My Record of Work: The Annoying, the Interesting, and the Just Plain Weird--The Year 2000.

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JULY!


7/31/00

My friend Meghan has a daughter named Katelyn who turned 2 recently. I had promised to get her a present when I got my paycheck, and I was on my way to the back room when I passed the long "junk" table, partly full of toys, at the back of our store. I saw a toy and just as "That would be perfect for . . ." crystallized in my mind, a guy right next to me yelled, "KATELYN!" I was a little startled by that until I heard a little girl answering the guy and realized he was just calling someone else, and it was a weird coincidence. Strange.


7/30/00

Today I got some shipments of books and had to call the people to tell them their books were in. I asked for one woman and she got on the phone. I told her, "A book you ordered from us has come in . . ." and she sounded very confused, complaining that she didn't remember ordering any book from us. She asked who we were again and I told her which store we were, and then she was like "I ordered a book???" I told her that I had a record of her ordering a book and gave her the date, and then almost choked when I gave her the title: Improving Your Memory.


7/28/00

An older gentleman came up and asked me if it would be possible to get his 10% discount even if he didn't have his card, like if we had a way to look him up as a member or anything. I told him I thought we could do that (I don't work cashier, never have, and so I didn't know), and then he started telling me why he forgot his card. "Usually when I go to the bookstore, I ask my wife if I can borrow her card, but she just DIED on Friday so I can't do that anymore." What do you say to that?

Also, a guy amused me today by saying he'd already read the book he was looking to buy today but was annoyed with the library's policy that you actually had to RETURN the book. ::snicker::


7/27/00

On South Park there is an offensively portrayed character named Timmy who uses a wheelchair, and only says his own name in sort of a garbled fashion. Since the character of Timmy was invented, I've been hearing people imitating him in public places somewhat often; you'll just hear someone yell "TIMMEHHHHH!!!" for no reason. Well, I was on the phone about to contact a customer to tell her that her book was in, and I heard some kid yell "TIMMEHHHHH!!!" behind me. I turned to look, and . . . it was a kid in a wheelchair. I almost peed myself, failing to realize that it was probably a non-disabled child who'd hijacked the store's wheelchair, but in the moment I thought it was a real wheelchair user making that "joke." And then the lady I was calling on the phone *answered*. . . .


7/26/00

My friend Joe surprised me today by coming up behind me and asking rather loudly if our store had a pornography section.


7/19/00

Some guy for whom I was looking up a book asked me, in a "can I be honest with you?" kind of tone, whether he could tell me something. I said he could, and then he said, "You are just unbearably cute." Thanks so much.


7/18/00

An older man was shuffling across the store while I was on some errand. I could tell he wanted to stop me to ask me a question so I stopped and looked at him, and he came toward me, slowly. He looked sort of pissed off, and I got worried when I saw how he was looking at me, like he wanted to complain. I'm like, "Can I help you?" and he goes, "I need to tell you something." He got really close to me and put his finger in my face, pointing at me like he was instructing me on something, and said, very firmly and grouchily, "Don't . . . you . . . EVER . . . cut that purdy hair of yours." I nodded and said I wouldn't, and he made me promise.


7/17/00

Today a guy called to ask me if I could hold a newspaper for him. He spoke in a very professional, deep voice, and when I told him we still had copies of the newspaper he wanted and could hold it, the reply was the most high-pitched little "YAY!!!" I've ever heard in my life.

I also got a dude who asked me if I had anything with "that one comedian." I asked him if he was looking for a biography of a comedian or if he was just looking for something funny by a comedian. His reply was, "NO, I don't want a biography!" so I took him to the humor section and pointed out the comical books written by stand-up comedians. He said, "Oh, no, no, that's not what I want, I want videos!" I kind of stared at him blankly for a second and said, "Videos?" He was like, "Yeah, videos, don't you have any with that one guy?" I told him we didn't really carry videos because we were a bookstore (our only real videos are kids' stuff and a few bargain videos in a bin), and he asked if I could order him one. I told him we really only order books and audio books, at which point he asked if I had the phone number for Blockbuster.


7/13/00

This was my first day of work. I was being trained today and the guy who was training me talks a little louder than I think he realizes. We were talking about computers and he said really loudly, "I don't know DICK about computers" while a customer was walking by. It was funny.


On to August!


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