So Long 2017…You Sucked…You Sucked Hard…

It’s New Years Eve and I’m spending the last few minutes of the year watching some King Arthur movie on television…it’s not even a good one with Sean Connery or anything…my wife and son are both sick…struck down by their first colds of the winter season…even my loyal dog Bailey has abandoned me for a better spot on his bed in front of the fireplace…to be quite honest?…I’m okay with all of it…2017 hasn’t given me a whole hell of a lot to celebrate anyway…

Some bloggers at this point might break into a lengthy diatribe about Narcissistic Number 45 or our dysfunctional Senate and House of Representatives…how the new tax plan will only benefit the extremely wealthy…like them…or about the abuses that have come to light by so many men of power and influence…but no, this year has sucked for me for so many other reasons…reasons I wouldn’t wish on anyone…

For the second time this year, I’m watching as my wife struggles to find another job…as a consultant we always understood that she would be going from contract to contract…this last one ended much earlier than we anticipated…not to mention it comes at a time of year when companies just aren’t hiring…in 2017, thanks to job changes, our family was covered under 4 different health insurance policies…each one progressively more expensive than the previous one…after so many years of stability…healthcare had become a huge financial burden for us…

In October, after a short illness, my father-in-law Joe passed away…Joe accepted me into his family…despite all of the negatives I brought with me as a young and immature man…and he treated me more like a son than a son-in-law…unfortunately, I didn’t always show him as much loyalty as he deserved…

My daughter chose that weekend to also deliver a gut punch that has changed our relationship…she will be going into the Navy in January…yes, I should be happy and very proud of her decision, but I’m not…when I hear her talk about it?…she sounds like a commercial and her reasons just don’t ring true with me…part of my disappointment with her decision comes from my own past…I never went to college…it was something my family could never afford…I turned 18 and went to work at the sewer plant…I literally shoveled shit for a living…my wife and I put my daughter through 4 years of a very expensive private college…maybe I expected her to graduate…get a job I approved of…start a family…all of those things are on hold now while she pursues a career I’m not sure she really wants…then again, maybe I don’t know her as well as I thought I did…

But 2017 wasn’t done yet…the final blow coming when I learned a close friend who I grew up with in New Jersey was killed in Maryland…as painful and as difficult for me to accept that he’s no longer here, I can’t imagine the pain his wife, his sons, his parents and his brother are feeling now…

I included links…my own little depressing year in review if you will…hope you will take the time to read them…

Worst Christmas Card Ever…

And Then She Broke My Heart…

Oh Joe? Sadly, Won’t See Him No More…

I can honestly say that not everything about 2017 was bad…I landed a new job…I’m no longer a truck driver…I’m a grocer…more about that here…

The Best Worst Decision I’ve Ever Made?…

…I participated in…to say I competed in would be too much of a stretch…my first half marathon…and I raised more money for St. Jude’s Childrens Hospital while I did it…

I have a lot to learn in 2018…my training as a grocer is much more extensive than you would think…definitely more than I thought…but it also allows me many more opportunities for success than a life of driving…I hope…

I know my wife will land a new job this year…she has too much experience…she’s too smart…too driven not to…I think if I have one concern right now it’s this guy (this post is short, I promise)…

When Bailey Lays Around the House…

Oh, and my son finally finishing college and finding a good job…but, at least I have my health…some health…maybe we should wait on that Conversation  …I’ll let you know after my physical on the 8th…

Giving Thanks At the Market?…Well, Maybe Not So Much For Everyone…

Yes, this is but another in a close-Knit  and endless stream of posts about my new job at the grocery store…if you want the latest on Number 45 and his Cabinet of Horrors you clicked on the wrong post…it’s also not a very imaginative use of the Daily Prompt Word knit…

Anywho, in my position as the most junior of all of the Front End Service Team Leaders, this has been a good week to work with other Front End employees and managers…and unfortunately also get my rear end handed to me…it was one thing learning HOW to work as a cashier…but something totally different learning how to work WITH the cashiers and help them through their hang-ups…their register issues…not their emotional hang-ups, for those they can use the Employee Assistance Program or their favorite bartender…if their over 21 of course…sorry if that sounds cold…

…this week they issued to me several cards…with printing barely legible because of the amazing amount of information…department numbers, phone numbers…all printed so small even with glasses on it was difficult to make out the numbers…add the pressure of a line of customers waiting for me to fix things…to figure out product codes or pricing when the item has none…why their credit or debit card was denied…the difference between in-date and out-of-date coupons…like I said…rear end?…meet front end…

I did learn some things the hard way, however my performance was not what you could call one of a seasoned professional in the grocery industry…I unfortunately maybe inadvertently ticked off a few customers with my new found incompetence?…not because that was my goal…however, I think I also showed great patience with some customers…I find it amazing that a customer can come running into the store and without even attempting to look around, ask…

“Where are the cranberries?”…

”Well…what kind would you like mam?…fresh cranberries, frozen, or canned?”…

”Oh, never mind. I’ll just wander around the store!”…

”Uh?…Okay then, Happy Thanksgiving to you, mam?”…

Sorry…but that’s just not shopping to me…and no, I don’t know the precise location of every  item in the store…we have an phone app for that…she could have looked it up before she even left home…saving us both from that uncomfortable exchange… 

…even in the face of a really irate customer who wanted to buy two turkeys…who didn’t read the dates on the sales flyer and who came to the register with two frozen turkeys and enough attitude to stuff both those birds…she might have gotten her price too…if only she hadn’t been verbally abusive to the employee at the register…a 17-year old…tell me we suck and then threaten me you have a blog?…

WHO IN THE NAME OF SAM HILL DOESN’T HAVE A BLOG?…And let me guess?…she added it on your Facebook timeline too?…hopefully for her and her family, Chinese food restaurants are open on Thanksgiving…am I right?

There were lots of other inter-actions with customers…some good…some not so much…usually my fault…but I’m looking forward to the end of my first month…all the while realizing that delivering packages for FedEx for the last 16+ years has taught me almost nothing…it’s time to actually use my brain again…

Saturday Orientation…Wait, What Did She Just Say?…

First day on the new job was just a simple 3-hour orientation seminar. No real earth-shattering information came from all of this…did hear how much my new employer was opposed to unions in their family business (I agree for now)…so much of the morning was spent listening to the store manager talk to us about their dislike for unions, then introducing a video where they?…you guessed it…talked more about the family environment they’ve worked hard to create…and how introducing a union into that environment could change all they’ve created (again, I agree)…

The video was also a highlights tape of happy customers singing the praises of my new employer…many of the clips and comments seemed to be from folks attending new store openings…hopefully these folks have retained that same love…there was one clip that made me almost laugh out loud until I looked around the room and saw I was the only immature one smiling…

Sometimes how a person says something is every bit as important as what the message is…what do I mean?…we’re all Americans, for the point of this post I’m only speaking about people born in the good old USA…here’s why…if you were born here, you’re native language is probably the English language that many of us butcher daily…the biggest difference being how you say something…location, location, location…the regional differences in the sound of our spoken words…or, somebody from Georgia may say the same thing as someone from, let’s say Maine, but it will sound different because of our various regional accents…

In the video clip they show the opening of a new store in one of the New England states…I know that because they have no stores below Virginia…and amidst all the celebrating and fanfare a woman steps up to the microphone and says…

“It’s like a tailgate party in here!”, which sounds more like, because of her accent and my failure to act like a grown-up, “It’s like a tailgate potty in here!” (ba-dum-ching)

Yes, you read this far just so I could get in a cheap, juvenile potty joke…but really what else did you have to do this morning, read more about Narcissistic Number 45 and his Asian tour?…the Russia probe?…Crooked Hillary?…watching lame videos of Sarah Huckabee Sanders Dancing with White House press reporters…it’s still okay to laugh occasionally, even if it’s juvenile potty humor…

Is Twitter A Tool, Or A Useless Toy?…

I was reading one of the other writers I enjoy on WordPress…what’s that?…fine!…I was reading one of the writers I enjoy on WordPress this morning…happy now?…and she was mentioning how our Narcissistic Number 45 blocked her on Twitter after only 3 tweets, and let me say…job well done…signing up to follow him…then to have the stamina and the patience to read every tweet this loud-mouthed dotard types out…We the non-Twitter People only hear and see what makes it into the news, I’m sure he tweets other nonsense that’s just pure covfefe…

And that got me thinking…what?…no, it doesn’t smell like scrapple frying in a pan!…how many other members in the Trump Cabinet of Horrors have their own Twitter accounts from which to be blocked?…members of Congress?… Senators?… corporate C.E.O.s?…how many crazy-assed world leaders are there on this Planet who are currently on Twitter?…if Kim Jong Bad Haircut has an account, there has to be others, am I right?…

How much fun would it be to get Twitter blocked by Vladimir Putin?…by Kim Jong himself?…and what could you possibly say that would insult those guys and make them block you?…maybe you’d like to tell Syrian President Bashar al-Assad what a douche he is for gassing his own people…reach out to the leader of Nambia…how about commenting on the Queen Mother’s newest hat?…do it respectfully though, her country may be one of the last allies we still have thanks to Number 45’s U.N. speech…

Like our president, Twitter can be a real tool…and like WordPress, it might be fun to see how many people I can annoy with irritatingly snide comments…