Back to the Renaissance Festival
It’s that time of year. We are Back to the Past.
The Arizona Renaissance Festival and Artisan Marketplace is up and running and once again, is the greatest place to go to pretend to work.
I say pretend, because after 20+ years of management in the auto industry, to get to go and just be an employee that does a good job and is recognized as such, is more like a vacation than actually working.
I got ding’d on a job application, because I forgot to list it as a past employer because it didn’t feel like work.
Last year, after several weeks of working, Jim commented that it was interesting as I never came home in tears from the Festival.
Of course, I wasn’t making $75,000 a year, like I was in the “get your brains beat out” business of the automotive world. And life was just fine, because of that.
This year, it’s like stepping into a pair of old shoes, and things go smoothly.
This is the week of the School Days. Yesterday was Middle School and tomorrow will be the Junior and Senior High Schoolers.
Here my rant begins.
What are parents thinking, not teaching their kids how to be money smart? Or how to be polite to vendors and shopkeepers?
First example:
Girl gives me $20 for a $4 slice of pizza. I say, “out of $20, and 16 pounds your change my lady… And (counting out the bills, explicitly) five ten, fifteen and twenty pounds are your change.”
She screams, “You are cheating me! I was supposed to get $16 back and you are trying to give me 20!”
I told her to get her teacher and come back. I saw her excitedly talking to her teacher, who saw me looking at her, and gave every impression of looking like she wanted the earth to swallow her, and took the young lady away.
But I was really appalled at how many kids had no idea about counting change, and got confused – what are math classes doing these days?
Then, I must rant on how many kids would just throw money on the counter (and then have to go chasing when the wind blew it away, and wanted to blame me for not picking it up fast enough, (although my back was turned and I was getting their pizza.)
I told them until they saw their money in my hand, their money was their problem not mine, so they needed to hang onto it. I started counseling kids not to let their money loose, only to put it into the hand of a vendor, and they all would look at me like I was nuts.
So what are parents or schools teaching kids about handling money?
Expecting fast services, but giving a handful of crumpled bills, like little raisins of dollars. Complaining they want their pizza NOW and getting an attitude when I tell them that if they opened up their dollars, it would be faster.
Parents, get a clue.
Teach your kids that just because someone is on the other side of the counter, they aren’t a lower class citizen.
Open your cash and count it out to the seller, rather than a wadded up clump of money.
Teach your kids how correctly counting back cash works. (“I give you a $4 slice of pizza for your $20, so 1=5, ten, fifteen and twenty is your change.) Don’t expect me to deal with your screaming kid, because she thinks I am trying to cheat her by slipping $20 change as stated above to her instead of $16. I was trying to count $16 to her properly. In fact, you have more serious issues if your kid thinks that $20 change is cheating if she thinks she needs $16 back. Especially when she got the $16 she was entitled to in the first place, and didn’t bother to either count with me or count herself.
Tell your kids they can’t order us about like we were their slaves. If they don’t like the pizza they get, and it is a normal slice, they get their money back and can go somewhere else. If the slice is cold or uncooked, we will replace it. If they want to count the pepperonis and see if there are more on another slice, too bad. We will not show them 4 slices and let them choose.
The kids need to speak up. I had a kid yesterday that I finally had to hand a marker and napkin to, because he was unable to express the answer to “cheese or pepperoni?” verbally. And I didn’t read lips well enough to tell. I tried the ASL I knew, and hand spelling and he looked at me like I was nuts, and shook his head and whispered softer at me.
So few of the kids I saw yesterday could handle the basic things my parents taught me outside of school regarding money transactions. And these were kids from all over the valley.
Parents, so many of you should be ashamed. We look at your kids and wonder, “how can they not know how to handle this situation?”