I just ended my third week working at a fast food location in my hometown. I can fly around the cash register ordering screen much more easily now, so the awkwardness of the first three days are history. Corporate does occasionally change the buttons around remotely, though, when a new item is being offered, which can get confusing when you're used to automatically finding something under a particular menu.
In the meantime, I've been trained a bit more broadly than when I last did a stint in the food service industry in 2009 and 2010. I know what I would need to do to manage the grill and make sure that there's enough meat, chicken and baked potatoes available for sandwiches and salads, and when and how to prepare more. I've gotten to the point where I can prepare most of the food except the sandwiches themselves--stuff like chili, staging fries for orders, and refilling the big ketchup containers in the dining room as well as the ice cream mix for the machine. All that's remaining is the prep-work for salads and bacon, I think, as well as getting some practice actually making sandwiches to go. You could say I'm 'skilled at many positions.' And of course I mean that in a totally clean way, which is what makes it a joke.
Transportation has been fun. I've needed to juggle getting rides or borrowing the car but a week or so ago, I got a bike from Wal*Mart for $94.94 to use to get to work. I would have to change in the bathroom, which is absolutely horrid to my senses, but survivable. The bike didn't last too long, however, because the handlebars slid out of the place where they were locked into the front wheel mechanism, and began wobbling up and down whenever I would stand on the pedals to bike faster. Because they were loose, the handlebars rotated backwards maybe 120 degrees, so the brake levers were leaning toward me, which was dangerous and very difficult to depress to stop the bike. Naturally I needed to get it exchanged.
The timing for when I went in to investigate if I could do an even exchange (I would still need to bike home, after all) was propitious. When I walked back to the bike section of the store, I ran into an old schoolmate (not classmate, because she was in a grade below me) who was looking at cards. I'd run into her only once since graduating, last year when my mom had taken me to Relay for Life because she didn't want me to be sitting around doing nothing at college on the weekend because I didn't have anywhere to go. I was scared to approach her because the last words I'd ever said to her were "I'm sorry," -- right after I had kicked her in the chin! The track team was doing a warmup lap and I got the dumb idea to jump on the high-jump mat which was right next to the track. I never talked to her again. I was mortified, terrified, thought she hated me. So when she caught me looking in her direction last fall and smiled and waved, a wave of relief washed over me. I'm forgiven! Or she forgot it happened. But either way, she isn't holding it against me.
What we talked about in Wal*Mart actually became the subject of a short poem I wrote (I'm just really digging writing poems now, you know?) that night, and it'll be posted here later today. :)
~ Rak Chazak
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