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!

 


In an astounding turn of events, Head Office has defied the odds and perhaps the workings of the entire universe as we know it, and happily surprised me with an act of charity and/or competence. And while it may sound rather selfish when you get right down to it, I can’t say I’m asking questions.

Suffice to say, the latest paycheck had with it a sizable bonus. Now there’s only one thing I can even think of that would warrant a bonus, but as far as I had been aware, Head Office had screwed me over on that possibility at the end of last year. Even if we don’t make our monthly budgets (which garner added bonuses themselves…and I haven’t seen one of those for at least a year…stupid local, economic slowdown), so long as we make productivity, there’s a year-end bonus the managers receive. Productivity for us essentially means: so long as we keep the total hours worked by our employees each week minimized to reflect slow sales, we make productivity and everything inevitably balances out.

However, for the last 4 months of ’07, Head Office spiked our budgets. By, oh, a few thousand dollars each week. And by “few”, I mean to say: at least $4000 on top of what we should have made last year. Emphasis on “should.” Sales were slow the year prior, which means if our store was originally slated to make a respective $12,000 one week, we ended up only making $8-9000 instead.

And thusly, instead of adjusting this past Commercialmas’ budgets to reflect last year’s sales, Head Office increased last year’s originally projections. So if last year we were hoped to make twelve grand, and we only cleared eight grand…this time around, Head Office figured that despite the downward sales trend all of 2007 saw, we’d pull miracles out of our asses and clear at least eighteen grand.

(Last I checked, only one thing comes out of my ass, and it is distinctly not a miracle…unless you’re going with a rather glorious yet disturbing example of humanity’s evolution over the last few millions of years.)

The short and bloody of it was: no matter how much I could have streamlined my store’s hours, there was no chance in hell of reaching our productivity goals. Not unless I had one person on shift all the time, and closed the store at least one day a week. (Which, come to think of it, might not have been a bad idea. I’d love to leave a sign on our doors one day that reads: ‘Had enough of you lot, am buggering off for the rest of the day.’)

All of this brings us back to the original paragraph or two in today’s bit o’ nowhere. I’m pretty damned sure that the bonus I received was the productivity bonus. The one Head Office screwed us over on, the one I knew based on that I’d never see. But apparently, it manifested itself in my paycheck.

I’m not about to question or complain in the slightest. Fact is, this is incredibly providential. Since Mel & I were gone for a number of days in Connecticut, my pay was going to be horribly slashed. The bonus not only boosted my pay right back to where it would have been had I worked my usual 5 days a week, but it also padded my wallet with some extra money. All of which immediately left my wallet as I paid off a series of not-quite-yet-outstanding bills, allowing me to breathe a little easier over the next few months. (Hey, Anime North is only 3 months away…)

Although…my curiosity has admittedly been piqued abut Head Office’s sudden change of heart. Did the Ghosts of Dumbasses Past, Present & Future visit them? Have they been abducted by aliens and replaced by zombies (who, despite being undead, might actually possess more brainpower than their living counterparts)?

These questions may never be answered, except for the last one if a memo ever surfaces asking us to donate one employee’s brain to Head Office for an upcoming luncheon.



Aaaaaand, on an utterly unrelated note, are Canadians so fucking desperate to spend money that on Family Day they’ll drive down in hordes to the US to shop? Are they so desperate to shop that they’ll go through agonizing withdrawal if they have even one day where they are denied even the choice to go out shopping? Can’t they just order online or shop on Ebay like normal people? Do we have to nail their feet to the floorboards just to make them reconsider their consumerist ways?!



(this rant has been brought to you by a 2 hour wait at the Canadian border to go back into Canada on the newly christened statutory holiday, Family Day. A day where you’re supposed to relax at home with your family instead of swarming the US malls and making normal travelers like us wait an extra two friggin’ hours to get home.)


Also, after 2 solid days of doing nothing but pine for me, Sammy the Wonder Schnoodle finally stopped sulking long enough to eat a pretzel. (I kid you not, Mel’s family told us that after we left, Sammy pouted over my absence for days and refused to leave his doggy bed. I feel flattered & lurved, but am still glad he’s not here to violate my arms again.)


Also, also: I despise customers. Specifically the ones who look at the “90% off” signs above our 4 winterwear bunks, and proceed to destroy the nice, neat rows of winterwear. It takes us half an hour to clean all the bunks, and less than 2 minutes for a single family to turn the displays into something that resembles the bastard love child between a tornado, an explosion and the Batman & Robin movie.

Oh, you whimsically untidy customers? Is it true you’ll be struck down by some cosmic force if you don’t mess up our bunks? Is it really that you’re genetically hardwired to not even remotely try to put things back where you found them? Does it actually turn you on to fling dozens of our hats & scarves across the bunks and not care about where they land?

And perhaps most importantly of all, can I claim temporary insanity after I bash you in the head with a stapler after seeing you do that…and then mail your brains to Head Office for the luncheon meeting, as per yesterday’s memo requested?

Labels: moneys (I had them), Wonder Schnoodle powers activate, zombies ate my mystery shopper

posted by Phillip at 5:14 AM

 


it's a shady blog! the small, white, fuzzy shi-tzu has commandeered her master's account and is posting her memoirs of her first international vacation. today: master's blog. tomorrow: the world! (but first, i crave mushrooms!)

the first thing i learned about being an international puppy: you spend a lot of time waiting for the car to stop moving. therefore, sleep is good. especially when it's on master's coat. i've never been on a car trip this long before, so whenever they let me out for a break, i got so excited i forgot to pee.

i also has ninja stealth skills. going past the u.s. border? they didn't even notice me, even when i was sitting on my master's lap and staring out at the other cars. going back into canada? i was sprawled out in the back. they never even asked about me. i rule! now all i need to do is learn the jedi mind trick and then i'll get snausage treats every hour on the hour.

the united states? it has a lot of yippy puppies in it. mel's family loved me (as usual, and as rightly they should) and snuggled me and rubbed my tummy. but the small, black, fuzzy schnoodle of theirs has way too much energy. he's always running around. and jumping at me, wanting to play. and pulling on my ears. and humping master.

sammy does that.

a lot. and only to master.

i think mel's family has a gay schnoodle.

but i can't exactly complain, since whenever sammy humps master, it means he's not annoying me. why couldn't he have been a cat? i like kitties. my best friend and super-best playmate is a kitty.

and now i want snausages. i must practice on master.

"you want to give the puppy snausage treats..."

Labels: attack of the shady blog

posted by Phillip at 9:01 PM

 

Good morning...or afternoon or evening or night or 3pm tea-time, depending on. It's been a surprisingly balmy time down here in Connecticut, which leads me to believe that once we arrive back home all snow-laiden hell will break loose. (As a sidenote: contrary to popular belief, it does freeze in hell, much like Dante's version. But instead of eating history's most notorious traitors, the devil just chases random people around with a souped-up zamboni machine.)

There are many, many glorious things I could talk about. The love of family. Shady impressing everyone with her "pretend I'm as limp as a ragdoll so you can love me & rub my tummy" antics. Also Shady showing off her ninja stealth skills by being in plain open sight of the US border guard...and the guard apparently not even noticing her or commenting/asking for her vaccination papers, since he waved us through 30 seconds after we pulled up to his station.

But wait, there's more. Unexpected bookstore sales. Mel's sister hardlining most of the entire first season of Veronica Mars (along with the rest of us, since there's really only 1 TV in the house, not that I'm complaining).

But if I were to talk about anything that you readers would find truly interesting (read: amusing since it involves my abject humiliation), it would probably have to be Sammy the gay Wonder Schnoodle. And by gay, I mean "gay only for me, apparently" since I'm the only person, period, that he feels inclined to...er, assert dominance over. Which wouldn't necessarily be such a problem if he didn't try humping every single limb I have...or my hips...or my torso...basically, I'm terrified to go onto the carpet for fear of what part of my body will be asserted upon next.

He is a very sweet schnoodle--rather energetic, and with a peculiar little grey goatee on his otherwise entirely black fuzzy body. He also has two modes of transporting himself: prancing fabulously, and quite literally bouncing like Pepe le Pew in pursuit of a hapless lady-cat. (Shady is still attempting to adjust to him, and so long as he doesn't pounce on her in an attempt to get her to play, she likes him just fine.)

But still, so far every dog in Mel's family that I've encountered has tried to assert their dominance on me. What the hell am I, an uke?!

Wait...don't answer that.

Labels: Connecticut 08, we heart Sammy the Gay Wonder Schnoodle

posted by Phillip at 7:39 AM

 


In a few days, Mel & I will be heading down to the great snowy not-quite-as-north -as-Canada. Wherein there will be family gatherings, belated Christmas gift exchanges and more than likely a visit to the local teppanyaki place. And we also get to see: a) how easy it is to have Shady cross the border with us (with her tags & papers included, natch), and; b) how Shady handles Mel's family's schnoodle, Sammy.

I myself am intrigued, since Sammy is about the same small size as Shady, and there's another schnoodle in the neighborhood (named Bear, which makes the name all the more adorable on such a small dog) who really gets along with her. Then again, Bear is even more docile than Shady, whereas Sammy...er, I suspect Shady will spend a great deal of time curled up on my lap for protection from that black, furry, yippy thing.

Ideally that'll be the most stressful thing we get to endure down in Connecticut. If anything for the sole reason that work has been giving me one too many damned heart attacks this last week. It all began with the regional auditor paying a surprise visit to our store. Now all my paperwork is always in order, and the auditor himself is a really nice guy, so I had no panic flooding my system as I saw him stroll in.

The panic hit as I innocently asked, "So what brings you here today?" and he gave me a confused look, as if the answer should have been obvious. It wasn't. Turns out that our store was due for its annual inventory...less than 2 weeks from that day. Way to go Head Office for letting us know this. (To his credit, the auditor had the presence of mind and stopped by in the first place to ensure everything was in order and moving along smoothly for the inventory. Good thing he did, too.)

Now the news of the impending inventory didn't fill me with dread. I'd have needed to pull a few extra hours of work (and huzzah for more cash!), but it would have been manageable. The date of the inventory is what nearly scared the piss out of me. It's not good when you're the manager, and you're being told the inventory a manager is required to be there for, is happening on the Friday you should already be 2 days deep into CT.

Conversely, if both Mel & I suddenly cancelled our trip down, at best we'd be disowned and at worst you'd be identifying our found-frozen-in-a-ditch corpses. The last time we were down to CT was almost a year ago, and we haven't seen her family as it is for nearly 6 months. Even if I bowed out and Mel went down solo, the odds are even if I wasn't killed during her "Mel-chan Smash!" rage, I'd probably get an arm ripped off somewhere along the way. Sure I'd have the pleasure of seeing Mel use said severed arm to beat someone to death at Head Office, but I still need that arm for other things.

So yeah...panic. (And not a disco in sight.)

As it turned out, my District Manager hadn't received any heads-up on this, and was as surprised as I had been about her area being inventoried in the next few weeks. And to boot, I'd acquired her approval to take my CT trip well in advance, at least a full month prior. So our auditor sighed, shook his head at Head Office, and told me not to worry. It's tricky to reschedule for a full district, but a single store's no problem.

Now our inventory will be happening sometime around April or May, possibly earlier if an opening pops up. And now not only can we do the visitation, but by the time my store does get inventoried, all of our dreaded winterwear will be gone. You wouldn't believe how much of a pain in the ass it is to count a few hundred tiny pairs of mittens...and that's just one out of eight mitten boxes!

So, bullet #1 was dodged.

Bullet #2 arrived a day later, and on my day off, no less. This one is rather convoluted, so in keeping with the spirit of Thoreau, we'll simplify the whole debacle. It's mid-morning. A message from my store employee is left on the answering machine, asking if I could really, really, please call the store, it's that urgent. I call the store.

There's an employee from Waterloo Hydro at our store. She has a form/notice to hand to us. The form tells us that our store's account info needs to be changed, or in 5 days our hydro is shut off. The hydro employee adds that usually when she sees this form, it means the store or company is closing its doors. Permanently.

In short, there's a chance that I'd show up to work on Sunday and discover the doors were locked & a sign on those locked doors would tell us: "So long, thanks for all the fish, and you're all fucked, have a nice day! ^-^"

So yeah...panic. Again.

I page my District Manager. And, because the previous day the auditor mentioned my DM's pager might still be broken, I spend the next half hour calling all the stores in her area in an attempt to track her down, just in case my emergency page was sent into limbo.

One hour, many phone calls, and at least 5 pounds lost due to stress-induced sweating later, things are sorted out. The store will not be closing. The hydro company needs to revamp the account due to the Head Office filing for bankruptcy protection, and that will be taken care of by someone at Head Office.

The deadline has already passed. Our store is still there. And it has power too. ("Unfortunately," I am somewhat tempted to add.)

And with that, bullet #2 is dodged.

It may be either ironic or just plain ridiculous for me to say it, but I've been rather tempted as of late to channel Danny Glover from Lethal Weapon and mutter, "I'm getting too old for this shit." So if anyone needs me, I'll be over in the corner rolling a katamari ball. At least when I get fragged by the King of All Cosmos, he makes it a most fabulous fragging.



In other news, I've inadvertently come up with perhaps the greatest name for an alcoholic drink ever: Orgasmic Wookie. I think the amusement stems from just the visual one gets of walking up to the bar and saying in a loud voice, "Bartender! Give me two Orgasmic Wookies!"

Labels: inventory is when, orgasmic wookie, rumour control

posted by Phillip at 8:09 PM

 


January is dead and gone. And hopefully, it’ll stay dead for quite some time. The past month has been quite literally one ailment after another for me, all of them divided up amongst work, being a plague monkey and the general malaise this time of year sees. The final day proved to be no exception, as the month of January gave me two things to remember it by: a snowstorm and a flu & cold that knocked me flat on my ass.

It was one of those slow-to-sink-in colds too. I woke up with a headache, and before the afternoon was out my entire body ached like a 95 year-old’s. The ends of my hair even ached. And that boggles me. I didn’t even know hair could do that. Oh, and there was also the dry cough, severe exhaustion and digestive upheaval. (All of which is now currently getting its ass kicked by something far meaner and fouler: Buckley’s.)

But still…aching hair?!

January has officially gone from ‘downright vicious’ to ‘just plain WTF’ in its torment of me.

At this point, I’m really hoping that such a thing as karma exists, because I must certainly have gotten all the crap of 2008 out of the way by now, and all that’s left for the remaining eleven months will be peace and quiet. And maybe a winning lottery ticket. (Note to self: next time you plan on winning the lottery, buy a ticket first. It helps.)

In the meantime, today is being spend on all the backlog that’s piled up for the last week or so: lots of cleaning, dishes and Emails that should have gone out days ago if not for me trying to cough up a lung (and at one point, almost succeeding). It’s also not helping that, as I attempt to write all this, I’m having unusual trouble locating all the necessary keys. And therein lies the problem I face: my laptop, Mel’s computer (used for Emails) and my store computer all have different-sized keyboards. As a result, if I’ve been using one keyboard rather predominantly, switching to a smaller one is nothing short of aggravating.

Was that a ‘v’ you were trying for? Looks like you ended up with an ‘f’ instead. Too bad, but do try again, and perhaps this time you’ll be able to hit the space bar instead of the ‘m’ button.

And all of this pales in comparison to the chagrin I feel for having called Portal’s GladOS the rather erroneous GlenOS. Um…maybe GlenOS is GladOS’ crossdressing twin brother? Oooh, I smell a fanfic there!

Labels: GladOS not GlenOS, the evil that was January 08

posted by Phillip at 9:38 PM