The first thing to go, when a person is sleep-deprived, is not concentration, judgement, or reflexes. The first thing you lose — and people have studied this — is your temper.
At work we are re-arranging everything. We are moving furniture, redistributing shelves, cleaning, and unpacking. We are up on ladders, down on our hands and knees, and burrowing into boxes. We are arranging the store so that people will walk through it, irresistibly drawn to the next enchanted glade full of nymphs and luscious fruits — or rack of test tubes and petri dishes, but the emotional effect is supposed to be the same.
Into this fairly fraught scene comes a High Maintenance customer.
Some of our customers really need a lot of help, and I am glad to help them. And some of our customers are fun to chat with, and over time have become (or will become) friends. These people are not HMs. The HMs are the ones who want us to follow them around the store, listening to them deciding between yellow and blue pocket charts. Sometimes they want to haggle (we don’t do that) or whine, but they all mostly want an audience. Some of them are lonely; they have gotten themselves into a situation in their lives where no one will listen to them except those of us who get paid to. Some are not entirely compos mentis, and the decision between yellow and blue has an importance to them that I cannot expect to grasp. I try to be kind to all of them, and to listen patiently. I debate the pros and cons of yellow and blue, or, if they appear to be stuck in a dither, I tell them firmly which color to buy, with some spurious reason (“Blue is calming.”).
But yesterday was Friday, I was sleep-deprived, and I was deeply engaged in jigsaw-puzzling games into an unlikely space. I avoided the HM. I attempted to palm her off on the other workers (I never win at that game, for some reason). I got this close to saying “who cares which one you buy? You’ll just return it anyway!”
I got home and cooked dinner, refused to take #1 son to a friend’s house (his friend came and picked him up) and, when my husband came in two hours later and asked “What’s dinner?” I answered, “Over.” I also redistributed the stitches of my sock toe as though it were a heel. Fortunately, I realized what I was doing before I got too far, and finished the sock successfully. I would post a picture, but xanga is not in a picture-posting mood today.
In any case, I had intended to sleep in this morning until about 8:00 in an effort to improve my mood, but thanks to the alarm’s going off at 4:16 and a blanket-hogging husband, I gave up and got out of bed at 6:30. That has helped a little. However, while I know there must be housecleaning and grocery shopping today, I hope also to manage some napping and lolling around on the couch reading and knitting.
I would be high maintenance if it weren’t for all the people that would hate me. I just can’t do that. However, I highly recommend sleeping. I find that if I take a quick 30 miniute nap in a room that’s as dark as I can manage with a bit of classical music going to drown out the outside noise…
I seem to be a professional. This is not the case.
oh man… tell me about needy customers. i work at a health food store with a boutique. i order the boutique stuff and i’m a manager…i’ve also worked there for quite awhile…so they all want me to help them or order them a certain thing. you just don’t know how bad it get until people want you to go to the bathroom with them so they can show you something and get your opinion! ewwwwwwwwww. and then there are the ones that expect your undivided attention for about an hour and a half while they ask you waht everyone in their family should take to get rid of every problem/ailment they ever have or might have. oh yea and then there are the ones that want help in the love area…herbal viagra or sorts or as i call them weenie uppers =) oh yea my job is so very fun. but you are right one of the most nerve racking things is having to tell someone which item they want…followed by the fact they are just going to waste your hour and then bring the stuff back the next day! (rant)
8 is sleeping in for you? Wow. Tack on about 4 hours to that…THAT’s sleeping in for me. What exactly do you do? I’m confused. Blue..yellow…? Blue or yellow what? Anyway, I just wanted to point out that you identified yourself as “mom” on my chatterbox. I find that rather amusing and endearing. You check up on me when I don’t post for a while and you leave great comments that stimulate further thought. You’re like my Xanga-mom! 😀 anyway, keep it copasetic. peace.
I really really really (do I sound like a teen?) enjoy your blog! I have meant to leave commenrts several times, but not managed to do so.
I tried your short row technique on a pair of soaker shorts. I only found issues on the “purl side”, as I call it, meaning the turns after I had been purling. I was using Cascade Eco and size 8s. I knit one round normally, then I fixed the problem(holes) by drawing up a loop of the stitch below the slipped stitch on the next round, and knitting it with the stitch. That’s probably clear as mud, but it’s virtually undetectable in teh work, and that is just awesome!
How’s Hopkins?
And several weeks ago, you asked for comments from home schoolers. For me, the most wonderful thing ever woul dbe if you had a sample of a book in your store. Like one of everything. And then you would place orders for what we wanted. One of the real issues for many of us is that curriculum must be ordered sight unseen. Then when we get it, it’s not quite right for us. So we are left trying to return it, or sell it to someome else, or keeping it on our shelves forever. So if we could SEE it, that would really help.
One of everything does not of course mean on of everything. But say, math texts. I’d like to be able to compare the texts and teacher’s manuals for several different publishers. But you would not have to have 12 grades worth. If you had one primary grade, one middle school grade and one high school grade, that would be enough. And it was be especially awesome if you had teh same grade from each publisher. Ok, I have more to say (of course), but I have probably used up way more space than you wanted filled with my inanities.