Owl. She/Her. 20’s. STAR WARS SIDEBLOG: @twilightofthe (don’t go there if ur gonna clown 💋) Currently really into: Tolkien's works, so if you're a Tolkien blog and I follow u I mean no harm and am probs gonna set up a sideblog for the content. Loves: Bad Jokes/Sh*tposts, owls, anything sugary, and writing. Obsessed with early-2000's cartoons. Major Star Wars Nerd. I’m kinda getting into anime? Always reads the tags. Capslock addict. *profile pic by @inkedinred
finally reading the fma manga and ed is the protagonist of all time. he’s the softest lil guy. he’s a rabid raccoon. he is the scourge of the military. everyone wants to adopt him. he’s a pacifist. he bites. he gets giddily happy at the birth of a child. his speech is punctuated with sarcastic hearts. he’s a generational talent. he will walk directly into a trap eyes open head empty. he is a foul mouthed little rat. he makes friends everywhere he goes. he’ll dig up any grave and turn over any stone and kick anyone’s ass to get his brother back. he refuses to believe his brother cares about him the same way. he makes this face:
When deciding who to work for there is a sliding scale of employers that goes from lil mom and pop shops up to corporate monoliths. I have worked at both ends of the spectrum and I can pretty definitively say that tiny businesses are hands down the most insane employers.
The sweet spot is a place that has like 10-20 stores; that’s the best possible work environment. They’ll be polished enough to have protocols that make work structured, but not so bogged down with bureaucracy that nothing can ever get done.
This story is not from that sweet spot. This story is from my time working at Oil and Vinegar. Now, like many little franchise stores, the idea was solid. There was on tap imported olive oil and vinegar and it was really delicious. Top shelf. Unfortunately, each location was like the Wild West because owners varied wildly.
My owner was the human embodiment of Mr. Krabbs. His eyes were just constant dollar signs. Throughout my training he informed me of the price of every single piece of equipment I touched and how much it cost to replace it.
He had cameras set up to watch us, and an app on his phone to access the live feed. He’d call us to ask what we were doing when he’d just checked a camera to make sure we were being honest.
Now, the trouble was he had two locations. His location further south did amazing. It was way more centrally located and got three times the foot traffic. The one I worked in was in the snottiest mall possible in Arizona and consequently the rent was through the roof.
It was not going well for my store. We didn’t get as much traffic, so there was only so much I could do in a day. I could dust, sweep, and wait for customers. I read a lot and was frank when he called to interrogate me. I always asked for additional tasks but he never had any. What could I do to prop up a failing business?
But this man was convinced there was some Secret Reason that the store I was in was doing worse. He crunched numbers, looked at staff, and eventually hit upon the most insane possible solution.
We used too much toilet paper.
We were probably stealing toilet paper! Bleeding him dry one single ply square at a time! How dare we need to use the bathroom?! His south location used half as much toilet paper as we did, we must be thieving little monsters!!!!
Friends. The south location was populated entirely by men. My location had three people on staff who had to sit to pee. It was so blindly transparently the source of the discrepancy but this man was convinced we were making off with toilet paper to bankrupt him.
So he implemented what he believed to be an entirely reasonable response to this base treachery. We were allowed to have one roll of toilet paper. At any given time, one roll was permitted to us. This was so transparently unhinged that we protested but he insisted. If we were low on toilet paper we needed to call him to drop off a roll that he brought from his home. Smiling jovially, he assured us he lived so close by that it would be no problem!
When we needed to call him often for more he started tearing his hair out. What were we using toilet paper for?! Why wasn’t his genius plan to stop our scandalous waste working??!
Finally, the manager, the only man on staff had to pull the owner aside and be like, “Look, man, their bladders are smaller. They need to wipe every time they pee. They need to pee even more on their period. Is this really the hill you want to die on?”
Yes. It was. The manager was fired unrelated reasons and denounced as a traitor. The toilet paper ration lasted until I quit and probably until the store closed six months later.
Worked at a big trucking plant that made canopies for cars that shipped all over the US and in Canada and then worked at a tiny art gallery. I went from both sides of the spectrum in a fucking rocket ship
Read more for bullshit jobs
Big Trucking corp (I was data entry making 17/hr even though I was working many jobs it should have been more during the fucking pandemic :) I left after a year):
Was working Tue-Sat bc the truckers left on sunday but there were only myself and one other person finishing up the paperwork on saturday for the truckers to take to the dealers BC EVERYONE ELSE BUT THE PRODUCTION WORKERS WORKED MON-FRI
so if some dumbass entered something wrong we were screwed bc they never picked up their phones
plus we had the bulk of our papers (me data entering and my associate finishing up and printing out the payment forms) on Saturday that we would stay until 11pm (until I got faster and even still it was killing me and her but she was use to it)
EVERYONE I mean everyone complained and hated their job. It really kills your soul that no one at least liked their work lol and yea sure you don't have to love your work but every time I talked to anyone it was to bitch about their job (and I did also bc that type of environment how can you not but also my job sucked ass)
Was told to come in on Sunday if I didn't finish (this was the deciding factor of me leaving into the other side of hell...) but also there was one time I was so stressed that while at work I couldn't move my body for like....10 minutes...it was scary
HR lady got mad at me for doing too much overtime so I said, "well...I wouldn't do that if we got an extra pair of hands...how is the search going?" HR Lady: "oh it's a lengthy process haha just try to not go over time haha" ...lady...
We finally got our extra pair of hands and it was bliss! We finished on time and it was nice for a couple of months until someone quit without 2 weeks (don't blame them) and production manager came up to me and said "want a promotion?" I stopped bc I was suspicious like you and HR lady didn't want to give me 20/hr but now I get a promotion what's the deal? Well he wanted to see if I wanted that other person's job. I told him I rather stay in my position (bc something stunk about the whole thing). WELL my boss comes in a day later all pissed off and I asked what's up, and he said "THEY WANNA STEAL YOU AWAY FROM ME!" (Sounds creepy lol but he was actually the only hard working manager in the whole fucking place and I had a lot of respect for him) but basically how I got the job is that the last person left and he was doing his job and mine and he threaten them "if you don't find someone soon, I'll quit" and bc he's an amazing manager they didn't wan to lose him (in comes me then). So he was like "I said I'll quit if we go back to square one" BUT BUT BUT he looked at me (I already told him I turned it down bc something felt off) and he said "Good call bc he was saying that you would do this job AND that job to appease me! I told him that wasn't possible and he was bullshitting me of course" So my instincts were correct lol
BUT THEN HE ASK OUR NEW HELP AND OF COURSE THE NEW GUY AGREES AND WE LOSE OUR HELP WITH THE FINAL PROCESS AND THAT WAS ALSO THE LAST STRAW
There was more but that's a good portion of it. Hate that place, but I miss my old boss he was a real one that was being jerked around also
Small art gallery (Took a pay cut of 16/hr and part time but I thought "I'll be working in my field of study and maybe I can start my PhD etc):
First day I stood outside the fucking building for 30 minutes while the gallery manager just fucked around and ignored me bc it wasn't time to open but I was told to come in early to shadow her (so the bosses didn't fucking tell her so she thought I was just some rando waving at her and waiting to open but also why didn't you come and see what I fucking wanted???)
So I shadow her a few days and then she had to step down due to her husband needing a heart transplant and that's all good good for them BUT THEN I GET PROMOTED AND IM SUPER GREEN?!
I'm gallery manager/director/cashier/cleaner etc all for fucking minimum wage and "part-time but not really part-time" :') so no health insurance
So I'm thrown to the wolves trying my best and I survive the year and I thought I did well for being what I had to work with (basically on my own bullshitting everything bc there was no direction whatsoever.
So Manager comes back and despite having a higher title she resumes more of the responsibilities (which ok fine) but didn't teach me ANYTHING so I'm like...back to square one???
No communication whatsoever, the teachers didn't know what was going one, I didn't, only the manager (like 90% of the time) and owners knew what they wanted and they did not communicate it clearly but would bitch and gossip with each other with how incompetent ppl were??? and I was there standing like "uhhhhhh" it was weird high school behavior (well one didn't participate but she was in the same boat like "uhhhh Im sure they are doing their best" I like her.
Anyways, nothing is progressing bc their is not action plan for anyone just the random fucking "quick money" skims such as a subscription based art???thing? They were explaining to me and I sat there like "no one will realistically buy this shit...on a subscription base model." But can't tell them that nooooo so I had to bite my tongue and go "omg such a great idea!" and then I had to sell it.
There's a lot but that's the most of it but so after manager comes back and I'm burnt the fuck out I thought "let me request time off for a week and then come back refresh maybe that will help" and dammit I deserved it!
Well I go on vacation (something I hadn't done in years not only bc of COVID but just being poor...I was still poor but I made it work) and I come back on the day we were gonna have a staff meeting. I arrive and I thought I was early bc no one else was there...well they sat me down and laid me off...RIGHT after coming back from vacation. :)
I was livid and crushed bc I had NEVER been laid off.
So I leave and I just shut the place out my mind bc fuck all that noise and they stay open only a year longer before closing down :)))) and I heard one of the owners (the one that owned more of the business) burned a lot of bridges.
BONUS: I'm working my dream career after 1.5 years unemployed and feeling worthless but I work with one of the owners (the nice one)...and I asked her to go to coffee in the future...I'm kinda curious on what she has to say lol
I forgot when I wrote my addition but I ran into one of the old owners (the one I like) and she told me that basically the manager was stealing from them for years... so yea I knew something was up with that bitch!
Ppl will step on your neck esp if they think you're gonna find out you were stealing.
im posting this here despite the website being extremely white centered, I want people to understand how in this country it's basically ok to murder and victimize black people, especially women and children in the name of "self defense" and white America will reward you for your antiblackness.
The headlines of the two articles don't really convey how fucking horrible this was. To anyone scrolling by who wasn't going to click on the links, here is a short summary:
The store owner got his gun out, and he and his son started chasing the 14-year-old boy, because they FALSELY believed he stole FOUR BOTTLES OF WATER.
The boy who was being CHASED WITH A GUN FOR NO REASON did carry a gun, and it would have been very much justified to actually take it out (because he feared for his life since he was being CHASED WITH A GUN FOR NO REASON), but witnesses never saw it in his hands, and at no point did he actually point it at his two pursuers. He had his back towards them the entire time because he was FLEEING.
The kid stumbled and fell, dropping his gun in the process. The gun was only ever seen on the ground next to his body, it probably fell from his waistband or pocket or whatever, not his hands. And since it was dropped, he did not have it on him AT ALL when he was murdered. He was SHOT IN THE BACK WHILE LYING UNARMED ON THE GROUND.
The sheriff's report written in 2023 said that this was "not a bias-motivated incident" even though there is literally zero ambiguity that this man was just itching to shoot a Black kid. There is no other explanation for why you would take your gun out and chase him more than 100 yards over a vague, weak, unfounded suspicion that he might have stolen four (4) bottles of water. In and of itself, the train of thought "this Black kid was holding four bottles of water at some point, and now he's leaving the store, clearly there's no chance that he simply put them back, he must have stolen them" is already racist as hell. But the cops say "well there's absolutely no indication that shooting an unarmed 14-year-old Black boy because you falsely suspected him of stealing a few dollars worth of water was motivated by bias" because of fucking course they do.
The murderer was found "not guilty" because the self-defence reasoning was accepted even though multiple witnesses confirmed that the kid did not have a gun out as he was running from the store, and definitely did not point it at his pursuers at any point. If anything, the kid would have been the person for whom self-defence would have been justified since he was the one being actively chased with a gun.
not every mutual fits neatly into an archetypal medievalism but there are some mutuals that im like yeah addressing you as “my liege” would come strangely naturally
I think it's funny world-building how like, so at the center of Life we've got Water. Arguably The most important resource. Colorless transparent substance that molds to any container and we die without it and quickly. And all organic functions of society hinge on its availability. Could fight a ton of wars over this thing.
And well beyond organic life, modern society's great human invention is the Electronic Magic. Our greatest minds invented the Electronic Magic and it sends information around the world instantly. Our infrastructure our economy our modern life, minute by minute by minute, hinges on utilizing the great Lighting Technology.
BUT ☝️☝️☝️☝️☝️☝️ DO NOT. DO NOT EVER. get the magical Elixir Substance of Life and Living and Healing, Water, IN the Electronic Device. The water keeps you alive critically but it KILLS the Electronic Device instantly and catastrophically. This Says something.
I see your “Rocky swears like a sailor but only in pitches humans can’t hear/refuses to teach Grace what those words mean” and raise you “Rocky swears like a sailor and now has to explain to Grace that ‘bad bad bad’ isn’t actually a sequence you play on your Eridian speech piano in polite company.”
Grace is both horrified and amused to realise that a more accurate translation for what Rocky’s been saying is “shit shit shit”.
when brandon sanderson talks about villains in his famous free youtube writing class video lectures he'll say 'what's the difference between gollum and sauron' and of course he means the villain that's present in the narrative and characterized in a way the audience can potentially relate to or sympathize with vs. the looming threatening anonymous far-off force (among other things). but every time he asks that i think 'well one of those guys tracked down frodo and got his ring back'
well of course beluga has a skull!! that's just not where it is.
see, you wouldn't necessarily pick up on this, but beluga skulls (and most cetacean skulls in general) are pretty much
flat...
so what's going on up there? well, most of the beluga's head is taken up by soft tissue and a large organ called the melon, which is basically a big ol waterballoon of semiliquid fat!
(boob. it's a head boob.)
this organ is found in every toothed whale and dolphin species on the planet and it's INCREDIBLY important, because the melon is what lets them echolocate!
the actual sound-producing organ is inside their nasal passage of all places, which sits up behind there, but the melon is what's actually used to fine-tune the soundwaves into the laser-accurate pinpoints that dolphins and toothed whales are so famous for.
tldr: without their head boob, belugas and their relatives would be literally flying blind!
@weirdgirlwambsgans @vampire-juicebox you guys are in luck bc it does not! Belugas will squish their melons voluntarily against things like rocks and glass. Think of it like when you squish your butt (but at the same time not, bc they have no nerve endings beyond the skin) they even voluntarily let humans play with it!
This is a strong creature, if that hurt or bothered it, you would know
Context: I've worked with her for 3 years now, and for the first two, we got along okay. However, I have seen be her rude/mean to several people. (i.e. talking behind their backs, saying rude things to them in front of students). While working with her this year, she has texted me on my personal phone and was extremely rude (claiming I wasn't doing my job and it was my fault if test scores were low this year). I ended up blocking her.
Now she's pregnant and my mom says I should get her something for her baby shower because the gift isn't for my coworker, but for her baby
Yes
No
Nuance
Should I give my coworker a baby gift?
yes
no
nuance
Remaining time: 5 days 21 hours
Context: I've worked with her for 3 years now, and for the first two, we got along okay. However, I have seen be her rude/mean to several people. (i.e. talking behind their backs, saying rude things to them in front of students). While working with her this year, she has texted me on my personal phone and was extremely rude (claiming I wasn't doing my job and it was my fault if test scores were low this year). I ended up blocking her.
Now she's pregnant and my mom says I should get her something for her baby shower because the gift isn't for my coworker, but for her baby
I just wanted to add this quote from the peppermint patty peanuts wiki page about Charles M. Schulz and his relationship with his gay cousin. The source here leads to a book that I did not read but the original source is Schulz's wife who confirmed this in an interview. If I can find the interview again I will link it here but uh. just in case someone tries to claim Schulz was a homophobe on this post again.
Every day I handle more money than I will ever make. Every day.
At the start of my employment, my boss showed me videos of people stealing, and we both had a chuckle about it. How silly they were! There was a camera overhead, and it’s not to watch the shoppers. See, we can’t actually stop shoplifters. They get away with it maybe nine out of ten times. But we, who are watched and tallied and witnessed? We are always caught.
At first it was hard to hold one hundred dollars bills. An amount I had never seen before. An amount that didn’t exist in my household. It’s normal now. Here is something that is not for me.
“What the hell, I’ll take another,” says the man, pondering our 200 dollar watches. What the hell. Total comes to 580 and not even a flinch in his face. I have been working for 11 hours today and made only 110 dollars. It will go to my rent. Today I work for free, it feels. When I get my check, I will have 35 dollars left for food and saving.
The six hundreds he hands me go into the cash register. For a moment, I imagine having money. Then I put it away, counting out his change.
I know for a fact we sell our products for double what they are worth. That I could be making commission. That they could hand me those 580 dollars and change my life and not even mark the difference in their checkbooks. He’s not the only sale they make today, but I am the reason they made it. He’s not the only one spending 600 dollars, but if I hadn’t spent two hours with him telling me about his life, he wouldn’t have spent any. I go home. I don’t own a watch.
I have watched and rewatched a video on how to make salmon four ways. My shopping list is always the same. Pasta. Rice. Tuna. If I can afford butter it was a good week. I dream of the world I will never walk in, where I can throw the best fish fillet in the cart with a shrug. I hold hundreds in my hand and look up at the camera. I put them under the cash drawer.
I go to work. I scrap together my savings. I eat my bowl of rice slowly. My manager takes a paid week off from work just for his birthday. He owns a yacht.
i wrote this while i was working at orlando’s walt disney world parks.
i was part of their college program. i moved to the state for it. they legally owned the building i was living in and still charged me rent. i ostensibly was being charged to work for them. it was a 2 bedroom apartment and they placed 6 adult women in it in forced triples.
as many as one in ten disney employees have experienced homelessness while working for the company. despite huge efforts to unionize, strike, or otherwise demand fair treatment; disney has refused to increase employee quality of life.
disney admits publicly that a good portion of their success is because the employees (“cast members”) are dedicated, passionate, and selfless. this is never reflected in pay. even “face” characters (ie those that are princesses etc) make barely above a minimum wage.
at the time that i worked there, i made $8.50 an hour. at one point i was asked to create a human shield around a bag because a bomb dog had alerted to it. for eight fucking dollars an hour.
i now work a very cushy office job. i have bought the salmon and cooked it all four ways.
i go to the store. i am nice to the person behind the counter. she looks up at the camera while she counts out my change. there is nothing fundamentally different about her and i.
