Jamie

I made mention of the fact that I work with a woman named Jamie that is a bit of a bitch.
I'm fixin' to talk about Jamie.
She is nonstop drama. Some people are like that everything has to be a big fucking issue. Whatever.
I realized pretty quickly that everybody is automatically on her shit list and I tried to get off that list by being cool with her...that was a mistake.
I decided that if I'm on the shit list I may as well do something to get on that list. You know, be proactive?
So I spent the better part of a day antagonizing her...and we got along famously.
Then the next day whenever I would ask her to get a phone for me (I won't bore you with the details but inventory has been going missing and so now if I want to replace someones' phone I have to go through someone else to get the thing)
So I say, "Jamie, can you get me the phone for Jones please?"
she says, "Umm no. Do you need anything else?"
So I say " get me the damn phone, Yo!"
and she laughed and got me the phone.
So that worked.
Then later, same situation, I need a phone and I know she is going to give me shit again so I walk up and say "woman! get me the phone for Smith!"
She laughs even harder than the first time and gets the phone.
This is progress for us.
The other day she comes into the back room and sees me watching TV on mu phone with only 5 minutes left on my break. She says something about "youdon'twannabewatchin'noTVwhenyouonlygot5minutesleftyoubettah'eat!"
When a woman talks to me like that I can't even hear it. It's like when Rosie Perez goes off....
I make eye contact with the manager and she is smiling at me. I ask, in a voice loud enough for Jamie to hear "What ethnicity is she?"
Racheal says, "Jamie? She's white."
I say, "hmm...'cause when she starts speaking Peurtorican I can't understand her."
Jamie goes ballistic and repeats what she said about my "5 minutes" at close to maximum volume and, out of politeness, half the speed.
One of the funny things about this whole affair is I tell Cindy about all this and she says "are you two flirting?"
Enh, no.
I have to say that is not a bad guess though...many times my flirting takes the form of verbal combat....but not in this case, not at all.
So today, I come into work on my day off. I got a text from the boss that DJ called in and they are short. So I show up to cover lunches and get a little OT. I log into DJ's station which is right next to Jamie. Somebody says something about me being in the back of the store instead of where I usually house..up front.
I say yeah "I'm rolling with the 6-7 Mafia (I am at station 6 Jamie at 7)
Jamie laughs hard enough to pee a little.
Then later somebody else makes a comment about me hanging in the back....I say "aww hell no, you fuckin' wit' the 6-7 mafia!"
Jamie loses a it a little bit more.
I swear, if I keep this up, we may end up homies.

Best Customer Evah!

I deal with a lot of irate people in my job. The more bent out of shape and rude people are to me the more I go into passive-aggressive mode. When I'm at work I don't have much of a choice. My normal mode during any sort of confrontation is aggressive-aggressive as anyone who knows me personally will attest.
I had one of the best experiences with a customer the other day. I was overjoyed...it was so much fun.
A kid with pierced lips and a nasty concert t-shirt and his 3 stupid friends came into the store and dropped off his phone for repair. An hour later he came back to pick it up and instead of getting on the wait list like everybody else he stood around for a while goofing around with his dumb-ass friends. When he realized someone wasn't going to walk up to him and ask how they could help him he went up to Jamie and said, "I'm late for work can you get me my phone?" in a very abrasive manner. Which is exactly the wrong way to approach Jamie.
(I haven't written about Jamie yet...I know I will at some point though. Jamie kind of looks, sounds and acts like....I guess the best way to describe her is if Rosie Perez had an older sister...but waaaay bitchier. In case you don't know who Rosie Perez is, she is an actress who plays almost exclusively really bitchy Puertorican girlfriends. She's always the girlfriend and always a bitch. Jamie could give her bitch lessons.)
So they go back and forth about him not being on the list and she finally says give me the ticket and goes to grab his phone. I am loitering innocently in the back room and Jamie approaches me "you need to go give him his shit because I ain't tryin' to put up with his sorry ass."
I say "sure" for 2 reasons
1. I am doing my best to remove myself from Jamie's shit-list. It seems that you have automatic enrollment on the shit-list and getting off of it requires diligence. I made small strides recently during the staff meeting when as I was speaking she made snoring sounds and I responded with "get the fuck out of here, I have one thing to say and I have been listening to you ramble on about your bullshit all morning" She's like one of those bullies that will be your friend if you stand up to them.
2. this might be fun.
Here's why it might be fun: his phone is not fixable. We have to replace it in the store with a new one, but we don't have the phone in stock...so we have to order him one. He's not going to be a happy camper and Jamie has already pissed him off.
So, I grab the phone and I walk out front and Jamie says, "he's going to help you over there" and she points.
So we go to my work station
Me: unfortunately the technician was unable to fix the phone so I'm going to order you a replacement.
Pierced Face Kid: what!? I wasted 2 hours and you didn't do shit with my phone?!
Me: well I wouldn't say we didn't do anything. The technician did assess your phone and conclude it's unfixable. I can order you a replacement.
PFK: Replacement?! I need a fucking phone now!
Me: I can order you one...
I don't think I actually got to say that whole sentence.
PFK: What the fuck am I supposed to do!?
now here is where I start to have some fun with it
Me: well I think you have 2 options. You can let me order you a new phone. Or, you can take the phone that you broke beyond repair and leave.
PFK: FUCK YOU! I'm late for work motherfucker! You people made me late for work!
he then grabs the phone and begins to stomp out.
He gets a few feet away, the whole time yelling expletives, and I say, "have a nice day"
He yells "FUCK YOU!"
He gets to the door and I say, "buh bye" and make a little wave with my hand.
He kicks the door open and says:
"SHUT THE FUCK UP STUPID!!!"

Ok, at the time I thought that was pretty funny.

But here's the blowback on this one ...for a week now at least a few times a day I try to ask a question or make a comment and somebody shouts at me
SHUT THE FUCK UP STUPID!!
that's not happiness for me, I have to be honest.

Chick Norris

I got a text from Cindy yesterday:
Fucking Ridiculous! I just pulled a Chuck Norris!

I can't say I wasn't extremely intrigued.

She went home for lunch. She decided to use the facilities before going back to work.
(I support that decision. I go at home whenever humanly possible. Public restrooms are so unseemly.)
So she attempts to do the next natural thing which is leave...and she can't. The door isn't locked, it's stuck. She calls to her mom to help her out.
Reports are sketchy, eyewitness accounts vary.
We still don't know exactly what was transpiring on the other side of the door...we do know her mom was attempting to use scissors to free her from the bathroom.
It became clear that no help was forthcoming from the other side so she decided to take the pins out of the hinges and pull the door out from the other side. Her mom had opinions about this. To which Cindy responded, "Well, clearly you can't get me out of here!"
So...she gets the pins out and ...nothing.
She decides to climb out the window.
Hang on. You have to understand, she's on lunch. She has to be back to work.
Calling back and saying, "Hey, I'm not going to be back in today, I'm stuck in my bathroom" is not the kind of thing you will realistically be able to live down any time soon. Every time you go near a bathroom someone will offer to "spot you". It's just not possible.
So she decides to go out the window.
But, of course she's wearing a skirt on this day, so going out the window and possibly showing the neighbors your big girl underpants, is not an option.
She calls her mom back to the door and has her stuff under the door something to cover her legs...pajama bottoms.
So, instead of piling out the window in a skirt she piles out in a blouse and pajama bottoms....I have to be honest, I have questions about which is more dignified.
So, she gets a quarter way out the window and realizes it's actually pretty fucking far to the ground.
So she calls mom again. Mom puts a stepladder underneath the window.
She climbs out the window and ....
this may be the moment she lost her shit.
She goes into the house and at a run, kicks the fuck out of the bathroom door.
Kablam!
The door drops in one shot.
She was mad at that door!
That door got a round house kick to the face!

Then she went back to work and I got a text:
Fucking Ridiculous! I just pulled a Chuck Norris!

Today I got another text:
I just had to Chuck Norris Sandra out of the bathroom!
Turns out her 15 year old daughter got stuck in the bathroom.
I can't tell you how gratifying it was to hear that two days in a row my friend went
Kablam!
....on a bathroom door.
I know that from now on, if I ever get in a situation that I need to fuck up a door, I don't have to do it myself, I have a friend that can do it for me.
Doors?
Don't be so smug, I have a friend.

ps: the second best thing about this story?
Sandra on her cell phone,
"umm hello, I'm locked in the bathroom?

When I was a kid I kicked my uncles ass one time

That title is totally misleading and inaccurate.
Let me clarify.
First, the misleading part. My uncle is only about a year and a half older than I am. By saying that I kicked his ass it makes it seem as if I was a tough little kid who somehow took on a grown-ass man.He was bigger than me though.

I was small for my age...
This is a picture of me playing football. Not to sound pedantic but can I explain an artistic concept? Foreshortening is when things closer to the viewer appear larger and things in the background smaller. So why the fuck am I closer to the camera and yet I look so much smaller?
I always joke that I was the smallest kid in my class...except for one Asian girl. I was also the smartest kid in my class...except for that same goddamn Asian girl. This led to me getting into a lot of fights...but that's another Oprah.
(By the way, at what age do they stop saying you're small for your age? I mean you never hear somebody say "how old is that guy? 36? Wow, he's small for his age!"
'Little People' don't count...I guess if I saw a guy who was totally normal and fully formed..but he was the size of a baby, I might say, "He's small for his age"
Yeah right!
I'd say, "holy jumping Jesus did you see that baby sized man?!")
But I digress.
Second. The thing about the title that is inaccurate is that I said I kicked his ass one time. I actually did it plenty of times. We used to scrap all the time. Usually I'd be on the losing end...but somehow that never once stopped me from throwing down.

I want to talk about one time in particular.

I'll tell you right now, the point of this story isn't the fact that I kicked his ass, the point of the story is that I said one of the stupidest things I have ever said...which compelled me to kick his ass.

We were arguing about something.
Look. We were best pals, like brothers. If anybody said shit to either one of us they had to deal with the Miller Boys collectively. Michael and Mark would happily fuck up your world...but we kept our skills sharp by battling each other.
So we are going at it about something and he pushes my last button and I snap and smash my fist into an Etch A Sketch and crack the shit out of it.
He runs over and looks at his smashed Etch A Sketch and he says, "how stupid can you be?!"

Hey, look...Ok...what had happened was...
I meant to say " not as stupid as you"
But what I actually said?
"Stupider than you!"
People.
"Stupider than you"?
That got the poor boys ass stomped.

And he didn't even say it!