I guess it is 5 o'clock somewhere...

not here tho, or at least, not when Mr. Tipsy got in my line today at 4ish.

I'm doing my usual thing, "Hello how are you" rings up items after patron grunts whatever response la de da, de da.

Then I hear this, "HELLO THERE!" bellowed from the depths of some guys gullet.

I look up and see... Mr. Tipsy.

I do not know who he is, but he has definitely been hitting the bottle early,
maybe there was an office luncheon,
maybe a birthday party,
who knows cuz it's only Thursday.
He seemed to be having a little difficulty deciding what volume his voice should be, or which direction was south if you know what I mean. Needless to say, this is what followed...


Mr. T: "HOW are YOU today!"

Me: *Trying not to giggle* "Oh, I'm good, how are you Sir?"

Mr. T: "well... I'm just DANDY!"

Me: "That's nice Sir"

Mr. T: "Yea YEA, you can shove ALLLLL that in one bag for meh!"

Me: "Sure, no problem."

Mr. T: *grunts and swoons* "Huh, is that there the bathroom?" *gestures to our kiddy play center, definitely NOT the bathrooms*

Me: "No Sir, the bathrooms are just behind me" *Points to bathrooms*

Mr. T: "OOOH! ok, Mind if I USE em?" *swoons some more* "Hey, YOU think I could LEAVE my BAGS HERE?!? THINK they would be OK!?!?"

Me: "Sure, I'll keep an eye on them, it's no problem at all."

Mr. T: "You do that, and THANK YOU KINDLY!" *grunts and swoons way to the bathroom*


*Next customer enters the que*

Me: *ackward smile* "I apologize, that man is clearly intoxicated."

Nice Lady: "Well, at least he's polite and behaving himself. Hey, its 5:oo somewhere right?"

Me: "Indeed." *rings up groceries*


*Mr. Tipsy returns from the bathroom for his items.*

Mr. T: "ALL right young LADY! THANK YOU KINDLY!!!"

Me: "Your welcome!"


I really hope he was not driving...
but maybe I do.

To Latex Lady, with love

Today I met the latex lady.

She is allergic to latex...

our conveyor belts are MADE of latex...

you see the problem here.

So, she puts all of her items in those blue carry baskets so nothing touches the belt, and if something falls onto the belt, you have to get it replaced for her, she really can't touch the stuff.

She's a little weird,
but otherwise a cool person.

I like weird, cool people...

therefor...

I like you Latex Lady.

And then a savior appeared...and she said the wisest thing I've ever heard...

So I was working a few days ago, doing the usual spheal of hellos and how are you today's and getting the usual fines and goods and total ignoring of my presence when I was asked to ring up a little old lady on register 20.

This woman was AWESOME!

She told me to take my time, that she wasn't going to move fast and while she was here I could just take it easy. The world tries to move too fast anyway she says. My bosses close the lane for her, this is just the drill.
She ragged on my bosses, but in a friendly way, very warm and grandmotherly humor.
A lot of the front end ppl came by to say hello to her, She would say,
"Oh hello Evan, yes Jason already helped me out, this nice cashier is doing a wonderful job, but I have to say, Jason did a better job at helping me here then YOU Evan, ah ha ha, just kidding, just kidding you."
All laughs, all smiles.

The best thing she said to me was, "I'm old, I've earned the right to bitch!"
To which I said "Man, I hope I make it to that age then!"
She laughed and laughed like it was the best thing she's ever heard, said don't worry, you will, just take your time getting there.

She was an amazing person.


She is dying of cancer.


She is living every moment of her life upbeat and happy about it. Thankful for and enjoying the time she's got. I'm sure there are negatives, but she doesn't dwell on them.

I admire her, I'm 24 and I envy her, this old woman with cancer, because she has life figured out. So many people never figure life out, I hope I do.

later



And remember,

The world tries to move too fast anyway.

Im not as healthy as I look you know...

Ok, listen, or read rather,

I can understand that where I work there are a lot of youngins (14-18 yr olds) that are less responsible and would just call out of work willy nilly "cuz man, i like, really wanted to go to that concert" or "dude, I really, like, don't feel like going to work today"
That's wrong, and irresponsible, and maybe they should be required to bring in a doctors note for a few days off...but give me credit where it's due!

I do my damn work, and I work hard!

I mean, seriously, been there for 5 years, never caused trouble, no history of calling out randomly, only when I've been sick...which, unfortunately, has been more often as of late. I've been battling a bout of bronchitis that I can't seem to shake. It has reared its ugly head for the past two summers now.

Yes, that's right, I get bronchitis...in the middle of summer, warmest and most beautiful months of the year here, and I get sick...WTF?!?!

Well, I have diabetes, type 1, had it since I was 7, so my immune system is shot to hell.
I look ok on the outside, but am a mess inside.

Its like AIDS without being contagious, please don't get offended, because it is true.

If I don't die from some weird accident, I will most likely die from pneumonia or some common cold in my 60s, which come to think of it, isn't so rare in the elderly is it? I guess what I should say is, I work just as well or harder then my coworkers, but if I get overtired and a cold then I get bronchitis because my body is bad at fighting off the infection.

It happens fast too.

You get a cold, your sick for a few days, I get a cold and a few days later, its bronchitis.

SUCKS HUH?

so,

The point of this whole rant, is that in a complexly irrespective way, my 'Woman Instigating Troubling Coworker Hell ' or WITCH tells me I need to bring in a doctors note...WTF?!?! No feel better or anything, just a brief, concise demand for evidential paperwork. I love how she doesn't give a shit who I am or knows I have this problem, way great equal treatment and such employers, yea. I only have trouble with this supervisor, all the others are very understanding. My boss, well, we will just leave Natzi Bitch out of this.

This WITCH, she treats you like her dogs, like you serve her now dammit kneel before her! God forbid it you get sick, then your like a broken dog, someone to kick while your down.

Oh hell no, I kneel to no one.

What A Little Jerk!

OK, so last week I actually had a kid who didn't want to listen to me and well...

So Little Jerk comes in with his little sister, hes 8 shes 5, and there is already another 8 year old boy in there playing with the blocks. For some reason, when you get two or more 8 year old boys you get trouble, some kind of macho, dominant male in the room thing.
Usually its not a problem cuz they listen to you, you can, after all, call their parents and that's usually a good enough threat.

Well, this kid wouldn't listen.

Little Jerk keeps taking the other boys blocks, even off of this really spiffy town he's made. The other boy comes over and tells me, he's well behaved and polite. I tell him I'll take care of that, and let him know to just be patient, it will work out. I tell Little Jerk to stop, twice. He says hes going to hit the other boy, mind you these are those old fashioned wood blocks some of which are the size of baseball bats, I'm like, orly? O-O'

Me: "*insert real name here*, I'm calling your mother"
LJ: "How come everybody knows my name!"
Me: "You mom has to tell us, because we are responsible for watching you."
LJ: "AND how come you know her PHONE NUMBER?!?"
Me: "You mom has to give it to us for you to come in, in case we need to call her"
LJ: "Well, I've never heard of that, shesh, she never told me that, shesh, she's lost her privileges!" *pouts away*
Me: *erm, wtf, must be how he's disciplined...?*
LJ: "Well, if you call her I'm going to hit him"
Me: "No, your not" *now, I'm prepared to get between these kids, my body language must say so...*
LJ: "Well, I'll kick his tower down when she gets here then"
Me: *patiently waits for mother of devil child to arrive, acting nonchalant so as not to raise the suspicions of the room, they can smell worry you know*

Well, the mom gets there, and I tell her what her son had done, why I had to call her, and why he has to leave, she understands so no problem. He still had the nerve to knock the top off the tower, but mom's sharp disproving voice put a stop to that.

I put a note on his card, and left a note for who I consider my boss in the 'nursery'

I don't think Little Jerk will be returning any time soon.

By the way, his sister the whole time from start to finish, NO problems sharing, and was an absolutely lovely child...

so ?

WTF, Who did the schedule?!?!

Seriously,

It was like a kinder gardener with ADD did the schedule this week. This hasn't happened in a while, but it was baaaaaaad.

Ok, so in my previous post I talked about being scheduled without warning on Monday just because it was Labor Day and they felt it would be busy? I guess they scheduled too many people Monday since they gave me no trouble when I asked no to come in since I had plans.

Well, this over scheduling of course, effectively messed up the rest of the week.

Short staffed, MAN were we short staffed Tuesday!

At 1 in the afternoon there were only about 5 or 6 cashiers on front end when there should have been at least twice that!

Oh shit,
so managers were jumping on register(the cool managers were there by chance, so they were ready to get right in there and help, do what really needed to be done.), and the Nazi Bitch was calling for any available cashiers from the different departments in the store (I worked it for a couple hours, I was suppose to be in the kiddy room, I had to close it that night.) No one got their breaks, it was so dumb...and illegal.

I suspect the same person that scheduled me for work on the night of the baseball game was the one who did the schedule this week...so fuck them.

I signed WHAT?!?!

OK, granted this one was my fault, but I vow to learn from it, and not complain except for about how backhanded and sneaky it seems from this end...

I went in today to work, and check my schedule for this week, and found I was scheduled for work this holiday Monday. I'm not available to work Mondays and thus, had made plans with friends and family, so a conversation with my immediate superiors went something like this.

Me: "Um, I'm scheduled for work Monday, but I'm not even available to work Mondays and have plans."
Associate Service Supervisor: "Oh, your not available Monday?"
Me: "Well, no, not even normally, but plans have been made."
ASS: "Ok, no problem we'll take you off the schedule."
Me: "Ok then. "o_O' *surprised, but ok*

Now, this was weird, and the first time it had ever happened to me in all the 5 years I've worked here, so I went in search of a more knowledgeable employee...

Me: "I'm scheduled for work Monday, but I'm not even available to work Mondays and have plans, do you know why this happened?"
Slightly More Informed Labor Employee: "Oh yea, like a gazillion years ago when you were hired and signed 7 billion forms, on of them was for which holidays your available to work."
Me: "Ok, but since it's not my usually work day wouldn't it be nice if I was told I would be working?"
SMILE: "Yea, no, they dont have to tell you, or ask you or anything, and no one ever remembers the paper they signed either."
Me: "Not good tho, people make plans, have prior commitments, this is a bad system."
SMILE: "Yea, its kind of a gray area..."
Me: o_O'

Oh kaaaaaaaaaayyyyy,
my bad,
still,
this is a really bad fuck you in the ass kind of system.