Monthly Archives: June 2010

About Her

Since I didn’t sleep well on Tuesday night I figured I would sleep well on Wednesday night. Nope that wasn’t the case despite melatonin. It wasn’t an especially tiring day but I was busy enough. I didn’t even nap during the day. I stayed up until 12:20 and went to bed.

It was stuffy since it was raining and the windows were closed in the bedroom. I lay in bed and listened to Bill start to snore. I told him about 4 times that he was snoring. He’s not supposed to snore since he wears a mouth guard which adjusts his jaw to allow his soft palate to do something and keep his airway open.

Or something like that.

I followed my advice and got out of bed around 1:30 and sat in front of the computer and posted my insomnia on Facebook. I did eventually go back to bed and slept alright. Of course the melatonin kicked in at some point making it difficult to wake up.

But wake up I did and did my thing. Developing a routine lately and was at the bus stop a little after 8:00 this morning. The bus was like a sauna, much warmer than it was outside and there wasn’t many people riding at that point.

I asked the bus driver if she could turn the air conditioner on and she said it was on. I think she actually had both the heater and the air conditioner on.

Subway ride uptown, spent some time in the shade of a nearby hotel talking to Bill on the phone. Got to the shop at 9:25, no lights on. 9:30 is when I’m supposed to start. I stand outside the store until 9:45 when Calvin shows up saying he didn’t think I was working the early shift.

I did my best to ignore that and punched in 15 minutes late. I will have to tell Calvin that I don’t want to be marked as late tomorrow when I was actually on time and it was he who was late. According to Raymond I should tell Calvin that and he would understand and make amends to my hours to reflect that I was on time.

This will all change when I get a key to let myself in. Until then I am still the newbie.

Visiting the cigar shop, there are arrogant customers on occasion, and quite timid browsers. That’s just 2 of the usual customers that sometimes wander into the cigar shop.

My attitude is ‘if you have money and you’re rich, well good for you’. I hope they got their money fair and square or even if it was inherited, that’s fine. It’s just that, one guy comes in, dressed very nicely, asking for a specific cigar.

I’m more than happy to oblige, it’s my job. I explain what I know about certain cigars, and make recommendations. He asks for one cigar and decides to buy a box. He says he’s going on a friend’s 150 foot yacht and I can only guess he doesn’t want to come empty handed.

The cigars he wants are in tubes and cost over $400.00. There’s another box which is the same type of cigar, just not in tubes. And it has 5 more cigars. He gets indignant and thinks he’s getting a lesser quality cigar since he’s paying less.

I have to explain while he gets all huffy. Then because he’s buying cigars and lives in the apartments above the store, asks if he gets a discount since he lives upstairs, then demands a free cigar cutter.

People like this aren’t the norm and we do get a fair number of monied cigar smokers who don’t mind paying for 4 or 5 cigars the price I would have paid for a box. I’ve met a few of these guys and they’re good blokes.

But there’s one in every tax bracket I suppose.

Then there is the timid browser who walks in. They’re greeted with whatever salutation the time of day dictates. They shrink and barely mutter a word in return, which is fine. They just try to be as invisible as possible and obviously lack social skills.

It reminds of of Stingy and the Autistic Manfred. Raised to think the world is your enemy, and everyone is out to get you. I just don’t know how these people get through life.

Tomorrow and Saturday I work the late shift. I’ll try to post beforehand since I’ll be too tired to do so after work, but there are no guarantees.

47 years old and still getting pimples.

About Face

Updated 9:32PM
Well today is the day off. Next one is Sunday. Last night was a quiet night. Just spent time chilling out. Watched TV of course. Bill came home close to the end of the finale of Nurse Jackie.

He had major drama at work and proceeded to tell me all about it. I paused the DVR as he explained what happened in great detail. Quite an interesting story, but it’s his story and not mine. He went to bed soon after that and I stayed up and watched the Simpsons.

Then I went to bed and did not have an easy night of sleep. The weather has cooled considerably so the windows were open, allowing me to hear the smashing of bottles that were being picked up for recycling. The dreams I had were strange, and maybe a bit violent. I did sleep for about 8 hours though and that was OK.

Felt a bit unmoored, not knowing what to do. I knew enough to have breakfast after I showered. Caught the Daily Show and the Colbert Report, both of which I hardly ever watch anymore. I did have tickets for the Colbert Report taping last night but had to return them since I wasn’t able to go, being employed and all.

I started a playlist for the shop and headed out with about 50 songs on the list. I went to T-Mobile since I’ve been having problems with my sending of pictures to Facebook, to my email, and even to my cellphone.

I was on the phone with T-Mobile the past two days and followed their instructions, including if all else fails, go to a T-Mobile store. So I went to the one on Washington Street. I dealt with Laura who talked with an Eastern European accent.

She mentioned that I might need a new SIM card and she wouldn’t charge me for it. I was surprised that she would even consider charging me for the SIM card since the phone is relatively new, having only gotten it in December.

I mentioned that the customer service on the phone never mentioned it and as I said that she cut me off. She kept doing that, I guess she was expecting me to shut up. I don’t do that, I keep talking about what I was saying.

She’s been doing this for six years she said so she knew all about these types of things. She also mentioned that she had a smart phone and never had the type of problem, including losing a network immediately after a phone call.

The new SIM card seemed to have done the trick. I thanked her in what I thought was her original language, Russian- спасибо! She smirked and said she was Albanian but knew what I meant. She certainly wasn’t a charming salesperson like I try to be at the cigar shop.

I walked over to the Guitar Bar and saw Mister Wonderful, Jim Mastro. He asked me how the job was going and I told him despite some initial feeling of confusion and a general not knowing what the hell I was doing, it was getting a lot better.

He asked if I was getting psyched for the party next month and for a minute I didn’t know what he was talking about. Then I figured it out. He mentioned that his daughters Lily and Ruby were working on a set list. I headed out of there since Jim was dealing with a customer who was playing a bass quite loudly for my ears.

Walked back up to Washington Street and started taking cellphone pics of various flowers, just to see if the camera was working. Decided to walk up to Eleventh Street and listened to the playlist on the iPod. Sounded fine to me.

Headed to the supermarket to get some groceries and cash in a rain check from April before it expired. When I came home and looked over the receipt which seemed a bit odd and it was off. They over charged me and I called up the store who told me to come back for the refund.

Ran into Julio who was running home on his lunch hour and chatted for a few minutes before it started to rain. Dropped off and picked up some dry cleaning for Bill and myself. Came home and added a lot more songs to the playlist which runs from pop, R&B, some hip hop and even opera and rock and roll.

At last count it’s 12 hours long and has 176 songs in it. I hope it goes over well. And if it doesn’t I will try not to take it personally like I used to at Farfetched.

Back to work tomorrow, early shift, then Friday and Saturday I get the late shift. Off on Sunday, for which I hope will have good weather.

Update: I had a letter to the Editor published in the NY Daily News again on June 2, a reaction to a letter regarding Memorial Day.

They also serve II
Hoboken, N.J.: It’s a shame that what seemed to be Voicer Bill Lynch’s heartfelt sentiment regarding Memorial Day was cheapened by his politicizing and liberal-bashing. Liberals have fought and died for this country. And the ACLU will defend his civil liberties should they become endangered.