Tales from the Retail Underbelly

Over-Educated and Unemployed

2010-02-02T16:22:00.003-05:00

It had to happen eventually. I was officially fired last week from the Retailopia universe. Shall we take a moment to grieve? .... Moment's up! I wasn't fired because I suck at my job, or because I have a lazy eye that makes people nervous, or even because my boss discovered this blog (now that would have been understandable). No, I was fired because *gasp* the boss's daughter hates me.

No lie. I was literally pulled into the office and told "you haven't done anything wrong...you do excellent work...the best we've ever seen [because apparently data entry can't just be done by trained monkeys, who knew?]....but even though you've done absolutely nothing to deserve this and we know it's wrong [unethical, evil, and rather jerk-ish], we still have to let you go because my daughter has said that if we don't fire you then she will no longer be a part of our family."

You'd think I was making this up, but I'm serious. People aren't creative enough to make this shit up. Okay, I'm not creative enough.

So, after hearing for 45 minutes what a wonderful employee I am (seriously, people, learn how to google your employee's names and find their blogs and then ya won't be thinking they're so great after that, let me tell you AND you'd have a legitimate reason to fire them), they kicked me to the curb. Because the boss's daughter doesn't.like.me.

When did my life become a movie written by Paris Hilton with costume design by Lindsay Lohan and starring that fat guy from Superbad as my boss's pug-faced daughter? When, I ask you, WHEN?

I really don't get why she doesn't like me. I mean sure, she wasn't getting her responsibilities done, so they gave them to me and I did them in like 2 seconds. And sure, I didn't put up with her crap when she frickin lied about me and destroyed my hard work by deleting my computer files. I went straight to her daddy. And apparently no one's ever done that before. And apparently it kinda pissed her off.

So, I was enlightened last week to the fact that for 2 years now (yes I said 2 years), she's been calling for my head on a silver platter. And the Boss-Man has finally acquiesced after the "I will shun you if you don't fire her" tantrum. (Really Boss-Man, did you really give it that much thought, because never speaking to that spawn of vermin poop doesn't sound so bad to me).

So, besides me "stealing" her job out from under her, how can she not like me? I have such a winning personality. I mean, have you read my other blogs? Hellooooo. Who needed that stupid job anyways? It's so obvious that I will be a super-famous writer one day. Or homeless and frying my cat on a spoke over a burning trash can for sustenance. It's still a little up in the air at this point.

And yes, I realize I've neglected this blog as of late and so I probably don't have any readers left anyways, and I do apologize for that. But as you can imagine, life's been rather hectic lately, and let's face it people - I never gave you that much love to begin with. But here's to being unemployed with nothing better to do but write witty (albeit bitter) diatribes against my former employer. Let the semi-hysterical rants begin!

The Dirty Dealings of the Better Business Bureau

2009-12-05T13:33:00.005-05:00

I'm sure most of you have heard of the Better Business Bureau, or BBB. Founded in 1912, the goal of the BBB is to "foster a fair and effective marketplace, so that buyers and sellers can trust each other." If you would like to read the BBB's official (and rather wordy) mission statement, you can do so here.

Now, I work for a small business that has existed for over 30 years. And though we may have our faults (which you can read about in my other blogs - ha!), customer service is not one of them. Our phones are answered by live people, emails are responded to in less than 24 hours (less than one hour during business hours), and errors on our part are humbly apologized for and corrected. Why am I telling you all this, you ask?

Because yesterday we received an email from a first-time customer asking us to please cancel her order because she had looked us up on the BBB's website and our rating was a C-, and therefore she did not feel comfortable ordering from us. We were shocked. Firstly, because we are not BBB accredited, so how can we have any rating whatsoever? And secondly, a C-?!

Well, we of course immediately looked ourselves up, and sure enough. But the reason behind the C- was troubling. There is no record of ANY complaints filed against us EVER, so why the bad rating? The explanation listed was as follows:

Reasons for this rating include:

BBB does not have sufficient information to determine how long this business has been operating.
BBB does not have sufficient background information on this business.

Really? You don't have sufficient information which means we automatically get a C-? When we called the local BBB branch to inquire about this, we were told that we had been sent papers a few months ago (yeah, uh-huh sure...) with questions regarding our business, and because we had not filled them out and returned them, our rating is a C-.

I see. So, even if you're not BBB accredited, you still have to fill out their paperwork and turn it in to them, or they'll slander your reputation. Got it. Makes perfect sense.

Now, why wouldn't you just become BBB accredited, you might ask. Well you see, the BBB makes money by charging companies for the "honor" of being accredited with them. I had a little trouble finding any information on their website concerning accreditation costs (only a "contact your local BBB for this information"), but from what I was able to find from googling "BBB accreditation costs" it can range from a couple hundred to several thousand dollars based on the size of your business.

So, all of this got me curious, and I decided to look up a bunch of businesses that I order from periodically to see what their rating is, and if they're even accredited.

First stop: Amazon.com (here's the link to their BBB page). Well, they of course are accredited and have an A+. As of writing this, the BBB website states that they have had 2,793 complaints filed against them. Now, I love Amazon, but their customer service is crap and I was actually surprised the number of complaints wasn't higher.

Moving on. Let's try Woot.com, the most awesomest website in the entire world and one that I have ordered from close to a hundred times, and have never experienced a problem with. Well, Woot isn't accredited (good for you, Woot!), and yet their rating is a.... D-. Wait, what?! So, what have they done to deserve that rating? Well, here ya go, straight from the BBB website (or click here to go to the BBB's page for Woot):

Reasons for this rating include:

62 complaints filed against business
Failure to respond to one complaint filed against business.

Hmm. Yeah, uhhh, I guess I can totally see how a whole 62 complaints in the past three years, and failture to respond to one of those completely justifies a D- rating. Oh, and of course, the uhh, lack of being willing to pay for accreditation. That too.

Of the dozen or so sites I looked up on the BBB's site, all of the accredited companies had A+ ratings, except one (Dell), which had a C (check it out here).

The ones that weren't accredited, well....those either had a "no rating" or a horrible rating, ranging from C- to F. And keep in mind, all the companies I looked up were ones I have dealt with frequently and never had problems with.

Though it makes me rather sad, I can't say that I'm surprised to learn that the BBB is a business just like any other: in it for the profit (despite their "non-profit" status). Sure, they tout a good line about caring for consumers and looking out for them, and maybe that's not altogether untrue. But requiring businesses to pay you for a good rating? That's what I call dirty business dealings.

It looks like the BBB only recently implemented this A+ thru F rating system (on June 1, 2009 according to Wikipedia), so I guess you could argue that they're still working out the kinks. But, I'm not the first one to call them on the carpet about this, apparently. In an article I found here, a BBB representative was asked why non-accredited businesses receive significantly lower grades, and the response was: "I can't explain that. Clearly we need to do a better job in articulating what the differences are."

Yeah. Clearly. The respresentative went on to state: "A letter grade speaks to our degree of confidence that a business operates in a trustworthy manner. We're talking about business integrity."

Oh really? Speaking of which, I looked the BBB up on their own site, since technically they're a business, too. They're not even listed. Why not, BBB? Afraid of the number of complaints that will be filed against you? Go ahead, have one of your representatives leave me a comment. I'd really like to know why you're not accredited. Can't pay the fees? Yeah, I hear ya there.

So, tell me, readers: Have you had any experiences with the BBB? If so, what happened and what was the result? Have you ever looked up a company on the BBB site and made a decision not to buy from that company based on what you found? Did you know the BBB requires companies to pay for "accreditation"? Look up a few of the businesses you order from frequently and tell me what you find.

*Information about the BBB was found at Wikipedia, the BBB's official US site, here, and here.

Miracles Can Happen

2009-10-26T23:11:00.002-04:00

So, it's been awhile since my last post for several reasons. One: I'm lazy. Two: I've become addicted to Team Fortress 2. It's awesome. Three, and most importantly: Big changes at work!

I have my own office now (woot!), so I can officially close off the world and specifically the dreaded B.D.G. Which I have had fun doing for the past couple weeks now. Okay, in all honesty, it's not so much an office as the supply closet with a desk shoved in among the cobwebs, but you don't see me complaining! I don't have to sit next to B.D.G. anymore, so I say bring on the spiders! Oooh right.

Not so fun? Having to hear her grating, nasally voice every two seconds when she calls (because she's to lazy to walk the 10 feet to my office) and have her give me more work to do. Blegh. And since the more work is usually fixing her incompetency, it's double BLEGH. That is the only word, or pseudo word, capable of describing the conundrum I find myself in. See? Working here for 3 and a half years really has made my IQ drop. Yup. It's a pickle.

Ahh well. In other more dramatic news, apparently the Boss-Man has finally realized that his daughter is insane, because two weeks from now we're having a "professional business consultant" (yeah, I couldn't believe that was a real job either) come and teach us "team building." I really hope they don't try to make us do that trust exercise where you fall backward and someone has to catch you. I don't do trust. Or falling. Or exercise for that matter, but I digress. We'll apparently have to sit around for this 6 (!) hour meeting and learn how to spell T-E-A-M. Did you know there's no "I" in it? It was news to me, too.

I don't really get what is supposedly going to be accomplished here. I mean, at the end of the day, the Boss's daughter will still hate me, will still consider it her sole purpose in life to make my life a living hell, and she'll still get away with it because she's a spoiled, rich, doughy-faced gremlin who has her Daddy wrapped around her $300 stiletto. It doesn't really matter what some peppy "consultant" (and I use that term loosely) says or doesn't say. Even if she told Boss-Man that the only way to fix his company was to fire his spawn-child, he wouldn't do it. So, again I say, what is the point?

Oh, hey, did I mention I've been looking for another job? Yeah, too bad the economy's gone down the tubes and there aren't any.

The Holiday of Labor

2009-09-10T18:29:00.002-04:00

Labor Day Monday dawned bright and clear with the smell of barbecue wafting on the early morning breeze. Unfortunately, there would be no Labor Day celebration for me. Like all good retailopians everywhere, I had to get up at the crack of dawn, throw on my hideously unattractive "sale day" uniform (complete with button-down denim shirt that hasn't been in style since the 80s) and go to work.

While others get to celebrate, uh...wait...what exactly is celebrated on Labor Day? Labor? People who labor? People in labor? I'm confused. But I digress. Let's try again, shall we?

While others get to celebrate Labor Day (whatever it may be for) with barbecue and family gatherings and fireworks, I get to stand at a cash register and wait on all of my favorite customers.

Look! Here comes the dirty old man who asked if we carried "dirty books" shortly before propositioning me the other day. He's buying one of our sheep puppets. And he's picking my register to check-out at. Well, of course he is. Oh, goody, and now he's shoving his sheep puppet in my face and making "baaaaa" sounds and I have to stand there and smile and say, "will that be all today, sir?" and hope beyond hope that the answer is yes so he gets the hell out of here.

And now Big Bertha is walking in. Since it's such a pleasant day out, she's poured her ample frame into a pair of daisy dukes. The fabric is not enough to completely cover the crotch area, and oh, God. Oh, God! I could have lived such a long and happy life without seeing that peeking out at me.

After the endless stream of disturbed and disheveled customers, finally we can lock the doors and flip the welcome sign to CLOSED. If only it was time to go home. But, no. I still get to clean up after the invasion. All my nice, neat shelves are in disarray. Why, oh why is it so difficult to put a book back where it belongs when you decide you don't want it? And is it completely impossible to put your trash in the trash can instead of dropping it on the floor?

And what the hell is that in the toilet? Flush it down, people! Flush it down! I don't care how proud you are of your daily turd (or judging by the size of it, weekly turd), nobody else wants to see it!

Finally, after 12 hours of dealing with the bottom rung of human existence, I can go home and sleep. Hopefully it will be a nice, dreamless sleep and I will wake up tomorrow refreshed and with the horros of Labor Day blocked from my memory.

The Comment Debacle

2009-09-10T07:41:00.002-04:00

To all my loyal fans:

I believe I have fixed the evil comment problem that has been plaguing my blog since I did some updates the other week. So, hopefully it is all fixed now, and if you see something that you just have to comment on because it's so witty and venomous, then please give it a try! And if it's not actually fixed yet...well...I'm working on it, dammit!

A Foul Stench

2009-09-01T10:04:00.003-04:00

Ahhh, a day in the life of a retail cashier. I stand at my post as the sun begins to peak above the clouds, golden streams of light cascading down upon me. I squint to see my computer screen past the glare. I can't make it out. I reposition myself. Still no luck. The customer is getting impatient. She wants to know how much she owes (and apparently is unable to read the total on the little screen that faces her).

I glance longingly at the expensive designer blinds on the windows, and then my gaze turns to B.D.G. sigh. Unfortunately, though we paid hundreds of dollars for these custom mini-blinds, B.D.G. does not allow us to use them. The showroom needs light she says, and as I slowly go blind each day, my optometrist is reaping the rewards.

I lean over the counter to read the little screen facing the customer, completely invading her personal space in the process, and read her total to her. I really don't understand how customers can be so unobservant. Maybe they think we don't work hard enough as it is. It builds character when we have to use our brain twice as hard to make up for the empty space between their ears.

Just as the customer is walking out, a spider spindles its way down from the rafters and lands next to my keyboard....two inches away from my hand. This is not my day. Why do I have to work in this filthy warehouse with its creepy crawly spiders and lack of air conditioning? Why can't I work in the mall folding sweater vests? Sure, I'd get paid half as much, but at least I wouldn't be battling arachnids.

As if my day couldn't get any worse, all of a sudden Boss Man appears carrying a canister of "air freshener." (I use that term loosely).

"Have you noticed that it's starting to smell very bad in here?" he says, looking concerned and sniffing at the air. I steal a glance at B.D.G. whose face is glowing red.

"No, I haven't noticed any smell." I say. This isn't entirely true. It's true that it doesn't smell bad right now. But lately, B.D.G. seems to have developed a bad case of, well....what's the polite way of saying this? Gaseous eruptions that can easily be mistaken for small earthquakes. She must be on one of her new-fangeled diets. Like the kind where all you can eat is beans.

But I can't very well tell my boss that the smell he is concerning himself with is coming from the evil spawn of his loins, and is most likely the stench of all of the souls she's crushed rotting on the bottom of her Jimmy Choos.

"Oh, yes daddy," B.D.G. says jumping up. (Yes, she does still call Boss Man 'daddy,' even in the work place). "I have noticed that it's been smelling very bad in here. cough cough. It's been smelling awfully musty lately. I think there must be mold growing somewhere." She looks around frantically to emphasise her point.

Mold. Uh-huh.

"Ahh, yes. I though so," Boss Man replies, and then proceeds to empty the entire jumbo-sized canister of "air freshener" throughout the room.

Now the place smells like decaying baby powder. The air is heavy with it. There is actually a visible cloud engulfing our heads. I can't breathe. I can feel my lungs closing off. This is the end, I just know it. I see light. Blinding light. Oh no, wait. That's just the damn sun again.

Oh, okay. The air is clearing now. I'm left with a splitting headache but I don't appear to be dying. I find that I'm actually a little disappointed.

Karma's a Bitch, Ain't It?

2009-08-26T21:08:00.002-04:00

I feel like a minuscule human being for finding glee in another person's misery. But I can't help it. Apparently yesterday (my day off), B.D.G. contracted some sort of rare cross between the flesh eating virus and poison ivy. Her face looks like soggy pizza dough covered in oozing, angry red pustules.

I know I really, really should feel bad for her instead of snickering behind my computer monitor all day today. I mean, it must be awful. I know what pride she takes in her appearance each day. And now her face totally clashes with that new pink cashmere sweater set she just bought. You know, the one that cost more than I get paid in a week.

And she couldn't even call in sick and hide in a darkened room because our latest sale flier was due at the printer's today and she hadn't even started it yet. So, she not only had to come into work looking like the rabid dough boy, but then she had to actually, you know, work.

Then, as if that wasn't enough, her daddy forced her to hand me the flier and actually ask me to proof-read it. Yeah, I couldn't believe it either. She did wait until 4:30 to give it to me. And as if her day wasn't bad enough already, I went and pointed out all these typos. Life is such a bitch sometimes.

The straw that seemed to break the camel's back was when I pointed out how ironic it was that she had spelled vengeance wrong. I hadn't ever actually seen someone shoot daggers out of their eyes before but apparently it is possible, folks. Rare, but possible.

The Joys of Walmart

2009-08-25T11:02:00.003-04:00

Grocery shopping always puts me in such a bad mood. For one thing, I absolutely despise crowded areas. And Walmart is always crowded with stinky, sweaty, staring people. What is it about Walmart that just screams "personal hygiene not required"? They really should post signs saying that customers are required to have bathed in the last 24 hours.

Usually, because I'm doing my grocery shopping in the wee hours of the morning (to avoid crowds as much as possible) the lines at checkout aren't all that long. But the cashiers are rather unbearable.

Yes, even in Retailopia, there is a hierarchy, and the cashiers at Walmart are the Untouchable class. They do spend their days scanning deli meats, womens size 3X underwear, and lighter fluid all day. They get paid next to nothing, and are so miserable they usually can't even muster a convincing "how are you today?"

And they absolutely despise anyone who shops with coupons. Last week for instance, the cashier completely ignored my coupon pile and rings me through without them. When I point them out to her (for the second time) she starts randomly punching buttons and says "well, too late now, the transaction's gone through. That's what you get for swiping your card early."

Now, I know this isn't true. I am afterall, a fellow cashier. I know exactly how the system works and she was lying through her decaying teeth.

Then today, I have a coupon for a free carton of my favorite ice cream. Not a "buy one, get one free" - an actual plain old "get one free" coupon. I have said coupon because I wrote to the ice cream company a few weeks ago and complained that my latest carton of Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough tasted like an old lady's foot. So they sent me a free coupon.

So, when I'm at checkout, the cashier is busy chattering away to the customer before me who has already finished checking out. I very diligently hand my coupons to the cashier and she starts swiping them, still chatting away to her long-lost best friend. Of course the ice cream coupon doesn't scan on her first go, so she glances down at it.

"Why does this say you get one free? You can't just get a free ice cream. I mean, what does that even mean? You have to buy something too," she says.

"I don't believe that's what the coupon says," I say evenly.

"Well, I'm gonna have to read all the fine print," she says, giving me a susipicious look like it's a counterfeit coupon or something. Who knows, maybe there's been a run on forged coupons lately. The economy has been pretty bad.

Finally, after reading every single iota of print on both front and back she heaves a hefty sigh and says, "well I suppose I'll have to give it to you." Well, of course you do. And don't act like it's that big a deal, woman. It's for a $2.99 carton of ice cream. It's not gonna kill you.

I think I'm mostly annoyed at this exchange because I can't fathom caring enough about my retail cashier job to read the fine print on coupons. I can't say that I even read the large print. If a coupon doesn't scan, I just type in the 55 cents off or whatever and move on with my life.

Of course, maybe counterfeit coupons aren't as common in the book world as they are in Walmart. Apparently, you just can't trust the unbathed masses anymore.

The Shack

2009-08-24T18:25:00.002-04:00

What is it about the book The Shack that has people acting like maniacs? Even though this book has been out for over two years, we are only now beginning to carry it at the Christian bookstore where I work. (Yes, we are rather slow on the uptake - perhaps that's why business is so bad!)

People seem to either absolutely LOVE this book and think it's the greatest thing since sliced bread, or they HATE it and condemn anyone who reads it to hell (you think I'm joking, but I'm serious). I've read the book, and I have to say I wasn't impressed in either direction.

For starters, it's horribly written. I mean, the man cannot write. Long ago I came to the conclusion that people in general, and Christians in particular, wouldn't know good literature if it reached off the shelf and whacked them upside the head. The fact that this book was even published to begin with makes me certain that someday I too will be able to say I'm a published author. At least I can actually string a coherent sentence together which is more than one can say for a lot of the best-selling 'authors' out there. But I digress.

Back to The Shack. So, we just got this book in after months of people requesting it, and literally 2 minutes after we put it on our website last week, the trouble begins. We've been getting at least a couple emails a day, everyday, by "shocked" and "disgusted" customers asking how we can carry such heresy.

The customer today emailed to tell us that we will have to answer to the Lord for the people who are led astray after purchasing this book from us. What the hell?! It's a book! She accused us of only caring about making a profit (uhhh, hello? That's called running a business). Then, she went on to say that if we did not stop carrying this title IMMEDIATELY she would remove herself from our mailing list. Well, jolly good for you.

Now, to all you customers out there, let me point something out: Nobody gives a flying monkey if you don't purchase from their company again unless you are a hella' big spender. And I mean, purchasing every week and spending thousands upon thousands of dollars a year. Then we might care. But alas, this customer has only ordered from us once in their entire existence and that purchase was $22. (Yes, we really do look that type of stuff up and debate whether it would matter if said customer stopped ordering - and in this case, it sure as hell didn't.)

But I mean, are you serious? We will have to answer to God for selling a book? I've read some reviews of this book where the reviewer says that people who read The Shack are jeopardizing their chances at getting into heaven. I've read other reviews that have said you won't get into heaven unless you do read this book. It's no wonder people think Christians are a bunch of nutters. Tearing each other apart over a book, and a badly written one at that. It's shameful, and I'm embarassed for the lot of you so-called 'Christians' out there!

There. I'm done ranting. I'll just hop on off my soapbox now. I feel much better.

Trashing the Competition

2009-08-23T17:29:00.002-04:00

I knew my stealth proof-reading work would be caught eventually. I was in the midst of sneakily proofing our email newsletter when the Jolly Giant (who, although nice, is very naive and disconnected at times) announced out loud and in front of B.D.G. that I needed to give my proofed pages to her this afternoon, since he was leaving early for a doctor's appointment.

This brought silence down upon everyone as B.D.G.'s laser vision veered from watching Fox News on her secondary monitor to the newsletter sitting naked and unprotected on my desk. I quickly lowered my eyes, lest I be blinded by her gaze, and continued working. When I was done, I handed her my corrections and managed to keep my hands from any noticeable shaking.

B.D.G. left soon afterward (not for a doctor's appointment, I'm assuming). The next day as the Jolly Giant was looking over the newsletter, he realized that B.D.G. had not made any corrections to it yet. Since it had been scheduled to be sent out 1/2 an hour before, he was not amused.

He quickly located D.'s corrections on B.D.G.'s desk, but was unable to find mine. "I'd suggest looking in the trash," I said. Though I'd said it jokingly, Jolly gasped in horror at the thought that this could be the case. He valiantly attempted to defend B.D.G. by saying that he was sure, even she would never do that. And it should be noted in her defense that he didn't find them in her trash can.

Well...he didn't find the pages in her 'main' trash can that was used for normal and acceptable trash. But he did find them in her hidden trash can - the one she keeps in the shadowy corner of her desk and that she uses to throw away the things that she wouldn't deign to claim had come from her. There, intermingled with the vast array of gum wads and chocolate candy wrappers were the crumpled pages of my proofed newsletter.

Since B.D.G.'s dad, the Boss Man, is out of town for the next week, I guess I get to wait awhile before finding out just what kind of trouble I'll be in for proofing her work. Though it was the Boss Man's idea to have me proof it without her knowledge, lest I offend her fragile countenance, I have no doubt by the end of her inevitable tirade he will have forgotten that vital piece of information. I can't wait!

The Ketchup Nazi

2009-08-22T13:46:00.003-04:00

Apparently, I missed the memo about ketchup being a banned substance in psuedo-highbrow restaurants.

My husband and I went to the grand opening of a new "family friendly" restaurant that was kind enough to locate itself only 5 minutes away. We could practically walk. Of course we didn't, but that's not the point.

Nothing ever happens in the small town where we live except the occasional tractor pull or drunken riding lawn mower race, so a new restaurant opening is kinda a big deal.

Our waitress seemed normal enough at first, though the amount of makeup she had melting off her face did give me pause. Immediately upon being handed a menu, I realized I would be in trouble here. Almost every item had either the word "ribs" or "barbecue" in the name. Since I don't eat anything that once possessed the ability to poop, I found myself in a bit of a pickle.

But wonder of wonders! At last, I found the sole vegetarian item on the menu. A veggie burger with garlic fries.

Our order arrived (brought out by one of the kitchen staff because our waitress was nowhere in sight) and I noticed there wasn't any ketchup on the table. This saddened me greatly, but I like to think I'm rather compassionate toward restaurant personnel, seeing as how I am also in the service industry. So, I didn't sweat it. Besides, these were "garlic fries." Maybe they didn't need ketchup.

Alas, they most certainly did. But still I persevered, not wanting to cause undo stress on someone's first day. Besides, our waitress still hadn't been seen since taking our order nearly 30 minutes before. Then, an angelic and highly observant waitress from a fellow table noticed I was without condiments, and after asking if I cared for some ketchup, she brought some right away.

Ahh, ketchup. I know some don't care for it, but I put it on just about everything. And french fries, no matter how you dress them up, are most certainly in need of a healthy douse.

I was just polishing off my first dollop of ketchup when our waitress magically reappeared. As she approached, she wore the pasted on smile that we all learn to use when dealing with customers, but it slid right off her melting face as she reached the table.

"Is everything alright here?" she asked in what was a decidedly curt manner.

"Oh yes, everything's great, thanks!" I said, smiling and turning back toward my food.

I looked back up as I remembered that I had just run out of ketchup, and was dismayed to see our waitress snatching the ketchup bottle off the table and stalking off.

I was a little confused and cued my husband into the thievery. As we sat watching, our waitress approached a wispy teeny-bopper waitress in the corner and, waving the ketchup bottle in the girl's face, asked if she had been responsible for putting this on our table. The girl said no, so our waitress made her way toward the busboy who was standing idly in a corner and proceeded to shove the bottle in his face. Apparently, she distrusted his abililty to understand English, because she then very loudly and with undo enunciation, berated him for putting ketchup on our table.

This left us wondering why exactly a ketchup bottle was causing such an uproar. Was she angry someone else had honed in on her table while she was on her smoke break? But if that was the case, then she should also be mad that we had any food at all, since she certainly hadn't been responsible for that.

Maybe ketchup wasn't allowed in such fine dining establishments. But no, as my husband pointed out, each and every other table had a whole silver spinneret consisting of mustard, ranch dressing, sweet and sour sauce, and yes, the wrongly convicted ketchup. Besides, any restaurant that uses construction paper in lieu of tablecloths and serves buffalo wings does not get to consider itself high-brow. Even in this black hole of a town.

Finally, the girl who had actually committed the apparent sacrilege emerged from the kitchen and the busboy pointed helplessly at her and said, "it was her! It was her!"

As our waitress turned to bring wrath upon the head of this third person, she caught us staring open-mouthed at her and managed to proceed with her lecturing in a quiet, albeit vehement manner.

When our waitress came back to ask if we'd care for any dessert, fake smile firmly plastered on her face, we declined. Maybe if I was a person who liked confrontation, I'd have actually asked her what had been the point of stealing my ketchup. But, I don't, and by that point I just wanted to get out of there. So we did.

Alas, the ketchup incident remains a mystery. Which I suppose makes it a better story anyway.

Zen Narcissism

2009-08-15T08:59:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I visited my friend who's in town for the weekend. She is staying at a spiritual retreat that just happens to be ten minutes away from my house, but that I never knew existed until yesterday. It sits on 70 acres of land with wild flower fields, woods and three lakes. This is interesting to me because this expansive secluded paradise is, like I said, only 10 minutes away from my neck of the woods (or lack thereof), where the houses are intimately close to each other. When my kindly elderly neighbor sits on the sofa in his living room, he can see straight into the shower in my bathroom. Intimate, indeed.

And yet, 10 minutes away there is 70 acres of nothing but quiet. We spent two hours traipsing through the woods, communing with the bugs, sticking our toes in a suspiciously orange lake, and walking a "labyrinth," which turned out to be little more than a circular mowed path surrounded by a slightly less-mowed path that ended with a "prayer rock" in the middle that was already being sat-upon by a grasshopper.

As a general rule, I don't like peace and quiet. In my mind these words are equated with laziness, or perhaps forgetfulness. As in "I know I'm forgetting something I was supposed to do today, and yet my mind is blank so I will sit here quietly until I remember what I'm forgetting."

Being surrounded by quiet and....nature....causes my mind to wander in a most distressing way. Work and bills and life just seem so trivial when you're side-stepping poison ivy and pulling a wayward piece of bark out of your shoe. And yet, I have no snarky comebacks to bitch slap nature with. I have to suck it up and commune.

This whole zen idea just zaps the narcissism right out of you, and we can't have that. Because then the only thing left to replace all that self-absorption with is guilt about my sarcastic, jaded self. And if there's one thing I detest more than bugs, it's guilt. Besides, when it comes right down to it, though work and life pretty much suck, complaining about them is somehow quite rewarding.

Dear Delinquent Parent: Cashier is NOT Synonymous with Babysitter

2009-08-13T17:45:00.004-04:00

Maybe I'm too hard on the parents of the world. Seeing as how I'm not a parent myself, I can't really identify with them when their child is screaming bloody murder, or experience any empathy for them when their child starts flinging poo at their heads. (Is that children or monkeys? No matter.)

I get that parents are tired and haggard, and that for the next 18 years, they will inevitably, perhaps at numerous points along the way, ask themselves why, oh WHY, did they think having children was a good idea.

Maybe some of these haggard parents have gotten to the point where they can’t distinguish between right and wrong; can’t remember that the mores of society dictate that leaving your child unattended is never a good idea. Unless, of course, you like the idea of spending 3 to 5 in a barred room and having said children raised in foster care.

Now, lest you think otherwise, I don’t have anything against children, per say, except for the fact they're generally useless and high-pitched, at least for their first several years. What I do have a problem with, however, is the crazy parents.

Like the mother today who came in with her two-year-old with Down Syndrome. Apparently, this mother decided she couldn’t handle trying to shop for books while also managing a child. So, she turned to me and did what any parent in her situation would: She asked if she could leave her child alone and unattended while she shopped. She candy-coated it a little by leaving out words like "alone" and "unattended" and "neglect," but the meaning was the same.

I looked at her like she had three heads but said sure, because the only thing worse than enabling neglect is trying to tell a parent (no matter how tactfully you manage it) that she is a bad, bad mother for purposefully leaving her child unattended in a 20,000 square-foot store so she is better able to shop.

Now, like I said, I don't have kids. But, you best believe if I did, I would not leave my two-year-old child alone in some store so I could have an extra hand free to grubby up some books. Especially if that child had special needs. But like I said, maybe this is normal parental behavior.

So, this specimen of parenting skills sets little Jimmy down right next to a wobbly metal rack holding heavy, pointy objects and meanders away. I can't see little Jimmy because I have a row of bookcases between my desk and his new home. I also don't feel inclined to stop doing my actual job to play babysitter.

Inevitably, the woman is back in five minutes (apparently she does have the intelligence to at least check on her child), but alas, Jimmy has upped and vanished as I hear toddlers are apt to do.

She turns to me and wants to know where Jimmy is. It doesn’t seem to matter to her that her child was never in my line of sight to begin with. Nor does she seem to hear my protests that I didn't know when she said, “can I leave Jimmy playing here with his train?” I was supposed to magically equate that with, "you, there, watch my kid and do my job for me.”

Turns out the kid hadn’t wandered far anyways. B.D.G. caught him heading for the forklift in the Shipping Department and was valiantly shooing him back toward the actual store section with a spare filing folder. Yes, if you think my opinion of kids is terrible, you should know B.D.G. equates children with vermin, and if she met either in her basement late at night, she wouldn’t think twice about setting out poison and traps.

Lesson learned, the now repentant mother latches her child securely into his stroller and wheels him in front of the t.v. to watch cartoons for the next hour while she finishes her shopping in peace.

Of (Dirty) Books and Men

2009-08-11T22:00:00.004-04:00

Oh, to be old and codgery and able to say anything you want and blame it on low sperm count. One of my least favorite customer types (of the Horny Old Man variety) came into the store today. Since B.D.G. and I are the only two women under 30 in the whole place, and since of the two of us, I am the only one that does not look like a hippo in tiny designer shoes, the old geazer with the aptitude for inappropriate flirting set his sights on me.

Now, your typical horny octogenarian can be spotted a mile away. Like the sloths of the Amazon, they move slowly and often have fungus sprouting out of their orifices. I'm sure in the feeble mind of Mr. "I drink prune juice for breakfast," he is still a young strapping fella' who hasn't aged a day. No matter that his grandchildren are my age and his wife is standing next to him. He still feels the need to hitch up his suspenders, angle his walker my way, and greet me with a toothless grin and an inappropriate comment.

Old Guy: "Well, hey there little lady! So.....ya got any books in this here store?"

Me: (looks around at the vast array of bookshelves all holding *gasp* books!) "Uh, yes, sir. Was there a specific book I could help you find?"

Old Guy: "Yer got any dirrrrty books in here?" (wink, wink)

Me: (long pause) "No, sir. This is a religious bookstore. No dirty books available. I apologize."

Old Guy: "Well, that's a shame. Say....you get paid on commission? Cos, I'd sure like to help you earn a little money this afternoon." (wink, wink)

Me: "No, sir. And actually, as a matter-of-fact, I don't work here at all. Let me go get someone who does."

At this point I excuse myself, hope the logo on my shirt couldn't be seen through his cataracts, and high-tail it to the shipping department where I feign interest in bubble wrap for the next 30 minutes.

Stealth Work

2009-07-29T07:04:00.002-04:00

I thought the situation with B.D.G. couldn't get any more bizarre, under-handed, or unprofessional. I thought wrong. Yesterday there was a big blow-up between B.D.G. and her father, the Boss Man. Doors were slammed, voices were raised, and tantrums were thrown.

The latest catalog B.D.G. is working on must be at the printers by next week. But it needs to be proof-read first. And I am the proof-reader. Apparently, this is what caused the eruption yesterday. B.D.G. does not want me editing her catalogs anymore and she has put her foot down.

I couldn't tell you exactly what happened in the hour-and-a-half long meeting between B.D.G. and her father since, blessedly, I was not subjected to their presence during that time. I can, however, tell you what the outcome was as far as I'm concerned.

After B.D.G. strolled out of the office for the day at 3:00pm, Boss Man's son approached me with an assignment. The mission? To proof-read the latest catalog without letting B.D.G. see it. This is a little tricky considering our desks are right next to each other. So, I am to employ the hours when she is not there. Fortunately, she doesn't usually stroll into work until 10:00am, and often leaves early, so that does buy me some B.D.G.-free hours.

However, this is a catalog we're talking about. It is pages upon pages long, it is riddled with errors, and it requires hours of work. And it's not like this is my only responsibility. I am usually working on other equally important assignments when she isn't around. I do not appreciate having to now coordinate my day around her variable arrival and departure times.

So, in order to get this catalog proofed by next week without the "Advertising and Marketing Manager"'s knowledge, I am having to take it home with me to work on in the evenings, which are usually reserved for things I actually like to do. And no, I don't get paid for working on it in my "free time."

The Lack of Children Stigma

2009-07-25T07:06:00.002-04:00

There are many, many questions that customers ask that will automatically make me annoyed, despondent, and slightly bitchy.

"Why aren't you in school?" for one. Just because you're 80 years old, lady, doesn't make everyone else a teenager. And just because I work as a bookstore clerk instead of say, a paralegal, doesn't mean my intelligence level is questionable. I can still understand the subtle insults flying out of your yap. I appreciate your solitary fight for my future, really I do, but I am not your spawn or your grand-spawn which places me clearly and completely outside the ring of your meddling rights.

"What do you mean you haven't read it? Don't you work here?" is another. On any given day, we stock over 50,000 titles. I have read, or skimmed, a great deal of them. I have probably read the back blurb of 49,999 of them. But no, no I have probably not read the book you are now holding in your grubby paw and waving in my face. Why? Because, contrary to popular belief, working in a bookstore does not mean you sit around all day reading books. Most of my day is comprised of waiting on people like you, and believe me, ya'll take up a hella lot of time. And yes, I would rather be reading.

My personal favorite inappropriate question from a customer occurred again yesterday:

"Do you have children?"

Those four little words are the bane of my Customer Care Representative world. Maybe this question does not bother people who already have kids. Maybe it doesn't even bother others who don't have kids. But it bothers me, dammit, because it is none of your business.

Do you also go up to perfect strangers on the street and ask them if they have kids? Or is it only because I'm in the service industry and therefore a second-class citizen that you feel you can get away with asking someone, 5 seconds into a conversation, this type of question. Are you also one of those people who go up to pregnant women, place your germ-infested hand on their belly and then regale them with stories of your 52-hour labor? Oh, you are? I'm shocked.

Whenever the children question is posed by a customer, there is always an underlying accusatory ring to their voice. The conversation yesterday went something like this:

Customer: I want to purchase this board game based on this famous book. Will children enjoy this game?

Me: Well, I haven't played the game myself, but it is advertised for children over the age of 5. If you are planning to purchase it for a child over 5 years old who enjoyed the book, then I'm sure they will also enjoy the game.

Customer: Uh huh. And do you have children, miss?

Me: (long pause as I wrap my mind around how this is relevant). No, no I do not.

Customer: I see. Then how do you know children will enjoy this game if you don't have any?

You see, the children question is never posed innocently. It is always done so with a hint of condescension, a dash of superiority and a world of stigma. If I am asking you something even remotely related to mini-people, then you best have popped out some spawns of your own, otherwise your opinion will be deemed irrelevant.

I find it fascinating that because I have not chosen to start propagating yet, that I have been deemed an unreliable and unworthy source of information about a board game.

What if I said that yes, yes I do have children but I don't allow them to play board games because I keep them locked in the basement all day, chained to the water heater, with only a three-legged cat for company? Would I be automatically launched into the realm that belongs solely to parents, and therefore be a font of knowledge about diapers, pink-eye and board games?

Would you blindly follow my lead and decide that on second thought, you know, my children don't need a board game either and maybe I should try that chained-to-the-water-heater thing instead. After all, it was suggested by a fellow parent, which automatically makes it a superior solution.

Sorry, I can't buy this game after all because I have to go pick up some sturdy chains and cut the leg off my cat.

Papyrus

2009-07-11T17:34:00.004-04:00

Instead of writing about my life as a 'customer care representative,' I thought for a change I would write about being on the receiving end of customer service and actually (gasp!) enjoying the experience.

Ever since I took over the "Problem Orders" when B.D.G. was 'promoted' to her self-titled position as the Advertising and Marketing Manager, I find myself secretly hoping when I order something from some company, that they'll make a mistake. I actually get disappointed now when I order something and it is exactly what it was supposed to be. I mean, where's the fun in that?

If there's a mistake, I get to scout out other companies and see how they handle the same situations that I get to handle now on a daily basis at my job. I will say that since I've taken over the Problem Orders from B.D.G., our customer service in this area has vastly improved.

Before, when it was still under her domain, it would be several weeks (if not months) before a poor customer that we'd shipped the wrong book to would finally receive the correct one. Chances are they would have called at least once or twice in the course of that time, inquiring as to the whereabouts of their missing item.

I think this is pretty shitty customer service. All companies make mistakes. It happens to the best of us. But a company should be very prompt when handling their mistake once it's pointed out to them. However, B.D.G., who had better things to do than showing up to work most days, let alone handling Problem Orders, didn't seem to share this opinion.

Okay, I got side-tracked. Anyways, my point was, now that I take care of the Problem Orders, customers are getting their correct items shipped to them within 48 hours after calling and reporting the problem. I think that's pretty good! Especially considering all the drama I have to wade through just to get anything done at my crappy job.

But, even though I kick ass at my mindless excuse for a job, I still like to see how other companies handle these situations.

I got the chance last week when my order from Papyrus came. If you're not familiar with Papyrus then first of all, SHAME ON YOU! They are only the greatest greeting-card company on the planet. To all of you diehard Hallmark lovers I say, "phooey!" You have not truly greeted until you have greeted with a card from Papyrus.

Anyways, they were having a freakin' awesome sale and I was super-excited to receive my order. Alas, there was one mistake. I had received a wrong item and had gotten a different item in it's place. This same type of thing happens all the time at my job, so I completely understood.

I emailed them promptly with my order number, name and address, the item number for the card I had ordered and the item number of the card that had been sent instead. (Just a note for all you simple-minded customers - it is not appropriate to just write to a company and say 'uh, i received something wrong in my order.' Believe it or not, I myself have received such emails and let me just say that the more information you're able to provide, the speedier the process will be).

I wasn't expecting to hear back from Papyrus for at least a day because that's how long responses generally take from companies. So I was pleasantly surprised to get a response in less than 30 minutes from an actual human who apologized and said that they would ship me the correct item THAT SAME DAY via UPS 2nd Day Air (!!!) and it would reach me before the end of the week.

And this was a $2.95 item! I would have been happy if they'd sent it on a slow boat from China.

So, like I was saying people - if you still think Hallmark is the king of the greeting card world, you better think again. Because with customer service like that, you best believe Papyrus has made a life-time customer out of me.

Now if I can only convince my boss that WE should ship out missing items to customers via 2nd Day Air. . . . .

I Seem to Have Mis-Calculated

2009-06-10T20:30:00.002-04:00

When last I wrote, I was overly excited and optimistic about my latest B.D.G. debacle. Unfortunately, I seem to have overestimated my boss's ability to take a neutral stance between his best worker (me, of course!) and his lazy sloth of a daughter. Oops!

After almost a week of silence concerning the situation and my standing up for myself (yay me!) for the first time against B.D.G., I was pulled into the boss's domain. What followed was a lecture of epic proportions on the inappropriateness of my email and the need for everyone to "all just get along, y'all."

Hmm. To which I replied that THAT would never happen as long as his daughter still works here and treats everyone like crap. Yes, I was that blunt. And no, I didn't get fired. Miraculous, I know. It's only because they need someone around here who actually comes in on time, gets all their work done by the end of the day and is actually nice to their fellow co-workers.

So, with my cynicism in the human race restored, I scuttled back to my desk and went back to work. You might think that B.D.G. (whose desk is behind me), was grinning like the Chesire Cat after my return from the Lecture of Epic Proportions. Well, I'm sure she would have been had she managed to make it to work that day. But alas, shoes don't just buy themselves. Silly you for thinking so.

The Bitch is Back!

2009-05-09T06:51:00.002-04:00

I've been waiting patiently for the past few weeks to be able to write this title. B.D.G. has been suspiciously mellow and dare I say it?....Nice. But now the real B.D.G. has stood up, taken off the gloves and attempted to bitch-slap me.

Friday morning B.D.G. called in sick. As I was on phones that morning, I received the call. Using her best impression of someone suffering from Swine Flu, but sounding more like she'd been drinking bourbon in her morning coffee again, she asked to speak to our resident Jolly Green Giant. Since speaking to B.D.G. for longer intervals than -.5 seconds has been found to be detrimental to my mental health, I gladly passed the phone along.

Needless to say I was more than happy to hear that she would not be gracing us with her potato-shaped presence that morning. But alas, she still found a way to wrap her tentacles around my neck from afar and attempt to squeeze the sanity right out of me.

Jolly Green came out and told me that yes, B.D.G. was "sick" and that she had also told him to tell me to stop "messing up the website" by putting books in the wrong categories. This greatly amused me for two reasons. Number one - she knew she couldn't tell me that herself without getting in trouble with my actual boss, her father. Although Boss-Man is unwilling to take off the rose-colored glasses when it comes to B.D.G., he is also unwilling to lose one of his best employees and so attempts to side with both of us whenever the claws come out and B.D.G. starts going all foamy at the mouth. He's also put a cease-and-desist order over her head and banned her from reprimanding me about anything....ever. Hence, the telling Jolly Green to do it for her.

Apparently B.D.G. thought that since Jolly Green is the Webmaster, he would be able to effectively tell me to sod off. Unfortunately for B.D.G., she had another thing coming, which brings me to amusement Number 2. You see, the book in question, a pithy little novel about an 8-year-old Southerner, has been causing trouble for months now and Jolly Green (like everyone else) is already aware of the situation and has already chosen his side - mine.

When B.D.G. put together our latest catalog, she incorrectly put this book in the Teen Section, and of course, conveniently left out the part about it being about it having an 8-year-old main character. Though this error was pointed out to her by me and D. (who have the lovely job of editing B.D.G.'s ever-increasingly erratic work), it was not changed. Now the catalog is printed and we have a problem.

So, when I discussed the situation with Boss-Man several weeks ago, he said to just make sure it got put in the correct spot on the website, since I am Jolly Green's minion and get to be in charge of categorizing products (a mindless task until B.D.G. rears her ugly head). So I do my job correctly, stick it in the Children category and wait. I wait because I know. I know the day of reckoning is nigh. (Does anyone else love the word nigh? I know I do.)

And then it happens. Last week, the categories are mysteriously changed. It is in the Teen Section. Jolly Green does not know what happened. He has too much to do than to mess with categories. So I changed it back. And then this week it was changed again. And I very merrily changed it back one more time and very merrily waited. And then yesterday it came to a head. A giant, oozing, puss-filled head.

Now, if you're thinking this is an awful lot of fuss to make over one measly book, then YOU'RE ABSOLUTELY RIGHT. I agree whole-heartedly. You would think, in a professional environment, when an error is first pointed out months ago in a catalog, it would be changed. It would not be taken as a personal attack and become a control issue. The boss's daughter would not play the martyr and whine about how hard her life is driving her Lexus to work each day and breaking the heels off her designer shoes with her impressive girth. But apparently her job is oh-so-difficult.

I mean, she has to contend with people who actually care not just about their job, but about doing their job RIGHT. About making sure things are in proper categories so people can find them. About not wanting a whole bunch of angry teenagers returning a book they bought about a stupid 8-year old.

Yes, life is difficult for the misunderstood B.D.G. But if she thinks she delivered a long-distance reprimand on Friday, then she has another thing coming. Because I took the issue to Boss-Man myself and informed him that I would not be putting a book in an incorrect category just to appease his daughter's psychological issues. Okay, so I didn't phrase it like that. And it might have actually come across as more of a "your daughter's picking on me again, make her stop." But either way, it's not getting changed.

Now lest you think that this makes me a tattle-tale or whatever, let me remind you that although it bares remarkable resemblance, this is not the 3rd grade. B.D.G. is actually interefering in my job. She's taken it a step too far. It's no longer about her not liking the way I do something and telling me I should do it differently. Now she's actually creating more work for me just because she wants to exert control over an issue, not because she's actually right.

And in times past, I have had to find out that she's gone above my head first, and even though I've been correct, I'll have to play catch-up and work to climb out of the hole she's dug for me, justifying myself along the way. So, I find it best in these situations to go to Boss-Man first and explain myself before she comes along and sways him back into neutral.

Let the games begin.

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

2009-04-15T18:10:00.004-04:00

People like to think they're unique. Unforgettable. Special. In the retail world, this is only true if you're also a pain in the ass.

If there's a particular store you frequent so often that you're on a first name basis with the employees, you probably feel warm little fuzzies every time you walk in. Well, I'm here to tell you that those warm little fuzzy feelings are not only misleading, but also a sign that you may have a brain tumor.

My 3+ years of working as a "customer care representative" has taught me many things. Near the top of that list is: a good customer is in, out, and on their way without more than general pleasantries exchanged. If you, the consumer, have more to say than "hi," "bye," and "thank you," then YOU ARE DOING SOMETHING WRONG.

Below, I have compiled a list of the most heinous of offenders. If you find that you fall into any of these categories, please seek help immediately. Please note: This list is NOT comprehensive, otherwise it would have gone on FOREVER. So, if you're not sure of your offender status, err on the side of caution.

The Chatty Cathy: If I had wanted to hear a list of ailments, a tale of woe and suffering, oh-so-clever names for pets (Fluffy and Spot, really?), and a lively discussion on God and politics, I WOULD GO VISIT MY MOTHER. But I don't. So keep your yap shut.

Kelly the Corpulent: Now, don't get me wrong. I don't hate fat people. In general I find them quite jolly and squishy. And, because they have basically no social life, they buy lots of books, which keeps me employed. That said, The Kellys are a special batch of heavies. You see, Kelly does not merely walk into the store. She gallops. And by gallop, I mean she attempts to skip like a little schoolgirl ALL OVER THE STORE. I don't know which is worse - the sight of a grown woman (no matter her size) skipping down aisles, or the ceiling plaster that inevitably falls in my hair due to the structural integrity of the building being compromised every time she graces us with her presence.

Pete the Perv: It should be noted that nothing is more disturbing than a man old enough to be your grandfather addressing his questions to your breasts instead of your face. I know they're magnificent. Now move along.

Clarice the Co-Dependent: Clarice was in again yesterday. She wrung her hands and looked anxiously about and asked after the one and only employee (fortunately not me) that she trusts. When I had to tell her that D is on vacation for the next two weeks she gasped and let out a cry of anguish heard miles around. "But whatever will I do? I don't know what to buy without D here!" And it's true. D, who is a much kinder soul than I, waits on that atrocious woman hand and foot. Clarice will be in for 2 hours at a time and D will have to be at her side for every second of those 2 hours. If she starts to drift back to her desk to do some actual work Clarice calls her back. "But what about this one? Oh, it's the exact same book as the one already in my cart, you say? But how can you be sure? Oh, yes, I see...yes I guess they do have the same cover."

Though my list is no where near finished, I find that the process of delving into the recesses of my traumatic memories for these examples has depressed me, so I will end here.

Eastering in Walmart

2009-04-13T18:51:00.003-04:00

Apparently, Easter and Walmart do not mix. Who knew?

I came from a family that didn't really celebrate Easter. Sure, I dyed eggs urine-yellow and vomit-green and other varying shades of the rainbow. And there were always obligatory bags of candy, most of which disappeared quite quickly into the darkened bowels of my mother's room. The only evidence they'd ever existed in the first place were the empty husks of candy wrappers lining the bottom of the bedroom waste basket.

So, needless to say I was rather taken aback to enter Walmart yesterday on my regular Sunday shopping routine to find mayem, chaos and vast expanses of emptiness where there used to be what constitutes food nowadays.

Although I entered Walmart wearing jeans and a t-shirt, after spending the day cleaning out our old apartment, I began to feel that I'd walked in naked. Women in four-inch pastel heels and lacy, frilly dresses crowded the aisles. All the men were in polyester suits or plaid sweater vests.

I made the mistake of entering the candy aisle behind a little blue-haired lady. The shelves were almost bare, except for a few random bags of Twix and Almond Joy. Two pimply-faced Walmart serfs were frantically scanning bar codes with their fascinating high-tech scanny thingys and punching in numbers.

Blue Hair turned to Pimply-Face #1 and in a quavering voice asked, "Where is all of the candy?!" Pimply-Face #1 shot her an irritated glance over his hunch-back and said it had been sold.

"All of it? Surely, not all of it!" Blue Hair replied, clutching at her heart. "But where are the Cadbury Eggs? The PEEPS!" Her voice rose on the word 'PEEPS' into a glass-shattering falsetto. I quickly extracted myself from the situation before Blue Hair could start beating Pimply-Face #1 with her walking stick and headed off to the non-perishable aisles.

My husband, who I find myself increasingly mentioning in my blogs, and who I will hence-forth refer to as Bartok, and I have been living in our new house sans appliances for the past 2 weeks. Because of this, we have had to get creative with our food situation and have been subsisting on canned soup and stale bread. This has made us rather cranky. My crankiness was not improved upon turning my cart into the cracker aisle, narrowly dodging a group of pastel-clad Easter celebrators, and finding that it too had been cleared out.

On to the pudding aisle! But alas, it was not to be. All of the chocolate pudding had been cleared out except for the sugar-free kind. And, really, who wants to eat that? What goes in to today's Easter baskets, anyway? Candy I can understand. Pudding sort of makes sense. But crackers?

I can tell you one thing: If the Easter Bunny had ever brought me a box of Saltines and a pudding cup, he would have found said box shoved up his backside. It's no wonder kids are so messed up today when this is what they're being given for Easter.

Twilight Zone

2009-04-11T06:24:00.002-04:00

Although I'm too young to have ever actually watched the show, my general knowledge of it has led me to believe that I have now entered it.

B.D.G., the source of my pent-up frustration and temper tantrums has turned from a venomous, self-righteous prune of a human being into a docile and slightly self-deprecating plebeian. Alas, this has left me very little to blog about. My muse is gone. She has been replaced by what is no doubt a highly medicated shell of her formal self.

On the one hand, I'm grateful to not be flinching every time her grating, high-pitched voice enters my hearing range. On the other, I find work to be almost...mundane. In reality, I really shouldn't be complaining. I mean, it's about time the girl got a good psychiatrist and some anti-crazy meds.

But how am I supposed to write witty, poignant, and sardonic blogs? I ask you! Whatever else in the world is there for a person of my limited intellect and talents to complain about?

Maybe I could start writing about gardening. And post happy little pictures of all my bright green foliage. But it's April in Michigan and I still wake up with frozen toes, so it's probably too soon to paint my thumb green. And more importantly, gardens are a lot of work and I just don't do that sort of thing.

Oh Oooh! I know! I can write about my dogs. I'll dress them up in fuzzy pink sweaters and booties and then I'll post 500 million pictures of them and caption each one with a "Isn't my baby oh so cutesy wootsie?!" This sounds promising. Now...where to find sweaters to fit an 80 pound pork-chop of a dog and her psycho brother who has decided to vent his frustrations about our new house by pooping in every corner he deems worthy of excrement?

So, speaking of our new house, maybe I should write about that. I'll create a stalkers paradise complete with pictures of my new street and the drug-deal taking place three doors down and of course pictures of every single room. "And in this room, we find my husband..." who will be looking slightly disturbed by his wife's sudden camera-happiness as she snaps away from every conceivable angle, capturing just the right view of his face, lit by the computer monitor's glowing blue light.

Yes! Genius! And I'll caption it "Greetings from the Twilight Zone."

Top 5 Signs Your Evil Co-Worker Isn't Really Human

2009-03-04T13:49:00.003-05:00

How many of us have wondered after a particularly cruel but inevitable betrayal by a co-worker if that person has a shred of human compassion in them at all? Well, maybe they don't!

In my on-going feud with B.D.G. (the boss's daughter and my personal nemesis in the work-place), there have been times I've stared into those soulless eyes and wondered if there was something I was missing; if there wasn't some big cosmic joke just waiting for me to uncover.

And then it hit me - she's not human!!! How simple to overlook in my naivete that humans are alone on this planet. Truth be told, it took me watching Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles a few nights ago to realize this fact fully. And I haven't yet figured out whether B.D.G. is a robot, alien, witch, or perhaps a yellow-spotted toad.

But after careful observations over the past couple of days, I've compiled a small list of evidence that will help you to identify any potential non-human co-workers in your midst as well:

1. Toxic Odor - B.D.G. enters work each day in a cloud of stale coffee, copious amounts of hair product, and a "I bathed in a vat of my grandmother's perfume" stench. Although the combination would be lethal to a baby elephant or beluga whale, and has, on more than one occasion, had me running for the bathroom with bile in my esophagus, B.D.G. doesn't seem phased.

2. No Lunch Break - In my 3 years of working with B.D.G., I have yet to see her consume anything but coffee. Like the alien teens in Roswell with their Tabasco Sauce, B.D.G. seems to shun the food that humans need to survive. Even at company luncheons, she will only move food around on her plate, not actually ingest any of it. She is a fairly rotund woman, so she apparently gets her sustenance from somewhere - perhaps she feeds off the despair and anguish of those around her?

3. Time Stands Still - My morning will be moving along speedily until B.D.G. waltzes in around 10:30 or so each morning and then, BOOM: It's as if the earth has stopped spinning on it's axis. People move in slow-motion. You'll swear an hour has gone by, but when you look at the clock only 15 minutes has passed. The Earth slowly crumbles into the sea and the polar ice caps begin melting at an alarming rate.

4. Mood Swings - B.D.G. will be in a rage one minute, slamming down phones, insulting customers, yelling at co-workers, storming out of meetings. Then, just as suddenly, she will develop a flat-affect. Nothing seems to phase her, she answers in muted syllables, she shows no emotion, and her face goes all dead - doughy like a lemon-filled, powdered donut: No form or expression, but a tart and gooey, trans-fat fortified middle.

5. Temperature Fluctuations - Granted, we are experiencing some of the coldest days of winter here in Michigan, but even so, when B.D.G. enters the room, it's like God left the galaxy's back door open and a draft descends on the building. The wind picks up outside and an incessant howling through the windows starts that disturbingly resembles the anguished cries of dying children. A frost begins to form in the corner of my computer screen and my fingers go all numb with frostbite. Clouds cover the sun and I feel I will never be happy again. Meanwhile, B.D.G. whips off her designer coat and summons a minion to begin fanning her, lamenting about the sudden heat-wave.

Sorry You Got Fired, but Can I Have Your Chair?

2009-02-26T10:41:00.004-05:00

The day was cold and blustery. Perhaps because the heat had been turned off to conserve money. But other than that, how were we to know that the Boss Man would hold a staff meeting announcing that by the end of the day some of us would be without gainful employment, while the rest of us would have our pay reduced to wages similar to that of the third-world children who make preppy sweaters for The Gap?

Fortunately, when all was said and done, I still had a job, and wouldn't ya know? Coming that close to losing your job makes you pretty damn grateful that at least you still have one, even if you do still have to deal with B.D.G. everyday.

And sure, seeing your co-workers "let go due to budget restraints" sucks, but as for me, I try to look on the bright side of things. I have twice as much work and I get paid half as much. Oh right, bright side, you say?

Oh okay....umn....I only have to work 4 days per week instead of 5, which is actually something I kind of wanted so I would have more time to pursue some of my real interests. (I know it's hard to imagine, but working in a bookstore for the rest of my life was not one of the goals I listed in my high school year book.)

And, although I am sad to see Scary Hairy and C. gone, having your co-workers leave suddenly and tragically does mean that their office supplies are suddenly not in use any longer.

You know that Swingline stapler you've had your eye on? Yeahhh, you know the one. It's orange with gray racing stripes and your breath catches just a little every time you walk past C.'s desk? Well, it's yours now!

And that chair....ohhh, that chair that makes your butt feel like it's floating on a cloud? Well, Scary Hairy won't be needing it anymore.

Now, if only you can find a way to ask your boss for the SwingMaster and the Chair of Heaven without seeming insensitive......

The Customer is Always Right and Other Lies of Consumerism

2009-01-31T13:59:00.003-05:00

With one of our biggest sales of the year fast approaching, I feel the need to remind customers of proper etiquette when dealing with the sad souls who are being forced to wait on you (namely, me).

I know you customers do a lot of complaining about bad service. I will admit to whining about a particularly rude 'customer care representative' myself a time or two. (Really Bath & Body Works? You send me the wrong product twice and then tell me I can feel free to return it at MY expense and order again at a later date?!)

But the fact of the matter is, I think it's high time you look deep within yourself and think about how you might be contributing to the bad service you receive. And if you're unable to delve into the tepid waters of your soul and examine that shriveled black thing you call a heart, then please read the following list of behaviors to avoid if you are hoping for good (or at least mediocre) service:

Do not snap your fingers to get my attention. This may work well with your dog, your spouse, or your two-year-old, but just because you've lost the ability to think and speak in actual sentences doesn't mean I have. If you want a smile and helpful service, it's best to smile at me first, lose the hand signals, and figure out how to form a complete sentence before addressing me further.

Do not assume I am a high school drop out and that's why I'm working retail. I do not want to hear one more customer ask why I don't try going back to school and then lower their voice, glance apprehensively at my older co-workers, and whisper conspiratorially "do you REALLY want to still be working here when you're THEY'RE age?" Not that it's any of your business, but I graduated from COLLEGE Summa Cum Laude with a 3.97 GPA. I work Retail because it pays the bills in this crappy economy.

A velour track suit is not proper attire for a day of shopping. Ahh, I still fondly remember the days when people actually used to dress up to go shopping because it was such a big deal. (Okay, I don't actually remember those days, but I have heard of them). Look lady, generally I wouldn't care what you wear - I'm a jeans and t-shirts type of gal myself, but in my humble opinion the velour track suit MUST DIE. I do not need to see your 64-year-old body crammed into florescent faux velvet. Your saggy boobs and ass, your beer gut, and your carrot legs do not need to be gift-wrapped and set on display. YOU ARE BLINDING ME!!! (And making me depressed for what I have to look forward to in another 40 years).

Do not act like I'm your servant. I am not your butler or your nanny, so do not treat the bookstore where I work like your pigsty of a house. Rearranging books on the shelves I organized, dropping trash on the floor and thinking I didn't see you do it, and letting your children run barefoot through the store while you peruse the Harlequin Romance section are not going to win you any points in my book. Furthermore, handing me the list of 20 books you want to buy and telling me to 'go fetch them' for you is not acceptable. You have eyes. Find the books yourself. I'm busy trying to clean the carpet where your child just regurgitated their Happy Meal.

Do not lecture me on the sinful nature of the books we carry. I do not care if your pastor just preached a sermon on the evils of Harry Potter. Those books sell. (And they're damn good too). No one's telling you to buy it! And yes, yes I do know that the unsaved masses of unbelievers will burn in hell for all eternity. Thanks for the reminder.

Do not confuse a bookSTORE with a book FACTORY or PUBLISHER. I'm very sorry you received a book that was missing pages 87-123. But lets break it down for you, shall we? A BOOK is PRINTED on PAPER and then BOUND with GLUE at a FACTORY. Then the books are SHIPPED to BOOKSTORES like this one. Believe it or not, we don't actually look through every page of every book that comes in. So yelling at me about MY carelessness and deceitfulness for selling you a book with missing pages will only serve to PISS ME OFF. If your book is defective, we're happy to replace it. Just don't act like I'm secretly hoarding your missing pages under the cash register just to spite you. Although, now that you mention it, that is a good idea.....

Do not act offended when I can't tell you if we carry a book that you can't even remember the title or author of. If you come in requesting a really popular book, chances are I'll know not just if we carry it, but where you can find it (did you not see the big display as you came in the door?). And even if you ask for some obscure title from 1967, I can still look it up for you in this thing we call a computer and see if we have it. But asking if we carry "that one book with the girl on the cover by that female author" will yield no results!

Looking at my engagement ring and saying "what happened to the diamond....oh....oh wait, i see....it's just really small!" is NOT ACCEPTABLE BEHAVIOR. Believe it or not, some people actually DON'T CARE about the size of a piece of jewelry. If I wanted my hand weighted down like yours by a 5 carat atrocity, I would have let my husband know. But I didn't. I didn't even want a ring because I felt it was a waste of money. But my loving husband got me the PERFECT ring for me and I'll be damned if I'll let some bottle-blonde, 38 year-old, twig of a woman who hasn't eaten a proper meal since 1983 try to belittle me. And by the way, I think your botox is wearing off. Have a nice day.

This is a bookstore, not a library. Do not come in the door and seat yourself at one of the cash registers hoping to use the internet. (Believe it or not, this actually happens on a regular basis.) In that same vein, coming up to the counter with a big stack of books and then being offended when I say your total is $238.59 because you're 'just wanting to check them out,' does not go over well. What part of BOOKSTORE was unclear to you?

If you see a CLOSED sign in the window that means we're CLOSED. If the sign says we close at 5:00pm this does not mean as long as you're here by 4:59pm, you can stay as long as you like. It means we CLOSE AT 5:00pm. Shut the doors, turn off the lights, go home. We have lives too you know. We've been at work for 8 hours today and have to get home to our loved ones and cook dinner and do the laundry and take the dog out and maybe actually, if there's time, relax after 8 hours of being on our feet. Unlike you, we didn't get to take the afternoon off and go shopping because we have to be here to wait on people like YOU.

In closing, just remember kids: Customers are taught they're always right, but us 'customer care representatives' are taught to let the customer THINK they're right even though most of the time you're all just a bunch of idiots.

*And yes, all of the above examples are things that have actually happened. I have a good imagination, but not that good.

Baby Mania! Is it Something in the Water?

2009-01-30T13:58:00.004-05:00

Perusing Myspace the other day, I came across the page of one of my classmates from high school. Apparently JJ is "8 months pregnant!!!" and she "has the happiest, most wonderful life!!!"

Although I have a hard time understanding how being a pastor's wife in the middle of nowhere could be "happy" or "wonderful," I guess this is one of those times where that whole "different strokes for different folks" phrase can be over-used for the millionth time.

Scrolling down JJ's page, I found no less than 5 (five!) comments from fellow equally blonde, equally chipper women who had pictures of either their newborn, their naked baby-bump, or a countdown timer for their own spawn's arrival.

This causes the paranoid voices in my head to start spouting off about conspiracies involving the government lacing our water with fertility drugs to better populate America with more Stepford wives and their 'passel 'o chiluns.'

I mean, I guess I am at 'that age' where everyone is getting married or popping out a kid or seven. But I don't understand it. Last week, I refrained from writing a blog entitled "O Period, Where Art Thou?" only because I felt it straddled the border of too much information and a reality I wasn't ready to grasp. But boy was I freaking out, even if it wasn't in the Blogosphere realm. I didn't feel butterflies nor did I feel very glowy like I hear you're supposed to when 'expecting.' I guess this is because it turned out I wasn't pregnant afterall (praise Jesus!), but I really don't think a plus sign on one of the nine pregnancy tests I took would have made me feel glowy butterflies.

I'm sure it was different for JJ. We were never friends in high school. We'd known each other since our diaper days (small towns will do that to you), but even back then she was one of the Untouchable Barbies. I always had the urge to knock on the top of her head just to see if it was as hollow as it seemed. In middle school, she began developing a distinct mating pattern that she had perfected by high school. For the first month of the new school year, she'd scope out the field of potential mates. Come the first week in November she had made her selection and had pounced! The lucky one always had the same look: Spiky hair with too much gel, faint facial stubble, and of course, the jock/preppy facade. I'm sure the poor sap never knew what happened. For him, it was the happiest 6 months of his life - on the arm of one of the tanned and toned poster-esque "it" girls. For her, it was just another day of high school. At the end of the school year, she would end it cleanly and without dramatics. The year was over and so was the relationship. No muss, no fuss.

Being unfamiliar with the dating world myself at that time, I just assumed this was a pattern that would follow into adulthood. But I guess when you reach a certain age and that biological clock starts ticking (apparently some hear it way sooner than others), the innate urge to settle down with the one you're with takes hold. So she married the man of the hour (if not the man of her dreams) shortly after graduation from college. And now, a brief but inevitable two years later, she is with child. What more could a person ask for but the stereotypical life? I wonder.

I still remember fondly what is probably the only time in her life where she was embarrassed in high school. In our antiquated health class we were required to wear an 'empathy belly' for one day of the semester. This was supposedly to teach us what it feels like to be pregnant. I think in reality it was the conservative Christian schoolboard's way of instilling fear of pregnancy by making us see how fat we would get if we were to give out our flower freely.

JJ happened to be scheduled for the empathy belly for the Wednesday of Week of Prayer. We had an elderly Jamaican pastor come to preach at us for the week. I'm sure he was nice, but he was also out of touch. Poor JJ's assigned seat for chapel was in the first row and the pastor took it upon himself to point her out in the crowd and ask that we all whisper a silent prayer to Jesus for the saving grace that only He can bestow upon this scarlet woman and the bastard child that resides within her.

He commended her for her obvious repentance that only sitting in the first row of chapel can bring. And then he vehemntly chastised the rest of us for our uprorias laughter during his heartflet speech, which he mistakenly believed was directed at JJ. As if anyone would have dared to laugh at her.

It's funny how 10 years and a husband later, she's happy to be in the front row of her husband's congregation, proudly showing off her pregnancy.

I wonder if I'll ever get to that point. The glowiness, the butterflies, the "please touch my belly, I beg of you" stage. Probably not. Alas, we can't all be Stepford wives.

You Are Irony's Bitch

2009-01-29T19:11:00.009-05:00

This morning I was greeted by a lovely email in my inbox:

This is a urgent reminder to always, always use spell checker when adding products to the website. I have recently found dozens of spelling errors that a simple run through spell check would have resolved. The most recent example was . . . .

Sincerely,

B.D.G. (Bitchy Daddy's Girl)

I've had better starts to my day. It's not that I disagree with what was said in the email. On the contrary, I completely agree that there should not be spelling errors on our website. I mean, how horribly unprofessional is that?

What irritates me about the above email is the following:

I am not the one making the errors. I use my spell check, thank you very much. C., the other person who puts new products on the web is the one who manages to forget the existence of both spell checker and deodorant on a daily basis.
This is the second time in less than a week that B.D.G. has managed to falsely find fault with my job capabilities, and has publicly made accusations to that effect, and this new habit is really starting to piss me off.
B.D.G. is not a manager nor a superior of mine in any way. She is simply the boss's daughter. Which only means she has immunity from being fired, despite coming in late everyday (if showing up at all) and sending out emails she has no authority to be sending out.
One of my jobs in this hell-hole is to proof-read our advertising. She is the one who does our advertising. So, I am the one who edits HER work. I am the one who finds so many errors that I run out of my cheery, florescent sticky tabs after the first 5 pages. So for her to even imply that I am making errors, let alone 'dozens' of them, is laughable.
And lastly, the third word in her email is a typo!

And although I took the high road and did not mention this last fact when I replied, I am not above whining about it here. I mean, come on! "This is a urgent reminder..."?! I know 'u' is the forgotten step-child of the vowel family, but if you're going to write an email berating someone for their supposed errors, at least make damn sure you're not setting yourself up to look like a fool.

Needless to say, it was not a good day. But, since we had no customers in the showroom and the phone didn't ring, I got to slip my headphones on and blast music at deafening decibals into my left ear (my right ear sadly gets no love from the headphone gods since the right side of my headphones don't work...either that or I've gone deaf on one side and haven't figured it out yet. That's possible too).

Since the rest of the day passed without incident, I was able to think up a list of my favorite things to do when feeling blue:

Listen to angry singers like P!nk. Her life seems to suck pretty bad, and it makes for some great music.
Eat Ben & Jerry's ice cream. That creamy goodness (any flavor please) can melt your cares away. My wonderful husband introduced me to the world of Ben & Jerry's. Before them, I naively assumed that ice cream was supposed to taste like cardboard.
Take a picture of your co-worker/nemesis when they're not looking. Then teach your dog that attack command you've been putting off, using the picture as the attack object. This may sound a little extreme, but you have no idea the gratification you'll get over the next 2 days as you see your nemesis' shit-covered face exiting your dog's intestines.

Radon, Nitrates, and Reverse Osmosis, Oh My!

2009-01-18T06:46:00.004-05:00

So, my husband and I got the home inspection results back on the house we're planning to buy. NOT GOOD. Apparently the house tested very high for Radon, which is just a little chemical in the air THAT CAN KILL YOU. Cancer, lung disease, etc. All those cheery ways to go. Apparently, the EPA does not allow Radon in greater quantities than a 4 (of whatever measurement you use to measure Killing Gas with). Ours tested at an 18.

Then the inspector launches into the explanation about the water results from the well test. Negative for everything except nitrates. Nitrates.....like what you find in FERTILIZER are floating around in our water supply! Agh! He says Nitrates are allowed to be no greater than 10 (insert another convoluted measuring system here), and ours are a 14.

The alarm bells in my head labeled 'expensive' and 'complicated' start going off because last time I checked Killing Gas and contaminated water supplies are a pretty big deal. And big deals equate to large amounts of money being thrown at people who supposedly know how to fix the problem.

The inspector tells us that the Radon problem has a 'fairly simple' solution. He then proceeds to say words like 'foundation,' 'drilling,' 'tubes,' 'escape route for Killing Gas,' and '$800.'

Okay, so $800 may not sound like a lot, but considering we're already planning to pay $6000 to upgrade the electrical (which looks like a child did it back in 1950), and this house is already on the upper-end of our budget, another $800 doesn't sound like a 'fairly simple solution,' thank you very much Inspector Man.

Inspector Man doesn't really know much about how to fix the Nitrate problem except to say that a Reverse Osmosis Filter would need to be installed, and these are only a couple thousand dollars. So, my husband and I proceed to the internet (I love Google!) to find out just how bad this whole "Nitrate" thing is.

Turns out Nitrates are JUST FINE for a healthy adult to ingest. The only living creatures who have problems ingesting high quantities of Nitrates are animals (of which we have 3) and small children (blessedly, we have been spared thus far).

I think, well, maybe this isn't so bad. Except, as we read further, I see that the problem Nitrates cause for children is "Baby Blue Syndrome." Turns out it's exactly what it sounds like. An infant's stomach lining isn't well-developed enough to handle a large amount of Nitrates and it makes their skin...turn....BLUE. And I'm thinking, if I did get pregnant, and did pop out some minion, I really wouldn't want the spawn to be the same color I'm planning to paint the dining room. I'm all for coordinating colors, but that's taking it a little far.

So, we have some decisions to make, I guess. If the Seller is willing to pay for the "fairly simple solutions" to these problems, than grrrreeeaat! If not, I guess we'll have to walk...and be out the $565 it cost to have the inspections done in the first place. But I suppose $565 lost is better than blue babies gained.

Forbidden Danish and Big-Wigs

2009-01-17T18:52:00.006-05:00

Yesterday I arrived at work about 20 minutes later than I'm supposed to. I blame this on the fact that a) the roads were solid ice and I haven't had time to install ice skates on my car yet; b) the other drivers on the road were all trying to kill me, and c) I spent about 45 minutes in bed with my husband and my dog, pretending it was the weekend already, all of us too cold and tired to come out from under the covers into the frigid temperatures.

The part of the Michigan mitten that I live in was a balmy negative 16 degrees yesterday. I didn't know the lower-peninsula of Michigan could get that cold. And I've lived here my entire life.

So I enter work late, grouchy, and cold. Our resident Gentle Giant from the second office had generously emerged from his lair to turn on all of the space heaters out in the front where us women-folk work. At 6-4 and with enough body fat to make a walrus jealous, GG is actually one of my favorite people at work. He's certainly the nicest. I've been trying for two-and-a-half years to get him to say something mean about a customer and I've yet to see it happen.

He's also the only one that seems to remember how cold the women-folk get, not being privy to individual office space ourselves. What GG neglects to remember, however, is that turning on all of the space heaters full blast, and then trying to print something on the antiquated printer, makes the circuit blow.

So, sitting at my desk in my boots, mittens, and puffy coat that makes me look pregnant, I suddenly find my one source of warmth die as I press the 'print' icon on my computer to begin my daily regime of printing orders. Damn.

Thus begins my day.

When Boss-Man comes in, he informs us that two Big-Wigs from one of the publishers we carry are coming in. I ask if they're here to spy. (This is a legitimate question, but would take too long to explain here). He laughs and says he doesn't think so, but offers no further explanation. This is unusual.

So I ask Boss-Man's Son of Questionable Facial Hair what's going on. "Mr. Owner is being non-responsive and un-communicative. Why are Big-Wigs coming here?" I ask. After all, we are a small, privately-owned book warehouse. Big-Wigs do not grace us with their presence. We are a blip on their radar. Usually. Son-with-Questionable-Facial-Hair says that he prefers to remain un-communicative as well.

I say "Hmph!" and head back to my desk with thoughts of hostile takeovers and mergers and unemployment lines in my head.

Soon a catering service pulls up and starts unloading freshly baked bagels, pastries, and cookies. D pulls out the 'best' tablecloth (per instructions from Boss-Man) and begins setting the table. My stomach starts to growl rather loudly. The daughter of Boss-Man (the bane of my existence and the thorn in my side) must hear it rumbling because she jumps up faster than one would think she could move and begins informing each of us in turn that the food is NOT for us. It is for Big-Wig A and Big-Wig B. Her watery eyes squint at me with suspicion and she sways ever so slightly on her fashionably heeled boots while trying to look authoritative at 5'2.

She fails miserably since a) I tower over her by a good 5 inches; b) it's hard to take anyone seriously in stiletto-heeled boots when there's 2 feet of snow outside and, c) as the boss's daughter she's spoiled rotten and lazy, comes into work late everyday, bosses everyone else around (even though we've been informed by her own father not to listen to her), and dresses like she works in a New York publishing firm instead of a dirty warehouse. Oh yeah, and she's a bitch. And no, we don't get along in case I left any doubt in your head.

After the Big-Wigs leave we have a meeting while getting to eat their left-over (and now cold) pastries and bagels. Turns out said Big-Wigs don't like how low of a price we're selling their products for. And since they can't tell us to sell them for a higher price (BECAUSE PRICE-FIXING IS ILLEGAL PEOPLE!), they are simply going to start making us pay more, hence causing us to have to raise our prices in turn.

But who will our customers get mad at? US. And we will be the ones fielding the response from the suburban house-frau who has nothing better to do but complain that our really, really low prices are too damn high. I mean, when she’s spending $300 a month on her hair, HOW DARE WE raise the price of said book by $5? THE NERVE.

Fortunately, the mood lightens considerably after cold Danishes and bad news and we go out to try an experiment that D and Son-with-Questionable-Facial-Hair both saw on the news this morning:

Boil some water
Put said boiling water in a cup
Take outside
Throw the water up in the air as high as you can
Watch as it turns to ice crystals before hitting the ground

And yes it worked. Negative 16 degrees will do that.

When my space heater blew for the 7th time, I voted we try the experiment at my desk next. But no one took me up on it.