Fun at Work

So Today is Thanksgiving and I have to work. Whaaaa poor me. Well somebody had to do it, I guess, and now I can be a martyr for the cause. What cause? I dunno. I just like answering customers when they ask me what I'm doing for Thanksgiving with a sigh and a "Oh, I have to work, no Thankgiving for me" and then a downcast look and another sigh. Oh, I'll have Thanksgiving after work, I think. I'm not sure.. anyway, at some point I'm supposed to go to my sisters, I don't know what day exactly. It's not very organized this year, what with me, the revolving point of everyone's lives, throwing everything into chaos by working. Anyway, a few customers promised to bring me pie and plates of food and stuff. We'll see which ones make my good karma list.

So yesterday, I was at the coffee bar and this lady is there, POURING her coffee into the trash can. I see this, and automatically a Mr. Miagi "HAT -T -T-T-T-TTT!!" escapes from my mouth as I reach over and pause before presuming to grab her wrist or her coffee cup. Well, this kind of freaks her out and she jerks the cup back, sending coffee flying in that ballistic way that gravity sends liquids when yanked or jerked or launched, and she says, "Oh, my bad, sorry, I'm so sorry, oh oh oh, sorry...". So I tell her it's ok, of course, everything is really ok, didn't mean to freak you out, it's no biggie, people do it all the time (lie, nobody has ever poured a cup of coffee down the trash that I've actually seen) I'll take care of that for you, and I take the cup and pour it down the sink. Whew. It feels like a close one, even though the coffee can is now full of wet coffee. But at least the customer didn't break out into tears.

Later this young cutie tries to buy some grape cigarillos. Maybe she thinks she'll get them on looks alone, but I ask for her ID. "Oh come on, you've got to be kidding, I come in here all the time" (I've never EVER seen her in the store and I've been working there for a year) "I always buy cigarettes." Sorry. "Really?" Yes, sorry. It's a state law. "You're awesome," she says with a roll of the eyes, and stalks out to where her boyfriend is airing up her tire. So, I make a note of that, she has a boyfriend, and whaddya know, about 10 minutes later, he comes in the store and wants to buy two packs of grape cigarillos and some zig zags. "Sorry, but I know you're with the girl who tried to buy those eariler, so according to state law, I can't sell them to you." Well, he just looks at me with wide eyes, like he just can't fucking believe what is happening. Yes, his ironclad scheme to buy tobacco for his girlfriend has failed. He says something like "I can't fucking believe this," and turns around and walks out of the store like a zombie. Rarely do I ever get the chance to enforce state law to that degree and as a result I am filled with a giddy shaky feeling, like I might pass out.

So these two chicks are at the store yesterday, I dunno... taking inventory or something, or reorganizing the shelves. One of them is very pushy. I'm outside smoking with the MOT in my hand, ordering stuff, and she says "Have you ordered bread yet?" Ok, at this point I have no idea who this lady is. I tell her yeah, I've ordered bread, "Well you need to go back and change it. I want ONLY ONE SHELF of the RED BREAD. And ONLY 3 of the THIN SLICED. And ONLY 3 of the LARGE and maybe 2 of the SMALL. Ok? Got that?" So I kind of just look at her and don't say anything. Seriously, I just stand there and look at her. About 30 seconds go by and I guess she finds her center and she tells me that she's with the bread or something like that. So I say, ok, and go back to ordering. Later I'm in the store and there's another lady with wearing a 7-11 shirt with her, so I can now safely surmise that she probably works for 7-11 and that I should probably re-order the bread, and that she wasn't just some crazy bread lady.

Later the Crazy Bread Lady motions me over to the bread aisle and proceeds to give me the same lecture but with references this time. "I want ONE SHELF of the RED BREAD" she motions towards the wheat bread "and ONLY 3..." etc. Finally she gets to the donuts. "And these are our TOP SELLERS so I want the HAWAIIAN BREAD RIGHT HERE NEXT TO THEM." Well, I have been subserviant up to this point, but the Hawaiian bread was moved to the top shelf for a reason, because it doesn't sell well on the bottom shelf next to the donuts. I tell her this. "Oh, you'll sell them RIGHT HERE NEXT TO THE DONUTS." I tell her that they've always been there, right next to the donuts, and they've never sold, that's why we moved them to the top shelf. "Oh, they'll sell, TRUST ME ON THIS." So, I say "if you say so," and she gives me this look plus daggers. So later on I try to make some conversation with her, just to kind of break the whole "I hate you " vibe that seems to be going on, and she never answers me when I talk to her. I even asked her once, twice even, if she needed help with that shelf that she was manhandling with chips falling over her shoulders, and she never replied. Maybe she just never really heard me.

So later I'm sitting in my car smoking a cig and reading, thinking to myself that this is all I want to do, just to sit back and read, and that I really really don't want to go back in the store, and I start to get really tired for no real reason... I guess the Crazy Bread Lady kind of took it out of me today. I still have two hours left though, so I go back inside and bravely endure them. Eventually the day finally ends, as days are wont to do, and I go home and I am overwhelmed with just being really tired and I go to bed at 3:30 and the next thing you fucking know, it's 4:30 am and here I am. Weird, that.