Happy Birthday, Crappy Birthday

Part I: Happy Birthday...

Wow. What a fucking day. I try to refrain from cursing on here, but after the events of today, I may let the expletives fly. It was a pretty good b-day weekend more or less. Friday I got out of work early for the first time in months. I shit you not. I haven't worked early on a friday since February. More on that later. It was a little rainy, so Kerri and I had move part 1 of out co-birthday weekend at Nautical Mile to the more land locked location of Rockville Centre. After sending out texts, emails and phone calls, only TWO people responded, one of them was my sister. Jen couldn't make it Friday b/c she had work early on Saturday and Saturday looked to be more fun anyways. So our celebration consisted of Me, Kerri, Breanne and Dave. We still had fun, went drinkin' and had dinner at Cabo, then hit up Champs and some other bar. Good times. The next day in the city, Kerri and I find that just Jen will be joining us for dinner. Between Kerri and I we invited 40 people. Close to a month before. Over the course of 2 days, only three people felt they could make it to dinner. One was my sister, the other my girlfriend. Of the people who couldn't make it to dinner, only a handful had a legitimate reason they couldn't attend. More people did make it out to Brother Jimmy's for live band Karaoke which was just uber fun. There were 8 of us, plus another b-day party going on who we had a small back and forth with, everyone was drinkin', laughing, talking & singing. It was a blast.

Sunday Breanne surprised me with tickets to see American Idiot on Broadway. Fucking awesome show. I loved it. As we were heading out, we signed our name on the walls of the lobby (its cool, its encouraged, they even provide the sharpies) I signed in 2 places. One was on the lowest part of the wall, i signed my initials and the date. Then, I see it, the spot where a lot of people will see my signature and say, WTF? Right on top of the main exit sign, SUPER 579. You literally can't walk out without seeing it. And its high enough that not too many people will be able to write near / on it. Anyways, Breanne hears someone say she met Billie Joe Armstrong. So, not having anyplace to go, we "stage doored" it and hung around for the cast to come out. We met a few of them, all super nice and really appreciative of the fans. Then, after a while we started getting ready to go and out walks Billy Joe! I pushed Breanne over to him, snapped a couple of candid shots and Bre got his autograph right as he was leaving. Awesome night, and a great way to end a pretty cool weekend.

Ah, now comes Part II: Crappy Birthday

Allow me to sum up my work schedule the past 4 1/2 months: January, my counterpart at work took off for 3 weeks, during what would have been my winter break. I worked 10-8, Tues - Fri and 830 - 430 Sat. for the first 3 weeks of January. When she came back I changed my schedule to work early that Friday and put in for early the night of my sisters b-day and the night before i took 2 teaching certification tests. After coming back from 3 weeks vacation, after the first friday night she had to work, she complained that i was taking advantage and she was working too many friday nights. So I was basically told I wasn't being fair and to work Friday nights. My schedule for the semester was Tuesday 12-830, Wed 9-430 (so i could get to class from 530-730) Thursday 10-830, Fri 12-830 and Sat 830-430. So I went from working open to close 5 nights to closing 4 of 5 nights. I was being REALLY selfish there wasn't I? So I stuck with it, worked all but 3 Friday nights from January till last week. My manager tells me to work out a schedule for the summer with my counterpart. We worked out that Id work Monday - Friday and shed work Tuesday - Saturday She hates working Mondays, I hate working Saturdays. We each get 2 days late and 2 days early during the week. I put myself down for early Fridays. Which works out good b/c she's very lazy, can never finish her work and leaves stuff for the next day and sometime can't do it till the day after. I, on the other hand, get literally twice as much work done in a day than she does. Friday nights its a light load, one doctor leaves early so there's nothing for her to get backed up with. Also, its balancing out the fact that I worked all those prior Friday nights.

Guess who complained about the schedule AFTER I SHOWED IT TO HER. She waited till I left, to go out for my birthday no less, and before her first Friday night was over, complained to the bosses that I was taking advantage and she was working too many nights. So yesterday I was told we'd all sit down and work it out. I reminded my assistant manager that I worked the open to close shift for 3 weeks & closed 4 out of the 5 days I worked during the semester. She said we'll all work it out tomorrow. Well, it was a rainy crappy day, but I was getting tons of Happy Birthday texts and Facebook messages so I was in a good mood. I was stuck with a patient a little longer than I wanted, which lead me to staying at work literally 5 minutes too long. This is when my manager and assistant manager and counterpart decide to say I'm being unfair with the schedule. I remind them that:

1) I went made the schedule asking her about the days and hours, all of which she said yes to.

2) The 3 weeks I worked open to close

3) that I worked till close 4 of the 5 nights

I was told fair is fair and it's not fair to make her work Friday nights all summer. I interjected, saying "at the risk of me repeating myself, that I worked till close 4 of the 5 nights, and all but 3 fridays since January." I got "Fair is fair" again and was told that we should alternate Friday nights. This girl does nothing. She can;t handle the workload and has been pushed from position to position for some reason. She cant handle working here? put her there. Can't handle that? move her over there. They never remove the problem, they move it. So now I'm getting screwed, again. I'm PISSED. Red. They basically said, I'm being unfair when I ask for reciprocation. Lets say I worked 12 Friday nights, is it wrong to ask her to work 12 friday nights? I don't think so.

I need to find a semi-decent M-F job for the remainder of the summer and I'll just save up what I can and take out a slightly larger student loan for the coming semester so I wont have to work and can totally focus on school. If I can get a job by mid June that would totally fuck this place over. They would BEG to have me back. People keep leaving and they don't replace them. We are so short staffed if one more person leaves, they won't be able to handle the amount of people we see. I can't say the name of the company I work for but it sucks. And might I add, fuck 'em.