And you can quote me. (or "Just Call Me Misanthrope)
"Educator Appreciation Weekend" again at the bookstore. Also known as "I Can't Believe These Assholes are Teaching Future Generations" weekend.

Let it first be known that not all educators are included in my broad, bitter, blanket statements. One of my best friends taught me high school English. Another friend teaches kindergarten. They both rank at the top on the Most Kind, Cultured, and Intelligent People I Know list. I know there are others out there. So WHY....pray tell, don't they happen to shop at the bookstore I work at?

It never fails. The moment a woman wearing a fuzzy sweater-- with, say, geese on it, or perhaps a heartwarming embroidered cliche of some sort-- approaches the counter with that "you just lost recess privileges, mister" look on her face, I know I'm in for it.

Fact: Teachers make up a high, HIGH percentage of the most manipulative, condescending, deceitful, and outright rude customers I experience. I can't count the times that I have had to practically bite off the end of my tongue to keep from saying something snide to a teacher feigning ignorance about taking advantage of our discount system, or outright lying about what items they're buying for their students. I still get a churny stomach when I think about one particularly loathsome woman who originally stuck out when she was rude to a coworker of mine, and who I saw talking to her teenage grandkid in the manga section, and who boldfacedly included a Battle Angel Alita book in a discount purchase for her third graders.

For those of you who are familiar with Battle Angel... does that seem strange? (When I think of the anime, I just have to say, "The dog! Good Lord! The poor dog!" )

Her excuse? Her excuse for supposedly getting an R rated book for her third graders? "Well, the kids...they like to draw the characters. I'm teaching them how to draw the characters." then an extremely dirty look. If I had been able to snort in her face and tell her to shove it, I probably wouldn't even remember the incident. But instead it just festers, made worse by other just plain nasty people. I know--I have issues.

Among my issues is the fact that I don't forget a face. So I recognize the guy who cut me off and flapped his hand dismissively at me when I asked if there was anything more I could help with. "TCH! (he silences me). Don't babble at me. I'm done with you. Go away. God. You people." I also recognize the guy who tried to steal a cd, and the woman who called me a bitch because our store didn't have the book she wanted, and the woman who berated me because I wasn't able to process her expired coupon, and the man who cussed me out because our store carries one magazine and not another, or the kid who came in in a suit, expecting to get a managerial job, and snorted condescendingly when I asked if he'd like to fill the application here, or bring it back. "I have a resume here." Good. And I have a degree in Literature. The store doesn't hire you if you don't apply. He ended up snatching his resume back, dusting it off, and stalking out. I recognize these people when they come back. I help them find their books, and sometimes I take their abuse again. I'm tempted to ask, "So... still think you're better than everyone?"

All this to say, sometimes I hate people. Stupid but well-intentioned people are fine. They make me want to help even more. But mean people are another story. The best thing to do is go to bed early.

On another note...

Tonight the Boy and I walked around outside, since it was "nice" for the first time in eons. We walked up to a pitiful defunct Big K and looked at all the "Store Closing!" and "Everything Must Go!" and "For God's Sake! Buy our Crap!" signs. We peered in at the empty rows of white metal shelving and the little clusters of stuff that still hasn't been sold. It was creepy in a Twin Peaks sort of way, as if Nadine was going to come busting out with her arms loaded with cotton balls for her "silent drape runner" invention.
The creepiness was compounded by the fact that the coke machine outside was clearly disturbed. Instead of the little screen about the cash insert flashing "Cold. Drinks. Coke. $1.00." It instead told us, "Flolt. Boop. 4931. Gaup." Hmm. I was poised to flee rapidly if it flashed, "ZOOOLE."

The Thing about Tuesdays...
I could never get the hang of tuesdays.

I also could never get the hang of why people kill each other.

That's all I'm going to say about that.

Actually, that's not all I have to say about it. Before I shut up on the subject, the reason I will not be writing about the war in this blog is that the world is supersaturated with information and opinions for and against it already. It is not that the topic of the war doesn't evoke many emotions in me. It is not that I don't have anything to say about it.

It is that I have trouble getting up in the morning, and I have trouble going to sleep at night, and I have a sick feeling in my stomach most of the time these days. Come to your own conclusions. You don't need my opinion. And I sure as hell don't need to write about it.

For the record...

One of the undisputed sweetest little moments of working at a bookstore/cafe happened a couple years ago. The guy in the cafe served a hot cocoa to a mom and a little girl. He topped the daughter's drink with sprinkles and handed it to her with a wink. Later, he was wiping down the counter when he heard some rustling from below the front of the register. Then a little hand emerged from below the counter to set a note on it. It quickly withdrew, there was more rustling and some smothered giggling. The paper showed a crayon drawing of a boy and a girl holding hands and running while an enormous smiling sun looked benevolently on. The boy was wearing an apron. And below, it said:

Dear Man. I like you. I liked it when you blinked at me.

No signature, just an anonymous love note from a tiny admirer. It's still posted in the back room of the cafe.

Another paper a little person recently gave a manager said this:

Sory! Sory! Sory! sory! Sory 100000000000000 times!!!

Along with the paper, we also received the little plastic key chain that the young author had stolen. It's good to know that someone's son out there probably won't grow up to be a cleptomaniac.

alwayswearunderwear


I remember it as the big joke of the high school Latin club or what-have-you. "Semper ubi can ubi." Or something along those lines. Students would intone it seriously across the cafeteria, and those of us "in the know" would titter into our hands.

It comes to me because today I was reminded of an event that took place several weeks ago. A. told me about it with a mixture of distaste and laughter. How does a small, flower-printed pair of panties end up hastily wadded under a display in our children's department? I'm not sure I want to know. Wait. Make that a definite "no." I really don't want to know.

The thing that reminded me happened at the drive through at Taco Bell today. You may not inspect the curb while waiting in line at the drive through, but I sure do. There are all kinds of bizarre things to be found on streets and curbs. I have seen these things at the side of the road:

1. a big live crab
2. a gun
3. (In Illinois) a crumpled New York license plate.
3. two policemen on foot with flashlights and dogs in front of a slowly moving police car.
4. a guy wearing nothing but a sandwich board that said "ART"
5. a big cd binder with 50 cds in it. Unfortunately, most of them were crappy music.

I'm hoping to someday find a big envelope of rent payments for the next 300 years. I'm not crossing my fingers.

As I glanced down today, I was slightly startled and amused to see an underwire. You know, from an underwire bra. The kind that drive you nuts until you have to just rip the wire part out. There was no mistaking it. They look a certain way. A flat "C" of metal with the ends coated in plastic so that they don't actually make you bleed when they painfully stab you. I'm not going to make a cup guess or anything, but I can sympathize with the poor woman who was so frustrated with torturing bustenhalter that she ripped from it the offending wire and flung it from her car just in time to place an order for a "Meef Chubacabra Combo, with coke and a soft taco. "

Eureka!

This post is also directed to the misdirected individual seeking a pretty amputee.

You know, I might just have found your perfect lady! Sure, she has all her limbs, but she seems like just the sort of wacky, good humored, clever woman you're looking for. Perhaps if you two hit it off, she might be convinced to get a leg removed or something.

Yup, I'm talking about "crazy coffee stealing little old lady." I think you two might just share something really special... like a total disregard for social norms. I mean, this old girl really knows how to buck the system! I used to see her all the time in the cafe at our store. She'd come in a few minutes after we opened, and spend her entire day pretending to read whatever magazines were left on the table, and figuring ways of nicking coffee for free. Her original approach was to casually go up to the info desk where the coffee samples were, and get herself a little cup. Then for the rest of the day she'd dash to the pots in the cafe and fill up whenever the staff's backs were turned. My very favorite of her approaches was the "ninja-stealth mug approach," where she'd sit near a table where someone had left a cold, halfdrunk mug of coffee and some magazines. This approach takes discipline, wits and a keen sense of timing. She had them all. At any time, someone might sweep through and clear away the target mug, or she might been seen in her careful, steady approach, sitting closer and closer to the mug table until eventually she was sitting right across from it. Casually, she'd get up to inspect something nearby, and when she returned, BINGO. She'd sit right down in front of it, and look at the mug as if to say, "You're mine, bitch."

Can you believe it? I know you guys would totally fall in love. She's so clever. But get this:

Once she had the hapless mug in her grasp, she'd sit there clutching it for awhile, so that everyone would know that it was hers all along. She didn't even care if there were lipstick marks on it, when she was obviously wearing none. Then she'd streeetch and pick up the mug and head to the cafe counter, pretending to be really interested in the danishes. Sometimes she would even buy a few things just to throw off the salesperson... and then, without warning... "Could you warm this up for me?" She would proffer the purloined mug. Just adding coffee would never do, you see. She wanted it microwaved, presumably so that any germs from the previous owner would be "zapped." Of course, if you offered her fresh coffee in the same mug, she'd get flustered and flap her arms a little. There'd still be germs! Then a sly look would cross her face. "Oh, thanks. but could you warm it up in the microwave? Um...because your coffee is never hot enough. Yeah."

It could be it's never hot enough because you've never had it fresh, Coffee Lady.

So, what do you think? I could totally hook you guys up. What you'd probably want to do is sit very quietly at a table in the cafe with a half cup of cold coffee across from you as bait.

I'm just trying to help.

Lonely..... leg?
Ok, Mister. I know you're out there. Yeah, I'm talking to you--- the guy who sneakily leaves xeroxed signs taped to the garbage cans outside our store every other Tuesday or so. (No, not you, Mr/Ms. "work at home, lose weight, and make millions" sign maker. )

I'm talking to the guy who leaves the signs entitled "Seeking Pretty Amputee"

For starters, I would like to know why you leave your signs on our garbage cans in the dead of winter. If you are seeking an amputee, shouldn't you look someplace amputees are...well, LIKELY to be? Or have I simply missed the droves of good looking limbless that hang around reading trash cans in the snow rather than coming the heck inside the store for some good hot chai? That could be it. Either way, you probably should post it away from all those "lost pets" signs. it looks weird. Er... weirder.

The next thing that leaps to mind is the text of your...proposal? Personal personal ad? Query? In any case, what you make known is that you are a clean, slim, white, male office professional around the age of 50. You are a self proclaimed creative--an artist and a writer. There is no mention of how many limbs you may have. I would, however, like to suggest a thesaurus for replacing overused "personal ad" phrases like, "nice" or "disease free."

Now, the writing, I can forgive, but you claim to be an artist. You even provide said art--the top half of your sign is dominated by a clumsy rendering of what I can only assume must be a pretty amputee. Now, I can appreciate your use of the pastoral setting. Everyone looks nice lounging on a picnic blanket in a woodsy park... But is there a reason that this particular legless lady is so busty that an explosion from her lowcut top seems eminent? Or does she have to lean forward like that to balance herself? The prominent placement of her crutches seems so contrived, as if she is saying to the world, "Well, hello, World. Has any one happened to notice I only have one sexy leg?" I would recommend going for some classical Danish props next time. Perhaps your next amputee could be gazing at a skull, or holding a copy of the Gutenburg Bible. To be quite honest, the overall feel of this work was less like high art, and more like that of a coloring book.

...Which is probably why your latest posting ended up colored by crayons, and on the breakroom fridge. Like we're some proud parent, displaying your art. Don't get your hopes up.

The next thing I would like to point out is your description of the perfect Ms. Right. You seek an intelligent woman of any age who is slim to curvy... hmm... I guess being non-specific can only widen the playing field... but then you had to add that she must have one leg amputated a few inches below the hip. Right or left hip?

You're "seeking a serious relationship, possibly leading to marriage," and those are your specifics? I'm just asking. Your closing statement of I'm drug and disease free. You should be too. seems a little demanding. Or is it just me? Are you saying that if she's not, she ought to be, but by all means, write anyway? Or don't bother? Can you afford to be so picky?

Anyway, I just wanted to offer you a little feedback. I, uh... hope you find your amputee. before she finds you.