Cup of Coffee

December 21, 2011: Breather

104 Comments

Today's my last day off until Christmas. I'll be steeling my heart for the nonstop flow of customers angry about the fact that the popular thing they wanted isn't on shelves anymore just a day before Christmas.

104 thoughts on “December 21, 2011: Breather”

  1. And, of course, many of those customers will assume that you're either lying to them or it's all your fault. It's sad that a season that should bring out our best too often brings out our worst.

    1. it also brings out the best in some people, too.

      The holidays are a very stressful time for many people, and I don't lay too much blame on materialism, though that likely contributes some. Unresolved family conflicts, feelings of loss, disappointment with one's life, and job stress due to the extra work you have to do to prepare for the days off are also heavy contributors.

      Now, excuse me while I go visit a client that has no family, job, or feelings.

    2. Yeah, we see all of those. I've had to say "No, sir, I promise you I do not have any of those in the back - and at this point, even if I knew they were there and wasn't supposed to sell them to you, I would so you'd stop with this."

          1. Most of them were just trying to press me to try to see if I'd give them something if they got aggressive (since OMax was the biggest pushover store in the history of ever), but one guy literally thought this, and got my manager involved.

            Of course, he complained loud and long enough that he got a discount on something that wasn't on sale, so he ended up winning. Come to think of it, most of my retail stories end up like that.

            1. That's the worst. To remove the offending customer in a situation like that, you almost always have to give them something they don't deserve. It's the best for the store to have the customer out of the building, but the message still ends up being "Whine, and you'll get what you want."

  5. There will be no Spanning the Globe today because life got in the way. Nothing serious, just some stuff I need to take care of. I expect Spanning the Globe to be back tomorrow.

  6. i'll be up in town for xmas. honestly i'm not sure how long i'm going to be up there, but anyone up for a mini-caucus? we're not heading up until the 23rd, and i'm guessing we'll leaving on the 27th (possibly the 28th). boxing day meet-up, maybe?

      1. I feel like I deserve one, too, but unfortunately I'll still be in Ireland. I'll have a pint at Fealty's for all of you.

    4. December 26th is no longer Boxing Day. It is now Ricky Rubio Day.

      I might be available for a minicaucus.
      -

    6. wow. wasn't expecting that big of a response. awesome. honestly, i'm a little out of touch with the mini-happy-apple-tits these days, so if someone else has a suggestion on a good meeting place, i'm all ears. city works best for me, but i'm sure anything can be arranged.

    8. I'm there - wherever & whenever.
      Where is "there" again?

      edit: Oh, I see that's not been decided yet. Well, I vote "there" ought to be somewhere.

        3. I love the Lowbrow - I'm there usually at least twice a month, but hey I'm game for anything.

    10. I would love to, but we're heading back home on Monday. Stupid only getting one extra day off for the holiday.

        1. actually, yeah, on that note, when are you heading there? we'll most likely drive through on friday.

        2. I don't know if we'll have time, sadly. We are driving to my mom's across the river on Saturday for a lunch time family Christmas followed by the extended family coming over for the annual Christmas Eve party, so I won't be in Stillwater until Sunday. But if you know what time you might be making that run I can see if I can swing in quick for a meet-up.

          1. I'd have to make the run before 2...really it's just an excuse to get out and meet you for a pint.

            1. I'll talk to my wife and see what she says. Depending on when we roll in to town, I might be able to make it around, say noon. I'll shoot you an email (I think I have it) with my cell just in case.

  7. 10 years ago today, I became a dad for the first time. How the time has flown. It's scary to think I'm going to have a teenager in three years.

  8. Continuing my java talk from yesterday, my niece's husband just tweeted about a mom and daughter that returned their Starbucks beverages and wanted a refund because their coffee drinks tasted like coffee.

    2. httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uo94DSTzdc&feature=related

      While this is one of my favorite scenes in cinema history it also describes the kind of coffee available at the shop.

    3. Which is funny, because Starbucks coffee tastes more like the awful, burnt remnants of a coffee bean.

      1. Nope. No, it doesn't. That would be Caribou. For all of Starbuck's many crimes, bad tasting beans are not one of them.

        1. Oh I didn't say their beans were bad, just that their brewing procedure for the coffee served in their stores destroys and good taste they might impart.

  12. yesterday the Royal singed Yuniesky Bentancourt, today..well..

    DKnobler DKnobler
    Royals announce they've signed Jose Mijares

    1. I always thought Mijares was a lot better than people thought he was. There for a while, he was absolutely lethal vs. lefties. It'd be nice if he got his career back on track (it'd also be nice if he stopped having it out with his teammates).

        1. He's been the head coach since 2005. Teaches 9th grade English. He always downplays his team's chances, but said he likes this years squad. They had been hammering on teams during the non-conference schedule.

          1. Spamtown has a chance to be pretty good this year. The Aase boys (cousins) are junior big men (~6'5" or 6'6", I think; one is the son of my old friend Lee, who was the star of our state runner-up team in 1981) and returning starters (1st and 2nd team all-Big 9 last season, respectively). The point guard (who scored 29 against East) is a returning starter and only a sophomore. These kids have been playing with an AAU club in the Cities.

            They are the anti-Iversons.

            “Practice for basketball is just like playing. If you like to play basketball, you should like to practice,” Joe said.

    2. But, yeah, a win was totally unexpected given the performance. Love looked good. Lee played pretty well. Ellington was solid. That's all the encomiums I will hand out.

      1. Just to make it clear, people are calling Super Cool Beasley just "Lee" now, right?

          1. I didn't. At the new job I don't get home until 10pm EST. Makes for a lot of west coast basketball for me this season.

              1. I get to spend time with the little dude in the mornings until 12-ish, which is nice. Hopefully I will be back to banker's hours by baseball season so I can show the Bison his namesake doing cool stuff.

          3. I'm so old, I can remember when a Wolves win was reason enough to celebrate. Now we need style points?

            I didn't see much of the game and I hear that Adelman didn't play the small lineup, but two victories over a decent Milwaukee club is better than a sharp stick in the eye.

            1. Had you watched, you'd know what I meant. S-n-P did.

              I don't know about you but I'm not going to sit through this sort of regular season game after the lockout, even if there is an awesome 2 minute finale. I have a bad feeling that the tail ends of back-to-back-to-back affairs are going to be more refundable-worthy than not. If the league and its players owe its fans anything at all this year it is 66 games worth of solid efforts.

              This lockout burned me in a bad way and I'm simply not going to deal with the Dog Days of the NBA like I have in years past. I know that this is the pre-season and I don't want my general grumpiness about this particular game to distract from the fact that I am (for me) very optimistic about this year's squad (they have the tools to play .400-.450 ball)

              1. yeah, I couldnt make it past Halftime of the game. It was just too sloppy for my taste and its a meaningless game. I watched the second half of the football bowl game instead

                1. I watched the second half of the football bowl game instead

                  Wow. Just wow. There wasn't a re-run of the Ellen DeGeneres Show or something available?

                  1. well, Wednesday night is usually 'Happy Endings' on ABC night, but every channel in in holiday mode

    2. If this is for more than $2.75M I'm going to be a little grumpy. Which is not to say I'm happy about it if it's not; if it's not, I just won't care about it at all.

      1. He's had two good years in the last three. Not sure how much I'd put down on him, but his bad 2010 was in a small sample size and he was probably hurt. If he's healthy, on a short contract I think he's somewhat intriguing. Certainly I'd put him a cut above, say, Ramon Ortiz.

        1. I don't agree that he's had two good years in the last three, but I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that.

          1. I'm not that tied to that opinion, it just looked that way to me at first glance. 4.00-4.10 FIP from a starting pitcher generally puts you in the 50th-70th percentile amongst qualified starters, and there usually aren't very many qualified starters. Another way of putting this, I suppose, is that last year there were only 55 starters with an FIP better than 4.00. I suppose it depends on what "good" is, but (of course always depending on how much he's signed for) I'd be pretty happy to have another starter around if he put up a 4.00-4.10 FIP. Just how likely that is, like I said, I don't know how much money I'd put on it.

            1. one career season with an fWAR over 1.9 (4.0 in 2009). He looks like a ~1.5 fWAR pitcher, on average. So, I guess if they are paying less than $6M/yr, I'm ok with that. But, quite frankly, I'd rather have Slowey.

              1. Sure, I'd rather have Slowey, too, and there are a lot of pitchers I'd rather have, but at 1yr/$3M, it seems like a low-risk, reasonable-upside addition to the staff.

  18. I find humor in the phrase "and the pass by World Peace". Clips/Lakers on NBATV, again.

Comments are closed.