Recently in work Category
Never More
[ rakaur on Sun Aug 17 at 01:40 PM // category: nih, work ]
So, I live in Baltimore with Steve now.
I had once mentioned that if he could get me a job working with him, that’d be cool. So, when he called me a couple weeks ago and told me he had done just that, I was a bit surprised. I had about two weeks to decide whether or not to move. Well, I did.
I start work tomorrow, with the whole background check and paperwork and such going forward. I’m currently in residence with Steve on his living room floor. That’ll probably be slightly less than a month, hopefully. My girlfriend and I are hopeful for a certain apartment that’s available in mid-to-late September. That would be a nice birthday present.
This was supposed to be a nice, long thoughtful entry, but, that’s pretty much it.
-- rakaur // 2008.08.17 @ 01:40 PM
Hard Times for Hard Drives
[ rakaur on Mon Jul 07 at 05:03 PM // category: life, work ]
The hard drive in my laptop finally died. I probably won’t be around until it can be replaced.
I am also currently unemployed. Someone give me a job.
-- rakaur // 2008.07.07 @ 05:03 PM
Ding-a-Ling
[ rakaur on Mon Oct 16 at 10:01 PM // category: eastgate, hardware, subway, technology, work ]
So, Helio is pretty awesome.
I’ve been taking full advantage of the unlimited data. I use it to check sports scores (go Cards!), send tons of SMS and MMS, upload photos to Facebook, etc. The service is great, and the phone calls actually sound pretty good, which is high praise coming from me (I think all phones sound like varying degrees of shit). The Internet is fast when on Sprint’s 1xEV-DO, and really, really, just terribly and utterly mind-blowingly slow when on Verizon’s 1xRTT network. It was a nice feature after having used Sprint’s Vision service.
The phone itself, the VK650C, or Kickflip, is pretty sweet. The interface is beautiful, and just as polished as the phone itself (which is more than I can say for the RAZR and friends). It has a two megapixel camera, which I paid $250 for three years ago. Of course, the opening device is also cool.
Alas, this would not be written by me if it didn’t contain complaining somewhere. The phone has its quirks, which is disappointing because I have the second rev, and I would have thought they would have had to time work this stuff out. The internal photo album gets corrupted from time to time. It’ll list one picture under one name, but when I try to MMS it to someone it’ll send a different picture. I have to go in through the PC software and reset the memory. The camera takes pretty good pictures outside, or where there is a lot of light, and it takes really, really shitty pictures otherwise. The “flash” is just a light that shines for a little while, which is pretty crappy. There are also various bugs in the software that are just enough to irk you. I also loathe the fact that I can’t add words to T9. Obviously, none of these are deal breakers.
Being that it uses Sprint’s and Verizon’s network, I tend to have coverage everywhere. My old Sprint phone barely held onto a signal in my basement, and I have 4/5 bars on the Kickflip right now. I’ve also been told that the phone itself has a fantastic antenna. In fact, the only place I don’t get service is in the storm shelter basements in the buildings at my school. Unfortunately, I’m subject to the same retardedness that I got from Sprint. Things like getting voicemails from people that my phone never rang for, or getting voicemails two days after they’re left.
So far, I’ve dropped it twice. Once onto grass in my backyard from about three feet up, and it flipped open and got some dirt on it, but that was it. I stopped carrying it in my hoodie pocket after that. The other time was out of my pants pocket from about a foot up (I was sitting in a theater chair) onto carpet, and that somehow managed to make the battery fly six feet away. It’s still undamaged, and unscratched. I need to buy a case to keep it that way.
The PC sync software is… shitty. I was disappointed to find that it requires special software to do things. The software isn’t all that terrible, but I’d prefer something standard. The phone also has media playback, but I haven’t tried it out since I just use my iPod. If I could purchase a sufficiently large transflash card for a sufficiently low amount of money, it might be worth it, but otherwise my iPod wins. The headphones that came with it were apparently designed for elephants, because I’ll be damned if I can fit the things in my ear.
Anyway, it’s cool, check it out. Be sure to use me as a reference if you decide to sign up!
On another note, I got fired from Subway. There’s a guy there that talks about how attractive the younger girls are, and he’s like 45. I was joking with one of the girls there, and said “oh yeah, he’s kind of a pedophile.” Well, someone heard me, and told him. He didn’t care; he knew I was joking. He told the manager, and he fired me.
Kind of sucks. Now I’m back at hellho—Eastgate until I can find a better job, again.
-- rakaur // 2006.10.16 @ 10:01 PM
Fubway With an S
[ rakaur on Thu Sep 21 at 11:38 PM // category: eastgate, subway, work ]
I’m finally free from my shitty job at Eastgate. I got a much better job, doing something way more interesting. I’m away from selling popcorn, away from duping people out of $5.75 for a cardboard tub, away from greedy corporate bastards. No, I’m done with all of that now. Now I sell sandwiches.
Totally worth it.
So Eastgate can officially suck my left testicle. The right one tickles.
-- rakaur // 2006.09.21 @ 11:38 PM
Eastgate Defeats Me
[ rakaur on Sun Apr 16 at 10:53 PM // category: eastgate, work ]
When I go into something, I tend to like to make that something better. I try to fix things. I went into my relationship with a pregnant girl wanting to make her better. For the most part, that has been successful. Most times, for the most part, I’m successful.
Not this time.
I’ve been trying to make Eastgate a better place for a long time. I helped get rid of two of the people that lived to make it hell (and still do, even after leaving), but there’s still one left that does nothing but start shit and get away with it. I learned how to do everything, and learned how to do it better than everyone else. Managers asked me to help them, to tell people to do what they’re supposed to do, and to do what I do. Eastgate was a good place to work in December.
It’s not a good place to work anymore.
The new manager isn’t a good manager. The place has definitely gone downhill. She lets people walk all over her 99% of the time, then when she tries otherwise she gets laughed at. She’s now close to being fired, because of that other person that likes to start shit. Tell me, Valerie, how will that get you anywhere? What if she DOES get fired? Then we get someone from ShowPlace that will run it a hell of a lot more strict than Tracy ever did, and you’ll be fired within a week. You know why? You’re a bad worker. You’re a bad person. If hell exists, Satan is worried that you’ll try to wrestle the throne from him.
So, I hereby officially give up on Eastgate. I used to care about the place. I don’t anymore. It’s clear that it will never be anything more than the shithole it is now. I officially give up on being a good employee. I give up on fixing things, making things better, and doing things that aren’t in my job description. I’m not going to be a bad employee, I’m just going to stop being a good one. There’s shit on the wall in the women’s’ bathroom? Damn shame. There’s a film that wrapped? That’s unfortunate. It’s 4am and you can’t find anyone to build and preview? Well, go get some coffee, ‘cause I ain’t coming in.
For me, it stops now.
-- rakaur // 2006.04.16 @ 10:53 PM
I HATE MY JOB
[ rakaur on Sat Mar 04 at 10:23 AM // category: eastgate, work ]
My shoes are black with a small, silver “N” (for New Balance), and some silver stripes of some sort. My socks are solid black with a white Adidas logo. These are, apparently, both completely and utterly unacceptable for a company as prestigious as a movie theatre.
For years, we’ve been allowed to wear tennis shoes, so long as they were black, and white socks, so long as they were covered. However, quite suddenly, my area manager decides that uniforms need to be more strict, because it makes us look bad (however, things like bad equipment, dirty screens, holes in the building, no fire system, etc are completely acceptable, because he’d have to spend money to fix those). So, I’m one of the only people that even bothers to wear black socks, but since I have a white portion on them, it’s a uniform violation. Since my shoes have a silver “N” on them, it’s a uniform violation. He said he was going to write me up for it. I said if he did then I’m quitting.
Oh, and for the first time in like six months I had some gum in my mouth. That is, apparently, the sin which makes me akin to fucking Satan himself.
He also threatened to write one of my friends up, even though he was off the clock, because he had his shirt undone as he was walking out. Apparently they can even control our lives when it’s not on their time, because we’re “still a part of the company” when we’re in uniform, or some stupid shit.
I hate that place.
-- rakaur // 2006.03.04 @ 10:23 AM
Blah Blah Eastgate Blah Blah
[ rakaur on Mon Feb 06 at 12:52 AM // category: eastgate, work ]
Man, I just don’t even have the energy to bitch anymore.
-- rakaur // 2006.02.06 @ 12:52 AM
The Eastgate Blues
[ rakaur on Mon Jan 30 at 11:39 AM // category: eastgate, work ]
So, she finally got fired. Went on break and never came back. Four employees said they’d quit if she didn’t get fired over it. I guess that tells you how much she was loved.
I thought I’d be happier. I know the place will be a lot better now, and her little lackies will probably quit as well. At least the place will run smoother, and there will be 99% less bullshit factor. It still doesn’t make me like the place any better though. Working there still sucks, and whoever replaces her will probably be from ShowPlace, so that’ll be three people from there in management. Bummer.
I still want to find another job. At least I don’t have three terminations on my record.
-- rakaur // 2006.01.30 @ 11:39 AM
The Fall of Eastgate
[ rakaur on Tue Jan 10 at 10:53 PM // category: eastgate, work ]
Eastgate is my place of employment. I’ve bitched endlessly about it before, so you should all be well aware I hate it and almost everyone there. Unfortunately, it’s about to get much, much worse.
The only reason I haven’t found a better job yet is because I wanted to help out my manager, in hopes that he’d help me out later on. Well, it’s not going to happen: he’s quitting.
After working my ass off for quite some time, hoping there would be some reward for working harder than 95% of the people there, but no. Instead, after having helped him out, he’s fucking me over because he’s got a better job offer. I can’t blame him or be angry though, because I’d do the same thing.
Unfortunately, there’s a plethora of people that are going to quit with him. The place is going to be left completely inoperable, so I either have the choice of
- staying at Eastgate and trying to help as much as possible, or;
- quit, and let the three retards that caused it all take over.
It all started because one of our previous mentions decided the manager was sexist, because he gives all the guys the highest raises possible. He’s sexist because he only schedules guys for the “easy” job of USH Booth. He’s sexist because he only hires guys. Right. The only person to get the highest possible raise was a female. The person that usually gets scheduled for the pretty-damn-hard job of USH Booth is female. Out of the two new people he hired, one was female. He frequently schedules himself on weekdays with him and two females. Where’s the sexism? I guess I’m just not there. I guess I’m too busy working instead of writing a complete lie of an email and printing it out to show my little posse of fucking morons.
So, the most likely option for salvation involves The Twins coming over from ShowPlace to run the place. I think the person behind this planned the whole thing in hopes that she’d take over, and favor her two retards that sit around and do nothing. Yeah, and the manager is sexist. Take a look at yourself. I can’t even begin to put the absolute irony of the three most worthless people there trying to get into a position to run it by taking out good people. I’d almost like to see it happen, just to make you people realize what absolute pieces of shit you are and how completely unprepared you would be for running the show. They would shut the place down.
If The Twins don’t come over, they might actually rise up and take over. I find it highly unlikely though, because everyone there knows if that happened it’d be them three “running” things, and nothing would ever be done right.
In either case, I’m going to be finding another job. Any other job pays me for the actual work I do and doesn’t treat me like shit.
-- rakaur // 2006.01.10 @ 10:53 PM
USH to the Booth
[ rakaur on Tue Dec 27 at 12:03 PM // category: eastgate, work ]
So I always used to get pissed when I was thrown into CCA every single Friday night and other people would get to do “easy shit” like USH and USH Booth. I’m going to shut up about that now.
I was USH Booth Friday night, which was dead, so it was way better than being stuck in CCA. I was also USH Booth last night, which was 350 over predictions. It was bad. I think it’s mostly because the film schedule is so wacky though. There was absolutely no break between the evening set and the late set. As soon as I started the last evening set movie the first one got out. It was frustrating. I think the only reason I was really pissed about it was because I had to janitor, and it was messy.
Booth isn’t as easy as I figured. By “booth” I mean “projection booth.” It’s fairly easy when everything works, but it’s time consuming. It takes me around three minutes to thread the film through the projector, and then another two minutes double checking everything and getting the payout platter all pretty and non-wrapped, and there’s six movies, usually all starting within ten minutes of each other. So while I’m supposed to be helping the other ushers clean theatres, I’m stuck upstairs treading, because by time I’m done threading and starting the 7:00, it’s time to start threading the 7:10. I try to get them all threaded ASAP, but of course you can’t do it until the movie is out, which is when I’m supposed to be cleaning. If there’s nothing to clean I’ll go up and thread as many as possible, but that’s usually two or three. I was lucky to get down to help CCA for five or ten minutes here and there.
When things don’t work, well, that’s another story. I had two of them mess up on me last night, both minor (non-wraps). When I started one of them the film decided to just leap off the bottom part of the projector, so it stopped itself. I had to go and violently spin the rewind platter backwards to get enough slack to rethread it in a few places, and then it was okay. Another one was my own stupid ass fault. I started the projector without turning the platter on payout, which means it just wraps instantly and gets stuck there. It sucked. It wasn’t hard to fix, but it sucked.
I was tired. It’s still better than being stuck in CCA, but I’ll never say it’s easy.
-- rakaur // 2005.12.27 @ 12:03 PM
