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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Sunday, January 29Hu
Spent all day at work and four hours at the retailer and I probably should’ve been somewhere else because I felt no better than yesterday.

It was pretty low key at the resort…Bianca was there and not only does she do her work well, she is very pleasant to boot, except when she’s calling me a “turd” from time to time when I didn’t measure up, which makes me laff…Considering we are smack in the middle of ski season and everyone and their mother was checking out we weren’t half as busy as we should’ve been…Guests, by and large, avoided the front desk and weren’t bothering us for toilet paper and coffee filters and slow drains.

However, since it was only Bianca and I – Karina, the PBX operator, was sick and Jules the Manager wasn’t coming in until PM shift – there was no chance to sneak away for a nooner soak at the hot springs like I scammed yesterday.

I spent most of my shift at the retailer catching up on the training I should’ve done before I ever hit the floor…I got all of the third section done, 90 percent of it was stuff I’ve been doing regularly for a few months and, of course, some of what was taught was different than how we actually do it in the trenches, which was pretty exciting because it meant ol’ Sparrow failed a couple of assessments and had to take them over.

Saw a video on how to handle an active shooter situation…The video showed a malcontent white guy with some sort of rifle walking thru a store and its offices shooting at people…He was a lousy shot who couldn’t hit the side of a barn and no one got hit, much less died, and three people in the warehouse eventually took him down…What was funny was as the crew was evacuating an office, the men had turned tail first and were leading the charge out the door, no doubt to clear the way for the women they left behind to fend for themselves.

My own opinion is you can watch all the videos you want but no one really knows how you are going to respond in a situation like this until you’re knee deep in it…Some people might surprise you and lose their head while other will remain calm and you have some zero clue who will do what until the deal foes down….Years of sports officiating and some private security work has shown that o’l Sparrow tends to keep his head when the deal is going down, but I’ve never been in a shooting, so who the hell knows.

Spent some time with the new couple Rustam and Faruza during the hour or so I was actually working a register…Because I asked, Faruza said they were originally from Uzbekistan and laffed when I asked if that was near Finland…After the laffs subsized, i came back strong and noted it was actually in Central Asia, which seemed to impress her.

Rustam was having a bit of trouble with a cash transaction, which I cleared up for him…He seemed disturbed he had made a mistake and I told him not to worry about it, that any mistake he makes once I’ve made twice and it’s tuff to do something that can’t be corrected or worked around.

I told Julie I am will not be in Monday…I need to get as well a possible for the Detention Deputy test…I have not been in the gym half as much as I should have been lately…I’ve learned over the years working out when ill generally does more harm than good…We’ll see how I feel Monday…The Wife has been taking good care of me and I am feeling better, so maybe I’ll feel good enough to get in warrior condition in one day.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Saturday, January 28
Fabulous.

The sickies, a few days before a fitness test I am getting less and less likely to pass by the hour.

I left work early, too, because I wasn’t doing anybody any good by being there…I went to the gym, too, and tried to sweat the yuckies out of me…First I spent some quality time in the sauna, then I soaked for a while, both of which helped a lot.

I’ve been playing fast and loose with call offs at the retailer, and I sort of had to report for duty today…The problem on my training modules was fixed and I spent a couple of hours there, completing the current segment…The managers who could approve this and authorize me moving on to the next segment had all bailed, so I took a break and spent an hour or so on Aisle 4.

There are two new cashiers, Rustam and Faruza, who are husband and wife and Middle Eastern, tho I am unable to narrow it down any further than that…Rustam was training with Abdul, which marked the first time I’ve seen a Middle Easterner and an African working a register before…Faruza is sweet and wears appropriate head gear.

Two brothers about my age came through the line…The older one was visiting the younger one and, as brothers will, were bickering about who was going to pay for their crap with, as usual, the older brother winning…I don’t do envy, but my brother’s dead so we can’t hang out anymore, so instead I was happy for them enjoying their time together.

I got home and went straight to bed…Well, after The Wife stuck a Nettie pot in my nose and put some Vapo-Rub on my chest.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Friday, January 27
The Wife brought home a poop stool today…It is a place to put your feet when sitting on the can….Why she did this was not immediately clear…The Wife, clearly, is very excited by this development, so exited ol’ Sparrow had to show – feign – a suitable level of excitement or risk causing offense.

At first, tho, I wasn’t entirely sure what it was for, thinking it was something you sit on and if you think that is whacko you don’t know The Wife…She’s capable of bringing home something like that…Then I thought it was something for the cat to use…I had no third opinion…I was otherwise flummoxed.

The Wife had to provide complete instructions and in her glee simply could not wait to see me use it, eagerly banging on the bathroom door tho, of course, I refused to open the door, and initial findings on the merits of the poop stool were inconclusive.

Jesus passed me on the way into work this morning…He lives in the next county and he passes me a couple of times a month…This is funny because I have enough experience driving in the winter that I no longer drive like an old maid, but he passed me anyway before a really small town about halfway into town where the speed limit – which I was more or less observing – was 55.

In the breakroom, I walked up to Jesus.

You know, Jesus, the speed limit near that town is 55 miles per hour, not 97, or whatever the hell you feel like going.

To emphasize this point, I held up both hands, each with five fingers extended…For his part, he told me he routinely passes everyone who drives 20 miles an hour.

A lesson I’ve given here was reinforced today: always call and confirm your reservation!!!

You never know…Yesterday I got a call from Mr Smith, looking to confirm his reservation for Saturday…I tapped a few keys and told him we didn’t have it, asked who he booked thru, which turned out to be some online auction site I was not familiar with…I told this wasn’t unusual, some sites wait till the last minute to send them, and to call again today.

He did…Good thing, too, because I had to go digging to find it…I emailed the site’s support desk and in fairly short order I had the reservation, but boy, the path it took went through the online auction site, a timeshare exchange company we do business with and subsidiaries of theirs in Mexico and, get this, Bolivia…I am not making this up…I am still not entirely sure what the hell happened…The auction company probably had the listing from someone who wanted to sell their week here…The auction company doesn’t have access to our reservations database, but they’re merely a third party vendor and don’t require it and the exchange company never got the reservation to us.

Gave in to a bit of vanity today and bought some gray hair liquid…I can handle not having much hair on top…That’s no big deal, especially when I was shaving my head anyway or keeping it very short…I think I am going to let it grow out because I am in the mood to do so, but it is awfully gray and I don’t really like the way it blends with what remains of my dark brown hair…I made the first application today, and the package, as their ads have said since I was a boy, proclaimed that in two weeks all the gray will be gone and would have been so gradual no one will know!

Well, The Wife will…She was at the retailer when I bought it, along with some other toiletries and she was working self-checkout when I was heading out and peeked inside my bag.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Thursday, January 26
A bunch of us were in the breakroom before clocking in today, including several maintenance apes, Jesus, Dan-o, Danny, some others…Some of them have lockers in the breakroom which I’ve never understood…They have their own building for Pete’s sake, they can keep their tool bags over there,  but they have lockers in the breakroom.

Anyway, I was inspecting Dan-o’s tool bag and getting some good-natured needling about not knowing anything about its contents…Regular readers of this crap know this good-natured needling is earned…Well, not completely…I can recognize, and probably even use, some of them, like the screwdriver or maybe even one of those wrench deals, but that’s probably about it.

Jesus started in, actually talking to Dan-o:

Hey, Dan-o, I bet Sparrow doesn’t know any of the stuff in here…He just recognizes pens and the TV remote and stuff…

Dan-o smiles then looks at me, then at his tool bag.

You know, you might be right…Hey Sparrow, you know what any of this stuff is…

I purse my lips and start looking thru the bag, touching each tool carefully, as if I could catch the plague from it:

I dunno…What do we got here???…Looks like we got some ratchets…pylons…what’s are these, pot holders???

Dan-o and Jesus both laffed.

Some locals brought some wine and beer for some of their friends who are staying with us…It was sitting on the back counter waiting for delivery to the room when Karina the PBX Operator walks out, sees it, and wonders if she could have some…Since Karina has not yet achieved mandated by this state to legally purchase and consume stuff like this I said no…I then take her to the back office, where Angelica is sitting at the Rooms Control desk

Angelica, what is our policy on underage drinking???

This made us both laff a little because we have an inside joke about this…Angelica is only 19 and on her  birthday I made a crack about how I knew the celebration of her birth would most certainly not include the consumption of alcoholic beverages…Angelica was firm and solemn:

Underage drinking is against the law.

She then nodded her head for emphasis, which was funny, too, and Karina thought we were serious, that she was going to get in trouble for even thinking about it, before I told her it was our inside joke.

After work I went to the gym to get some cardio in for the fitness test I have some zero chance of passing…I’m trying tho…I repeat, there weren’t any specs to meet in the letter and everyone was “encouraged to do their best” so we’ll see.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Wednesday, January 25
Spent some quality time with Stanko today, who’s the adjutant for both the Legion post and district I command…He said there were some things we needed to go over, so we met for lunch at a diner in town.

The big one is the location of April’s district meeting…At the last meeting, we set the last Saturday in April as the date, and the post here in my small town would host it….Usually, district meetings run from 9 till lunch…If there’s any leftover business we take of it, but they are all usually done by 1pm.

Well, as usual, the state got their paws in it…They want to attend both our meeting the meeting of the district south of us and they want to do it on the same day, too…They had suggested one on Saturday and one on Sunday, but Stanko put his foot down on that…Nobody really liked the Sunday meeting we had last time…Stanko also suggested District 13 have their meeting on Friday night, because the state bigwigs will already be in town, but we’re not entirely sure District 13 would like that.

Another option was to have District 13 have their meeting in the morning and we’d have our meeting in the afternoon, in a town about an hour away from District 13’s meeting…We don’t know if they’ll be able to host it, tho, and I told Stanko I would take care of all the arrangements, because he’s leaving town…This really doesn’t matter in this day and age, but Stanko, adorably, remains convinced that district business can only be conducted when he is actually in the state because he doesn’t travel with a laptop and only uses his mobile phone when some member of his family has been kidnapped or some such other emergency.

He also had some paperwork for me to sign…For the record, I had the diner’s splendid meatloaf sandwich and fries…Stanko had his usual hamburger – no cheese – and fries and he never eats all his fries, so I had some of his, too.

Stanko also said Win is interested in becoming Commander at our election in May. Recall I’ve served a couple of terms because no one else wants the job and if Win is really interested I’ll gladly step down…Win is currently the post’s senior vice commander and it is certainly not unheard of for the senior vice, as they are known, to move up to commander…In fact, it’s the standard fact in most posts…You work your way up, with my ascension almost immediately upon moving to town the exception.

I brought my non-working watch into town to take it to a jeweler to get a new battery put, but it’s working again…I am not making that up!!…I had asked Stanko for a recommendation for a place to get it replaced at and I looked down at it an wappo!, it was working again!!!

Slept in till almost 8:30 this morning, the latest I’ve slept in ages…I was up at 5 or so to use the can and felt pretty good and thought I’d stay awake after crawling back into bed, but no…I asleep in fairly short order…The Wife slept even later…Coffee was on and I was putzing around the office when she finally stirring about 9 or so.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Monday, January 23
One of the raging battles The Wife and I fight is over the proper way to store bread…Bread, of course, comes with a plastic tab, or one of those wire twisties, that secure the top of the package…Following a tradition established by Pa Sparrow, I am in the habit of not using the tab and tucking the top of the bag underneath the bag.

The Wife, however, is a traditionalist who uses the tab and has, from time to time over the ten years we’ve been together, provided instruction in how to properly secure the top of a package of bread…I tend to ignore this instruction and since I tend to leave the tab on the counter, it usually isn’t too hard to find and, not matter what method is used, we always have fresh bread.

Tonight, The Wife, finding her usual fault with my Bread Preservation Method, brought the bread to the table, opened the top and said:

Here why don’t you just leave it on the counter like this…It’s the same difference…

I laffed…It was a pretty funny line.

The Wife was in rare form today and in the morning also gave me the finger…She was about to head out to do something and couldn’t find her wallet…This, I have learned, is no cause for alarm…She frequently cannot find something and invariably it is someplace nearby and I long ago stopped going to DefCon 1 whenever her wallet, or keys, couldn’t be found…As it was, this morning her wallet happened to be, and I am not making this up, in her purse…Not in her desk, not in a drawer, not in her winter coat…In her purse….I told The Wife I was not particularly worried about finding them either, you know, based on past experiences and stuff because at any given time we are usually no more than a few feet away from the lost item.

I don’t worry anymore until Day 5…

That’s when her middle finger made an appearance…The Wife also instructed me to perform a physical impossibility on myself.

Good workout today…Recall I have a fitness test for the detention deputy spot at the county jail and I’m in reasonably good shape…If they ask me to complete a triathlon I’m up a creek, but otherwise I should be OK.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Monday, January 23
One day after the Queen of England would have been hard pressed to get a late checkout out of me, I actually granted a couple…Both were to rooms that did not have an incoming guest and neither were for more than an hour…So it is possible to get a late checkout out of ol’ Sparrow, but the planets have to be in line, there can’t be anyone coming into the room later that day and you can’t sound like a snot when you make your request, so no one should get too excited.

And there were more snotty people today, altho this guy did have legitimate gripes about our WiFi service…It is not all that great, frankly…It is difficult to access because you have to sign up and enter a promo code to dismiss the charges and it’s pretty slow when we’re busy and this guy was peeved…He said sorry wasn’t good enough and he wanted to know, immediately if not sooner, just what I planned to do about it.

Well, I planned to pass him off on the vendor who supplies the service, that’s what I planned to do…I called and talked to a nice guy who investigated and found there was a problem with some signal director or something like that and then I transferred him to the guest and I didn’t hear anything from anyone after that.

Like you probably, conversation at lunch in the breakroom centered around insecticide, cheese curds, bank robbery and lactation…Most of it was courtesy of Charlie, tho it started with Austin and I chatting about workout supplements…Then Charlie, who’s pretty smart, took that as an invitation to talk about insecticides because I guess they’re related, at least in his world, and if you’re looking for what got him off on that tangent, good luck, I’ve forgotten…From there it was a natural progression to cheese curds because Austin had mentioned Wisconsin, then Charlie  rolled right into some infamous local who robbed a bank and got five years in prison for it.

Hey Charlie, I said, you get invited to many parties???…That was really dull.

Anyssa talked about lactation…Regular readers of this crap know she recently gave birth and not only does she breast feed, but she pumps milk at work with some contraption she keeps in a blue, steel box that is not small…Anyssa added, in the same manner she would have used had we been talking about the weather or a sandwich, that sometimes she has so much milk stored she actually leaks, which I thought was pretty funny, tho she said I wouldn’t think it’s funny if my wife leaked all over the bed…She also said, well, never mind…It was pretty technical.

Tried to get more online training done at the retailer, but I couldn’t get past this one module…It wasn’t really module tho…It was supposed to be training on some government welfare program, but you click on the link and you get a PDF form that says Close this window which takes you back to the main page but doesn’t let you take following modules…Connie, the Personnel chief, tried to figure it out but couldn’t, so I ended up on Aisle 3, where it was rather slow…There wasn’t even a decent bachelor purchase of the night, tho one older guy did buy a couple of frozen pizzas and mac and cheese, but I got the impression he was more of a guy who whose wife was away for a couple of days than a day-in, day-out, working bachelor.

The big news is the battery on my new watch – the real cool one that is mainly made of wood – appears to have died…At 7:10 yesterday morning…So I wore the old $7 one I got at the retailer a year or so ago, after my solar powered one threw in the towel during another winter when it wasn’t getting its required sunlite…It sill had accurate time, too…Well, it was an hour off because of the time change, but other than that it was right on the money…Meanwhile, my $150 fancy-pants watch needs a new battery…Go figure.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…

Sunday, January 22
Boy, a very busy shift at the resort…Leah called off and I was alone and it is not a trade secret that Sundays are the busiest morning for a lodging establishment and it was a dead sprint from 7am until about 1pm or so when it slowed down to a light jog…Tanya called off for swing shift, too, which was tuff because there were almost as many incoming guests as departing guests, and the new manager Julie said screw it and came it 3pm to help Alberto.

It was so busy I worked straight through without a lunch, we were that swamped…Karina, the new PBX operator came in at 9:30 and that really helped, but there were still guests to attend to and duties to do and I didn’t even get to eat the lunch The Wife made for me…The only reason I had anything to eat at all was because Allyson in sales took pity on me and brought me a sandwich.

There had to be at least 15 people who called asking to check out late this morning…All tried to make it sound like theirs was the first late checkout request in Lodging History and all were told no…Look, it’s not my fault you booked your flight for the middle of the night…You can’t stay still 4pm and, frankly, you should’ve had the good sense to book an extra night, then you could leave at your convenience.

My personal fave was the guy who indicated how he coulda sworn his late checkout request wouldn’t be a problem, it was only an extra couple of hours, and then snottily kept quiet, as if this would magically make me see the error of my ways.

Look, a ski resort in the winter is busy, and established check out times are there to ensure that incoming guests can get into their room before sundown…If I would’ve granted every late checkout housekeeping would’ve been paralyzed and rooms would not have been available until midnight.

I was, as usual, gracious…Everyone was issued the standard line: I’m sorry, I’m unable to offer a late checkout this morning…Sometimes, like the snot who shut up, were told it multiple times.

Back on Aisle 5 at the retailer!!!

Not the whole way, but the first two hours, blow me, don’t even start…I had reported for duty prepared to do more online training but Sir Thomas took command and nixed that immediately, saying we were, as usual, shorthanded and he directed me to Aisle 5.

It was like coming home…We weren’t too busy, so the first thing I did was fuss over the station, cleaning the conveyor belt and generally tidying up…To celebrate my triumphant return, I even had a decent Bachelor Purchase of the Night!!!…Some guy in his early 30’s came through with some ramen, some house brand macaroni and cheese, Fritos, a gallon of chocolate milk and some Spam…Well, not real Spam, the house brand processed luncheon meat product…I didn’t really approve of this…Unless I was scrounging the sofa for loose change – not completely unheard of in those epic bachelor days – I would’ve gone with the leading national brand, Spam, but payday is later this week and a buck could be a buck.

The Wife and I will get Spam from to time…Or rather I will, she doesn’t really like it…More for me, and since I can make a sandwich out of old flashlight batteries, I generally fry them up and put some cheese on them.

While on Aisle 5 I noticed there was a brand new box of plug chewing tobacco…Recall, I sold some plug a couple of weeks ago and so did someone else because we were down to one pack and some got ordered…Based on how long the four packs lasted – about five months – this new box of 15 should last a couple of years.

Regular readers of this crap may well remember the lady who appeared to have had a facelift reversed…That is the best way to describe her look…She came through again tonight and looked more curious than ever…Actually, it looked like someone had taken some paint thinner and a scrubby to her face and injected her lips with a double dose of halogen or estrogen or whatever it is they inject in lips to make them bigger.

She bought some stuff for around the house and spent $54.12.

The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.

It was inspired by the 19^th-century British novel of the same name.

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