This is just so inspiring.

Check out my new uniform at work:


Note the contrast of black screen printing on stark white fabric. Such a work of art, and one that screams professionalism...not. Still, I do get paid pretty well for what I do, I admit, so I guess I can handle wearing this "uniform" that puts me back in the days when wearing silk-screened T-shirts was the thing to do (extra long, over a pair of tights?). I also have to admit that it was especially nice having a T-shirt uniform today after walking through this scorcher of a day (the humidex was 42 ºC when I left here) to get to work...putting on our other uniform #1 (red sweatshirt with Ice Gardens crest on left chest area and "Staff" stitched in underneath...nice and warm for those facilities fellas when they're flooding the rinks) or even our other uniform #2 (summer league jerseys that are pretty big on us Guest Services gals considering that we don't have lots of hockey padding on underneath 'em) would not have been real pleasant when I came in from that heat. Still, a polo shirt would be nicer than this, but I guess that's not my call; maybe our new owners will change it, but we only got bought recently (Friday I was told the announcement would be later that day--maybe it was, but I sure didn't hear it) so it will take a while for them to get to know us (and it longer still before any changes they're going to introduce will be implemented) so I don't think I'll be seeing a better summer uniform before I'm done my summer job there.

Incidentally, at least two other Guest Services staff besides myself remember the days when you could buy those buckle things to feed part of your T-shirt through to cinch it around you and bunch it up all cool-like on one side of the front of you (I think we formed these T-shirt "tails" near our waists)...well, that is, if you weren't cheap and had to resort to tying the lower part of your extra-long T-shirt in a knot to try to acheive the same effect. I never could get that knot to hold so well.

In other work news...a team was robbed at our facility again today. I feel sad about this one because the manner in which it was carried out shows that the perpetrator is someone who is very familiar with our facility, seeing as:

• the team that was robbed had locked their dressing room
• the room that was robbed (F5) therefore had to have been entered through the shower room that F5 shares with F6 (you can lock the door that leads from each room into the showers, but this team hadn't done that)...only this rink and I think one set of rooms on another rink have this shared shower situation...the "perp" likely had to be familiar with our facility to know he could do this
  
• the four wallets that were taken and pilfered were found in a bag in F1, which was not in use at the time (the bag was found by a referee who snuck into F1 to smoke on his break, which he was not supposed to do, but there you go)...I suppose the "perp" could have found an unoccupied room by trial and error and didn't need to know what rooms were being used and not being used by programming at the time (though it might look suspicious to do it the trial-and-error way, especially if he walked in on another team), but interesting to come prepared with a bag to hide them in. I did not hear details of what this bag was like; I assumed it was like a trash bag, but that is only my assumption.

This especially does not look good on our facilities staff (who know the layout of the rooms well, including the shared-showers detail, who would not look suspicious going into F6 carrying a trash bag, presumably to clean up F6, who have ready access to trash bags, and who have to know what rooms on each rink are occupied and unoccupied during all our programming so they can clean the formerly-occupied rooms up after each team leaves), but my fellow Guest Services worker pointed out it could be any of us--a ref, a timekeeper, a convenor, a Guest Services worker...the list goes on. The guys who were robbed were just happy to get back their wallets, credit cards, etc. and are not pursuing the matter as altogether they only lost about $100 cash. I guess the thief gets away (again? was this the same person who robbed those kids in an incident I mentioned in another entry?) because, in the paraphrased words of one of our convenors tonight, "No one is strict enough to do anything about it." Sigh.

Y'know, I do like the laidback, no-pressure nature that my job has for the most part, but there are times (especially times like this) when I wish a lot of the other staff weren't so laidback and, dare I say, apathetic about a lot of things. It will be interesting to see if the atmosphere changes when the new owners start doing some moving and shaking...if they start moving and shaking by the time I am done my term there, that is.

Oh well, off to bed for me now...I need to do some parallel parking practice tomorrow, after all, and am hoping to do my step aerobics DVD, too (yep, it arrived shortly after I ordered it last week, and I have already confirmed how painless it is to work with the DVD version of this workout compared to the VHS tape I had been using...I really am going to start enjoying this stepping thing again). Good night.