Slayers: Divine restart

Slayers: Divine on Smackjeeves

Hey everyone! Just wanted to let the sphere know that I've finally restarted my doujinshi efforts. If you've been following me (or even if not) I've been using this doujinshi as a way to improve my art and storytelling abilities. A way for me to learn to organize my thoughts and to translate what I want to say through pictures and dialogue. I hope I'm getting the hang of it because, you see, I want my original titles to be amazing when they really hit the ground running!

Maybe I can learn some marketing while I'm at it, nyo.

So follow along, why not?

Recent sketches

Been off and on with the drawing thing the passed few weeks but with my recent job situation I think it's finally coming back. I'm going to keep working on it, of course. Because I love it. <3 br="br">

My life at work

Here’s a situation and you all can tell me what I can do. I think it interesting that every time I scroll down on blogrolls or other social media and these…work help articles are popping up:

Right now, I’m a waitress at an Indian joint in the Pitt. I’ve been there since Feb. 2011 and, at the beginning, it wasn’t so bad. I make $8.00 an hour with no tips and I average 10 hours a week.
But these hours are spread out in such a way that I’m spending a lot of time on public transportation getting from home to work and visa-verse.

The work environment began to degrade when my coworker, a student from India, started working with us. He came around when my bosses and their entire family went to India for 6 weeks leaving me with the welfare of the restaurant. We did very well and everything went smoothly but, again, the quality of the environment began to get worse. They started neglecting me as a candidate for anything extra curricular like catering or deliveries around downtown and cut my hours to give this other guy more even though he was in school. Lately, it’s been really bad. This happens all the time but here’s one example: Last week I had asked for some time off for my chest. I had gotten so angry, so irritated with their attitude and the boredom of sitting around in downtown all the time that I had to slightly change my routine just so I wouldn’t end up in the hospital. They said OK (plus I haven’t had any real time off since I started working there.).

They called me in for Monday night because coworker had a class to go to. I wasn’t happy about it but I went in anyway. While there, it went from bad to worse. Boss-lady came in and we’re usually pretty busy with deliveries and with in-house orders so but she likes to try and do everything because she believes that nothing will get done if she’s not doing it. 3 sets of regular customers came in, I knew them all and I knew what they ordered except one of them, this time, wanted to change up their order a bit so I ended up fielding a few questions. Now, I’m not Indian but I know the food at the restaurant and I know the menu and how big everything is. They asked me a question and as I was answering, boss-lady runs over, bumps her body into mine causing me to stumble off to the side a bit and says “What’s the problem?” I say “There is no problem, they were just wondering about portion sizes” and she raises her hand in my face and says “don’t worry about it, I’ll take care of this.” I turned away, put my pen and book down and then the phone rings for a delivery. As soon as I go to pick it up she says “Hey! I’ll get it.”

Now. This happens a lot to which I have to ask myself “Do you even want me here?” And it’s putting a real damper on my attitude.

The week before last she called me in to work on some time off and at first I was like “No, I have some things I want to get done.” And she says “but don’t you need the money?”
I thought. “$16.00? really. Maybe not.” And then she starts guilt tripping a little bit like “Fine, I’ll just deal with it.” I got annoyed and said I would be there. When I got there, she fucked around with me the entire 2 hours I was there. I know it doesn’t seem like a long time but when people are dicking you around it feels like a thousand years.

She was first yelling and screaming at me about how fast I was going with customers. At lunch time we do a pretty big buffet and we get a lot of people all the time during lunch so there’s always a lot to do and there’s no set priority of what to do first. We just have to do what we can when we’re in front of it or thinking about it. I have developed my own little system to handle customers and get as much done as possible.
So I was at the register handling the people leaving. She walked over to the register, stood there and watched me. Now, remember, every seat in the restaurant was full with the exception of the people leaving. Instead of going away and doing something else like I would have done she just stood there watching me. I finally looked over and asked “What’s the matter?”
She said “Here, let me do this.”

I said “Why? I got it and it’s getting done…”

She says “Bev, just go do something else.”

Ok, fine. I dropped my pen and walked away. As I was cleaning tables in the back she came to me and told me I needed to pay closer attention the people coming into the restaurant. I just said OK and kept working.
But I think the final straw was when I asked her if I could leave at the time I normally leave after lunch. She said, and I quote:

“No. You need to stay until 3 because I have things I need to get done today.” and she walked away from me muttering under her breath “I’ve been trying to get out of here for the passed hour.”

I was stunned. Simply stunned. She called ME in on MY day off to help her when I ALSO had things to do but the world had to stop for her? What? I said, OK and asked her if I could at least eat since there was nobody else in the restaurant. She said yes but that I had to “Hurry up in case people show up.”

I’m thinking. Every time I eat and we’re still open, even if I’ve been dismissed for a few hours, I get up and help anyone in the place plus people coming in. That’s just the way I am. I’ll interrupt my lunch for people and it’s been like that since I was working there.

I go to the back, pick up a place while slightly cussing under my breath and Boss-man (her husband) comes out and just laughs at me like “What’s the matter.”

I said “Nothing” and kept working to throw a little bit of food on my plate. Boss-lady comes back there and they start screaming at each other in Panjaub and she comes storming out of the kitchen yelling at me: “FINE Beverly, you can leave! Not like I had things to do today.”

Consider camel back broken. I dropped my plate and left. Chest pain and all.
Now, look. I know it’s unprofessional to diss your bosses and job but fuck all that. A couple of months ago I asked for an increase in my pay. Boss-man is all like “What? Like a bonus or something.” And I said Yes.

“Just something to help me save a little bit of money. winter is coming and I want to have something put away for food and such since I can’t get on food stamps.”

He said OK.

His idea of a bonus is $8.00-$20.00 and when he gives me $20.00 he won’t give me anything extra on the following check.

I have some people telling me to quit. I have some people telling to stay since it’s $100.00 plus or minus every week but to be honest, I want to quit. And Badly. I have a second job, one where I make more than my weeks pay from the Indian joint in two days. (if that made any sense). Even with the second job, all of the money I make is going straight to rent and bills plus the occasional home cooked meal. If I’m not too tired and annoyed to make myself something.

I’ve packed on 25 pounds, developed chest pain, have grown to hate customer service and have developed prejudice against Indian people and their culture. I have a severe negative emotional reaction to anything Indian and my love of being around new people has been hindered. I think customer service, especially with food, is a good opportunity to meet lots of cool people, and I have. Popular musicians from the orchestra, conductors, directors; I’ve met politicians and activists; I’ve met people from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Israel. So, lots of interesting people, lots of cool stories from all of them. But I’m at the end. I really can’t do this anymore.

I’m afraid I’ll be stuck and that I’ll end up as a low end waitress for the rest of my days. I’ve been contemplating suicide and destroying things and even reenlisting in the military. I almost punched a hole in my wall yesterday amidst sobbing like a little kid. I’m having severe emotional breakdowns and headaches on a daily basis. My art has stagnated and it rains all the time…I’m tired of this and, honestly, not sure what to do. I have been looking for other jobs and work but no call backs and when I go in to check they’ve already filled positions or something. I’ve been persistent and everything else. I would like to go back to school but can’t settle on a major and it’s coming out in my grades. I’m bored with the classes I’m taking and the degree I want is just novelty. I thought about opening a business but my credit is so bad I don’t think I can…plus in this economy what would be the point?

I haven’t stood up for myself because of the way I go about it. It’s been bottled up for so long that if I do release it’ll be super bad. Violent even but I can’t let these people walk all over me anymore. And a lot of this anxiety is stemming from boredom! I’M BORED!