Life In the Slow Lane August 6, 2008

So yesterday, I was cleaning up a bit at home. Specifically, I was clearing off the top of the bookshelf I use as a nightstand (from the top bunk). I was quite motivated, as I had a new alarm clock to plug in…and nowhere to set it. So I began to wade through piles of dangerously balanced junk, some of it papers and correspondence dating back to 2006 (did I mention I’m not so good at filing?) This required many trips up and back down off the bed, often carrying armloads of stuff that belongs elsewhere. That’s when it happened.

 

I managed to land wrong on my left ankle. The problem with that being that I sprained that ankle over ten years ago and it hasn’t been the same since. The good news is that it didn’t bother me at all…then.

 

I didn’t realise that I’d aggravated that old injury till about 3 1/2 hours into my 8-hour shift at work. As a cashier. Standing there all the time and running around price checking things for customers.

 

Rats.

 

I bought an elastic bandage and wrapped it up, then convinced my manager to let me pull a seat over to my register for the rest of my shift. I plan to go home and ice it. But all I can say is: This is not fun.

 

I moved pretty slowly for the rest of the day. And I think I like the advice I got from one customer: “Everyone should be able to move slowly every once in a while.”

 

So now I have a greater appreciation for the mobility and youth I typically have. Typically. ‘Cept, you know, the ankle.

 

I shouldn’t be able to tell you when the weather will change by my joints. I’m only 20.

 

Sad.

 

Hopefully it feels better tomorrow, just in time for another long shift. Sigh.

 

I can help the next customer on register 5.

Labels June 25, 2008

Labels are great. They help you find things.

Overlabeling is not great. What ARE we, idiots?

We’ve been cleaning and organising at the store where I work for the past couple of weeks. Apparently there’s some grandiose scheme to make every inch of the store shine, all the time (which won’t happen unless we follow our customers with mops and vacuums, but hey, what are you gonna do?) One job that I as a cashier had was to clean out the cabinets under the cash registers: take everything out, clean the floor and all the walls of the cabinet with surface cleaner, figure out what needed to go back in the cabinet, and figure out where the rest should go. Doing this, there were several things I learned.

1. The cabinets under the scanners where we put the hangers from apparel are quite large enough to climb inside. In fact, this is more or less necessary in order to reach the back corners and clean them. My coworker has photographic proof of this fact.
2. Quarter-inch thick dust+strong smelling cleaner+a small enclosed space=Headaches and aggravation of other factors, which may also lead to nausea and dizziness.
3. When one store changes to another store, stuff from the first store may still be found squirreled away under the cash registers. Two years later.
4. It is truly fascinating how many wires are needed to run a cash register. It is truly mind-boggling how they could all get in my way at the same time…and move with me!

This digression was brought to you by: Victor Hugo.

And now, to my main point: labeling.

The other day I found my manager at customer service with a labeller. Not unusual, since they’d been labeling drawers up at customer service to help them stay organised. This is the proper use of labelling: placing a little sticky label on a drawer that informs you that the drawer contains certain types of forms, a first-aid kit, or whatever you may need to find is good.

My manager was making labels that read “STAPLER”, “HANGERS”, and “REGISTER TAPE”. Her plan? Under directions from others, she planned to stick these labels inside the cabinets, in front of the very spot these objects were supposed to go.

Pardon me, but this isn’t Sesame Street.

If you are working as a cashier, here that means you are at least 16 years old. If you are 16 years old, and can read well enough to utilise said labels, chances are you could just as easily remember where to put the register tape. By the time you open the cabinet (the last one, naturally) and see the label pointing you to the register tape, you would see the register tape, probably more easily than the label, actually.

This whole situation put me in mind of the comedian Brad Stine.

Sad. Truly sad.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go stick labels inside my drawers so that I’ll know where my left socks go, and where my right socks go.