It’s summer, and the middle of the quarter. There is no counting to account for right now. Now, if he was doing this in March, then that would be impressive.
Those debits and credits won't balance themselves, though.
Ugh, Fridays at my office are always insane, because everyone and their brother takes Fridays off work and figures its a good day to talk to my Accountant!! He surely doesnt want Friday off!
You know what I've spent most of my week doing?
Advising on Property Sales.
Everyone in this town is either buying or selling property or both and Realtors are just making cash hand over fist. Its insane.
Now we're getting close to the end of the year and people are concerned about how this is going to affect their taxes.
So...who you gunna call?
Quote:
Originally Posted by I-Hate-Hulse
Bwhaha - Dalhousie Parts monkey here. Being lead by Managers who make Kevin Lowe look like Eisenhower, I too had the same level of dedication as you.
"Excuse me....what kind of hitch do I need?"
"Class IV...it's the only way to be sure"
"I can't get this oil filter off, can I heat this up with a butane torch?"
Uhh don't do that.
So many stories....
For me, the biggest one was the battery and alternator testers.
"Can you test this battery for me??"
No. I can see the sides bowing out, its frozen and if its frozen its pooched and if I hook that thing up to the battery tester...its going to explode. Just go buy a new one."
"can you test this alternator for me, I'm not sure its working!"
No. Do you know how alternators work son? You see a wee little belt spins this pulley here and it generates car electricity...like magic! Now do you see your pulley and how its seized and doesnt spin anymore? The magic is gone!
Thats your problem. Go buy a new one.
I had one guy come in one time returning a car-jack.
Whats wrong with it? I ask politely.
"Turns out I didnt need it."
- The receipt here says you bought it 3 hours ago along with....cans of brake clean and shop towels.
So...you used it, cleaned it up a bit and are now trying to return it.
"Yes."
Alright. Well at least you cleaned it up! IDAGF. Take it to the counter over there and she'll give you your money back.
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I'll expand in what is now becoming my 'Jobs Thread' but no, nobody 'died,' a little pool water was ingested, albeit that comes with some problems of its own...
Apparently when little Johnny is splashing around like a lunatic you're supposed to 'rush in and save him!'
I mean, I've got to put my radio down first, take out my phone and keys, I dont want them getting wet and then I try to fish him out with the Pool Skimmer first and that didnt work so I tried that long hook they have for the pool cover but he just wouldnt calm down enough to grab on.
People are screaming and yelling and I'm thinking:
"Hey! You guys are already in the Pool! Why dont you swim your ass over here and save him?
If I get in there I'm going to be wet for the rest of my shift, my clothes will be all damp when I have to drive home, it'll get my car seat all wet and that'll take forever to dry...it would just be miserable. A really miserable day."
But hey!
Good news! If you make it out alive we offer swimming lessons!
Bad news? I teach those too.
Moving this one here to again, avoid derailing another thread.
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This Post Has Been Distilled for the Eradication of Seemingly Incurable Sadness.
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If you thought this season would have a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention.
I almost killed a guy at Canadian Tire one time and I didn't even know it. It is quite possible, had he died, that he would have been found dead and nobody would have any clue who triggered his death. It would have been assumed that it was a stupid accident. Was it actually me that almost killed him? I don't even know.
This one memory was triggered from Locke's post regarding climbing into the trash compactor to unjam it. One day at work a co-worker told me that he was clearing out a jam when suddenly someone threw stuff in and pushed the button. He scrambled to get out of there and nobody was around when he got out and tried to look at who to holler at. He said it was quite slippery in there and he almost slipped back in but he got lucky.
I mean, he was dumb for doing that on his own. In my many years there I never went in there but if someone did, there was always someone on the lookout to make sure nobody came and pressed the button... that wasn't fool proof though because there was two doors with control panels, one on the warehouse side and one on the garage side. I'm pretty sure we actually weren't allowed to go in there but I recall many people doing it.
And now this triggers another story.
One kid got busted for shoplifting. We were "renovating" our store and I was moved to the reno crew. We worked over night to take apart aisles and set them up in their new location within the store. It was a complete revamping of the floor plan. My particular part of this crew was merchandising the freshly re-located/re-built aisles.
Well one of the kids who was moved to the night crew was stealing stock. He would take it to the warehouse, slide into the trash compactor and climb out into the outside bin and leave it within the gate for someone to pickup and/or grab it himself later on after the night shift was over. It was quite the scheme the kid had going but he was caught and arrested shortly after someone became suspicious of him. It took the security guard a couple of nights of hiding out in the warehouse to observe him but they caught him.
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How many times a day did you hear this song over the PA?
Not once. Thankfully.
We didn't play music over the PA very often. The GM tried it out one time and I hated it. It was during the time that this song was charting and down here in Lethbridge the local radio station that we played on the PA had played that song eleventy times per hour:
I may have gone to the office to disconnect a cable from the stereo system a few times.
Our GM got the grand idea that staff should come up with our own promotions to highlight stock that we want to sell. It could have been something on sale that week or something discontinued and priced to clear or just something we had an overabundance of stock. We had to write our own little PA announcement and do it every 10 or 15 minutes. Departments started to compete with each other... although in retrospect, I think it was just me (in Sports & Seasonal) and one guy in Hardware. I was a former Business student trying to find my true calling (IT) and the other guy was going to school for Multi-Media. I think he worked radio for a bit before selling cars... he could very well be a member on this forum too.
We had an unspoken competition with each other to see who could come up with the funniest and most unique promotion. At one point we were doing our promos every couple of minutes before the boss pulled the plug on those promos. It was fun but very unproductive.
One other occasion he gave himself stitches and a major concussion. He worked in the warehouse and was trying to break up a pallet that was falling apart. He grabbed a crowbar and instead of using it to pry the wood apart he wound up as though he was using a sledge hammer and smashed down on the pallet. The crowbar immediately bounced back and cracked him on the forehead. I don't recall if he lost consciousness but he was loopy and blood was everywhere. The people one would work with at Canadian Tire doesn't leave you with a lot of faith in human kind.
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And, the thing is you had to be goddamned careful in the interview. It was like the opposite of George Costanza looking for a job.
"The Sorting Hat decrees you as SEASONAL!! In the spring you shall work....the GARDEN CENTRE!!! Mwahahaha!!! Evil has spoken!!"
"Did you drive here?"
- Uh no, I biked.
"SPORTING GOODS IT IS!!!!"
Nailed it! You need to work in the blatant stereotyping though....
Housewares - 50's to 70 yr old - grandmotherly non-diverse women (lifers)
Seasonal - 30-40yr old lifers, usually male, some lifers
Auto Service Writers - Smooth talking greasy dudes, usually non-diverse
Sporting goods - Transient 20yr old dudes with zero knowledge of automotives
Auto Parts - Transient 20yr old dudes with an ounce of automotive knowledge, oddly diverse
Customer Service - Cute 20 something girls
Warehouse - people you wanted to keep out of sight
Quote:
Originally Posted by Buff
This one memory was triggered from Locke's post regarding climbing into the trash compactor to unjam it. One day at work a co-worker told me that he was clearing out a jam when suddenly someone threw stuff in and pushed the button. He scrambled to get out of there and nobody was around when he got out and tried to look at who to holler at. He said it was quite slippery in there and he almost slipped back in but he got lucky.
I mean, he was dumb for doing that on his own. In my many years there I never went in there but if someone did, there was always someone on the lookout to make sure nobody came and pressed the button... that wasn't fool proof though because there was two doors with control panels, one on the warehouse side and one on the garage side. I'm pretty sure we actually weren't allowed to go in there but I recall many people doing it.
Oh wow - these are the same stories and folklore that circulated at CT Dalhousie! This seriously must be a part of the CT Manager's Training program. Death by cardboard compactor - check. Busted someone stealing crap after hours - check (this lame accusation was used by a manager who turfed a member of the warehouse crew who asked for university friendly hours - I know he wouldn't steal stuff...)
I always loved how management would randomly install cameras to watch the staff (can't say I blame them). Good thing we had a 6'5' dude on the crew and a really long broom that could re-aim cameras at the ceiling (dome cover weren't really a thing yet).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Buff
Well one of the kids who was moved to the night crew was stealing stock. He would take it to the warehouse, slide into the trash compactor and climb out into the outside bin and leave it within the gate for someone to pickup and/or grab it himself later on after the night shift was over. It was quite the scheme the kid had going but he was caught and arrested shortly after someone became suspicious of him. It took the security guard a couple of nights of hiding out in the warehouse to observe him but they caught him.
I hope stealing that Blaupunkt car stereo head unit and some 6x9's was worth it...
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Okay. So sometimes when the Garage was busy they'd ask Auto Parts guys to help out.
One day a service manager hands me a set of keys and says:
"Theres a beige Saab that we need you to bring inside. But nobody can drive it."
Why? Whatever, I can drive stick, thats no problem. And yeah, Saab had a weird reverse gear, but still, no problem.
Fine. Whatever. This job sucks. So I get to this Saab and drive it onto the hoist and thats the end of my involvement.
Until a couple hours later my Boss and the Store Manager just absolutely stalk me down.
"You brought in the wrong Saab and the owner is PISSED!!!"
WTF? You didnt give me a license plate number or anything! The key opened the door and started the car. How was I supposed to know it was the wrong car? Its a Beige Saab!
Apparently they only had so many key permutations and lo and behold I grabbed the wrong car.
He got a free break job.
What do you want me to do? The key opened and started the car. Why would I suspect it was the wrong car? Make/Model/Colour are all on point and the keys work. When was I supposed to get suspicious? Maybe give me the License Plate number next time?
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This Post Has Been Distilled for the Eradication of Seemingly Incurable Sadness.
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How many times a day did you hear this song over the PA?
Christmas time at Safeway. The Muzak system seemed to only have one “tape” of Xmas music which was on permanent loop through most of December. You knew not only that “White Christmas” came after “I’ll be Home for Christmas” which was currently playing but “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” was after White Christmas. Late in an 8 hr shift of bagging groceries if you heard that song one more time you were going to toss yourself down the compactor (we had one too!). It might be -20 out in the frozen tundra of the Southland Mall parking lot, but collecting carts throughout the parking lot and pushing them back to the store through the snow was preferable to hearing that, and other songs again. (in the olden days you didn’t have to pay to get carts so they were just free range and left all over the lot.)
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Bwhaha - Dalhousie Parts monkey here. Being lead by Managers who make Kevin Lowe look like Eisenhower, I too had the same level of dedication as you.
"Excuse me....what kind of hitch do I need?"
"Class IV...it's the only way to be sure"
"I can't get this oil filter off, can I heat this up with a butane torch?"
Uhh don't do that.
So many stories....
Southland and MacLeod! Represent! So many stories...that was such a bad job.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Buff
I almost killed a guy at Canadian Tire one time and I didn't even know it. It is quite possible, had he died, that he would have been found dead and nobody would have any clue who triggered his death. It would have been assumed that it was a stupid accident. Was it actually me that almost killed him? I don't even know.
This one memory was triggered from Locke's post regarding climbing into the trash compactor to unjam it. One day at work a co-worker told me that he was clearing out a jam when suddenly someone threw stuff in and pushed the button. He scrambled to get out of there and nobody was around when he got out and tried to look at who to holler at. He said it was quite slippery in there and he almost slipped back in but he got lucky.
I mean, he was dumb for doing that on his own. In my many years there I never went in there but if someone did, there was always someone on the lookout to make sure nobody came and pressed the button... that wasn't fool proof though because there was two doors with control panels, one on the warehouse side and one on the garage side. I'm pretty sure we actually weren't allowed to go in there but I recall many people doing it.
And now this triggers another story.
One kid got busted for shoplifting. We were "renovating" our store and I was moved to the reno crew. We worked over night to take apart aisles and set them up in their new location within the store. It was a complete revamping of the floor plan. My particular part of this crew was merchandising the freshly re-located/re-built aisles.
Well one of the kids who was moved to the night crew was stealing stock. He would take it to the warehouse, slide into the trash compactor and climb out into the outside bin and leave it within the gate for someone to pickup and/or grab it himself later on after the night shift was over. It was quite the scheme the kid had going but he was caught and arrested shortly after someone became suspicious of him. It took the security guard a couple of nights of hiding out in the warehouse to observe him but they caught him.
Un-jamming the Trash Compactor is CSR work.
So, for the uninitiated, CSRs are usually 15-16 year old kids, they're 'Customer Service Reps' and they're usually the poor bastards you see collecting carts from the parking lot in 2 feet of snow and -30.
They are the 'Expendable Army.'
They are the ones mopping up the vomit in Housewares and other effluvia from various parts of the store and in general if there is an atrociously awful job to do? You call a CSR.
They are the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the Crappy Tire World.
I remember befriending a certain CSR he was like 15 and was one of those 'too cool for school' kind of kids, I forget his name but he was fun!
And the thing is, if you befriend a 'Parts Monkey' then he might be so inclined to call a different CSR for horrible work...
Anyways, we had a Christmas party and they literally sat the CSRs off in the corner at what essentially was the 'kid's table.'
So I went up to my CSR buddy and hatched a plan.
I was going to swing by the management table, say hi to them all, wish them a Merry Christmas, because I had a really interesting relationship with my Store Managers.
Half of them absolutely adored me and the other half wanted to shove me in the Trash Compactor and hit the button. There was no middle ground.
I loathed the whole lot of them.
*Narrator's Aside*
My boss in Auto Parts was so short you couldn't see him over the aisles, so I made him a little headband with a car's Radio Aerial antenna attached to it and a little clown-head aerial ornament so you could tell where he was.
Some of the managers thought that was hilarious and others were a little more murdery. Thats just the way it goes.
*Narrator's Aside Over - Back to your regularly scheduled programming.*
Anyways, as I distracted all of Management my CSR compadre was instructed to tear of a couple of arm-lengths of drink tickets from the roll while the managers weren't looking.
Oh man those CSR children got so loaded! They went home so wasted it was hilarious!
I understand there were some consequences for Management for that, but nobody seemed unduly concerned.
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This Post Has Been Distilled for the Eradication of Seemingly Incurable Sadness.
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If you thought this season would have a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention.
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Oh and as to the Saab story, the reason I was the only one who could drive it is a little hazy since its been 20+ years but...
In standard North American and most European cars, 'Reverse' is all the way to the right and down.
In Saabs, and its been a long time, I believe it was having to push down on the shifter then to the left and up to get into reverse.
That might be wrong, I've only ever driven two Saabs in my life and I think the kicker for everyone else was they'd never driven a car where you have to push the shifter down to engage Reverse.
Something like that. Anyways, it was the wrong car either way.
__________________ The Beatings Shall Continue Until Morale Improves!
This Post Has Been Distilled for the Eradication of Seemingly Incurable Sadness.
The World Ends when you're dead. Until then, you've got more punishment in store. - Flames Fans
If you thought this season would have a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention.
Christmas time at Safeway. The Muzak system seemed to only have one “tape” of Xmas music which was on permanent loop through most of December. You knew not only that “White Christmas” came after “I’ll be Home for Christmas” which was currently playing but “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” was after White Christmas. Late in an 8 hr shift of bagging groceries if you heard that song one more time you were going to toss yourself down the compactor (we had one too!). It might be -20 out in the frozen tundra of the Southland Mall parking lot, but collecting carts throughout the parking lot and pushing them back to the store through the snow was preferable to hearing that, and other songs again. (in the olden days you didn’t have to pay to get carts so they were just free range and left all over the lot.)
Only December? I worked at superstore throughout high school and after Halloween was over Christmas music would take over. Most of November, all of December and a bit into January it was the same 8 songs covered by 10 artists.
Getting crushed by a pallet of bananas was preferable to listening to that awful music.
