All about the triumph of intellect and romance

(I promise I'm doing things other than writing fanfic and watching Mad Men. Seriously.)

Work's been a little odd. We had two servers leave this month -- one guy, Matt, who'd been with us ever since we opened, and his girlfriend, Veronica, who'd been there a year and a half. Three new people just got hired to take their place. So it's been a small adjustment period. I don't really enjoy training new people. I can be patient, and don't mind having to go through what they need to learn, but the general awkwardness, plus having to keep up on small talk for most of the evening, is the worst.

I'm also in the middle of writing the town visitor's guide for our chamber of commerce. It was due a couple weeks ago technically, but I was unhappy with the draft I came up with and needed to cut out quite a bit of nonsense from the version I was working off of, so I'm still grinding out new work as of this week. Hope to have that done soon. It's been frustrating, but at least I'm getting paid for it.

Last weekend I got to see dozmuffinxc and several of my old college friends/former professors for J's regency birthday tea at the O'Henry Hotel. We had an amazing time, and it was really lovely to visit with everyone again. There are pictures on facebook and on my phone. I'll edit this post later to put those up here if I can. :)

My cat Goldie is doing better. Thanks to everyone who commented on last week's post. I took him back to the vet for a checkup on Wednesday and the wound on his neck has been healing really well. His energy is up, and I think he's gained a tiny bit of weight, too. All good things.

I haven't really been keeping up with the Boston bombing news, apart from the day of the manhunt, when I got sucked back in. The desperate need of the networks to be the first with "breaking news" has made me beyond frustrated. Plus, every time I looked at the grisly pictures I just felt torn up, and I didn't even know anyone in the event. I got to a point where I just had to stop seeking out those things for my own mental health. So, most of the posts I've been reading about Boston have been of the "goodness of human nature" type -- Runner's World's website has featured plenty of those articles over the past few days.

I'm also glad to hear that my Texas friends are okay, given the plant explosion in West. Honestly, it's been one of those weeks where all of the terrible events have just mixed together in my mind. To quote The Onion: "Jesus, This Week."

I'm lurking around LJ and trying to catch up on previous posts/comments. Let me know if there's anything big I've somehow missed.

Mine was actually going fairly well until I left for work. I had been helping my mom clean out one of her rental properties so she could get it ready for the new tenants to move in; despite spiderwebs and dust galore, it wasn't too difficult.

I came home, put on some makeup and decent clothes, and was primed to get to Boone early, with extra time to run a couple of errands beforehand. While coming to a stop at the exit of my neighborhood, I realized that my chap stick (which for me is a tiny pot of Vaseline) was going to be needed soon, and thought "Hey, why not pull it out right now?" Forgetting that my purse and its contents had been in the sweltering sun all morning. As well as the fact that said pot of Vaseline had completely melted because of that exposure.

So, instead of getting relief from my chapped lips, I was promptly moisturised from torso to knees with liquid Vaseline, forcing me to go back home, stick my clothes in the freezer (to try and scrape the stuff off later), change into new clothes, and speed to work so I wouldn't be late. Additionally, it got on the seat of my car as well as on some dashboard instruments. Sigh.

Work wasn't bad today, though. It was fairly slow, but the people who came in usually bought something, so it didn't matter much in the end. Had a couple of hilarious older ladies (I'm guessing 50/60ish) come in midway through my shift -- one was looking for a flower arrangement for her daughter's house. After finding something simple, she ended up buying a hurricane vase for herself as well. 

Anyway, as she paid, she was attempting to justify the purchase to me and to her friend. I said something like, 'Oh, well at least this vase is fairly small. It won't make for clutter." She laughed and said, '"Oh, my house is just a closetful of shit right now! I definitely don't need any more clutter!"

Which just made me love her. We discussed that, as well as the fact that her newlywed daughter might or might not be pregnant. It doesn't sound like much, but as a retail girl, I've had to force conversations about the most boring topics with customers. (Ex: "This flower is too mauve for my living room. I need more of a lavender. Not a dark lavender, either. Something airy.") To be so entertained by a customer, and to gossip a little with them, is something rare.

Anyway, now I'm drinking tea, watching Brian Regan, and attempting to type out some concrete thoughts on 'Turn Left'. Hopefully one of those will come to a resolution before I go to bed! :)

Ugh. All attempts to get off work on the 4th of July weekend have not been going so well. I have already talked to two people about switching shifts with me, and neither of them can. My third prospective, I just found out, is trying to take off on that same day, as well; she was scheduled to work the shift before mine.

So, I am still hoping (knock on wood) to go tojkg_vader's sewing get-together. Let's pray for a miracle and some extra help, shall we? Or, conversely, maybe we don't need to open the mall store that weekend? Just a possibility?

....This is basically what I was yelling at the cash register at the end of my shift tonight.

See, work was supposed to go very smoothly and very well. I made lots of sales ("lots" meaning "more than five", as the mall store is never very busy), and put out all the items that Tibbs had brought over from Blowing Rock. The floors got mopped. The back area got swept/dusted, the lights were turned off, and everything was brought inside by 7:50. I got excited, thinking that I might leave before 8:15 if I was efficient at closing.

In a good mood, I went over to the register to start closing out. By turning a key and pushing the cash button, it is supposed to print out a receipt for all the day's sales. But, being made of snips, snails, and various mechanical parts of Lucifer -- the thing froze up instead, started beeping like a smoke alarm, and wouldn't print a thing. I changed the register paper, pressed random buttons -- nothing worked. So, I spent fifteen or twenty minutes on the phone with my manager, figuring out how to manually close out the register and tally the day's earnings without actually having the important numbers (such as tax or z-total) in front of me. I counted up the money -- slowly, trying not to make any stupid mistakes -- and wrote down everything that had gone wrong on the end-of-day report. Then, I had to call the store's owners and tell them the day's totals, as well as what had just gone wrong. Just to let them know that my numbers might be erroneous.

This prompted one of my bosses to get on the phone and coach me, step by step, while I tried to fix the cash register. Which took another 20 minutes. We FINALLY got it fixed, but that required having to beat on the keypad like an escaped ax murderer to unstick the dysfunctional mechanisms. After that, I had to go back and fill out the paperwork that I'd previously ignored because I didn't have the right figures in front of me.

So, instead of getting out early, I was able to leave the store at a cool 9:15. Nearly two hours after I had closed the doors.

UGH. Remind me why I took this job for a second year?