings'. I'm sure I'll manage, even if it's anything bad.

*frowns* You know what? I hope things go better for ya. It really kills your whole day when you have a work situation like that.

Wow... That's really gotta suck. I hate having days like that at work, it just ruins the rest of your day. Hope tomorrow goes better for ya.

hey, I'll come buy candy from you if it makes you feel better :P

Stick to it, theres only a couple months left, (I keep wanting to use your name) Loz.

Yep. Gotta love the working life.


You'll get over the eye twitch. Then it'll be random physical attacks. Then you'll advance to just taking it and planning the boss's murder.

Wow, today was much better. I won't say it quite made up for yesterday, but it came close. for the entire second half, I got the cigarette counter. in case you didn't know or your Wal-Mart doesn't do it, we have a 20> item checkout in the middle where all the tobacco is sold. it's like the jackpot for cashiers.

on normal lines, when you run out of people, you have to go red-line (go out to the end and find someone to check out). but you can't leave the little tobacco area in case of theft, so you get to stay down there the whole time. it sucks more for the knees, but it's easier. and since our Wal-Mart sold something they shouldn't have fairly recently, we get to card everyone. and I mean EVERYONE. everyone today was cool about it though. if anything, they were glad we did that as a policy.

the highlight of the night (oooh, rhyming) would have to be the Jewish (guessing here, and I'm a bad call for foreigners) lady. she spoke about two sentences in English, so her 13 or so year old daughter had to translate when I need to ask something. she had 73 items. a little more than. I might have tried to turn her down, but it was eerily quite tonight for a friday night. and before the Fourth no less. of course, I'm not complaining though.

Hah... the reminds me of my first volunteer work day I have about a year ago. I was working at the local animal shelter and my boss was an illegal immigrant so of course she knows very little English and all the words she knows are either racist towards white people (me) or Asian's. So I asked her where to put the new stock of cat food, and of course she tells me in Spanish. So I just go and toss it in storage where someone else will get it later. The first person I help is a foreigner who just came to America (like his first week in US) and when he comes in he yells, "F**K YOU B**CH!" This is right after I ask him what he needs. Then he throws a small dog at me and says something I can't understand (I think he was Hebrew) and then starts to leave. So I lock the door (Via remote) and tell him he has to pay a fee for giving us the dog. So he wants the management (Illegal immigrant vs. PMSing foreigner!) and I call her out. They both start talking in different languages (Which was probably the funniest thing I've ever seen.) Then half a minute later the assistant manager tells me to clock out because were closed for the day, and as I come back in my normal clothes they tell me to never volunteer there again.

Ya, I smuggled out all of the kittens though (about 10 or 11) in my bag. When I was out of view I opened my bag and then headed straight for the animal shelter about 30 miles from my house (on bike.)

This sort of thing always makes me very conflicted and unsure of myself :( You have to remember that the longwinded Sevvy has feelings as fragile as anyone else's.

If the manager tells you to do something which forces you to stay, doesn't that make him responsible?

[Insert a jewish people are good at counting joke]
[Insert an it's ok because I'm a member of that minority excuse]

My jobs and volunteer work are very low key. The only work I do at a cash register is at a book store. Very relaxing. Well, I did volunteer work at my temple helping teach little kids, and that wasn't exactly low key, but it was lots of fun too.

good job, Kitty Crusader

you'd think, wouldn't you? I wouldn't count on it. they'd probably assume it was my job to remind him when I was getting off and making sure I did. I doubt they'd care even if they gave me time to explain.

and for the record, I didn't mean to be racist, I was just trying to add details...

sorry for the double post, but I wanted to people to know I have something new

today, wasn't bad because I was in a good mood. I had a couple exceptionally difficult customers.

first off was a mexican family. they insisted they had 20 jugs of water, and handed me one. it didn't look like that much to me, but the customer is always right...pssh. anyway, I rung up 20, they saw the number and yelled at me. they had me come around and count. it turned out to be twelve. the voiding process takes a little while, and on the receipt, it shows up just like the original, except for a little minus sign. I finished with them, but they came back. we had to go through a spanish speaking 'associate' to explain that it wasn't 28, it was 12. they really should just go to the spanish speaking ones in the first place if you ask me, but apparently that would make too much sense.

the best however, was an American female. she threw the bigger tantrum I've ever had in my line. I'd guess she was about...THIRTY, and she was rather large. not huge, but definitely large. try to imagine this scenario: due to stupid people, we can't just ring ice up at the registers any more. they have to bring it out for us to scan directly. this ....lady.... didn't know that. she spent a good minute or two arguing with me. when I finally got it across to her that I couldn't, she very literally stomped across the path, grabbed her ice (couldn't she her, but I'm sure it wasn't pretty) stomped back, slammed it on the counter and slammed it back in her cart. we've got a little fundraiser going at our store for some hospital. it's only a dollar, but most people, being greedy and all, refuse on the spot. I was SO tempted to ask her, just for the reaction, but I was having enough trouble containing my laughter as it was.

EDIT - I forgot to mention. I acheived an amazing (especially considering I'm on my third week now) 620 items per hour. I know it doesn't divide out terribly flatteringly, but keep a couple things in mind. first, it also included the time it takes people to pay...which can be quite some time. and second, average IPH around here is high 400s, maybe just scratching the low 500s. it impressed my favorite CSM: Jon. he;s the nice one that I've almost made swear on the job a couple times because I had to clock out.