Neglectful

I have been very neglectful of this blog--shame on me. My apologies to my reader(s).

Yesterday I visited my last place of employment (has it really been two years since I held a job?!). The managers I worked under were both present and they barely recognized me. In the past year I have started wearing glasses, cut my hair short and lost 40 pounds, so they both did a bit of a double take when I greeted them by name upon entering the store. We had a pleasant visit and I purchased a few items before leaving with a smile on my face.

I have worked with some lovely women over the years, and I am grateful for that. I'm even more grateful to be a housewife. I'm sure I'll have to get a job again someday, but for now I am happy to leave the hustle and bustle to someone else.

Happy New Year.

Going Postal

While out shopping the other day, I happened upon a cool stuffed dinosaur on the clearance rack at Kohl’s. My four year-old nephew loves dinosaurs and I knew it would make a great addition to his small collection. So, being the cool aunt that I am, I happily took the dinosaur home.

I boxed up the present and went to the post office. The only labels I had at home were USPS Priority Shipping labels I had left over from Christmas. I wasn’t going to ship the gift priority so I simply planned to cut off the top part of the label which identified it as a postal product. When I stepped up to the counter (with label, pen and scissors in hand) I asked the clerk to weigh the package and tell me the parcel post rate. I was still filling out the label and the following conversation occurred:

Postal Clerk: You’re not allowed to do that.
Me: Do what?
PC: That’s a Priority Shipping label and you’re not allowed to use the label if you’re not shipping the package Priority.
Me: Well, I’m going to do it anyway. It’s a label, not a contract.
PC: I’m not going to ship that package parcel post with a Priority label on it.
Me: Fine, then don’t.

I took my package over to the automated postal machine in the lobby, paid for the parcel post stamp ($9) and dropped the package in the box. Problem solved. Or so I thought.

Yesterday my nephew called to thank me for the gift. I was surprised it had arrived so soon; parcel post usually takes all week to travel across the country. I assumed it was a fluke, but then my bother got on the line and told me what really happened. The package arrived Priority Shipping postage due to the tune of $17. There was an official postal form attached to it explaining that the package had been re-routed from parcel post to Priority Shipping due to the fact that the address label was a Priority Shipping label. The mail man who delivered the box to my brother told him he could refuse the package or pay the postage due. So he paid the $17.

I don’t care about the money. What bothers me is the creepy clerk. He felt so strongly about enforcing the postal code that he actually left his counter position, looked for my package, and filled out the form to change the delivery method. I had my first stalker and didn’t even realize it!

Did he do this just for spite? Did he get some perverse pleasure from adhering to the strict letter of postal law? Was he trying to teach me a lesson?

The next time I go to the post office I will be sure to take home a stack of Priority Shipping labels to use as scrap paper at my desk. I have to make up the $17 some how.

You Just Can’t Take Me Anywhere!

I went out for lunch with my new friend Sara yesterday and proved to her that I don’t know how to behave in public.

I met Sara a few months ago through a hobby we both enjoy and we hit it off. As it turns out, she only lives a mile away so we’ve been hanging out every once in a while, in addition to seeing each other at our mutual hobby.

She picked me up at my house and we went to Olive Garden for lunch. We were seated at a small table for two in the corner. Half of the seating along the row of tables was bench seating (against the wall) and the other side of the table had chairs. The other tables were all tables for four and there was only about 18 inches of space separating each table. A little close, I thought, as I took the booth seat.

We ordered our food and were talking and laughing over our salads when a woman wearing way too much perfume sat on the bench seat next to me. She was at the next table but with only a few inches separating us, her scent was overwhelming. I tried whispering to Sara that the woman’s perfume was making me gag, but before I could choke out a word or two the hostess brought a highchair and deposited it in the 18 inches of space separating our table from the next. An older woman (grandmother?) stood there holding a toddler. Oh, great! Two annoyances for the price of one.

I looked up at the hostess and, in a firm voice, said, “Can we not do this.” Everyone froze! The two women with the baby finally gasped and the child’s mother said loudly, “What, you don’t want to eat near a child?!” I kept my eyes on the hostess and said, “If you need to seat them here, I’ll move.” The highchair was blocking my way out, so I made no move to get up and leave, but my tone said it all. I was not happy.

The two women with the child kept cackling, but my issue was with the restaurant employee who decided that the only place in the entire restaurant to seat a woman wearing half a bottle of perfume and her small child was right in my lap. She was scanning the room for another place to seat people when the smelly woman snatched her child out of the highchair. Seeing that the decision had been made, the hostess proceeded to escort the women, child and highchair to another section.

I turned to Sara and said, “I’m sorry if I embarrassed you, but I would have been uncomfortable with them sitting so close.” She had looked surprised at the beginning of my exchange with the hostess, but admitted that she saw my point. We were seated in the corner and my only way out was the small space in which the high chair had been placed. Add to that the overpowering odor and our meal would have been ruined.

I joked with her that she needed to make a mental note to never eat out with me again! I am a bit of an acquired taste, and I readily admit that. I’m not intentionally abrasive but I don’t put up with shit any more than absolutely necessary. I’d rather be disliked for who I truly am than loved for an act that I put on for people.

The rest of our meal went smoothly and the table next to us was eventually occupied by two women who sat on the far side of their table for four. (And they didn’t stink or need a highchair.)

I guess I wasn’t so horrible after all, because Sara drove us to her favourite gelato place for dessert.

True friends love you, warts and all. Hopefully I’ve found a new true friend.

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