Servers of the mid-priced Americana restaurant unite!

Alright, this one's a rant about my stupid-ass job. I work in a mid-priced Americana restaurant. I don't know if that is the technical classification of it...it's mid-priced and they serve "American food," if there is such a thing (steaks, burgers, salads). Anyway, I am a good server. My style is one where I will get the job done efficiently, smoothly, and courteously, but I refuse to get into chit-chat and all that bullshit. I haven't the patience.


Anyway, the general manager at my restaurant is a primo douchebag. He has a lot of experience; he's been with the same company for at least 20 years. But he is a lazy, impatient, and unprofessional fellow. He shows great favoritism for employees who are meatheads or members of his former fraternity. I do my best to avoid interacting with him, I guess.

This particular manager constructs the weekly schedule. He is notorious for not accommodating anyone. He often schedules people when they are unavailable, leaving the rest of us to pick up these shifts. Anyway, I pick up a lot of shifts because people beg so they won't get in trouble for not showing up. When I pick up shifts, I often forget I do so.

And so, this morning, I received a call from work that I was supposed to be in at 11. I got in at 11:45 and received a good yelling-at (the "why don't you just quit?" kind). And why don't I just quit? I need to get out of there. It is a waste of my time. I am a college graduate. I am a goodish person. I don't need to be covered with greasy food for a few dollars an hour every day. But I am torn between two positions. One is romantic: I'll just quit; I'm better than this; I will go elsewhere. The other is pragmatic: I don't have any other job to fall back on; I need income to support my student loan payments; I don't have any other plans for the time being.

This was a stupid post. Whatever.

First and goal

Acknowledging the popular opposition to blogging as self-important, I nevertheless have been musing about the world and wished to put my thoughts down somewhere. I'm going to start with a political current event:

So I read and watched news reports and commentary about Barack Obama's recent statements in San Francisco. I feel I may be in the minority as a person who doesn't think what he said was that bad. I thought the most offensive thing was Obama referring to "middle-America" as "they." That type of othering is not desirable in a presidential candidate and surprising for a person who attempts to reach across lines and divisions.

But that aside, his statement is one I could have seen myself saying at one time. I think he likely misspoke. His statement was an exaggeration, but I think it reflects concerns about some of the backwardness evinced in America. I don't think he views religion as a negative; I think he views blind fanatacism as a negative. I don't think he views guns necessarily as a negative; I think he views gun culture and proliferation as negatives.

I am not even a decided democratic voter yet. I was for Obama, then Clinton, but now I am again in between. I just think that people need to look at things more practically. The media always blows US election news out of proportion.