Yikes and Away!

Great Idea!

Now- how wonderful would the world be if things like this happened more often?

Crazy Customers Get It

I've been in retail 24 years and I really enjoy reading the horror stories of other retail slaves.  One of my favorite sites is Not Always Right.  This was their lead story today:

 

He Who Eats Less, Laughs Best

Ice Cream Shop | Evergreen, CO, USA

(While I’m working, I see this teenage girl pull up in an really nice car. With her orange spray tan and expensive clothing, I could tell it would be interesting.)

Me: “Hey, what could I get for you today?”

Customer: “You’re going to make me a non-fat shake with non-fat mix, non-fat milk and non-fat chocolate.

Me: “Oh, Ok…I’ll have that done for you in just a second.”

(Right before I start to blend the shake, she speaks up:)

Customer: “So since you work here, do you eat a lot of ice cream?”

Me: “Well, I suppose I eat enough to be able to recommend stuff to customers….”

Customer: “Well, you just look like you eat a lot of ice cream. You might want to quit your job before you get too fat.”

Me: “Thanks for that advice.”

(While my coworker rings her up, I proceed to add 5 pumps of chocolate syrup, extra chocolate chips, and tons of extra ingredients to her shake, putting it up to a total of about 4,000 calories.)

Customer: *taking a drink* “At least you can make a decent shake.”

The other story comes from The Consumerist.  This is an amazing site full of tips to help you save money, watch out for scams and shows you how to fight back when you've been overcharged, scammed, etc. 

Father & Son Cut In Line At Walmart, Go To Jail

By Chris Walters, 1:33 PM on Tue Jan 13 2009, 22,499 views

When 26-year-old Edward Pluhar Jr. decided to walk past the people waiting in line at Walmart's customer service desk over the weekend, he probably didn't expect one of the men he dissed to confront him over it. What he and his father really didn't expect, however, was for the guy to be an off-duty police officer who doesn't appreciate being threatened.

From the Star Press in Indiana:

The police officer [Chris Kirby] told Pluhar Jr. he needed to wait his turn, but the Frankfort man purportedly refused.

[His father, 61-year-old Edward R. Pluhar Sr.,] then allegedly approached the off-duty officer, told him to mind his own business and asked whether Kirby wanted to take the dispute outside.

When Kirby asked Pluhar Sr. what his intentions were, the Frankfort man purportedly said he would kick Kirby's posterior and also suggested he might shoot him.

Kirby then informed the father and son that he was a police officer and called emergency dispatchers to send an on-duty officer to the scene.

According to the article, the Pluhar family then left the store and the off-duty cop followed them and stood behind their van until the police arrived. Pluhar Sr. backed into Kirby's leg with the van, and Pluhar Jr. got out of the van and physically fought Kirby. Then the police showed up and arrested the Pluhars.

We feel there should be a jug of moonshine somewhere in this story. It was probably in the van.

The moral of these stories- be rude at your own peril!  I also want to thank our wonderful, never-rude customers!  Our customers are all so nice, it's hard to believe I still work in retail!

Top Sellers This Past Holiday

We just compiled our sales data and were surprised at some of the bestsellers.  Here are the Top 20 in order with some pictures:

Classic Disguise Glasses

Extreme Office Crafts- co-authored by the store's co-owner!

The Sarcastic Ball

Chicken Chucker Catapult

Whoopee Cushion

Stylish Mustaches

Bacon vs. Tofu

Gnarly Teeth Set

Yodeling Pickle

Bite Me! Memo Clips

Zombie Haiku

Shock Gag Pen

Best of Stuntology

Great Lies to Tell Small Children

Pirate Flag Bandages

Paperwork Sticky Notes

Ultimate Bumper Sticker Book

To Do Tattoo Set

Bite Me! Fish Ornament

Bacon and Egg Bandages

 

January Sales and Such

 Wednesday 1/7

“I’m Not Going to Take It Anymore Day” is today.  Come in for an attitude adjustment and get 20% off any one item!

 

Saturday 1/17

Happy Birthday Jim Carrey!  Forget the lousy movies and concentrate on “Liar Liar”, “The Truman Show” and “Bruce Almighty.”  In his honor, all books are 10% off today!

 

 Wednesday 1/21

Today is national “Squirrel Appreciation Day” and we’re offering 25% off anything in the store that has a squirrel associated with it.

 

Wednesday 1/28

Come celebrate “Fun at Work Day” with us!  We’ll have free candy and jokes available today to help make the workday a little more bearable.

 

Saturday 1/31

Our favorite sort-of-holiday! “Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day”!  Come in and take home a piece of bubble wrap on us!  Go ahead—pop away!

 

January Store Hours

Sunday–12-4

Monday–Closed

Tuesday–Saturday 10:30-6

 

 

Happy Holidays!!!

more animals

Weird Christmas Songs We Love (in no particular order):

1. “Holiday Hate”- Psychostick.  The chorus is “Buy!” screamed over and over again.  One of our top favorites!

2. “Twist of the Magi”- SheDaisy with Rascal Flatts.  One line says “I sold your Rolex, to buy that new Versace dress…”

3. “Aquaclaus”- Bob Rivers.  “Steaming like a roast duck, spitting out of pieces of his bearded fluff, hey, Santa Claus” to the tune of “Aqulung” by Jethro Tull.
   

4. “O Little Town of Bethlehem”- Bob Rivers.  Normal lyrics, but it’s sung to the tune of The Animals' "House of the Rising Sun".  Who new the 2 songs were so alike!
   

5. “You’re A Mean One, Mr. Grinch”- Thurl Ravescroft.  Have you listened to the long version?  It’s much more twisted than the parts that made it into the cartoon!

6. “Slower Than Christmas”–Boxmasters.  Lament about crazy family members.  Gotta love a song that combines the holidays and “s**t-house rats!”

7. “Soulful Christmas”- James Brown.  Found this CD in a bargain bin and play it every year.

8. “Fruitcake Makes Me Puke”–Bill Engvall.  We happen to like fruitcake, but this song is still cool.

9. “12 Redneck Days of Christmas”- Jeff Foxworthy.  Ok- one of us used to be a redneck and knows this song isn’t far from reality

10.  “Christmas Wrapping”- The Waitresses.  We were in high school and college during the 80’s and just had to include this.

11. “Merry Christmas Baby”- Pepe the King Prawn.  Pepe, author of a hot new book, is backed by Dr. Teeth’s band on this version.

12. “12 Days of Christmas”- Bob & Doug McKenzie.  What are the holidays without beer?

13. “Santa’s Got a Hotrod”- Brian Setzer Orchestra. Everyone needs to rock out during the holidays.

If it's your turn to clean out the office fridge...

Uck!  You know how disgusting the office fridge gets!  The first person to crack is the one who gets to clean it out.  Jimmy, master punster, has come up with some holiday songs that might make the gruesome task a little better. 

Now, gather round the Frigidaire's inner light and sing:

"Dark! The Hairy Pasta'd Thing!"
"Wee Three Things (of Mystery Are)"
"Away with the Danger"
"Deck the Walls with Arm & Hammer"
"It's the Gross, Marvelous Slime of the Year"
"Have Yourself a Little Dab of Clorox"
"O Little Tin of Moldy Ham"

Retail Shoes

One of the best things about owning your own business is setting the dress code, especially after 23 years in corporate retail!  I was able to say goodbye to sensible, ugly dress shoes and hello to funky shoes that actually offer some support.

I found the following shoes and begged for Jimmy to buy them for my last birthday.  Like I said, I've been in retail a loooooooong time.  Retail workers see the Holidays as a time of long shifts, angry customers, no breaks, incredible messes and STRESS.  Luckily, our kids help Jimmy and I keep the season in perspective. And A Sense of Humor gets very few irate customers!

I still think these are the perfect footwear for all Retail Slaves!

A Reason To Be Happy

I know- there's just so much bad news out there.  But keeping a positive attitude does more than just help YOUR mood!  Read on...

Happiness is contagious, new study finds

By Judith Graham |Tribune staff reporter

6:21 PM CST, December 4, 2008

You may think your attentive spouse, your loving children, and your good friends are what make you happy. But something else may be going on: The people they're connected with are making you happy too.

So suggests a new study proposing that happiness is transmitted through social networks, almost like a germ is spread through personal contact. The research was published Thursday in BMJ, a British medical journal.

It's the latest in a growing body of work investigating how our social connections--neighbors, friends, family, co-workers, fellow congregants at church and other associates--affect us. The premise is that we live in a social environment that shapes what we do and how we think and feel.

"We've known for some time that social relationships are the best predictor of human happiness, and this paper shows that the effect is much more powerful than anyone realized," said Daniel Gilbert, author of "Stumbling on Happiness" and a professor of psychology at Harvard University.

Previous research by the authors, James Fowler of the University of California-San Diego, and Dr. Nicholas Christakis at Harvard, has concluded that social networks influence obesity and tobacco use by altering perceptions of acceptable weight and desirable behavior.

Now they've turned their attention to the emotional realm, exploring how social ties influence our moods and our sense of well-being. Their primary finding: People who are surrounded by happy people are more likely to be happy themselves. And it's not only people in our immediate circles who make a difference--it's the people surrounding the people we know.

Imagine several pebbles thrown into a pool of water that send ripples outward, said Fowler, an associate professor of political science. Each pebble represents a happy person and the waves the impact of that person's mood on others. This impact, his study found, extends through several degrees of separation, to the friends of a person's friends.

Some experts question whether the researchers' statistical methodology can support that conclusion. It's difficult to sort out cause and effect in this kind of research and the authors may not have done so with enough rigor, said Charles Manski, a Northwestern University economics professor who studies how inferences can be drawn from social interactions.

He asks, is it that one person's happiness makes another person happy, or could it be that another factor experienced by both people is affecting both?

Say two friends are watching a TV show together, and one laughs after the other does, Manski said. It may look like the first person's chuckle is the cause of the second, but the jokes on the TV show might inspire both reactions.

Christakis said his research factored out such mutual influences. The study asked the subjects--4,739 participants in the famous Framingham Heart Study in Massachusetts--to complete a survey including four questions relating to happiness three times between 1983 and 2003. They also provided information about social contacts, which allow researchers to map their connections.

The study found that happy people form clusters and the happiest people are those most centrally located in the clusters.

"If you imagine the fabric of humanity as a patchwork quilt, it turns out if you're happy or not depends on if you're in a happy or unhappy patch," Christakis said.

"We postulate that people who are in closer, more frequent contact with each other are more susceptible to catching each other's moods," Fowler said.

The researchers stress that personal factors such as jobs or marriages also affect happiness and that, although happiness may fluctuate, people tend to return to a personal happiness "set point" over time. It is this relatively stable emotional condition they examined in the paper, not the fleeting moods people experience day to day.

Richard Suzman, director of the division of behavior and social research at the National Institute on Aging, said the line of research holds "enormous promise in helping us improve interventions aimed at helping people change behaviors and improving public health."

Such interventions may involve targeted programs designed to alter social networks that influence behavior. The institute on aging has provided funding for Fowler and Christakis' work.

An editorial accompanying the report in BMJ called its conclusions "intriguing" but advised caution. Framingham, a relatively small community, may prove unique in ways not yet understood, wrote Peter Sainsbury, director of population health in Sydney South West Area Health Service in Australia.

As for whether unhappiness is also spreadable, Fowler and Christakis plan to look at that topic in upcoming papers on loneliness, depression and social networks.

Need a laugh?

Ahhh... remember the good old days when an empty box meant hours of entertainment?  What- you still like to sit in an empty box and pretend it's a car?  Well...okay!  Whatever gets you through the day.

Seriously, the world would be a better place it we indulged our inner child more often.  That's why we have so many toys for adults -and not the x-rated type!  Our Cubes Office sets are like Legos for work and our Dead Fish Potholder makes leftovers seem more exciting.

So add some humor to all aspects of your life and you'll fell better.  It doesn't have to cost much- just check out the kid in this video: