SoapZone Community Message Board

I need to vent about it, even though most of SZ seems to be off celebrating the holiday somewhere <g>.

I need to start off by saying I don't believe my store manager is TRYING to upset me with the schedule. I actually believe she is partly trying to "help" me...anyways, two things you need to know that SM knows about me:

1. I *need* to eat lunch in a timely manner, usually somewhere around 1:00 PM, maybe as late as 1:30. If I eat too early, my stomach doesn't want what I'm trying to put in it; if I eat too late, I first get REALLY hungry, then I get nauseated, then I get light-headed and feel like I might pass out. I've never yet done so but I came close about a month ago when we had a bunch of customers in the store after noon and only two of us working (my co-worker that day--B--was with one of our high rollers who "needs" individual attention so B was taking care of her while I was waiting on literally everyone else). I didn't get lunch until 3:00...it wasn't pretty.

2. My birthday is next week. SM knows--and teases me about it, not in a kindly way--that I usually go out for about a half dozen birthday meals with various friends or family members.

Back to next week's schedule...B is still in New Orleans with her first grandchild but I believe she's due back Saturday the 13th. SM made a big deal about how she "has" to work 24 days straight while B is gone, despite the fact I told her I'm perfectly capable of opening and closing the store by myself (and other stores who are short of help just ask for workers from other nearby stores). I even worked it all out...for the weeks B would be gone, SM could work her usual all-day schedule Sunday (we're only open noon-5:00) and Monday and give me those two days off (I absolutely refuse to work Sundays anyways), then she could work the morning shift Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, taking Thursday off just like she always does (she's the only one with a set schedule) and I could close Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday and work all day Thursday. But SM said she didn't want to "put all that on me". We've ALL commented that SM sometimes says or does something that seems nice but it's likely more because she likes to play the martyr. She also told me she would give me my birthday off. Which was nice but I didn't expect it. I've worked on almost all of my birthdays so far, and I told her as long as I could just work the morning shift so I could get the traditional birthday pizza for dinner with Dad, it was good but she insisted. When I checked my schedule this morning, I saw that I was indeed off Tuesday. BUT...I'm working noon-7:15 PM Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I was hoping B would be back Saturday and I could convince her to trade an evening shift the following week with me so I could have all Saturday off and go to a local arts festival, but I was thinking if I worked my usual Saturday night shift (I almost always close on Saturdays), I could at least go to the festival when it opened at noon and stay a couple hours. Also, with me working noon-7:15, I likely won't be given a meal break until around 4:00...AND that means no birthday lunch or dinner with ANYONE (other than birthday dinner pizza) next week. Grrr.

I'm trying, as always, to give SM some grace here. She won't have B next week, and another co-worker--M (85 year old firecracker)-is scheduled for cochlear implant surgery September 12 and will be out 6 weeks. We just hired someone new but who knows how long (or IF) she'll stay. And I know SM is thinking "Vicky needs money so she needs more hours", and that's kind of true. Only "kind of" because if I work at least 20 hours a week, which I always do now, I'm covering the bills, but I'm not saving anything and I have to budget carefully for the small "luxuries" (a fast food meal, maybe an iced coffee before work, etc.). But heck if I want to work "full time" (which at Chico's is 30 hours a week) and not get FT benefits. Plus the parent corporation recently demoted a bunch of people, saying only stores making over $1 million/year--which we don't--can have more than one full-time worker (SM is our only full-time worker now; poor B lost hours and PTO).

I'm still looking for another job. So is my bff and my good church friend; they're both looking for something to supplement the income from jobs they actually like. But prospects are mighty grim out there right now and I don't want to make merely a lateral move.

If you made it through all this, thanks for reading. I just needed to get all that off of my chest, and when I vent to Dad, he either tries to "fix" my problem or else tells me to quit already and sponge off of him, which I really, really don't want to do.