Retail Bathrooms!

I wrote up a resume this week and wow, I’ve worked a lot of shitty jobs. What better way to take all of you through memory lane than with “Kevin’s jobs and the bathrooms at them!”
First thing, retail sucks. I want Rite Aid to be my last retail job ever. Might not be, never know, but I would like it to be. I had my first job (other than summer jobs) when I was 18 at a retail place. Here it is 10 years later and I have a bottom rung of the ladder retail job. No more I say! Anyways, on with the show…

1.) Roland’s of Chesapeake Beach, MD. I was 16 and worked here for the summer that I stayed with my Dad. I don’t remember much of the place. I’m sure it had a bathroom but I can’t remember a thing about it.

By the way, I’m going to write something more meaningful about past jobs, and many things in my past later on. I’m just on a toilet kick tonight.

2.) SugarCreek on Arsenal St. Oh this place sucked. The bathroom was in between the supply closet and the car wash. So to go out to the car wash you had to walk through the bathroom, and vice versa. Any time I sat to take a Count Dooku (thank you Venture Bros.) I was worried someone would have to cut through there to get a broom or something. “Don’t mind me, just passing through.”

3.) Majic 103.1 with Johnny and Erika. Small radio station. It had a nice toiley. The odd thing was that there was only one potty for the men and women that worked there. And no handicap access either, which is great when your country DJ has one leg.

4.) Hills. Wow, I hated this job too. The upstairs employee bathroom was like a sauna. Metal roof, lot of stink, and no windows nor air filters. It got so bad I would leave the store, even for a pee, and go use the mall food court bathroom. Probably why I have no fear of it today. Crabs be damned!

5.) Staples. An awful place that fired me after a month. Alright bathroom. It wasn’t alright after I kept using it (as a customer) and not flushing. Feel my fecal wrath! You want me to clean it up? Press your precious “Easy” button and see what happens.

6.) Aussie Outfitters. I loved this job. Hang out at the mall all day in a rarely shopped at store. This is where I started reading a lot again, and found a love of anime (Damn you Pokemon Game Boy!) I think the best time was when I thought I was alone. I go into the bathroom, no shoes on (I never wore shoes behind the counter then), and proceed to make a lot of noise along with a running commentary of what was going on. (“Oh wow, did I do that?) When I get out, wet paper towel in hands, I see two of my friends who have sold 3 shirts to a customer that was waiting for me to ring up the order. Luckily, they could hear my commentary and knew when I was finishing up.

7.) Price Chopper. It is never a good idea to have to use a bathroom in the middle of a store remodel. Chopper used to have the worst bathrooms in the city. My second day I was asked to clean the men’s room. I walked over, opened the door, closed it, and told them I’d rather be fired then clean that. It looked like someone’s knees didn’t work, so they bent over at the waist and sprayed their mess all over the wall and everything next to it. Later as I grew to hate the job I would hide out in the bathroom. Not to do anything toilet related, but just sit there and read and try to not get caught. After I left I found out that some people thought I was sick and had constant diarrhea.

8.) TJ Maxx. Currently the worst bathroom in the city. You know how most stores have those powerful toilets? The ones where the water shoots away so fast you wonder if it could pull your face in there too. If that was an area you would put your face, that is. Well TJ Maxx doesn’t have one of those. Instead it has your usual home quality, 2 gallons at most toilet. This would be fine if 2 or 3, even 4 people used it daily. But not every other customer. And not after these customers have been to either Applebee’s or the Greek place, or the Chinese buffet. Messy messy customers. While working here, I swung a plunger like Babe Ruth swung a baseball bat: drunk. Constantly a disgusting part of my day. And the women’s bathroom was always the worst. It looked like 5 women decided to abort little black or brown (occasionally green, what did you eat?) babies all at once. Then not flush. And ladies, those little trash boxes are for your napkins, use them, or I’ll wipe your mouth with said napkins next time you leave them on the floor.

9.) Rite Aid. Not a bad bathroom. Nothing special either. It’s funny to see wrappers for stolen merchandise in there every so often. We don’t clean it nearly enough though. I think the same wad of paper towel has been there for a week. Not bad, not a treat either. Much like the job really.

Now that I’m done I wonder if I could have written something comparing my happiness at a place to the quality of the bathroom. Ah well, I’m too tired to do such a thing now and my tummy’s rumbling.

The Rite-Aid ghost bear.

See the pictures? That's one scary fucking bear right there. And it doesnt have any eyes! Oh yeah, if you cant see the pictures go to dieseldecent.blogspot.com I uploaded them correctly there but I'm having trouble with the other sites.
Anyways...
This is the bear that's on all baby oil, powder, basically all baby products sold at Rite Aid. This is supposed to be comforting? It has no pupils! It has no soul! But wait, the Ghost Bear effects every day at Rite Aid. There is a security system, but not much of one at the store. It works like this. One of the security tags found in or on such items as liquor, condoms, teeth whitening, and some pills, goes off. Myself or another cashier looks at the door, nods at the thief in question, and goes back to the task we were on. No security guard, no calling police, no cameras. Sure Los Gatos is a rich neighborhood but shoplifters can drive, dont 'cha know?
Anywho, lately the alarm has gone off when no one is around! The automated doors will open (then close, they work in pairs like that) and the alarm will go off. But not a soul is in sight. Because the ghost bear has no soul!
Also, there is some sort of alarm, beeping noise, whatever that comes from the ice cream cooler. Some say it goes off when the temperature is being reset for efficient, um, cool-ness. No, I say its one of those cold spots that any ghost hunting show looks for.
Step 1, go into haunted place.
Step 2, find an area that is many degrees colder than the surrounding areas for no reason.
Step 3, piss yourself.

I blame any odd happenings at Rite Aid on the ghost bear. Any missing product is the ghost bear's fault too. I was just hanging on to it for him.

I thought a porn star came through my line at work today. Jenna Haze.



The girl looked exactly like her though. But alas, the "real" names did not match (thank you Wikipedia).
Tune in for another installment of almost meeting celebrities.

The Rise and Fall of ECW by Thom Loverro

I was so happy when this book came out. I thought that it would contain detailed behind the scenes stories about the little promotion that could. I wanted dirt and sleeze. Instead on page 64, "Sabu and Tazz defeated the Pitbulls; Tommy Dreamer beat Stevie Richards..." This goes on for awhile, and is repeated over and over again. Here's the form of the book. In 1997 these matches took place at ECW shows. In June of that year Cactus Jack had a good match. Mick Foley puts it this way, "yeah that was great". Thank you Mick.
Oh but it gets worse! On page 77 the writer copy and pastes the whole page out of Have a Nice Day! Mick Foley's first book. I would be amazed if this guy took more than an hour to write this book. He copies match results which can be found dozens of places online or directly copies someone's quotes from previous books (like Foley) or from the Rise and Fall of ECW DVD (which was an amazing piece of work). It's hack writing to the EXTREME!
No matter how much time Loverro had on this project it was squandered. Give me the same amount of time and I'll write a five star book on ECW. Only recommended for a completist.

A movie review from Steve "Guts":

Pulse-less

So I saw Pulse tonight, the horror movie about dead people trying to break into our world and suck our lives from our souls. Originally it was opening March 3rd, the date proudly displayed on posters and ad materials. Then it was August, then it was September, then it was August again, then another date in August. It drops tomorrow and I took a chance on watching it tonight. The main reason was Kristen Bell, who I am now deeply in love with. Not just because she is hot but because she is such a good actress and really appears to have something going on upstairs. She is, for those that dont know, the title character in Veronica Mars.

Some movies are shuffled around the release schedule and in the process are unfairly tainted and thought to be bad movies, unreleasable. Some are actually good ones that are kinda out-there and are difficult to find homes on the release schedule for. And some are just garbage. Pulse (2/10) is garbage. There are some good ideas, but its all build-up, and very little payoff. So little payoff that I very nearly wrote, "all build-up and no payoff." But there is a bit at the end where it is all supposed to come together. I assure you it does not. It is an ending where you think, "I took this journey to get HERE????" Thankfully, the journey is 87 minutes long. You wont be investing that much in it, which works because you get next to nothing in return. Please do yourselves a favor and save the $8. I'm seeing World Trade Center and the rest of Talladega Nights sometime this week, thoughts will follow.

You know what you should see instead of Pulse? THE DESCENT (8.5/10). A new british import horror movie. It is kickass. Bloody, gory and VERY suspenseful. Images from that movie will haunt your dreams. If you give yourself over to it and let it fuck with you, its a wild ride. If you go into it with a chip on your shoulder and plan on not being scared or thrilled, you likely wont. If thats your thing, then fine. But I assure you it is a descent worth taking. I wont spoil the cool shit for those who will eventually see it. Its been years since a horror movie actually had me watching my back as I walked through the parking lot.....because you never know what's behind you. All I will say is that I am never going cave diving, no sir....because you never know what's down there waiting for you....

Thank you Steve.

And now... A message from Joe.

Its my opinion that if you put a small child in a oven your wife will call the cops. oh wait...was that real....i've got to stop taking those pills. I just don't recomend it.


O"B's opinion of the day

Thank you Joe.

Rite Aid regulars
Category: Work

So, as many of you know, I'm stuck at Rite-Aid for the summer. Hopefully I'll have a more degree related job soon. But this job is not without its fill of writing material. Let's discuss two of our regular customers.

The first one I like to call "Drunky the Crow". I dont know what her real name is. She's maybe 35 or so but looks like a weather and cock-beaten old bar fly. She comes in once every other day to buy a 12 pack of Beck's. I'm sure she would buy a 12 pack every day if she had the money, and one look at her tells me she doesn't have the money. The other day she comes in to buy her Beck's and asks me if we sell Stella Artois. Why yes, yes we do. "Ok, I need to buy some.... Holy shit that's expensive. I wish I didnt have to buy it."
My curiosity is piqued (and I just learned how to spell that!). So I ask why?
"Well I invited some guy over last night and he and I drank half of my landlady's Stella's. (Stelllaaaaaaa!) So now I gotta buy some more and try to replace them before she sees that they're gone."
Let's review here:
She invites a strange man over to drink.
More than likely both of them have already been drinking.
She lives somewhere where she has access (legal or otherwise) to her landlady's kitchen.
She doesn't have a lot of money.

Here's a money saving idea. Stop drinking every night and fucking drunk strange men.

Speaking of strange men, this leads me to the second customer who I have dubbed "Sensitive".
See, Sensitive has Sensitive hearing. So sensitive that he has to cover his ears when the cash drawer opens because the sound of it and the change rattling inside disturbs his ears. He always comes in wearing a leather jacket, jeans, and sunglasses. Doesnt matter what time of day. I'm not sure he's ever not had sunglasses on. He drives a beat up 'Vette or something like that. Now Sensitive comes in to complain about Trevor. (Shout out.)
"That blonde head guy over there has some problem with me. If he doesnt stop I am going to call the cops and sue this place. He made a comment about me buying cigarettes the other day. I dont need comments like that. I mean what if I want to buy prophelactics? Is he going to ask me if I have a hot date?"
Blah blah blah. I say we'll take care of it and he goes on his merry way. So now Sensitive comes to my line a week later. I try to be nice and not disrupt his hearing. I'm very considerate. So considerate that when he has trouble carrying everything out I ask him if he needs any assistance. He turns to me and says, "believe me if I ever need any help I'll ask you first."
Well fuck you too Skippy! Go find a new store to buy your dirty rubbers in!

That is all for this week's adventures in Rite Aid.