well, all righty then.00:17 Jul 05 2011
Times Read: 954
Warning: the following contents may create such a sense of disbelief that you will be tempted to doubt my word. It is also extremely graphic.
Don't. It's all true. Every. Last. Word.
I swear, one of these days, Carnelian Myst and I are gonna end up in the old Vamp's home, sitting on the front porch by the light of the moon, cross stitching and comparing work horror stories. We'll laugh, and everybody else will think we have lost our flippin' minds...
I worked a golf tournament on Wednesday. Since about March, we have had several problems with the electrical outlets upstairs in Panorama room. In a socket with 4 plug ins, 2 didn't work. On ALL of the outlets that service the bar/computer area.
The solution? After poking around, the maintenance guy decided that instead of paying to fix the sockets, he would plug the bar, beer cooler, and soda cooler into a power bar. That cord was then plugged into a 150 foot extension cord, which was then piled on the floor in front of the computer, and plugged into another power strip, which also has the plugs for the computer and credit card machine.
Does anybody besides Birra and myself see a problem here?
So of course, when I got to work on Wednesday, and walked behind my bar, I noticed that nothing was working.
The cooler was not running, the bar would not turn on, and the soda cooler was leaking water and had no lights.
Peachy.
So, with the supervisor watching, I crawled around on my hands and knees, under tables, around boxes, and figured out that someone had moved the chair by the computer desk, and unplugged the extension cord.
Fine, problem solved. And thankfully, the supervisor emailed the appropriate managers, informing them of the problem.
2 hours later, when I had 20 golfers at the bar and was slinging my ass off, what happens?
Everything shuts off again.
Again, the supervisor was close enough to hear me when I hollered, and having seen what I did to fix it, followed my steps and got everything plugged in again.
I managed to finish the rest of the function without any further mishaps.....
On Friday, I went in to work a wedding, and since I was upstairs again, I stopped by the office to talk to the Assistant F+B guy to make sure he got the email, and knew the background to the problem. He informs me that the maintenance guy told him it was just a matter of flipping the breakers.....
My ass, it is. If that were true, why hasn't everything been plugged back in where it is supposed to be, instead of routed 20 feet on a 150 foot cord somewhere else? So I clued him in a little on the finer points of the nature of the problems upstairs, and asked him if that sounded like a breaker problem.....
He got a little green around the gills, and said no, it didn't.....
So off I went to get all the stuff needed to work the wedding I had to work upstairs. Package bar, with the following items available as hosted, with nothing extra available for purchase:
Peller Estates red and white wine.
Domestic and premium beers
gun (or well) liquor
Sodas and juices.
I got the wine, which was the only thing I had to bring up from storage. I got to my bar, and guess what?
Nothing was working.
The beer cooler wasn't running, the bar wouldn't turn on, and the soda cooler was leaking and the lights weren't on.
*sigh*
So I retraced my steps from Wednesday, only to discover that the wedding decorator had unplugged every single plug from the power strip by the computer in order to plug in five strands of Christmas lights.
I hunted up the supervisor for that function, and told her what was going on. Between the two of us, we decided that I was going to try the plugs in the outlet by the bar, which is where all this shit should have been plugged in in the first place.
I'm telling ypu people, I didn't have a good feeling about this. For those of you who read my journal regularly, you know what my luck with weddings on Canada day are like. If you don't read my journal, you can catch up here:
https://www.vampirerave.com/journal/journal_section.php?section=personal&journal=RedQueen&page=July 2008
Copy and paste, since I can't do linky links like some of the more computer savvy people around here.
It's the entry titled "The wedding"
So off I go to plug things in where they are supposed to be. I pick up the plug for the beer cooler, the largest of the appliances I have to deal with, got a good grip on the rubber part, and pushed.
Sparks flew EVERYWHERE.
But, surprisingly, the cooler started running, and nothing caught fire. Go figure.
So I plugged in the short extension cord, and plugged in the bar. NO sparks, and everything is humming along.
So I crawl around on the floor, looking for the plug to the soda cooler, and then try to find another socket. I pull up the table cloth of the table this thing is sitting on, and find two electrical outlets that service the telephone lines, with wires hanging everywhere, and no cover.
Hum. There is fabric and cardboard boxes everywhere, and this mess.
I find the other electrical socket, and get everything plugged in, and off I go.
This was the wedding where the trailer was in the parking lot by the wedding garden. Oh yeah...white trash personified on this one people.
These people started coming into the room, and things got real weird, real fast.
First, the brother of the bride showed up with fireworks, which are illegal up here. The wedding sales person asked the mother to give them to her, and the mom says she is too busy, for her to go get them herself.
So she does. She and the other sales woman load them into a cart, and drive back to the clubhouse. There is so much, she had to go in and get a box to load it up with. While she is gone, the brother shows up, and when she comes back out, it is to find him screaming at the other salesgirl at the top of his lungs, and snatching the fireworks away from her.
Carissa called the police. They told her to remove the fireworks, and if she can't, they will come arrest the young man.
She returned to the trailer to tell them this, hoping to avoid having to ruin this girl's wedding.
The kid got even ruder, if possible.
Carissa came back empty handed.
She repeated all this to me, along with the fact that he had made her cry, and I got my rednecked hackles up. The servers, of course, think I am so cute when I get really pissed, as long as it isn't at them.
She asks me what to do. I told her she had two choices:
!) Call the police.
2) Let ME get the fireworks.
When the AFB manager came upstairs to apprise everyone (meaning everybody else but me) of the situation, all he said to me was "The situation has been taken care of."
KAY.
Of course, I had the groom's friends on my side. Most of these guys are big bruiser Romanians, I kid you not. So one is standing to the left of me, and asks for a vodka soda. No problem, and I start making his drink. To my left comes bruiser #2, and he is already trying to talk, telling me he wants a vodka soda. I told him I would be right with him, and I go back to making bruiser #1's drink. I no sooner get the straw in the glass, when bruiser #2 reaches over and picks up the drink.
Oh, I don't THINK so. I don't care if it is hosted, you are GOING to wait your turn.
So I reach over and take the drink away from him. Suffice it to say, he is bowing up and about to raise hell....
"That's MY drink!"
NO, it is not. That is HIS drink (pointing at bruiser #1) and HE is going to get it. YOU will get your drink when I get it made. DO you understand me?
"Yes, ma'am."
GOOD.
So I made his drink, handed it to him, smiled at the sonofabitch before I could help myself, and went on about my business for the next 6 hours.
The father of the groom was a charmer, and an absolute pleasure, and thought I was as cute as a bug. Course he was twice as big as me, so I guess he was entitled. Some people...*snicker*. Some of them actually tipped me, and then seemed to think that this entitled them to get drinks after we had closed. But most of them were well behaved, and nice to me.
Then I started noticing something strange. Alot of people were missing from the party, but then would show up. And amazingly enough, everytime they came back, they all had more in their glasses than they did when they left, and they were getting more and more stoned.
Go figure. The party trailer had offically opened.
When I mentioned this salient fact to the closing supervisor, he told me that technically, it was a private area, and there wasn't anything they could do.
Let me get this straight. We have a flaming field day about calling the cops over the fireworks, but a stoner lodge in the parking lot is fine?
Welcome to British Columbia.
I went looking for the supervisor sometime during the function, only to learn that he was trying to turn on the parking lights, which surprise, surprise, where not on. Seems the maintenance guy was again trying to save money by flipping the breakers to the lights instead of just resetting the timer. I guess too many people had figured out thattrick, so he had to do something else....
Everybody left, there were no near death experiences, no fireworks, and no further personality clashes.
I finally got home, Scott made me the best dinner of grilled cheese pinwheels and ravioli, and I slept like a log that night.
Then I went to work on Saturday.
And here, people, is where the proverbial shit hit the fan.
It was a small wedding, most of the guests were older due to the fact that the bride and groom where in their late 40's, so while they were drinking steady (it was a toonie bar, meaning that what was availabe in the package was only $2), I wasn't getting slammed, and I had time to talk to people and enjoy myself.
Someone ordered a dark rum and coke, so I pick up the gun and hit the button.
Nothing.
So I hit it again.
Nothing.
So I grab up the gun on the other side, and hit the button.
Again, nada
I looked over at Heather, and ask her what is wrong with the dark rum. The other manager, she who shall remain nameless, looks at me, and says:
"Oh, the dark rum hasn't worked in awhile. Something is wrong with the seal."
I just stared at her, flabbergasted. REALLY? And you didn't think maybe you should have mentioned this to me before I had to work a 100+ function tonight?
*snarl*
When they started going to hit the buffet, things slowed down some, and I had time to talk to Heather, the shift manager in the resturaunt. She and I have alot in common, mostly because we are closer in age, so we enjoy talking to each other when we work together.
The gentleman who used to be the maintenance manager for the clubhouse, before the new owner fired him because he got paid too much, occasionally shows up and has dinner. When he does, he always asks me what is going on, because he knows I won't sugar coat it to cover anybody's ass. He's the one who gives me hope that things could be getting better in the future, if you know what I mean.
So I told him about the electrical problems, and a few other things that had been going on, and he told me what he had noticed and seen when he was walking around. I told him the place was sinking rapidly, and at the rate these people were going, it woudln't last much longer. He agreed.
I noticed that Heather had been listening to some of this, so I told her later that I was sorry if what I said upset her, I knew she was friends with one of the managers.
"What makes you think that?"
Well, you said you were sitting up in the office talking with her the other night....
"Just means I'm friendly hon- she treats me like I was some homeless person who just walked in and took this job."
That was all it took. I literally had a meltdown right there in the bar. Thankfully, the dj was playing (both badly AND loud) and so no one else heard it but her. But I let it ALL out- the way everybody had made me feel lately, the way I was treated, etc. She took it all in, told me the same thing had been happening to her, and we both vented to our heart's content. It was extremely cathartic, and made me feel much better knowing I wasn't the only one being singled out for this shit.
After all that, we hugged each other tightly, laughed about the day when things would blow up and bite these people in the ass, and went back to work.
And that, folks, is where things just went to hell.
An hour or so later, as Heather was doing her closing up schtick, I asked her and the other waitress if they would mind restocking the beer cooler for me, and I would in turn take care of closing up everything else when I was done. Deal done, and off they go.
I go to take care of a couple of my guests, when I start to realize that my feet are wet.
WTF?
I look down, and realize that I am standing in ankle deep water. There is water everywhere on the floor, and the dishwasher behind me is belching water from underneath. I quickly check the few things I know to look at when this happens, to no avail. So I finsh the run it is on, and shut the whole thing off. THEN I had to catch the girls before they walked in with their load of beer so they wouldn't slip. There is a drain in the floor, but it was covered by the bar mats. So I roll them up.
Surprise, surprise. The drain is plugged up, and barely draining.
The supervisor is then told of the problem, and bless her heart, she takes the time to mop up as much water as she can. But I had to leave my mat down so I can keep working, and it of course is holding back most of the water. So I worked in ankle deep water for three hours.
I told the supervisor to call the maintenance guy, since this was what the hell he was being paid for.
Again, quel surprise. He isn't answering his phone, and wouldn't return any of her messages.
So, I keep going. One of the guests comes up and orders a Honey Brown draft.
I got the glass, stuck it under the tap, and pull.
I can PISS faster than the beer was coming out of this tap. Took me 5 minutes to fill the glass, I handed him his beer and apologized, and off he went.
10 minutes later, someone else came up and ordered a different draft beer. Figuring it was just the honey brown, I get a glass, stick it under this tap, and pull.
Again, it took 5 minutes to fill the glass. Again, I handed him his drink, apologized for the wait, and turn to look at Heather. She looks at me, I look at her.
People, I have been speechless exactly 3 times in my 48 years. The first was when Connor was born. The second was when Scott proposed to me the first time, on the computer.
This was the third.
There absolutely were no words for the cluster fuck I was standing in the middle of that night. None whatsoever.
I sent Heather down to turn off the taps, and just didn't serve draft anymore.
So one of the groomsmen comes up, and orders a draft Honey brown. I told him the taps weren't working, so I wasn't serving draft anymore.
"So I can't have draft honey brown?"
Right. I'm sorry.
"Can I have a draft of Stella?"
Sir, NONE of the draft is working.
"What about a draft Heffeweissen?"
No. How about a bottle of Honey brown?
"Okay!"
*sigh*
I managed to get through the rest of the night on my end, but then the story from upstairs started trickling down.....
Seems one of the guests, a really plump guy, had sat at his table, and literally gorged himself on food, chocolate, and alcohol. MOSTLY chocolate. Around the time the bars closed upstairs, he stood up from the table, headed to the doors, and got out in the hall before puking all this food and alcohol all over the floor by the end of the buffet line.
Then he shuffled through it, tracking it down the hall on the way to the bathrooms.
Since he tried to cover his mouth as he puked, he braced himself against the wall after, and dragged his hand down the wall as he stumbled to the bathroom.
By the time the servers found their supervisor where she was doing the paperwork at the computer downstairs and told her what was going on, everybody upstairs, including the phantom puker, had left. And thank all that is holy, the cleaning crew was actually scheduled to work that night, and had just arrived......
I saw the looks on their faces when they got upstairs. For once, I truly felt sorry for them.
I went home. Scott was playing a new game he had gotten from playstation online, and was a little too distracted to listen to what I was trying to tell him about the night. So on the drive down to Bellingham for Ian's birthday (Scott's nephew) I filled him in. While deleting some of the more gruesome parts, I also told his parents while we were eating lunch.
These people know me, and even THEY didn't believe all of it.
Right now, waiting for my hair to set before getting ready for work tonight (a golf tournament), neither do I, and I was THERE.
I am at a loss. But I tell ya what, it is going to be interesting to see what the rest of the week brings around here.
I told JadedOracle that I would wave my voodoo cow over her problems, if she would do the same for me.
It may take an entire herd, AND Rat's voodoo snow doll......
/addendum/
I worked a golf tournament yesterday, and the power kept flickering......
COMMENTS
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Nedra
23:42 Jul 29 2011
That
Is
Awesome!
PAGAN
00:19 Jul 30 2011
no. just no.
LOL who thinks these things up?
Requiem
01:50 Jul 30 2011
Oh my god. I want a pair. And a man to wear them.
And he needs to lie a little bit. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! ♥
Isis101
04:38 Jul 30 2011
Too cute - funny!