odd-jobs for me!

After having dinner with an old friend I stopped by Tower Records on my way home. Ah, Tower Records.
I worked there for a year and a half. My last day was December 25, 2005. When I started I was intimidated by all the 'cool music knowledgeable people' and it took me ages to pick out what to wear every day. After a while I realized that a bunch of them are dorks, but nice ones. I started wearing whatever I wanted and being a cool dork too. And then, after a while I got tired of it. I got tired of running a cash register that belonged in a museum and having to pretend that the new Limp Bizkit CD was worth $18.99. And I was tired of making $7.25 an hour.

Stopping by today made me remember the good parts about working there and started me wondering why I left. Sometimes I make dumb decisions that I later regret. Leaving Tower is one of them. Not the biggest one but a regret all the same. I regret leaving because the job that followed sucked so badly that I contemplated running into the street to end it. I didn't think it would that bad.
I mostly quit jobs because I get bored easily. I stay for about six months and then move on. I stayed at Tower because for the summer I was on an on-call basis. And because of this I have quite a resume.

1. Appalachain Spring- I was 15. I got to box up crafty, expensive things for the Christmas season. What fun.

2. Painting Hebrew prayers onto prayer shawls- I worked for this woman that my mom worked for. My mom made the shawls and I painted them. It was weird and only lasted for a little while.

3. Moto-Photo- I worked there for quite a while. I wasn't very good and got yelled at a lot for fucking up people's precious memories. The good thing about it was I could wear whatever I wanted and listen to whatever music I wanted. And the people were cool.

4. Books-A-Million (formerly SuperCrown)- When it was SuperCrown it was easy going and cool. All the artsy kids worked there or at Micheals down the street. When I started working there they had all left and it was slowly becoming Books-A-Million. Not so much a bookstore as a catch-all for tacky knicknacks and Thomas Kincade calendars. I almost got fired several times for reading too much. I'd go and hide in the kiddy section to read. Putting a book addict in a bookstore is like making a drug addict a dealer. Not smart.

5. Cosi- coffeeshop for the masses. They're becoming the sandwich and pizza version of Starbucks. I worked there off and on for about three years.

6. Auto Shop- I answered the phones and tried to understand the mechanical jargon my boss threw at me. He couldn't seem to understand that I don't know what a catalytic converter is or where it goes.

7. Back to Cosi- I can no longer tolerate wearing black except for work purposes. I like how it looks but I CANNOT DO IT!

8. Tower-see above

9. McCormick & Schmicks- Otherwise known as McCormick & Shits or Muck & Suck. I thought I'd like making money. I hated it and I hated having to wear black. I hate hostesses. They are stupid and vapid. Or at least some of them. I hated, hated my boss. The moment I saw him I thought *cough cough* douche *cough* and I was RIGHT!

10. Tavern on the Lake- Much better. Working here was like getting into heaven from the purgatory of McCormicks. Except for the whole "I dated my co-worker and now we ignore each other" thing. But other than that it's great. Tiring but great.

11. My film production company.

One day all these crazy jobs will be behind me and I will only have a memory of a day where I worked crappy jobs for little money. I hope.
I think it should be mandatory for everyone in this country to work as a waiter/waitress or retail person. Like some countries have mandatory military service. This would teach people that 10% is not okay. And neither is being dismissive of your server.
I hope I will never be. I hope that even when my menial jobs are in the distant past I am still polite to my servers. Because I work hard at my jobs and just because I'm a server doesn't mean I can't be the next Sofia Coppola. Watch out.