Theatre Freaking

The Life and Times Of A Theatre Freak in Chicago

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

And now....

we live in a country where it isnt even safe to send you children away to college.... I've been to Virginia Tech on numerous occasions, and I spent years in a secluded college town in West Virginia....It never would have ever occured to me that something like this could have happened in places like that. City street, bad neighborhoods maybe. Not sleepy college towns. It is a very sad day in our country's history for sure.

Friday, April 13, 2007

LOL


ewe...
Originally uploaded by MariGerard.
thought Id share this funny pic taken while tooling around Milenium Park at about 7:30pm on Monday Evening with my friend Stephanie who was visiting...

click the pic to take the flicker tour of more shots from her trip.

Have a good Day!

Thursday, April 12, 2007

And this was the Managing Directors Response

Read the blog below this one FIRST, or this response will make no sense.

"We all are sympathetic to the frustration of solving these problems. I am sorry you do not feel appreciated. You are appreciated…but there will be more time to appreciate you when these aren’t hanging over our heads. How many did you solve and what do you suggest for the balance?

__________ or I will call about the ones you sent to support.

Talk to _______ (not email) about either calling _______ or sending them to support. Then please proceed by calling ________ or sending to support"


Is it me or did she miss the point of my previous email?

Ranting and Raving....

So for months now I have been working my butt off keeping things running at my job in Box Office, while I train a woman hired to be my boss, and a woman hired to be under me. I was promised a raise in Jan....as of last week this raise has yet to show up on my pay check. I do all sorts of tasks above and beyond what I was hired for, and way beyond what I am currently paid to do....I had been doing them because I was hoping my dedication would show my obvious worthyness of my promised raise...... yesturday when I asked for a simple approval of a Renters Document I had been preparing to make our relations with the renters operate smoother, I was responded to from the General Manager of the Theater with this " I will trade you the approved Renters Document for the completion of Outstanding Posts" Keep in mind that I was not the Director of ticketing Services then and I am not now, so why the functions of that position have been dropped on my shoulders I am unsure.

So I responded with: That is not my job now and was not my job then. Either get the person whos job it was then back in here to finish her job or make the new Director of Ticketing Services (whos job it is now) responsible and get her to do it.

The Problem with that response was that the New Director has not been trained fully on all the things that she is responsible for. So of course she cant do what they are asking, in fact I am actually the only one still remaining who even knows where to begin on these tasks....

So today I spent 5 hours doing nothing but trying to resolve old End of Day accounting for them, and then I responded with the following email:

After much research, and attempt at resolution the following EOD’s are the only ones I am unable to resolve. ( spent from 12:30pm-4:30pm today strait working on these and nothing else)

11/2
11/3
11/10
11/28
11/30
12/9
12/19
2/16
2/21

All others have been completed and sent up.

March and April are current and have no outstanding posts.

** I would like to apologize for my tone in yesterdays email to ______regarding Posts. My frustration came from the fact that the sole reason I did not apply for the Director of Ticketing Services position when I was asked to was this EOD situation. I had been watching ______ convolute all the numbers and jerry-rig Provenue for months and I knew it would take someone with far more experience than I to resolve those issues.

What I did agree to do and have done successfully by myself since they left in Jan/Feb was to keep moving forward with EOD’s and de-bug the system so that they would run properly from here on out, while simultaneously handling all renters needs, training _____and _______in all functions of the Box Office (this is still on going), and making sure that we are able to sell tickets everyday. Please understand that the above mentioned are no small tasks and I have worked many hours of overtime since ______left in Jan to accomplish those tasks. When I am told that something I desperately need to make the job I am supposed to be doing (Box Office Supervisor/Renters Division) work properly, will not be available till I complete tasks that were never supposed to be on my plate to begin with I become incredibly frustrated. ________has not had time to train on End of Days yet, so I have been more than willing to work on them all I am able till she is trained, but ultimately by job description the Director of Ticketing Services is the one responsible for that level of accounting when problems arise that the base managers are unable to handle. (That is why she is the Box Boss and you pay her the big bucks and me and Ali are lower level managers.)

I am sorry about the way I may have come across yesterday, but I also feel like I have been working very hard for months to make sure the transition between ______/________ and ________/_______goes smoothly and not create any new problems or issues, and I feel like I get no recognition of my hard efforts. I have yet to have a day off since Feb where I am not contacted on the phone to resolve issues _______ and ______are not trained yet to handle. This is understandable and I know this is part of my job as the one who knows what has to be done, and I always have my phone at the ready when I am off for that reason. I would just appreciate some kind of recognition for my efforts. I work very hard for the benefit of the BOX and when I get responses like I did yesterday, it makes me not want to work hard at all. I feel like it would have that effect on anyone in my position, but I know I should have communicated that better than I did yesterday, so I do apologize for that and I will try not to let that happen in the future. ***

Mariangela Saavedra
Box Office Supervisor

See Even the dream job comes with BS.......


Thanks for reading the rant. I feel better now.

Saturday, April 07, 2007

Francheeze


Francheeze
Originally uploaded by MariGerard.
Take one Hot Dog- stuff with cheese-wrap in bacon- deep fry it, and serve on a bun.....then promptly have a heart attack and tripple bypass surgery....yep that' Chicago eats for ya! This is the world famous Freancheezey, found only at The Bagel in Chicago. The Bagel is a Jewish Deli that has been around since someting like 1955, and makes all their bagles from scratch daily. John Stewart, Steve Colbert and Dennis Miller all sing the praises of The Bagel. So if your in town I highly sugesst checking it out.

And Now...back to work!
Have a great weekend! Happy easter! Bock Bock!!