Back in B(la)C(k)

So I am back, in the original home...

I'm Edmonton sick already, I'm so pathetic... Oh well, can't say i dont have my reasons, living around such wonderful people all day every day really lifts the spirits (even though the time from Seussical to the end of finals was complete and utter hell)...

I look forward to going back, but I hope that I can enjoy myself here as much as I can...

I spent most of the day at home sleeping, a passtime, I must say, I have thoroughly missed. I was told I had to be extra nice to my family... They weren't too happy that i forgot to call them on their birthdays... not that I actually forgot, I just... I dunno... I can honestly say that I have no emotional attatchment to them. So calling them wasn't high on my to-do list.

Oh well, woah is me...

Staying up all night packing appears to have been a bad idea... Completely destroyed and reseblence to a sleeping habit that I may have had... Lol... Sleep is for the weak...

I'm so weak...

It also messed up my appetite... I have barely eaten since I got home. As not to put a cap on my own stupidity, I have recently consumed quite possibly the worst "I haven't eaten in 24 hours" food ever... I kid you not, I drank a near litre of egg nog...

Ick...

Oh, well... I look forward to church tomorrow! Its going to be fun, im also going for dinner at Jenns house tomorrow evening... Then I set myself into schedual to start work at petro can on monday! Its gonna be hella fun!

Gnight all

Returning

Well, now that this symester of schooling is (almost) done, and I will soon be making a few quick trips to cowboys before I go, I figure I should get abck into my old style of thinking for my return to Petro Can for the winter break...

I figure that I would complain (generically, of course) about my HS kids again...

Seriously, dumb as posts...

The RA's felt it would be nice for us to treat them out to a dinner, one that isn't cafeteria food. Now, I for one, would feel greatly honoured that someone would take time out of their busy shedual (we are in exams right now, and all the RA's are full time students) in order to provide some time away from campus and a decent meal...

But I kid you not, I heard so many complaints about how boring it was and how much the food sucked (it wasn't bad, honest)...

I wanted to yell... something along the lines of "I am not your entertainment, I am mearly here to ensure that you do not choke on your own toungues whilst you are away from the parents... whom obviously don't love you enough to let you go to a local school"

But I didn't... perhaps I'm getting soft in my old age... I'll be 21 soon enough... *sigh*

Oh well.. Time for sleep, I need to study in the morning...

Night all

Ending

So, I think these last two weeks have been the most wretched of my life..

If I never have to do anothe report on polyester, I will die a appy man...

Im tired and cold, and the heater is still making crap loads of noise, but I survived...

Biochem is going to be a walk in the park...

Gnight all

So Very Very Cold

So I have come to the conclusion that Concordia gives shit about you opnce you've given them their money...

Point and case:

I live in a dormatory which happens to be in one of the coldest provinces in Canada...

As such, i have a generic full-wall heater thingy that, for all intents and purposes, does not work... Rarely have I seen it giving off anything that resembles heat, but since it hasn't very cold as of late, this was no problem...

Or so I thought...

This last weekend we had the joy of breaking the -20C barrier... No super cold, but cold enough that even with double pane glass, a little bit of additional heat would be nice...

And wouldn't you know it, the heater turns on (aww how nice)

Anyone who knows me, knows I wouldn't go without complaining, so here goes!

The fucking thing is as loud as hell

I kid you not, I can barely listen to music overtop of it... Its so horrible... It pings and rattles like you wouldn't believe...

It's to the point where I can't sleep at night, and its constant so its hard to sleep during the day too...

And I inform the necissary people of my plight... "we'll get around to it eventually" is all I get half-offered...

Where is my $5000 going? It certainly isnt into service, I mean it took me two weeks for them to replace my light tube when it burned out... And by "them" I mean, I found the room where they hide the lightyubes and changed it myself...

Ugh...

Okay, im done for the day...

(Damn you concordia, damn you!)

Welcome to December!

So... Needless to say, I have survived... By the skin of my teeth, and a little worse for wear...

Im certain I'm going to fail Chem 321... Ive come to terms with this... needless to say, im in no hurry to finish the paper... Meh... I made a valiant effort (lol, the lies I tell myself)

Umm...

Things are going good, this weekend was hectic with all the concerts and all... They went really well...

I'm looking forward to going back to work at petro can for a few weeks... i know its sad, eh?

Umm...

Yeah, thats pretty much everything...

Oh, and just so everyone knows, and so noone worries, I've decreased my smoking severly, almost to the point of social smoker...

Umm...

yeah...

Oh... and worked this weekend... if I really want to call it work that is... I was asleep or at concerts for most of it, lol... Stupid kids, I hope one of them caught pnemonia and died..

Well... not really...

but it might be funny..

One of my friends turned 18 today... Mwahahah

We're going to the bar tonight... he was all like "I don't want to get to drunk"

1) today is the last day of classes
2) It is his 18th birthday today
3)Exams are do not start until Thursday

This boy will be lucky if he can walk to his exam on saturday ;)

I'm so horrible...

What kind of example am I...

lol

example

me?

November Ends, blahs continue

So, Im lying in bed this morning, thinking "Whats the easiest way to piss myself off"... Well, not really, but I was thinking... And thats the part that annoys me, I can't turn off my brain, and its driving me nuts...

"you're so stupid" it yells me...

"why didn't you do this sooner" another voice pipes in...

"guys, back off and leave him alone, it's my turn to torment him" shouts a third...

If I wasn't so certain that these voices are caused by stress and sleep deprivation, I would be certain I was developing some severe schizo tendencies...

But alas, I have no one to blame but myself for this awful predicament I am in... Since when did I become this lazy... And I mean really, Ive reached new levels of laziness that are beyond comparison to any level of laziness I have ever achieved in my lazy past...

Really, I'm putting vegtables in hospital beds to shame, at least they have to struggle to breath (perhaps the ones on repirators are lazier to me, but I'm thinking it takes a lack of laziness in order to learn how to talk through blinking...)

So as it sits now, if I refrain from sleeping for the next three weeks, I will be able to pass all my classes... It wouldn't be the first time, trust me...

But I've reached a point where it doesn't really matter, cuz insofar as sleeping goes, I prefer it over essay writing any day of the week...

Perhaps my professors will understand my plight?

lol

I kid myself...

Im beginning to think that professors are heartless beasts...

I recieved a lecture from one of my profs when I prayed for focus... Perhaps hes on to me...

Usually professors don't realise I haven't a clue until after they grade my papers...

At least I wont be accused of being a female-hater this time around...

Swear to god, if my Chem teacher tells me I hate polyester im gonna smack him upside the head... Im so fed up with the polyester paper that its not even funny... I can regurgitate all the information necissary to complete it... polyester is the result of esterfication of dimethyl terephthalate with ethylene glycol at 240C to give bis-(2-hydroxyethyl)terephthalate and methanol, followed by an increase in temperature to 270C causing polymerization via self esterfication resulting in poly(ethylene terephthalate) and ethylene glycol... Throw in a few diagrams, the uses for polyester, the manufacturing companies and the amounts the produce and voila, a ten apge paper... Problem? I don't have valid reference material...

9/10 pages I've found have a littl tagline at the bottom stating "such and such is not responsible for any inacurate information found on this site"

Whens the last time you read a textbook that said "by the way, anything you read in this book may not be true, but hey, you can't sue us! mwahahahah"

It doesn't happen...

Needless to say, Im contemplating just using the retarded references simply for the ability to have the paper done...

Ugh, I hate this so much...

Oh and everyone else around is stressing out...

Well, minus a few friends...

Speaking of which, I'm getting quite happy with the calibre of friends I'm managing to pull off... If only they knew how horrible of a person I really am :)

In all seriousness, I think I'm gaining my new friends at the expense of my old ones... Not that this is a concious choice, but the new friends are around a lot more... By that I mean, we have more social connections that lead us to hang out more... And Im beginning to think that because the new friends are so accessable, the old ones are hitting the back burner...

Oh well, not a whole lot I can do about that right now, unless one of them would like to complete this fricken polyester report for me...

It would be big points on the Neal favouritism scale...

*sigh*

I'm not really sure what else there is to say...

Oh, about my recently aquired addiction...

I love it so much... I'm not sure if its the nicotine or the deprivation of oxygen caused by inhaling carbon monoxide/dioxide, but the feeling after a cigarette is amazing... Health risks aside, I think smoking is right up there with body modifications...

Oh!

Good news, my Petro Can boss called me, and asked if I wanted to work over winter break!

Saweet!

I hope I get lots of stat days!

Not to mention, I should have lots f great stories for over the break...

Anyways, I should really be getting to bed, its oh so very late... gnight!

So

Setting things straight is ending up being a lot more fun than I thought it would!

Yay!!

On the plus side, Ive started smoking...

I suppose thats not really a plus... I hate smoking... I really do... But it's oh so good...

Hopefully this is something I can forget about really soon, but for now I need to find a way to get me a pack of my own... I need to stop mooching...

*Sigh*

November

/sappy rant on

Well, it's been a long time comming...

To say that novembers suck would be an understatement... Pretty much everything I do focuses around my inability to do anything productive.

November Blahs; my archenemy... well actually, my figurative archenemy, as I have to many literal ones...

I think I am less pleasant to be around in November, as I am finding myself complaining more... I know what youre all saying- "he has a higher level of complaining?"

I kid you not, I'm even noticing how much I'm over complaining... Even this post is a complaint... Oh woe is me!

I suppose things should get better now, I mean all I have left to do is a couple of papers, a few exams, a crapload of concerts, and aid a friend with her capstone...

Not to mention maintaining the social aquaintances I have made in the last few weeks... I'm trying to ween myself off of the computer as much as I can... It's not going as well as I would have hoped, but I'm doing better... Mayhaps that had more to do with Seussical (a musical about seuss, for those not in the know)... I was the antagonist... mwahaha... typecasting I know, but I digress...

I look forward to going home, not so much the going home part now-- I feel quite indifferent about my returning back to Vancouver for the time being... don't get me wrong, I look forward to all y friends and stuff... heck I'm even looking forward a bit to working at petro can... how sad is that-- but I am looking forward to being able to look back on these last three months with some perspective...

Without getting into to much detail, I've really screwed somethings up... Other things have turned out a million times better than I ever could have hoped... I just wish I hadn't hurt so many people in the process...

They don't seem to hate me, thats for sure, perhaps they're enacting revenge in some sadistic way I dont understand... That would certainly explain why the cafeteria food was so awful this weekend... Or perhaps some miniature voodoo neal doll would explain why ears, knees, nostrils, hands and thumbnails were so easy to bleed this last weekend...

Regardless, I wish I could say I am simply going to wave my hand and everything will revert back to the way it was-- heck, take me back to last december, and let me try it all over again...

But then again, I did say that i like the way some things have turned out, and it would be selfish to revert everything...

Meh!

Okay, so this is it.... Everyone who is reading this, this is the point at which I change... When I look back at my year during that 'sit and ponder' part of New years, I will reflect back to this point as the time when I started to become the person I wanted to be...

No longer will I sit idley by and accept the person dictated for to me... I'm gonna make certain things right; be honest and truthful...

If thats what it's gonna take... hoo-wee Im gonna do it...

/sappy rant off

Gahk!

Just a quick post before I head off to bed...

Tonight, I was not on duty, thank God! But someone had to be, so the other guy-- whom I have become quite good friends with-- stopped by my room on his patrol of the halls when room curfew went into effect...

They gave him the roughest time, and I felt quite bad... (although I felt like cheering when he lost his temper and told one of the little shits to 'stfu')

Needless to say, after 40 minutes of yelling at the 'tards to go to their room, he finally burns out and heads off to bed...

He hadn't been gone from my room for 40 seconds when someone knocked on my door and asked 'can you let me outsside so I can have a cigarette?'

'OMG! NO!'

'Why?'

'Cuz you gave the other RA a really hard time, and I'm not out to be doing any of you favours!'

'That wasn't me!'

'Get out of my room!'


I wanted to punch him, as he walked back to his room I yelled a reminder that he is to have all of his smokes before curfew, and that i would not be making and exceptions from now on...

Although I'm quite certain that he was one of the people making the other RA's life miserable, I hope that f he wasn't, he beats the shit out of one of the that was...

Sigh

gnight

Discontent

To say that I am discontent would be an understatement...

I have achieved the level of November Blahs unlike any man has ever reached before... I wish I could go back to when life was simpler, unfortunately, I am well aware that no one with a 5th grade education gets very far in life... Wait a second, thats not true!

Every person I deal with in my daily life has a 5th grade education.. well maybe there is a genius or two who skipped grade 5, but everyone has indeed taken it... Perhaps there is hope afterall!!!

But before I drop out, and become the Edmonton Mole Person ( http://www.straightdope.com/columns/040109.html ) I figure I should explain...

I said yes to a musical... no problem, except I forgot how much time they take up... I didnt learn my lesson the last three times... Woe is me, eh?

Needless to say, by the time I'm done rehersals, the chances of me wanting to start right away on homework are slim to none... But I continue on... Blah!

But when I come back to my room, I am forced to deal with the imbiciles we call high school students... Those that i am lord and master over are dumb as tree stumps...

They keep trying to show me the hypocracy of making them go to their rooms while i continue my showering and TV watching... And I keep reminding them that I have their signature on a form that says they will abide by all rules set forth by concordia, and one of those rules is the 11pm room curfew... I also need to remind them that as a university student, I am not required to sign such a document and am free to spend my time doing whatever I please...

I have had to keep repeating this so many times... and not to everyone... to the same 5 people... Jeez, get it in your heads you retards! I am not going to change my opinion, and all youre doing is making me like you less, so that when you ask me to do something I would otherwise have let you do, I will tell you no... and I will do it with a smile on my face...

Oh, and they got their interm report cards back last friday... So there were quite a few upset parents, needless to say... (dumb as stumps, I kid you not)...

One of the kids was questioned about his grades were so low and why he was almost always late or absent from his first classes in the morning... He blamed me... Apparently I keep him up late with my wild parties and excessive noise... I don't even like the little fucker, I want to beat the shit out of him (and there are two things stopping me 1)I'd lose my job and 2)Beating him is a dream, and should I succeed in doing it, and I don't enjoy it as much as I hope, then one of my dreams would be a failure)... Sorry, back to my tale...

So the kid blames me (apparently telling him to go to his own room keeps him up at night)... Once more, the kid tells his mom a specific tale in which I kept him up 'till 4am drinking pop, listening to music and eating pizza... (I had a brief meeting with my boss because the mom thought it was horrible that someone hired to ensure that her son was getting the best of his education would be keeping him up at night)

Bgwah???

I seem to remember the tale a little bit differently than he told his mother (not that I blame him entirely, I've dealt with his mom, she's such a cow)

I was out studying (yes, occasionally I study, don't act shocked everyone)... During my study period, I ordered pizza... We have a great little pizza place that has really decent pizzas 2 for 1... So I bought, and ate to my hearts content... I, by myself, could not finish two whole pizzas, so I carried them home in order to place in the fridge for later consumption... Approximate time 2:30am

Upon entering the hallway towards my room, I saw a light from an open door... Inside the room were several of the guys from high school, three were studying, one was working on art (he paints and draws and stuff) and one was chatting to the others (bet you can't guess which one is the focus of our story... heres a hint, it wasn't the studiers or the painter)...

Figuring they were already up, being relatively respectful in regards to quietness, and I was not on duty, I offered them the remainder of my pizza, offered a few cans of pop which i have stored in my room, and then went to bed...

What a bad bad man I am, eh? Keeping her satan child out till al hours of the night with my drinking and my promiscuity... Oh the humanity...

I hope things start getting better really soon... Boss has said that the kid will be suspended if he gives us lip... So I'm down with that, now all I need to do is find a way to get around the can't touch status that some of the kids have...

They're the preferred children to Boss... And because he hangs out with them, they have been manipulating him, and often get off with wrist slaps when they should be getting suspensions and stuff... Worse yet, they're playing me and Boss like two divorced parents... Except I'm the bad parent that never lets them get away with shit, and so I always find out later that Boss said it was okay...

Im sick of dealing with this...

Ugh...

Whoowee, how am I going to get to sleep tonight?

RA:TTM

Hello Faithful readers..

Well, I'm back! Sort of... I'm not working at petro can for the time being, but I plan on returning next summer...

I was bored and a figured I should update this, since its been so very very long...

Just so everyone knows, due to the nature of my current job (I am a RA:TTM! -- Residence Assitant: To The Max!!!) I am not able to complain about things in public... Or at least thats how I read into it.

I had to sign a confidentiality agreement that pretty much states that my job (well, the parts of it that would be worth putting on this blog) are not to be shared. I like my job (most days) so I will not go beyond my legal agreement and talk about the indivuals I associate with as per my paycheck.

That being said, I am allowed to gripe, so long as my gripage is generalized or about non-dorm stuff... I can also share all the cool stuff that i get to do...

So I have a month and a bit now to reflect upon... I shall try my best to remember certain things, but no gurantees... I'm not so good at the remembering thing...



Initially we were attempting to be Nazi's in dorm. We have high school students which share accomodations at our university... They are considered wards of the school, and in many ways we are allowed to act as their guardian. But, they have rules that they are to follow. They have a manditory study time from 7pm-9pm mon-thur. They have building curfews (10pm sun-thur 12pm fri-sat) and room curfews (11pm mon-thur).

Like I said, in the beginning, we were nazis. These rules were the be all and end all in the concordia universe.

But we slowly started to let them slide. So long as they were respectful. They wanted to make a phone call at 2am? they had to talk quietly... They wanted to study as a group for an exam until 3am? They had to keep the door shut... Needed to go out for a smoke? We wouldnt set the outside alarms until 11pm so that you could until room curfew..

Above all else, they needed to make sure that the girls dorm was not aware that there was a double standard in the way the dorms were operated (the girls have been successful in their attempts to Nazisize their dorm)...

Last Tuesday the male RA's (myself included) were informed that the guys were abusing their privilages... They were going out for 'smokes' and actually walking over to girls dorm to flaunt their freedom... They were telling the girls that they were allowed to stay up late and hang out... They were glaoting about how easy it was to avoid studying during study hours...

No more...

We have since resumed prison status in our dorm

It was an initial shock when the guys tryed to get back to dorm at 10:05 and the doors were all locked... They were banging on it trying to figure out what was wrong (the high school kids are not given outside door keys in order to prevent them from being able to sneak in)..

I dunno how long this will last... It should be loads of fun though... So much moe work for me...

Horrible People

So, after many years of debating what actions the most horrible person would do, I have another thing to add to the list...

See, there are the stereotypical things that a horrible person would do... Kill baby animals, steal from charities, wait in line and decide, once they get up to the counter, to start looking at possible items to purchase.

Yes, these are all horible things...

But if I may, might I add:

Spit chewing tobacco in various places underneath products at a convenience store...

I kid you not. I spent about 4 hours yesterday cleaning the store, and in four locations there was a big gooey gob of chewing tobacco... Beneath car oil, beneath ritz crackers, behind cereal, under garbage bags...

SO FUCKING GROSS!

I was gagging... it was so sick...

Oh, well... I need to go and pack...

Important Information!

No matter how many times I say it, noone ever learns, so I'll say it again

IF YOURE GOING TO HAVE AN ADDCITION, YOU NEED TO KNOW HOW IT WORKS BEFORE YOU COME UP TO THE COUNTER!

Okay, now that that is done, SPREAD THE NEWS! Refer this site and all of its stupidity to every person you know. I am serious. If you have ever worked in retail, I'm sure you have nodded at more that half of the things I've complained about. The sad fact remains that many of the people who have never worked in retail do not know that these behaviors are frowned upon. Not only are they ignorant of the frowning, but they continue to ruin the lives of every reatail person they come in contact with. If you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem.

Anyways, I got into a shounting match with a customer today. An actual shouting match, not just the regular voice raised 'You're Wrong!' thing, this was actual yelling...

She was such a stupid cunt (and believe me, I do not use that word very often... and even less often do I feel that anyone is deserving of such a degrading name...)

Her and her boyfriend pull up, and lift the nosal. No problem thus far, I do my intercom message. She comes in. Still no problem.

'Aren't you going to clear him to pump?' She demands!

'I haven't recieved any money yet, have I?' (I'll admit, I was in a bad mood last night to begin with)

'Well I'm standing here'

'I'm not starting the pump until I have recieved payment'

'FINE!!!' she slams $20 on the counter

'Do you want it all in gas' (I tried to be as polite as I could, cuz most of the time customers will just leave if theyre still the only one angry)

'NO I WANT FIVE FUCKING DOLLARS WORTH OF GAS!'

Glaring, I hand her back $15 and clear the boyfriend for $5. I do not say a word.

'Can I get a pack of Matinee Red King size as well?' (said in a snobby manner)

'We do not carry those' (we dont...)

'JUST GIVE ME THE GODDAM CIGARETTES!'

'I TOLD YOU MATINEE DOES NOT COME IN RED!'

'I BUY THEM HERE ALL THE TIME'

'WE DO NOT! CARRY MATINEE RED! THEY COME IN GREEN, WHITE, AND GOLD!'

'I WANT MATINEE RED'

'NUMBER 7 COMES IN RED, WE DO NOT HAVE MATINEE RED'

'I DONT WANT NUMBER 7, I WANT MATINEE RED!'

'WE DO NOT CARRY MATINEE RED!'

'WEL THEN WHAT HAVE I BEEN SMOKING FOR THE LAST 3 MONTHS!'

'IT WASN'T MATINEE RED, AND IT WASN'T FROM HERE!'

'I KNOW THEY WERE MATINEE RED, AND I BOUGHT THEM HERE'

Thats when I snapped... I just didn't care anymore...

She yelled and yelled, and I ignored her... She finally settled on a pack of dumaurier (oh my! Those are red!) and left... thank god



So this is my second to last night working at petro fo rthe summer......

I'll see about topics to continue my blog. Those of you who know me, know how good I am with finding things to complain about... We'll see in the near future.. I apologise if I am not able to update in the near future... The whole province to province move might make things a bit akward...

Guns and umm... Roses? nope.... more guns...

Im gonna make this a short one tonight, cuz I have better things to do...

Today was fun. Had a wigger parading through our store... not touching any of the merch', but still actin' all shady n' all (I'm trying to talk like a wigga in case ya din't notice)...

So I figure he's about to lift something, so I be watchin' him like a hawk, fo shizzle...

Then he spots something outside that he likes... or doesn't like, and starts to boot it out the door... He hadnt grabbed anything so I lost attention...

What happened next is what I am told by both my coworker and the many customers/bystanders who came rushing into the store.

As he was leaving the door, he pulled out a hand gun and began chasing another person (who was at one of the parking lot enterances--on foot) down the street.

A third person at one of the pumps, pulls out a gun and begins chasing after the chaser, screaming for him to put the gun down...

Of course we called the cops... ANd I gave slurpees to all the people who didnt feel comfortable going outside...

Why We Lock the Doors

So, as I'm sure you have guessed, we lock the doors for the graveyard shift... Or maybe I mentioned it before... I'll assume I havent mentioned it before, as I have no interest in going back and readin my 33 or so previous posts in order to see if I have mentioned locking doors... that would be pointless... If I have mentioned that we lock the doors, I apologise, for I will reiterate that we lock the doors. If I have not yet mentioned that we lock the doors I have a surprise for you...

The doors at my gas station lock, and we lock them during the graveyard shift.

Wow... I think i need to sleep, but I will continuenone the less, as it will probibly be a more inyteresting story when you factor in my sleep induced delusions!

Okay, on with the story... that was probibly the longest preamble in my literary history. I should write a note to myself to be more concise with these things...

I digress...

So this topic is going to be a splice of two customers I have had the joy of serving ove rthe last two days.

First we have a barlely coherent homeless person. Hmm... maybe homeless is a bit of an outdated term. I don't want to be accused of being discriminatory... I will call him a house-o-Phobe (kinda like homophobe except house, instead of milk)

So he comes in to pay for his cigarettes. In typical houseophobe fasion, paying entirely in nickes and shiny beads.

Now like most people paying with a lot of change, he announces his purchase (a pack of duMaurier Regular King Size... a bit rich for a person of his public stature, but who am I to judge) and starts counting the coin, that way he can get a bit of a head start in the counting of the coin in the time it takes me to retrieve his mechendise and return. And because he is guranteed the cigarettes are going to cost at least several dollars he does not really need to know the price of the cigarettes until he is sure he is approaching the value he expects them to be (for example, if he thinks theyre going to be about $8 as he approaches completion of his $7 pile, he will ask the value... this is usually the case for all polite coin counters).

Needless to say, he asks for the price.

"$8.95" I respond

"8.95!!!" he screams, still counting his change... He screams some more... then moves on to the obscenities... All the while still counting up to the 8.95 value.

He completes his piles, and assides from the continuing screaming would be the ideal customer. he makes no offensive movements (like he's going to pounce... mimicing some sort of tiger onto a wounded animal) nor does he direct his yelling towards me or any of the customers. And he stands over to the side while I count his change so my coworker can serve other customers.

He leaves the store. Still yelling about how high cigareete prices are.

he even pauses for a second in the middle of the parking lot, so that he can bend over and yell directly at the ground.

Now this isn't voice raised yelling...

No, this is 'I can hear him still through double paned glass from 40 feet away" yelling...

Eventually he turns the corner past our store, and I havent seen him since...





My second door locking story comes form a completely different kind of customer... This is the creep-eww-gross kind of customer that most people would turn their backs to in order to avoid their crackhead/nose-running-down-to-their-chin goodness. Anyways, I was moping the floor, and my cooworker was doing something behind the counter... I think he was making coffee... or baking... or maybe he was doing dishes... Who really knows... I dont, nor do I really care...

Anyways, there came a rap tap tapping on our chamber door (quoth the raven 'nevermore')

I'm so tired, I need to go to sleep as soon as Im done writing this...

As i was saying, someone knocked on our door... And my cowrker let them in.

So now I have two crackeheads running through our store (he had brought his pseudo-prostitute girlfriend with him it seems... I call her a pseudo-prostitue because from the looks of her, I doubt her ability to charge when so many attractive girls in Cloverdale are giving it away for free)

Anyways, she runs straight for the bathroom... Hopefully to take some sort of contraceptive... we dont need these things reproducing... and he runs straight for the slurpees (drink the mountain dew sir, apparently it decreases your sperm count... drink a lot of it... please)

wow... Im an ass when im tired...

okay okay, back to the story.

The guy fills up an extra large cup with grape slurpee... And then proceeds to walk straight out the door...

Now, you're probibly thinking "what kind of idiot drinks grape slurpee?"

Okay okay, I know... you are actually thinking "what kind of idiot walks past two employees out a door with merchandise in hand, only to sit on a bike and wait for a crack-whore girlfriend... but now that you mention it, who does drink grape slurpee?"

But boy, does it get better...

He gets outside with his newly stolen slurpee... grabs his bike... sits on it... gets off his bike, poors the slurpee on the ground (I wish i could say this was a waste... but is grape... eww grape...) and proceeds to perform an angry tap dance on the now emptied cup...

He also started yelling... Perhaps he realised the err of his ways, and then thought to himself 'they probibly wont let me back in to grab some mountain dew, are they' leading to the little dance rutine that led to the demise of the cup....

So yeah... these are the type of people who i am defended from by the means of a solitary magnetic lock. If the power ever goes out, these people are going to have free range of me, Im sure...

Anyways, Im going to bed... g'night all!

Please Prepay

So, as has been the topic of many of my previous posts, we require people to pay for their gas before they pump it.

Now I don't know if this is that complicated of a topic, but we ahve a lot of people that just dont seem to be able to wrap their heads around it.

Yesterday, I almost got into a shouting match with a younger person about the necessity to prepay. i think he may have simply forgotten who the employee is and who the customer is. I know policy, he does not. I know how prepay works on our system, he does not. I am right, he is not.

So...

He pulls up to the pump, as would be usual to a customer, and lifts up the nosal. I do my 'please prepay' spiel over the intercom and he hangs up the nosal and comes inside. He puts $40 on the counter and says, 'I'm gonna need about $50 worth of gas.'

I inform him that I cannot allow for a prepay without the the actual amount of intended purchase in my hand.

He informs me that the $40 is collateral for his $50 intended purchase and that he'll "be right back with the rest" (LMAO!!! like I havent heard that a million times before...)

I inform him that the only valid amount of money for collateral for a $50 purchase is at least $50. (this concept is not foreign... is a bank gonna give you a $100k loan if you put a 1983 ford taurus with 400k km up as collateral?)

He begins to argue, telling me that I can and that I will and blah blah blah.

I begin to argue that if he leaves the store with only leaving $40 collateral then he only going to be getting $40 worth of gas.

This went back and forth for about 2 minutes.

Finally I made up some lie about how every purchase showing up on my bosses computer and that not complying with the manditory pre-pay rule was considered serious and that I was not willing to lose my job for the sake of him getting more than $40 worth of gas.

He bought it put another $20 into the pool and left...

Drunken Idiots

So you really have to wonder about people with nothing better to do than hang out in a parking lot of a Gas station ona Friday night. Maybe I simply have a misspent youth, and was not properly introduced to the joys that only a parking lot can produce, but I am a firm believer that If you cannot find an appropriate to drink, You probibly shouldn't be drinking.

Go to a bar and get sloshed, hang out at one of your friends parents house and drink till the wee hours of the morning. All these activities are fine by me. Go right ahead. But for the love of God, get the hell out of my parking lot.

In case you didnt know, we live in a country where public intoxication is frowned upon. Disorderly conduct caused by intoxication can get you a fine or even jail time, depending on the amount of resistence that you put up. The same goes for drinking in a public space. These activities are not allowed. Everyone knows that, I'm sure.

Yet you still continue to come to a small parking lot to drink beer in large groups.

Now, under normal circumstances, I would have let this slide. If the cops had happened to stop by, I would have played ignorant to youre being there, maybe even putting in a word about how quiet you were being, and a most asked the police officer to check for signs of vandalism. But, when youre yelling at customers, throwing beer cans into traffic and comming in and out of my store and falling overtop of displays, I draw the line.

I'm sorry, but youve pushed me too far.

And please don't expect me to come outside and tell you to leave. For saftey reasons, I am not required to leave the store during the graveyard shift. I am told... no no... trained to simply pick up the phone and dial the non emergency police officers. And who knew, one of their favourite things to do is bust up roudy groups of teenagers hanging out in parking lots. I certainly didn't, but they sure did seem to have fun. Especially when the second and third squad cars showed up.

In all fairness though, when two of the partying girls came in, I told them 'the cops are comming to break up your party... you guys should probibly leave' but did they listen? of course not!

meh, not my problem.

Exact Change

So I was inspired by a friends Blog for this post.

Please refer to http://customerssuck.blogspot.com/ to read up on his blog.

He has a similar story to tell as me, with the only majour differences being that 1)He works at a fast food chain and 2)His customers are not allowed to use the machinary *coughcoughIHateSlurpeeMachinescough* (although arguably some McD's employees are worse than our customers, but I can't really be sure this is the case)

Anyways, I'll paraphrase the post which i will be reflection on.

His complaint is towards people who pay in exact change. Now, he (we) is not referring to people that give you helpful correct change-- Say pulling out a few pennies so that we can give you $2 change rather than $1.96. Nor are we talking about people who will hand you $5 in loonies and $1 in quarters.

No, the complaint is against people who will go out of their way (and take you out of yours) in order to count out exactly $9.84 in nickels, dimes, and pennies in order to make exact change. This is especially annoying when you plainly have paper money of sufficient value in order to pay for your purchase, but continue to hold up our lines at your own leisure.

And as my friend so plainly put it "One might think that this is really no big deal, however that ideology may mean you are an offender." C. Mercer ca.2004

Wise words C., wise words. (check out the afore mentioned blog to see C.'s rant in its entirity, as well as other lol (the real kind, not the fake MSN kind) rants about working at McD's)

Anyways, insert me. I also had something to say on the topic, and posted it as a response to his blog. Woopity-Doo, eh?

Here is my response, since I felt it was worthy of its own post on my site (as well as putting a shameless plug for C.)

Truth be known, if they don't give classy establishments like yours their change, they will inevitably end up at my gas station.

Whats worse than people who take their time digging through their purse (I say purse because in my experience women are more prone to the exact change behavior whereas men are more prone to the I dont want change behavior) is people who will say 'I'll be right back, Im going to my car to get change' and then throw a hissy fit when they come back 5 minutes later and youre serving other customers.

Sorry (said in the most sarcastically way imaginable) if there was a line behind you when you left, and now you have to wait 15 seconds for me to re-scan your items.

And please dont go looking to the other customers for sympathy nods when your yelling about what an ass I am. THEY AGREE WITH ME! I didn't see any of them volunteering 'I'll wait till she gets back to pay for her stuff, then I'll go... don't worry about it, I understand.'In fact- I will now go out of my way to apologise to all the customers for not making you go to the back of the line.

We will laugh and joke about how stupid you are. Perhaps they'll invite me over to their house for a beer after work.

Okay so that last line was a joke. I've been offered beer plenty of times, but never for an after shift party...Im done now...

Questions

So in order to create a little bit of audience participation (yes, I do have an audience... believe it or not) Im gonna start a topic in which I ask all of you to respond (assuming you have the time and some sort of work-like activity that will allow you to contribute to the topic).

The topic is 'Stupid Questions':

Criteria- It needs to be a question that was asked to you or a fellow employee (preferably in your presence), feel free to embelish (I don't know how to spell that word) but I would prefer if you didn't outright lie... often these things are a lot more funny when theyre as acurate to the situation as possible (after all, there is a reason these questions stick out as being stupid)

Also, I ask that (if necissary) you add a little tagline explaining why the question is funny... for example:


'Do you sell lotto here?'... this is not a funny question... But, when I explain that while this man was asking this question he was standing 1/2 a foot away from a counter covered with a large display of scratch'n'win tickets, as well as a large '6/49-Super7 Jackpot Sign' to his direct right, smaller but equally noticable '6/49-Super7 Jackpot Sign' directly behind me (in front of him) and a large lotto validation machine on a counter beneath that.

No sir. What could have given you that impression.




Anyways, I hope this all makes sense...

I'll start us off with a bunch of questions I have had...

'Are we near the ferries?' (The ocean is nowhere in sight from our gas station... I really wish people would just say 'I'm lost, which way to the ferries' rather than trying act surprised when i tell them theyre quite a ways off...)

Do I have to prepay? (most of these are asked after I announce over the intercom that durinfg the graveyard shift all pumps are prepay or pay at the pump only... are they expecting me to say 'Nope! Gotcha! hahahaha!!!' cuz I'll start doing it if theyll leave sooner)

Do you guys have a washroom? (No, since we are not privilaged enough to be a part of a cushy union, we at petro can are required to urinate behind the ABM machine (it's not an ATM)... Seriously, whens the last time you were at a gas station with a couple thousand square feet of retail space that didnt have a public washroom?)

Do you carry american brands of Cigareetes? (is that even legal? I dont think so... I don't even think were allowed to sell albertan cigarrettes... you might as well be asking for LSD (which probibly wouldnt be very hard for me to get you... this is cloverdale afterall))

can I get that discount if I don't buy gas? (Okay, so you know the discount, so youve read the sign... 'Save $ With Purchase of Gas'... 'With' is the important work in that sentance)

I hope to hear some of your guys' questions... I'll try to think of more... DON'T BE SHY!

Skittles

This is gonna have to be a short one cuz im really tired...

So, if you are looking around for something to eat, and all you are finding is engine oil, air fresheners and lightbulbs (well.. only if you're in my store that is) you are in the automotive section.

And, if perchance you find soemthing particularly edible... like say a bag of skittles... in and amongst the various automtive fluids and gadgets, and this bag of skittles is the only bag of skittles, and there are no signs that say 'SKITTLES HERE!' then chances are, the skittles have been moved by another customer and then ditched (rather than walking the 6 feet to where the skittles are supposed to go).

And for the record, I will no honour the price underneath the location where the skittle bag was found. The skittles were not put there intentionally, they were not by a sign that said 'SKITTLES ARE NOW THE PRICE OF CHEAP AUTOMOTIVE THINGS' and for all I know, those skittles have been nowhere but the shelf where theyre supposed to be and in your hand (you lying sack of horse feces)...

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you work at a majour department store, and the customer says there is a descrepancy between the scanned price and the item price the customer can't say "Oh, I found this 24lb turkey in with the bulk penny candies... So it has to be $0.05"

Ugh... i fear Im nto making any sense... Sleep now...

High School Friends Revisited

This is a continuation of a former post in which I moaned about people who ignored me in high school but now want to be all chummy-chummy when they see that I'm making the mad money working for minimum wage at a gas station.

That post can be found at (for those of you too lazy to look for yourself):

http://nealwroberts.blogspot.com/2004/06/high-school-friends.html


Anyways, on with my story.

I forgot my name tag somewhere... I think at home... I could be wrong... I'll have to look for it later.

Anyways, its gone, I can't find it, and I need to get to work.

So when I arrive at work, and the time comes for me to get into uniform in order to start, I began contemplating my options for a new nametag.

Initially, I was just going to put on a 'Hi! Im New Here!' tag, but that didn't seem interesting enough.

I then considered borrowing Gurpreets nametag. All the fun I could have, just imagine.

"Is you're name really gurpreet?"

"Yeh, my Parents were hippies and totally into the near eastern movement long before it was popularised in western society" (for those of you who don't know me too well, I would NEVER be mistaken for an Indian-- person from India, not the spear-hunting-Sieux type-- I have skin pigmentation to put snow to shame)

I ran this idea past Gurpreet, but she didn't seem to keen on it (especially the using her name as reference to my parents being hippies)...

So I was left with the third option, using Adrian's nametag (adrian is the twit that can be found here:

http://nealwroberts.blogspot.com/2004/07/twit.html )

So needless to say (because I have to have a name tag and when you put the 'H!INH' tag on, people will ask you youre name anyways) I was, for the night, going to be known as Adrian.

For the most part this isn't a problem.

Im the only person that any of the customers are going to be talking too, or asking questions, so I always respond-- and they get to humour the minimum-wage-gas-jockey by pretending to learn his name... Even though i serve some of these customers every weekend...

Anyways, I digress.

The main component of my complaint today, is people who try to pretend to know me in order to try and get free stuff.

"Can i have a free slurpee? Come on, it's just a slurpee? We go way back, Adrian, you and me went to Tweedsmuir together!"

What?

The fact that we went to the same school has nothing to do with anything. Something like 1400 people were attending Tweedsmuir when i graduated, not to mention the 1000's that graduated while I was going to tweedy, or the thousands that ended up going to Clayton or that other school that noone really cares about... Should I give them all free slurpees? Jeez, thats like 1/2 of cloverdale right there. And what about alumni and staff members. At least some of them were nice to me during high school.

And for Christ Sake! Remember the name I actually went by in high school before you start begging me for stuff.

I had two female customers come in today and say to me 'you look like that Neal guy who worked here last summer' (they probibly said Neil, but I have corrected their speech in order to make it the proper spelling).

These are customers that I do not know, and they probibly graduated quite some time before I was born, but they remembered my name (and they had quite the chuckle when I explained to them that was indeed the person they were remembering) and to top it all off, THEY DIDNT ASK FOR FREE STUFF!...

I thinkI'm done...

Ugh!

If you're going to be stupid, just be stupid. Do not try to force upon me your twisted logic. You make no sense, none! So do not be surprised when I disagree. And if for some reason I do start to agree with you, you have not won. Simply, i am trying to get you out of the store. you have sufficiently annoyed me enough that I no longer will even attempt to be polite with you.

"Wow! I never thought about that... I guess youre right." This is what I will tell you when you are undoubtibly wrong. If you hear these words spoken from my mouth, I do not agree with you, I am trying to inflate your ego enough that you will puff your chest up high and parade out of the store. This works, and I will not refrain from using it at any time, assuming that I feel it is the only method to get you to shut your pie-hole and leave.

Phew!

Glad I could get that off my chest.

Now I guess you would care for an explaination?

It would be an honour.

You see, I had a lady come in today. She had a wide grin on her face when she walked in the store. I figured she would be a pleasant customer. Smiling is usually neither a signal of stupidity nor intelligence. But at least the transaction will be pleasant.

Boy, was I wrong.

Almost immediately upon it being her turn to be served at the till she began a very vocal argument with myself about the injustice of our '2 nestle chocolate bars for $1.78+tax' deal. At first I thought she was going to complain about how expensive chocolate bars were in our store (as per the usual 'complaining about chocolate bars' customers would do), and I immediately went into 'this is a gas station and as such we are unable to sell chocolate bars for as cheap as other places' mode. But I was caught off guard when her argument turned the other way.

She was insulted that she should have to purchase two chocolaate bars in order to get a lower price.

I was baffled.

She began explaining her side of things. That we were descriminating against people who were watching their weight. They had to purchase two chocolate bars in order to save money. But if they bought two chocolate bars they would have to eat two chocolate bars. And by eating two chocolate bars they would consume the calories contained in two chocolate bars (I kid you not, she probibly said 'two chocolate bars' a good half dozen times in the first paragraph of her argument)

At this point I am even more baffled. After talking with a friend of mine who has been put on a very strict diet for medical reasons, I have become aware of all the contents of many of the foods I eat in my daily life. I can now assure you (the reader) that if you are watching your weight YOU SHOULD NOT BE EATING CHOCOLATE BARS IN THE FIRST PLACE!

Save your $1.78 and buy something that doesnt contain the calorie intake of a small African country and buy something that has any level of nutritional benefit. Cuz I assure you, you are not getting what you need from chocolate bars.

Now she obviously saw the look I was giving her (it was a cross between a 'are you serious?' and a 'how far could she run before the nutty farm gets here') and decided to change her argument. It switched from 'your store hates fat people' to 'does your store hate poor people?'

At this point I seriously thought I was going to throw up from the sheer stupidity.

I nodded at her to continue, cuz quite frankly I wanted her to explain to me why saving money on chocolate bars is discrimination for poor people.

Her argument is that a person that is poor enough could not afford the extra $.75 (tax included one chocolate bar is $1.17 and two i s $1.92). By having the 'buy two at a discounted price' we were forcing the really poor people to have to buy chocolate bars at an 'artifically high price'.

BGWAH?!?!?!?!?!

I'm really sorry. But that is so illogical. Besides, what are people this poor doing in the first place? Shouldn't the be buying milk? or bread? or waiting in line at the food bank?

Okay that last one was uncalled for.

But really now. I can assure you that being that we are in Surrey, the Alabama of Canada, we have some of the poorest people comming into our store.

These are the types of people that will buy a half litre of 2% milk, eat the $.05 candies that children have let fall on the floor, and buy $15 worth of scratch tickets and 6/49.

They've made their decision's and it appears that chocolate bars were not really on the top of their list.

Anyways, back to the story. This lady was going on and on. She was almost to the point of yelling about all the injustices about having to buy two chocolate bars in order to save money.

After about 4 mins or so, I finally said to her, 'you know, I think you have a point'

She had a kind of glint in her eyes when I said that and she added 'a person as fat as me shouldn't be buying two chocolate bars, you know?'

I nodded and said 'yeah I guess you're right'

This really offended her. I had to bite my toungue in order to keep from laughing at what i had just (unintentionally) said while she got herself into one big ol' huff about me calling her fat and blah blah blah.

She left the store (thankfully).

I was left to explain to my coworker (a new staff member working her first evening shift) how you need to know when to pick your battles with customers.

Vandals

I have a simple note to vandals. Although I enjoy the aestetically appealing doodles and I'm quite certain my boss has enjoyed the increased property value (as well as the spinoff industries comming from replacing various aspects of our store) I have one thing to note. (only one tonight cuz Im sleepy).

If youre going to do something do it right.

Im sure youve spent a good 10-15 minutes creating a piece of urban art of such calibre onto our building. And I can say i am quite impressed... impressed that you would use what must be a dry-erase marker onto a plastic panelling. IT COMES OFF WITH WINDEX AND A PAPER CLOTH.

Thanks again for your consideration, and I look forward to the 30 seconds it takes to remove your design.

Counting

So we were training a new employee today, and of course, they are subject to amke a few mistakes. But, much like the 'L' ICBC makes new drivers tack on their vehicle, the 'Hi! I'm New Here' name tag new employees are forced to wear attracts only the stupidest and most obnoxious drivers in BC.

Needless to say, as I was helping her man down the tills, an angry lady (she started that way) approached with an armload of groceries.

The NE (new employee) ran the items through and announced the total.

"thats too much" yelled the lady.

the NE cleared the items and started to scan them all through again. Announcing the total (same as before) the lady became even more agitated.

"thats way more than it should be" she yelled

the NE was looking my way giving me the 'If you dont help me I will cry' look.

I began the long process of naming all the products she had purchased and doing a vocal sumation of all the prices.

"Case of water $5, 2 bags of chips on special $10, One bottle of Coke $12, 4 slurpees $16, 10 in gas $26 and Two packs of cigarettes... for a grand total of $42"

"Thats way more than it should be!"

"Your purchasing things at a gas station, if youd liek directions to safeway I can giove them to you"

She did the angry 'huff' and paid for her stuff and left.

Then NE gave me the 'Oh! thats how its done' look.

She is strong in the way of the force. She will be trained well!

Porn Stars in Training

So, continuing with my theme of things that can get you thrown in jail, some very young (maybe only slightly post pubecent) girls came into the store yesterday. I estimate their ages to be about 14 or 15. Now under normal circumstances this wouldn't be cause for a story, had these children not been of the skank variety.

You see, the generalization that children are getting sexually active at a younger age does hold some truth, as was the case with these girls.

You see there is something to be admired about a person who is confident with their body in all its flaws. Maybe not to the point where flaugnting yourself is acceptable, but when you don't feel you have anything to be ashamed of, theres no point in hiding it.

That being said, when you say "I'll show you my tits if you give me a free chocolate bar" IS NOT COOL! Your offer would have been refused even if you were a legal adult. I do not like to facilitate people in the prostitution of their bodies especially when said prostitution can get me in jail.

Oh, and for the record, giving me your number and telling me to call you after Im off of work does not make it better. In fact, it makes it worse. I WILL NOT GO TO JAIL BECAUSE YOU ARE A SLUT!

Wow... Some peoples children!

Event Filled Weekend!

So I'ts been a little while since I have updated this (again)

Sorry everyone... I know I know...

But i have had an event filled weekend (as Im sure you could have guessed from the name).

There were numerous thefts to be had this weekend. Actually, all the ones Im going to be telling you about happened on saturday/sunday night/morning.

So Im doing my baking (I bake all the pastries and yummies that our store sells... when it says fresh its not a lie, it is at most less than a day old) minding my own business, and serving customers (as per my job description) when out of nowhere some customers enter.  (yes out of nowhere, I added that for the sake of dramatization... this could potentially be a very boring story without the drama as added by me)

I, of course, stop what im doing to watch them because customers are less likely to steal when you watch them. They actually didnt pocket anything (unless they managed to shove a province newspaper down their pants)  but simply stepped up to the counter each carrying a 1L bottle of pepsi. Now there is nothing unusual about this, nothing at al, but the fun begins here.

You see, the first person pays for the pepsi, turns around and looks at the other person.

says "Oh, hey, I bought you one already"

the second one loks at him, nods and starts to walk back to the cooler.

He takes three steps turns 90 degrees and walks out the door.

Bottle of pop still in hand, within plain sight of the cameras, myself and the other customers in the store. He walks to his car, which parked in plain sigh (white pickup lp# plainly viewable) turns onto 64th ave and drives off...

All the while Im sitting there thinking "OMG"

I suppose thats what he was expecting but the fact still remains I have the right to refuse him service, and his buddy's transaction information is on our computer... I dont know what good it'll do, especially since we rarely have the cheapest gas in Cloverdale...

 
My second story happens about 20 minutes after the first.

I was helping a customer count coin (he had a collection of nickels he was tring to roll so as to get it out of his collection and possibly into something edible)

Another customer walks in, and mentions to me "Did you just sell a bunch of water to those kids?" "no i re[plied" "Well theyre taking them anyways"

So we have had a lot of water stolen in the last few days (30 cases of 12 on one night last week) so our boss is willing to press charges on anyone so much as breathing in the evaporated moisture from a bottle they have yet to purchase.

So I instantly call the cops, get a few witnesses to verify the lp# I was writing down. Set up a police file with all the information of the vehicle and the such and such and on and on.

I felt like a knob, but my boss made me feel like a hero...

 
My third story (as I reported it to my boss) was me. I took a cookie.

A chocolate chip cookie.

And I didnt pay.

And I have no plans on it.

 
And my fourth story is funny as heck (maybe not a 'hahaha' funny, but definately in a siruationally ironic type of hillarity).

turns out some kids had been in the store while I was on the phone with the cops about the water.

They had taken that time in order to pocket some candy and chocolate bars.

Then they had paid for a few things and left the store.

Then they went to a deserted alleyway where they divied up their stash.

Someneighbours thought it was suspicious that kids were parked in an alleyway so late at night, so they called the cops.

The cops showed up to investigate.

The kids were not intoxicated nor did the cops smell any illegal substances.

But the kids were acting suspicious none the less.

So the cops began questioning them.

Eventually the topic of the collection of choclate bars and candy came up, which they claimed to have purchased.

The police officers felt that the topic of candy made the kids act a little bit weirder, so they contiued, asking where the candies had been purchased.

My store was mentioned.

One cop stayed to make sure the kis didnt go anywhere and one came over to petro can to ask me if I hda sold these specific candies to these kids (we dont give reciepts to all customers so they wouldnt necissarily have had one for the cops).

No longer had the petro cop radio-ed then the kids fessed up to having had stole the candy.

The cop told me what was up (and all the events that had occured up to then) and then left.

He came back about 30 minutes later to inform me that the kids had not yet eaten much of the candy, and returned to me about $12 worth of unopened merchandise, as well as a large caramilk bar (missing a bite) and a Fruit&Creme candy snack (its like starburst).

He also informed me that my boss probibly wouldnt need to press charges as (because the childrens parents were not home or able to be contacted) the kids would spend an amount of time in jail (up to the time that one of the parents could be reached and could come to release them).

I think I'm going to learn the names of all the graveyard police officers in cloverdale by the end of summer... I think it would be fun if they also knew me by first name...

Oh well!

Gnight

Full Force

So it seems like all the freaky weirdos and psychos have been saving up their special powers to make my return night to graveyards oh so extra special.
 
The succeeded!
 
Not only were there the drunks and the weirdos, and the creepy people who only seem to ever live in cloverdale (I think there is something in the cloverdale water supply that makes people look and act especially homely... thankfully I'm on well water)
 
But there were a few special people that deserve honourable mentions in my blog.
 
I'll start witha  rather mundane person, and build up to the really fun person. I hope you don't mind, but in my eyes the stories are going to get progressively more entertaining in this one.
 
I'll start off with a man, a plan, a canal... I mean pump... Sorry, I'm sleepy. So a guy pulls up to the pumps, and lifts up the nosal. Of course, there is a beeping sound inside to tell me someone somewhere has picked up a nosal (my spidey senses are tingling)... I do my little speech over the intercom "blah blah blah prepay/pay at the pump only blah blah blah" and all is fine and dandy. he starts walking to the door. he opens the door, half steps inside and asks me "I can prepay at the pump, right?"... I did say pay at the pump, but for the sake of getting him out as quickly as possible, I just smile and nod. He leaves, back to his car, hangs up the nosal and inserts his card (I know he inserted it because my compter... err spidey senses... tell me so)... Thats when he decided not to enter his pin. I know so again because of my spidey senses... Afetr timing out (just like regular debit, if you wait too long the machine cancells your transaction) he comes inside to tell me that the pump is broken. I, at the time, was dealing with the other 8 or so customers who were waiting their turn (for some reason the really stupid people tend to think that ines do not apply to them...) and ignored him until I had a spare second... in that time, he had gone back out to his car and moved to a different pump. Lo and behold, this pump was 'broken' too (he didnt choose which grade of gasoline he wanted). Again he came in to complain about the broken pump. I was still dealing with some customers, but I afforded him a sidewards glance an offered a solution. "Follow the directions on the pump... you're not doing it right!" he gave me the 'you don't know what youre talking about, the pump is obviuously broken' look... But upon returning to his car, the pump was miraculously healed and able to be pumped from... Some people would say that he smartened up, but I would like to think that the oil stain on the pavement that looks like the Virgin Mother may have had something to do with it --Thanks Jesus ;)
 
Next we have the a crack fiend... I have a lot of these visit the store, its kinda like gangsta's in Detroit or bad haircuts in Saskatoon-- they're all over the place. But this one was something special. He comes by and asks if I can make change for his $50 bill. I respond no. I am working by myself, in a gas station that has been robbed twice in the last six months, and has been offered hundreds of dollars worth of fake bills. Needless to say, I dont usually carry anything more than a five, and I rarely have change for a $50 or $100 (Not to mention the fact that there are places that get far more traffic and have far more emplyees on staff that will not accept 50's or 100's... let alone during the graveyard shift.) So he starts begging... 'don't you have any toonies or loonies or anything you can trade for $50' at this time alarm bells start going off. Not only is he looking to get change, he is willing to get less back in return. I don't know if you know the nature of crackheads, but generally they tend to be the type picking cigarette butts off the ground to get the left over tobacco, or eating the $0.05 candies that have fallen on the ground in the candy isle. Giving money away does not seem to be their stong point. Needless to say, I refuse all attempts on his part to persuade me to give him money in exchange for his $50. He leaves. The same man comes back about an hour later... Wearing a different (cleaner) shirt, Ill have you (I think he thought I was fooled... but I wasn't... unless there are two of them... scary thought)... Anyways, he begins by stating that he needs coin for the payphone and asks if I can help him out. I have no problem giving coin out in most circumstances. For me it's not even really an issue. I accept, and out comes a $50... back to square one. Can't accept it, no excpetions, blah blah blah... He asks me how much he has to spend before I'll accept it. I tell him near all of it, and thats if I can examine it to make sure its real... He promptly leaves the store...
 
He comes back at about 5am. Thistime he's got about $20 worth of silver coin for me to count. he's lucky I had nothing better to do, and that we have a counting device... I assume that the coin was for his dealer, cuz his dealer showed up before we had finished counting out all the nickels... And they started haggling the price of the 'rocks' inside the store (and I highly doubt that these were special stones for his koi pond)...
 
This sounds like a good time to bring up my third and bestest eprson of the day. The dealer. No longer had a price been agreed, and a certain crack fiend left to his car (I assume to grab another fifty dollars or so) when the dealer began trying to sell me some stuff. Now under most circumstances I would have just asked him to go... but, he was busy writing down his cell number so that if I changed my mind, he could be my supplier... right their, in my store. After I told him I had never done drugs in my life. I should have told him that if I wanted to try drugs, I have family members with better connnections than him, but I figured that he's just an entrepeneur, and that i shouldn't be too mean...
 
I intended to call the cops with my new found drug dealer ph#... but I didn't, cuz the dealer had my name and the location of my work... And with a failing gun registry and all, I dont think that would be cool...

Twit

So, things were pretty interesting today at work...
 
You see, there is this little thing in this world called theft. Although most people have the morals enough to prevent them from taking what isn't theirs, so people have been denied of the skills to determin between right and wrong. I attribute this to a lack of beatings as a child, but I am sure there are a hundred other reasons why this may be (perhaps this person should be beaten now, just to make sure)...
 
Anyways, before you start jumping to conclusions, I am not speaking of a stupid customer without enough brains to get caught, I am refering to an emplyee who was stupid enough to steal from his boss. Yes madams and sirs, we have some insider theft on our hands. (please refer back to the Intercom post... this is the same employee that I complain about there)
 
The way he was doing it was slightly ingenius (I use the term slightly because his downfall negates any geniusness caused by his clever cash clepto-- my English teacher would be proud of that alliteration)... He would scan all the items into the computer, just like a good little employee. But then instead of pressing [Cash] -> [Enter] to ring it through, he pressed [clear] -> [open register]. He then completed the transaction as per usual, providing the correct amount of change and all, but he would pocket the cash that would have gone to the till. Since there were no items rung through, no cash was missing, and any items that were noticed to be gone when inventory came around were attributed to thieving children.
 
Now, enter the downfall (cue clown music). He has a gambling addiction.
 
Wait...
 
To call it an addiction would degrade crack heads and alcoholics alike.
 
okay, so this guy really REALLY likes his scratch tickets... REALLY REALLY likes them. And I assume that is what lead to his thieving... But when he started spending more money than he was making on lotto tickets (and Im not saying that it would have been like "he spent $300 but he only made $295"... no it was more like "How is he buying $110 worth of lotto tickets every night... lets watch the videotapes to see whats going on")
 
I kinda wanted to be the one who called him to tell him... I think it would have been fun. I did get to write a note about him in the internal log, telling everyone that he's to be treated like a (much disliked) customer. I got some level of gratification out of that.
 
Now I am going to try to get as many of my friends hired at that store as I can. Contact me if you might be interested (the sooner the better)...

Back to Work

Tonight was rather disappointing.

I figured I would have large amounts of things to tell you, but the people tonuight were rather well behaved... Cept one, but its kinda lame...

Anyways, here goes.

He pumps his gas and comes inside, grabs a 591mL bottle of diet coke, and comes up to the counter. With his purchase of gas ($29.02) and his purchase of pop ($1.49 for the pop + 0.05 deposit + 0.03 environmental levy + 0.11 tax) we have a grand total of (drumroll please) 30.70.

Now this seems to be a case where this guy gets really confused, and convinces himself that the whole is greater than the sum of the two parts.

He begins to argue with me about the price of his purchase.

He tried to convince me in a "I'll forgive you because you weork at a gas station and therefore can't be very smart" type of voice that his bill should only be 29.02.

I remind him that he is also buying a bottle of pop.

This does not register with him.

He reiterates that he only pumped $29 worth of gas.

I reiterate that a pop plus a gas equals more than the price of gas.

Then he snapped out of his stupidity (It was like watching a dog when it responds to a vocal command for the first time... I had given him the proverbial "Sit!... Good boy")...

the whole time he managed to keep it very low key, and without raising his voice during the entire ordeal. So I dont really consider him an idiot so much. I'll just assume he had a long day.

Apologies

Just so all of my unwavering fans can be 'in the know' I was on vacation for the last week... Well, technically bI wasn't vacationing, I was doing the whole 'Lord's Work' thingy... you know how it is.

I work my first return shift tomorrow. I'll be bright eyed and bushy tailed; ready to remember to the very best detail exactly what stupid things customers do.

Oh, and I guess I can fill you in on the workings of some other fun stuff, since I haven't added stuff in a long time, I'll just talk about stupid people in general, and not just the people that come into petro can.

First off, stupid driver. Not really much to say, as saying too much would elevate this action to a level of some sort. But if someone slows down to 30 in an 80 zone in order to let you merge, then bloody well merge. I don't need to have a liscense in order to know this, therefor you should know this. Stupid lady.

Umm... second... If you're in a crowded museum on the opening day of a major exhibit (the Royal Museum in BC has an exibit on ancient Egypt which I, and some friends, was able to view on opening day) DO NOT BACK UP AT RANDOM! The hall was very crowded, and he paused in order to take in the true beauty of the entire piece (while listening to the cool voice overs of the personal tour guide-- no sarcasm, I actually thought they were quite neat) he decides to back up at random. Whats worse, he kept moving in a backwards motion afterhe walked into me and stepped on my sandal shielded toes. Had there been someone trying to cut past him from the front, or had he apologised, or had he not cut me off in the first place (I was standing at this particular exhibit for a good 2 mins before he walked in front of me) I may have just 'meh'ed it off, but together these things really iritated me.

Finally, if you dont like to overhear a particular conversation held by two people, then move. I was having a pleasant conversation with a friend of mine, discussing the humourous nature of watching seals, otters, and porpoises (I dont know how to spell that one at all) get sucked into the engines of a catamaran (one of the reasons the 'Fast Cats' were stopped was due to the inability for critters to escape). After discussing all the sensual reasons for why it would be funny (the sounds, the water colour, the choppiness of the engine as it saws through their bones, etc) as well as the emotional reasons (the anticipation of waiting for an approaching animal, the joy of seeing the sea bits flow up behind the boat, and such), I was given the eye of death by a lady standing next to us. We were standing on the upper deck of (I think) the queen of Victoria. Needless to say, we are above 6 other floors this lady could have moved to in order to avoid our conversation, but she chose to stay and listen in to our conversation. Should could have walked to the other side of the boat even. Chances are if she had moved another 5 feet along the empty handrail, she wouldnt have been able to hear us over the sound of the engine. I have a dark sense of humour. Deal with it lady!

That will have to do... I know its not up to my usual standards, but people just don't seem to be as stupid as when theyre at the gas station.

I think it's the fumes of the super clean.

Canada Day

So, yesterday was Canada Day! yay! I had the joy of being the person working by myself as the fireworks and festivities wound down a little ways down the hill. yay! As i'm sure you can imagine, working by yourself at a gas station as several thousands of people disperse in every different direction is far from fun. In fact, it's so much not fun, that you couldn't even include fun in it's description. Calling it not fun would be an injustice to all the not fun things there are in this world. Like womens amateur golf marathons, or having teeth pulled, or shooting yourself in the foot with a nail gun. It's not not-fun, its bad. Very bad.

There were only two things keeping me going. 1) I knew that there were people who had it worse off then me (I can't imagine workig at the places that are right across the street from such events-- I'm 4 blocks away and its still quite bad) and 2) XL french vanilla cappiccino...

Anyways, to put things in perspective, between 2150 and 0200 I did the same amount of sales as would normally be done between 1800 and 2200. But, I was working by myself, the other shift has two people. And I have more tasks. I have to bake, do dishes, stock the cooler, bleach (pretty much) every surface, change all the garbages, sanitize the bathroom. All between serving the exhorbant amount of customers. Needless to say, I was getting a little bit drained.

But, now comes the real fun part. You see, this is just my regular complaining, now lets introduce the customers.

You see, what better way to celebrate Canada day then by intoxicating yourself so much that you don't remeber what youre celebrating, who youre celebrating with, or how to read the signs that tell you how much something is.

Now I'm not saying that a lot of my customers were drunk, I'm saying that I was fearful of doing my baking because breath was probibly of high enough proof to burst into flames.

and they would all ask the stupid questions. Mainly "how much is this?" 99.9% of the time the products have a price directly under them. the other .1% of the time is usually because another customer put a product down without purchasing it, and in the wrong place none the less.

But the cream of this crop had to be the guy who asks "How much is this pepsi and doritos deal?" Obviously reading the sign, because deals are not advertised any other way, he was obviously missing the very large $3.18. If he had read one more word past doritos, he would have been at the price. Completely disregarding the fact that the price is twice the size of the products listed, you'd think he would have at least ahd the decency to read the entire sign first. but no. My initial thought was "quick, look around he's obviously trying to be a distraction for someone else!" Sadly, no. He was the only one in the store. And he was serious. He wanted to know the price.

Another teen wanted to know if he could get one of those pepperoni cheese sticks without the pepperoni. It wasnt very hard to point the 2" to the left to where our pepperoniless-pepperoni cheese snacks --cleaverly disguised under the name cheese snacks... yeah, we like to be confusing here =)

A man was trying to pay at the pump, but his first attempt ended because he entered the wrong pin#. After waiting for him to hang up the pump, so I could clear the machine, he gave it a second attempt. Again, it was the wrong pin. He then decided it was time for me to get a talking to (I use the word 'talk' loosely cuz it wasn't exactly on his to do list). After explaining to him that he haed entered the wrong pin, followed by a brief argument about his ability to enter in the right pin at least once for sure, I decided to patronize him. I explained that we have had difficulties with the pump before (not an entire lie, its usually people doing stupid stuff to it that causes problems, though) and that we could do prepay inside. I swipe his card, he enters in his pin #. Sure enough, denied- Wrong Pin. He examined his card, turned bright red, and left. He attempted to pay at the pump again, with success. Ha! Take that! I win!

My final short story of the night comes from a very irrate lady. She had obiously had a very long day (she was wearing hospital scrubs, which is a dead give away). She pulls up to the pump, and lifts the handle. I OK her throught the computer. ***ERROR***. I wait for her to hang up the pump to clear it and find out what happened. ***Card inserted at wrong time***. (you have to do the entire transaction before you can lift the handle up-- inserting the card when the handle is up is a no-no). The beeping outside had stopped (the pumps beep quite loud if something goes wrong.. partly to alert the user that something has gone wrong, partly as a sadistic way to make everyone turn and lok at the idiot that can't use a pump) so she had moved on to try again. This time it was so quick that I didnt have a chance to do anything. She seemingly managed to lift the handle and place the nozzle in her tank at the exact moment she inserted her card intot he machine. Needless to say, ***ERROR***. This time she came inside to see what was up. I explained to her to follow the directions on the pumps screen in order to complete a pay at the pump transaction. She nods and goes back out to her car. ***Card inserted*** ***Please Enter Pin*** ***ERROR***... I wait for her to hang up so I can again clear her pump, and this time she comes in to give me the lecture of all lectures (again, I use the word 'lecture' lightly, because lecturing is probibly the last thing on her mind...) I cut her off mid sentance and explain to her that the entire interact thing needs to be completed before the handle is moved, lest she want to be beeped again. She gave me that 'deer in the headlights' look you usually only get if you catch a little kid doing something they know theyre not supposed to. She went out side, completed her transaction, and then came back inside to buy a cofee and some munchies. She apologised for having yeled at me. I gloated in my victory.

Well, sorta...

and I waited till she was out of the store...

she was really buff, and the counter doesn't really seperate us from anyhing...

and I'm a wuss...

Gas Cap Lady

So, if I have ever claimed to have met the most unintelligent person in clover, I take it back. This lady takes the cake... although, maybe she is from langley, the water isn't so good there...

Regardless, I will get on with my story with the following assumptions 1)this lady is from cloverdale and therefore 2) is easily the stupidest person in Cloverdale.

Picture this, a beautiful summers day. Birds are chirping, the sun is shining, somewhere children are kiling tiny creatures with magnifying glases or gasoline.

Now into this picturesque environment, insert rusted out Honda (cue lightning strike).

This lady pulls into full serve, whilst I am aiding a handicapped women pump her gas (for people with certifiable disabilities (generally people with one of the little blue signs), our boss allows us to do full serve at a self serve stall, freeing them from the discomfort of having to get out of the car and allowing them to feel much more generous when it comes time for tipping). Now the difference between self and full serve, or at least one of them, is that full serve nozzles have a catch so that you can set the gasoline to pump and then let go of the handle to go do other stuff. With self serve, there is no catch, so you constantly have to be holding the nosal in order for gas to continue comming out. SO needless to say, I had two options, I can tell the handicapped lady that she has to wait for me to come back and continue pumping her gas, or I can wave to aknowledge the lady in full serve and signal that I will be thre as soon as I can.

I opt for the second option.

The lady stopped in full serve, waits a few seconds, then gets impatient and revs her engine. Not once, but twice. This is not cool. I would put this at the same level as raising your hand and snapping for service at a restaurant, just plain not cool.

Anyways, after the second rev, I'm looking in her direction, and she is giving me the "I'm waiting for YOU to get your ass over here" look. Although, I was not motivated to help her at this point, I did not go out of my way to be slow. I finished my transaction with the Handicapped lady, and headed over to impatient lady. And this is where things got interesting.

**side note, in order to save time, and hopefully clairity, I will abbreviate a sound the woman made several times with the Symbols *#* Dont ask me why I chose these, because there is no reason. But the sound the woman kept making was kind of a huff/sigh, like the sound you would expect a 16y/o girl to make as she is walking to the door to go to her boyfriends house and her parents tell her she has to vaccuum the living room before she is allowed to take the car.**

I greeted her, *#* she complained about how long it took me to get over to FULL SERVE!!! Asked for $10.

I asked "regular?", *#* 'yes.'

I asked her to turn her car off. *#*, she does.

I ask her for the key to her gas cap. She tells me its unlocked. (Although it clearly had a lock on it, it is entirley possible that it was unlocked). I tried to open it. It was locked. (keep in mind this is not really the cap, but the little hinged door that covers the gas cap)

I ask her if she has the key to unlock the gas cap, *#* she claims it doesnt usually need a key, and begins fiddling around with the buttons around the left side of her dash. No luck.

I ask if her ignition key opens the gas cap as well (quite frequently it does). *#*, she puts her key into the ignition and starts her car up (totally not what i meant) and she asks me if its unlocked not.

No, I answer. *#*

She suggests prying it open, because it should be unlocked.

I try, but sure enough, there is quite a catch, and there was no way I could get it off with my fingers and no way without damaging the car.

I ask to see her keys, with the hopes of finding the one that opens the cap. *#*

She takes her keys out of the ignition, takes off all the keys but the ignition key, and hands it to me. Perhaps I was going to run off with her keys and sell them on the black market, which leaves me wondering, who told her.

Since it obviously wasn't going anywhere else, I try the ignition key in the lock. Perfect fit.

I fill her gas, take her money, and she leaves. Thank God.

High School 'Friends'

It amazes me how some people, now that we are beyond our high school years, think that is ok to simply forget that they spent five years ignoring my exsistence and then show up at a gas station two years after graduation and pretend that we were 'bestest friends' and then reminace (I don't know how to spell that word... so sue me) about all the fun times we had.

And you'd be surprised how much this happens.

People that wouldn't give me the time of day.

People that I had in numerous classes with in 8-12, but probibly still didn't know me by first name.

People who went out of their way to make me feel as unimportant as possible.

These are the people asking me how I'm doing, telling me I should give them a call so that we can "go hang out." Not that I ever would, I hope that some of them realize that I see through their pitiful attempts to patronize me.

"Oh how you've changed, Neal... I can barely recognise you" (thats because you have'nt talked to me since grade 7 grad, you stupid bag)

Of course I feed them my GSA smile, which they seem to feed off, like it makes my day that they recognise me. They get to leave thinking in some special way they've touched my heart.

I get to stay, thinking 'thank-God we carry peptobismal'

Naivity

Two apologies...

First, for not updating this blog in the last few days (I've been busy, im sure you could have guessed)

Second, for my creative (but undoubtably wrong) spelling of the word Naivity in this title...

Anyways, I just thought I'd add a few little something to make your day.

I was working a shift the other day with Amanda, and we spent the better part of two hours talking about the various parts of the job of GSA that really suck. And I don't mean the parts that we hate doing, simply the parts that make us loath comming into the store for our shift, or the parts that make us want to hit the magnetic door lock and curl up on the flor behind the counter and eat $.05 candies for 8 hours.

Anyways, as to be expected, we had a lot to talk about. Of course, never in front of the customers, that would be very bad.

As it turns out, we were approcahing the end of our shift, we were in the home stretch, the final hour. And we started discussing the joy that we would be experiencing with our release, and how great it would be to not have to work for at least 8 hours.

As we were about halfway through our little song and dance about how great things were gonna be in an hour, a customer walked in.

And afetr leistening to us celebrating, but without knowing what it was we were celebrating, he decided to inform us that he thinks it's great that two people can be so enthusiastic about working in the service industry, and that our cheerfulness really made his day.

I never said that this guy was an idiot, but I just thought that it was quite humourous... They can't all be interac ladies, you know!

Mr Lotto

So, i am a firm believer that if you have an addiction, you should at least have the decency to be addicted correctly.

If you're an alcoholic, know all the ingredients to mix your drinks.

If you're a smoker, know what brand you like best and know it visually so as to help service clerks who do not smoke (especially if its an obscure brand).

And if your a gambler, like my next PIQ (person in question, that is), for God's sake, KNOW HOW TO BUY LOTTO!

There are two easy ways to buy lotto tickets.
1) (easiest) fill out your own form, provided at a counter in every lotto selling retailer. you choose your own numbers, your own plays, and everything to your own liking.
2) (only slightly less easy) ask the service clerk for the plays you want. If you want a double, three plays, no extra, the service clerk can provide for you a ticket which has three plays of 6 numebers plus a bonus for both the 6/49 and BC/49. If you want a 6 pack, the service clerk will provide for you 6 plays for the Super 7.

Now there is a slight problem with these two systems... They are, more or less, non interchangeable. If you fill out a card, we can not substitute the 47 for a 32. We can not skip the extra for a week. We cannot add an extra play on the ticket. And for the other way around, we can enter in personalised numers into the machine by hand, but the process makes it so time consuming that most people are not even taught how to do it.

Now that we have the background set up, as per usual, Il get on with my story.

A man comes into the store with his card of pre selected numbers (some people reuse the same cards because it contains "lucky numbers" -- which they have never won the jackpot with i'm sure-- which they hold a special attachemnt to for whatever reason).

Now, when he hands me his card, he says to me "6/49, no extra."

I run the card through and while I'm waiting for the ticket to print I'm making myself more and more confused thinking about his comment.

So, since I have nothing to loose, I ask him "Did you want the 6/49 no extra in addition to this ticket?"

He freaks out. "Why do you guys always ask me that, I want this [his card] on 6/49, no extra."

At this time, I am quite pissed off that he's yelling at me (this is after the piercing guy btw) and I decide I am going to make a stand and not let him leave without me being the winner of whatever argument he wanted to start.

"I was just checking to make sure that I was providing you with all the tickets you wanted, sir"

"All I want is this [his card] 6/49, no extra! Is that so hard?"

"Well sir, a lot of people will bring their ticket and then ask for additional tickets in the form of a quick pick"

"Well I don't care what other people want, I was just making sure you didn't mess it up"

"Sir, the card determines what it prints off, there is a YES box and a NO box for the extra, and if you only want 6/49 you check here"

"I did"

"Then why did you ask for a 6/49, no extra?"

"I didn't"

"Then what did you say"

"I wanted my card, 6/49, no extra"

"If you've used this card before and gotten the right ticket, why would you need to reiterate what you want?"

at this point, he left... without responding...

I take this as a personal victory =D