Tomatoes

From my experience, if you're running a business you should be catering to what your customers want so you can keep them wanting to return for more, correct? If you have frustrated customers they start becoming irate and many times consider never coming back to your establishment again. Where I worked this didn't seem to be the case because people would keep returning even though they would obviously come in, become irritated, and then many times leave. The food must have been drugged or something. One of the main reasons they would become irritated though is. . .

 We were always out of supplies at this store. The common things to run out were lettuce and tomatoes. Now I can understand those sorta things will run out rather quickly in food service, but we had times where there were literally three days before we would get any more in. Many times we would take our own money to head next door to the grocery store to buy it ourselves so we wouldn't have to keep losing customers. As for the owner, I(actually 'we' since other employees shared my sentiments) don't think he cared about his customers and could care less if they were angry.

Ironically one day when I worked at the restaurant the owner would work in I told him customers that would step into the other shop would become mad and irritated because we were always out of supplies or because it was under staffed. He said that wasn't true and that it was fine. Soon after saying this two customers walked into the store we were working at. I made their meals and when they were done they expressed their gratitude for it being so good compared to any other sub shop they had been to from the same franchise. Of course the owner mentioned his other store that I usually worked at, to which the couple replied, "Is that the one by the mall? Everyone there always seems angry and they're always out of stuff!" I looked at the owner and he said they probably just got somebody who was in a bad mood that day. That's fine, stay in your oblivious mental state.

Mischief

Sometimes goofy things happened on the job.

Poor Frank. Interesting fact about that fridge/freezer - the door rarely actually shut. You'd end up with ice all over everything and then the ice would form around the door itself not allowing you to close it at all.

Behind the Shop

When you watch a movie that happens to be based in a larger city, bad things tend to happen in alleyways or behind buildings. Or at least that's something I've noticed. So when you think about the backside of a business or those long, creepy walkways to get to the dumptster, your instincts tend to tell you that bad things are about.

I was lucky enough to never run into any of the bums. Everyone who worked there tried to take the garbage out before the sun went down, and if they didn't take it out before then all of it would be put into the shopping cart and be thrown into the dumpster the next morning.

What a Mess

Have you ever been able to look at a person, just LOOK at a person, and tell how their personality would be and that you more than likely wouldn't enjoy trying to get along with them? I've run into quite a few people I knew would rub me the wrong way just by looking at them. At this job there was this one employee who eminated negativity and had an absolutely horrible attitude. His appearance made me think he could be related to the mayor in the movie O Brother Where Art Thou. You know, a foul mouthed southerner who smokes too much. The most annoying thing about him though. . .

was that he was lazy. Even though this job was horrible, made me sick, and ultimately led to me not working there ever again, I worked hard. Most of us worked hard, except for him. I was also told he would steal money, take everyone's tips when they weren't looking, and in general he was a pain to deal with. There is one more memorable annoyance relating to this individual, but that will wait for another comic.

Cheese Fries

I consider myself a bit of a adventurer when it comes to food. If I see something that looks entirely unusual and yet somehow exceptionally appetizing I'll feel inclined to try it. While working at the sub shop one night, my co-worker, Kat as she'll be known, told me how to make cheese fries because she enjoyed them. Now when I thought of cheese fries I assumed it would be like the kinds you buy at carnivals -- cheddar cheese smothered, overly soggy, and somehow stomach churning delicious.

I was strangely surprised to find out they were made with mozzerela and bacon if you wanted. Why had I never heard about this before? After perusing menus at local pizza places I found this is a really common way to make cheese fries. I lived in New York for almost six years and I had never even heard of a pizza/sandwich restaurant making cheese fries. If you ordered fries it came with ketchup, ranch dressing, or whatever dipping sauce was your fancy. Needless to say, cheese fries made this way is now on the top of my list for awesome foods.

The Sign Isn't Lying

Do you ever have those times when you're looking at an advertisement in the paper or on one of those obnoxious coupon websites and you somehow know "Wow, that's way too good to be true", then to your surprise after reading the fine print you realize it is too good to be true? I hate when that happens as well. In the case of where I worked though the ads they had, on the wall, in bold face, obnoxious yellow text were very easy to understand. They weren't all sales either(most sales were on the whiteboard), but merely pointed out what extra additions you could include with your meal to save a few cents on extra delights. You know, combos.

 I'm still lost when I try to understand what on earth she was talking about. It was obvious from the sign on the wall what extra fees were included to turn it into a combo meal. Most other fast food restaurants have combos, but they're numbered and show what you can get. Was it that hard for her to understand that we normally sold sandwiches by themselves and you had to pay extra for your drink and chips or fries? Maybe she was ignorant. Perhaps she was cheap? Or perhaps she was trying to get extra free food. I'm going to go with the latter assumptions. Luckily this only happened one time, and to be honest, she wasn't quite this obnoxious. Frank's(the manager screaming) frustration due to this would have made you feel she acted that way though, so it's fitting.

Flirts

With most jobs I've worked there has been the occasional flirt or two. That's fine, it's nice knowing that I'm appealing to some people and that they found me to be charming. What annoys me more than a regular flirt though is a flirtatious individual who uses their so called charm in an attempt to acquire higher services or swag.

Am I going to pay for it? I really thought she had to be joking. With how much I was being paid to work here it would have taken about two hours of work to pay for her detestably flavored sandwiches. And if you're able to even afford to acquire a grill to supposedly beautify yourself as you consume your nutrionally void victuals, then you should be quite wealthy enough to pay for the lovely, soggy sandwiches. Needless to say, her attempt at alluring me with her teeth that would make a pirate jealous was ineffective on myself. Now if you'll excuse me I need to go brush my teeth.

The Kitchen

One of the more aggravating things I had to deal with at this job was that at the main store I worked at(Which is ironically NOT the store I applied for) we had to do any form of food preparation on this table that was barely a meter wide. Of course the owner thought it was a great thing because then the customers could watch us make their food, sorta like how Subway is set up. That is a great concept, exlcuding the fact that Subway has an entire walkway to do all their preparation. With this place there was barely enough space for one person to take orders and another person to prepare food.

From what I was told, the main, larger table that had a larger fridge and also held all the bread above it had been broken for a long time. Why hadn't it been fixed? Probably because the owner of this store never actually worked at this place and didn't even like it.

Subshop - Interview

The last job I had was working for a poorly managed sandwich shop. I wasn't exactly there for very long, yet the amount of experience I gathered while working there was interesting and amusing enough to create a short comic set from it. As with all jobs the first thing you have to do is go to an interview, which is what my first comic is about.

All of this actually happened. She also informed me that the owner of the place didn't want to interview the people because he didn't want to be biased over who he was hiring. That's the whole point of being an owner though, at least that's what I've assumed? You hire individuals you feel will be proper workers at your establishment? I suppose I'll never understand why some people are like that. Back to talking about the interview though. It wasn't till two weeks later that I was called and asked if I was still interested in the job. Probably one of the bad signs I should've recognized sooner was that on the phone I was asked if I still wanted the job in a "Are you like, still looking for a job? Gosh" manner. Of course I was desperate and I said I was still interested.

On the first day of the job I found out why it wasn't till two weeks later that I was asked if I still wanted the job. The other applicant who was there the same night as myself was given the job first. Now I don't want to sound cruel, but when I was there I could have told you the woman was a bit,   oh. . . crazy? At least that's what my first impressions were after seeing her and listening to her speak. It turns out she was crazy, so much in fact that she didn't follow anything they said, she worked only two days, and then she supposedly threatened the owner to pay her in cash for those two days of work because she was suddenly getting married and moving to Pennsylvania. So wow, I don't know what to say about all of that, yet after writing and drawing out these comics I'm thinking that maybe she was actually the smart one and dashed out of this place as soon as she could. As these comics unfold I guess you'll be able to formulate your own opinion regarding that.