The 9-5 Change Up!
I have been having trouble with 9-5's over the past year. I do my best to accommodate them and only really request accommodation back.
As an actress the first thing I honestly will state to a potential employer is this:
"I am an actress. As such I will be needing time off. Now when I say time off I doubt it will ever be more than a week. I should, in fact, have the exact dates and times I will need off well in advance and most of the time it's only a few days a month, mostly Mondays. I can ask for those days and times off RIGHT NOW! While I will do my best to keep you abreast of any changes to my schedule by putting them on the time off sheet, know this...any time I write on the schedule as being a time I can't be there is not a request. If you schedule me and I have asked for a particular day off, I will not be there. I work 40+ hours a week while I am not at work as a professional actor. I will not turn down a roll if I can switch with someone.
However, I can promise you I am hard working. I do not call in, if I do something is VERY WRONG!
Be flexible with me and I will be so with you."
At the most recent 9-5 I had been having trouble. In general people don't understand me and there are rumors I don't much care for, but it happens.
Often times I would pick up tables for the newest servers and already be running a section bigger than everyone else.
On several occasions the owners mother would come in and not seat my section, or worse, seat my section but give my table to other people and threaten to fire me for working in my own section. She had lied to customers before, blaming me when the kitchen was late and saying I didn't pick up food and was a poor server. Any customer I have ever had can tell you otherwise.
No I am not perfect but I am efficient and kind in the worst of circumstances and can still handle more tables than the rest of their servers. On several occasions I handled upwards of 12 tables on my own when their lunch closer didn't want to stay.
So when my employer starts to watch my every move and pick on me for simple things I know they want to get rid of me but have no good reason to fire me.
So this leads me to Monday the 11th of Mar. I had been in Charleston all weekend for a film festival. It was great. I got to spend time with my boyfriend and in general enjoy life a little.
On Saturday we get back and my car lights weren't coming on and my door was ajar, meaning my battery is dead. My car is parked in between a whole bunch of cars and I can't reach my battery, which sits ever so conveniently to the right side of my car, so I figure I will wait until the next day, when people leave for work, and then I will be able to get out and go to work.
6:30am rolls around and I wake up and no one has moved. That's ok! I can leave as late as 8:00 and still get to work on time. Go inside, pass out for another hour and wake up and no one has moved. My battery is located at such a place that no matter where I pull my boyfriend's car I simply don't have the slack to get the jumper cables to the battery, and it is getting LATE! So at 8:00 exactly I give up and call in saying I can't get to work. The manager asks why and I tell her honestly, but just in case I snap a few pictures.
The manager hangs up on me and calls me back after my phone dies and leaves a message saying I need to be at work by 4pm because she switched me with someone.
At this point I have no idea how I am going to get my car out but I figure since I called in I can check the office. And here is the sign.
As an actress the first thing I honestly will state to a potential employer is this:
"I am an actress. As such I will be needing time off. Now when I say time off I doubt it will ever be more than a week. I should, in fact, have the exact dates and times I will need off well in advance and most of the time it's only a few days a month, mostly Mondays. I can ask for those days and times off RIGHT NOW! While I will do my best to keep you abreast of any changes to my schedule by putting them on the time off sheet, know this...any time I write on the schedule as being a time I can't be there is not a request. If you schedule me and I have asked for a particular day off, I will not be there. I work 40+ hours a week while I am not at work as a professional actor. I will not turn down a roll if I can switch with someone.
However, I can promise you I am hard working. I do not call in, if I do something is VERY WRONG!
Be flexible with me and I will be so with you."
At the most recent 9-5 I had been having trouble. In general people don't understand me and there are rumors I don't much care for, but it happens.
Often times I would pick up tables for the newest servers and already be running a section bigger than everyone else.
On several occasions the owners mother would come in and not seat my section, or worse, seat my section but give my table to other people and threaten to fire me for working in my own section. She had lied to customers before, blaming me when the kitchen was late and saying I didn't pick up food and was a poor server. Any customer I have ever had can tell you otherwise.
No I am not perfect but I am efficient and kind in the worst of circumstances and can still handle more tables than the rest of their servers. On several occasions I handled upwards of 12 tables on my own when their lunch closer didn't want to stay.
So when my employer starts to watch my every move and pick on me for simple things I know they want to get rid of me but have no good reason to fire me.
So this leads me to Monday the 11th of Mar. I had been in Charleston all weekend for a film festival. It was great. I got to spend time with my boyfriend and in general enjoy life a little.
On Saturday we get back and my car lights weren't coming on and my door was ajar, meaning my battery is dead. My car is parked in between a whole bunch of cars and I can't reach my battery, which sits ever so conveniently to the right side of my car, so I figure I will wait until the next day, when people leave for work, and then I will be able to get out and go to work.
6:30am rolls around and I wake up and no one has moved. That's ok! I can leave as late as 8:00 and still get to work on time. Go inside, pass out for another hour and wake up and no one has moved. My battery is located at such a place that no matter where I pull my boyfriend's car I simply don't have the slack to get the jumper cables to the battery, and it is getting LATE! So at 8:00 exactly I give up and call in saying I can't get to work. The manager asks why and I tell her honestly, but just in case I snap a few pictures.
 |
My car! |
 |
| Problem one...my battery is on the right side and there is no extra room past the edge of frame for a car. |
 |
| Problem two...this is only part of the complex! |
 |
| DANG IT!!!! |
So now I have to wait until 9am to see if "A" they move so I can jump my car with the cables I have. Or "B" get the info from the folks in the office to see who owns the cars. FYI...they too are visitors and can't be towed because there is no assigned parking. After several failed attempts to get to my car to jump it I am tired and figure I will just give it a rest.
So now I am stuck with a non-functioning car in Raleigh as well as a non-functioning phone. Stressed out morning so I go to lunch with the boyfriend and we relax a bit.
Congratulations I get my phone powered up again after lunch and TADA! WORK called and left a message. I listen and laugh, oh yeah great gotta be at work at 4 and I am still stuck in Raleigh.
I call them and calmly state I am still in Raleigh because my battery is still dead. (Honestly, what part of dead battery stuck in Raleigh was unclear?)
AAA finally comes with the box to charge the battery remotely since no efforts to get cables have been successful and my car starts! YAY! Get home with a few stops on the way and figure I will wake up early the next morning and go in to check my schedule.
I get in and they have taken some of my hours away. Yes they are punishing me for not showing up during a genuine emergency. Congratulations, you have officially reached the limit of my patience. I can't live off 1-2 days of work a week.
In my mind...that is it. I won't take it anymore. So I start job hunting. Not like I hadn't been for months but that was the end of it all! I was going to get a new 9-5 in the next few weeks if it hair-lipped Hitler.
On Friday I worked. Saturday I went to film a movie. Sunday, I had a personal emergency and sent a text to one of my managers. I had to drive to Atlanta that night so I crashed in Aville with a friend really late. I left the next morning for an audition, went to the audition, drove by to Aville and passed out again before driving back the next morning, Tuesday, and making a stop to interview for another job and then stop by work to see if I was supposed to go in and when I was going in.
Interviewed for the other position, was myself and go the job where I sat, So I went in for a drug test and figured I would give my 2 weeks.
Walk into work and they have scratched my name off and are asking for a book and an apron. I was totally unaware I had been let go. No one informed me. Not only that but I have physical proof that the reasons for me not being at work were legitimate reasons I could not get to work so I could sue for wrongful termination.
But I let it go. No big. I wan't happy there and other than the stress of not having something to do, I am ok.
Start new work next week. Here is to better paying jobs.
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