Interdepartmental Trash Bag Stealing

Just one of the interesting tidbits I picked up from working at Publix. Hide your trash bags so no one steals them.

Obviously, that's not all I've learned from my first job. I am now a bread-slicing fiend, although a week ago, I was not. You might think it's easy if you've got an automatic bread slicer, but then you gotta put that sucker into a bag without all the pieces falling apart.

Oooh, and I decorated cupcakes! Aside from the occasional opportunity to write "Happy Birthday Kay" or "Happy Safe Driving" (for a customer's son who passed his driving test) on a cake, that's the only decorating this Decorator Apprentice (slash Bakery Clerk) has done.

So turns out I'm not doing much decorating. I sweep, I mop, I slice, I write, I take cake orders (definitely one of the more difficult aspects. Why do I always manage to screw something up?!), I run into table corners and cut my back on some sharp metal object while standing up too fast. Ouch.

But hopefully my apprenticing will continue throughout the summer, and hopefully I won't have to work 35 hours every week. I finally figured out why everyone says decorating is such a tough job. Unlike at a small bakery or cake studio, like Bliss, Publix has to take every single cake order a customer throws at them (unless they don't order a day in advance). And the decorators make them all the same day they get picked up, so on days when there are a lot of cakes, they gotta be there at 4 or 5 in the morning. Yikes!

That's one of the reasons I want to run my own place. I can hire someone else to do the dirty work (dishes, mopping, trash throwing-out), and make my own hours (if I want to stay up late the night before, instead of getting up early the next day, then gosh-darn-it, I will!), and decide who's cake I want to make, and who's cake I don't. No need to overbook!

But I suppose that everything I'm learning at Publix is helping me "find myself" a little more, and I really do like the job. Plus I can put some of that money I'm making aside (after I figure out this roth IRA business that my dad keeps talking about) for funding my own dream bakery. :)

P.S. I made a graduation cake last weekend, and I promised on Facebook that I would post pictures, so I haven't forgotten! Stay tuned!