From behind the bar and over the counter.

Every once in while, you meet an individual so spectacular that you wish you could share this person to the world. This person for me is my Starbucks store manager.

I fucking hate that douche.

Be not confused by my choice of vocabulary. “Spectacular” in this sense refers to the sheer awe of stupidity that this man manages to be. I only want to “share” this person with all of you, in the flesh, because otherwise, it would be hard to believe such a neanderthal should exist.

Six feet tall, blue eyes, and a brain full of oatmeal, this guy has single-handedly made my last college summer a living hell. Despite living on an island surrounded by beaches and sunshine, I have made it to the ocean twice in the past three months. I have no tan to show off when I start up school. Just a handful of paychecks and overtime hours to display on my tattered green apron.

We have duly named this beast of incompetence “Shooter McGavin” from the movie Happy Gilmore. He not only looks like the despicable villain from the Adam Sandler movie but has the same personality as well, like he studied the movie script and devoted his life to be as much of a jerk-off as possible.

The Inevitable Beginning:
When we first heard of this man coming to lead our team, we were hopeful. He had big shoes to fill, being that our manger who was leaving was all but perfect in his leadership and managerial skills. We received tidbits of information from his resume (don’t ask how we got it, Starbucks is a cesspool of sneaks, tattletales, and spies… Just kidding, our regional manger emailed us giving a little background on him, but still, be wary of your mouth in this corporation; more on that in a later blog). I should have known from then that the store was doomed, that our perfect era would come to a slow and torturous end.
First of all, the sheer number of restaurants this man has jumped around is alarming. In the span of almost five years, he had held managerial positions at several different food establishments. While at first this may sound comforting given the high turnover rate in our industry, this standard is only held to the many young adolescents looking for various part-time positions. If you are middle-aged and constantly looking for job after job, that is a problem. Further investigation involving interviews with previous workers who’ve served under this man only proved my expectations. The first words to describe him were “perverted asshole.” Not a good combination in any perspective. When asked to explain, he was mostly described as being very sexual with female employees, lacking basic managerial skills, and creating a hostile work environment. But the last thing that was said about him was the kicker; HE WAS FIRED. It was confirmed that he was walked off the premises for at least two restaurants. How he even got to the initial interview with the higher Starbucks management team baffles me.
But as lowly baristas, we have no say in who we trust, depend, and lean on in our time of frappucino fury. Shooter’s arrival was inevitable, as our pitiful fates were.

The Long and Excruciating Middle:
At the very least, he was not a disappointment to the least of my expectations. In fact, Shooter met and even exceeded any preconceived notions I had of him. I suppose this was the first and only time this has happened for him.
He schemed, lied, and manipulated any and everyone who crossed his path. He accused supervisors for stealing, screwed up even the most simple of managerial tasks like scheduling, and blamed everybody but himself for his day-to-day failure of rearing the Macy’s stronghold. He was not responsible for the constant lack of simple supplies like cups and lids that we need daily nor was he at fault for never being on the floor as a solid leader to direct the chaotic traffic that goes on during any given shift.
A few examples of his horrendous lack of character and testicles:
1. He had no problem relaying private information from his life to explain his present incompetence, as if he would be a capable human being if life was just not so hard.
2. As expected, he never failed to come up with inappropriate comments to female employees. From commenting on a barista’s bra strap color that was shown peeking from a tank top to jokes about his own sexual appeal when the girls talked about good looking male customers (done off the floor, of course), Shooter’s done it all.
3. Lest we not forget the touching. The man had no sense of the personal bubble or boundaries to where and where not to touch an employee, especially a female one. Light touches around the upper waist, soft whispers to the inner ear, all acts we wish from our beloveds than the de-loved manager from hell.
4. He was a sickly man, constantly calling out of his shifts and even once, leaving a closing shift early with no other supervisors on the clock or in the store. He promptly gave me, a normal barista, the key and said to leave all the money in the registers, a very big, corporate NO-NO.
5. “I’m open to suggestions… It’s my way or the highway.” Yes, he said these two statements not a minute apart from each other at his first store meeting. My coworker, Amanda, promptly asked just what the hell he meant by it. Shooter stammered something inaudible and proceeded with his pointless speech. Whether he has short term memory or English is his fifth language, we have yet to figure out.
6. FAVORITISM. He wanted us to be his friends. A few faltered and gave in to his whims but the rest were clearly not taking the bait. And those who didn’t, paid dearly. He was hired to lead, not to congregate. You are a loud-mouthed, obnoxious liar in your mid-forties. No, I don’t want to be your friend.
7. He was a scatter-brained fool behind the bar. He neither had the finesse or discipline to man the bar for more than ten minutes on his own. He always looked like a scared, wide-eyed cockroach, skittering from here to there, trying to avoid the massive booted-foot of peer pressure as he failed hour after hour. Most shifts were left up to the veterans to delegate. We functioned effortlessly without his dooming presence and burst into flames the moment his sweaty brow dripped his salty tears all around the Verisimo espresso machines. After a while, he just gave up trying to keep up. He disappeared behind the corner and glued his eyes to the computer screen. If he was trying to take a page from the Phantom of the Opera, he should’ve at least put the mask on. It would’ve relaxed my gag reflex every time he peeked out from his dunce corner.
8. Liar, Liar, pants on fire. Need I say more?
I could go on and on. My coworkers can vouch for me. I encourage those of you who have your own Shooters experiences to comment back with them. If you don’t, I understand that you do not want to revisit those painful memories. Let they rest in hell with his rotted soul.

The Bitter End:
He could’ve left gracefully. He could’ve left promptly. But then again, that would not be the inconsiderate Shooter we had all come to hate and demonize. He chased away almost half of our team and replaced them with newbies he hoped would love him the way his parents never did. The store was in disarray. Everything was misplaced, nothing was recognizable. The regulars either left or learned to spot the veterans before standing in line. No one was happy; the bright luster of Starbucks Macy’s had dulled to the color of two week old dog poo. Eventually, the weight of our combined disdain and his unwillingness to perform as a capable store manger willed him to seek another food establishment to destroy.

You may ask why we didn’t speak up to upper management. Well, we did. You may ask why nothing was done. We ask the same thing. The corporate hotlines, the calls of complaint, the emails of concern, the endless meetings to get this man out were all done in vain. Shooter and the rest of us were all caught in the faults in the corporation. Starbucks may claim to be deeply involved in its workers’ lives but when where they going to save us from Hurricane Shooter? Where was our relief? Where was our support? While they might reason that given the bigger frame, he was a minor crack in their economic plans, he was a crater of inhumane evil and indecency in many people’s lives. How great is health insurance if you’re going to the doctor for migraines that are caused by the very institution that gave you the insurance in the first place?

All in all, he’s gone. That is the only good that came out of his green-aproned stint, his very departure. Good riddance.
I pass this word of warning to any and all restaurants, bars, coffee-shops, grocery stores, clothing stores, and any other establishment that barters goods for cash… Beware the man named Shooter.