J-O-B. Even though it's three little letters, it's definitely a four letter word (if you get my hint). If I didn't have bills to pay, I wouldn't drag my ass out of bed every evening for a job. I've pretty much always had a job, since the day I turned 18. Every job had it's problem, whether it be the job itself, a co-worker, or the boss. Unfortunately, life is full of these horrific things called "bills", and they come every month like clockwork. Oh how I wish they'd all take a vacation.
My first job, there was a little "tiff" between some co-workers and the line was drawn in the sand. It made everything extremely uncomfortable for the last few months that I worked there. Just goes to show sometimes it's best if you don't hang out all the time with your co-workers. My next job was okay, although I kept getting told I wasn't dressed professionally enough. Dude. I was 18. They were lucky I remembered to show up. The job after that was my first vet clinic job. I enjoyed it, learned a lot. But I wasn't really fast enough (hmmm...because I was new at the whole thing??), and he wanted more bang for his buck (for lack of a better term, he needed someone better at the job for the money he was paying considering he just built himself a snazzy new clinic). After that I worked at the admissions office at the community college in town. Decent gig, saved on gas since I had to be there for class anyway. However, while I thought everyone was really nice and wanted to help me get where I needed to go, it turns out we all got a surprise. Most of the details turned up after I had moved to Chico State, but it started during my last few months there. One of the counselors apparently started hitting on some young girls, myself included. I kept passing it off as he was just over-eager in wanting to help me. That is, until he offered meeting for coffee in Chico to "hang out". I'm sorry, on what planet do I want to go "hang out" with a college counselor? Then it just got all kinds of creepy. Turns out, he'd been doing a lot of that, eventually I was asked to give a statement, and after several months of investigation the man was arrested. I think drug dealing was also involved. Yeah. Great counselor.
Once in Chico, I worked for a vet clinic, that after about 6 months the manager seemed to have a serious problem with me. I don't know why, but suddenly she's keeping me there until midnight telling me I've missed a spot on the all behind the door, or how the wall under the front counters looked like it hadn't been cleaned in weeks, there were finger prints on the reception counters (gasp! say it isn't so!!!), a dust bunny stowed away in a corner, the cats had the nerve to shit in their litter boxes in the 10 minutes since I'd been gone, and the damn dogs in the kennels and the nerve to move their bed from the front of the kennel to the back. Guess who had to fix it all again before I left? Yep. Me. After a full month of this crap, she calls me a liar to my face, and writes me up for "animal neglect". When asked if I'd like to defend myself, I agreed and basically said something along these lines: "I've owned dogs, cats, rodents, horses, goats; house-sat for my friends and family members; worked for several other vet clinics, and in my 21 years, I have never ever once been accused to animal neglect. I cannot help it if the cats drink all the water in 8-10 hour period that no one is here, especially considering the small size bowls we give them. I cannot prevent the cats from using their litter boxes in that time either, nor can I prevent the dogs from defecating their kennels once I leave. Once I've clocked out and locked the door behind me, it's out of my hands." She then handed me my written notice to sign and date with a fucking smile. Bitch.
Moving on from there, I went to Petco. Shock, I went to another animal job! No, I was never accused of neglect at Petco. Actually, I learned a lot by working there. I got over my fear of some reptiles, and learned about fish and birds. I eventually became the Small Animal Specialist, and became in charge of a department. However, pet stores are always in for a profit. Yes, we all cared about the animals and we all did what we could to make sure all them were healthy. There were times that our store budget was severely cut (once because we were forced to purchase a new printer) and we didn't have enough money left over to buy enough food and supplies for all four departments. So I had to "store-use" everything. And customers would constantly complain about nothing being on the shelves and how many times they were coming in to check. At one point I finally stopped skirting the issue and lying and started telling the truth. While they were upset, they thanked me for being honest. I was as professional as I could be about it, and then told them if they felt compelled to complain to please go to the website or call and talk to our manager, but "please don't mention my name". LOL
Now I work graveyard for a veterinary lab. I'm still in the animal industry, something I've always taken great care to do. I like what I do. The hours, however, suck. And like every other job, sometimes situations arise that really just make you shake your head and want to go home and crawl under the covers until it's all better. I've learned a ton of stuff since I started work at this company 6 years ago. And before you ask, yes I've been on graveyard the whole time. Yes, I'm nuts. Thanks for reminding me. I've learned how to fix our machines when they go down - which depending on their moods, can be often. And again, before you ask, yes machines have "moods". If you told me 10 years ago I'd be doing this and fixing all these things, I would have told you that you were crazy. Now, I can only do so much with the machines before I have to call in the big guns - our service guys. They are very lucky. They get to come in 8-5 to fix stuff for us, so most of us on nights never get to meet the service guys. The exception is Gabe, who works on our big chemistry machine, and has been nice enough at times to stay until 2AM to make sure it's fixed, (I wrote a blog about that machine and us having to pump water), who is, as we girls like to call him, Mr. Hotty-McHotHot. Seriously, this guy is gorgeous. For those that read this that know of Carlo, this guy is hotter than Carlo. Yeah. Seriously. I have to go stick my head in the freezer now. Anyway, moving on - since the economy went south, our bosses have been cracking down on the OT. I used to get all the OT I wanted, and I loved those paychecks. Suddenly I'm being told that I can't have any OT, and my bank account is whimpering. Suddenly, we're being told by a bunch of people who sit behind desks and have never done our jobs that we're over-staffed and OT should never happen. We lost one girl a month ago to a departmental transfer. We just lost another girl to school starting up again (you go SSHAW, you rock that nursing school!). And we don't get to replace either one. So guess who found out she gets no time off for Thanksgiving? ME. Guess who's pissed off? ME. Why? Because one person requested the damn week off before me. So because one person gets vacation, the rest of us who have to travel get screwed. Right now I'm picturing using this person's head as a soccer ball. Then, I get told that I have to "tweak" my vacation for Christmas, because it's my turn to work Sundays. I currently have two soccer balls. We can't give people the vacations they've requested because 1) We don't have the staffing levels anymore to allow more than one person off at any given time; 2) We're constantly having to send people to our TN and FL locations because apparently they're worse off than we are (hard for us to picture, obviously). So, because some paper-pushers make the decisions (from 3000 miles away might I add), we don't get to have nice comfy staffing levels. Because our company is so broke (which is major sarcasm btw, as our company continues to rake in the profits all over the globe) we can't afford to hire a few part-timers to help out. And let me tell you, in this economy, there are people who would kill for a part-time job to put food on their tables. I seriously love corporations. I want to hug them and squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze them tight. Really tight. Especially when you consider, our industry hasn't taken near the hit as most other industries have. We've been going steady and strong since the economy took a nose dive.
So, here's to the turkey dinner I will more than likely be sleeping through, if I can actually go anywhere for a turkey dinner. And here's to the Christmas vacation that ends on Christmas.
I fucking love my job.
My first job, there was a little "tiff" between some co-workers and the line was drawn in the sand. It made everything extremely uncomfortable for the last few months that I worked there. Just goes to show sometimes it's best if you don't hang out all the time with your co-workers. My next job was okay, although I kept getting told I wasn't dressed professionally enough. Dude. I was 18. They were lucky I remembered to show up. The job after that was my first vet clinic job. I enjoyed it, learned a lot. But I wasn't really fast enough (hmmm...because I was new at the whole thing??), and he wanted more bang for his buck (for lack of a better term, he needed someone better at the job for the money he was paying considering he just built himself a snazzy new clinic). After that I worked at the admissions office at the community college in town. Decent gig, saved on gas since I had to be there for class anyway. However, while I thought everyone was really nice and wanted to help me get where I needed to go, it turns out we all got a surprise. Most of the details turned up after I had moved to Chico State, but it started during my last few months there. One of the counselors apparently started hitting on some young girls, myself included. I kept passing it off as he was just over-eager in wanting to help me. That is, until he offered meeting for coffee in Chico to "hang out". I'm sorry, on what planet do I want to go "hang out" with a college counselor? Then it just got all kinds of creepy. Turns out, he'd been doing a lot of that, eventually I was asked to give a statement, and after several months of investigation the man was arrested. I think drug dealing was also involved. Yeah. Great counselor.
Once in Chico, I worked for a vet clinic, that after about 6 months the manager seemed to have a serious problem with me. I don't know why, but suddenly she's keeping me there until midnight telling me I've missed a spot on the all behind the door, or how the wall under the front counters looked like it hadn't been cleaned in weeks, there were finger prints on the reception counters (gasp! say it isn't so!!!), a dust bunny stowed away in a corner, the cats had the nerve to shit in their litter boxes in the 10 minutes since I'd been gone, and the damn dogs in the kennels and the nerve to move their bed from the front of the kennel to the back. Guess who had to fix it all again before I left? Yep. Me. After a full month of this crap, she calls me a liar to my face, and writes me up for "animal neglect". When asked if I'd like to defend myself, I agreed and basically said something along these lines: "I've owned dogs, cats, rodents, horses, goats; house-sat for my friends and family members; worked for several other vet clinics, and in my 21 years, I have never ever once been accused to animal neglect. I cannot help it if the cats drink all the water in 8-10 hour period that no one is here, especially considering the small size bowls we give them. I cannot prevent the cats from using their litter boxes in that time either, nor can I prevent the dogs from defecating their kennels once I leave. Once I've clocked out and locked the door behind me, it's out of my hands." She then handed me my written notice to sign and date with a fucking smile. Bitch.
Moving on from there, I went to Petco. Shock, I went to another animal job! No, I was never accused of neglect at Petco. Actually, I learned a lot by working there. I got over my fear of some reptiles, and learned about fish and birds. I eventually became the Small Animal Specialist, and became in charge of a department. However, pet stores are always in for a profit. Yes, we all cared about the animals and we all did what we could to make sure all them were healthy. There were times that our store budget was severely cut (once because we were forced to purchase a new printer) and we didn't have enough money left over to buy enough food and supplies for all four departments. So I had to "store-use" everything. And customers would constantly complain about nothing being on the shelves and how many times they were coming in to check. At one point I finally stopped skirting the issue and lying and started telling the truth. While they were upset, they thanked me for being honest. I was as professional as I could be about it, and then told them if they felt compelled to complain to please go to the website or call and talk to our manager, but "please don't mention my name". LOL
Now I work graveyard for a veterinary lab. I'm still in the animal industry, something I've always taken great care to do. I like what I do. The hours, however, suck. And like every other job, sometimes situations arise that really just make you shake your head and want to go home and crawl under the covers until it's all better. I've learned a ton of stuff since I started work at this company 6 years ago. And before you ask, yes I've been on graveyard the whole time. Yes, I'm nuts. Thanks for reminding me. I've learned how to fix our machines when they go down - which depending on their moods, can be often. And again, before you ask, yes machines have "moods". If you told me 10 years ago I'd be doing this and fixing all these things, I would have told you that you were crazy. Now, I can only do so much with the machines before I have to call in the big guns - our service guys. They are very lucky. They get to come in 8-5 to fix stuff for us, so most of us on nights never get to meet the service guys. The exception is Gabe, who works on our big chemistry machine, and has been nice enough at times to stay until 2AM to make sure it's fixed, (I wrote a blog about that machine and us having to pump water), who is, as we girls like to call him, Mr. Hotty-McHotHot. Seriously, this guy is gorgeous. For those that read this that know of Carlo, this guy is hotter than Carlo. Yeah. Seriously. I have to go stick my head in the freezer now. Anyway, moving on - since the economy went south, our bosses have been cracking down on the OT. I used to get all the OT I wanted, and I loved those paychecks. Suddenly I'm being told that I can't have any OT, and my bank account is whimpering. Suddenly, we're being told by a bunch of people who sit behind desks and have never done our jobs that we're over-staffed and OT should never happen. We lost one girl a month ago to a departmental transfer. We just lost another girl to school starting up again (you go SSHAW, you rock that nursing school!). And we don't get to replace either one. So guess who found out she gets no time off for Thanksgiving? ME. Guess who's pissed off? ME. Why? Because one person requested the damn week off before me. So because one person gets vacation, the rest of us who have to travel get screwed. Right now I'm picturing using this person's head as a soccer ball. Then, I get told that I have to "tweak" my vacation for Christmas, because it's my turn to work Sundays. I currently have two soccer balls. We can't give people the vacations they've requested because 1) We don't have the staffing levels anymore to allow more than one person off at any given time; 2) We're constantly having to send people to our TN and FL locations because apparently they're worse off than we are (hard for us to picture, obviously). So, because some paper-pushers make the decisions (from 3000 miles away might I add), we don't get to have nice comfy staffing levels. Because our company is so broke (which is major sarcasm btw, as our company continues to rake in the profits all over the globe) we can't afford to hire a few part-timers to help out. And let me tell you, in this economy, there are people who would kill for a part-time job to put food on their tables. I seriously love corporations. I want to hug them and squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze them tight. Really tight. Especially when you consider, our industry hasn't taken near the hit as most other industries have. We've been going steady and strong since the economy took a nose dive.
So, here's to the turkey dinner I will more than likely be sleeping through, if I can actually go anywhere for a turkey dinner. And here's to the Christmas vacation that ends on Christmas.
I fucking love my job.
HA! That is an AWESOME ending!! Love it!
ReplyDeletehttp://cinderitaadventures.blogspot.com/
Oh goodness. I absolutely hated the corporate world where all they want is profit over quality of care for their employees or customers. It's why I had to leave. I told myself the same thing you did over and over. "I hate my job" "Why am I doing this again!?" Once the bitterness creeps in it's so hard to purge. I have to admit...sounds like you are on the recieving end of some pretty crappy stuff. If I had to "rework" my Christmas arrangements I'd be pretty pissed! Good luck!
ReplyDeletehttp://jewelsturning30.blogspot.com/