The Things You Cannot Change

This is a post just to vent. Read at your own risk.
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Today is Monday.

Last Thursday and Friday were the hottest days we've had in three years.

A.) Since the store got a new manager, and

B.) Since sales are sooooo slooooow, and

C.) Since late June is to a 666BBHS garden center what late September is to a normal person ( I.E. I've already got Christmas products listed on my incoming shipments)....

....I don't have the help in the garden center that I at did at the beginning of the season.

Nonetheless, there are still LIVING plants waiting to be sold, and more coming in.

So, on Thursday and Friday, with very little help I battled the elements~ eight hours at a stretch~ and WATERED. That's all I did. And when I left on Friday night, everything was fine.

This is what I came into this morning.


(Photo taken from the web.)

For the two days I was off, no one watered. Maybe they did on Saturday, but with plants that doesn't count.

I walked into carnage the likes of which I haven't seen since last year.

Anybody who cares about plants and walks into a 666BBHS garden center can identify with the horror and anger you feel when you see swaths of plants just BEGGING for water. I've had that experience myself, and I worked there. But for it to be MY garden center and having worked so hard for the two days prior to keep them alive.....

For the first 5 hours I wasn't angry. I was heartbroken. Really. It was all I could do not to cry while on my break (I did cry when I got home).

What I did for this eight hours was to water with one hand and throw dead plants in a cart with another. By the time I left (having had no help) I had five full carts and another 4 racks of dead plants.

The thing that galls me is that for both days the 'best and the brightest' were working~ led by Susan, the woman who lost the job to me. By the time the day was over I had told the store manager to hire a vendor we have that cares and put Susan back in Home Decor where she can talk someone's ear off without killing half the merchandise while she's at it.

She works tomorrow. I have no idea what attitude she's going to find from me.

.....................

Why in the world did I think I could change anything?

Oh, The Things We Can Do!

Jay spends WAYYYYY too much time in Walmart, but he has to for his new job. In his job he wanders the store and one day sent me this photo of a magazine cover.

The main article tease is somewhat hidden. It reads, '12 Great Ways to Pray'. Well, golly.

Has prayer come to this? We have to make it exciting? Trendy! Hip! Make it do-able on our worst days?

I grant you, I haven't read the article and won't. I'm too busy using biblical step number 4; sending a plague of locusts to every CEO I've ever heard of, in order to end the recession. Then I'm going to turn Bernie Madoff into a pillar of salt.

Yeah. That'll help.

You Really Wanna Know?

Carmon was kind enough to give me an award.

It's been a while since that's happened and I'm honored.

I'm supposed to come up with 7 interesting things about me and pass this on to way more folks than I know at this point.

Well, one step at a time....

Interesting Things About Me

Huh.
.
.
.
I'm thinkin'.


...And I'm reaching, but,

1. I have not one, but two friends who have grandfathers who were true snake handlers. One (Michael Childers) used that knowledge to create a frightening character on the X-Files. He's terrified of snakes and had to reach into a box with real snakes to do the scene.




2. I met my first husband on June 8th and married him on August 27th of the same year. I've never regretted it.

3. During the AIDS epidemic, I did a lot of writing. Someone talked me into having an editor look at it. He wrote in the margin, 'Good, with flashes of brilliance'. It's not enough.

4. I went to California once. That's why Jay moved here with me.

Thinking...

Thinking...

(I used to be interesting....)


5. When I was 17 my boyfriend Tim and I picked up Cathy and Peter in Tim's van (that was a rich brown color and was named Shadowfax and had a livable interior....walls of orange, shag carpet...doncha know) and then we picked up Renee from her dorm and decided to drive her to Ohio where her parents lived.

Problem. It was the '70's, we were 'hippies' and she was Jewish. Her parents were 'pleasant' for as long as it took them to tell Renee there was no way we would be staying overnight.

Well, hell.

Peter had to get home to Canada, so why not? We took him home and parked the van all over Toronto at night, and slept wherever. Tim and I had long since quit doing drugs but the border patrol confiscated his allergy medicine all the same and threatened to find us if it turned out to be, what?

I called my mother to tell her I wouldn't be coming home for a while.

That went well.

I still have pictures of Peter and Cathy at Niagara Falls, and I remember that Tim was able to cash a check at a bank... long hair and all. And the thing I remember most about Canada was thinking that it was what the United States must have been like without so many people. It was awe inspiring. (Is it still, Violet?)

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6. Jay found a clip from the movie 'Up' and it shows Russell (the kid) meeting Dug (the dog) for the first time. We watch it all the time. In the clip Russell finds out Dug is trained.

A friend gave me Bear ( a huge Cocker Spaniel). It took me forever to figure out why he did what he did when I gestured. Turns out, he had been taught with hand signals.
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7. It meant little to me at the time, but now I know when gardens became important to me.

When I was eight or so my mother walked me down to a garden below our house and we walked along a row of carrots. She told me to pull one. I did.

There is magic in what the Earth can offer, and it's orange.

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I guess that's it. I want to hear from all of you, but Mel.... YOU ARE MY PICK. Tell me seven more things about you and your incredible life. And Jolie, don't be shy, as if that would ever happen.

And it occurs to me... Kevin, I know you're reading this. Tell me in the comments. I DARE you to come up with seven things I don't know THAT CAN BE WRITTEN HERE.

Thanks, Carmon. This should be fun.

Hmmmm.....

Bridges

Incredible photo by Keith...

From 1979 until the early '90's I worked somewhere in or around the Loop (in Chicago). I lived north of there by about three miles and took the 151 Sheridan bus down trendy Michigan Avenue and got off somewhere, to walk east or west to my job. To entertain myself during the commute I usually read, but I remember a rich time when I studied latin from a book and what I learned then serves me to this day.

Anyway, in the summer you had to pray the bridges weren't going up before you crossed them. There was no way to really know when it would happen, so you just crossed your fingers and hoped for the best. But if you got to work late and said the bridges were up, people knew what you meant and you were forgiven.

Sitting on a bus, you never saw what was keeping you (though I've stood many other times to watch it happen). Keith did a balcony for a client recently and took the above photo. Sometimes it's only one sailboat that holds up an entire city.

For some reason, I find that cool.

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My birthday was this week.

Someone who loves me gave me these.....



They came with two cards, one from Jay and one from Meander. Both referred to my advanced age and my 'de-vanced' body. All I can say is that this better not be a trend. 'Youth' has it's weaknesses, as well. Don't make me call you out.


The couple upstairs (Reva and George) just couldn't resist finding me something from the movie, 'UP'.


Dug and I are now fast friends. As are the lotion and body wash he arrived with.

Then today, Jay said there was a bag hanging from our doorknob. It wasn't birthday wishes. It was Christmas for all of us! No, really. Our Christmas presents.



Kevin, I don't know how you did it (or maybe she was just tired of looking at it?) but, thank you. We were broke bitches without candles and, you're right.... that WAS fun. (And you outdid yourself on the ornaments.....)

My Dad emailed me a photo. I mention it last because it gives me such pause.

My mother gave him something not long after I was born and he's saved it for me. Oh, the stories it's created in my head...
Dad, you'll never know how much it means to me.

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Work? Yeah, there's work.

The store manager quit... the one who hired me. This 666BBHS screwed a man who worked for them for 18 years, so he's gone off to the OTHER 666BBHS. Against all rumors, an in-house person was hired in his place. I think we like each other, which would be good....

..........

One last note for history's sake.... it's cold. I mean, it's June 10th and soon to be in the forties. I'm tired of it. Reva is tired of it. The plants won't grow, it's hell to grill out, we don't want to use our porches.

Sean and Steph leave us in 10 days. A posse disbanded is not a good thing. We need time to bond~one last time...


click to enlarge...

Walk the Crooked Road

and, reflect.

If Unemployment Is Touching You....

you might want to look at this...

marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/06/03/pm_unemployment/

Sorry....

I'm on a roll....

If you took the flowers off the top of these lillies, that stalk of leaves is what you'd have. It's what I have in droves.

It happened last year and it's happening now. The people in corporate think everyone wants these damned plants, but most people already have them. Early in the season we get vast shipments of them and we are not allowed to cut the orders. So there is lily upon f*cking lily and they keep coming and coming and coming, and....you get the idea.

If people won't buy them with blooms, they sure as hell won't buy them without~ so I asked someone to take all of the bloomless lilies off the table and truck them over to the clearance carts so I could re-price them. By my hand they went from 4.98 to two bucks. And there they sat. A good 75 of them.

.................

I walk by a couple about my age who says 'hi, you don't remember us'. Nope.

Last September they came in for flowers for their daughters outdoor wedding and I helped them. Now, I remember. They were happy and now they are back.

She tells me that if I will give her the lillies for a dollar each she will take all that are on that particular cart, which is 50. I would imagine that my manager would not be pleased. Five dollars minus four is a big gouge in profit. I would say it's a 'non-profit' situation... but it beats hell out of throwing them out last year. I pause and say sold.

Her husband still has a cane, so she says she needs help putting them in the car. Really? A six pack of them isn't heavy but we're getting rid of them. Fine.

As she pays, he pulls the... big, black, luxurious car up and opens the trunk. I ask if they have a huge yard since he's been bitching about the amount she's buying and I'm beginning to smell the arrogance. He says, "Oh, yes!". Meanwhile, I've told the cashier that there are 50 plants at 1.00 each...on clearance. She has to ring it up per plant.. 50 times.

One of my guys arrives to do the loading, so I leave him to it and go back to whatever, somewhere in the garden center.

A few minutes later I hear the cashier shriek my name.

What?

The cashier is holding up a lily plant and says, "She wants to know if she can have this one for free."

No.

And I see the customer wave her hand dissmissively and go to her car.

After the customers' left I asked the cashier why she wanted a free plant.
.
.
.
Because it was taking the cashier too long to ring up the sale price of 50 (five dollar) lillies for $1.00.

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You'ld better believe I'll remember them next time.

Hannah said....

"Oh but this is so FUNNY. I bet as you're going to sleep you remember one of these moments and laugh yourself awake," about some of my customers.




Not so much. This was today's....

Answer the phone, 'Garden Center. Robin speaking. How can I help you?'

I hear:

"You are the third person I've talked to. What you are going to do is listen to my question and then hang up on me."

What is there to say?

I said, 'Okay'.

"What I want to know is, do you have Fuchsia hanging baskets?"

"No, we don't. We did, but I can't get them anymore."

"So, you don't have Fuchsia baskets?"

"No. We don't and cannot get them again."

"Where are you located?"

"Somewhere between here and Extreme Aggravation Avenue."

"And how much were the baskets when you had them?"

"Somewhere around 8.99. They were a good deal."

"But you don't have them anymore?"

"No. We DO NOT HAVE FUCHSIA HANGING BASKETS ANYMORE."

"But, my friend just bought them there two days ago."

"She couldn't have, Ma'am. We haven't had them for three weeks".

Click.

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Not enough?

..............

Nicely dressed, perfectly coiffed woman is staring down at a table of red begonias.

"If I buy these I'll have to get a tray for them, won't I?"

I don't know what she means so I pull out a flat for her. ( A 'flat' being 6 packages in a tray.)

"You think I should put them out in THAT?"

I looked at her.

As if I should have known, she said...."I'm putting them on GRAVES". (People always say GRAVES or CEMETARY as if you were too coarse to understand the gravity of their situation.... knowing dead people and all....)

This still doesn't clear up the tray thing. Eventually I realize that she can't plant them in-ground and needs a container. I point her in the correct direction and go about my day.

She looms large, five minutes later holding a 24 inch long planter, saying loudly "You have nothing smaller than this?!"

"No, ma'am. That's the smallest we've got."

"Well, I bought them here last year smaller."

I don't bother to tell her that we didn't have smaller last year. I ask if there are restrictions on shape. Could she use a round pot?

"A round pot? Like what?"

I point to a cheap, round terra cotta-like pot..

"You mean a deep pot?"

"Yes."

"But, but...you won't be able to see the flowers!"

"Of course, you will. They will rise above the lip of it as well as they would the rectangle."

To my astonishment, she literally shrieked, "NO, THEY WON'T'!

I said, "Okay" and walked on to leave her to it.

~ It was on my lunch break, thinking it over, that I realized she thought she should put in two inches of soil and plant them in the bottom of the pot.

People like that deserve what they get.

No, girl, I can't laugh....

You make me smile, though.

New Studies Indicate that the....

least religious states are....


10. Connecticut
9. Nevada
8 and 7.....tie: Rhode Island and Oregon
6. Washington
5. Alaska
4 and 3...tie: Mass and Maine
2. New Hampshire
1. VERMONT

States with the highest 'Sin' taxes?

10. Florida
9. Utah
8. Maine
7. Michigan
6. New Mexico
5. Iowa
4. Alabama
3. Washington
2. Hawaii
1. ALASKA

Most 'free' states...
5. Texas... Uh huh. I'm still not visiting, let alone moving there.
4. Idaho
3. South Dakota
2. Colorado
1. New Hampshire

Least 'free' states...

5. Maryland
4. California
3. Rhode Island
2. New Jersey
1. New York

Per www.realclearpolitics.com

Given this information, I'm headed to New Hampshire.