kindness

Fired: Go West. Or East. Just go.

/ rickeydobbs / 1 Comment

I fired someone on Monday.

She had it coming.

Bad attitude. Flippant guest service. Repeated 10+ minute bathroom breaks in the middle of volume. Refusal to follow recipes. Verbally abusive to supervisors in my absence.

The last straw came when a loyal guest complained about her. The employee was less than deferential to the guest’s questions about vegetarian versus vegan items on the menu. The guest was kind. She told me, “I think your employee just needs a little more training.”

She’s worked here for 3 years. Continue reading →

I used to be stupid. I’m still stupid, but I also used to be.

/ rickeydobbs / 8 Comments

Back in 1996, I was stupid.   I’m still kind of stupid at times, but I was generally, consistently stupid back then.  I consider myself very lucky, though my luck as a younger man was often simply the fact that I didn’t die or get incarcerated for my stupidity.

Here’s a little story about some madcap hijinks and a caper or two from yours truly.

Sophomore year at the University of Houston had begun. It was my first year there, I had transferred in from the University of Texas. I was living on the 11th floor of the south tower at Moody Towers. Rick Burman was my roommate, and had just transferred from Wharton County Junior College. We met Larry Dean a few days into the semester, and Larry had just come to UH from Austin College up in Denton, Texas. Continue reading →