Thank You (Now Get Out) – 8/17/10

Now, keep in mind, last week, I promised comics, and not art.  Therefore, without any further ado… comics about people… good and bad (mostly good).  Now I know on a couple of these unless you have OMG-I-am-so-jealous-of-your vision, then you won’t be able to read the text.  Y’all know you can click on the pictures, if you’re so inclined, to get the big thing, right?

So.  This one is Strawberry Sorbet in to save the day.  I walked in Saturday morning with a stomach ache, four hours of sleep, in a bad mood because of a fight with my parents over my broken bed, dejected because Bryan and I had a fail!date the day before… and loads of work, including a redo-job that would occupy exactly five and a half hours of my day.  No exaggeration.  We timed it.  So, anyways, my manager took the liberty of calling Strawberry Sorbet to see if she would come in early.  Bless her.

Rawr.  This guy made me wicked mad.  The Blueprint Arch-Nemesis came in twice before the scene above.  He wanted to copy at least 100 blueprints while he waited.  ‘Scuse me.  Shrink and copy.  I told him no the first time.  Kate told him no the second time.  The third time, Kate was on her way out and he said he only needed a couple done.  She said yes and left it for me.  Wanna know how many a couple is?  45.  It took over an hour.  And he was unhappy about it when it was done, because it was less quality than he expected.  Dah’ling.  You either get speed or quality, but you can’t have both.

This one, clearly, was drawn at a different time in a different colour.  I was having an awful day and Happy PC brought me an oreo milkshake thing from Wendy’s.  He didn’t make and pomp and circumstance about it, he just left it on my desk and I noticed it at least twenty minutes later.  And even though it was a little melty, it still tasted good.  And it was the highlight of my day.  I’m telling you, guys.  Random acts of kindness, no matter how small, really do make a difference.

Those are the ones for this week, ladies and gents.  Apologies for the mediocre drawings… they really only took a couple of minutes each to draw, and I’m no cartoonist.  Most the people lately have been in the run-around back-to-school groove and therefore all rude, but only moderately so.  I think August makes people irritable.  It’s like March.  We’re done with this season, NEXT!  What do y’all think?

Thank You (Now Get Out) – 6/29/10

Tonight, as soon as I get home from work, I took my shoes off and collapsed in the living room for a good ten minutes.  Just the idea of putting my feet up made all the difference.  Physically, standing for eight hours is tiring.  But that’s not why I’m tired.  I have spent the last four days being squelched.  Squelched- it’s that thing you do to mosquitoes sitting on your living room window.  You take a tissue and squish them until they’re two-demensional, then you squished them a little more, wrap them up in sixteen more tissues, and flush the package down the toilet.  These last few days, ladies and gentlemen, I was the mosquito.  People have been a very special level of rude and selfish lately, for reasons that I cannot pinpoint.  Let me give you a few examples of the worst of the worst:

I Can Yell If I Want To
I had a lady a few days ago who was unfamiliar with the copier, and she loudly stated this while I was on the phone with another customer and couldn’t get to her to help.  Out of the goodness of her own heart, another lady went to help her, and when things didn’t go exactly the way she wanted (or more importantly, the price she wanted) the irate novice unleashed her wrath on the good-hearted tutor.  I apologised fervently to the tutor (after being ripped apart by the novice myself) but the damage had already been done.

Cleansliness is Next to Godliness
Strawberry Sorbet (one of last week’s angel’s) had the misfortune of dealing with this lady.  She was making large sized copies for a customer, and because they are so big, occasionally one may tumble to the ground.  We do our best to prevent this from happening, but we are only human.  Sorbet tried to catch the copy, but to no avail.  Cleansliness was appalled and informed Sorbet that under no circumstances would she accept the tumbled one.  I understand apprehension, she doesn’t know how clean our floor is (very, we vacuum several times daily) but she did not politely ask for an unsoiled copy.  She made it clear that she thought the entire place was a cesspool and that Sorbet was incompetent.

Can’t Be Bothered With Children
This is another one of Sorbet’s customers.  She wanted three-dimensional lamination done, which Sorbet made clear wasn’t possible.  After struggled “negotiations” she hands Sorbet an item about an eight of an inch thick and will not take “this will only ruin your original” for an answer.  Meanwhile, as Sorbet does her best with the impossibility, one of Can’t Be Bothered’s children pulls on her sleeve and asks quietly for a trinket (as children will).  Can’t Be Bothered turns and screams at her child… and well, it just escalated from there.

F-The-World
F-The-World made an appearance a couple weeks ago, but he’s back this week.  This week, he had pencils to return.  He hated them, he wanted me to know that “he was going to be nice to me because I’ve been more respectful then many others in this dump, but the company should be ashamed to sell these.  The cashier who rung them out should be fired, the salesman who presented them should be fired, the manager should be fired, and the general manager, and the president of the company that manufactures the product”.  He went on to tell me all the flaws of his 99-cent pencils (most notable of which was that the lead breaks if you push down really hard, which in my eyes is human error, not product malfunction) for about fifteen minutes.  When he finally found the receipt for the item, he realised he had purchased them elsewhere.  Embarrassed, he switched his complaint to a different item.

1-800-Cell-Phone
This evening, I met a gentleman who wanted my time and attention, but didn’t want to give me his. Apparently, he wanted me to be psychic. He came to my counter, slammed a bunch of stuff down, pointed to my copier, then called someone on his cell phone, opening with the line “Hey, I’m not busy right now, what are you up to?” He proceeded to talk on the phone, pausing only twice to wish my manager and one of my male co-workers good evening. When I finished his job, he hung up, paid, and as he was leaving, called what I think was the same person, and said “sorry, I can’t remember my pin number when I’m on the phone.” He completely ignored me, expect to point at my machine, no matter what I said to him.

Strawberry Sorbet
She’s back this week as my one and only extraordinary angel.  She deals with all these insufferable people, and still smiles.  She doesn’t complain, and makes the most of it.  Honestly, I thought that Can’t Be Bothered With Children and Cleanliness is Next to Godliness were some of the most remarkably unfortunate human beings I have encountered in a long time, and she handled it all very professionally.  She has also been incredibly nice to me these last two week, and I’m a lot more relaxed around her because of it, because it makes all the difference in stressful environments.  I’m looking forward to going to an amusement park with her sometime this summer!

That, ladies and gents, was the worst of the worst this week.  I wish words could adequately show you how inappropriately the negative people acted, and encourage the world not to be that person.  As for me, I’m going to bed, and here’s hoping that next week turns around!

Got any remarkable stories about people since last Tuesday?  Someone you wanted to punch in the face, but didn’t?  Someone who brightened your day?  I’d love to hear about it!

mv77@kent.ac.uk

Tastes Like Melting Plastic

Very impromtu last night, I went to a co-worker’s house for a bonfire.  I’ve never spontaneous, but it was fun.  We got marshmallows and graham crackers and Hersey Bars and made s’mores.  Well, sort of.  It was mostly people from work, but they’re all nice people.  Parker played his music and even though he’s big into rap and hip-hop and I’m not… it wasn’t that bad.  Zachary, our host, was a terrible host in the sense that he’s just not experienced at it.  He provided the bonfire pit, but couldn’t find matches or a lighter to start it.  Luckily, someone else had a lighter.  He also offered us “lemonade” which was really Arizona iced tea.  He’s a good kid, but a little flighty sometimes.

He didn’t like getting too close to the fire because it was too hot, so his marshmallows either took forever to roast, or burnt to a crisp, which was kind of funny.  We all showed him the proper way to make marshmallows.  I’m a pushover and it pains me to watch someone do something wrong, so I made him a bunch of marshmallows.  See, I enjoy making them, but not eating them.  I’m weird.

Zach found this old-school retro chair-thing.  You know.  The lawn chairs with the plastic weave and metal frames?  The first time someone tried to sit in it, it broke right through.  Teehee, whoops!  We ended up throwing it in the fire later that night.  The plastic arms were interesting to watch cook, because they melted slowly so it dripped down and stretched out like bubblegum or melted marshmallows.  We just threw it on the fire because it was something to throw on the fire.  It was fun, and I wish I had my camera with me.

It was supposed to rain last night, but it didn’t, and it looks like it’s going to now!  Yikes.  Hope I get to work before it starts!  Still, the bonfire was a nice chance to see people I like at work in an outside-of-work setting.  Besides Zachary and Parker, Kate and Ben were there.  I work with Kate later this afternoon, actually.  Bryan was there too, of course (can I go anywhere without him?  Rarely), but he spent a great deal of his time and energy making fun of Zach.  …  I think all him tormenting is one of the reasons I feel the need to be so nice to him.  I mean, I tease him too, sometimes, but not over the top.  I just feel kinda guilty.  Everybody jabs at him a little (he jabs back, too) but none as hard as Bryan.  …  It’s sad.

Anyhoodle.  I had a lot of fun last night and I needed it after some of my customers, but you will hear more about the rude people of the world in tomorrow evening’s update!

Until then… ciao!

Thank You (Now Get Out) – 06/22/10

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“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion.  If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” ~ Dalai Lama

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So.  I have some good news!  This week was really sunshiney!  The only negatives I have had this week were today: It’s You (who didn’t understand there was nothing on the drive) and Actually, I Don’t Want to Talk to You (who figured he could climb up the ladder and get someone else to create his thing while I waited.  When I left 45 minutes later, he was a happy camper).  But rather than go into detail about their ignorance, I’m going to let the angels sit in the spotlight:

Iguana Man
I was walking down the street on Wednesday and I walked past a man with an iguana or other reptilian creature wrapped around his neck.  It made me giggle.

Miss Jinx
Not to be confused with a Pokemon, Miss Jinx is a character who I am friends with, but see rarely.  She is eccentric but talented and her energy and quirks are really uplifting.  Basically?  She rocks.  I got to spend a little time with her on Thursday.  I learned that she is one of the few humans I know who approves of Hawaiian pizza.  My love for Miss Jinx has grown because of that fact.

Lil’ Miss Gaga
Named for the fact that she idolises Lady Gaga, Lil Miss Gaga is technically one of my students, but she presented me with a music CD on Friday that has been brightening my days ever since.  She introduced me to several new artists as well as reintroducing me to new songs I haven’t heard in ages.  The only down is that I’ve had Ballroom Blitz stuck in my head for days.  But nonetheless, Lil Miss Gaga is also someone who comes off as being in complete control of her life, and I don’t worry around her.

HappyPC
HappyPC is a character who will probably show up a lot.  He’s a bundle of smiles and always, always lifts my spirits when I’m frazzled.  He sure did on Saturday!  Thanks a bunch!

Hey, ‘Sup.
Hey, ‘Sup is one of the people I work with, and whenever he’s not in a bad mood, he’s a lot of fun.  Great personality, and always helpful.  Sunday, he gave me a while into which I could escape, which is always nice at work, when I’m getting overwhelmed.  And the conversation is distracting in a good way; it’s helps me hit reset on his brain.  Hanging out with him on Sunday was tops.  Also, he gets my Captain Courteous award this week, because he always opens doors and lets me pass first, picks up stuff when I drop it (unless I get to it first).  He’s a gentleman in the old-fashioned sense.

Master Chief
Ah, Master Chief.  He came in to look around and say hello in Sunday and he was also a wonderful distraction.  Master Chief is a wonderful human being, though.  He’s a very patient, understanding type of guy, and a great listener.  A pleasure to have as a friend.

Inconceivable!
Inconceivable is an old friend of mine.  In a sense, we’ve been through everything together.  We’ve known each other for about half my life, and I know he’s got my back.  He was one on the ones that went with me to the drive-in Sunday night, and he made me laugh through everything.  I’m so blessed to know him, because he’s just one of those people that I could go a year without seeing, and we’d pick our last conversation up right where we left off.  Seeing him is always a blast.  I get that nagging reminder sometimes that we are moving in different directions with our lives, but it’s coupled with the knowledge that neither of us mind taking a couple steps back and having a good chat.

It’s A Beautiful Day
When doing calls for some of our customers, I try not to be too robotic, and I happened to mention to one customer that it was a beautiful day and I hoped he was at the beach.  He came into the store just to tell me that it made him smile, and he appreciated my perky personality and customer service.  I blushed.  Totally appreciated.

Strawberry Sorbet
Strawberry Sorbet is one of the girls I work with.  I generally get along with her fairly well.  She was particularly nice to me on Monday, maybe she was in a good mood, I don’t know.  But that isn’t what struck me.  What stuck me was that she did a job for a customer who she knows from outside of work, and coming back for the job would be an inconvenience, so she told him she’d bring it to him on her own time in the evening.  He lives about a 40 minute round trip from her.  I thought that was a really nice, selfless thing to do.

Th-th-that’s all folks!  Come around for more next week!  Got anything to add… good, bad, or ugly?  Post it in the comments below!