Thursday, December 02, 2004

WalMart = One of The Levels Of HELL!

We headed off to Wally World tonight in search of the items we should have bought last night but didn’t because I just could not fucking remember and K was utterly unmotivated. One of the items on the list was fabric, as in fabric that will match the cool fake tiger fur I made Super Girl’s amazingly fabulous coat out of. Cabbage Patch was in love with it and wanted a coat to match her sisters. We head for the fabric section and I select a white leopard print as they did not have a white tiger print (I thought it would be cute to have them in tiger print and white tiger print). All I need is one yard of fabric. I take the bolt to the counter and wait. There is no store employee around. This is actually pretty common; generally if you stand around impatiently some older woman in a horrid blue smock will appear out of nowhere and will stoically ask if you need help. So I do that. Stand around and look for signs of employees. Meanwhile the Little People have changed to their alter egos of Chaos and Destruction and are trying their damnedest to live up to their names – luckily upon entering Wally World I instantly recalled that some alien cosmic force eminates from Wally World (and only Wally World) that fucks with the brain waves of normal mild mannered children (of which my offspring are not, but they are still affected) and causes them to become foul little demons complete with heads that revolve and pea soup spewing mouths and worst of all the ability to WHINE at a level that can annoy EVERYONE within hearing distance of their shrill, piercing voices. K decides to push the cart around while I wait for a helpful employee to appear – this is generally a smart and safe idea as it’s harder for the Tiny Terrorists to get to a moving target and decreases the collateral damage inflicted by them. After nearly 10 minutes the helpful employee appears. She is neither stoic nor elderly and I’m instantly suspicious. In my experience the only helpful employees in a sewing area of Wally World are stoic and elderly. Her name tag said Jenny and she appeared to be maybe 20, tall and anorexic – and way to chipper for a Wally World employee. I quickly discovered her chipperness was probably the only thing that kept people from killing her after 5 minutes of conversation, she was dingy. As she came from where the patterns are, followed by a customer she announced that she was sorry, but she had been looking for a pattern *smile*. I nodded and waited. She and customer got into a discussion on how much fabric was needed for the garment that customer’s son would be making for some kind of school assignment. This involved much yelling back and forth between the customer and her son (he was wander around the section) and some debate between Jenny and the customer. I quickly realized that neither the customer nor Jenny had a fucking clue about sewing. While it was being debated as to how much fabric would be needed, Jenny casually mentioned that I knew exactly what I wanted and gave me brief but false hope that she would tell customer to hold on one moment while she cut my fabric for me, but it was not to be! I guess I had some minor bad karma to burn off this evening. Customer and Jenny came to a decision on how much fabric son would need and Jenny laid it out to cut it. Then the word *NOTIONS came up. Blank stares from customer and son, foggy look from Jenny – she had the concept but not a clue what was needed for this pattern even though it’s written on the back of the freaking pattern. *sigh* My patience was wearing thin, I had offered a few words of help during this time but I realized that if I EVER FUCKING WANTED MY LIFE BACK, I would need to assist these clueless people. I take the pattern and say “You need thread and Velcro. I’m sure you need elastic also.” Then ensues the conversation of why Velcro. Uggh! Fuck I don’t know, it just fucking says so on the package! That’s what I thought, I did not say though. I looked at the instruction sheet and could not find an answer, I gave her my best guess and told her to buy it. She asked if I was sure 5 or so times. I started telling her son to go find things so this painful experience could END. Customer and son got into a debate on just about EVERY FUCKING THING! But finally things were cut. They finally left, but not before the ever so chipper Jenny asked what I would be making with the furry fabric and I told her a coat for Cabbage Patch. You would have thought I had just freaking pulled a diamond out of my ass. Customer was so almighty impressed that she launched into a monologue of how she wished that she had learned to sew when she was in school, yadda, yadda, yadda. Customer almost wet her pants when I said I had made the coat last night. Jenny casually quipped “Oh yeah, she sews all the time.” I smiled at her thinking “Oh… so now you know what I do? You’re a mind reader? No, no, you’re just utterly and completly insane, the smile should have tipped it off for me.” I didn’t say anything, I just wanted her to finish cutting my fabric and for customer to stop fawning over me, thanking me for my assistance and just go away before she asked for my number incase she had questions later. *sigh* 30 minutes after I entered the fabric area, I was released from my prison and free to finish my shopping experience with K and the Tiny Terrorists.

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