Better Than I Could Ask

I turned in my Two Weeks' Notice this week. It was pretty weird typing it up, and my general manager hasn't even been in the state to read it, but he already knows I'm leaving, so oh well.
I'm going to miss that job. I really am.
Last night, while I was working in the box office, I nonchalantly included on my facebook status that I was lonely, bored, and desired chocolate.
My friends, of course, went above and beyond the call of duty. Within half an hour of posting that, my lovely BYU best friend talked to one of my friends here in Tmec, which led to him bringing me a gigantic symphony bar 'from Bri'. It was a combined effort. They're both awesome. How many people can say their friends send them chocolate from other timezones?

It didn't end there, though. Maybe half an hour before my shift ended, I see another lovely friend walking up with a grocery bag in hand. Through the ticket window she slides a gallon bag of peanut butter m&ms, a 6 pack of cookies n cream hershey bars, and a bottle of Mountain Dew. (This is my college roommate, so she knows what my grocery trips usually consist of). When my manager comes back in to close my shift, he is astounded by the love of my friends.
"They sent you all this because of your facebook status?"
"Uh huh. I feel so loved."
"You are loved, obviously. It's refreshing to see people care about others that way."
Then followed something about him missing me at work because I'm one of the good workers.
How did I get so lucky? How did I land the most amazing friends in existence? I think, most of all, I'm grateful that I don't have to lose them in two weeks, too. Except for Will...darn. Well, I'll make it work. THANK YOU modern miracle of skype.


vc 2504

Welcome to the World, Inhabitants May Be Unsavory

While working at the theater today, I experienced my first real taste of sexism. Apparently, the head usher at my theater, a man, was quite disgusted to learn that two girls, and only girls in general, were assigned to usher with him. So much so, in fact, that he complained to the manager who makes the schedule. It's true, most of the time, only the guys are scheduled to usher. Not to be oppositely sexist, but simply because there are many more male employees, and the females have better track records with working the registers and customer service. The odds of the only two ushers being girls are actually pretty slim. Honestly, though, the guy already gives me the heebyjeebies. He's always standing a little too close, hovering, looming, smelling of weed or whatever it is he smokes to get high before work. This is one man I really don't like, which is odd, because I like almost everyone. I do not, however, like men ten years my senior throwing popcorn on the ground as I sweep everyone else's trash, and then, after I've swept his mess up, have him joke that he was just trying to see if he could make me angry.
Well bud, mission accomplished. Not like I'll ever let you know that. Why on earth would I give you that satisfaction? So you could blemish my perfect record at this job with an event that you created? No, not at all. I'll just furiously blog about it. Hmm...maybe I'll finally tell him off for being a pig on my last day...

See, even though this guy is head usher, he never really ushers. Our job is to make sure the theater is always clean--focusing on cleaning up after each movie--yet I've never seen him walk into a theater with broom in hand. Liz and I cleaned over twenty theaters today, supposedly while under his direction, without him ever setting foot in the theater. Except, of course, the one time he decides to grace us with his presence, only to tell us with the cockiest smirk ever that we left one armrest down. Although, because he does creep me out a bit, I was kind of glad that he mostly ignored me today. Except, of course, when we got into a (calm) dispute that ended with me taking a step back, and acquiescing that we'd do it his way, hinting as strongly as I could that I was only giving in because he's technically my superior and I don't argue...or yell...in public. Because this makes me so angry, here's a diagram:

Many guests who come through the front door don't always see the ticket podium across the lobby. Without that rope barrier, many (especially those coming from the restroom) try to go straight to theater 10, without passing the podium first. If they don't pass the podium, I can't tear (and therefore have tangible record of) their ticket. Head Usher decided today to take down the rope barrier, citing that when the guests leave, they'd have to go all the way around it. I told him that many will try to not go around to get to the screen. Apparently, if that's the case, I must have been doing my job wrong yesterday, if I let them get all the way over there without stopping them and tearing their tickets. Because I can totally leave the podium, ignore the line of twenty people, and run across the lobby to stop one person. You're right, it's much less logical to simply direct them my way first with handy barriers.
Luckily for me, my managers don't like the guy either, and are aware of the problems he causes. They periodically checked on me throughout the day to make sure I was ok, and to help where they could. I guess that makes two cases in the past two days where the head usher has tried to write me up with the managers. Yesterday's cause was equally ridiculous, and each time, the managers have listened to him, then come to tell me that I managed to tick him off again, and that they were refusing his write-up requests on grounds of ridiculousness. Instead, I'm to avoid him where I can, and talk to the managers if I have more problems with him. I'm just waiting for him to tell my general manager that I'm insubordinate. My GM really likes me, and openly says so, but if head pig gives him a bad report and my other managers aren't there to counteract it, I could seriously lose my credibility with the GM.
That man is the one problem I have with my job, but I shouldn't feel so intimidated by my coworkers. I think I might just ask my manager to not schedule me when he's in.
Any other suggestions? What do you think I should do?

All Jammed Up

Listening to: the mismatched ticking of two clocks, but Rhythm of Love is stuck in my head.

Another post from the beautiful city of T-mec, where temperatures can reach eighty degrees in the dead of winter. Life has been going well, lately. So well, in fact, and just well, that lately 'keep on keepin' on' is a phrase that finds it's way into my mind at least once a day. Life at the theater is ever-changing, and it's dynamics are sometimes a little tough to swallow, but I like it. There's never a completely dull day, at least. My managers like me, are trusting me with more responsibilities, and each day I work makes me want to leave it less and less, but I only have thirty-nine days left in T-mec. (No, I'm not counting, I just checked it because I wanted to see how close moving day really is.)

For the record, I'm not ready to move again. I was really hoping to get more of my future plans worked out during my semester off. To top it off, I just learned that I'm technically (credits-wise) going to start my sophomore year this semester. Normally that'd be cool, but BYU-I has a credits cap--if I don't have my degree by a certain point, my enrollment will be terminated. Oh, did you hear that? That sound just over my head? That, my friends, is the whip being cracked, and it just scared the living daylights out of me. On top of all the educational deadlines that need to be met, it's officially time to start getting ready to pack up again. Yes, I did mean 'start getting ready'. It's like planning to make a plan--it's what we crazy people do. It really just involves picking through my things, deciding what I need and what I don't, stocking up on everything, maybe picking out a few new blouses and skirts, things like that.

I'm officially at a loss between my lives. I have a school life, and a home life. Which one is real life?