Don't expect me to cover your butt anymore.

There is absolutely no feeling I hate more than that of being taken advantage of...it stirs up within me some of the most deep-seated rage I've ever experienced. This feeling pops up in sometimes the most unexpected places, but always for the same root reason. The store charged me a price higher than the tag said. The mechanic got me to spring for repairs I didn't really need. My hair stylist "just dried" my hair and charged me extra for it without disclosing that fact beforehand. The wranglers are supposed to pool their tips from the multi-guide rides; everyone but me pockets their money, so I wind up making about a third as much as everyone else. Some kid in school really wanted me to be her partner for the project...because, as I later learned, she knew I would work for a good grade even if she didn't do a darn thing, which she didn't. A boy I was totally in love with and would have roped the moon for...well, let's leave that one alone.

The latest issue has been with other employees at Starbucks. We are going through a bit of a transition time right now, training new employees and losing two faithful workers (one of them is me), so there has been sort of high stress anyway. On top of that, yesterday my relief person called one minute before my shift ended to say he'd just woken up and would be about an hour late. I didn't stay to cover until he got there because he has overslept on numerous occasions, doesn't do his job when he does show up, leaves messes for everyone else to clean up, and I'm tired of covering his butt. Then again today, my relief person didn't show at her scheduled time. I called my manager several times to see if she'd called, asking him to call her, asking him if he'd reached her, etc., for an hour and a half, with absolutely no helpful response. Finally, it was time for me to leave and she still hadn't shown, nor had my manager bothered to let me know what was going on, so I just left. And I don't feel badly about it. I am really tired of being the responsible one who gets shafted because no one else feels like being responsible.

Grrr.

Finding the good in the bad: anger is a phenomenal motivator in kickboxing. I kicked butt tonight.