Night Shift

Since I was in school I started off working the night shift. This shift ran from 5PM to 8PM. This was the busiest shift of the day. For the most part there was usually enough employees on the clock to keep the rushes in check. When the rushes did come in they were hectic. Managers would be running around the front and back of the store helping with food and passing it out. Due to the incompetence of the expediters lots of food had to be remade.

The only side work consisted of washing the dishes and taking out the garbage. I was a big fan of taking out the garbage because it meant I got to go outside and smoke a cigarette.

It didn't take long for me to learn the ins and outs of working there. The level charts were completely useless as far as predicting how much food would actually be sold so we ignored them unless Dick was around. Some days he would come in all smacked out wearing sunglasses at night and go on tirades. Whenever we knew he pulled up we'd get food up to the level charts, but he always picked really bad times to show up. He'd be yelling that I didn't have X amount of chicken sandwiches cooked immediately after somebody had bought one or more of them. The level chart might say to keep 5 chicken sandwich patties up. I'd keep 2 up because I knew we wouldn't sell more before they expired. I learned to ignore his rants but they were still annoying. In the long-run I was saving him money by not wasting food.

The managers apparently weren't very good at taking inventory and keeping food in stock because they were always running out of something. Since the managers couldn't leave the store they would often send an employee across town to pick up meat or buns or drink cups. Sometimes the other store would need something from us at the same time, so it benefited both stores. I was usually the one picked to go across town. The reasons being that other employees liked to slack off and run other errands while they were gone, I drove straight to the other store and I drove really fast. It might take someone else 45 minutes to make a round trip going the speed limit whereas it only took me 15. I didn't mind doing this since I got to stay on the clock and they would compensate for gas.

Dick would randomly demand that we attend meetings. In my three years working there, I may have gone to four or five of them. I guess in some of his smacked-out moments he thought he would improve his business. These meetings were completely pointless as all they did was go over holding times, procedures, and optimum cooking temperatures. The kicker was that while we were required to go to these meetings, they didn't let anybody clock in. This was illegal but Dick realized that none of his employees could afford a decent attorney. By law you're supposed to be evaluated for a raise every six months or so, but I may have gotten a ten cent per hour raise in three years working there. This is also illegal.