Day 4

Somewhere between 2 a.m. when I couldn't sleep and "The Nanny" came on TV and I was like, "Oh, The Nanny's on. Wait. I fucking hate 'The Nanny'" and half-watched 10 minutes anyway before turning it off in disgust and 4 something a.m. when my room alarm clock went off,* my mindset changed. I went from "This is kind of fun. What an interesting way to make money for a week! This will be fun to write about**, what an adventure!" to "Fuck this noise. I want to go home. I miss everyone. I'm lonely. Is this really what I'm doing with my life?"

I guess I was just being over dramatic for a Monday morning, but it felt like I got no sleep, couldn't turn the alarm off, didn't have time to make coffee and forgot my tie. I got into the store at 11:15 and the nice girl who has tried to befriend me*** asked if I had a late night. I didn't feel like trying to explain the Nanny/alarm situation so I half nodded and went to work.



When you don't have a tie on, you're just a guy flying helicopters. My dad tells me how at a radio station he worked at back in the day they made the DJ's wear ties and they always got in the way. Ditto with flying helicopters. Here's what I can't figure out. How was today my best sales day?!

Sales:

Cloud Forces: 18 When I was getting settled in, the boss told me we didn't have any and we wouldn't get any until Wednesday. Well, Santa came early. We got enough of the clouds to last all week. They didn't get there till like 4:00, but it revived me.

Silver Bullets: 71 I've gotten really good at selling two at a time with the 2 for $50 deal. One guy bought 6.

How did this massive sales day happen? I honestly don't know. I looked and felt like shit, was late and was freaking out about Adrian Peterson not playing and it was the only weekday I've worked, but it was my best day. Go figure. Especially when spazzy Adam Morrison didn't even buy one. Who's spazzy Adam Morrison? Author of quote of the day, of course.This super awkward spaz with an Adam Morrison mustache comes in and is mumbling about his helicopter that he got somewhere else. He was curious about the advertisement of the "gyroscope" on the box. I explained that it kept the helicopter steady.


Quote of the day:

"Gyroscope. Is that like the food, Gyros?"

Yes, the part of the helicopter that keeps it upright is exactly like the sliced lamb in pita bread dish. The only difference is cucumber sauce. You dumb shit. After I laugh it off and say "Well, I don't think they're related, but yeah, it hovers well because of the gyroscope," he turns to fruit punch mustache kid, who's completely mystified with the helicopter and keeps following it around with his fruit punch mustache mouth hung open, and says, "it has a gyroscope! like the food, Gyros! And they're 2 for $50 or $25 each." Whoa, whoa, whoa, spazzy Adam Morrison ... spread your lies elsewhere. After I get him to stop making shit up, spazzy Adam Morrison has me show him both helicopters and was totally hard for both of them, but still didn't get one. And I still had my best sales day. Go figure.

Dumb stuff

• # of people who tried to get candy from the machine: (Read day 3 first if you haven't for explanation) ~50. I usually rolled my eyes, but one guy was especially perplexed and I still felt like shit, so I emphatically, silently, pointed to each word of "This. Is. Not. A. Working. Unit." He felt really dumb. For real.
• # of people who told me I have the best job in the world: 7
• # of people who misheard me and thought I said 2 for $15 instead of 2 for $50: 0. I started enunciating the shit out of 50.
  
• # of kids who think the helicopters are $10 because they see the save $10 when you buy 2 sign and are can't totally read yet: 3
  
• # of kids who asked if they could try it: 15
  
• # of those kids who were satisfied when I let them hold it as it took off: 8
• # of kids who clench it with a death grip and wouldn't listen to the "hold it with an open hand" instructions no matter how many times me or their parents told them: 4
  
• # of those kids who got hit in the face when they held it crooked: 1

Random

• # of kids with a Justin Bieber t-shirts/gifts/dedication t-shirts: 0 All these fads are over apparently.
• # of times I remember hearing “Winter Wonderland” on the Christmas mix: 0 I think the mix changed somehow. I'm mostly hearing "Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree." Would it kill them to put the Mariah
  Carey version of "All I Want for Christmas is You" on this mix or the Home Alone soundtrack? That's the only decent Christmas music I know.
  
• # of free Asian chicken samples: 3. It did get me to eat the Chinese food in the mall. Damn it! I've always been susceptible to that trick. The Chick Fil-A people had samples. You never know how tasty Chick Fil-A is until you've had it for free right after having shitty terriyaki samples. Good lord. Why didn't I just get Chick-Fil-A? The sample lady didn't come out until after I'd eaten. Fuck it all. If I hadn't lost all 3 fantasy football match-ups in a devastating way, I think today might have been pretty solid. I guess it still was. Two more days left! It sure felt like Winter started today.
  

Clothes

• Striped shirt with white collars/cuffs
  
• Khaki pants -4th day in a row.
  
• Silver tie- got it out, buttoned the top button, forgot it. My neck thanked me. I may be done with ties this trip. Who's gonna stop me?!

*Someone must have decided to set three alarms on weekdays for this Travelodge alarm clock in my room and made it impossible to disarm in the dark. Jesus. I'm unplugging the bitch tonight.

**This IS really fun to write about. It's 3:10 a.m. and I'm adding more footnotes.

***For the first two days, I honestly couldn't tell if it was a guy or a girl. Turned out it was a lesbian. Not that there's anything wrong with that.