Final Assignment (portfolio) Observation Paper

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Tara Link

English 1010

Haley Stokes

12 March

Taco Bell

Its a Saturday night and like always my husband,Riley, is working. He is a shift manager at Taco Bell on Saturday and Sunday nights. I decided that for my observation I would visit him and observe everything that goes on at Taco Bell. I wanted to know what kind of people go there, especially past mid night.

I got to Taco Bell at around 7, it was way busy. It was going to be a great night to observe. There were a total of four employees working that night. My husband, an older lady named Angela, and two teenagers, Oscar and Brad. It was Angela’s second day so Riley was really helping her and still training her. Brad and Oscar were both making the food while Riley was training Angela to take orders.

I wasn’t able to observe the drive-thru very well, so I mostly just sat in the lobby and observed. At around 8 an older man came in and went straight to the restroom. He then came into the restaurant and ordered a few items. After that he went to his table and sat by himself, started to read a book, and eat. I looked away and started to observe the other customers that were in the lobby. I looked back at him ten minutes later and he was completely passed out on the table. His drink was spilled, so he was lying face down in his soda with a half eaten taco right under his face. I was super shocked by this, I ran to get my husband Riley. He came out and tried to wake the man up, he didn’t move. Riley was really busy so he just decided to let him be for a little while.

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After it had finally slowed down, Riley went back out to the lobby to try to wake the older man up again. He shook him once, twice, then three times, before he finally stirred. He woke with a jolt, and looked extremely confused. Riley then told him that he needed to leave, because he could not keep sleeping in the lobby. The old man got up asked if he could refill his drink, and then he left stumbling the entire way out.

The next people that made an impression on me was this huge family with about 6 kids. I tried counting but they were all running around the store acting crazy. They ordered over $60 of food. Surprisingly it didn’t take too long for them to get all of their food. The parents didn’t do anything. All of the kids were just sitting at different tables and eating very sloppily. There was food falling out of their tacos everywhere, and they were throwing food at each other. They had napkins, and hot sauce packets everywhere, on the tables, and the floors. They were there for about 45 minutes before finally leaving. When they left the whole lobby was completely destroyed. Riley was so happy that they finally left.

After this crazy family left I decided to go behind the counter and listen in on the head phones, where you can hear people ordering their food. I can say it would be very difficult to do fast food, because of the wind, and the cars driving by it can be very hard to hear sometimes. The drive-thru was busy all night long. There was hardly ever a break in the cars. The workers had no time at all for any breaks, they were just trying to keep up with all of the massive orders they were receiving. Then Lobby was closed and locked by 12:00 am. but that doesn’t mean the drive-thru stops. It was really busy all night. The best part of the night was when a man drove through the drive thru, got to the window, and then said

“uh..never mind I don’t want my food anymore.”

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He then put his car in reverse and backed up, hitting the car behind him pretty good. I could see and hear the whole thing happen. The guy that got hit then got out of the car threw his hands in the air and said

“ What the fuck man, seriously who goes in reverse in a drive-thru?”

The other man was then yelling back in a panicked voice

“Calm down man, calm down.”

You may not think this is funny, especially for the two men in the accident, but I on the other hand was busting up laughing. I could hardly catch my breath.

It was a very interesting night at Taco bell, it may be sad to say this but I think I may go hang out there more often. By the end of the night all the employees were super tired, and were very grateful to finally be going home