after the whole infected sliver debacle (courtesy of hours of bare gardening) last weekend i realized it would be best to invest in some garden gloves. since i have become maniacal about my rented backyard i decided it couldn’t wait and one day last week went from work right to the home depot that is a block down the street before driving home.
i went right to the garden center to locate gloves and was hoping to find a nice trowel as well to assist with weeding. before i found the gloves i happened upon the shelves of various decorative fencing/stonework. in my rented backyard there is a tree that stands near the garage; it sits among a bed of bluebells whose dirt had begun to overtake the walkway. apparently that dirt had also swallowed a few pieces of the red brick edging that had once surrounded it. as luck would have it the first aisle i walked down boasted that exact same brick edging. of course, because i’ve gone insane about the yard, i was forced to grab a few. they were heavy, and became more so the longer i toted them around the store.
i continued on to look for a trowel and gloves. as i was carrying around the equivalent of a brick baby from hell (it also had started to feel as if it was actually 80 degrees outside) i heard a male voice say “those are a couple of nice lookin’ bricks you got there”.
seriously?
i actually stopped walking and turned to find out what kind of male would utter such veiled harassment. the guy had to have been at least 60. had he been even 20 years younger i would have hurled the brick baby from hell right at him for assuming that i was so vapid as to think he was actually complimenting it. okay, so i would only have done that in my fantasy world where it would be completely acceptable to act on any absurd impulse that presents itself. at the very least i would have chewed him a new ear.
i think it was clear evidence of my progressing maturity when i realized immediately that anything i attempted to say in response to that salty old character would have been wasted effort.
so instead i blinked at him a few times and, at a loss for words, just kept on walking. pick your battles, right?
Archive for April, 2006
hardware store etiquette
return to sender. unable to forward. deceased!?
it’s a terribly disheartening thing indeed to be faced with the potential of one’s imaginary passing.
i rarely live in the same apt./house for very long. in fact, since the age of 20 i have moved at least 10 times. that’s an average of 1.25 times per year. those of my friends and family that actually use dinosaur-like address books know better than to write me down in pen.
in all those moves the US postal service has been awfully kind to me. any bill that went unpaid in the past 8 years was always strictly related to my inability to be an adult and pay it, not because something was unable to find my new home. the US postal service has even exceeded my expectations in most cases; my mail usually changes destinations right on time.
that harmonious relationship is no more. at least not since some office rat in edmonds apparently has my number. i was delivered via inter office mail a letter that my employer had attempted to mail to me. the fact that i have yet to change my address with them for the last 2 places i have lived now resulted in that letter being returned to them. rather than just stating something normal like “no known address”, the letter proudly displayed
Deceased.
it is certainly a feeling like no other to read on paper that you’re dead. also, probably not an everyday occurrence for most. i imagine the clerk who stamped my letter, hunched over bins filled with other sad, homeless letters growing more and more embittered about that promotion he was passed over for…again. i imagine a glint in his eye as he picks random letters to incorrectly stamp as a small stab back at ‘the man’. as he stamps mine, he probably throws in some on-the-edge laughter for good measure…
Labels: Daily
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