Rant time:
So today I made a 16 hour trek from Michigan to Oklahoma City for work and I'm depressed when I shouldn't be. During the long drive I browsed GAF, posted Matthew Stafford gifs and other Lions news trying to remind all of you people about the impending Restoration of the Roar. I'm finally getting my shit together and I have a good job that has a lot of potential.
However it's me, my boss and two other dudes for the next two to three weeks at this one jobsite so I'm staying at a hotel which is par for the course when you work construction. I'm going to get an avatar quote on this, but my coworkers don't particularly care for a decent meal and they decided Golden Corrall was a good idea. I'm the youngest and I hated the idea but whatever I was hungry and needed to eat.
Just being inside Golden Corrall before they closed at 9 PM and seeing the hordes of human beings flock to grab food before they closed that was horrible was depressing enough. On top of that all I was a busboy in the past so I know how much food gets thrown away at the end of the night.
Someone starts awkwardly hitting on this waitress (it was cringeworthy) and I overheard it so I grabbed her attention for some more water to get her away from the douchebag. I looked at what the state sales tax was before I arrived just in case I buy something (possibly a console) before we finish and I asked her how much Oklahoma minimum wage was. She responded "waitresses/waiters don't get paid minimum wage in Oklahoma we get paid $2.13 an hour and rely on tips".
I was shocked. In California at least, you get $8 an hour or whatever minimum wage is. I couldn't fucking believe it. Living on $8 plus busboy tips was hard enough. But somehow the state of Oklahoma decided it was okay to pay people below minimum wage.
$2.13 an hour. That's 8 quarters, a dime and 3 pennies. How the fuck is this even legal? How is this allowed? And working in the restaurant business I know how people can be such assholes just because they can. I started talking to her after my coworkers walked out because I could tell it bothered her. She was probably around 23, left her a tip and just struck up a conversation essentially seeing what she was planning to do with her life and to get the hell out of Oklahoma if the opportunity ever arose. Again paying under minimum wage should and AFAIK illegal so I have no idea how it's even legal. Some shit needs to be done about this. Get your shit together, Oklahoma. I'm greatful to have my job but that whole experience put a damper on my night.
/Rant
