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Meg and various other things
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| Penned by a Retail Monkey |
[22 Aug 2009|11:48pm] |
Top Ten Tips for Customers
10. Keep change in pocket. I understand what it means to be strapped for cash, but most of us know the ballpark price of the things we want. Why come into a store with barely enough when you could have just enough? Isn't it embarrassing to run out to your car for the last 60 cents of a $4 purchase? Broke people shouldn't sneer at dimes and pennies. And you shouldn't think that the rest of us aren't broke enough to relate -- if you can't pay the FULL AMOUNT, you don't need a GPS. You need a good change purse.
9. Don't ask your kids about everything. Not everyone is tech savvy and I get that. But just because your twelve year old can play X-Box, that doesn't make him an expert on how to wire your home theater system.
8. Don't ask me if you aren't going to listen. I'm a sales person, not your ninth grade algebra teacher. I can tell you how to hook something up, I can tell you if it's going to work, I can tell you my opinion on quality and price. I can't drive home and prove to you that it will work in your house. And I can't make you buy the right thing. Don't waste my time if you're going to do the opposite of everything I say. I could be helping other people.
7. People in retail are too tired to visualize. If you can't describe it, we can't help you. We aren't opposed to charades, but keep in mind that the help you receive is only as good as the questions you ask.
6. Service plans or warranties have rules and limitations. And no, you can't make up your own for the fifty dollars you're spending. Know what you're buying or you'll just make yourself look like a major douchebag when you cry over the disappearance of your own imaginary terms of service.
5. A mismarked price is not always false-advertising. Unless it is used to get you into something you don't want to be in, it's not illegal. Don't try to showcase your knowledge of law you haven't actually studied. If I told you a GPS was $99 to get you in the door and then you came in and found out it was actually $300...that's false advertising. If you find a pair of headphones on a peg that is clearly marked "screen protectors" and ask for that price...that just means you a) can't tell the difference between headphones and thin squares of plastic or b) you can't read. Either option is embarrassing. And yes, sales associates do laugh at you behind your back.
4. Don't assume all stores have public restrooms. Companies supply bathrooms for employees because they trap us in their building all day to be slaves. We need to excrete and they don't want it done on the floor. Don't be offended when we won't let you use one of the few luxuries provided to us. Small stores don't have janitors to clean up after you, so we don't have bathrooms you can use. It's unfortunate that most of the time you're inconsiderate beings who like to clog our toilets and leave pee and poop on our toilet seats and floors that WE have to clean up. We wish it weren't so, but... relieve yourself ahead of time.
3. Always hand the cashier your form of payment. Throwing money on the counter, tossing your card by the register, laying quarters down and making someone pick up your payment wreckage is impolite. It's also seen as degrading. We aren't your hired help. Retail workers might not have any food of yours to spit in, but we will be less likely to give good advice, phone numbers or speedy service. In fact, we might even point you in the wrong direction just to fuck with your day. These things might seem small to you until Black Friday. Or Christmas Eve. Have fun waiting in line and driving all over town.
2. Nothing is free. And if it is, it's only to get something else out of you. Free cellphones require you to sign a two year contract. This is true wherever you go. Cellphone companies don't give a shit about you, they just want to know you'll pay them on a monthly basis for the rest of your life. We explain this to you, even when our companies try to keep it secret with their pretty red and white signs. There is never a pure good deal.
1. Read. Read your contracts. Read your receipt. Read the return policy we mention to you in passing. Read the lighted sign at the register that says EXPRESS. Read the sales ad. Read the hours sign posted at the window. Read the tags on what you buy. People in retail go out of their way to give you as much information (however flashy and misleading it sometimes is) as possible. We explain, we write it down, we lecture you constantly on the nature of our world. And we smile through all of it. Yet you never do the homework and you get angry at us because you learn nothing. We want to have faith in the consumer, we want to believe you really are intelligent and kind and respectful people raised in an educated democratic society. So read. Help us see you aren't the soulless day killers that we dread. And maybe, MAYBE... we can finally help you.
Have a nice day.
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[08 Aug 2009|12:21am] |
I'm exhausted. Not in the physical way or the emotional way or any kind of way but the way that makes me incapable of a real, honest thought. The way that has me home at 9:30PM with the motivation to do nothing but watch animal reality tv shows or lay in bed with my eyes shut even though I can't sleep just yet. I'm the kind of tired that requires darkness but at the same time can't shut off the light. I can't choose anything either. God. I can't make a coherent decision without it being some life shattering moment. Sometimes I think if Bryce asks me what I want for dinner again, I might cry. Or give up and lay myself out in the middle of the grocery store's main aisle to accept an inglorious death at the hands of a shopping cart. Anything would be better than admitting that I really don't have any thought there. Me, the supposed creative writer. What a joke. Ha. Ha ha ha. Even if our brains were our lower intestines and I drank all the bowel relaxer in the world, I couldn't shit verse. I feel like an idiot sometimes. Or a depressed washout or an absent-minded bag lady. It's really hard to describe without giving people cause to think I'm even crazier than I am. Or think I am. Or...
Whatever.
Maybe I should blame work. Or my diet. Or the fact that I haven't really done anything for myself in a while. I don't have time, I think. That's a lie. I could probably make time if I tried hard enough not to sleep whenever I had the chance. What do I do with my time anyway? Or I think...conference call at 8:00 on Tuesday. I have to do paperwork and my cage count and my store needs to be perfect (again) before Friday. And why on earth do I get so touchy about people speaking poorly for the company I work for when I don't even really like the company I work for? I don't know. I really don't know. I do know that I have to do my laundry and that I've been saying that for at least two months now (at least). I can't keep doing it in pieces because then I will never put the closet back together again. Not that it really matters because I've completely and utterly failed at keeping it together like I promised myself I would when I got here. Sometimes I think I should just burn all of my clothes and start over. Then I remember that I need money, which is another train of thought entirely.
You know, the worst part of it is I'm not unhappy. I don't feel unhappy. I just feel stressed. And blocked. I feel unstable. I feel like everything can just evaporate in an instant and all the sudden nothing would matter at all. I hate that feeling...you know where you think you could actually get away with disappearing? Okay, so I'm unhappy. I feel like an ass for saying that though. A whiny ass. I should be happy all of the time. I have a job. I have a place to stay. I have family (that I don't bother to keep in contact with...another train of thought as well). And I live with someone I love very much. It should be enough for me and I should be able to sit down and write whatever the hell I want. Or do my fucking laundry. Or reorganize the books on my shelf. Why can't I do that? Why can't I just...do it. Like a normal person would. I could before.
Ugh. I hate August. And I hate angsty free writes. I can't stop the former so I'll stop the latter. Thank you.
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[18 Jul 2009|09:45pm] |
I am not a screen,
my readings do not compute
to a logical result.
I am not a fighter,
pain is not my motivator
nor is high reward.
I am not a crane,
picking up where I left off
is not so easy.
I am not a recording,
recitations and propaganda
make my tongue stumble.
I am not a mannequin,
when light shines on me
there is no eternal smile.
I am not a chisel,
tapping me against rock
will not yield a beautiful thing.
I am not a river,
being held and being still
are all I seek from some days.
I am not a hermit,
solitude is only the tool used
to fit a mask back in place.
I am not a child,
my heart and mind can rebel
even when I follow command.
I am silent
when I should speak,
when I should yell,
when I should sing
and I wish I could say
all of these things.
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[31 Jan 2009|05:20pm] |
I saw the most awesome SUV earlier today. It was all black and had lines on it like police car. I thought it WAS a police car until I got close to it. On the back there was a zombie chasing a mother and child and the text "Zombie Assault Preparedness Vehicle".
It was the most awesome thing I'd seen all day.
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| To Do |
[30 Jan 2009|12:42pm] |
Phone Calls:
-> Allstate
-> Radioshack District Manager
-> Grandma
Research:
-> Registering a car in Texas
-> Getting Texas license
-> Nissan service locations
-> Read Enterprise's business site
Errands/Chores:
-> Nails
-> Clean out trash in room, dust
-> Pack remaining clothes
-> Pack electronics
-> Clean car
-> Load up packed stuff
-> Donate old clothes
-> Grocery shopping
-> Change address on all loans
-> Get maps tabbed and print directions
-> Pull all money from health savings
-> Deposit bonus check
Other:
-> Figure out video chat w/Katy
-> Mess up mom's hair as much as possible
-> Get pictures of the kids
-> Get bourbon ball recipe for Caela
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| Twenty-Five Random Facts |
[29 Jan 2009|11:44pm] |
I saw this on a friend's page on Facebook. Feel free to do it yourselves!
1. Whenever I'm super sick, all the blood goes out of my fingers and they become finger-cicles.
2. My first personal pets were fish. They were tiny and glowed in the dark.
3. I love canoes.
4. My favorite birthday cake is vanilla cake with vanilla icing and coconut. Mmmm.
5. I like singing in the car. With the windows down.
6. I only have performance anxiety when playing the French Horn.
7. Browns and reds are my favorite clothing colors.
8. The most vivid dreams I have are often violent nightmares, but occasionally include dead people/animals I knew.
9. I think my bedroom is haunted because my jewelry box door sometimes opens by itself.
10. Softball was my favorite sport because of the insulting cheers we did while other teams were at bat.
11. Sarcasm is my most beloved past time. It also gets me into a lot of trouble.
12. I am prone to passing out because when I get stressed my blood pressure drops.
13. I love pickles on every sandwich but PB&J.
14. Rollercoasters are not fun for me because they make my legs feel funny. And they're scary.
15. When I was a kid, I was always thinking up schemes to make money because I wanted to buy a shed and live in the woods.
16. I love decorating and organizing for other people's parties.
17. I have a shot glass collection but I've never been drunk.
18. Frank Sinatra's songs are best in the spring to me. '
19. I'm afraid of being forgotten or becoming a ghost.
20. I want to get into baking more and cupcake decorating. And maybe candy making.
21. My mom thinks I was able to read at a very young age because she read to us all the time.
22. I like going to rock concerts because I enjoy feeling the music reverberate in my chest when I'm in the crowd.
23. When I lived in Florida, I used to pray that God freeze the ocean and give us snow. I stayed up all Christmas Eve one year to see if He'd do it.
24. I love kitties because I like observing their personalities. I think cats have old souls.
25. I was a girl scout until my sophomore year of high school. I was a cadet. It was fun while it lasted.
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| 2009 |
[03 Jan 2009|12:38am] |
I don't like to review my year; it feels like I'm trying to re-live things I either only half-remember or wish I could forget. There are probably millions, perhaps billions, of livejournal posts and blogs and facebook one-liners describing the baggage that people are tugging over the line to 2009. These are the same people bouncing around cyberspace singing about "change" or their awesome new lives or how everything is going to be so much better because they scribble down '09 now on their checks, rather than that blah of '08. Well I will not be one of them. I defy the violent urge to write paragraphs of hokey hopes and weepy garbage that I'd sooner burn than read aloud to anyone. Why look back when there are twelve shiny months waiting to be filled in? Why ask why things happened when I can focus on how to make things happen now?
The truth is, I've spent most of my life analyzing my life. When I fuck up, I remember in detail why I fucked up and why I shouldn't have fucked up. When I do something great it energizes me even years later, but makes me wonder why I'm not that awesome in the present. The big events in my life stick to my memory stronger than any super glue or any binding duct tape can provide. So when it comes to the New Year, I treat Time as I treated high school. Or college. Get me the hell out. I'm ready to do something new.
The more I dwell in what was or could have been, the more I weigh myself down. There is no way any soul can bound across this earth if its heavy enough to make an elephant feel insignificant. I'll honor the past and then get it out of my way. If 2009 is such a great thing, then I'll embrace it for what it is: a year not yet lived. I won't predict, won't plan and won't worry. After all, I get another crack at a blank slate in twelve months.
Thank you, beautiful calendar of chance!
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[27 Dec 2008|06:09pm] |
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Do you ever feel like you're not stressed, but secretly are?
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| haha |
[22 Dec 2008|11:56pm] |
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[22 Dec 2008|08:39pm] |
Christmas cards are coming late this year, but they are coming! I couldn't help stuffing extra goodies in the envelope...so it's a bit more costly.
Hee.
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| memeage |
[14 Dec 2008|11:27pm] |
I decided that I need more happy entries after doing this...
( woo! )
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[04 Dec 2008|08:51pm] |
 Dear Santa...
Dear Santa,
This year I've been busy!
Last Tuesday I pulled ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) faeness's hair (-5 points). In October I broke pixle's X-Box (-12 points). In July on a flight to Colorado Springs, I stole the emergency flight information card (-40 points). In September I farted in an elevator (-6 points). Last week I committed genocide... Sorry about that, lucentstreak (-5000 points).
Overall, I've been naughty (-5063 points). For Christmas I deserve a lump of coal!
Sincerely,
less-than-sane |
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| HEY YOU PEOPLE |
[28 Nov 2008|11:34pm] |
GIVE ME YOUR ADDRESS SO I CAN SEND YOU AWESOME CHRISTMAS CARDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Comments are screened.
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[13 Nov 2008|08:15pm] |
I guess I have been out of touch lately and for that, my online friends, I apologize. I've had a lot going on since I got my personal time back from Halloween-land. November is half gone and I don't know where it went. I never thought there would be a time when I wasn't on a computer for at least six hours a day. Is it weird that I feel less socially active for it? I'm only writing for one group over at Insanejournal now and that feels like a lot of work. There was a time where I'd be involved in ten or fifteen. Of course, back then I didn't have a full-time job...
Anyway. There has been a lot going on. I'm going to Texas on Saturday (yay!) and I'll be there through Wednesday of next week. The week after that is Thanksgiving, which means I will be cleaning/cooking a lot. A lot, a lot, a lot. Plus working. And then we're into December, which means Christmas. I have cookie baking, card writing and present-buying to do. My budget is unfortunately limited this year, so I think I will only be sending cards. It's sad, but true. Maybe I will send out crazy favors to my buddies next year.
I've also been trying to write poetry and read it again. Kick starting my reading habits has been harder than I thought it would be, but I think I'll be good again by the start of December. I also want to start listening to my poetry recordings again and maybe start recording myself, but I think starting small is a good thing.
On top of all the usual craziness that ensues after recovering from October, I am reworking my resume and clearing out my room. My mom would LOVE to help me, just because she loves throwing things away. But I don't think I need to drop the mom-bomb on my personal stuff yet. I'm doing okay so far on my own. I'm moving at the end of January/beginning of February, so I've been trying to get ready for that to make the transition as painless as possible. I figure the less crap I have, the better. That includes job issues. Finding a new job is always a fun experience, especially in a bad economy, but if worse comes to worse...Party City loves me.
-.-
Speaking of which, I have to skip out. I'm at work now. I'll try to write more in here later. Or tomorrow. I guess it all depends on how much I feel like procrastinating.
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[16 Oct 2008|03:05pm] |
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If I didn't think McCain was a jerk before, I sure do now! Thank you final debate for solving any doubts.
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| In October... |
[13 Oct 2008|01:58am] |
I am impossibly retarded at keeping things together. Right now I have no voice; I had to squander what sounds my throat could bear making on directing employees on Saturday. Yelling while having a sore throat is not the greatest idea, but it's hard to manage when you're a mute. Especially when your staff is teenagers. Anyway, my voice died and now I can't even get out the scratchy man voice I had going. I'm more annoyed than in pain; I guess that should be a blessing. I could have gotten the flu or strep throat. I just never realized how difficult it was not to be able to talk...
But to get back on track, everything is a mess. I have only one pair of clean jeans. When I wake up in the morning I forget to do important things. Like brush my hair. Or shower, which I've taken to doing at night now to help me go to sleep. And so I won't forget in the morning. Putting on deodorant was another thing I failed to do. Ew. Yeah. I had to buy some powder fresh stuff on one of my lunch breaks -- which are also one of the main reasons why my finances are stuck in the shitter. If I could make my lunch everyday I'd be rolling in money. Instead I eat out all the time. I want to wake up early, but the snooze button is too attractive and I can't resist. So I roll out of bed, get dressed and go to work day after day after day... While I am not a complete zombie yet, I've been working 12-14 hour days, six days a week. It's slowly caught up to me. There's very little I can think about beyond missing the person I'm in love with and looking around at my surroundings, horrified that I've let myself come to this so easily. Even my bed is cluttered. And when my life isn't assembled on my bed it's dumped on the floor beside it until the next day. I slept with my writing journal last night and no, it was not as hot as it sounds. I'm just glad I have a moleskin and not that hardback thing I wrote in three months ago.
I know I work hard and think deep thoughts and I'm generally a responsible person. I just feel ashamed that I can't keep it together. Jamie, my sister in law, has two kids, a job and manages to go to nursing school. She doesn't have a messy living space. I have a job that's it. Oh, and excuses.
I hope I can clean tomorrow, but it's more likely I'll just sleep in. Tomorrow is the last day of freedom before I live and breathe my job for two (close to three) weeks straight.
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[13 Sep 2008|06:32pm] |
So there is a lot I've been meaning to put in my LJ recently and just haven't. There are a lot of reasons for this -- my store is a wreck, it's September and Halloween madness has started, my house is a crazy place and lastly, I think I'm sick. I don't know what I'm sick with or why, but I'm going to the doctor on Monday because it's bugging me enough to distract me. My mom thinks I probably have an inner ear infection or something, but I've been having consistent problems with dizzyness lately. It went away for like a week and then started bothering me again. I'm kind of hoping for ear infection and not something else. I'm not the healthiest person on the globe, but I've never really had any super serious medical issues and don't want to start.
It could also be related to stress. That's always possible, but I don't know. Dizzyness is kind of a weird side effect for that.
I'm going to try to write something meaningful in here soon. It's just hard to focus right now. That was my point...before I started rambling.
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