We have a special today, tin signs are only $15.

This is a common refrain of my boss at the Poster Master on State Street. I always wondered why no one ever called him out on this. It is not a special if, like the faded signs around the store stated, that the signs are always $15.

How someone trust a person who is blatantly dishonest in his business transactions?

We can have the entire store inventory online so people can see what we have before coming in.

At the beginning of my employment I inquired if he would be wanting the website I was to program to have an online shop. No, he stated. I asked because I wanted to know what I would be designing so when it came time for the finished product to be ready, there wouldn’t be any changes.

A month into working on the site and having it near completion for what I was originally asked to do, I was asked when the shop would be functional.

I digress.

can come into wok @ 2?

My work schedule was never set. At one point I thought I was working ever Thursday morning. However, a week later when I inquired when I would be working next my boss asked me to come in Saturday morning. ‘What about Thursday?’ I inquired. ‘Did you want to work Thursday?’

I was asked to make sure I would be able to work the 3rd and 4th of July, a day or two after I was hired because I was the employee with the least seniority. I consented (only later to protest the store being open on a national holiday). A week after I was hired, I was asked to work Christmas Eve and to be available to work the time after the holidays.

WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT!? YOU CAN LEAVE NOW

The above quote was yelled from my boss’ mouth as a customer brushed against a tin sign that leaned against a window and it fell over.

I was informed by my boss that he bought this business with the winnings he made from playing poker. I can only assume that this is the same poker that he plays on the computer behind the counter.

With one eye on one of three poker programs and the other on customers, he would check out a customer’s purchase.

Did you want anything to drink? No? You’re fucking crazy.

For a person who works in retail with customers coming in and out of the shop through a door by his perch at the computer, he had a foul mouth.

‘Is the website fucked up?’ he would ask of me. Stunned by his formation of the question, I always paused before responding.

For those of you who follow my Twitter, you might have seen similar Tweets about the above. For the two months I have worked here it has been Hell. I did not feel bad that I told a guy who handed in his resume for my position to not take the job and then proceeded to tell him why not.

I quit my job at the Poster Master last week. It was one of the best things I have done in a long time.