"Mine" means I own it and you can't have it.

A couple issues that happened this past week:

It seems my private driveway has turned into a public parking lot. Not really, but the neighbors seem to think so. I live in a townhouse so the driveways connect, it looks like a 4 car drive, but it's really two 2-car drives. I can't count how many times I've come home from work only to have to knock on the neighbor's door to have them move a visitor's car from my driveway. Last night the visitor asked "why don't you just park in the street" well, because it's MY driveway, I live here, I pay rent, I park here.

Second, I live with a bunch of pigs. My brother eats anything that isn't nailed down. I'm constantly chasing him out of food that I buy for myself. Just because I didn't eat it the minute I brought it in the door, doesn't mean I'm never going to. I just don't feel I have to eat everything faster than a bargain hunter at a 75% off sale.

Getting nowhere as an American

This has been an issue with me for quite a long time.

Some background: My mother's ancestors founded Massachusetts. Two of them are signers of the Declaration of Independence. My father's ancestors were on the beach to greet them when they got here. Basically, my family has been in the US since the beginning. What does that get me? Absolutely nothing.

I bring home $280 per week from my job. That's 40 hours a week, after deductions. This is the money I live on. Last year I filled out the application at my son's school to get free fees and free lunches. I was denied. Their reason--my income was too high. That $280 is half of what is printed on the guidelines that are published with the application. I tried to appeal, and was told I could not appeal but I could reapply if the situation changes. I reapplied but the second application was ignored.

This year I applied again. The information remained the same except I changed one thing. Instead of marking "Caucasian", I took advantage of my father's ancestors and marked "Native American". We were approved.

Isn't it sad that you have to be either a minority or an illegal alien to get anywhere in the US? Being an American in America means nothing anymore. That's very sad.

Please avoid "reply all"

Somebody on my e-mail address book sent out one of those silly "getting to know you" quizzes, to all 100something people in THEIR address book. I usually ignore these, read them, go "how nice" and delete it.

In the last two days I've gotten at least 30 replies from people I don't even know because instead of replying back to teh sender, they hit "reply all" and sent it to everybody. What makes them think I want to know everything there is to know about them? Honestly, I couldn't care less.

Please refrain from using the "reply all" button on emails...unless you really want to tell 125 people what color underwear you're wearing.

Spam Mail

I had to post after seeing how horribly written some Spam mail I recently got was...Granted I'm no grammar/spelling police, but this is just too bad!

Here's the first one: Notice the misuse of "you're" (huh? I am winning lottery?) and it's Spornsored by UK Live (but further down, it lists South Africa) I've put some comments inside ** so you know it's not part of the mail.

PROMOTION BY LIVE COMPANIES *as compared to 'dead' companies?*

YOU’RE WINNING LOTTERY.

COMPUTER PROMOTIONAL DRAW

SPORNSOR BY UK LIVE UNSIGNED.

HEAD OFFICE

Coors Brewers Limited, *I don't even drink!*
130 High Street ,
Burton -on-Trent,
Staffordshire
DE14 1JZ

THIS MESSAGE IS FROM THE PROMOTION MANAGER, INTERNATIONAL PROMOTIONS/PRIZE AWARD DEPARTMENT

PRESTIGIOUS LOTTERY .

YOU HAVE WON ON THE COMPUTER BALLOT,

THE SUM OF US$940,000.00

PLEASE CONTACT

(MR.MIKE ZUMA)

YOUR CLAIM AGENT IN AFRICA ON THE BELOW DETAILS *Africa? I thought this was UK Live*

FOR YOUR IMMEDIATE PAYMENT

From: The Office Of Claiming Agent, South Africa.

No 45 Kensington Close

P.0.Box242- 3431- Johannesburg

Tel +27 737766655/Fax +27 866 132 914.

EMAIL: mikezuma111@live.co.za

(PRESTIGIOUS LOTTERY SA.)

PRIZE AWARD NOTIFICATION

South Africa mail announce you as one of the 10 lucky winners in the ongoing SA Lottery Draw for the year, 2009. All 10 winning email addresses were randomly selected from a batch of 50,000,000 international emails each from Canada , Australia , Unitaed States , Asia, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Oceania as part of our international promotions program which is conducted annually,consequently, you have been approved for a total pay out of $940,000.00(NINE HUNDRED AND FOURT THOUSAND UNITED STATE DOLLARS ONY.). *fourt thousand ony*

This Lottery was promoted and sponsored by a conglomerate of some multinational companies as part of their social responsibility to the citizens in the communities and the whole world where they have operational base. Further more your details(e-mail address) falls within our South Africa representative office, as indicated in your play coupon and your prize of $940,000.00 will be released to you from this regional branch office in South Africa . *I totally do NOT understand this paragraph some companies?*

Note that your email address qualified for the draw, as a result of your visiting various websites we are running the e-business promotions for. You/Your Company email address, attached to ticket number 100-309-7482, with serial number 513-10 drew the lucky numbers 7, 14, 20, 33, 38, 43 and Bonus number 5 and consequently YOU HAVE won in the Second Category. *Nice use of different colors to let me see where you've reinserted different numbers*

Your winning Ticket is Number. S/A/N/LYour Serial Number. 754-77
Your lucky draw Numbers are. 15, 16, 17, 18, 26, 46 Bonus Number 40
Your INSURANCE Number: BBTHY/453L/GMSA

You have therefore been approved for a lump sum pay out of $820,000.00 (NINE HUNDRED AND FOURT THOUSAND UNITED STATE DOLLARS ONY.)

in cash, which is the winning payout for the year 2009 category winners.

*Notice, the number and the written out words do not match...and it's still 'ony fourt thousand'*

Please be informed that you have to contact your claiming agent on the neccessary step to take for the claiming of the sum of $940,000.00 is insured with your email address which won you this prize, therefore you should contact (PRESTIGIOUS LOTTERY ) your agent and give them your full names so that they will re-insure your WINNING under your full names.

Please note that PRESTIGIOUS LOTTERY your paying agent, will invite you to their office in Johannesburg South Africa for your immediate payment, you have to hurry up and contact them immediately. To begin your claim, please contact your claim agent immediately, Mr Mike Zuma Email: mikezuma111@live.co.za

NOTE: In order to avoid unnecessary delays and complications, please remember to quote your reference and batch numbers and other information provided above and below in every one of your correspondences with your claims agent.

Congratulations'' once again from all our staff and thank you for being part of our promotions program.

Sincerely,

MR. C.J GOOWER SAMILITY.

SOUTH AFRICA REP.

Copyright © 2009-2010 LOTTERY
All rights reserved. Terms of Service Guideline

77635 476378 255667460

THIS PROGRAM IS SPONSURED BY: SOUTH AFRICAN LOTTO AUTHORITY. AND SUPPORTED BY: (F餩ration Internationale de Football Association) FIFA SUPPORT

*Notice sponsured*

Here's the next one: apparently I just got a grant...I think. The first paragraph is nothing more than a huge run on setence and uses such big words that it's impossible to understand what they're saying.

Dear Beneficiary,
Ref Num: (GRT-877)

Congratulations to you as we bring to your notice that office of the
Senate House has chosen you by the board of trustees as one of the
final recipients of this year promotion cash Grant/Donation to
celebrate the 30th anniversary celebration and your email address have
emerged a Grant of {$750,000.00 USD} Seven hundred and fifty thousand
united state dollars. We are giving out a yearly donation of
{$750,000.00 USD} Seven hundred and fifty thousand united state dollars
to 12 lucky recipients as this Year promotion from the W.H.O, UN, and
the EU in accordance with the enabling act of Parliament.
Participants were selected through a computer bllot system drawn from
2,500,000 email addresses of individuals and companies from Africa,
America, Asia, Australia, Europe, Middle East, and Oceania as part of
our International Promotions Program. CONGRATULATIONS! Your fund is now
deposited with the paying Bank.

In your best interest to avoid mix up of numbers and names of any kind,
we request that you keep the entire details of your grant award
strictly from public notice until the process of transferring your
claims has been completed, and your funds remitted to your bank
account. NOTE: To file for your claim, please fill out below
information and contact the payout bank Via email contact below.

1. Full Name:....... 2. Address:........ 3. Nationality:.........
4. Age:.......... 5. Sex:.......... 6. Occupation:..........
7. Phone/Fax:......... 8. Present Country:...........

Contact Agent:
Mr. Donald Jones
E-mail: mrdldjones9@yahoo.com.hk
Tel: +234 805 279 0400

Your Faithfully
Donald Jones

I love this one:

Donna,

I am Paul Stevenson, and I would like to give you an opportunity that changed my life:
http://mintperu.com/2dh8txn4z6h64ees


This is great program; I am six months pregnant and was looking for something that could make me money from home.
I am so happy that I am able to be a part of this, and I would like to extend an invitation to you as well.


Over 21,256 people have already started living a better life, don't let them leave you behind.
Find out how safe and easy it is for you to work from home too.
http://mintperu.com/ijkxgrzgkxkujcqi



Regards,

Paul Stephenson
Elk Grove, CA

Wait....PAUL was six months pregnant? Somebody copy/pasted without proof reading! WTG Paul! I hope it's a healthy baby!

Dumb question of the day: "Can I pay for this at the checkout?" uh no we prefer you just make a run for it.

Definately NOT mother of the year...

First off, now that I know mobile blogging is working, I might post more often since I usually come up with something to blog about while I'm at work, and before I get home I totally forget what it was. Happened today...I should vent about that....why my brain can't remember a simple blog topic LOL

While at work today I dealt with a ton of idiotic people. The worst came in with a newborn with sunburn and was looking for something to use for it. Well, anybody with common sense knows that you don't use anything on a newborn without talking to the pediatrician first. For some reason this woman did not want to call her doctor and just wanted something over the counter...unfortunately nothing OTC exists for infant sunburn. Anyway...why the heck did she not have that baby in the shade to keep it from getting burnt?

I just activated mobile blogging, testing to see id it's working.

Child Support

This is a subject that ticks me off the most. I touched on the subject a little in my very first post.

First a little background:

My son turned 18 this past April. I dated his "father" (I more commonly refer to him as a sperm donor since that's all he did) for a year before I got pregnant. We were engaged, but I broke off the engagement when my son was 6 months old. The reason was that the sperm donor was just too immature and there was no way he would be able to support a wife and child. He spent his spare time partying with his buddies, I had to beg to get a package of diapers for the baby (he was always broke because he spent all his money on his buddies). He completely skipped out on the first birthday, he claimed it was because his best bud was getting married. That bud has been married 3 times...his child only had one first birthday.

While I was pregnant, I went on public aid. Part of this was pursuing child support. The baby was about 2 months old when we first went to court. The first thing he did was order a paternity test. This angered me because I was a virgin when we started dating, and he'd been the only man I'd been with. He tried to claim that he was sterile (obviously not). Then his mother kept saying that the baby didn't look anything like him so it couldn't possibly be his child. Of course the test came back saying "You ARE the father".

Public Aid tried to get me $350 a month for support, however when they went to court, sperm donor brought in only one W2 that said he only made $5,000 the previous year. Going by that I was only awarded $25 per week for support. To get out of paying, he moved to Wisconsin. When that didn't work (because I sent Illinois his address) and the support started coming out of his paycheck, he quit his job. For about 4 months his mother sent letters to the state saying that he was unemployed and couldn't pay his support. They finally sent him a letter saying that unemployment was no excuse and he still owed, if he didn't pay he'd be arrested. His parents paid his support for him for nearly a year.

When my son was 15 I discovered that during a visit when he was 13, he was shown porn. At that point I decided to take the sperm donor back to court to amend the visitation order so that he could not take my son outside of Illinois and no overnight visits without supervision. Rather than deal with this 'bother', he decided to waive his visitation rights. I also asked for an increase in support since it was costing me more to raise him. This time his W2 said he made $300. Thankfully I had a judge who wouldn't let him get away with that. I knew that the sperm donor had been working as a Blues Brothers impersonator for cash (which is not reported on a W2), so the judge took that into consideration, as well as a housing allowance since he lives with his parents rent free. The support went up to $50 per week. The sperm donor says this is too much of a hardship for him so he stopped paying. I do have a few court orders that require him to work, report once a month, and if he's not working he has to file unemployment and report that once a month.

Here's my vent: He never did pay his back support from the previous 18 years so he owes me about $4500 in support. Now that my son is 18, the sperm donor doesn't think he should pay anything, including the back support. Once again, another court order so he knows that he still owed the back support. Of course now this is ticking him off so to "punish" me, he sends as little as he can. Last month I got $50 the entire month. Today I got another payment...$50. At this rate I'll have grandchildren before I see my back support.

What is it with some men that they think they can get away with this stuff. The only people they're hurting are their children. Men like this should be castrated.

Mindless Boring Work...and big waste of money

Ya gotta love working for a store that's part of a corporation. We're convinced that anybody working in corporate has never set foot in one of the stores...ever.

We've recently rolled out the "Big Relief Price Cut" (sounds like a good bowel movement) in which "corporate" decided to mark down several items in the store. They made a huge deal about the markdowns, then when it happened it was only about 500 items and they were all generic, and the savings was less than a dollar. SO a few months later they decided to roll out "wave 2", even MORE items marked down and now they've added some name brands. Since some customers complained that they had difficulty identifying the marked down items (ya know those big red sale tags just don't do it), they sent us about 4,000 of these big red dots that we're supposed to clip to the shelf at every item that's marked down. Spent 2 days doing this. Of course now our store looks like WalMart, I was waiting for the giant yellow smiley face to come get me.

Of course corporate says there's not enough money in the payroll to actually give employees a living wage, however they can spend thousands of dollars printing these silly dots to hang on the shelves. Heck, put that in my paycheck and I'll personally tell the customers what items are marked down, but it just irritates me to see the company wasting all this money on junk when the employees can't afford to even shop there.

On another note, today I answered a price check call for some napkins. The customer got red and blue solid colored napkins and claimed they were on sale because they were 4th of July product. They're actually not because we sell solid colored party goods year round. When I told the customer that the solid colors are year round and not included, she got angry and demanded a manager, who promptly gave her the sale price. Now...we're constantly told to watch "shrink" (items that leave the store for lower than selling price), yet when a customer claims something's on sale, they give it away. Once again, waste.

Closed is Closed

Yeah, another work rant. That happens in retail. We're the worst paid and worst treated workers anywhere IMO.

We've had signs on the doors for the past week that we were closing early for the 4th of July holiday. When do people come in to shop? 8:55pm...5 minutes before closing. Then they get angry that we won't let them keep on shopping. Sorry, but closed is closed. We're tired and we want to go home. And we did our shopping early.

Happy 4th of July

Stopping by to wish everybody (all one of my followers ROFL) a happy 4th of July.

Me, I'm working. There are 6 people who can close the store. One doesn't work weekends (she has another job), there's a mother/son 'team' who claimed they were unavailable (after being unavailable the rest of the week too--but not taking vacation or personal time---I'm sure they're having a nice party), one is out of state for the weekend, and the two highest store managers never close on weekends. So that leaves....ME. The only recourse I get for working on a holiday...I got an extra day off this past week, and I get paid an extra $8 to work. Yup, $8 not time and a half, a dollar an hour to work on a holiday. Hardly worth it but I can't afford to take any unpaid time off.

A lot to gripe about

This has been a couple weeks from H-e-double-toothpicks.

First off, thanks to Dave from Not So Straight From the Hip for featuring my blog on his. Of course this means I might actually have to post more than once every 3 months ROFL .

Let's start with the obvious....work.

A couple weeks ago I had a week's "paid" vacation. I get my check via direct deposit, so every Friday morning I go to my bank's website and check my balance to see what my deposit was. Usually it's no problem. This morning I should have gotten paid for my vacation week. I check and...no deposit. I go into my work's associate website and see that no check was issued for me for my vacation week. Hmmmm ok some body screwed up. Get to work, and tell the manager. What do they say "Well, you'll have two checks next week" um OK, but that doesn't help any for THIS week. Store director came in, I mentioned it to him (since he's the one who was supposed to have sent in the vacation hours), and he blamed the assistant (who's out of state this weekend)...and once again "You'll have two checks next week"...but still, that doesn't help for THIS week. SO.....getting exceedingly pissed off I kindly informed management that at that time I had $20 in my pocket, 1/4 tank of gas, and bills to pay. Gas will last me maybe the weekend so I'd have to call in next week until Friday morning when the two checks hit the bank. Plus, I might need a day to call those who have bills due and explain that my idiot managers failed to pay me for vacation time so I didn't get a paycheck and please don't give me late charges and I'lll pay double next week. They finally decided that I could get an emergency cash payout that I'll have to give back when I get my two checks next week. What really pissed me off though....none of the managers wanted to take responsibility for the mistake. While I blame all three to an extent, the Store Director is the biggest to blame because he should have made sure that the vacation time was put in. What's nice, the assistant manager (who is being trained on how to do payroll and assumed the Store Director had already put in the vacation time because that's not something he's been trained to do yet) had offered to give me a loan that I could pay back either one lump or little by little. That was very nice of him, but since I got the payout, I don't need it.

My other gripe is the education system where I live. Basically if you're not an illegal alien, you don't get squat. I received a letter the other day informing me that my son did not have enough credits to move onto Senior year, so he'll be a Junior again next year. Now....not once all year did I receive anything telling me that he was in danger of not moving on. No failure notices, no phone calls, no emails, nothing. Why didn't they say something when there was time for him to make up the credits. Now today I get a bill in the mail for the previous year...when I was supposed to get free fees because I'm low income. Apparently they've changed their mind and figure that $280 a week is too high to get free fees. By their thinking, because I rent from my parents that I should include THEIR income as mine. Um, nope. I don't get any of their income, and part of their income is my income since I pay them rent...so I don't see why I have to include them just because they own the house. Do they include the landlord's income for all renters? I don't think so.

Back to a work gripe...after having 10 days off for vacation, I get back to work to find my department in a shambles. SO....I say that I wanted the next day to put it straight again. Didn't happen. I had to cover another department for 3 hours. I had yesterday off (because I have to work on the 4th---that's another gripe....I have to work a holiday and all the company gives me is $8), and today when my warehouse order comes in, I have to cover for another 2 hours because the cashiers who were scheduled for today (a holiday weekend) were cut from the schedule. I have my yearly review coming up and it's going to be a bad one because my department looks like crap because I've been working every job in the store but my own.

I'm ready to walk out and go work somewhere else.

Peeves

No, I do not mean the poltergeist from Harry Potter (who was deleted in the movie version)

I mean things that really peeve me off. I've been thinking about these for a few days and the list seems to keep getting bigger LOL

Most of these are work related...of course because I work in retail and there's nothing good about working retail.

Co-workers who think you have nothing to do all day besides be at their beck and call.
Managers who think you have all the time in the world to do your job plus three others.
The same managers who ask you why your work didn't get done.

Customers who talk on cell phones while you're trying to wait on them.
Parents who let their children run around unattended.
Parents who let their children throw tantrums in public and ignore them.

People who think they know your job better than you do.
Customers who think they know your inventory better than you do
People who think they know store policy better than the employees.