On St Patrick's Day (the date of my last post) I actually ended up seeing Nick in the evening. I felt kind of down and so it was nice to see a friendly face. The next day I was off and Tyler suggested going to Blizzard Beach. I'm not the biggest fan of waterparks but it's still free for us to get in and it was a lovely day outside so we went on the bus there. It was sooo dead! Afterwards we realised that this was because Typhoon Lagoon (the other Disney waterpark) had reopened that day after months of being closed for refurbishment so that's why it was so quiet. We did a slide (with a million steps up to it!) and went round the lazy river before going in the wave pool. It's really cool but I don't like the rough floor it has... supposedly this is because it stops people slipping over but in reality it just really hurts your feet! Then we lay out in the sun for a bit and got some quick service food and a funnel cake for lunch before we headed back. I went back to the Commons whilst Tyler went to work.
I got back and got changed before getting a random text from Nick if I wanted to go to his pool and lie around in the sun. So I walked over to his and he realised that he didn't know the access code for the pool (talk about gated community) so we abandoned that idea and both ended up napping in the afternoon which is totally out of character for me but did me a world of good! I was so tired from my first week of serving that I needed the extra sleep. Once we'd both woken up we went to Chevy's and got some food before he dropped me off at Downtown Disney. I walked around and bought a couple of things with my new-found wealth (ahhhh tipped positions....!) before meeting Sophie at the cinema. We went to watch The Vow which was really good and quite sad! We didn't get out til quite late so we just got the F bus and went home.
The next day I wanted to meet Tyler at Magic Kingdom after he finished work. I didn't hear anything from him so I headed over that way on the A bus anyway. I popped into Cast Connection but didn't find anything good so then got the cast bus to the Tunnels... I always feel a bit edgy going through the Tunnels into the park especially now I don't work in MK anymore. So once I got out into the park, I went out of the turnstiles and back in just to cover myself!! I put my stuff in a locker and watched the parade from the train station which was unusual! Then I got the train round to the new Fantasyland station which has reopened as phase one of the Fantasyland Expansion. I walked through past the new Goofy's Barnstormer (which I need to ride at some point) and the new Dumbo. Got myself a pretzel from Tomorrowland and then wondered into Liberty Square. Decided to watch Hall of Presidents so I could tick it off my list and then the same for the Country Bears Jamboree which is one of the WIERDEST things at Disney World. Never again. But at least I could cross it off my list of doing every single attraction in the 4 main parks. Then I finally heard from Tyler who, it turned out, had got food poisoning and had ended up calling into work and spent most of his day in his bathroom, poor thing. So I left MK and headed home. Nick had got off work so I went to his and we bought stuff in Publix, went home and made a yummy spinach quiche before watching Airplane! on Netflix which was hilarious.
Tuesday it was back to work time. This was supposed to be an AM shift but I knew with it being Tuesday it would more than likely end up as a Mid (same goes for tomorrow...) and sure enough in pre-meal they asked for volunteers to stay. I was in 106 for the morning which was okay and then 510 for the evening where I had some really nice tables who bought lots of alcohol... fun times! I was pretty tired in the evening but had racks as my sidework which wasn't too bad. We went to McDonalds after work (9 of us in Tarik's Taxi trying to go through the drive thru... hilarious) and then home.
Wednesday I was a PM so I slept in for the morning and then headed to work for my shift which I was in 510 again!! I had a really good shift where I almost earnt as much as my Mid the day before. I really felt like I was getting the hang of this server lark now! As long as you keep calm and keep your head screwed on then you're fine. Oh, and it helps if the kitchen is working well because the only issues come when the guests have to wait a long time for their food really unless YOU make a mistake which you can only blame yourself for... (more on that later)
Thursday I was a PM again, this time in 514. This is an okay section - it's the one I did my test in but it does mean you're KD (kitchen duty). This means you have stay until the last server is done and check all the sidework and sections then be present for the co-ordinator or manager to walk the restaurant so basically you end up being last out. I had a pretty good shift though so it was just a bit tiring staying until the end that's all. I ended up having a 7 top and a 9 top as well so Janet (the assignor) kept me busy!
Friday I was a Mid and it was EMH (ugh). In the morning I was given section 301... also known as Dart Room. It's horrible. I really don't like it because 1) it's inside and 2) it's right next to the bar. In the heat of summer I'm sure it will be a better section but at this time of year people like to sit outside. I also had quite a few annoying guests... the worst was the old lady cast member retiree who, every single time I was near her table, wanted something else. She also didn't speak much english so had to go through her daughter to translate the spanish for me which was a bit tricky. Just when I was trying to take their order, Janet sat me again with a 4-top on 302 and I felt super bad because they were sitting there for like 10 minutes before I could get round to spieling and taking their order. Lucky for me, they were a really nice table and they were on the dining plan so it all worked out well. They even told David on their way out how nice I was and how much they enjoyed having me as their server which was super nice of them :) I ended up telling Janet to cut me as early as she could for my break so that I could hopefully be back in the restaurant for most of dinner service. This is because I would have a better section and earn more money as well plus it would be more convienient for her too. So I eventually went on my break at like 3.30pm and only took about 35 minutes. We theoretically get either 45 minutes or 1 hour depending on the length of our shift but it's up to you if you don't take that amount of time because it means you'll be back on the floor earning more money. If you take your full hour at say, 4pm on a Mid shift then you're basically throwing away $100 potentially so it's up to you really. As long as I get enough time to eat, drink and have a bit of a rest then I'm happy. Because it was EMH it meant it was an extra long day so that was *fun*... I was out in section 510 AGAIN!! The PM part of my shift started well and was all fine until I screwed up and it threw me off... basically, when you put in the order for appetizers you have to keep an eye out for when they're ready because if the food runners are busy with entrees then they won't run your appetizers. Well, I forgot to look out for them so they were sitting there for 10-15 minutes before I remembered and took them out. Well I hadn't put in the entrees order to the computer to that point because if I put it in at the same time as the appetizers then they'd potentially all be ready at the same time which isn't good for the guest obviously! So, I gave them the salad and soup, then put in the entrees. Well, by this point it was like 7.15pm which is one of the busiest times of day for the kitchen and it meant they had to then wait 20-25 minutes for the entrees to be ready so they'd been sitting for an hour by the time they got the entrees... and it was all my fault. I felt really bad because they were complaining about how slow it was (I blamed the kitchen but really it was all my fault). This all piled up on top of me plus I had 3 other tables of course and I had a bit of a mini-breakdown in a corner of the kitchen. Whitney (my manager) found me and was asking if everything was okay but I just needed a minute to de-stress. When you get "in the weeds" (meaning you have too much to do and not enough time to do it in), it takes some time to calm down from it once you're back on track and I just couldn't deal with it. It was the first time I'd been in the weeds so that's why I got upset. Anyway, I was back on track and the table were still nice to me and still tipped me (I wouldn't have blamed them if they'd scuzzed me because it took so long...). The rest of the evening was okay. I essentially had a 3-table section because the family sitting on 510 decided to sit there for over 2 1/4 hours so that they could see the fireworks. It was very annoying because they had 2 kids meals and one adult meal between them and so basically sat from 8-9.15pm without ordering anything and just taking up a table. But there was nothing I could do so there we go... Eventually I got out and after sidework I went home.
On Saturday it was 'my Friday' and I had an AM shift. Whilst there were people who really wanted to ER and give away their PM part of their Mids I was determined to stick to having an AM shift. I was down on lower deck (707) for the first time. I was supposed to have Dart Room again but I swapped with Dougie who didn't want to be outside. It was a great shift!! It gave me faith in AMs because up to that point, I was strongly disliking lunchtimes! My guests (bar one) were all lovely, friendly and alcohol-drinkers! YEAH! So it was very enjoyable. I banked out at around 4.45pm (because I got sat my last table at 3.20pm which sucked!) and then me, Amelia and Emily went to Outback for some early dinner. During the 2 for 1 cocktails, we decided that Cowboys would be an awesome idea so I went home, got ready and then went to Amelia's for pre-drinks. We got Tarik's Taxi to Cowboys and it was really fun!! Got home at about 3am after 25 of us squished back into the taxi home and went to bed.
Yesterday (Sunday) I was off and got up feeling a bit rubbish. Not hungover, just tired... I went to Downtown Disney to get a couple of things (and an Earl of Sandwich!) then Walgreens to buy some ingredients for a cocktail I wanted to make for a birthday party that's coming up and then Walmart for some food. When I was on the way to Walmart, Nick called and said he was bored so he picked me up from Walmart and I went to his where we ate pizza and watched game shows on TV. We both were feeling ill with colds so he dropped me back home at about 10pm and I dosed up on Nyquil and went to bed.
Luckily today I'm feeling a lot better so I went to Panera Bread with Tyler and have spent the afternoon cleaning my apartment for the inspection tomorrow, doing my laundry and updating this blog! Now I'm going to upload some photos to my Facebook and straighten my hair - joy!
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