Ever notice how it's the little things in life that amuse us so much? More to the point, ever notice how it's the silly little idiocies in life that amuse us more than anything else? Well, this is not as much ''the little blog that could'' as it is ''the blog that enjoys going up the down escalator in your local mall.'' Will it have anything of real importance? No, probably not. But enjoy the ride never the less!

 

One week and almost 60 working hours later, I'm sitting here marveling at how this "day off" concept feels. It kind of itches a little. Considering this past week saw the kiosk go in a week early and two same-day funerals amongst the staffers, I'm rather hoping we don't get a repeat of this. Unless it involves an act of God (ie, the kiosk being struck by lightning) or a zombie apocalypse (ie, the kiosk being attacked by zombies).

So far, mind you, the kiosk is doing better than it usually has compared to years past. Sure the frame is bent, the electrical system is suspect (Tom, the miracle repairman, had a few choice and not-child-friendly words to say when he had to practically rewire the kiosk's electrical systems...in the process discovering the guys assembling it all had put in no less than 3 already fried outlets), and the cash drawer needs an extra shove/flying tackle in order for the drawer to actually close. But it's still an improvement.

For now.

After all, it's only been a week.

But other than, all is faring decently enough despite the inherent fatigue. I am enjoying Stephen Hunt's Court of the Air, despite its ability to throw fantasy-historical and -political details at me without any sort of warning or backstory, my tapeworm has been working overtime with at least 2 extra meals needed per day, and The Project has reached the ever-important completion of Phase 1. And Mel is busying herself with geisha cross-stitching and asking me why I feel the need to watch Rocky Horror in the early hours of the morning.

Then again, the reasoning for that is simple: don't dream it, be it. (Or is it: don't dream it, blog it?)


Today's Lesson: the stench of burnt microwave popcorn will linger in your apartment for at least 3 days.

Labels: ie the kiosk being mentioned in the labels, Project rumblings

posted by Phillip at 10:31 AM

 

Today was the first day but-still-a-whole-damn-week-early-thanks-Head-Office of the joy that is the Winter kiosk. Now if the past 2 years have taught us anything (and I do mean a collective "us", as you also get to revel in the life lessons Mel & I experience), it's that a little bit of love goes into the assemblage of every kiosk. This love is horribly overshadowed by the epic amounts of fail crammed into the rest of the kiosk.

Thus far, comparatively the sadomasochism is not quite up to usual standards, and for that I must confess to being incredibly relieved. The "all kiosk no power, phone or banking info" year was about as fun as watching Aeon Flux. Likewise, last year's "introduce troubled employee to Mr. Amazing Sales Associate Appreciate Pancake Maker" fun was inherently not fun. This year, it seems as if they're taking a new approach.

Everything except the electricity works, due mostly to whomever put it together was either drunk, deluded or was kidnapped by aliens midway through assemblage, rectal probed and then beamed back down to complete their work but was hampered by the shock of said probe. Our regular maintenace guy, Tom, will be in Wednesday to fix the mess...and probably swear under his breath at the idiots who half-assedly put it together, and at the heads at Head Office who are too cheap to hire someone competent enough to do it right the first time.

I adore Tom.

But yes, there is a lack of power right now, and an overabundance of fugly winterwear. Most of it left over from last year. I should know. I transferred most of it when the kiosk closed down. And Mel should know too: she watched enough people comment on how fugly those items were.

All of this pales in comparison to the remote possibility that the kiosk may try to kill us this year. Not with fire, as per last year. No, this time around it might be the metal frame that supports the curtain track and lights. It's not a good thing when you stare at a corner support beam only to notice it's really tilting to the left. It's also not a good thing when you walk to the other side of the kiosk, stare at the opposite support beam and notice it's really tilting to the right.

If the idiot(s) putting this thing together actually had a level with them, I'd vote they be beaten to death with it as appropriate punishment. That way it's both cruel and unusual. (Because, if Hostel has taught us anything, it's that most killers go for the power tools or pointy things first.)

The kiosk hasn't been up for a day yet, and while I'm not ready to kill something yet, my body is really sore and very, very tired. 60ish boxes of stock and 12ish boxes of random supplies and shelving unites/braces/etc. does that. Not to mention my day off this week might get kaiboshed due to 2 employees both having a death in the family and leaving for the funeral.

And the season has only started.

I'm really holding out hope that my November & December months ease up, if not for social events and visitings, then at least to give me a day here or there to either clean the apartment or rest. However, there's a part-time gig I'm thinking might work out despite the inevitable schedule from hell...

http://www.durexcondomtester.ca/

(You only wish I was joking about this. The ad was on the radio, which in turn led me to that.)


Today's Lesson: if they built it, they'll bork it up somewhere, somehow...usually almost everywhere.

Labels: I can has condom testing, the inherent untrustworthiness of a slanted kiosk

posted by Phillip at 7:48 PM

 


Apparently, I am psychic.

At least, according to the unenlightened masses at Head Office, I am psychic. Why, do you ask, obviously not having paid any attention to the fine print beneath the caption? Well, the answer is simple. Painfully, aggravatingly simple.

The mall's winterwear kiosk was due to go in on October 29th. That was what Head Office has been telling us for months. (Since July & August, as a matter of fact.) That was also what the mall administration has been telling us that our Head Office has been telling them for months. Which is all fine and dandy by me. I like definitive, clear-cut dates to work with.

Today, in the middle of the afternoon, I receive a phone call. It's from my District Manager, who (by sheer blind luck) had a passing remark made to her by one of the higher-ups that our kiosk was going in this coming Monday. That's Monday, the 23rd--a whole bloody week earlier than anything we'd beentold.

The reaction of my District Manager was pretty much, "Um, WTF?" I shared the same reaction when she conveyed this information to me. A quick jaunt to the mall offices later, and our mutual thoughts were something along the line of: "I just need a plane ticket, a Head Office Appreciation pancake maker and an alibi."

So...yeah. Head Office decided to up the kiosk's arrival by a week, and completely, totally and utterly failed to inform me or my District Manager. Because, apparently, I'm fucking psychic and would naturally just pick up on those wavelengths.

I ended up spending the entire evening ripping apart and redoing schedules for the next 2 weeks, and trying to get in contact with everyone to let them know that it's all gone to hell in a handbasket. What further incites my wrath is that this has shredded anything resembling a social life for Mel & I, since now we've got to slap together enough people (read: us) to cover the store and kiosk's shifts simultaneously.

Visiting Toronto to see Ysa and the gang? Not happening.

Visiting Brantford to see Kevin, Donna & Gabezilla? Not looking good at all.

Having lunch with an old friend, which was planned over two weeks ago? Nope.

My next day off won't be until the week after next, and I think I'm going to be too damned exhausted to want to do anything. Bad enough I've already been having to endure a cold that's been kicking my ass for the past 2 months now...but my butt's already looking misshapen from that, I don't need Head Office grabbing a steel-toed boot and taking a swing or two.

I think what grates me more than anything is the seeming, unblinking way this entire situation is being presented. It boggles me that not a single smeghead at Head Office actually thought to confirm with us as much in advance as possible that we knew the change of dates. Plus I honestly don't think Head Office cares that no one bothered to inform us of these changes, and I'm pretty damned sure they're not going to apologize in the slightest for this. (Our District Manager, though, apologized on their behalf, but she unfortunately gets the same monkeywrench thrown at her too, since she has to rearrange her own schedule to help us out a week earlier than planned. So I'll accept her apology, but Head Office is still on my frag list.) And even worse, I'm betting this sort of thing will probably happen again next year.

So you'll have to excuse the seething anger as well as my absence. But do me a favour: if you happen to receive in the mail from me a bloodied pancake maker, please dispose of it accordingly and tell the police that I was hanging out at your place the entire night.

Today's Lesson: once again, we find that there is nothing I can possess on a social calendar that Head Office cannot take away.

Labels: magical changing kiosks, rectal-cranial inversion 07, this is why I've lost faith in humanity

posted by Phillip at 9:34 PM

 


Ah, Head Office. You make me laugh in a special kind of way--the kind that usually involves my forehead eventually crashing onto our cash counter as my rueful guffaws taper off into a rueful groan.

The company's been in the game now for 20 years. (How it's survived sometimes can only attest to either a glitch in natural selection, or proof that God has a schadenfraude sense of humour.) To celebrate this momentous event, they had a special promotional sale for all of our stores: everything was an extra 20% off.

The brand new, highly professional, ultra-swanky ceiling banners and sign toppers we had advertizing this glorious occasion thusly proclaimed:





So...how many times should you be seeing the letter 'n' in 'additional' again? Yeah: oops. Quite frankly, I'm amazed this made it all the way into our stores without anyone at either the printers or Head Office picking up on this. Hell, I'm chagrined to say the banners were up for a week in our store before I suddenly performed a double-take on that word. (But in my defence, I was expecting someone in the higher echelons to, you know, proofread the things they were sending our way.)

Now if you'll excuse me, I have some of the new Avatar episodes to geek over, and season 1 of Heroes to become addicted to. (Damn you, Kevin!) But before we go, let me deal grievous injury to the hearts and minds of all you Avatar fans out there reading this. When Mel asked me to find a terrible, horrible, no good very bad fic to read aloud/mock for her (she has peculiar bedtime reading preferences, what can I say?), I stumbled drunkenly along through ff.net and crashed headlong into a so absolutely not safe for work story. The result of which has culminated in more than a mere mockable story. This is epic. This is brilliantly ridiculous.

This! Is! Cock-Bending!!!

No, really, I'm serious.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3719839/1/A_Bender_of_Her_Talents

(On the plus side, this whole thing works great for reading if you narrate it sounding like either Dame Edna, or a really exasperated Basil Fawlty.)

Enjoy...

Labels: cock-bending, head office spellchecking for teh fail

posted by Phillip at 8:38 AM

 


We now return you to your regularly scheduled yet utterly half-assed run blog. Yes, Virginia, there is an Interwebs connection once more. Not that you'll probably notice it, since this is a rather irregularly updated blog, but hey, it's better than hearing about me in the news. (And it would probably be something involving a lack of pants on my part too. Would you expect anything less from me?)

There's been a lot of random things that have happened since the last bit of nowhere, and I've already forgotten half of them. Then again, they're mostly "you had to be there" anecdotal things: Mel having too much fun ordering William Sonoma cookbooks; people asking me if our store sells pantyhose and/or womens' underwear (to which, in case you yourself were confused, the answers are: no, and a profound no) ; and my newfound and "instant addiction" discovery of the manga Hollow Fields, whose ghoulish faculty members are happily reminiscent of the Foulthings in Brom's The Plucker.

Hollow Fields preview:
http://www.gomanga.com/webmanga/index.php?series=hollow&page=1

Brom's work: www.bromart.com/

What can I say? I like my stories creepy.

Aside from that, there's been a whole lot of trivial moments and instances I've all but forgotten. Then again, I am someone who has trouble recalling what he ate for breakfast yesterday, so it's possible I'm just going senile before my time.

But I can regale you with two memorable moments from the store's colourful clientelle. First up is perhaps the only person I've never been able to maintain eye contact with. And this says something, since I've honed the ability to unflinchingly look at a customer while talking with them, regardless of whatever abnormality or disability they might have. This one woman, however, destroyed all of that.

Mostly because she had a moustache whose size and volume rivals Gary's. And despite hers being blonde, there was no way you could hide it as anything else. I must admit I was lost somewhere between staring on in disbelief, or bursting out in incredulous laughter.

Next up, we have an incident that, as I write this down, is giving me the disturbing sense of deja vu. Suddenly I'm wondering if this has happened to me before, and I blogged about it then, and right now I cannot locate the specific entry since it predates the "label" option. But I digress. To the encounter...

There was an older gentleman in an automated wheelchair who came into the store. And if you interacted with him for about 30 seconds, it would become rather obvious his mental faculties were not as up to speed as the rest of us. This unto itself is nothing, as I've pleasantly & politely interacted with others like him. However, the more I interacted with him, the more he began making comments and questions that raised my worry levels accordingly:

Okay - "You're a very nice friend."

Peculiar - "How old are you?"

Worrisome - "Do you work out?"

Creepy - "Could you flex your arm for me?"

Really Creepy - "Now raise it above your head."

Slowly Back Out Of The Room Creepy - "Could you turn to the side and hold that pose?"


There are times where I am willing to go above and beyond the usual levels of customer service for some people. This was decisively not one of them. The most he got was an arm flex, and by then my nervous laughter was attracting the worried looks of other customers on my behalf.

Like I said, this has a disturbingly familiar ring to it. I'll have to hunt the archives and see if I've been asked to pose for him before. In which case, I'm diving behind the cash desk the next time he rolls on in.

Labels: Brom, Hollow Fields, Madame Moustache, muscular posing that left me feeling sullied, Schreodinger's Internet

posted by Phillip at 9:24 PM

 


Our Intarwebs has a slight case of death. But don't worry, it'll be resurrected soon enough. In the meanwhile, we shall leave you with Today's Link, being My Little Cthulhu: http://dreamlandtoyworks.com/my_little_cthulhu.html

Labels: broken internets, cthulhu

posted by Phillip at 10:40 AM