7:00 pm Thursday--As it goes every night, I checked my work voicemail to see if I was scheduled to work today. I was, but only for four hours. Four hours? No problem! Fridays usually aren't very busy. All I had to do was wait for the sales rep to call me with the stores and times, and I would be all set. I'd get an early start so that I'd have the whole day to enjoy myself before my parents came home Saturday.
9:30 pm--After spending a great deal of time contemplating why in the world Beth, the sales rep, hadn't yet called me, I listened to my original message again and realized my manager's assistant who left the message hadn't given Beth my Kraft voicemail number. I looked up Beth's voicemail and left her a message with mine.
12:00 am Friday--I had wanted to be in bed for the past two hours. Unfortunately, still no call from Beth. I checked my voicemail obsessively. Finally, giving up, I went to sleep only to wake up at 1:30 and check voicemail again.
5:01 am--My phone vibrated on my bed next to me. Why is my alarm on vibrate? Oh well, at least it's far less annoying than the little song it normally plays. I typically don't get up at 5 for work, though on occasion I have. Today, though, since I didn't know exactly what was going on, I wanted to be prepared for whenever I had to leave the house--I had never worked with Beth before, but I heard from other merchandisers that she likes to start really early. Voicemail again--nothing.
6:00 am--I got ready for work slowly, checking my voicemail at least three times within the hours. My lack of knowledge as to what was happening plus Winston's incessant whining that spurred my constant response of "It's NOT time to eat yet!" plus the effects of my caffeine detox left me nearly wanting to scream.
6:12 am--while sitting at the kitchen table wrapped in a fleece blanket and eating my nutritious, high-fiber cereal, I breathed an enormous sigh of relief when I heard, "You have one new message." Two stores, no specific times. Sounds great.
6:35 am--I left my house, equipped with Aveda tea, and ready to enjoy my drive to the first store.
7:00 am--I arrived at store #1.
8:35 am--Work went smoothly, but then I sat in traffic, taking 17 minutes to go less than two miles. I love Illinois.
9:10 am--After a long and frustrating drive, I pulled up to store #2: Walmart. The delivery wasn't schedule till 9:45, though. There was some backstock that needed to be put on the shelves, but I still had extra time, so I took a detour to Starbucks that resulted in a free green tea frappuccino. Yes, it kind of broke my "no caffeine" rule for the week, but by that point I really needed something more than ibuprofen to deal with my headache. Since I didn't have time to finish it I wanted to put it in my travel mug, but I had a little bit of tea left in it. I poured the rest of the tea out onto the parking lot, then giggled when it really looked like someone had peed next to my car.
9:30 am--I entered Walmart and just as I started backstock, Dan, another merchandiser, appeared to help me.
10:20 am--With backstock finished, I embarked on a hunt for our shipment, which, as I discovered, hadn't arrived.
10:25 am--Both Dan and I checked our voicemail to see if Beth had left either of us a message about the shipment's late arrival. Nothing.
10:30 am--We wander into the back room to double check and see if anything new had come in the past ten minutes.
10:35 am--Finally! It's here! Oh, oh no....the receiver went to lunch, now there's no one to check in the product. We wait.
10:55 am--All right, the receiver has returned! And...holy crap, that's a lot of shipment.
11:10 am--Right off the bat, we began to discover that whoever did our aisle's reset yesterday is an idiot. Several of our products' facings have been completely removed from the shelves, and others were grouped disastrously. Seriously, why not keep all the Chips Ahoy varieties on the same shelf, rather than scattered in different places on five shelves?! And what is it with Cheese-its taking our spot?! AHHHHH
12:30 pm--I never want to go back to Walmart, ever. Too bad, I have to go again tomorrow!
12:40 pm--I got a call from my mother on my way home, reporting that my family is returning home today, Friday, rather than Saturday night.
12:45 pm--I began frantically cleaning. It wasn't as bad as I anticipated, hence the report of my day.
Things I've learned from working for Kraft:
- I possess the ability to go 10 hours without going to the bathroom
- I am capable of spending extremely long periods of time in Walmart without entirely losing my sanity
- I can fit my body through a six-inch space.
- No amount of time off can fully heal the trauma of this job.
Wow! It sounds like you had a long, hard, frustrating, and interesting day. I hope that tomorrow will go much smoother :-)
ReplyDeleteYea, that is...yea I'm not sure I could have handled that without getting really stressed out! I'm glad you kept your sanity! :D
ReplyDelete