Curtains, Ice Cream, and Clothes

Few Days Off: So sue me, I took a few days off from writing. I've noticed that over the past week my blogs have been sort of stale so I guess I decided to take a little bit of time off to forget about the pressures of writing them. Course, there is no pressure, considering noone apparently missed them. Or maybe you did and you didn't say so. Oh well, here goes.

Follow The Gold Medal Ribbon: Last night Amanda and I went "curtain shopping" at JCPenney. She got a flier in the mail saying that there was a certain kind of curtain (funny, i know) on sale. So we went up there to check them out. We get to the department and Amanda starts looking. I flip through a couple of them and overhear a conversation between the two salespeople (TWO!?! We were lucky if we had ONE person working 10-5 in the draperies department!!!) and they were chatting with a customer. By the sounds of it, they knew her from somewhere, if not a former coworker. The conversation was about how much they "really enjoy" working in the department, how much they've "learned about draperies".

So Amanda and I walk around for what seemed like five minutes and BOTH of them completely ignored us. Finally the woman walks away and we waited a little bit longer and...nothing. They started talking between each other. Amanda and I made louder conversation about where they need to go, and measurements, and...nothing. So Amanda says "Yeah can we get a little help here?"

The first girl comes over and says "oh, yes, i can help you." We point out that we'd like this certain one that we'd found that wasn't the sales ad one. She says, "hmm, let me check." She checks, and says, "No, we've only got one. We can order them for you though!" So we decided that we'd put in an order for them. Amanda gets a few more ideas and the girl goes up to the register to put in the order. Of course, her system won't let her do it. She calls the other girl over, and they start talking between themselves about doing a "sens" or something. She doesn't offer this service to us, but mentions that they can't get them anymore. Amanda asks if they could get them from another store, and the second salesperson says, "...that...you can..." then asks her friend again who has to lumber back across the department (yes, lumbered...posture was like "leave me alone") and say that 'we'll be lucky to get these in' and tell us that it'll be $10 for shipping.

Oh, and when we asked about the curtain that was on sale, they both were in agreement that they'd never seen those curtains before.

Now I remember when I used to get bitched at at Sears for treating customers like this, and honestly, I had no problem with it then. Just didn't...figured that we didn't have it and that was just the way it was. I can't imagine doing that now. If somethings broken and I might be able to fix it, I fix it. If there's even a slight possibility that something can't be done, I say "I will do my best" so at least the guest knows that I tried. I apologize if I'm caught talking with someone other than a guest. I just can't figure out how I ever functioned like that before. Its hard to believe.

So we head down to get some ice cream at Baskin Robbins for a "pick me up". I got Gold Medal Ribbon and Amanda got some York Peppermint Pattie flavor that I wasn't really all that impressed with. We walked down to Sears to say hi and headed to the hardware department.

We talked to a few former compatriots, and sure enough I run into my old boss, Chris Litz. Chris tells me that apparently they've had to scrub the stores down, thats the new thing. Her hypothesis is that they might be selling off the stores. It wouldn't surprise me. Then she drops on me that Cheryl Sheldon, the Return-To-Vendor person, is having some major surgery again and that she might not be returning to work. How terrible :(

Then she asked me if Fred, the new Home Improvement manager (yeah, the job I almost got), had gotten back to me regarding my application I put in a few months ago for tools sales (yes, I applied again. So what, sue me.) and I told her he hadn't. She asked me if I'd want to do RTV if Cheryl couldn't come back. I told her I'd be all for it. Why wouldn't I be?
You scan boxes and load pallets with returned goods. 18 hours a week. Early mornings, but I'm sure if I couldn't make it due to a scheduling change at the hotel its not a job that would be the end of the world if I couldn't make it. I can turn on my music, have noone to bother me, and get my work done and go home.

I know that the "front desk supervisor" has been mentioned in conversation at the hotel and that I've mentioned it on the blog, but I can't wait for that to get a little more cash flow in, and last I knew, they weren't even looking for anyone to fill it. Besides, every other time I waited for something, I didn't get what I wanted. After all, I didn't wait for Amanda. :o)

"Baby Mama": Speaking of Amanda, her and I took one of her coworkers, Lori, and her friend Sabrina, to the movies to see "Baby Mama", the latest "SNL" flick that was probably taped during the writers strike. It looked hilarious on the previews, so we figured we'd check it out. It took a few weeks, but we finally went to see it Tuesday night. We showed up at Lori's apartment and picked up the girls and went to the theater.

Five minutes into the movie, Sabrina gets a phone call and instead of silencing it or saying "hang on a sec" and walking out, she gets up and tries to answer it while walking, and kicks over Amanda's popcorn. Amanda says "Are you serious?" loud enough, but the girl doesn't even stop and seem sorry about it, just kept walking. Lori gets up and goes out of the movie door. A minute later, she returns, and apologizes. Sabrina returns about five minutes later with a new bag of popcorn. No sorry, just basically shoves it in Amandas lap.

Oh, wait, the movie. Yeah, it wasn't NEARLY as funny as it appeared to be. Honestly, if they had worked it as a 'chick flick' it would have been a lot better in my mind. A few more sappy scenes and it would have been alot better off. Steve Martin steals the show as Tina Fey's boss though. Hilarious. "I'm going to reward you with five minutes of uninterrupted eye contact."

Dirty Duds Done Dirt Cheap: The last few weeks, as you've read, I've been fighting to fix the dryer downstairs. Laundry has been piling up. The neighbor downstairs offered to let us use her dryer, but I always feel weird about using it, since its not our utilities, all that stuff. So we decided to go to the laundromat on Tuesday morning. But not just any laundromat...we'll go to Campus Coin in Edinboro, where the washers are only $1.25 a load. Pretty cheap if you ask me. Then we'd stop by the neighboring Trophy Shop and say hi (For you new people, Amanda worked there for three years before she got the fateful job at Sears). We'd pick up lunch at Subway then head home for a bike ride.

We drop off the laundry, (took five washers to get all of it...I'd been wearing black socks for a week) and head over to the Shop. Mike, the owner, meets us at the door and we chat for a little bit. Tammy, one of their employees, says, "Hey Amanda, can you take a look at this?" and leads her back in the shop. I stayed out front and petted the dog and played around on my cellphone for a bit. Sure enough, Amanda ends up 'working' for an hour. I went over and put the laundry in the dryers, just in time for Amanda to meet up with me for lunch.

Subway $5 footlongs are still a pretty good deal.

So Amanda heads back to "work" and I start folding clothes. I get them folded, Amanda finishes up there, and we load the car back up and head for the Dairy Supreme. Get some ice cream, yummy, and head for Erie.

Sounds like a silly story, right? Sure enough, we realize at the end of the night that I somehow left an entire dryer load of colors at the laundromat. Mostly Amanda's work shirts. WHOOPS!!!! Luckily, the Trophy Shop also owns Campus Coin, and they had found the load of laundry at the end of the evening and have it there waiting for us.
Apparently the SpongeBob SquarePants pajama bottoms are what identified them as ours.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: "The older I grow the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom." Henry Mencken

The Next Three Songs On My Mp3 Player: "Say" by John Mayer, "It Hurts Me Too" by Eric Clapton, and "Just Pretend" by The Bens.

NEW: British Phrase Of The Day: "nine bob note" ... Apparently, overseas, they don't have dollars (haha). So our phrase, "Queer as a three dollar bill" is "Queer as a nine bob note".