I learned several things this week. First, if you are offered an extra $2.50 an hour, $25 in food expenses, and free room and board, the job isn’t going to be much fun. Everything else was, though; this week and next I’m working second shift in an office building a coupe hours away. The fact that I’m working until 1 in the morning isn’t ideal, but the hours were more like my “school hours,” and I got the chance to wake up naturally and run before work, which really made me happy. It was basically an all-expense paid vacation to work.
There was two of us, each with a $25 food allowance, so we had $50 to spend on food every day. There was free breakfast at the hotel, so we had $25 for each meal. With that kind of money, you can get a really good meal every day. One day we went to Friday’s, the next Ruby Tuesday’s, and the last we went to the Cheesecake Factory. At the Cheesecake Factory I was struck by a sudden and horrid realization: that place has a 20-page menu with ad space in it! I almost wanted to get up and walk out I was so disgusted by it. Here I was, with so much wrong with the world, and I was sitting at the epitome of middle-class gluttony and excess. I can’t say the people sitting near me helped the image: loud, annoying, and excessively fat, they were the poster children for what’s wrong with us. I’d like to say that I don’t think I will ever set foot in that place again, but my family is in love with it.
Finally, taking the time to be courteous to anyone and everyone can pay large dividends later on. For example, one of the night guards was a man who it would have been easy to take offense at, but we made the effort to talk and joke around with him. By the end of the week, in his own way, he went out of his way to help us an make things easier for us. It’s kind of corny and cliche, but a little kindness and amiability goes a long way.
And finally, I like traveling, as long as I get to sleep and run and eat well.
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