Well, it's official. After three times of losing a crew Bill is officially cursed. We had plans yesterday to do to the Pro Football Hall of Fame and were sitting around the campsite having coffee when Roger, Bill's boss, called. I took the call and Roger said that Bill wouldn't have a crew for Sunday night so I handed him the phone. It seems that the three crew members, Alex, Angela and Nathan had gone out on Saturday night with the two electricians as they were all staying in the same hotel in Wooster. Many drunken hours later Alex and Angela got into an argument at the hotel as one of the electricians had his arm around her when they were leaving the bar supposedly. This argument went on for hours and early Sunday morning Angela decided to up and head back home to Kentucky. Everything escalated from there and got physical with Alex getting scratches from Angela and he and Nathan trading punches and someone one of the electricians getting involved. The police were called and they carted Alex off to jail and Angela and Nathan left for Kentucky.
So by the time we got called it had been a few hours that he had sat in jail and that they had headed for home. Roger said he couldn't find the temp agency phone number (which is funny as I found it in like 30 seconds) and wanted to know if we could bail Alex out of jail. Oh, and one other thing, bail was $354 but he DEFINITELY had it and would pay us right back. In the meantime, I call the temp agency to order 4 workers for that night although I am not quite sure how this is my job? They call right back and say they will have them there --- the weird thing is that a few weeks ago when something like this happened on a Sunday Bill was told that they couldn't get temps for him on a Sunday night! I managed to do it just fine and I am not even authorized to order temps!
So we cancel our plans, drive the rig down to the North Canton Target store, pull the $400 out of the safe and drive the 30 miles to Wooster. When we get there they buzz us in and then the deputy says he has no change for the last $100 bill. So thankfully we had $54 between the two of us. THEN he asks if we want to put the bail money in our name or Alex's. Well of course we say our name and then he informs us if Alex doesn't show up for court on Tuesday and the bail money is in our name we would then be responsible for his fine -- to the tune of $3000 and change! Ok...put it in his name. When he gets out his is very apologetic and polite during the drive back to the Target. Come to find out she had taken all of his clothes and tools as well as the car. So Bill drops him off at the motel in the same lot as we are staying in by the Target. He had gone into a C store to the ATM and came out with only the ticket. We thought that meant that she had cleaned out his account or something but later we find out he has $300. He tells Bill that he will be in the store as Bill really needs him as the last two stores are more complicated than normal. A few hours later I go over and hang a care package on his door (after much pleading with the manager who doesn't want to give out the room number due to confidentiality issues! Argghh). Anyway, I leave him two Aeropostale t shirts, an Aeropostale sweatshirt and the usual toiletries as he had absoluately nothing but the clothes on his back. She even took his cell phone.
Bill goes into work at 8:30 PM to tell the electrician to stay away from Alex. At 10:00 he calls me to call the hotel as Alex had not shown up. So I take the truck and go over there. Surprisingly he answers the door and says that he is all messed up and can't work. I tell him that if he doesn't show he will be throwing away his job as Prime will fire him. He is all upset about her and I try telling him that obviously SHE wasn't thinking about him earlier in the day when she made statements that sent him to jail. I told him that Bill and I would go to court with him on Tuesday and vouch for him. He says that he is afraid as the county has a zero tolerance for assault and he will no doubt spend 6 months in jail and loose his job anyway. He says that he is thinking about leaving but that he is worried about the money we put up. I said that he had told Roger he would pay us right away and that we had put the bail in his name. He said that then he was probably leaving as he had no reason to return to Ohio and they wouldn't follow him with a warrant for a misdemeanor. I tell him to do what is right for HIM and not her. I said to think about what he will do for a job back in Kentucky with the unemployment still so bad and then left as there wasn't anything more I could do.
Bill came in this morning and said that he hadn't shown up so he told Roger who said Alex was fired. Roger said that we needed to knock on his door to get our money as Alex only makes $9 and that wouldn't be enough to pay us our $354 with what he made last week after taxes. That ticked me off as Roger had ASKED us to bail him out -- I consider it to have been a request from the company. Bill said that he never would have bailed him out if he knew he wouldn't show up for work. So I knocked on Alex's door...he had to have been there yet as the A/C was running. I also left a note stating we expected repayment. Then I went back to the rig and called Roger's boss Mack. I told him pretty much in no uncertain terms that I expected Prime Retail to withhold Alex's check and we needed our $354 back -- ALL of it, not partial payment. So far we have heard nothing -- nothing from Alex and nothing from Prime. It is bullshit that we are sitting today without that money and have to wait until Friday to get it much less wonder if we are getting it all back.
I am not extremely worried as I trust Mack to do right by us but my impression is that Roger did not tell him that he asked us to bail Alex out. I think Mack was under the impression that we did it on our own. Here again, we try to be nice to someone and we get burned. It is getting ridiculous.
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