Friday, November 28, 2014

One down, one to go.

The experimental mint crack.
Though I did not have to be at work at 5:45am this morning I still did not have any time to work on anything before I had to be in at 9am.  There is nothing new to show, though I wish there was.  I had brought some stuff along with me to work on my various breaks, but I only got a lunch break.  I spent that eating, so my hands were too busy to knit.

Above is a picture of my experimental crack.  It went over very well from those who tried it and let me know.  The extra chips I had were not chocolate, they were butterscotch.  I didn't want to have too many changed variables in it so this version doesn't have as much chocolate on it as it should. 
I was also informed that even if I didn't work there anymore I would be getting messages telling me I could drop off some crack at any time.  It is nice to be loved.



Black Friday?  Done!  I know I dislike it and tell people I don't encourage it, but I did buy something today.  Does it count as shopping on Black Friday if there was no extra discount, but was on the day?  I would like to think that it doesn't really count since there was no crazy discount and I did not go into the story at a crazy early time.  It was also from one of those stores where if you see something you really want, you should grab it because it probably won't be there next time.  So I knew if I wanted the perfect Christmas present for someone, I had to act then.

A day I for the most part approve of is: Small Business Saturday.
Something I don't like is that where I work opens crazy early and has some specials that are that day only.  If you have hundreds of stores open all over the US I don't think you are a small business and that you shouldn't treat it any differently from any other Saturday.  Putting on big sales just takes business away from small businesses.  I know this happens anyway, but if there is a day that you are being encouraged to buy from them, then others shouldn't be distracting people.  I know people can choose not to buy from the big businesses and all.  That probably got a bit rambly at the end, but it does frustrate me.


Your worst experience on an airplane.
I first read this as "Your worst experience in an airport" and got excited.  So for this one I want to describe both on an airplane and also in an airport.  They were not on the same trip, lucky for me.

Airport: The day leading up to this was very nice.  We were visiting people in the Chicago area.  I got to meet a bunch of The Hubby's out of state friends.  That morning it took us a bit longer to get moving than expected, but we thought that we still had time to go to the best steak and egg place in town.  I don't remember which one was the 'good one' but the place was called Steak ‘n’ Egger and had a neat diner style of decor.
We were rushed to the airport in hopes to make our plane.  We figured we could make it since we didn't have any bags to check so we just tried to check in on our phones.  It wouldn't let us so we went to the automated machines to try that.  It said that it was too close to our flight time to let us do that.  The lines at security was pretty short and moving nicely, so we figured that we still had a chance.
There was some running in the airport after that.  Now keep in mind that I am wearing flip flops and I am totally out of shape.  Running to the plane was a very painful thing.  The Hubby has longer legs than I have and is in better shape, so he got to the counter first.  The nice guy there informed us that they plane had already pulled back from the sky-bridge so there was no way we were getting on to that one.
The next flight wasn't for many hours.  For some reason I hadn't brought any of my knitting along with me and the DS games I had brought didn't appeal to me.  The Hubby also has problems sitting still for too long.  So we wondered around the airport for about five hours until our other flight time.  We would wonder to another part of the terminal and find some empty seating area and sit there doing stuff for a few minutes before getting up and wondering off again.  I feel like we were there for a week.
I had been hinting that we could call someone and hang out more, but The Hubby didn't want to impose any more than we had.  That made sense so I didn't push the issue too much, but it would have been nice to see more of the area in all of that sudden free time.  I especially wanted to go to LUSH and spend too much money on things that smell wonderful.


Airplane: This was on my trip back from Germany.  The interesting thing was that the problem was pretty much all me and nothing about crying babies or someone kicking seats.  The Hubby didn't have a great time on his trip to Germany.  The hubby had to deal with the guy in front of him reclining his seat back the whole way.  It got worse when that wasn't far enough for the guy so he slammed his body weight into the seat to get it to go back farther.  He guy almost his the back of his seat into The Hubby's face.
For me I was tired and cranky to begin with.  Then there was the fact that I had an eight hour flight to look forward to.  It might have also helped if I knew that the space in the seat in front of me had a space to the left that went farther forward than the part on the right.
So there I was, unable to move my legs from one spot because my backpack and shoulder bag were sticking out from under the seat in front of me.  My knees were killing me after only a few hours.  I kept trying to lean back, off of my seat, but that didn't help enough and that made my lower back start to hurt.  It didn't help that The Hubby didn't have anything under his chair in front of his except for his boots.  Though I had some delicate things in my bags, so I didn't want to have to worry about his kicking something and breaking it in his sleep.
The Hubby was trying to help and knows how much I like brie so he gave me his when we got dinner.  Though at one point I needed to get into my backpack and it slid off my lap when I leaned forward.  I don't like talking to strange people, so I didn't turn to ask about it since it had fallen so that it was sitting on the purse of the person behind me.  I had been hoping that she would notice that I was trying to reach between the seat and the wall of the plane, but she did not.

I was not sorry.
There are a lot of retail stories here where I did things that people didn't like but I was not sorry for.  I wasn't rude to them or anything, but it wasn't what they wanted to hear.  The latest one was when someone called on the phone from a school.  She said that they ordered some items from the store website.  Even though she used the school's tax free credit card, they were charged tax.
Since they were charged tax she asked if she could order it from our store, pay over the phone, then have an assistant come in and pick it up.  I told her that we do not take payments over the phone.  I didn't mention it, but that had been the policy for over two years.  There was at least thirty seconds of silence before she said "Fine!" and hung up.  I'm not sure if she sent someone in to get these things or not, but I was not sorry that I asked the managers something I already knew the answer to just to tell her the exact same thing.

Now here are some things I don't understand.  They will show you the break down on the list about each part of the charge before you finish.  There should be a line that mentions about how much they were charged for sales tax.  It should not have been a surprise. 
Another would be a two part wonder.  If they were returning it, wouldn't there now be as many as they had available to order?  Also, why not ask them about some sort of refund for the tax.  I'm not sure if people have to pay to send it back since the website is run by another company so I have not dealt with that, but if they had to, then they were paying shipping twice to not get what they wanted.
I'm probably thinking about this way too much.


Another time was from my old job.  This lady walks in with a Lexmark printer.  She had the printer for a month or two and the 'copy' button on the printer wasn't working.  She wanted to know if she could return the printer.  I told her that the return policy on electronic items was only fourteen days, so we could not take it back.
She had bought the store's Protection Plan on it when she had first purchased it.  She wanted to use that.  I told her that the booklet she had gotten her receipt stapled to had all the information on how to use it.  I asked her how long she had the printer and found out it hadn't been too long.  I told her that for the first year the printer came with it's own plan, so she would have to contact Lexmark.  Our plan didn't kick in until the one that came with the printer ran out.
She then demanded to know what would happen when she called Lexmark about the problem.  I had no idea so I guessed that first they would try and trouble shoot the printer to see if they could get it to work again.  Then I figured they might send her a mailing label and might ask her to send it in.
"So I won't have a printer when I need it most?" was her reply to that.  I was guessing she needed it most right now, but I couldn't really answer that one.  I repeated that they would try and trouble shoot it first, so they might be able to just get it working over the phone.
She then told me that all of that sounded like too much and she really needed a printer with a copy button that was working right now.  She then asked to exchange her printer for one that worked.  That would have been against our policy and we no longer carried that model in the store anyway.
She then jotted something down angrily on the top part of her Protection Plan and told me "See if I ever buy Lexmark again!"
I did not work for Lexmark, so I was not overly worried about anything.  I wished her a nice day as she was walking out, since I did want her to have a nice day, she seemed stressed.  She then thanked me for all of my "non-help."


Oh people, you make me laugh so often.  I had been writing down all my exciting stories from work at one point.  If anyone ever wanted to make some super funny angry people skits, all they have to do is to work retail.  I mean, there is even a comic about it!


Today's count: 2,032
Monthly count: 46,406
Prompts used: 27
Words from titles: 141
Pattern words: 1,870
Other blog: 1,162
Pictures posted: 4 (counting only finished objects)

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