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!

 

Sometimes I think that my relationship with Blogger, online diary of sorts that it is, is something akin to my Lego collection. Every now and again I forget completely about it, or don't really care to take it out and play with it. Once I do sit down and reaffirm our relationship, it can only be after I've blown the dust off everything, but I'll feel warm and happy for having done so.

Then again, at least with Blogger I don't have to worry about the cat showing up and potentially choking on one of its random bits.

But meh, sometimes life just gets in the way and other times I have enough mental capacity to at least tie the bib around my neck before I spend 3-4 hours drooling in front of the TV. Ah, escapism. Ah, atrophy.

I find it somewhat boggling how in the peak of what should be our dead season, we're still doing a surprising amount of business. The store still has enough customers to keep me finishing off my shifts with a, "I could have sworn I'd have been bored today." Sure, being bored would be a bad thing about 2 weeks down the road, especially if you all have to suffer through me whining about it (extreme emo action!!), but right now I could do with a tumbleweed or two blowing through the mall.

As it is, the kiosk is contending with transfers from a sister kiosk that closed down this week...and all of said transfers are for the most part useless crap that they probably won't sell and definitely don't need in stock. Like the intestine-scarf. I kid you not, there's a scarf out at the kiosk that looks like someone took a shoddy green scarf and interwove it with pieces of someone's digestive tract. There's bulges (not lines, but a series of bulges!) of red, purple and yellowy-orange running through it.

I'm seriously contemplating using this scarf as a Confic prop. Consider:


Hysteria: "But Hysteria made her kawaii little Chaos-poppa a kawaii little scarf-chan made with love and intestinal fortitude. Emphasis on the intestines!"

Chaos: -.-;; "Uh, Hysteria? Just whose intestines are those?"

Desolation: [grabbing the scarf] "Give me thoooooose! I've been looking for these for weeks!"


But beyond that, there's the usual smegheadery of Head Office and the rather peculiar "I'm-not-to-sure-what-to-make-of-it-smegery" of one of the newer seasonal employees at the kiosk. Now I'll be honest: the lady in question is very nice, and works hard and is very good at selling things. However...she works almost 2 seconds behind everyone else. No, really. In any conversation, if I were to say something to her, there would be roughly a 2-3 second pause, wherein you could almost see the gears in her head creaking along to form a response.

And then there's the common sense. And lack thereof.

Like earlier this week, when she asked about American currency. Now while our computers do give the option of people paying in US dollars, Head Office has decreed that unless otherwise noted all stores cannot accept American currency. Which is fine and dandy for the most part. US bills, I can understand, since the exchange rate shifts a lot.

Enter our employee, who asks when Mel arrives for her shift, "Do we accept American currency? I wasn't sure, so I didn't put this in the cash till" and promptly hands her a US penny. Apparently, this lone US penny had gotten mixed up with the rest of the customer's Canadian change. And our employee, genuinely concerned, was unsure if we could accept even a penny if it was American.

Before this employee, I had yet to meet anyone who even cared if an American quarter, let alone a penny, co-mingled with its Canadian counterparts. I myself believed it was common sense that, if the customer didn't care about Canadian/American coins, neither should we, and the two can naturally be interchangeable. Bills are, of course, the exception.

But pennies? Which does beg the question: how do you shoot down the offered penny?

"I'm sorry, Ma'am, but we don't accept American currency of any kind at this location. There is a bank in the mall, however, so if you want, just head over there and get this converted into a Canadian penny. I hear the exchange rate on pennies is very good right now."

I don't think even a Customer Appreciate Pancake Maker would be able to hold back the frothing mad masses.

In other news, I see winter has finally decided to put in an apperance, though the weather itself is still being mildly schizophrenic. (Sun today, with yesterday being overtaken by grey unpleasantness and enough sleet to make every intersection a potential crash site.) And Tachi the bunny managed to eat her way through her water bottle. Don't ask me how, but she found a way.


Today's Lesson: when your sock inexplicably gets cold & wet, and there's no visible hole in your shoe, it's still time to get a new pair of shoes.
posted by Phillip at 8:38 PM