200k? A round of applause please!

First day off in almost a week, but I feel great.  One more week to go in my front of the house training, and as soon as I can I will be be hitting Kuwait to learn the other side of the restaurant.  I am looking forward to learning new things.

I have learned so much too!  Charissa, Mike, Sarfaraz, Sean, Grace and Jorge have taught me so much about the front of the house, and how to handle guests, count money and do the things that are soooo much different than they are in the states.  I want to give a shoutout to our Sous Chefs and Ed as well, they have helped me learn a little bit and participate so I can get a feeling of how the kitchen (or as I like to call, the feet of the restaurant) works, and its ebbs and flows.

I suppose I should mention the little thing about our $200,000 US week we had last week.  Better than all of the Middle East stores and pretty much all of the ones in the US (sans Vegas).  My first week in a suit and tie training was pretty much the busiest week any PF Chang's will see in the immediate future.  I feel I handled it pretty well, and by the 2nd day I was already out touching tables, handling guests and helping the staff work more efficiently.  By day 4-5 I was practically on the floor alone for large sections of the day.  I want to give my thanks out to the Management team for their trust in me, and the lessons they have helped me learn.  I am excited to learn more!

$200,000 dollar week!

Thanksgiving is coming up and I hope all of my friends and family in the States (and here too) will have an opportunity to sit down with their loved ones and have a good meal.  I am really going to miss my Uncle Glenn and Bob's turkey dinner this year, but maybe I can make it back next year.  I have Thanksgiving off, but I am not really sure what I will be doing.  Maybe I will pester Mike and we can go out.

I am anxiously waiting for the 26th or so for my salary.  Word on the street is that I may have to go an extra month without pay.  If that happens, well... I will be alot thinner.  It will make it interesting to see how I am going to get a place to live with less than a 100 AED in the bank.

Something happened to my camera, so all the pictures I have taken are gone.  So no pictures of Dubai, or me in a suit until I can get a new camera either!

Anyway, thanks for reading and I wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving.

PS  I miss gaming.

Eid Mubarak kul 'am wantum bikhair (hope I got that right)

Had my first Manager shift yesterday.  It was an interesting experience.  It was day 1 training, so I did not really have to much in the way of responsibility aside from paying attention to the managers on duty as well as the flow of the restaurant.  We had plenty of hurtles to jump through, between our kitchen struggling to keep up, our dishwasher clogging up and our printers doing their wacky thing.

We did end up finishing with 121,000 AED or about 31,000 US (roughly) which was impressive for a weekday shift (It is a holiday week) but not the most the store has done on a shift, that will probably be later this week.

I think I may have a line on a studio apartment in Al Barsha.  I got their contact information and a reference so maybe these guys will actually respond to my phone calls (unlike the rest).  I want to find a reputable place without an agent so I can avoid paying fees I really can't afford at the moment.

Ah yes, the can't afford things thing.  I managed to stretch 300 US dollars for almost three weeks while still providing for all of my transportation and food.  I wish I would have known I would have to provide that for my first month before I got here, I would have pushed to sell my car for a bit more.  Here I am living in arguably one of the coolest cities in the entire world, and I am stuck in my apartment for most of the time (I know Mike, you said just give you a call, but I hate not being able to pay my own way).  Sean, Mike and Sarfaraz have helped out immensely this week, and as soon as I get paid I will be paying them back.

I may not be Xboxless for to much longer.  I found the part I need and it costs 199 AED, or about sixty bucks, so it looks like as soon as I get some money I will be getting Fable 3 and COD Black Ops.

I have been doing remarkably well as a hermit the last month.  I normally get really sullen, and while I have been sleeping alot it has been out of pure exhaustion (I don't normally work this many hours without caffeine) and not a general sense of wanting to avoid the world.  I think I may finally have this monkey on my back under control.  I have to give a shoutout to my friends, and my therapist Jake for seeing me through this.  It was money well spent.  I still miss Jess, and I feel I always will.  I consider it a curse and a blessing that when I do love someone, it becomes something eternal for me.  Every woman I have ever loved (all three) each have a part of my heart that no one will ever have.  I can only hope that there is a part of my heart I have not found yet, cause Jess honestly took everything I had up to that point in my life.

I am confidant though.  While romance is on the backburner in my life at the moment, I know that when the time comes to venture out in the debris filled world of courtly love I will be a better man than I ever was.

My son is going to be 9 years old.  My little big man, that sadly I never get to see (hopefully to change soon, now that I am making more) is the bravest and strongest man I have ever had the pleasure of knowing.  He has hurtled practically every obstacle, literally looked death in the face and said "no, I am not done fighting".  And even though he still has his struggles today, he still goes on.  He has a wonderful mother and family, and I am very proud of him.

Well, it is time for me to get in the shower and dressed up in my suit for work (for the love of some guy named Pete I need better shoes).  Closing tonight, then a mid tomorrow.

See ya!

Look to the West.

Short Blog today.

Work has been going pretty good.  Into week two of FoH training, and the last two days have been pretty boring.  Going through a short amount of server trainer basically has me just paying attention to our bartenders so I can learn some new drinks.

Aside from my money issues the only real bad thing going on is the fact I am pretty isolated from my friends over here.  I don't really have money to go out, and while I have been invited on plenty of occasions, that thing called pride is keeping me from taking a helping hand for entertainment.  Basically I feel lonely... but not in an overwhelming way.

I am looking for a place to live, but it looks like I am going to have to get a realtor.  None of the places I have called have answered their phones.  I am pretty sure I want to get a place near the Dubai Mall, hopefully in view of the Burj Khalifa.  I guess your apartment in Dubai is judged by how well you can see the Burj.  We will see.

Kanye West came into work today.  He was there with a small group of people  and we provided really good service to him, and we respected his distance.  So no pics or autographs!

He is pretty short.  And his giant security guard did a good job to intercept people from pestering him.  We had to tell a few teenager girls to leave the restaurant since they were taking up a table waiting to get an autograph.

Well, I had best get to laundry, closing tomorrow night!

Your mission if you choose to accept it...

I have been in Dubai for a little over a week now, and just finished up my first week of Front of the House (FoH) training.  I had a blast, even though I am not used to putting in fifty hours a week but at the end after I started using my compression stockings again it was easy.  Even got back to the "my feet hurt so bad they stopped hurting" phase alot faster than normal.

I only hit two snags during training this week, two of which I know I will iron out with practice.  The first was expo.  I had never actually expo'd a shift for PF Chang's before but I just decided to swallow any apprehension and jump into it with two feet.  I quickly learned why my store is probably going to top out over 7 million dollars in sales at least this year, and even with a moderate night I got spanked until I got backup.  I picked myself up though, I know I can hang now... and that means I will only get better.

The other snag was with hosting.  It is a job I have little experience in and I took it easy the first day with just seating and greeting guests.  They put me into a coordinator position at the beginning of the rush but I did not do so hot.  It is totally different than what I am used to with Restaurant work.  By day two I started to get more of a handle on it, thankfully it was a slower day so I could practice my seating rotation.  Again, I learned that a day shift where they only do 7,000 dollars in US is considered slow.  With that just being the day shift, and a promising night ahead of them, they still were going to spank my formerly considered busy Red Robin on most days.

The week I started they did $160,000 dollars, and were upset because it was the first time their sales were down!

Tom Cruise is in town!  Whoopee I suppose.  He is filming MI4, and the only thing that had me wondering if he is going to BASE jump off the Khalifa.  Mike saw him at a club he took me to a couple days earlier, and I kinda kicked myself for not going out that night, but alas I am still broke and living off the good will of my co-workers until the 25th.

As for my new team.  I cannot thank them enough for treating me so well.  I may be new to the store, but everyone has been so polite, nice, welcoming and kind that I really do not feel as if I have traveled 8000 miles.  I am excited to get my own place and finally have a place I can call home.  It has been a long long time since I have lived by myself and I am kinda looking forward to it.

I am also losing weight, just like when I was here before.  It is not readily apparent in the places I want to lose weight, but you can start to see it in my face (I need the belly, not the face!), and I will have more to come. I am moderately exercising and drinking tons and tons of water.  I am going to do some more research, but I am starting to honestly think we are getting stuff put in our water in the States that makes us more fat than other parts of the world.  But I suppose that makes me a conspiracy theorist.

I have been having some pangs of loneliness, but not because of the distance that I have traveled... just the same old heartbreak.  8000 miles can't keep that away, but I am not going to let it keep me down.  While I may not have moved on as much as some people would have liked, I am in a far far better place than I have ever been.  I am only moving up now, moving forward with me.

I found out that I am being sent to Kuwait in about a month and a half to do my culinary training, and even though it is a dry country, I am oddly excited to meet new people and make new friends.

Well, I suppose I should quit my rambling for the time being until I can get more posted.

I may not be able to update this as often as I would like.  Here at Nojoum I have to pay for my internet, and I do not have 500 AED to drop for a months worth of internet.  I am not home enough anyway to use that much!

This message will probably never self destruct in 5 seconds, but you had best throw it away in a cool slow mo shot anyway!

Prince Ali! Mighty is he! Ali Ababwa!

Hey look the North Pole!

Flew out of Pasco and headed to San Fransisco for my loooooooong layover. I was very tired, stayed up on the 28^th and 29^th so I can make sure to sleep on the plane/airport so I could reset my schedule for the 11 hour change in time zones. However, my inability to sleep when moving or being uncomfortable pretty much had me stay awake for forty hours with less than four hours of sleep.

The good part of it is, I found out I will always try to fly Emerites Airlines if I fly to a large international airport that they travel to.

I am in Dubai. Back in the same hotel I was at when I was here six months ago. I do have a 1400 square foot apartment to myself with a full kitchen, living room, two bathrooms, bedroom and two 42 inch flat screens.

Bad news to that, I am pretty far away from work, and until I discovered the Metro I was spending far to much money on cabs. Plus even with the adapters my outlet cooked my old speakers and sadly the power box for my 360 (thankfully, not the 360 itself).

I have not officially started working yet, that is tomorrow (Wednesday) so I have had a chance to see the town... Thanks to Mike of course. I have been two some pretty neat bars (I loved the Buddha Bar) and down to the Jumeria Beach Walk. I am pretty certain that I will be getting a place to live in Al Barsha, or perhaps the Jumeria Lakeside (depending on pricing) and as soon as I get my residence paperwork taken care of and I get paid I am getting my own place to save some money.

I have decided to do my best to lay low over the next month mostly because I have no money. I want to make a good impression at work as well, and get my training well under way. It does look like I will be in Kuwait next month to train culinary as well! I am pretty excited, even if its not Dubai.

I have made a commitment to continue my weight loss and health. For some reason I have found myself drinking water more than soda (probably the heat) and I feel great, even with the jet lag. Not to mention I am hitting the gym again, and though I am taking it pretty easy until I get settled into work my goal is to get down to pre-Red Robin Management size. And to help out with this I am taking pictures of myself (almost put them on this blog, but... they are pretty bad lol) and keeping them on my PC to remind me why I need to change this.

I already miss my friends, but once I have regular internet I can keep in touch with them.

The plus side of this, I have made a couple of more friends... and I am going to have to make an attempt to change my luck with the fairer sex... I have never seen so many hot women in one place... it makes a beach in Florida or SoCal look pretty... mundane. I probably just doomed myself with saying this though!

Well, I am going to let you guys go! Need to get back to what I was doing!