Lovely.
Yesterday and today were hot.
Yesterday and today were quite hot, and open campus days for a local boarding school.
Between yesterday and today I made more frozen blended beverages than I have ever cared to make in my life.
(What's a frozen blended beverage? I thought you were a barista.)
(I am a barista. But as I've discussed before, most people don't like coffee. They like fucking ridiculous ass things that are not coffee. Like frozen blended beverages.)
Banana. Strawberry. Fucking tea. Fucking mocha fucking chip. Fucking dingleberry macha surprise. Anything but fucking coffee.
And even the coffee kind bears little resemblence to actual coffee. It's cold. It's milky. It's icy. It's sweet enough to hurt your teeth. It's like a coffee milk shake. Without ice cream. Being from Boston, I almost said a coffee frappe. But that is meaningless to those outside my little enclave. Because, you see, order a milkshake in Boston, you get sweetened, shaken milk. If you want milk and ice cream, it's a frappe.
But it's all people want.
And people don't realize that they don't come from a machine. They mill around, in front of the espresso bar. They huff. They sigh. They make over-loud conversation to friends about how long it takes.
We have two blenders. Each beverage must be blended, poured, and finished. Then the blender must be rinsed. Then the next beverage may be started. And I'm not so bad. I can do two drinks at once, and have the rest almost ready to go. But I can't reach my bare hands into the ice bin, stuff my mouth with ice, milk, sugar and coffee, make a whirring noise while I chew and regurgitate an icy cool refreshing beverage into a glass. And even if I could, that would only increase my efficiency by one-third.
There was a moment yesterday when I had eleven of these beverages in front of me. There were no other drinks to be made. There was nothing to be done. My supervisor just told the other girl to stay out of my way. Not because I could do it faster, or because I'm better than anyone with these goddamned things. But because there's nothing else you can do.
Rage. There's no other reaction. First, annoyance. Then, resentment. Then, rage. Because people don't think. And you can't ask. You can't say "Hey, motherfucker, everyone else can have this kind of drink, but you can't, because five is too many. It's going to make everyone else behind you wait forever", or "Hey, asshole. You're thirty-five. Try an iced coffee."
If you have a job, imagine a day at work. Imagine there is something that is a small part of your job, but not something you do a lot, and not something you're expert at. Something you're barely set up for, but certainly qualified to do. And it's all anyone wants. And they can't see that everyone wanting this one thing is a problem.
And they just keep fucking coming.
And they think it's such a small thing.
But it's not. We have about fifteen different flavors of these goddamned blender drinks. And no one wants the same one. People will come in and order four different.
You don't understand. You can't understand.
But if today had been my last day, this is what I would have done:
(Picture me, behind the bar, six blended beverages in front of me, waiting to be finished. A gentleman comes up and orders three more, each one different and fucking retarded)
Me: Excuse me, sir, would you like a waffle cone with that?
Him: A waffle cone? Do you have that?
Me: No, we don't. How about some jimmies?
Him: Jimmies? You have those?
Me: No, we have no jimmies, either.
Him: Well, why did you...
Me: Because, motherfucker, we have no fucking waffle cones, and no motherfucking jimmies, because we're not a fucking ice cream store.
Him: I know, this is -my coffee shop-, and frankly, I'm offended-
Me: What do we sell at -my coffee shop-?
Him: I don't have to be spoken with this-
Me: WHAT DO WE SELL HERE?
Him: Coffee?
Me: You're fucking right we sell coffee here. Get out of my sight.
Friday, June 02, 2006
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Tuesday, May 30, 2006
Monday, May 29, 2006
An actual quote from work today.
Me: Were you just on bar?
Guy: Yes.
Me: So this is the milk you've been serving?
Guy: Yeah.
Me: I will destroy you.
Guy: Yes.
Me: So this is the milk you've been serving?
Guy: Yeah.
Me: I will destroy you.
What I learned on my memorial day weekend.
By Hobobarista.
Age 23.
Grade 18.
The first thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is that nice girls from south suburban boston can drive into cities without sponteneously driving the wrong way up a one-way street, off a cliff, burst into flames, bounce, end up in a river, and drown because the seat belts are jammed. This is only accomplished by good directions, however. Otherwise, flaming, blistering death followed by unnecessary drownings, I'm sure.
The second thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is that Brooklyn is very large. As I am not a mapologist or mathologist, however, I cannot compare it to Rhode Island in size, using fractions.
The third thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is how to bowl. Bowling is a game, where you mostly sit, but sometimes you throw something at something. Which makes it somewhat like baseball, except bowling happens indoors, near women named Carol. I also learned that staunchly heterosexual men can protectively cradle sparkly things that they've named after members of the E street band.
The fourth thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is much more thinky. Who you are is what you do, even if you don't do anything. Especially if you don't do anything, but significantly so otherwise. I'd managed to take this trip while my host and his friends were attempting something they've called the psuedo-sport olympics, which to me seems to combine all forms of gaming that can be accomplished without major physical conditioning, while drinking, with many visits to bars, for drinking, when gaming is not happening.
At the final bar visited Saturday evening, (Sunday morning, at this point) something started to crystalize for me. And not calcium in my gallbladder. Cognitions. Questions. Dissonance. Despite not actually knowing these people, I was having somewhere between 2/3 and 9/12 of a hell of a time. Much like I do with friends from home. But something was different. Around four am, it suddenly occured to me.
My friends were getting up for work.
These guys were going strong.
This was the first sunday that I haven't worked, excluding two brief vacations, in two and a half years. If you are a waitress, a coffee girl, a bartender, a cashier, a salesgirl or boy, or work in any job that requires you to facilitate anyone's outside of work life...you work weekends. That I have saturdays off, and have managed to maintain that for years, is a minor miracle of manipulation, whining, and threats of quitting. If I stopped working sundays, that would be quitting. If I stopped working holidays, that would be quitting. I have worked two thanksgivings, two christmasses, a new year's eve and a new year's day, two halloweens, and this is my third memorial day.
Skilled labor gets holidays. Unskilled labor, despite how hard the job is, stays on. Because without unskilled labor, how would the rest of you fuckers spend your sundays and holiday weekends?
And it gets to you.
The first year goes by fine. While everyone in the world gets up for work, you may be still asleep. Or while everyone is hitting the middle of their work day, yours may be over. You may get tuesdays off, and spend a day strolling through uncrowded museums, see an afternoon movie in an abandoned theater. It's moderately cool. It's almost like finding a loophole. You feel like you're cheating. Then the holidays come. And it's not so bad. You get time and a half. Big tips. Maybe your family holds dinner until you get off.
By the middle of year three, which is where I am, you're just fucking tired. Everyone you know, by that point, works in the same type of job you do. Because everyone else in the world does things on the weekends. And you can't. So people get tired of inviting you to do things that you can't do. So you pal around with the same exhausted, embittered, tip-dependent, apron, smock, and vest-wearers. People who understand that they may never have two days off in a row for the rest of their life People who have gotten used to wednesday hangovers and clear-eyed sunday mornings.
It's not a class thang; it's a caste thang.
And the bright dividing line between the upper castes and lower castes in America is weekends and holidays. The upper castes get them off. The lower castes spend theirs in service to the uppers. We're no longer a white, blue, and pink collar society. The white collar workers experience more instability than the blue, and can't really be distinguished from the pink. Is an administrative assistant really a secretary, or an administrator? Nobody knows. Try getting a plumber on a sunday, though. Or a mailman, mechanic, tow truck operator, electrician- they've got the day off. Manicurist, hair stylist, waitress, waiter, bartender, anyone who feeds you, touches you, or pretends to like you for money- all at work.
Saturday night was my first saturday night with the ivory to lavender collar crowd, followed by a sunday morning being served instead of serving. It feels odd. The whole lifestyle is foriegn to me. Knowing that everyone you know has the day off, all at the same time, and will have tomorrow off tomorrow, seems so foreign to me. But it's the lifestyle of my friend, and his friends. A lifestyle I haven't known since college.
It's a different world.
Another thing that I learned was that a grey-bearded man in a fifteen year old Toyota can get a blowjob while stuck in traffic in front of yankee stadium.
And that I'm a little bit of a bitch when I'm overtired.
And that a mid-sized blonde, fucking a man a little too affable to be entirely heterosexual, in a borrowed bed, can sound exactly like a wounded seal taking refuge in a hefty bag full of water balloons and astroglide.
Age 23.
Grade 18.
The first thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is that nice girls from south suburban boston can drive into cities without sponteneously driving the wrong way up a one-way street, off a cliff, burst into flames, bounce, end up in a river, and drown because the seat belts are jammed. This is only accomplished by good directions, however. Otherwise, flaming, blistering death followed by unnecessary drownings, I'm sure.
The second thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is that Brooklyn is very large. As I am not a mapologist or mathologist, however, I cannot compare it to Rhode Island in size, using fractions.
The third thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is how to bowl. Bowling is a game, where you mostly sit, but sometimes you throw something at something. Which makes it somewhat like baseball, except bowling happens indoors, near women named Carol. I also learned that staunchly heterosexual men can protectively cradle sparkly things that they've named after members of the E street band.
The fourth thing I learned on my memorial day weekend is much more thinky. Who you are is what you do, even if you don't do anything. Especially if you don't do anything, but significantly so otherwise. I'd managed to take this trip while my host and his friends were attempting something they've called the psuedo-sport olympics, which to me seems to combine all forms of gaming that can be accomplished without major physical conditioning, while drinking, with many visits to bars, for drinking, when gaming is not happening.
At the final bar visited Saturday evening, (Sunday morning, at this point) something started to crystalize for me. And not calcium in my gallbladder. Cognitions. Questions. Dissonance. Despite not actually knowing these people, I was having somewhere between 2/3 and 9/12 of a hell of a time. Much like I do with friends from home. But something was different. Around four am, it suddenly occured to me.
My friends were getting up for work.
These guys were going strong.
This was the first sunday that I haven't worked, excluding two brief vacations, in two and a half years. If you are a waitress, a coffee girl, a bartender, a cashier, a salesgirl or boy, or work in any job that requires you to facilitate anyone's outside of work life...you work weekends. That I have saturdays off, and have managed to maintain that for years, is a minor miracle of manipulation, whining, and threats of quitting. If I stopped working sundays, that would be quitting. If I stopped working holidays, that would be quitting. I have worked two thanksgivings, two christmasses, a new year's eve and a new year's day, two halloweens, and this is my third memorial day.
Skilled labor gets holidays. Unskilled labor, despite how hard the job is, stays on. Because without unskilled labor, how would the rest of you fuckers spend your sundays and holiday weekends?
And it gets to you.
The first year goes by fine. While everyone in the world gets up for work, you may be still asleep. Or while everyone is hitting the middle of their work day, yours may be over. You may get tuesdays off, and spend a day strolling through uncrowded museums, see an afternoon movie in an abandoned theater. It's moderately cool. It's almost like finding a loophole. You feel like you're cheating. Then the holidays come. And it's not so bad. You get time and a half. Big tips. Maybe your family holds dinner until you get off.
By the middle of year three, which is where I am, you're just fucking tired. Everyone you know, by that point, works in the same type of job you do. Because everyone else in the world does things on the weekends. And you can't. So people get tired of inviting you to do things that you can't do. So you pal around with the same exhausted, embittered, tip-dependent, apron, smock, and vest-wearers. People who understand that they may never have two days off in a row for the rest of their life People who have gotten used to wednesday hangovers and clear-eyed sunday mornings.
It's not a class thang; it's a caste thang.
And the bright dividing line between the upper castes and lower castes in America is weekends and holidays. The upper castes get them off. The lower castes spend theirs in service to the uppers. We're no longer a white, blue, and pink collar society. The white collar workers experience more instability than the blue, and can't really be distinguished from the pink. Is an administrative assistant really a secretary, or an administrator? Nobody knows. Try getting a plumber on a sunday, though. Or a mailman, mechanic, tow truck operator, electrician- they've got the day off. Manicurist, hair stylist, waitress, waiter, bartender, anyone who feeds you, touches you, or pretends to like you for money- all at work.
Saturday night was my first saturday night with the ivory to lavender collar crowd, followed by a sunday morning being served instead of serving. It feels odd. The whole lifestyle is foriegn to me. Knowing that everyone you know has the day off, all at the same time, and will have tomorrow off tomorrow, seems so foreign to me. But it's the lifestyle of my friend, and his friends. A lifestyle I haven't known since college.
It's a different world.
Another thing that I learned was that a grey-bearded man in a fifteen year old Toyota can get a blowjob while stuck in traffic in front of yankee stadium.
And that I'm a little bit of a bitch when I'm overtired.
And that a mid-sized blonde, fucking a man a little too affable to be entirely heterosexual, in a borrowed bed, can sound exactly like a wounded seal taking refuge in a hefty bag full of water balloons and astroglide.
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