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Banana Republic inventory, or, I can flip the damn shirts myself
Last night we did Banana Republic, the Gap's obscenely rich aunt who plants sloppy kisses on its cheek and gives it slacks for Christmas. We started the backroom early, undaunted by the piles and piles of XS strappy tank tops stacked 30 high. Undaunted, that is, before a manager with way too much free time wandered by and decided that, being only slightly more evolved than neanderthals, we lowly auditors needed to work one-on-one with someone to avoid messing up the stacks. Our boss did his best to diplomatically dissuade her, but this was her contribution to the inventory process and she wasn't backing down. It is absolutely irrelevant to the story that she looked a bit like Anne Murray would look if she were forced to abandon singing for a career in retail.
So my auditor partner and I had to share an already cramped aisle with two young bucks who I could tell had very little interest in standing there holding tags for us to scan. Before my guy arrived I had been using two hands to carefully transfer the shirts into another pile as I counted. He instead held the entire stack in one hand and with the other flipped the shirts back into a more disheveled pile. Which was better than when we got to the tanks that had the ticket buried deep inside the shirt. These he pulled off roughly, shaking out the folds and then tossing the shirts carelessly back on the shelf in a big heap. Because, you know, if we did that we'd be messing up the stacks. Inventory isn't a job for everyone. It is widely regarded as mind-numbingly boring. I don't usually mind it, since it gives me plenty of time with my own vastly entertaining thoughts (for instance, sketching the rough outlines of potential journal posts). One of the few perks of the job for me is the ability to work alone. However, even I had to admit that standing there while this kid fumbled through the clothes for the ticket, waiting only for the right moment to pull the trigger on my scanner tested my boredom tolerance considerably. It took every ounce of willpower I had to keep my mouth shut and put up with it.
My auditor partner had to deal with a similar situation, except her counts were also off on top of it. It was while she was searching back through one shelf to find the ticket they missed that Anne Murray returned to find the "helper" watching her do this. "Well if you're just standing there, Rocky, it defeats the whole purpose of me putting you with her," she snapped venomously. None of us made any attempt to explain what was actually going on, because I suspect we all knew how silly the entire exercise was. "Just...go do something else" she barked, and he happily scampered off. My auditor partner turned to me and said under her breath, "Well, that takes care of THAT problem." But I still had to deal with mine. We finally got out of the strappy tanks and into some wafer-thin but still more manageable T-shirts. I tried working with him. I suggested little counting tricks that I use to make it go faster, but he simply couldn't grasp them. I asked and he confirmed my suspicion that most everything needed to be refolded anyway when it went to the salesfloor, making the need to "avoid messing up the stacks" even less crucial. The final straw came when I noticed him using two hands to carefully transfer the shirts into another pile as we counted, in very much the same way I was before he came along. I gently pointed out that I could honestly handle it myself and probably a good deal faster, asking if he thought his boss would get too upset. He eagerly agreed that he actually did have a lot of other work he needed to do, and happily scampered off.
Later talking with Tery about this, she mentioned she overheard Ms. Murray bitching about her great one-on-one plan being "pushed aside." Oh, get over yourself, you soft-hits-of-the-70's-singing beeeyatch. If you don't tell me how to take inventory, I won't tell you how to manage your store. Deal?
In case anyone is sitting on the edge of their seats waiting for an update on my MST3k seller, the same day I posted he emailed me with tracking numbers. The discs arrived yesterday, hooray! However he uses the cheap-ass generic blanks (I've seen them on eBay, $20 for 100. What a deal!) so 4 out of 17 didn't work at all, boo. I emailed him hoping for replacements, but frankly I'm so sick of him I honestly don't care if he sends them or not. I just want him to crawl back into his cave and out of my life.
Addendum: Surprise, surprise. He emailed me to ask me to return the defective discs, saying "I am starting to think the problem might be with your player." Really? A.) How then would you explain 13 of the discs working fine? He also didn't care that I tested them on not one but three players. B.) What would I possibly stand to gain by lying about 4 discs not working? If I really wanted to make some personal profit off of your hard work, don't you think I'm capable of simply copying the discs to sell myself? Finally, C.) What makes you think this entire relationship hasn't been every bit as unpleasant for me as it has been for you? Why do you think I would fraudulently try to prolong it one second longer than I have to?
And on my way to the post office I saw this: The Toyota Sequoia. I'd like just 5 minutes in a room alone with the sick marketing fuckhead who came up with this deceptively Earth-friendly name. I'm sure they were hoping to play up the "ginormous, majestic" aspects of the vehicle. I'm not denying it is that, but why not go for the full smirk and call it the "Ecosystem"?
Finally, at this moment if my ferret Gideon could talk, I suspect he would say, "Is there any place on earth more magical than the bathtub? If there is, I'd be hard pressed to think of it."
FIN
So my auditor partner and I had to share an already cramped aisle with two young bucks who I could tell had very little interest in standing there holding tags for us to scan. Before my guy arrived I had been using two hands to carefully transfer the shirts into another pile as I counted. He instead held the entire stack in one hand and with the other flipped the shirts back into a more disheveled pile. Which was better than when we got to the tanks that had the ticket buried deep inside the shirt. These he pulled off roughly, shaking out the folds and then tossing the shirts carelessly back on the shelf in a big heap. Because, you know, if we did that we'd be messing up the stacks. Inventory isn't a job for everyone. It is widely regarded as mind-numbingly boring. I don't usually mind it, since it gives me plenty of time with my own vastly entertaining thoughts (for instance, sketching the rough outlines of potential journal posts). One of the few perks of the job for me is the ability to work alone. However, even I had to admit that standing there while this kid fumbled through the clothes for the ticket, waiting only for the right moment to pull the trigger on my scanner tested my boredom tolerance considerably. It took every ounce of willpower I had to keep my mouth shut and put up with it.
My auditor partner had to deal with a similar situation, except her counts were also off on top of it. It was while she was searching back through one shelf to find the ticket they missed that Anne Murray returned to find the "helper" watching her do this. "Well if you're just standing there, Rocky, it defeats the whole purpose of me putting you with her," she snapped venomously. None of us made any attempt to explain what was actually going on, because I suspect we all knew how silly the entire exercise was. "Just...go do something else" she barked, and he happily scampered off. My auditor partner turned to me and said under her breath, "Well, that takes care of THAT problem." But I still had to deal with mine. We finally got out of the strappy tanks and into some wafer-thin but still more manageable T-shirts. I tried working with him. I suggested little counting tricks that I use to make it go faster, but he simply couldn't grasp them. I asked and he confirmed my suspicion that most everything needed to be refolded anyway when it went to the salesfloor, making the need to "avoid messing up the stacks" even less crucial. The final straw came when I noticed him using two hands to carefully transfer the shirts into another pile as we counted, in very much the same way I was before he came along. I gently pointed out that I could honestly handle it myself and probably a good deal faster, asking if he thought his boss would get too upset. He eagerly agreed that he actually did have a lot of other work he needed to do, and happily scampered off.
Later talking with Tery about this, she mentioned she overheard Ms. Murray bitching about her great one-on-one plan being "pushed aside." Oh, get over yourself, you soft-hits-of-the-70's-singing beeeyatch. If you don't tell me how to take inventory, I won't tell you how to manage your store. Deal?
In case anyone is sitting on the edge of their seats waiting for an update on my MST3k seller, the same day I posted he emailed me with tracking numbers. The discs arrived yesterday, hooray! However he uses the cheap-ass generic blanks (I've seen them on eBay, $20 for 100. What a deal!) so 4 out of 17 didn't work at all, boo. I emailed him hoping for replacements, but frankly I'm so sick of him I honestly don't care if he sends them or not. I just want him to crawl back into his cave and out of my life.
Addendum: Surprise, surprise. He emailed me to ask me to return the defective discs, saying "I am starting to think the problem might be with your player." Really? A.) How then would you explain 13 of the discs working fine? He also didn't care that I tested them on not one but three players. B.) What would I possibly stand to gain by lying about 4 discs not working? If I really wanted to make some personal profit off of your hard work, don't you think I'm capable of simply copying the discs to sell myself? Finally, C.) What makes you think this entire relationship hasn't been every bit as unpleasant for me as it has been for you? Why do you think I would fraudulently try to prolong it one second longer than I have to?
And on my way to the post office I saw this: The Toyota Sequoia. I'd like just 5 minutes in a room alone with the sick marketing fuckhead who came up with this deceptively Earth-friendly name. I'm sure they were hoping to play up the "ginormous, majestic" aspects of the vehicle. I'm not denying it is that, but why not go for the full smirk and call it the "Ecosystem"?
Finally, at this moment if my ferret Gideon could talk, I suspect he would say, "Is there any place on earth more magical than the bathtub? If there is, I'd be hard pressed to think of it."
FIN