It just gets better....

Apparently we have a new Regular at the gas station.
She's a menace.
She first came in last Thursday night. Kind of short, long dark hair, probably mid-to-late-50's, a little wrinkly, fingernails all made-up. She grabbed a six-pack of beer and reached for the fresh beef jerky in the display case....
Then she paused. She was already starting to back people up.
"HOW MANY PEOPLE HAVE PUT THEIR HANDS IN THIS?" she squawked.
"...Everybody in town," I said. "But if I whacked the hands of everybody who reached in there, nobody'd ever come back."
"WELL, DO YOU HAVE TONGS?"
They were right in front of her, but she couldn't see them. I handed them to her.
Then when she tried to pay, she got her PIN number wrong for her debit card. She got it right the second time.
"Next time I'll have you SIGN for it," I said. "It'll be faster."
I already suspected she'd had a few, but I was almost certain when she came back a night later. She grabbed another six-pack and was able to get out of the store with no major delays.
But she came back 2 hours later to buy gas....
...And shoved her debit card up the RECEIPT slot and into the gas pump's machinery.
Only the second time I've seen THAT happen in almost 10 years.
I knew SOMETHING was wrong when she stood there in front of the pump for so long. She couldn't figure out where to slide her card at, I guess. Then I SAW her force her card up into the gas pump.
She headed toward the store but I beat her to it. I went out the door and said "You didn't...?"
"Ya got any tweezers?" she asked.
I had to ring-up a couple other customers, so it took me a few minutes to get outside to help her, and she probably wasn't too thrilled about that.
When I went out, it took me a minute to find the key that would open up the receipt box. Then I had to pull the whole printer mechanism out to see if we could MAYBE find her card.
Remember, this is me, The Blind Guy, trying to do this -- trying to do close-up work without his reading glasses.
I fumbled around with the printer for a minute, then tried looking down on it from above to see if I could get a better view. I figured her charge card was going to be gone forever, lost inside the innards of the machine.
But there was her card, an edge of it just sticking out of the top of the printer.
"You are LUCKY," I said.
She tried it again, using the actual card-slider this time, got her gas and went away, and she hasn't been back.
But maybe I have a new Regular to watch out for. Ghod forbid....

Our price for a gallon of Regular gas is still holding at $3.85. While I've seen prices as low as $3.75 (right across the street), I've also seen prices still as high as $3.99. Gouge while the getting's good....

Since The Biker Chick was let go, my shift now follows either my Manager or her Daughter every work-day. Which means I'm running my ass off. But only one more week to go before Vacation.
My Manager does at least stock the drinks cooler and does sometimes bag ice before she goes home. Her Daughter does as little as she can get away with.
So I do a lot of cleaning and stocking on my Monday night to get caught up with how the place was let-go during my 2 days off. And on my Tuesday I price and stock what is usually a pretty-good-sized beer order.
Most nights lately after closing I've been bagging ice and stocking the cooler before I count money and do paperwork. The only plus to all this is that I usually have no time left to mop the store.
I've mopped the whole store exactly once in the last month, and I'm finding other places to cut corners. Because I have no choice. Under our Owner's No Overtime Policy, I have to be out of the building by 1 a.m. So I get as far as I can, then I stop worrying about it and go home.
I've pretty much worn-out my good pair of Work Shoes, so I change shoes halfway through a shift. Most nights my feet ache by the end of a shift. Some nights I limp from the front door to the car, because my feet have HAD IT.
The Summer We All Wanted has at least kept most customers' moods pretty Up -- and I've basically been too tired to care. I AM tired. I've worked an extra month-plus before taking a vacation this year, because of our personnel shuffles. Now that we have enough folks trained to cover for me, I should be able to do my next week standing on my head.
And then a blessed 10 days off....
Long as we don't get too many more customers shoving their debit cards into the machinery....
In November, I'll mark 10 years at this job. Time to retire and write novels...?

Burned out

With apologies in advance to Mel Brooks:

I'm tired.
Tired of playing the game.
Ain't it a friggin' shame?
I'm so tired.
...But I don't wanna get fired.
Can't you see I'm pooped?

How tired am I of my job? Let me count the ways....
* I'm tired of all my co-workers who don't pull their own weight ... then make me feel guilty when I complain about it.
* I'm tired of doing all the work my co-workers leave for me because they're "too busy."
* I'm tired of all the people who bitch about gas prices, when they know I can't control them.
* I'm tired of all the people who rush the door at 2 minutes to midnight to buy massive quantities of scratch tickets or beer or gas -- and pay for all of it in change.
* I'm tired of all the people who make a $2 purchase and pay for it with a $100 bill ... and then get upset when I don't IMMEDIATELY have change for them. I'm not a bank.
* I'm tired of all the people who want their big bills broken. I'm not a bank.
* I'm tired of all the people who ask me a question and then talk over the top of my answer.
* I'm tired of all the people who interrupt me -- for whatever reason. It's rude as hell. I've even started doing it myself.
* I'm tired of all the people in a hurry who slide their debit cards before they've even told me what they want.
* I'm tired of all the people who complain when their credit or debit cards get declined ... even though anybody who uses their card knows WAY more about how much money they've got in their account than I do.
* I'm tired of drunks.
* I'm tired of drunks trying to cheer me up when I'm having a Bad Night.
* I'm tired of having Bad Nights.
* I'm tired of drunk women telling me I'm sexy -- when they normally wouldn't talk to me any other time.
* I'm tired of drunks and druggies and homeless people taking pity on me when I'm stressed out.
* I'm tired of people begging for money, for enough spare change to buy beer, for enough gas money to get home, offering to pay me back tomorrow or leave their car title with me to prove they'll come back. If you're that broke, why are you out driving?
* I'm tired of people asking if I've ever been held-up. If I'd been held up, I probably wouldn't do this anymore.
* I'm tired of people yelling, screaming, for no good reason, just because they think nobody will call them on it.
* I'm tired of out-of-control people. There are a LOT of them out there these days. People with no boundaries, who want to share their crisis with EVERYONE. Sometimes I think I'm becoming one of them.
* I'm tired of people skulking around, always being up to something, always trying to see how much they can get away with. Even if the economy wasn't in the toilet, there'd be a lot of lowlifes running around.
* I'm tired of everybody wanting something for free, WANTING A BARGAIN, wanting to barter: "I can get this cheaper down the road." So, go there. There's the price, pay it or leave.
* I'm tired of people who park in the parking lot for an hour -- or 2, or 3 -- and then leave. What are they doing out there? Making a drug deal? Gabbing endlessly on their cell phones? Thinking over whether it's worth it to hold me up? It's not. Get outta here, ya make me nervous. Go home.
* I'm tired of people trashing the restroom and not cleaning up after themselves. What the hell are they like at home?
* I'm tired of people who can't put down their cell phone long enough to complete a transaction -- or even tell me what they want.
* I'm tired of the drivers whose cars blow through the parking lot at 30 or 40 miles per hour EVERY DAY. It's a fucking GAS STATION, morons!
* I'm tired of the endless churning hurry, the rush to be somewhere, always running late -- it never stops. No wonder there are so many car wrecks. No wonder so many people are so stressed-out. It's sure as hell not just me.
* I'm tired of all the bullshit.
* I'm tired of complaints -- customers', mine, anyone's.
What does that leave? Well, not much. At least they're still paying me....