first day of grad school

today was my first day of grad school.

i had one class and it started at 8am. which meant that i needed to be up at 6am and out of my apartment before 7am in order to arrive to class on time. and that's not including the ridiculous strike traffic. i rolled out of bed and dreaded the day ahead.

i left around 6:40am and did the zombie walk to the subway. grabbed the subway easily and rode to finch where i just barely made the express bus to school. i made it to school by 7:30am. now i know that i can leave a little later tomorrow when i have to do it all again, and once again on friday. yes, i have 3 8am classes a week. this is not the grad school classes i imagined. hopefully next semester will be better.

it felt strange to be back in the classroom. i looked around and knew nobody. there was a definite age gap in my classmates. where were my TREN girls at? no where. it was depressing. the professor was late so the coordinator took over until he got there. this is when the coordinator told me to switch my one class to the other 8am on friday. i was not happy. class flew by and we didn't do much, similar to most of the first day introductions i've been in before.

i made friends with the two girls next to me who seemed to be remotely my age and i walked with the one over to admissions after class. she had the same problem as me: seneca needed 'proof of degree' from her. admissions opened at 10am and my class got out at 9:50am. the admissions lineup was all the way down the hall and almost around the corner when i got there. seeing as i had really nothing else to do today, i waited. and i waited. and i fucking waited. i waited an hour and 20 minutes to talk to someone. she told me that i needed to send a new transcript and a photocopy of my degree/confirmation of graduation and changed the expiry to the end of september. she told me not to panic. clearly, i was not in panic mode. perhaps i look panicky when i'm awake at 6am.

i headed home shortly after while talking to some of the strike people about their issues and whatnot while waiting for the bus. i like to be informed. the bus at finch going to school when i arrived at finch station had so many people waiting. i was glad to be going the opposite direction. i made it home around 12:30pm with a quick stop in at subway for lunch.

over the weekend, i saw lutzenkirchen, got drunk, and went to the eaton centre. i talked to someone at the eaton centre sport chek about possibly getting a transfer (even though i only worked 2 shifts at the niagara falls one) and she told me to call her on wednesday to figure it all out. in the meantime, i applied to various retail jobs at the mall and am waiting to hear back... if i hear back at all.

i need a good night's sleep.

home stretch

i move to toronto on thursday!

i spent 6 days at embassy last week: sweep, cutlery, cold, hot, more cutlery, more sweep, toast when somebody was sent  home.. and so on. the week went by so slowly. but i tried to do something every night.

i saw lots of friends and had some good hangouts. on saturday afternoon, dad and i went to toronto to measure up the new place, see what i need and what can fit, and really just to look at the place since i couldn't remember a whole lot about it! it was just as nice as what i did remember, however. and the majority of my stuff should fit. in typical corey fashion, his room is a disaster and spills into the living room. hopefully that will all change by thursday!

i came back saturday evening to hang with friends and see the dj big chocolate where i was on the guest list. it was a pretty good time. sometimes, i forget how much fun i can have when plans to do things actually happen.

i had today off for recovery -- both from work and the drinking that took place last night. tomorrow, i start back up at embassy for 3 more mornings. i did not give sport chek my availability for this week. after they cancelled my shift the other week and didn't put me on the schedule for last week, i decided that i would just bail. not that they would probably give me shifts anyway!

friends, if you're reading this and we haven't seen each other in days, weeks, months, or years, and you're currently residing in and/or visiting the niagara region in the next 3 days, please get in touch for last minute hangouts.

72 hours remain.

what else happened last week?

despite my injury, i went into work at embassy on the wednesday of last week.

my knee and body killed. i stuck around doing cutlery for service and peaced out shortly after. i had to go home and ice my knee so i could go into work at sport chek that evening. i had originally been scheduled for 2 shifts at sport chek; wednesday and thursday evening.

i went in for 5pm and talked to one of the managers who asked me when i was leaving. i told her she could schedule me up until august 31. she told me that it didn't make sense for them to train me on cash since i wouldn't be able to get it anyway (well, duh, not if i only go in once a month) and decided to use me as a sales associate/guard/helper for the sidewalk sale. sometime after 8:30pm, they began to take the sidewalk sale inside and i was told to go home around 8:50 as there was nothing left for me to do. i gladly went home as i never told them about my knee and by that time, i needed to  ice my knee and the tylenol had worn off.

an hour before my shift on thursday and before a big ass thunderstorm, sport chek called me and told me not to come in. they had cancelled my shift but didn't give me a reason why and i didn't ask why they did. i was happy to now have 3 days off -- which ended up being 4 days off to rest since i didn't have to work at embassy sunday either.

i'm not on the sport chek schedule for this week so i work 6 days at embassy, monday to saturday. in ten days, i move to toronto! i bought a new dining room table and a chair for my room. i haven't started to pack yet and i should probably do that soon.

i am so excited to move. this has been the longest summer ever. but at least i'm just starting to enjoy some of it.. whatever's left of my summer now.

a long week

i had the weekend off and started back at embassy monday morning working until saturday morning. 6 shifts.

over the weekend, i relaxed and threw a party. i had fun and that's really all that matters in the long run. monday, tuesday, and wednesday, i was back working cutlery. thursday, i started earlier and was on toast for my second time ever. i guess the kid who's normally on toast was off that day. i can't say i enjoy doing it but it was okay for a change. friday, i stocked the cold buffet.

i asked for saturdays off from embassy as i talked to sport chek and they said if i can get saturdays off, they would try to schedule me for a shift on that day. unfortunately, i wasn't on the schedule at all for sport chek this week and i couldn't understand why. but i had told embassy i was working there on saturday. on wednesday, a manager asked if i could come in early on saturday for 3 hours. i agreed even though i really didn't want to -- but my terms were that i could be guaranteed the sunday off, which i did receive. by the time this morning rolled around, embassy forgot i was even coming in this morning and i just helped out where i could/sweep etc.

i had a bit of an awkward encounter with a dude at work but hopefully we can move on from it. it will be interesting to see what happens in the next few weeks and where the rumour ends up by the time i leave, but perhaps it has already hit its peak for now. i also went to brock this week and picked up my thesis finally that's all nicely bound and printed, and spent my $10 gift card from the bookstore on a sweet canteen.

i got my timetable from seneca finally! but it's not that awesome. 
mondays i have 3 classes: 10:45am-11:35am, 1:30pm-3:15pm, and 4:15pm-6:55pm.
tuesdays i have 1 class: 8:00am-9:45am which is a such a long hike for just one class.
wednesdays i have 2 classes: 8:00am-9:45am and 11:40am-1:25pm.
thursdays i have off which i'm stoked about.
fridays i have 3 classes: 10:45am-12:30pm, 12:35pm-2:20pm, and 2:25pm-3:15pm, but hopefully the last one is just going to be online like it says.
i essentially have about a 45 minute commute to school everyday.. which means for my 8ams, i'll have to leave my apartment by 7am. not looking forward to that at all.

i've started to look into furniture and things we need for the apartment and so has corey; he moves in on monday and is super stoked. next week, i only work 3 shifts at embassy which is good since i'm exhausted from this week already. i have tomorrow off to play squash. hang out, and maybe check out buskerfest. i have thursday and friday off as i'm supposed to go to peterborough to see my brother but i may bail on that if i have to work at sport chek or might go to toronto or do something else cool.

5 days

i worked five days in a row this week.

sunday, i think i was on cutlery at embassy. again, i really enjoy that job. it's so simple! monday and tuesday, i started something a little different and was on sweep. i pretty much just walk around and clean up messes on floors/counters/etc and help out where i can. this got boring after awhile when there wasn't anything to do. time went by slowly.

tuesday evening, i had my first shift at sport chek. i went in for 5pm and they forgot i was even coming in. they set me up on a bunch of e-learning modules at the computer and i sat there for four hours completing like 1/4 of them. there were so many and they took so much time to finish! i didn't even get a chance to be on the floor. i just sat in the super air conditioned staff room and did simulations set up by the training modules of these ridiculous scenarios about some guy wanting his skates sharpened but the laces were discolored, so he wanted a discount, and he's paying in gift cards with the remaining balance in debit and cash and blah blah blah but then he also wanted to return items etc etc. ugh. they were so annoying. my hands were actually turning blue by the end of the shift because i was so fucking cold sitting there the entire time working on these scenarios. i doubt i would even come across a scenario like that anyway when i'll probably only get one customer during a shift if i'm lucky.

it seems as though i'm not going to get that many shifts (maybe only 1 shift a week?) and the majority of those shifts will be just finishing the training... and then i'll be moving away at the beginning of september. sport chek knows that i'm leaving at the end of the summer. i feel like it's a stupid move on their part for having to pay me for training and not actually use me. though i guess i don't care that much as long as i'm getting paid for the training!

wednesday, i was on cutlery again (where it was such a dead day and had nothing to do most of the time) and today i finished off with working the cold buffet. since i started working at embassy, i'm usually pretty tired when i get home, so i take a nap. when i have these naps, i have the strangest dreams. my dreams only get worse when i go to sleep for the night -- mostly nightmares that i'm definitely not comfortable with. i wake up with sweats and my heart racing. it's not a fun experience. i hope it goes away soon. i don't really know what i have to be nervous or stressed out about. i can't say i enjoy working at embassy but i don't hate it either.

i'm just happy to have the next 3 days off to relax, hang out, and throw my party.

working girl

i had an easy week of 3 shifts at embassy.

monday, i was stocking the cold buffet again with the same dude from last week. except, this week, he tended to disappear when we were the most busy and leave me to run around on my own. my supervisors kept asking me where the dude was. fuck, how am i supposed to know? he's not doing his job and i'm not his keeper! i hope he was yelled at because that was not cool. wednesday, i was on cutlery again. i enjoy it immensely. it's routine, i get it, can do it pretty well, and it's easy. the people helping me are usually pretty nice and the bar kitchen conversations make me laugh.

friday, i was stocking the hot buffet, something i had never done before. i had to look after all of the french toast sticks, milk, yogurt, hashbrowns, scrambled eggs, pancakes, bacon, sausage, and cooked omelettes. it's a lot to handle when everything is constantly being tapped. there are two lines of each item and the cooks were definitely not cooking and putting them out fast enough at times. so, guests were angry and frustrated. yes, i understand that we're out of _______ but we're getting them as fast as we can. and sure, you can stand there all pouty with your arms folded tight, holding up the line and making the line even longer until you get your ______ but it's not my fault that the 500 people before you took all the food! geez.

the worst part about this week was the way that i had to clean the hot buffet as my cleanup. and well, we throw out all of the leftovers... even when it's entirely full. instead of thinking of starving kids around the world (or even, starving employees working the buffet) we throw out the food. ugh. ridiculous! at least on friday there was a staff appreciation lunch with some decent-ish food for us to eat. i wonder if that will ever happen again.

this week let me have a bit of a life that i missed, which was nice. corey and i got the apartment! he moves in august 15 and i've aimed to move in for september 1st. i'm sooooo stoked! i should be getting my timetable soon i hope and i can figure out my schedule. i really hope i don't have any super early or super late classes. also, my party is next weekend and i should have the whole weekend off. i'm excited about that.

i start sport chek on tuesday evening as my only shift for the week... i think. it could be a long day if i have to work embassy. also, that's the day that embassy is having their orientation but i don't know if i actually have to go to it or not. i don't even know what it entails or where it is. hopefully i can just skip it.

5ish more weeks left!

first week

i'm alive after my first week working at embassy suites.

the mornings are difficult but somehow i managed. wednesday, i stocked the cold part of the buffet, which is a ridiculous amount of work all the time. i looked after all the muffins, pastries, cold cereal, bagels, fruit (grapefruit, watermelon, 2 types of apples, oranges, bananas), bread for toasting, and english muffins. it amazed me how much i had to constantly stock and the amount of people going through the buffet.

thursday, i was stocking cutlery and mostly working with high school kids in the bar kitchen. i knew working in a kitchen wasn't the best idea, but fuck. these high school kids are so fucking rude. not to me -- just in general. i'm pretty sure i wasn't like them when i was that age. anyway, so i had to stock the silverware (knives, forks, spoons). i'd grab all the washed ones from the dishpit, polish them off, put them in an insert, and run them out to where they belong on the buffet. this was a pretty easy job.

friday, i was on toast. i was situated at the end of one of the chef stations toasting bread for each of the 3 chef stations. all i did for the entire time i was there was toast bread and talk to the chefs cooking omelettes and eggs. this was okay but was also the day it was like 49 degrees outside and so standing in front of a toaster for 3 hours was not the greatest time in the world.

saturday, i was on cutlery again and it was insanely busy like every other tourist destination on a saturday during the summer. a few other people working had to help me out a couple of times just because the cutlery was disappearing so fast and not exiting the dishpit fast enough. i survived, though. i just think it's strange that the majority of people working in the kitchen actually do their work and don't normally shoot the shit that much. it's probably my first job i've had where quality work is being done almost all the time. that being said, i haven't met that many people and rarely if ever take a break.

there is one dude who's been helping me out since my second day. he's nice and we get along. we normally get assigned together to do cleanup duties. yesterday, 2 of the girls got me to take a break with them.. so that was nice to talk for a bit. we got along too. next week, i only work 3 shifts at embassy. i called sport chek and am not scheduled for next week at all since the trainers are on vacation. they said they would schedule me for the following week. the first week in august, holy shit.

corey and i are working on still getting the apartment. we should be able to have it soon! i'm so excited. also, my timetable for seneca should be arriving the second week in august and i'll know my schedule finally. a few weeks after that, i'll be moving to toronto!

i just want to move now.

2 jobs... again

i landed the job with embassy suites and today was my first shift.

i went in for an interview yesterday and was hired on the spot for a food runner position in the breakfast buffet. i was surprised they would even consider me for that with no kitchen experience, but i didn't care. i have to wear a chef uniform with the jacket, pants, hat, and apron that i swim in. it's pretty hilarious to see.

the shifts vary from either start time of 6am, 7am, or 8am and finishing about 12pm, 1pm, or 2pm. the buffet goes from 7am-11am then cleanup which could take awhile. getting up this morning was brutal to be in for 7am. i got a quick tour of the kitchen and was shown where stuff was. i stock the buffet when things run low and so on. it shocked me to see all these people constantly running through all this food even though i had just stocked it, went in the kitchen, came back out and the food i had just stocked was all gone already. people are crazy. also, the amount of food thrown out in the kitchen makes me nervous.. being an environmentalist and all. trashing that much food all the time is so unsustainable.

i worked and worked and worked, constantly running around. when the buffet was over, i started to clean and was not given a break. the girl i was cleaning with was hard to understand and wasn't giving me very good instructions on how to do things properly. of course, my body was tired and i had a terrible headache since i had barely drank any drinks during the shift because nobody had shown me where/how to get drinks. eventually, we had finished most of the cleanup and were told we could go on break. but instead, the supervisor said if i wanted to that i could go home. i was sold on the idea and left.

i began my search for the lockers and got lost. i ended up in a restricted area with a ton of cameras and somehow found my way out of the building. i still don't know where the lockers are. i work again tomorrow at 7am, then friday and saturday at 8am. i'm just going to let them know from now on that i can only work till noon or 1pm since i have my other job. they'll understand and at least i'll get out of there faster.

i called sport chek tonight and told them my availability -- pretty much 3pm to close everyday. makes it easier on embassy and myself so i'll have a couple of hours to regroup/shower/change/eat/sleep etc between days with shifts at both jobs.. which i'm sure will happen. i start next week at sport chek sometime when the schedule comes out. i'll rock embassy till then with one job i can sort of handle.

in the meantime, corey and i have finalized the apartment (i think) and began the process of moving in! i still don't know final costs and whatnot but at least we officially have a place. i'm so stoked. also, in a few weeks, i'm throwing my party and i can't wait for that too. i've already booked it off. woo.

okay. for the last time. there are 7 weeks of summer remaining. if i could please just keep these 2 jobs (or at least 1 if it comes down to that) i would be a happy amber.

the luckiest break yet

sport chek called today and hired me on as a sales associate.

my last shift at margaritaville was thursday night till about 11:30pm. i came home and immediately began applying for various jobs through email -- one being a front desk position at the howard johnson closest to my house. i had talked to someone at margaritaville who's mom worked at embassy suites in the breakfast buffet. she told me to go see her mom on saturday and i had plans to do so.

friday afternoon, i get a call from howard johnson and set up and interview later that afternoon. i did the interview even though i didn't want front desk (but, let's face it -- it's middle of the summer and i'm desperate) and i'm told that she would get back to me sometime next week. she asked me about my education, what the responsibilities of a front desk person are, about my last summer position and so on. i didn't feel as though i had nailed the interview but honestly, i didn't care. i had lost all my will to work after being let go.

saturday morning, i went to the embassy breakfast buffet and met with the manager. the buffet was insanely busy and i had to wait over an hour to speak with her. i thought for sure that she had forgotten about me so i had a hostess go find her. i gave a copy of my resume, talked about my experience and possible working over christmas/on weekends and left. the shifts are only 3-4 hours in length but include tips. i was told i would hear back in a few days if there were any openings.

this afternoon, embassy called and i set up an interview for tomorrow. about an hour later, i get another call from sport chek, who if you recall from this blog post here, they were supposed to call me by june 30th if i was hired. i talked to the girl and she offered me a sales associate/cashier position and for me to come in tomorrow morning to get it all sorted out.

perhaps i'll have 2 jobs again for the remaining of the summer?

more interviews

this week i had 3 interviews.

java joes called wednesday night to schedule a thursday afternoon interview. i thought things went well as we really only talked about my brother for the most part. i hoped that i would get lucky and land the job at least for the summer. she said that she would call back after 7pm thursday night. i did not get a call. and then i was bummed out.

i set up an interview with sport check for friday afternoon. the interview was supposed to take an hour. i got there early and the manager said to come back in 15 minutes. so i looked around for a bit and went back. i filled in an online questionnaire similar to those you get at future shop/starbucks/the source/petsmart/etc and then had the actual interview which ended after 5 minutes once they found out i was returning to school in september. apparently, this position was for a full-time permanent merchandiser.. as in, to start a career from. but they didn't read the first line of my resume that says i'm going back to school in september. wouldn't that be the first thing you look at in order to make a decision on calling to interview someone?

so, i asked them if they could at least interview me for a sales associate position. they decided to do that and asked 4-5 scenario questions. i thought i answered them pretty well. it felt more like a conversation than an interview. i was told that i would hear from them by june 30th if they make a decision.

the last interview i had this week so far was for jimmy buffett's margaritaville. they had called me a few times this week and i never responded until today. i set up an interview for 5pm which required 3 references that i really don't have. i met with the lady and answered all of her questions and seemingly passed the 'first round' of interviews, according to her. she said that she would pass me onto some other manager type for a second interview who makes the final decision on hiring. she called back just now when i got home to set up the second interview tomorrow night with the other dude.

i don't understand the process of second and third round interviews. it annoys the interviewee and i bet it is annoying and costly to the company running them. interviews are pretty hit and miss; you nail it and they like you or you blow it and they don't like you. it's what i've witnessed from not only this summer of my job hunt but every summer of my job hunt and every interview i've ever attended.

i am really tired of the job hunt. i'm frustrated and fed up. margaritaville was interview #12 of the summer.

short-lived

due to reasons i will not disclose, i have left my position at imax.

i worked a full 7 hour shift and knew by around the third hour that this was not a job that i was entirely capable of, among other things that happened or i learned while on the job. before you hear of any ungodly rumours: i was not 'fired' or 'terminated.' i have voluntary quit the position in order to look out for my own health and well-being. and that's all i'm willing to say.

so the job search continues for the summer.

i called ardene and i was told that they hired already. it wasn't me. over the weekend, i also received a call from sport chek which i did not call back until today. i was told that they would call me back later today and they never did.

i sent out 6 emails today: jimmy buffett's margaritaville, hilton, embassy, rainforest cafe, mp paradise pools, and java joes. i walked into a job fair at the beef baron after receiving an email today about it and applying in the beginning of june. i filled in an application and met with somebody (i'm not even sure who it was) who asked me how old i was and what position i was applying for. i told him for hostess/busperson; and of course, he said they had a bunch of resumes to go through and if they thought i was qualified, they would call. my next stop was copacabana where i met with the lady for essentially 10 seconds. i handed her my resume, she wrote down something on it, and that was it.

then i hit the outlet mall. i put in another resume to java joes and handed my resume to mcgregor socks, tommy hilfiger, rocky mountain chocolate, and urban planet. at tommy hilfiger, i talked to the one sales associate for awhile who commented on my resume a ton and then i met with the manager who talked about calling me for an interview soon. java joes is where my brother worked since they opened and then they shut down. they have re-opened recently for the summer months. my dad went in to talk to the manager and put in a good word for me. hopefully i might have a chance there. clearly, my brother and i are the same person.

it could be a long time until i catch another break in the job market.