Spring Break 2014: TreeTop

And now we've come full-circle. I hope you've enjoyed my (fairly regular) posts the past few days! As it's been Spring Break, I've had time to sit down and catch up on some blogging. Some of these posts were written in pieces over several days, and by the time I go back to school on Monday, I hope to have a good stack of "Scheduled" posts sitting in my account. It's been far too long since I had a good backlog of posts! I know, I know - it sucks reading pre-written material. Have no fear! I'll still write fresh things when I get around to it. Sometimes, though, I'm not able to get around to it because of...school!

Anyway, now that I'm back in Chelsea, I'm also back to work. My first (full) day at TreeTop, in the midst of the crisis that is Spring Break in Shelby County, went a little like this...

I'm scheduled to show up to work at 9:30 a.m., which doesn't really make sense because the place doesn't open 'til 10:00, and I'm prize center - I'm not doing anything that would require me to be there early. If I were café, Go Karts, or a manager, I'd understand being there early. But just for prize center? I guess I could restock...

...If I could even get in the door. When I pull up at 9:20, the whole place is dark, and I can't even get into the parking lot because the gate is locked. No worries; I was going to park in the side lot anyways (because I was in my truck, and I knew we'd get busy and I'd have to just move it over there anyways and yadda yadda yadda...). But now I've got a problem. It's 9:20, I'm supposed to clock in at 9:30, and there's nobody around. Eventually, two other people show up (my coworkers) and they also park in the little lot next to me. At 9:32, a manager pulls up and unlocks the gate. We follow her into the building, and I'm able to clock in at 9:36. 

Okay. I'm clocked in. I head over to the prize center while my coworkers go and do other things. I turn around and find that there's a lady standing at the cash register...twenty minutes before we open. 

"Ma'am, we don't open for another twenty minutes."

"I know. I just want to get this done before y'all do."

I stare at her. "Ma'am, there's no cash drawer. We aren't open. The owner isn't even here yet. The cashier's in the café finishing up her Taco Bell breakfast."

The lady narrows her eyes, and I scamper off in search of the cashier, who gets upset when I tell her that she has to stop eating and go deal with the angry old woman at the register. She basically repeats the same things I said, and the lady leaves, to wait in her car until we do open. The cashier locks the doors behind her. 

I spend the first two hours of my shift basically tidying up and restocking the shelves and the wall, because nobody comes to prize center at all. I get maybe three people in those first three hours, and they're all from the same family. Eventually, I have a posse of about three people around me, and we're able to deal with the crowd once they do come around. We have both cash registers running non-stop at this time, too: the line never gets lower than fifteen people deep until about six o'clock that night.

At around two, I'm able to take my break. I have a quick lunch and get back to the prize, because I don't want to leave the newbies there too long by themselves. They might get eaten.

It sincerely amazes me that people complain about long lines at places like this. I mean, it's SPRING BREAK. Other families want to get out and have fun, too! Heaven forbid you all decide to go to the ONLY ARCADE AROUND during spring break! And then complain about the lines! You're not the only ones that are entitled to get out!

I had to get the manager to do refunds for at least three people today, because people didn't understand the concept of "No refunds," "No substitutions," and/or "The line for [attraction] may be over 40 minutes long. Plan accordingly when buying the hour/two-hour/three-hour unlimited combos!" signs. They also don't listen to the cashiers say, "The Spring Break combo specials expire at the end of the day!" (There's also a note on the advertisements that say this.) People just amaze me.

Anyways, I'm going to quit ranting about the stupidity of humanity now before it threatens to overwhelm me. I've got a ten hour shift tomorrow, and I need to rest up for it so I don't snap and kill somebody. Wish me luck!

Do you work in a retail store during the holidays? Do you work at some sort of arcade, and thus feel my pain? What are your strategies to get through it?

Clubhouse

If you were expecting a story about some kind of rude encounter I've had recently, I'm sorry to say that you're out of luck. Most of the customers (sorry; we're supposed to call them "guests") that I've handled recently have been really, really nice.

Since I'll only be working weekends for the next few months (unless there's a DIRE emergency), I think I'm going to take a few weeks and talk solely about the different areas of TreeTop:

• Clubhouse
• Jumpies
• Water Wars
• Laser Tag
• Prize Center
• Café
• Cashier
• Party Captain

There are a few other positions, such as "Go Karts," "Arcade Tech," and "Party Assistant," but those are jobs that I have never done. (Actually, I've done Party Assistant twice, but it's been a long time. And it's an easy thing to do. I'm sure you can figure out what it is by the name alone, eh?)

This week, my topic is The Clubhouse. 

Now, Clubhouse is a giant indoor playplace, like something you'd find at McDonald's or Chick-fil-a. It's three stories tall, has a giant twisty slide, and costs $5.74 to get in. (I think. Or it's $6.53 to get in, and like $5.93 for the VIPs? I'll have to fact-check on Thursday when I go in.)

There are a lot of people who come into Clubhouse thinking that they don't have to pay. I mean, there's a gate, there's a scanner, and there's an attendant there at all times. (Most people hate running Clubhouse because there's nothing to "do." I bring a book or a bunch of paper and sit and read/write the entire time. It's easy.) We're a business; it's going to cost money to get into the Clubhouse! It's counted as an attraction, for Pete's sake, if you even bothered to read the signboards when you came into the business!

Then you have the parents that think we're a free babysitting service. I can't TELL YOU how many times I've had to desperately hold kids up and pray that their parents are nearby, so the kids can point them out to me. I, personally, have a rule that I will NOT let anybody under the age of eight out of the gate unless they can point out their parents to me. I don't want to be responsible for a four-year-old getting kidnapped. Sometimes the parents come back, furious that I haven't let their kids come to them when "they've obviously been waiting." Um, excuse me, ma'am, but you've been out riding GoKarts and playing Mini Golf (or Putt Putt, if you want to call it that), and you've completely forgotten your children. I've been trying to keep them calm so that they don't upset the rest of them. I'm not going to endanger kids because you think I'm a babysitter.

Then there are the parents that love that I don't let kids out without making them point out their parents. Their kid comes to the gate, puts on their shoes, and I say, "Hey, buddy/sweetie, where are your parents?" The kid peeks over the gate, surveys the parents sitting on the seats or playing games, and points out their parents. If the parents are playing a game and there's nobody else in Clubhouse, I'll walk them to their parents. Otherwise, I let them go, but I watch them all the way. If they veer off, I'll run and catch them and take them straight to their parents, but otherwise I let them go on their own. If their parents are sitting on a couch, normally they'll wave to me when the kid points, and I send the kid on his/her merry way, and watch them as they're reunited.

Some parents go up and rescue their kids if they get stuck, or they try to coax them down from the outside.

Some parents go in and play with their children (but I'm honestly afraid that some of the rather weightier ones will get wedged in the tight places. I mean, I get scared that I'll get stuck sometimes!).

Most parents sit outside and watch.

If a kid does start screaming, I'll take my flashlight out of my purse and go up to them. I know where they'll be: outside of the rocking tunnel. (It goes back and forth as you go over it, like a teeter-totter would. It terrifies the mess out of some of the children, especially the younger ones.)

I gently coax them across the tunnel, sitting on one side so that it won't shift. I'll take their hands and lead them across, if that's what takes it.

Most of the time, the kids are fine after that. They see the slide and they slide right on down.

Sometimes, they're terrified of the slide, too. Now, this slide is DARK (hence the reason for the flashlight), twisty, and FAST. If they're scared to go down, I'll offer to go down first with my flashlight pointing back at them. Most of the time that's all right. Rarely, the kid will want to go back across the tunnel (with me holding it down, of course) and doesn't want to deal with the slide at all. And that's fine.

Then there are the kids that think that I can go up and play with them at any given moment, because I helped them across once. If it's busy, I can't do that. If I leave my post, people could come in without swiping their cards and I'll catch hell from the managers or the owners, and that wouldn't be a good thing. I NEED this job. I need it so, so badly. I'll tell the kids that I can't go up with them, that I'm sorry, but they need to be big girls/boys and do it by themselves! Normally that works, and they find another kid to go up and play with them (they're fine if they have friends).

If TreeTop is deserted, I'll go up and play with the kid. There was this one little boy a few weeks ago... His mother was pregnant and couldn't climb around with him any more, so I offered to go up with him. He was terrified of the tunnel AND the slide.

I must've gone up and down with him about seven or eight times before he decided that he didn't need me any more. He literally sent me away, and the mother thanked me very much. An older lady who had been sitting nearby watching her granddaughter play in the Clubhouse (the granddaughter was the only other kid in the arcade) came up to me afterwards and said that she thought it was really nice of me to do that, especially since it's not in my job description.

"Aw, it's all right. I really don't mind. It's fun! I used to be terrified of dark slides, so I know how it feels. And besides...I really, really like to slide." 

She smiled and walked away.

Sometimes kids have "accidents" in Clubhouse. The Go Kart guys usually clean that up. One kid peed in the slide a few weeks ago, and the whole thing was shut down for about three hours so Garrett could sanitize it. A few months ago, some kid threw up on the second story, and Garrett and one of the Vitaliks had to clean it up and sanitize it. It's a dangerous place to get sick, that's for sure. No way to clean it up without being extremely cramped and uncomfortable.

So, Clubhouse isn't all that bad. It's good on slow days, because you can wander around, or read your books, or slide down the slide if you wish. On busy days, you're just sitting there, bored out of your mind. It's a hit-and-miss deal most days. I always bring a book, just in case.

Any more questions about Clubhouse? Do you think you'd be all right working this particular station? Do you have something like this at your work? What would you like to see in future installments? More stories, or more about how the place works?

"Who Wants to Volunteer?"

SO.

Do I have a story for you.

I was Prize Center at work (I work in an arcade, for those of you who don't know), and I was trading in tickets for some little kid when Mackenzie (one of the managers, hereafter referred to as Mack) comes up with my friend Hunter.

Mack says, "Hunter, you're going to fill in for one of these lovely ladies while one of them volunteers for something."

I'm alarmed, but I'm not overly concerned. "I'll do it," I reply, because the girl I'm working with is new (it's her second day), and I don't want to scare her.

Mack says, "All right. I need you to go to the last stall of the women's restroom and deal with whatever you find."

Now I'm freaking. "Do you know what it is?"

"I have no idea. Some lady just came up to me and told me that I should check the last stall. Double-glove, get the cleaning supplies, and be careful."

So I go to the stock room, put on two pairs of gloves, grab the supplies, and head to the bathroom, fearing the worst.

It was the WORST. POSSIBLE. THING.

Feces are smeared all over the floor, over the toilet, and on the toilet-paper dispenser-thing. The automatic toilet didn't flush, so it's all in the toilet, too. (I'm starting to fear that it's blocked, but I press the button to manually flush it, and it all goes down.) I look in the trash can, and it's got feces in it, too. Like someone reached into the toilet, scooped some up, and dumped it in the trash can.

I'm about to puke. And the worst thing is, I CAN SEE THE HAND PRINTS. IT IS CLEARLY AN ADULT'S HAND THAT DID THIS.

So, I step out of the stall, place my cleaning supplies in front of it, hope no one goes in, and I run to the kitchen.

"RUSSIA. DO. YOU. HAVE. BLEACH."

Russia blinks. "In the back. Under the sink."

So I run and grab the bleach. It's a full bottle (thank God).

I head back to the bathroom and pour it all over the floor, all over the toilet, all over the dispenser. And while it sits for a minute, I go out into the hall to clear my head ('cause that ammonia's noxious).

I go back in, and I start scrubbing with paper towels. I get every single bit off of the floor (IT'S DRIED), the walls, the toilet, and the dispenser. I throw everything in the trash, then I pour more bleach (let it sit while I go out and breathe), scrub everything a second time, and then lysol wipe the bleach can and my hands. (I scrub them for like five minutes in the sink with about half a gallon of soap.)

I return the cleaning supplies to the closet, the bleach to the kitchen (I used about half the bottle), and I grab a mop and a wet floor sign. I mop the floor in the bathroom twice, place the wet floor sign there, then put the mop back.

Then I grab the trash bag, tie it up, take it out (while still gagging from the bleach). I replace the bag, adjust the wet floor sign, scrub my hands more, then I go to the kitchen, grab myself some lemonade, and sit down for about ten minutes. Everyone asks what happened, and I tell them.

When I've recovered, I go back to the prize counter. I tell Mack what I found. She tells me that that's NOT THE FIRST TIME THIS HAS HAPPENED. It's happened at least five times in the men's restroom and twice in the women's.

Now that I'm home, I'm thinking... WHAT DID THIS PERSON TOUCH AFTER LEAVING THE BATHROOM. WHERE DID THEY WALK?! HAVE I TOUCHED SOMETHING THAT THEY TOUCHED?!?!?!

I'm betting someone gets some sort of disease from this, or at the very least gets sick. I hope it's not me. (I've inhaled enough ammonia for a lifetime.)

You can bet your bottom dollar I'm not going to volunteer for anything bathroom-related again. I've got this one under my belt. Next time, it's someone else's turn.

That Time When Parents Actually Parented

So, do I have a story for you this week. 

It occurs around 2 p.m. or so. It's a slow Monday afternoon. Corey and I are working café, but since nobody has shown up in a while, we're sitting at a table and talking. (And I'm working on my novel.) 

Suddenly, Corey leaps to her feet and starts sprinting towards the door, screaming, "STOP! STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP!'

I hear a bang, and then I jump up and start running after her, too.

There are three black kids punching the stuffing out of each other. Two of them are holding one of them down, and they're just going at it. I'm terrified that somebody's going to die, right there on the floor. (The bang? Someone had thrown one of the others into the giant metal rolly door.)

Corey screams at them to stop again, and one of them rushes out the door. The other one is slow to get off of the boy on the floor, but once he does, he runs out the door, too. 

The third one stands up shakily.

"Are you okay?" she asks him. He nods, and then he also runs out the door.

We follow them out.

All three are now sitting at a table with two women. Corey asks, "Ma'am, are these your sons?"

They both nod, so she continues.

"Um, they were fighting just inside the door here. I just wanted to make sure that they weren't hurt."

"They were fighting? Thanks for letting me know." And she kinda waves us off, so we go inside and sit down again, thinking that'd be the end of it.

Not ten minutes later, the two ladies are dragging the kids inside by their ears. Literally dragging them. The first lady drags up her kid and stands him in front of us. We stand up. 

"They have something they want to tell you," she says.

The kid starts fidgeting, mumbling and looking at his mother, at the table, at the floor... So his mother grabs his chin and makes him look at us. "You're not apologizing to the floor, to the table, or to me. You're apologizing to these nice young ladies. Now say you're sorry, and what you're sorry for!"

The kid proceeds to apologize for fighting and causing a disturbance. The other two do the same (after also getting a lecture from the first mother to stop looking at the floor and look at the girls!), and Corey says, "As long as they're not hurt..." because we really don't know what to say. Thank you? 

The mother says, "It's not all right. Thank you for letting us know. They're all fine, but they're not gonna be fine when we get home. Have a great day, ladies."

So they drag the kids out of TreeTop. I've never seen such terrified children. 

These mothers knew how to raise nice, polite young men, and then they went outside to talk, leaving the kids to play inside. So the kids proceeded to try and kill each other. That's why I think the mothers were so upset - they had raised the kids to be polite, and they were behaving like a bunch of thugs.

Nothing exciting happens for the rest of the day, and we hope that nothing like that ever happens again. It was terrifying.

"Apologize. Now."

I like running Clubhouse.

Sure, it's boring. You're sitting on this stool (well, it's kinda like a flat seat-thing...) for hours on end, getting up only to let kids in the gate and stamp their hands. Occasionally, you may have to climb up into the playhouse to rescue some kid who's scared of the tilting tunnel or the EXTREMELY DARK slide. I keep a flashlight in my purse for this purpose. (I do it gladly, because I used to be the kid that was scared of things; plus, I like going down the slide.)

But on the other hand, if you bring a book or a sketchpad or something to do, time goes by rather quickly. I don't read while there are kids in my gate, but otherwise, I will. I've finished books there before, and it's always a pleasant time.

During downtimes, if a kid wants me to go up with them, I'll do it. I went up with this one curly-haired four-year-old maybe six or seven times last Saturday, because not only was he scared of the tunnel and the slide, but he also wanted someone to play with.

So, last Saturday, I was manning Clubhouse. There are one or two kids in the Clubhouse, and a set of grandparents are sitting outside the gate on the same stool-seat things, watching their grandkids play. 

Out of nowhere, this group of little boys comes tearing up to the gate. One of them swings wide and pretty much trips over the grandfather (the grandfather was sitting upright, legs crossed. There's no way the kid could've tripped unless he ran into the man, which he did). He then marches up to the gate and demands to be let in.

Something inside of me snaps.

I swipe their cards, stamp their hands, and then I put my foot on the inside of the gate (so they can't open it with their grubby little kid-hands), and I glare at the one little kid who fell over the old man. 

"Apologize."

He throws a barked, "Sorry," over his shoulder, and proceeds to attempt to walk in the gate again. I'm not having any of it.

"Apologize to the gentleman you just so brutishly ran over, or I'm not letting you in."

The boys' mothers have caught up by this time, and one of them notices that I'm picking on her son.

"What's wrong?"

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but I'm not going to let him in unless he apologizes for running into the gentleman sitting behind him."

I'm half-expecting the mother to go off on a tangent and bite my head off. Hey, I was raised to respect my elders, and I hate seeing little kids treat older people like trash.

Much to my surprise, the mother turns on her son, gives him this look of evil and terror, and says, "Apologize!"

So the little boy slinks over to the man, squeaks out an, "I'm sorry I ran into you," and then flees back to the gate. I let him in with no trouble, the mother nods and leaves with her posse, and the old man smiles at me.

All in all, I think I taught that kid some respect. Or I put fear and terror into him. It's sort of hard to distinguish the two sometimes.

"Excuse Me, but Can You Wash Your Hands?"

Disclaimer: I'm not normally snippish. However, add in rude customers and a pinch of PMS, and you've got a recipe for absolute disaster.

Case in point: What happened in café a few weeks ago (June 30). 

First of all, this particular customer wasn't very nice to begin with. I'm going to call him Baldy (because he was bald.)

Baldy walks up to the register, which Cullen is manning, and orders a pepperoni pizza, sixteen-inch. 

I overhear this, wash my hands, put on my gloves, and start making the pizza right away. (All of our food is cooked-to-order. The cashiers even say, "We'll bring your food right out when it comes up. It'll be about (estimated amount of time here." The estimated time for this particular pizza is around ten to fifteen minutes.) Cullen then comes over and puts the receipt on my board.

Three minutes later, I've sauced the pizza, put on the cheese and pepperoni, and I bend over to place it in the over, when I hear someone behind me.
"Excuse me!"

I turn around, sweating from the 500º temperature. "Yes, Sir?"

Baldy narrows his eyes at me. "Are you just now putting my pizza in the oven?"

I calm down before I snap at him, smile, and say, "Yes, Sir. I apologize, but all of our food is cooked-to-order. It takes a few minutes to make the pizza, but not very long to cook it in the bottom oven. It'll be out in about ten minutes."

He sniffs, and goes to sit down with his wife and kid. I brush it off and go stand next to the register, where Cullen needs me to fill drink orders while he takes orders.

There's a line of about three people in front of Cullen (they're only ordering drinks, thank goodness!), when Baldy gets up, walks over to the ice cream cooler, pulls out an ice cream sandwich, and proceeds to open it up, split it in half, and walk back to his table, where he then hands half to his son and swallows the other half. 

Cullen and I look at each other in absolute shock. 

"He didn't pay for that?" I ask tentatively as I hand three small Dr. Peppers and a bottle of water to the last customer.

"No..."

By this time, the line's gone. All of two minutes, IF THAT, have elapsed. Cullen's a bit goofy-looking, but he can be imposing if he wants.

"Sir?!" He waves at Baldy. "Sir, you have to pay for that."

Baldy sniffs again, walks up and hands us $2.00. "Sorry," he growls. "Didn't want to wait in the line." 

Cullen and I exchange looks after he leaves, so that he doesn't catch us. Then we both go and watch the pizza cooking in the oven.

Almost absent-mindedly, I touch my nose with the back of my RIGHT wrist, just past the bone. Not two seconds later, Baldy's back at the counter.

"Excuse me!"

I turn around. "Yes, Sir?" I'm really starting to not like this guy.

"Will you wash your hands before you touch my pizza? I don't want you getting your germs all over it! It's disgusting. You're in food service. You shouldn't be doing that!"

I put my left hand (THIS IS IMPORTANT) on the cash register monitor. "Yes...sir? I always wash my hands, sir, before I touch the food. It's company policy." (Plus, I wouldn't be the one touching his pizza. I don't take pizzas out, cut them up, or deliver them to tables. I'm mostly cashier and burgers/fries/hot dogs. I only made the pizza because Cullen had taken register because he was closer.)

"Well, now you've gone and touched the register, and you've been ringing people up and handing out drinks!"

I vaguely hear Cullen calling for a manger through the radio through the bursts of ARE YOU KIDDING ME ringing through my head. I apologize again, grab a sanitary wipe, wipe down the register, the counter, and anything I might've touched before going to the back before I absolutely lose my cool.

A few minutes later, Heather comes to the back (she's one of the managers) and asks for my side of the story. I tell her what happened, demonstrated what I did, and tell her what the guy's done to me already.

She says, "Just remember not to snap at the customers." She then told me that he said I'd been handing out drinks and touching the register and food with my bare, germy hands. Cullen stepped in then and backed me up, saying I'd been washing my hands raw all day (I had, because I'd been cleaning all day, plus I wash my hands every time I pass that little sink, which is about 10 times an hour!) and the guy was lying through his teeth. Then he also told the story of "Are you just now putting my pizza in?!" and "SIR! YOU HAVE TO PAY FOR THAT!"

Heather looks astonished, and Russia just goes, "Snap at him all you want, sister. He's an expletive and doesn't need to treat you like that. Don't worry about it. It's your first customer I've ever seen you get pissed at."

We all exit the back of the kitchen, pausing to wash our hands at the sink. For the rest of the time that Baldy's in café, everybody who witnessed the incident goes to the sink about every minute to wash their hands. If they touch something, they wash their hands. If something touches them, they wash their hands. If the buzzer dings, they wash their hands. I think Baldy may have complained to Heather again about us rubbing it in his face, but Heather just smiled and said, "Sir, we're simply adhering to our hand-washing policies. Now, there are other people waiting on that table. If you would be so kind..."

There wasn't another soul in the restaurant.

It just irks me, though. The guy was behaving as if I'd sneezed all over myself and then rubbed it EVERYWHERE. That didn't happen.

May all your customers be sane (and not germaphobic). 

Pro-Tip: Wash your hands whenever possible. You never want to be on the receiving end of a stuck-up, whiny, germaphobic customer. It's not pretty. (And okay, yes. So I might've snapped a little. I just couldn't believe what he was saying. I hadn't touched anything.)

"Name?"

All right, all right. It's my turn to be the star of the story about my job. And, unfortunately, it's not a very happy story. (At least, not for me. You'll probably find it quite entertaining.)

I was working café a few weeks ago, and I'd just messed up someone's order. It was about an hour to closing time, I was nearly dead on my feet, and I was already stressed out about the food. 

Someone calls over the radio.

"Hey, café?"

I look around. I'm the only one not currently busy (Russia's at the register, and Ross is making a pizza; I'm just watching some fries), so I answer. "Yes?"

"Put a pizza in the oven for me, please?"

"Name?" I call back. I had no idea who was talking. I'm not very good at recognizing voices over the radio, plus it was freaking loud in the café, between the children screaming in the Clubhouse and the people chattering at their tables and the ovens humming. I couldn't have recognized the voice if you paid me.

"What?"

"Name?"

"What?"

"Who is this?" I asked. I was getting a bit irritated. I was tired, and they weren't making any sense.

"Push the button, wait a moment, then talk."

"I was pushing the button," I nearly snapped.

Ross turns and looks at me. "That's Alex Jones."

I nearly drop the radio. "I'm s-sorry, Sir. I'll get that right away." Then I hang the radio up and run into the back before I lose it.

Slim chases me down, and says, "Look, Jones won't care. He'll be like, All right. He was being sarcastic, Lauren. No need to flip out now. Calm down."

I had to take a few minutes to compose myself, and that included standing in the freezer for a bit. (The freezer was nice.) I did have to suck it up and apologize to him when he came to collect his pizza, saying sorry for being an idiot over the radio. He wasn't upset, and I felt a bit foolish.

I won't be answering the radio in café any more, you can be sure of that.

"How Are You Not Gray Yet?"

This is what a lady said to me when I was working prize center last Wednesday. I'd had to call in BACKUP, you see. There was a long line composed of Day Camp Kids (they attend "camp" during the summer while their parents are at work; it's like after-school care, but all day. If you understand what I'm saying, great. If not, just smile and nod), and while they were well-behaved, I was in over my head.

I called in backup.

"If there's anyone available, please send them to prize counter!" I pleaded over the radio. I was about to ask again when Jordan showed up, grabbed a scanner, and jumped into the fray.

After nearly a straight hour of helping day-camp kids, as well as the people in line behind them (I'm estimating maybe 40 kids, and then about 10 or so people aside from them... Maybe 50-60 people total?), we were able to relax for about five seconds. Then came another two customers, so I got one and he got one.

"Hey, buddy! You've got 370 tickets on your card, so that means you can get stuff out of this case, that case, and the top two rows of the last case. What can I get you?" And I smiled as I said it. I checked my watch. It was 3:06 p.m., and I was scheduled to go home at 4:00.

Their mother looked at me in wonder. "I just saw you handle that impressive line, and you're being so patient with my son-" (the kid was hemming and hawing and couldn't figure out what he wanted) "-and I want to know, how are you not gray yet? These two are driving me prematurely gray! I can't imagine dealing with hundreds of them all day long!"

And I smiled and said, "I get paid for this, ma'am, and I'm scheduled to go home in an hour. Prize Counter's not so bad on week days. Café's the most stressful place here, and I'm scheduled there on weekends. You should see me smile at 7:50 p.m, ten minutes from closing!" And I carried on with her son's transaction, they thanked me, and they left.

And I nearly fell over from exhaustion.

So, the question is, how am I not gray yet? I really have no idea. Let me give you a run-down of TreeTop's areas (that I'm able to work), and their stress-level.

1. Clubhouse. There's pretty much nothing to do at Clubhouse except sit and read. When a kid comes up, you swipe their card, stamp their hand, and let them in. You tell them to take off their shoes, and not to climb up the slide. They go on their merry way, and you sit back down. When the place is empty, you can read. When you have kids, you're expected to sit and watch them. And that's fine with me.
2. Jumpies. Pretty much the same as Clubhouse (except they have wristbands, which they have to get inside, so you don't swipe their card). You keep an eye on them. It's outside, so I hate it with a fiery passion. Thankfully, I don't get scheduled for Jumpies. It's boring, and I hate outside.
3. Water Wars. Pretty laid-back. Not many people like staying out in the boiling sun, paying $5 for six water balloons just for a chance to hit the other person. I'm not a fun Water Wars person (the guys like to nail the dry kids with water balloons), and as I previously mentioned, I hate the outdoors. But it's easy, at least. You can sit at the tables under the pavilion until you have customers.
4. Laser Tag. You get a seven and a half minute break every time you send a group in (ten minutes if you send in a party). I've gotten good at Solitaire. I can repeat the safety speech in my sleep. It's nice and air-conditioned, too, and the only stressful thing is when people outside are getting mad at you for letting parties ahead of them (which is what we're supposed to do; parties get priority, because they're paying hundreds of dollars to be here).
5. Prize Center. It can be dead for hours, then everybody in the entire place will rush in, leaving the one person scheduled there completely overwhelmed. Some days, we have two people working. On weekends, at around 8:30, we try to have about three people working Prize Center because EVERYONE rushes there at five 'til closing, which means the PC workers don't get to START their closing duties until the line is gone. (I once started my closing duties 20 minutes after closing. The managers wanted to go home, so they told me not to worry about them. I was scheduled to do THE most time-consuming things, too, even though they knew I was the only one on Prize.)
6. Café. This is what's going to cause me to have an aneurysm. I run cash register here normally, but I also help cook the food. Keeping orders straight, giving everyone their drinks, remembering to print the correct copies of receipts and putting the right numbers on them, PLUS dealing with the customer's complaints of, "Well, at McDonald's they have the burger READY AND WAITING for me!" is going to drive me into an early grave. ("We're not McDonald's, sir. We cook everything to-order. I'm sorry for the inconvenience we've apparently caused you, but you saw us getting the frozen patties out of the freezer, and I told you it would be about a ten minute wait. Now if you would please step aside, I have a line. Thank you.") Plus, with Russia breathing down my neck - he apparently doesn't think I can work the register, even though I pretty much LIVED in café while he was on vacation - I'm extra nervous. Some days I just want to step into the back room and SCREAM.

Also, Rule #1: everything is your fault. If the customer thinks the menu's too expensive, they'll blame you. If the customer's spending too much money, they'll blame you. If their kid crawls up the slide and gets hit, they'll blame you.

This Week's Lesson: Learn to block things out. Don't let them get to you. Don't let them have the satisfaction of seeing you break. If you need to, after they're gone, ask your manager/supervisor/whatever if you can take about five minutes to compose yourself. (If I'm in café, I go step into the freezer for a few moments. It helps tremendously.) Then, put a smile back on your face and return to what you were doing. Working with little kids and their harassed parents is something I never, ever saw myself doing. It's stretched me to my limits some days. But I always stay strong and push through it.

Never let 'em see you cry. It's not worth the gloating that will (more than likely) occur. Don't be that one person to break down. You can do it. Things'll get better. Remind yourself that you're just doing your job, that the customer is an idiot, and you'll be able to plaster that smile back on your face and continue with what you were doing.

You've got this.

"Don't Climb Up The Slide!"

I don't get scheduled for Clubhouse very often, but last week, I was scheduled for it twice. That astounded me. I picked out a good book, though, and settled into my little chair, ready to wait out a boring day.

And it was a boring day, until this group came along. Four children, all in varying stages of "My mother feeds me too much junk food." There were two kids who were siblings, one wearing a dinosaur shirt (hereafter referred to as Dino) and one wearing a Sonic shirt (hereafter referred to as Sonic). Their friends had on a Batman and a Red shirt (guess their names).

Now, these chubby kids sounded like little girls when they screamed. And that's all they did: scream. They all picked on Dino, claiming that he was a velociraptor. Dino thought the raptor was one of them. So they all screamed and chased each other. 

TreeTop echoes like nobody's business, especially in the enclosed space that is the Clubhouse. (It's got a high roof.) So I was fighting back a headache after about ten minutes of this.

Then things get out of hand. Dino starts screaming, and Sonic rushes out to his mother and says, "DINO CLIMBED UP THE SLIDE AND I SLID INTO HIM!" Batman and Red come out saying the same thing, so the mother scoops Dino up and takes him out of the playplace for a few minutes to recuperate.

The other three boys go back to their playing. Now that the velociraptor's gone, though, they calm down a bit, and there's no more screaming.

Soon, Dino comes back to the gate. His mother makes him apologize.

"Sorry I was climbing up the slide," he said.

"You can't do it again, buddy. Remember what happened when you climbed up it last time? I'll give you a warning the next time you do it, but I will kick you out. I can't have you breaking rules," I told him.

"I promise I won't climb up the slide."

So I let him in, and they resume playing. Not five minutes later, Batman comes up to me and says, "Hey, miss, that kid in the dinosaur shirt's climbing the slide again!"

So I get up and go over to the slide, and sure enough, Dino's climbing up it. 

"Hey, Kid, what did I just tell you? Remember what happened last time you climbed up the slide?"

He nodded.

"Now, if you don't stop climbing up the slide, I'm going to have to kick you out. This is your last warning."

His mother noticed me talking to him, and she added in, "Don't do it, Dino! Listen to the lady - she makes the rules!"

So I let him go, and I went and sat back down. I watched him this time. He stood where he was for about ten seconds, then he climbed straight back into the slide.

I got up and grabbed his shoulder. "Let's go, buddy." And I escorted him out of the Clubhouse area. His mother was waiting on the other side of the fence, and she fetched him. He was throwing a fit.

"I'm sorry," the mother told me.

"Look, I'm just trying to keep everyone safe. I'm sorry, but I can't let him back in today."

That didn't stop Dino from coming back at least six separate times begging to be let back in. "I'm sorry! I said I was sorry! I still have my stamp!" (The kid's about four or five years old, if I were to guess.)

"Sorry, buddy. You broke the rules. You disobeyed me when I told you not to climb the slide anymore. I sat here and I watched you climb it RIGHT AFTER I told you not to. I can't let you in today, even though you have a stamp."

"But I'm sorry!"

"You said you were sorry last time, buddy. And you promised me you wouldn't climb the slide again, but you did. I can't trust you, buddy, so you can't come back into the playplace today." 

And his mother came and dragged him away again, while Sonic, Batman, and Red continued to play happily in the Clubhouse.

***

Now, this was a little frightening for me. What if the mother had blamed me for what happened to her kid? What if she had dragged my manager out and demanded that I be fired for "daring" to speak to her kid like that? (I'm really good with words, especially veiled-threatening ones.)

This Week's Lesson: Stand your ground. Don't let anything anybody tells you get you to change your mind. You said you were going to kick the kid out? Kick the kid out. Don't worry about the reprocussions. If things are serious (the kid had a giant bruise on his skull by the end of the day!), your managers will side with you, and they'll agree that kicking the kid out was your only logical choice.

If, by some reason, the manger does reprimand you, wait until you get home before you unleash that frustration. Their job is to appease the customer, even if the customer's being an idiot. Just try to stay calm and act rationally. If you think that what you did was fair, stick to your guns. Just don't antagonize your boss. That would be bad.

Do you work anywhere with small children? How do you keep them in line? Have you ever had to outright threaten somebody in order to keep injuries from happening? How did you deal with the outcome? Talk to me!

"Oh, Wait - Are You Closed?"

There's one thing I will never, ever understand: how relatively sensible people lose all common sense the moment they step into a facility where they don't have to think.

In this instance, I mean TreeTop.

It never ceases to amaze me how little attention these people pay to things around them. 

Here's a scenario I deal with every single time I close café, no matter the day.

Setting: The Café
Time: after 8:00 p.m., when café closes, but before 9:00 p.m., when TreeTop closes
Cast: Me, Other Worker (in this case, Ross), Random Customer

In order to get everything DONE in café before TreeTop closes, we start closing café at 8:00. Sometimes, we "pre-close" starting at 7:30 if the place is deserted. Café takes an abnormally long time to close, because we have to pay so much attention to what we're doing. We can't afford any sort of health code violation. And Alex Burdette (hereafter referred to as "Russia") makes us scrub the place top-to-bottom. On week days, we move just the chairs in the eating-area; on weekends, we move the tables AND the chairs.

Ross and I were the only ones closing café on this particular Saturday night. I was cleaning up the eating area, and he was scrubbing everything behind the counter.

Now, when you stack the chairs, you have to put two in front of each entrance, so that it effectively creates a "barricade" that nobody's supposed to cross. I had stacked my chairs, and put my chairs in front of the entrances. Nothing was going to go wrong tonight.

It's now 8:26 p.m., give or take a few minutes. I've finished sweeping, Ross is counting the drawer. There are no lights on the menu, and I'm about to start mopping. I have started mopping, when this guy and his kid push the two chairs completely out of the way, and start walking up to the cash register, nearly slipping in my mop-water. I stare at them, dumb-founded.

The guy waltzes right up to the cash register and stands there for a moment, looking up at the menu. Ross realizes there's someone there, and looks up. He looks at me for a moment, and I look at him, and we trade looks of absolute disbelief.

Then he looks up at the customer. "Sorry, Sir, but we're closed."

The customer looks surprised. "Really?"

"Yes, Sir."

The customer turns and walks away, shaking his head, like I can't believe they're closed. They should have a sign or something.

Ross and I spend about five minutes freaking out over this person's stupidity, before we go back to closing café.

Some variation of this incident happens every time I close café. I wish I were joking. Sometimes they move the chairs to get in, sometimes they don't. They're often furious as to why we're closing café before the rest of the building closes. (It takes a heckuva long time to close the place, by the way. If we closed at nine, like everyone else, we'd often be there until 10:00 or so.)

"Oh, wait - are you closed?"
"Wait - y'all are closed?"
"'Scuse me, are y'all closed?"
"I can't even get a soda?" (No, sir; our cash drawer's been counted and taken, and the CO2's been disconnected.)
"Where're all the chairs?"

...

Seriously, people. Learn to read the sign outside the café door, or at the very least, don't act surprised when you walk into a place and find all the chairs missing, because they're closing. 

So, what's your lesson for this week?

Be considerate. Don't get mad at the workers for the hours that the employer sets. Don't get mad at them for something that they have absolutely no control over. Remember that the workers are people, too. Just because you're not ready to go home yet doesn't mean that THEY'RE not ready to go home. Remember, we've worked somewhere between six to ten hours that day, and we're just about dead on our feet. (Especially in café, because that's the singular most stressful station in all of TreeTop.)

I'm sorry if this got ranty, but I have to let this out some how. And I can't exactly do this at my workplace, at the customer, right? (I value my job, I'll have you know. I may not always like it, because I'm pretty sure it's causing me to go gray, but it's a good source of money, and I'm not ready to quit quite yet.)

Have a good week, y'all. Maybe next week, I'll have a more exciting story for you :)

'Murica Can't Math

I don't normally do such stereotypical posts (ha, ha; the US is behind in math skills), but after witnessing two separate incidents at TreeTop today, I think it's safe to say that, yes, while we are America and we are the land of the free and the home of the brave, some adults can't do math to save their lives.

I'm going to transcribe this as best I can, so bear with me!

Incident One: 11:32 a.m.
Scene: Café
Participants: Alex Jones (Owner), Danielle (worker), Me

Alex: Y'all won't believe what I just witnessed.
Danielle & Me: What happened?
Alex: You ever have one of those moments, like on the AT&T commercial, where your mind just goes *fwooom*?
Danielle: Yeah.
Me: Maybe.
Alex: I just had that conversation with someone. And I had to tell someone. I've been telling the entire staff, and y'all are last.
Danielle: What happened?
Alex: DD (another worker) comes into my office with the phone, and he says, Alex, can you help this guy? I can't get him to understand me. I'm thinking, Maybe it's 'cause you're black, but DD doesn't really have that ghetto accent.
Me: Yeah.
Alex: So I take the phone. Who's this? says the guy. And I say, I'm Alex. The guy goes, Who are you, Alex? And I say, I'm the owner. By this time, I'm thinking maybe the guy's a tad slow, and I can help him out and get back to printing paychecks. 
Danielle: You haven't finished paychecks?
Alex: Shh! Anyway. The guy goes, So I'm looking at your website, at the group rates, and I'm confused. And I say, What can I help you with, sir? And he goes, So, I see that your rates are for ten or more people, starting at $9.95 a person. And I say, That's right. And he goes, So, how much would that be for ten people?
Danielle & Me: *jaws drop*
Alex: That's not even the best part. In my head, I'm thinking, "Look, dude, you just move the decimal point, fwip, one space over! It's a tenth! A TENTH! You're an adult, for God's sake!" But I say, Well, sir, it'd be $99.50 for ten people. And he goes, Your prices are really confusing. And in my head, I'm still thinking, "IS THIS REAL LIFE?!" But I say, What do you suggest? And he says, get this, he says Maybe you should have a chart or something. Ten people is this price, twenty people is this price, and so on. And I'm like, "This is SIMPLE MATH, buddy! Your smart phone is smarter than this! It has a freaking calculator!" But I suck it up and I say, Well, thank you, I'll take that into consideration. And then we say our goodbyes and he hangs up.
Danielle: *speechless*
Me: That did not happen.
Alex: Oh, but it did.
FIN

****

Incident Two: Around 3:30 p.m.
Setting: Café
Participants: MacKenzie (manager), Danielle, Alan (worker), & Me. Plus Lady on the Phone.

MacKenzie has been taking calls for people wanting to book birthday parties. She has them on speaker so she can flip through the schedule with one hand and jot down sensitive information with the other. Since it's slow in the café, Danielle & I are sitting down while Alan's in there taking a break. Let it be known that Birthday Parties get a special price on pizzas - $9.50 per pizza instead of $13 per pizza.

MacKenzie: Thank you for calling TreeTop Family Adventure, how may I help you?
Lady: I'd like to book a party, but I have a few questions first.
MacKenzie: Certainly, how can I help you?
Lady *rattles off generic questions*
MacKenzie: Is that all for you today, ma'am?
Lady: Well, I do have one more question. On your website that I'm looking at, it says you have Party Pizzas for $9 a pie. Is that per slice?
Alan, Danielle, & I: *muffling our laughter because MacKenzie's shooting us death glares*
MacKenzie: N-no, ma'am, that's for the entire pizza. It's a pizza pie. $9 a pie.
Lady: Well, that's just confusing! Nobody knows what a pie is!
Alan: *gets up and leaves to go to the back of the kitchen, where we can hear him laughing*
MacKenzie: I'll pass that along, ma'am.
Lady: You better! *hangs up*
Danielle, MacKenzie, & I: *stare at each other for ten seconds, then bust out laughing*
We laugh for a long time, and we eventually end up crying because we're laughing so hard. Alan comes back eventually, and he's crying, too. MacKenzie relates the news to Alex later.
Alex: *comes into café* Do any of you here know what an IQ is?
Everyone Present: *raises hands*
Alex: Just making sure. The lady on the phone just lowered everyone IQ here by several hundred points. I may have to start paying damage or medical leave or something. *leaves muttering*
Everyone Present: *starts laughing again*
FIN

****

Honestly, it's like some people just don't take the time or the effort to think things through before they say them. 

The best phone calls, though, are the ones where people ask, "What are y'all's hours?" Guess why that's so funny? They have to go through a menu where the recorded voice TELLS THEM THE HOURS before they're asked if they'd like to speak to a live person. I just don't understand people.

We're raising a generation of technologically-advanced preschoolers (my cousins can operate their mother's iPad better than she can, and they're five and four years old; they don't get a lot of time with it, though, because she doesn't use it as a babysitter), and yet their parents can barely do third-grade math. 

It really worries me.