Strange Days

I hung out all night with Alex yesterday. We where going to go to the casino in Elgin, but a sudden snow fall put the kibash on those plans. Alex has this wierd phobia of driving when its snowing out, even if shes not the one driving. So we ended up at the Lake St Denny's (LSD for those from around these parts) drinking coffee and talking. I even managed to get her to come over here afterwards since the P's are out of town. She doesn't like to meet parents nor does she like people to meet her's? Well she messed with my PC and installed AOL instant messanger, even after my persistant "get away from my computer, I dont want that shit on there, ok you suck!" Well after that it was time for her to go! Seeing how we both had to be at work at 4pm I made her promise to call me at 3pm to make sure I was awake.

Well Alex screwed up the plan, and called and woke me up ast 2:30pm. which was cool that she called, but I promptly answered my phone, hung up and went back to sleep. not to fear I reawoke at 3:40Pm, with enough time to shower shave and speed to work. all that rushing was in vein because, the wise managers had changed the schedule without telling anyone. So I didn't have to work untill 5pm. No big loss, I just ordered some food and chilled till my start time.

As it would turn out today would be the day that we would be visited by none other than the VP of Lone Star and our new District Manager (RM). Our store, is no longer apart of the northern chicago district, instead we were swaped out with the Aroura store, and are now apart of the southern Chicago district? why would a nothern store be swapped out with a clearly southern store? Acording to the wisdom of the higher ups it looks better, if the southern district gets a boost in their overall sales from a store with stronger sales, showing an increse in profits for that district. While the lower sales grossing southern store really doesn't effect the stronger northern district. Make sense? Well thats how buisiness works.

Now most people might be a little shigh of meeting some one as important as The VP of the corperation! Well not everyone has known the VP as long as I have. You see the VP is Ryan Franklin, I just know him as Ryan. Ryan started his career at Lonestar as a manager. He quickly worked his way up to general manager (GM) where he ratted out his best friend at the time, who was the district manager, for drug use and embesslement. Ryan there by was promoted to the new DM. I joined the company around this time 6 very long years ago. From DM, Ryan was promoted to regional manager (RM) thanks to his revolutionary concept of the 12 steps to service and what he named 2-3-1-1! This concept was implamented nation wide, not bad, but its a shame he stole it from one of his underlings! From there he was promoted to something else and the made his way to Regional Vice President!

From what I said about the man you might think he's a cut throat prick. This couldn't be farther from the truth. In actuallity Ryan is probably the nicest guy who works for the whole corperation. From the first time I met him, he learned my name and never forgot it. He has this thing where he goes out of his way to learn and remember all those that work for him, even miniscule servers! At least when he was DM, seeing how he looks over some 100+ stores now, I don't know if he still practices this, but still he's never forgoten my name. I can't say that for some of the 7+ GM's and countless other managers I've survived! Anyways I alwas admired that quallity and he was always there to settle conflicts between managers and servers. So he worked hard and got to the top. If you scroll down loestars webpage in tiny print youll see his name towards the bottom http://www.lonestarsteakhouse.com/Directors.asp

Why give all this backstory? Well its an effort to add some light to our conversation.

Ryan struts in with the new DM and the manergers scramble about in a tizzy. I of course am like, what ever, becuase I've seen this countless times before with countless other managers. So after a while of walking about the resturant and Im sure not seeing to many familar faces Ryan comes over to the bar to talk to me.

"Hay Francis how you doing?"

"Ah not much, you know, the same old shit."
Most would be like oooooohhhh you cant talk to the VP like that (me making a hand stroking motion)

Ryan continues talking
"No that cant be all? how are things around here?"

"Nothing really new to talk about, heard you got a promotion?"
Of course I already new this but was making small talk and figured the best way to get the ball rolling was to get him to talk about himself."

"yeah, I'm the Regional Vice President!"

"Nice, hows that treating you?

"Good, Good, the companys been real good to me. Although living in Kansas sucks, not a lot to do out there and I have to travle all the time. Working a lot of hours flying back and forth.

"Naw you couldn't be working that much"

"I put a lot more hours in than you."

"I don't know, do you get 2 days off a week?"

Ryan then laughs this off turning the conversation back on me.

"So Ive been doing some digging and saw that you've worked here for 6 years!"

Befuttled as to where he was going with this
"Wow, has it been that long, I need to find a new job."
I now laughed this one off

Ryan returns with
"I've worked with the company for 11 years!"

Now I didn't quite know what this was all about, I mean why was he bringing this up. Lets do the math. Ryan+11 years= VP! Me+ 6 years= low man on todam pole who is still just a server/bartender :(
the only thing I could think of
"So Ryan can you find a job for me? I have a degree but I don't really know what I want to do yet."

"You have a degree, in what?"

Trying to play off that its just an associates, in hopes of a promising answer I simple put
"It's a Liberall Arts Degree."

Ryan didn't respond to this instead he came back with some more banter, that was short lived. I then pretended like I had something to do and walked away.

Well it was worth a try, I believe they call this networking, but I probably aproached it the wrong way, but you never know becuase I made an impression, although on second thought probably not a good one. Ahh what the hell do I care, I hate this company and everything about it! Whats the best they can offer me anyways? A shity managers posistion that I can rot in. Our manager turnover is like 2 a year. GM's tend to last a year and a half! Rite now we're under a massive server turn over loosing 3 people a week. we only have a staff of 20. These numbers should tell you about the kind of conditions and the people I work with.

I know this is a long post, but I have one last thing to mention. I met a girl today, well kinda. This girl I work with Tara, had a couple of her freinds from Elmhurst College come in and eat. Well I was joking with the other bartender which led to me asking one of Tara's freinds if she (cough cough) Wanted to take a ride on the Franswiggidy Wagon! The answer turned out to be a maybe and led to some diggits. God is that what woman respond to, crappy pick up lines? Sure it was funny to me, but other people? and who takes that seriously? The girls pretty/kinda cute, in a bizaro nerdy sort of way, but it starts to fall apart down stairs. I don't know if I'll even call her, I'm bad in that part. Talking to chicks I don't know. I mean what are you supposed to talk about, the crap I write about on here? So much Anxiety surounds me when it comes to the opposite sex. Can't say I had much of a role modle in that area, seeing how my.....Frank isn't one to talk about in that arena. But Valentines day is comeing up, so maybe as opposed to being alone, I should call her. If nothing comes of it its still nice to broaden my freind circle. maybe I should have gone into more detail about this story as opposed to the novel I wrote on The VP?