Two Days and Counting

Thursday is my last day of Pizza Hut. Will I miss it? Yes...and no. I'm going to list, and hopefully not bore you, with what I'll miss and what I won't.

What I'll Miss
1. My co-workers - I love working with people my age! I will miss them the most. I sound like Dorothy talking to the Scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz..."I think I'm going to miss you most of all."

2. The environment - sure I smell like grease and pizza after I get done with my shift, but I don't have to dress up in a buttoned shirt and sit at a desk all day. I get to wear sneakers, a t-shirt, and I get my exercise...not to mention my toned arms from all that pizza lifting.

3. Food - I barely buy groceries anymore. It's the life...except I'm getting kind of sick of pizza. I've been switching it up though - wings, pasta, pizza, potato wedges, etc...

4. The customers - well, some of them.

5. The tips - it makes my day when someone leaves me a generous tip. Thank you tippers everywhere.


What I won't miss
1. Closing - staying after midnight and cleaning is not my thing. Ugh, and I close a lot.

2. The crabby customers - the ones that don't appreciate you. Hello? I'm serving you food, don't mess with me.

3. The non-tippers - If someone brings you food and comes back to check on you for refills and other things...tip them. I don't care if it's just a dollar. Actually I do. Try to tip 10-15%.

4. The group of high schoolers who come in an hour before close and order water for drinks. I know they secretly want pop, but they're too cheap to order it. Oh, and they don't usually tip.

5. Returning to my table and telling them that the cooks forgot to make their pizza, but it's in now and that I'll take the pizza off of their bill. Then when I give them their bill they wonder why they have to pay for the food that came on time. Are you kidding me? It's $7.00! Would you rather I put the pizza back on the bill and have to pay the $20.00??? No, I didn't think so.

6. The customers who say they are ready to order and then argue about what they want - "What do you want?" "Whatever..." "Okay, we'll have the supreme." "Ugh, not the supreme..." Seriously? So I say, "I'll give you a couple minutes." But no, they are ready now...sure they are...

7. People who order salads and then barely eat any of it. Did you know I had to go in the back and make that salad?? Did you know that I feel like I fall so behind after making you your perfect salad that the rest of my night gets thrown off? Especially if it's really busy, don't ask me to make you a salad. Because you won't get it right away.

Thursday is approaching fast, and I'm happy to be done and moving on, but I'm going to miss working at The Hut. It's been, by far, my favorite job.

There once was a man from Nantucket...

Fair warning! I'm going to vent to you all.

There is this girl that I work with. I shall call her Fartha.

Fartha likes to tell the manager that she wants more hours. Yet, I get a text from her about once a week asking me to cover her shift.

I text Fartha, "On."

Then I text her again, "No."

Fartha also wants to become a shift manager. Thank goodness I'm graduating in a couple of weeks and won't be around to see this nightmare come true, if it does.

Somehow, Fartha has become a driver for Pizza Hut. She is not a good driver for Pizza Hut. Maybe she'll get better. I think she should stick to waitressing.

Then again, I like not waitressing with her...so Fartha should drive more.

Nope, nope, I can't even convince myself to like her as a driver, because I have to pick up her slack and do a ton of dishes at the end of the night just to help the poor driver who has to drive with her.

It's a vicious cycle.

Thursday is my favorite night to waitress. Somehow, Fartha got my shift. "I am angry. I'm like a large tornado of anger, swirling about." - Kicking and Screaming name drop.

On top of which, guess what happened!

Fartha texts me this afternoon. She said that she has a wedding to go to on Saturday and forgot to take off of work.

I think, too bad.

She texts, "Can you switch your Friday night with my Saturday night and I'll find someone to cover your original Saturday night hours?"

I think, no.

You see, I have a baptism to go to on Sunday, and I just called my sister today and told her I will be leaving on Saturday night after 8 to drive two hours to her house instead of leaving really early on Sunday morning.

Plus, I didn't want to give up my Friday night. I make glorious tips on Fridays.

So I texted her "no."

Fartha hasn't texted me back. Oh well, not my problem.

Kind Words

I was waitressing last night (by myself, because Jane couldn't make it in) and I was pretty busy with tables...a little stressed at some points...and a little groggy from the night before. All-in-all, I wasn't having the greatest night at Pizza Hut. It was just okay.

Then something changed.

The phone rang and I picked it up and said, "Thank you for calling Pizza Hut. This is Kinsey. Will this be for delivery or carryout?"

The man said, "Carryout."

As I typed in all his information he kept saying my name when he talked to me. For example: "Okay Kinsey, I would like this and this. Thank you Kinsey etc etc..."

Weird, right? I mean, not many people (over the phone) use the other person's name when ordering pizza. And if they do, it's rarely used more than once.

Does this guy know me? I had no clue. It unnerved me enough to share my weird phone conversation with a co-worker. It wasn't a creepy phone call or anything, but just unusual.

Anyway, twenty minutes later this guy (in his fifties) in a purple shirt comes in and picks up his pizza. I was near the cash register and we exchanged looks. It was the guy that talked to me on the phone. He was wearing a Winona State polo, but I've never seen him before.

He came over to me, obviously seeing my name tag that identified me as Kinsey, and said, "Kinsey right? I just wanted to tell you that you were very nice to me over the phone. You were very polite and friendly, and I just wanted to thank you for that."

This random stranger made my day twenty times better all because of a simple compliment.

Wouldn't it be nice if everyone was like Winona State Polo guy? It's true what they say: A compliment goes a long way.

And the award goes to...

I used to look forward to this day all year. In years past, I would watch from the red carpet interviews until the credits. Believe it or not, parts of the ceremony would make me teary-eyed, and other parts would have me rolling on the floor laughing (rofl). Okay...so I wouldn't be rolling on the floor, but I would be laughing it up.

This year, though, The Academy Awards sneaked up on me. ('Snuck" isn't the correct usage of the word, btw, the correct form is "sneaked.") I won't be able to watch the show in its entirety, because I'll be at Pizza Hut...working, well, barely working. Tonight I have to answer phones and deal with people who don't know that a Personal Pan Pizza only comes in a pan crust...hence the name Personal Pan Pizza.

Tonight, I'll miss the Lifetime Achievement Award, the banter of Alec Baldwin (love) and Steve Martin, and the heartfelt thanks from the proud winners. :( Which, when they give their speeches and thank their moms and dads, my mom tells me, "Someday that will be you up there." Wouldn't that be something? Although, as much as I love The Academy Awards, I think I'm more of a Golden Globe winner.

So to end this blog post, I'll wish all the nominees luck! And to all of you who are going to watch the awards tonight - enjoy and appreciate all the great films that were made solely for your entertainment.

Super Bowl Sunday

I'm going to go out on a limb and pick the Saints to win tonight. Everyone is picking the Colts, and I like to root for the underdog. Plus, the Saints beat the Vikings so GO SAINTS!!! It's going to be a close game too, so it's worth the watch. Unfortunately, I'll be a Pizza Hut answering phones during the game. Yay.

Speaking of Pizza Hut, the cooks forgot to make three of my pizzas for three different tables all in a matter of two hours. It's really embarrassing telling someone that the cooks are incapable of reading a ticket that tells them exactly what to put on a pizza, let alone make an entire one. I ended up taking money off bills last night which resulted in some tables leaving me a healthy tip and one table leaving me $.78! Don't worry - I only took a total of $20 off your bill and gave you two orders of bread sticks for free. Thank you for the $.78. I think I'll buy half a Snickers with that.

Now something positive: I received an A on my Web Development test last week. I thought I did horrible, but somehow I pulled it off. Actually, I got a B but then she curved it...so I ended up with an A. Nope, I still feel angry about the $.78. I guess thinking positive didn't help this time.

On a different note - I had to chose a goal for my Personal and Community Health class so I've given up pop for the rest of the semester. My reward: a new pair of tennis shoes. My punishment: run a mile for every pop I drink. That reminds me, I need to run a mile this week.