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Temp Work

I got to be a convenience store worker for five minutes this morning. Honest! Okay, maybe not really and truly, but sort of.

I got to be a convenience store worker for five minutes this morning. Honest! Okay, maybe not really and truly, but sort of. I walked down to the 7-11 this morning to buy a small box of cat food to tide the cats over until we can go tonight and buy the low-ash food they regularly eat, listened to the pop-psych show on the way there and mostly concentrated on not falling on the icy sidewalks. When I walked into the store it was empty except for the woman who worked there, who was standing in the middle of the store looking panicked. She said, “Can you do me a big favor?” and I was kind of startled but said, “Um, what?” and she said, “Are you in a hurry? Could you just stand here for a minute? I have to go to the bathroom,” and I said “Oh, okay, sure,” and then when I realized that it might be a really long wait I said, “Just a minute, right?” which meant, “You’re just peeing, right?” and she grinned and said yes, just for a minute and thanked me profusely and went into the back. So I stood there in the middle of the store right where she’d left me because I didn’t want her to think I was shoplifting and no one came into the store until she came back, and then three different people came into the store at once, it was very weird. Like movies where the sound stops for a minute and then starts up again when something interesting happens. So I picked out my cat food and a candy bar and she thanked me again and I smiled and said have a nice day, and walked on home.

When I got there I was sitting in front of the computer trying to decide what I wanted to do next and realized that I hadn’t talked to Sarah in forever and that she might want to come over, since she’s on vacation this week. I gave her a call and she said yup, she’d be over in a few minutes, and we had a bunch of fun looking at the web together (she knows the woman Auntie Lois is very meanly based on and so aside from the Feline Adventures it’s her favorite section) and hanging out with the cats. She had to run a video to the video store and call her sister, so she left and came back a few minutes later. We talked for awhile about Kitey, which was sort of helpful and sort of depressing, and made banana bread together, which sounds disgustingly domestic but really wasn’t.

Oh, but before that I was washing dishes so we’d have counter space, and no, I am not transmogrifying into Donna Reed, so quit snickering, and I had the water running on the rinse side of the sink while I was talking, and Sarah said in this excruciated way, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, but that water is driving me nuts and I wish you would turn it off if you aren’t using it,” and I was surprised to find that I didn’t mind her saying it. I mean, from someone other than Sarah or Todd that would have been irritating and intrusive, but I didn’t mind at all. She said something about how lights being on when they’re not needed annoys her too and I told her about my great-grandmother, who would turn off the light in the living room even if you were reading in there and all you’d done was gotten up to go get a drink of water and were coming right back.

Soggy Toast

Sledding, whee!