I used to have the best co-workers

After eating some lunch to the sound of him upstairs shouting the house down, I went back down to the main bar. I met the other new fish. I hate when new people come in after me, it blurs the lines. I was the new fish before, now what am I? There’s a girl who’s going to college to be a costume maker, great! Then there’s an angry Spanish man who looks like Russell Crowe. And the last guy I thought was the new management because he was wearing casual clothes and walking around like he owns the place. Turns out he wasn’t meant to be in today but just passed by and it was busy so he got behind the bar to help out. Loser! Ahem. He made sure to tell everyone this, and to start and finish every sentence with “geezer.”

“Alright geezer, what you want? Pint? There you go geezer. I’m not even meant to be in today, it’s my day off. Yes geezer?”

I disliked him instantly. Big burly git who took up way too much of the quickly diminishing space behind the bar.

Last Saturday had been absolutely packed and it was just me and the chef behind the bar. Backs firmly to the wall is the only time I really get going in the place. There was a queue about 3 deep, we were already out of glasses and had no one to collect or wash any, and the chef wasn’t altogether too sure of what he was doing. What else can you do but pour like you’ve never poured before. No one cares if you smile at them or not, you don’t need to worry about pouring the perfect pint, and there’s no time to watch the minutes tick by. It’s the best.

Now all of a sudden there were 6 of us behind a bar that had a total of 11 functional taps. We were like a pack of worker ants, scrambling around the bar bumping into each other then turning around only to bump into someone else. Russell Crowe did not like this. Earlier, when it wasn’t even busy I was putting clean glasses on the shelf and he shouted at me to collect the dirty glasses and he would stack the clean ones. No need for that. Shortly after, the only card reader went missing and with customers looking on he was literally jumping up and down, running around the place, shouting “where is it, how can it just disappear?” Now everything was pissing him off. I was pouring a pint but there was too much head so I let it settle on the bar for a second. Russell Crowe was pulling a pint from the adjacent tap and barked at me “Never leave this here, NEVER!”

“Stop telling me what to do”

“You are too slow, I have to tell you”

“You need to calm down; you’re like a bull in a China shop”

“I do not need to calm down, don’t tell me to calm down”

“You’re embarrassing yourself, it’s kind of silly.”

We continued like this, pouring pints and arguing under our breaths so the customer’s right in front of us couldn’t hear. It was a bit like Ron Burgundy and Veronica Corningstone when the credits are rolling. You have bad hair, Russell.

There's nobody
I can rerate to
Feel rike a bird in a cage
It's kinda sihry
But not rearry
Because it's fihring my body with rage

Why are people who work in pubs here such dickheads, or just unbelievably depressing? All the shit jobs I worked in in the States and Oz the managers I was working with were kings among men, there was endless hilarious characters and plenty of super-hot waitresses. People like Arthur Wolf and Jimbo were absolute heroes. And in Oz we just had the soundest co-workers you could ask for. Here they just drain the life out of you. You win Russell Crowe, I’m just so over working here already.

I work rearry hard and try make great friens
But nobody ristens, no one understands
Seems like no one takes me serirousry

And so I'm ronery
A rittle ronery
Poor rittle me