Changes Come Around Real Soon

I should warn you that this is kind of a long one!

Did I ever have a work filled past weekend!!! I think I almost worked 50 hours this past week! I worked/got trained on Wednesday for the night shift, it was really slow but I learned what I needed to do and it was pretty uneventful. Thursday, I worked my other temporary job for 6 hours making shakes for this new cosmetic company coming out. The people I worked with on the first day were great and we all got along well.

After work on Thursday, I went to a get together at a friend's house who lives in the beautiful outskirts of Rhode Island/Connecticut border. We ate burgers then played some games. The first game was Mafia which is the game where you have townspeople, mafia, a cop and a doctor and the mafia try to kill the townspeople before the townspeople managed to get rid of all the mafia. It is fun and can be crazy! After that, we played 4 people on a couch. You get into 2 equal teams and then everyone puts their name on a piece of paper and puts it into a hat. Then you draw a new name and that is your new name for the game. The object is to get 4 people of your team on the couch through strategy without discussing how with your teammates. This game was lots of fun as well. Afterwards, we played Catch Phrase. Overall, it was a fun night.

Friday, I worked 4 1/2 hours at my temporary job then I slept before heading in to work at the Best Western. It was going to be my first shift alone. That meant the whole entire hotel was my responsibility from 11pm to 7am including maintenance and security. The first 2 hours were kind of hectic with a lot of requests for towels and blankets to be brought up along with a lot of people calling to request wake up calls as well as a few noise complaints since there was no vacancy that evening. I did laundry, folded towels and pillowcases (sheets get sent out to another company) and put towels away in the maid closet or in the pool room. I did night audit as well (for this hotel it is really simple) and I also set up breakfast which consisted of scrambled eggs, sausages, waffles, cereal, pastries, toast and some other things. Newspapers to be delivered to each room once they arrive. I also swept and mopped the lobby and on this particular night, I also cleaned up the meeting room for Saturday's events.

On Saturday, I went home and arrived back at the hotel at 2pm to drive a shuttle (a Ford E150 7 passenger minivan) to take people to a wedding in a little town called Bristol which was about 30-50 drive away. I was supposed to take 2 groups of people along with another shuttle & driver. The first group consisted of 10 groomsmen for the wedding. I got 6 of them in my shuttle. All 6 were on their 5th or 6th beer and were chugging some down while I was driving, it can be quite entertaining to have 6 buzzed/almost drunk men for that long of a drive. They requested to stop at a liquor store (I passed it already, haha) then they wanted to stop at a local bar before heading to the wedding location to do a round of shots (their tradition apparently). I told them I would stop only if they got the other shuttle to stop as well. That they accomplished and we went to the bar (haha I sat in the car thank you very much!). The men were quick as promised and I dropped them off. I rushed back to go pick up the girls but by the time I got back, the girls had already lost patience and decided to drive themselves to the wedding. The person at the front desk back at the hotel was alone and had a bunch of different jobs to do left by our manager who apparently rarely makes an appearance on the weekends but does plan to have a lot of events and stuff done by various people so we are usually left to make things up and do things on the fly for guests. I offered to stay but both me and the other person thought it best to not stay since I would be hitting overtime and this hotel does not prefer to pay its employees past overtime. I headed home and returned back at 10pm at the wedding to pick up whatever people needed a ride back to the wedding. I showed up at 10pm since it was requested of me but I actually did not manage to get my drunks packed up until 11:40pm since the wedding was still in full swing while I was there.

While I was waiting, I was in the catering area and one of the groomsmen came and found me, he wanted me to go "polish the dance floor" with him but I told him no. I am not a huge fan of dancing that particular way with a drunk guy. He got mad at me for it and made sure to let everyone know how upset he was with me that I would not dance with him (that's why I didn't get a tip but I don't care, my body isn't worth it). Once the wedding winded down, I loaded up my shuttle with 6 people (all of which were really drunk and in a very playful mood). I got the person riding shot gun to be DJ and the party was taken on the road!

I got back to the hotel at midnight and everyone in the shuttle were excited to find out that I was going to be their front desk associate for the night. My night was a little busier than the night before because the hotel was at full occupancy with 2 wedding parties and a softball team. Both wedding parties were pretty drunk and noisey. Earlier in the day prior to my shift was a few food functions at the hotel and the breakfast room was in poor shape with several dishes to be done. I did these along with my usual laundry and as soon as I started getting requests to bring things to people's room (you know, soap, coffee, toilet paper, towels, etc.) I discovered that I had no key to both of the maid closets. I tried every key I could possibly find and I was forced to ignore requests for things which was hard. The room above the front desk was having a full on party (luckily their neighbors were passed out) and I had to make sure nothing stupid was being done (yep they smoked, $500 fine for smoking at the hotel). I did the rest of my duties as best as I could, newspapers didn't arrive until it was too late so that didn't get done.

At 7am, I was ready to head home when I got a phone call from my manager. He asked me how I was feeling and what not, I answered and he's like ok do you think you are awake enough to take the next shift instead of working the 3rd shift on Sunday night? If I switched, that meant I would be working 16 hours straight on barely any sleep as well as not getting any breaks while working and handling any events/functions the manager had arranged for that day. I told him no and I also told him that I would be quitting. He was shocked and disappointed since he was down to like 2-3 people (a person usually works 5 shifts a week) to cover the week's 21 various front desk shifts. I also told him that I would not be working that evening, he was extra upset with me. I did not like the way this company treated its employees as cheap labor amongst various other things and with the support of my father, I agreed to quit this job even though I need the experience.

I had to stay there until someone came in to cover for the employee not coming to work. They didn't arrive until 7:30am and by then I had missed my bus back to downtown Providence. I had been bussing to work. I was upset that I missed the bus especially since the next one wasn't for another hour. I headed outside in the pouring rain. No other businesses were really open this fine Sunday morning so I headed to another bus stop about 1 1/2 miles away in the pouring rain (yes I was smart and forgot my umbrella). I hate to admit that I just was not a happy camper that morning but God definitely had other things in mind.

I was waiting under a bus stop shelter with a guy and I had about 50 minutes to wait. The other guy and I are started talking and making jokes etc which really helped the time go by. It's just not like me to talk to random people like that. Then I got on the bus to head back to Providence. I got on my next bus and I watched as other people trickled onto the bus. I was very suprised to see 2 morman missionaries getting on the bus. They were the first set of mormans I had seen out here and they were also the only mormans that I even knew of out here which can be a shocker. I was suprised to see them sit next to me on the bus and a bunch of questions flooded to my mind to ask them. I started talking to one of them and we had an interesting conversation, the guy even made a joke about mormans which cracked me up and it was nice to talk to him.

Once I got home, I changed out of my sopping wet clothes and hopped on a bus to head to church. The lady across the aisle from me started talking to me and we carried on a conversation all the way to downtown. I walked to church in a happy mood realizing how much happier I was then when I had first started this morning and that I was possibly turning into my mother with me talking to all these random strangers. It was also pleasant to be somewhat social with some people since Melissa had left last Friday afternoon to New Hampshire for a little longer than a week and I definitely miss her.

I went to church then I went to lunch with this one friend that I had not been getting along with. I decided that even though he can be a pain in my rear, I decided to be friends with him since there is no use in having enemies in your company of friends. Afterwards, I headed home where I talked to my mom about my crazy day then I passed out from sheer exhaustion around 3:30pm. I awoke hours later and saw that it was 1am and I continued to sleep. I finally pushed myself awake at 7:30am to get ready for my chiropractor appointment. Yes, I got 16 hours of sleep! Holy cow! I looked at my phone this morning and realized I had been texting people and making/receiving phone calls in my sleep, oh how entertaining of me!

I wonder what adventures await me this week. I do know that I am still tired and plan to head to bed again very soon, haha. I also do know that I need to find a job again. Can't wait to see what God has planned for me in that department!