Jots and Tittles

It seems like the only time I post to this journal is when I want to complain anymore. So I guess you can assume that because I've not posted in a long time, things have been going well. But holy crap, today sucked on ice.

Okay, the beginning wasn't bad. I got to see my boy, that was nice. I'm a fan of sitting and just being together. That's nice. But when I got to work I knew it was going to be bad. Carole called in sick, so after 5 it was just me and Renee. Now, Renee is a very sweet lady, but I'm pretty sure that if her mental handicap were any more severe she would require live-in assistance. I'm not saying that to be mean, I'm saying that because it's the truth. The only place she would ever be able to get a job is a place like Wal-Mart; she simply doesn't have the mental capacity for anything else.

The problem there is, she's slow. And, well, awkward. She has to explain everything to you six different times, not because you didn't understand but because... well I don't quite know why. She knows she repeats herself because she'll even say, "And like I said..." when she does it. And she stutters, so it takes her forever to say anything once. She's very loud about it, and very deliberate (in the way that very small children are when they're doing something new that requires a lot of concentration). I can see customers who ask her for help cringing when they realize that their quick question has turned into a ten-minute discussion on the subject, and it makes me cringe because I'm sure they don't see that poor Renee thinks she's being friendly and helpful. All they see is this stupid woman who won't let them just go get the tie they needed in the first place. She's just as bad on the phones, and when she gets on the intercom to page she'll sometimes forget what she's saying and all you hear is this long "uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" while she figures it out. And of course, it takes her forever to do her work, because it takes so much effort from her.

That's all very well on most days, when we have enough coverage that we can let her go do her menswear and take care of everything else ourselves. But when there's only 2 of us, it creates problems. Somebody has to be on phones all the time, and either you put Renee on phones and have her awkwardly interacting with all the customers (*wince*) or you put her on the floor and pray the work gets done. Either way, something is getting neglected. And it's hard enough to make things work when there's just Barb and I, or just Carole and I. With Renee, well, I knew I was in for a night of stress. Glorious.

So to start the evening off, a lady called from Loveland looking for a White Stag polo shirt. We had a few on clearance (she didn't care about the size, which I thought was odd, but whatever) so I plugged some numbers into the telxon, figured out what kinds we had, and set aside 4 of them like she asked me to. She said she'd be in after a couple of hours to pick them up, so I put her name on them and forgot about them. She came in about three hours later with her daughter to pick them up. The problem is, she thought for some unknown reason that I said they were marked at $4 each, which is stupid because every single thing I had said they were marked at $6.50, which is clearance priced anyway and if you ask me it's a damn good price for a polo shirt. Anyway, she and her daughter threw an absolute fit, swearing that I had told them it would be $4 for the shirts and they drove all the way up from Loveland to find them and so on. Finally they had me call the supercenter, which also had them on clearance for $6.50. Apparently only the Loveland store has them down to $4. But they stormed out in a huff, left the shirts I'd pulled for them, and that set the tone for the evening.

Another lady came in looking to buy a dress shirt for her husband. She found some that were marked as clearance, but when she got it to the register it was ringing up as normal price. They called Renee up (it was menswear, after all) and asked her about it, so she put it into the telxon and sure enough, the shirt was in the system as regularly-priced. So Renee explained that sometimes customers will stick clearance tags anywhere, whether on the shirt on which they belong or not, if they find one they don't want. Oh no, insists the irate customer, they were all marked clearance. And sure enough, they were indeed. Well, that was somebody's mistake but it couldn't have been Renee or I because we're not in charge of markdowns. So we pulled all the shirts and left them for Tabby to deal with, but the customer was all kinds of irate. And I missed most of this particular situation, but when I came back to the fitting room after running some returns Renee explained it in excruciating detail, several times, at the top of her voice. And then wrote a nice novel for Tabby to read, explaining it in excruciating detail, which she had me read so I could verify that she hadn't left anything out. And then one of the assistant managers came over and asked her to quit talking about it because she wasn't exactly saying very complimentary things about the customer and she wasn't exactly being quiet about it. And she couldn't stop explaining what had happened, and poor Thomas was just standing there trying to get her to understand that he knew what happened and he would take care of it, she just had to quit talking about it where everyone in the store could hear her indignation with the customer. I was trapped in the fitting room scanning the returns so I couldn't just edge away slowly. Booooo.

So we were incredibly short-staffed tonight, nobody had coverage anywhere, and nobody could come help us get our returns away and so forth tonight. Renee and I had to do the best we could with what we had. I sent the phones up to the service desk so at least we didn't have to worry about that. But she didn't get all her returns done and I didn't get all mine done either (mostly because a bunch of girls who didn't speak English showed up at the fitting rooms about 9:45, and the fitting rooms close at 10, but they wanted to try on all this stuff, and I couldn't let them because the limit is six and they'd never get out before 10, but I couldn't exactly explain that to them because they didn't have a friggin clue what I was saying). By the time 10:00 rolled around I was still trying to clean up the mess the girls had left when they just dumped everything they decided they didn't want after all on the counter, and once I dealt with that I just left. I would have stayed until the work was done but then I'd have wound up with unauthorized overtime and Wal-Mart frowns on that kind of thing. Besides, I was exhausted and frustrated and I mostly just wanted to go home and vent to my livejournal, where I knew I could at least rant and rave a bit so I wasn't going to bed just wallowing in it.

I could really have used a hug tonight but my boy is busy blowing stuff up and he needs a night of guy stuff. So I'll go curl up with A Little Princess or something like that and eventually I'll fall asleep. And, with any luck, tomorrow will be better. Or at least Carole won't be gone so we'll have some more help...

-Jaya-

I got my schedule finalized at Wal-Mart today. 1-10pm every day except Monday and Friday. And let me tell you something: it SUCKS. First of all, it kills any opportunity I might have had for a social life except occasionally on Friday nights. And I'm still working for Rosie on Fridays until 6. Not that I had much of a social life before, but that killed it almost completely dead. The only benefit is that I can stay up almost as late as I like at night, because I don't have to work in the morning and I can sleep in. Small comfort, it's not like anyone else will be in that situation. Second, I'm a sales associate in ladieswear, which is probably the most boring job in the store. I spent all day today (when I wasn't in training, which was sitting in front of a computer watching lame videos and then taking quizzes about them) doing zoning and returns. In other words, I took clothes that weren't where they were supposed to be and put them where they were supposed to be. Or, worse yet, took those shirts that stupid people unfold and then just lay about willy-nilly and re-folded them, then put them where they were supposed to be. It was exciting when I found a return for another department because then I could walk the extra ten steps to the front and put them in the return cart. Woo hoo. And third, we're going to be changing to a Super Wal-Mart soon, which means I'll get to do that with an even bigger area. I can't wait.

Kill me now. Please. It would be so very, very kind of you.

Oh, and my parents (of course) can't make anything easy for me, so they're going to look in to towing the Explorer all the way to Brighton so they can take it to Briggs. Can you imagine how expensive it would be to tow that thing 60 miles to get it fixed? Uncle Scot was kind enough to look into finding me a mechanic (which reminds me, I have to call him tomorrow) and Dad can't trust his own brother to find someone capable of fixing my car. God only knows what's going to happen with THAT mess. And Mom wants me to come home for Travis's birthday, which isn't going to happen because it's on a Sunday and I really don't think he cares. And I'm not going home on Monday instead because that's Troy's birthday and that would be lame. Ohh, sweet, I just realized that Troy's birthday is a Monday! *insert evil laughter here* *and devious plotting here* But I can't tell my mom that; when I told her tonight that he was kind enough to let me drive his car until mine is fixed, she nearly flipped out because clearly that means I'm spending too much time with him (well maybe I am and maybe I'm not, but whether or not I'm driving his car has no bearing whatsoever on how much time I spend with him), et cetera et cetera et cetera. Needless to say, it'd be rather stupid to tell her that we're dating. So I had to carefully construct my answer in such a way as to make it sound like he's a wonderful awesome amazing fantastic person (which he is) but not let on that I'm dating him. Do you realize how difficult that is? *sigh* I wish I could just tell her the truth, but I can imagine how that will end. And it won't end well, for me or Troy.

Well that's enough complaining for now, I'm going to go watch a movie or something because I'm lonely and bored and I'm too wired to sleep. Au revoir, mes amis!

-Jaya-

Well, I've got about fifteen minutes left to sit at work, and absolutely nothing to do. I could, I suppose, go and clean out the spam box once again (all six messages that may have found their way in there since the last time I did so), or maybe put the most recent water bill into the ledger. But, I'll surely have more bills to enter than just one the next time I come in (Sunday), and so it doesn't really seem worth it to bother with one now. So, what do I do? Why, take quizzes, of course!

You Are 25 Years Old

You are a twentysomething at heart. You feel excited about what's to come... love, work, and new experiences.

I guess I act my age, or thereabouts. Go figure.

What Your Sleeping Position Says

You are calm and rational. You are also giving and kind - a great friend. You are easy going and trusting. However, you are too sensible to fall for mind games.

Huh. I guess that works for me. Coolios.

You Are Batman

Billionaire playboy by day. Saving the world by night. And you're not even a true superhero. Just someone with a lot of expensive toys!

Batman? Lame! I don't even really like Batman that much... because of exactly what they said. He's not really a superhero, he's just a rich guy with too much time on his hands and a lot of expensive toys. :p Boo.

What Your Soul Really Looks Like

You are very passionate and quite temperamental. While you can be moody, you always crave comfort. You are a grounded person, but you also leave room for imagination and dreams. You feet may be on the ground, but you're head is in the clouds. You believe that people see you as a bit small and insignificant. People pay more attention to you than you think. Your near future is a lot like the present, and as far as you're concerned, that's a very good thing. For you, love is all about caring and comfort. You couldn't fall in love with someone you didn't trust.

Um, yes, for the most part. Though I don't think I'm really that moody. My mood generally tends to be "happy" or some variant thereof; even when I'm down, I don't fall that far and it doesn't take much to lift me back up. At least, I don't think so...

You Are In a Decent Mood

You aren't turning cartwheels, but you're having a pretty good day. Some ups, some downs, but overall you're coming out ahead. And who knows? Tomorrow could be even better!

Yep, pretty much.

You Are 7: The Enthusiast

You are outgoing and playful - always seeing the happy side to life. You're enthusiastic and excitable. You love anything new. Multi-talented, you do many things well... and find success easy. You prefer to keep things light with others. Opening up is hard for you.

I don't know why that makes me a seven, but it's all true.

Your Brain's Pattern

You have a dreamy mind, full of fancy and fantasy. You have the ability to stay forever entertained with your thoughts. People may say you're hard to read, but that's because you're so internally focused. But when you do share what you're thinking, people are impressed with your imagination.

Sweet.

Okay, that's enough. In other news, I'm still looking for a job. Neither Gelazzi nor Barnes and Noble have called me back yet, though when I called both I was told that I would hear by the end of this week or the beginning of next week. So, we'll see. And if I get nothing from either one, I'll have to make something up for my mom (or just tell her that I'll pick up more hours from Rosie) so I don't get sent back to Brighton. Because, I'm not going to Brighton. I refuse to go to Brighton. I'm not suffering another summer under my mother's still-iron rule. I'm 21 years old, for Pete's sake, and I don't need to live under mommy's thumb for three months just because I'm having some trouble finding a job here in Fort Collins! Sheesh! So that'll be a fun confrontation if I wind up having to make it, but I've already promised Rosie that I'll be here all summer, so I'm not going back on my word.

So, that's what I've got. Now, I think I can get away with clocking out, since there's only 5 minutes till 6:00 and I can procrastinate with turning off computers and stuff until then. So, farewell for now.

-Jaya-

I'm sitting at work at the moment, going through the emails and whatnot.  It's still early in the day, unfortunately, so I've got to drag this out some or I'll run out of things to do and that's always sad. Or... something.

I still need to find another job, one that gives me more hours than Rosie can at the moment.  Wal-Mart is always an option, though this time I'm going to be smart about it and make myself unavailable after about 9 pm and before about 8 am.  I'm not getting up any earlier than 7 and I'm not getting off any later than 9 or 10.  Even that is freaking ridiculous but I remember how things get around 6 or 7 in the evening, and I know they'll want me then.  So maybe a compromise would be good and I'll say  I can't work after 8.  If they ask me why, it's because I have to work regular hours at my other job and I can't afford to work overnights at one job and then go straight to the next.  Or, something like that.  Actually if I worked at the Harmony Wal-Mart that wouldn't be a problem because they close eventually.  At, like, 11 or something rather lame, but they do close.

I'd be okay with working until 11 if I was at Barnes and Noble, actually, but that's probably about the only place I wouldn't mind practically living in until they kicked me out, and it's quite possible that I'd hate it after I was done there.  And that would be sad, wouldn't it?  Can you imagine me hating Barnes and Noble?  Good heavens!  I'd die!  Or Gelazzi? Heaven forbid.

However, Troy had an absolutely brilliant idea yesterday: work for Sylvia and the Voices of Orthodox Women!  Of course they couldn't pay me, but it would be experience and it would placate my mom, who would then allow me to stay in Fort Collins, and that's really the important part anyway.  So I emailed Sylvia about it, as well as my next article for the newsletter, and here's what she had to say:

I'd love to meet with you and I'm also intrigued about receiving some help with this work.  We're all volunteers, so there's no money involved.  But let's put our heads together. 
I was eager to read what you'd written.  It's good!  And, it's not too long.  You've made a strong point.  By the way, your name came up today because I was talking with Rich McDermott for a few minutes at break time during presbytery.  He had very good things to say.  So did I!  Now, let's set up a time when we can meet face to face.  Take a look at your schedule and let me know when it would work for you.  Then I'll look at mine.

Yay!  That's so exciting!  I can't imagine how this summer is going to work out, but if I'm working for VOW, paid or no, it'll be awesome.  Yay for God!  Now, if I could come up with something that pays so I could keep doing this for the rest of my life, I'd be quite well off. We were talking yesterday about me writing a book about all this stuff, which is something I've been considering for a while now, so maybe this summer would be a good time to start working on a manuscript.  I'm counting on all of you to keep me accountable, though, because without an external deadline of some sort I'm likely to just waste my time on the internet or something equally useless instead of working on what God has called me to do.  It's amazing how easy it is to waste your life completely away doing neither what you liked nor what you ought.  (And yes, for the more astute of my readers, that was a somewhat-mangled quote from Screwtape Letters.)  Like, perhaps, making long, boring and pointless posts on one's livejournal?  Yeah, I think it's time to sign off.

-Jaya-

I'm sitting at work at the moment, with an hour left to go and twenty minutes' left of work to do.  And that's stretching it.  Well, technically that's not true: Rosie wants me to solve two problems.  One, why Peachtree feels the need to number the invoices in a completely illogical fashion.  Two, why Peachtree feels the need to retain records such as that of DX, which had a credit of $500 and a debit of $500, in the Aged Payables.  Because really, if you have $500 go in and $500 go out, then why do you need a record of it?  Your end result is still $0!  And Rosie doesn't care!

So, while googling ideas on what the heck to do for that (and I have no idea how to even begin searching for answers--what keywords would I use?  So far "peachtree complete invoice numbering" is worthless, as is "peachtree complete invoice help stupid numbers *pounds head against brick wall repeatedly*" and "i hate peachtree with a fiery passion because it isn't very user friendly in troubleshooting." Not that I expected the last two to be terribly helpful but they've got about as good a chance as anything else I've tried, apparently.  And I kind of want to kill this computer because something weird keeps happening when I type--it starts to type letters that don't correspond at all to the letters I'm typing on this end, and something is getting horribly lost in translation.

Frustrations galore? You betcha.

So, for the three of you who ever read my livejournal (and perhaps the two others who might see the link on facebook and care enough to read more), I thought I'd write some stuff.  Not that I know what to write or anything because I really don't have much to say.  Tonight is planned as a homework night with Troy and Sarah and I.  Troy has to finish his gazillion-word paper of DOOM, I have a 12-pager, a 7-pager, a 5 pager and a 4-pager that I could be working on (not to mention the story revisions which thankfully aren't due till finals week), and I don't know what Sarah has to do but I bet I'll be taking her home to sleep long before Troy and I are done.  That's all right, though.  I don't intend to keep her awake just to watch us kill ourselves over papers, and honestly we'd be ignoring her and it would probably suck for her anyway, so whatever.  I hope that Invader Zim will be involved at some point, though that might be a bad plan because I tend to watch it instead of doing my homework.  Maybe we could throw in Star Wars at some point; I've been craving some ESB for a while now and I'd totally be down for doing homework to that.  I know, I know, doing your homework in front of the TV is a bad idea, but when it's something I've seen as many times as I've watched Star Wars, I don't think it'll be a problem.

I can't wait for this semester to be over.  I wouldn't call it senioritis (okay, maybe it is...) but I want to be done with school.  Forever would be nice, but even just for the summer is okay with me.  And to be honest, the thought of graduating is scary.  If I were to go to grad school, it would be because I know I'm good at school, I know I would be successful, and I wouldn't have to challenge myself very much.  But I'm getting sick of school.  Not learning--I could never get sick of learning--but then again, I don't feel like I'm learning very much in my classes.  Sure, I'll get the occasional class here and there which teaches me something new on occasion, but for the most part I've stagnated. I'm just playing the game until I can get my receipt... err, diploma.  I don't mean to imply that I'm not learning anything at all, either.  I've learned a LOT in the past year, and looking at where I am right now compared to where I was at this time last year is pretty amazing.  In some ways I feel like I've backtracked, but then again I'm also much more self-conscious about where I am so maybe that's part of it.  Actually, now that I think about it, come August I'll have had this livejournal for a full year.  That's crazy--this thing still feels new to me!

Well, I've managed to waste half an hour now.  That's promising.  Perhaps I can waste another half an hour and then it'll be time to go home, I'll give Sarah a call, and we can go study.  That would be nice.  But somehow this computer has tried to update this entry already even though I wasn't planning to be done... so maybe I'll be done anyway.  Laters!

-Jaya-

Well, that was an adventure.  I was up last night until 3:30 am writing my paper, at Troy's house, which meant that I didn't get to sleep until around 4.  The plus side is that the minute my head hit the pillow, I was out.  I didn't even change out of my shirt, I just threw on some sweatpants and collapsed on the bed.  I'm assuming I managed to get under the covers at some point since I was under them when I woke up.  I set my alarm for 10, since I had class at 11, but I didn't really expect to get up then so  I set another alarm for 11 so I could make it to my noon class. I woke up just long enough at 10 to turn that damn thing off, and then I slept until noon.  Thankfully, I had forgotten to turn off the alarm I set for noon yesterday, and it was set to the same song as my ringtone, so I woke up thinking someone was calling me and realized I'd better get my lazy butt out of bed.  I read through my paper once to make sure that it didn't have any glaring errors (after all, I did write the whole thing hyped up on caffeine, sugar, and very little sleep), made a few changes, printed it off and ran to turn it in.  It wasn't due until 2 but I wanted to get rid of it. Besides, I got an email from the library saying that my 1940s version of Pride and Prejudice (starring Lawrence Olivier and Greer Garson, heck yeah!) was in.  So I ran over and picked that up, too, and if I have time after I'm done packing tonight I'm going to watch it.  I might fall asleep in front of it... but I'm watching it.  Actually what might wind up happening is I put it in while I'm doing laundry and pause it every time I need to run down and  move stuff.  Speaking of which, I need quarters.  I wonder if Troy would be willing to spot me a few bucks' worth of quarters...

This has been quite the eventful week.  For one thing, Mark Gaudy showed up at the Source.  That was completely unexpected; I thought he was in Scotland!  When he explained that he was here for his brother's wedding next week it made much more sense, but either way it completely freaked me out.  It was kind of funny; I showed up and was just talking by the door, and I happened to glance over and see him sitting on the couch.  I must not have done a very good job of hiding my shock because it took him a while to come over and say hi.  He said I freaked him out.  I said it was because he freaked me out.  I tried to make a big deal of it at first (why the crap did he have to come back? I didn't have to deal with him! He was halfway across the world!) but I quickly realized that I forgave him ages ago and there's no reason for me to pretend that he still freaks me out.  It was just incredibly unexpected.  Kind of like last year at my birthday when, after not coming to the Source for months, he showed up and bought me Old C's afterward.  Kind of weird.

And then apart from that, it's just been more homework than any sane person could do in a week.  Thankfully of the three papers I originally had due on Friday, one was extended till the Wednesday after break and one till the Friday after break.  That meant I could waste all my time on the one that was left.  I hope it proves to be the hardest one.   And then she tried to kill us in Creative Writing with a gazillion useless assignments that only took my attention from the stuff I actually needed to be doing.  I swear, by Thursday  I was ready to strangle my teacher.

But it's all over now, and once I get off work I just have to pack for Arizona.  Life is getting okay.  It's kind of exciting. ;)

-Jaya-

When I'm at work, I often open a document of some sort just to record my thoughts on whatever is happening in my life at the moment.  I don't think Rosie minds considering how much I get done; at any rate, she's not objected yet.  But it always winds up getting deleted, because I don't want anyone like Rosie or whomever finding it and reading it. If I stick them in here, though, I'll be able to save them.

Of course, at the moment, there's so much going on that needs to be processed, I have kind of shut down and stopped processing anything.  Take yesterday, for example.  I spent the entire day with a sinking feeling in my stomach, accomplishing almost none of the homework that I hoped to, until I was able to talk to people and come to some sort of resolution to that whole mess of a problem.  Which wasn't  nearly as bad as it could have been... that's always the way it is with me.  I always think things are going to be the end of the world, and they never are.  God is way cooler than that.   But even then, I didn't feel all that well, though when I went to bed my spirits had certainly been lifted by watching Anchors Aweigh, courtesy of Nick.  By the way, Nick, thank you SO much for that!  It was a much-needed escape.  I'll get back to you on the other ones once I've watched them... but that might take a while because if I need more comforting tonight I'm watching AA again. ^.^

Anywho.  I've thought THAT particular situation to death, coming at it from every angle I could think of, and the answer is still the same, and I hate it.  It sucks a lot.  But if I keep thinking about it, I'll just make myself miserable again, and there's no need to do that.  I can be miserable because of lots of other things, too.  Like school!  I'm often miserable about school!

I have to write a story for my creative writing class--another one--based off my Nerdery story.  Woohoo.  I honestly don't give a damn about that class, I'm only taking it to get the degree. CSU's creative writing program is so lame.  Nothing but "serious literary fiction" is allowed, even though a good majority of the students to whom I have talked say that they hate writing "serious literary fiction" almost as much as they hate reading it.  So why the university still insists on making it the ONLY thing they teach is beyond me.  Maybe some day I'll earn a doctorate, come back, and teach genre fiction to the poor, undereducated students at Colorado State. :p

But that's not all I'm supposed to get done.  I've lost track of how many pictures I'm supposed to be writing in the next couple of weeks, but it's a lot. It's a WHOLE lot.  And I have absolutely no motivation to do any of it.  I worked on some of it yesterday, between bouts of nervousness/freaking out, but it wasn't as much as I'd hoped to accomplish with my Saturday.  The thing is, by the time 5:00 rolled around, I was at a point where I would never have accomplished anything even if I sat in front of my computer til my eyes bled.  It's a good thing Nick called (I'd forgotten that we'd talked about going to see Catch & Release) when he did--anything that got me out of the house and kept me from wallowing in my thoughts was, at that point, a definite bonus.  And the movie wasn't so bad, really. It could have been much better, of course, but at least she didn't wind up with the awesome guy after she'd already proved to be completely unworthy of him.  I could write a fanfic about it now, and give Dennis the kind of girl he deserves.  I don't think I will, because I already have so freaking much writing to do that a fanfiction seems rather frivolous and stupid, but I could.

Sigh. I still have 20 minutes left.  I love it when Rosie lets me "research" things online, because then I can do this kind of stuff and it doesn't matter at all, but this day is taking FOREVER to end!  I just want to go home, curl up in a little ball, and pray until my voice goes hoarse.  I need to spend more time talking with God anyway.  And practicing listening, because I freaking suck at that.  I prattle on, and whenever I shut up and try to listen for a response, I get distracted and start thinking about something else, leaving poor God hanging on the other end going "where did you go?"  That's lame.  But now that I want so badly to speak to Him maybe I'll do better. 

But I have to do homework, too, and I have no desire to do that.  We're down to five minutes, though, and then I can go home and eat dinner and worry about it there. I'll be done here for now.

-Jaya-