working at the mall

ranging from november the 22nd to december the 14th (tomorrow) my sisters and I have been claimed to work at the angel tree (giving tree now? idek) every day excluding thanksgiving and sundays from 3-9pm. and I love it. a lot.

why I love working at the giving tree table:
it's super mellow and really slow paced. You can go hours without any one approaching the table. and when people do, helping them is super easy. Since you are the only one working at the table and you don't really have anyone who is in charge of you, (my aunt is in charge of us, but she lives an hour away.) you can kind of do your own thing. We are encouraged to bring homework to do and books to read to get through the shifts. Also, being on your phone is okay. as long as you're not too absorbed to help someone.

what I don't like about working at the giving tree table:
we are in the most secluded corner of the mall where no one ever goes. it's between banana republic and gap. right where the abandoned nordstroms is. Further down in the corner of seclusion is a poor sweet man who plays a digital piano. bless his heart, but I hate him playing. He's not bad, but I really hate it. The piano is on like a jazzy preset and I hate jazz. he plays bad christmas music and I hate christmas music. it's loud. and the crappy christmas radio is still playing over on the speakers. So I am forced to listen to both the painful jazzy christmas songs and the christmas top 100 of I wish I was deaf.

the last thing that is rather unfortunate: everyone assumes I am volunteering. It makes sense, its a christmas charity job and it's low key, but I actually am paid. I don't have the heart to tell people that I am actually not a volunteer and that I am paid $8 an hour for sitting at a table and look like a heartless wench.

aside from the actual table, I adore working at the mall. I actually really dig the hook up. I may seriously consider it when I am looking for a day job before my mission. I mean, I am only working a small seasonal job and I really like the set up. Think about it:

• there's a food court with lots of different restaurants, so if you have to eat before or after your shift, you have options. 
• I'm not even a real mall employee, but I've still been able to reap the blessing of mall employee discounts (something else I'm guilty of). Imagine what sweet deals you could snag.
• the last and best reason, the attractive boys. there are a lot of really dashing gents that work at the mall, and if you work at the mall then you'd see them every once in a while. So it's like you work with hot guys, but you're not coworkers. This is prime because then they won't find out how annoying you really are, and you'd see them often enough to have a pretty solid flirtationship and score dates. also, if things don't work out, you don't really work with them. the danger of dating coworkers is very real and risky. so this is perfection.

the point of the matter is that from where I'm standing right now, it sounds like a pretty tight gig. now, if you have actually for real worked at the mall and think I'm looking at it through rose colored lenses, holler at me. Like if there is some big terrible unknown reason that working at the mall sucks that I don't know about, tell me now. (if it's that the mall is secretly ghetto, it's okay, I know.)

If you are interested in learning more about the Giving Tree that I work for, (not volunteer, sorry.) check it out here. It's run by United Way and Sub for Santa and is a wonderful way to provide Christmas to those children in your community whose parents can't afford it. I'd warmly invite you to adopt an angel if it were in your means, but tomorrow is the deadline to turn in the gifts. if you are adventurous, you can attempt it.

if you do, come to the university mall and visit and adopt one from me.

also, I don't know why blogger has issues with my photo formatting, but we'll get over it.