You want to avoid it, is what I'm trying to get at here.
Now, despite my rants and ramblings and bitchy little whinefests, Starbucks is a pretty decent pre-career job. It's fun, it's interesting, it has decent benefits, it makes you feel slightly more important than most other minimum wage workers, and it gives you the chance to mainline caffeine for free when you need it most. In fact, I enjoy it so much that, as evidenced here, I actually take it seriously.
That paragraph detailing the finer points in life, however, does not at all, even slightly, not even a little bit extend to the drive-thru.
This is the first image that pops up when you Google "drive-thru."It's like they know.
I have never worked at another drive-thru besides Starbucks before in my life. I don't know how much more terrible it is when fries are involved. But I can say that, with coffee and forced kindness, the drive-thru really is its own circle of hell.
I've condensed most of my hatred to the bing, the accursed bing, that occurs as soon as a vehicle drives up to the box. It causes Pavlovian responses of anxiety and the sweats every time most of us hear it, and it is usually a harbinger of doom.
Stories. Stories. I'm sure you want some drive-thru specific stories. I'm sure I got some.
Like...let's see...I told you about the guys who wanted the COW (coffee of the week), were mad that we didn't do that anymore, and tipped us in cherry slushie. How about the old, old man and his old, old wife that rammed into the back of the woman in front of them whilst navigating that difficult drive between the box and the window? How about the woman who drove in through the exit, stopped at the window, and couldn't understand why we refused to take her order until she was facing the right way? Oh, and then there's the total lack of volume control. And every. single. freaking. diesel. truck. that comes through. And the fact that almost every order is phrased like a Jeopardy answer. And the cold. Ohhh the cold. And the people on cell phones, and the people who drive up to the window with a fist full of bills punching the air before you even get over to your drawer, and the people who change their orders when they get all the way up to the window so that we have to shout it over to whomever's on bar because it won't reprint the sticker. And the people with angry, whiny children who have to shout over them to order their hot chocolates.
And...and...and...everything. Every. Thing.
However, like all clouds, there is a silver lining (or a gold one, when the sun peeks through).
In a drive-thru, especially one so close to PetSmart, we get puppies.
And that, my dears, is worth 5 diesel trucks and someone who drives straight up to the window any day.
I've condensed most of my hatred to the bing, the accursed bing, that occurs as soon as a vehicle drives up to the box. It causes Pavlovian responses of anxiety and the sweats every time most of us hear it, and it is usually a harbinger of doom.
Stories. Stories. I'm sure you want some drive-thru specific stories. I'm sure I got some.
Like...let's see...I told you about the guys who wanted the COW (coffee of the week), were mad that we didn't do that anymore, and tipped us in cherry slushie. How about the old, old man and his old, old wife that rammed into the back of the woman in front of them whilst navigating that difficult drive between the box and the window? How about the woman who drove in through the exit, stopped at the window, and couldn't understand why we refused to take her order until she was facing the right way? Oh, and then there's the total lack of volume control. And every. single. freaking. diesel. truck. that comes through. And the fact that almost every order is phrased like a Jeopardy answer. And the cold. Ohhh the cold. And the people on cell phones, and the people who drive up to the window with a fist full of bills punching the air before you even get over to your drawer, and the people who change their orders when they get all the way up to the window so that we have to shout it over to whomever's on bar because it won't reprint the sticker. And the people with angry, whiny children who have to shout over them to order their hot chocolates.
And...and...and...everything. Every. Thing.
However, like all clouds, there is a silver lining (or a gold one, when the sun peeks through).
In a drive-thru, especially one so close to PetSmart, we get puppies.
And that, my dears, is worth 5 diesel trucks and someone who drives straight up to the window any day.
I'm so glad I will never work at a drive-thru. However, you will never have to deal with someone holding a freaking class in your Starbucks. I love it when they ask, "Can you turn down the music?" I turn into a bond villian in those moments. "No... No I cannot turn down the music," I mutter as I tap my fingers together.
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