Batteries

There are some definite perks to working in a sex shop. One of which is you will always have hard to find batteries. The downside, is when you need to use those batteries for stuff that doesn't vibrate, it's always awkward.


When I started living with people who also work at STORE it got less awkward and more funny. Amelia came into my room at one point and said, "Hey, do you have any AAA batteries?"

I looked at her and nodded slowly.


She looked at me.


Then she realized why we were staring at each other and politely left while I retrieved them. They went into our thermostat.



Recently my wireless mouse died. It takes one AA, and I was out. I poked my head into Molly's room. "Hey, do you have a AA battery I can have?" She gave me the same look I'd given Amelia. "You can take it out of a vibrator, I don't care." She nodded toward the one sitting out on her desk and I scurried off with it.

ER Stories

I think I've said before, some of my favorite customers are ER nurses. They always have the best stories to tell. A woman was in earlier this week, and had a few.



The worst thing she's seen, she told Kat and I, was batteries. "Batteries?" Batteries that apparently came out of a toy somehow, and sat in the woman's vagina until they started to corrode. Which as you'd imagine, is pretty irritating to the delicate area. The smell was so bad apparently that when she came in about an irritation down there, and a smell, the doctor was so overwhelmed he had to don a surgical mask just to deal with it. The woman just didn't notice they'd gotten lost in there.



The other story she told us was a little better. A lot of women for pelvic exams get self conscious. In an effort to make life easier on the doctors and nurses, they'll clean themselves up before going in for the appointment. One woman was in a hurry, she grabbed a rag, wiped herself down, and dashed out the door. The room they do the exams in are quite small, with a spotlight pointing directly at the woman's bits. On this occasion the nurses weren't sure what to say. Finally they asked, "Was this on purpose?"

The woman looked down at them, "Was what?" "You're... well you're covered in glitter, is it a new fashion thing, or did you think we'd enjoy it?" The woman was mortified. Apparently her daughter had cleaned up her arts and crafts glitter project with the rag the woman had used to wipe down with.

Hiding in My Closet

Taylor came to visit. It was the best. And it was a surprise. Mostly.

As I was leaving the house with her on the phone recently, she heard Christian in the kitchen. She asked if she could talk to him. Confused, I handed over my phone. He took it and went upstairs, shutting his door behind him. I blinked at Kat and Molly and tried not to ask what was going on, since everyone was chiding me about being too inquisitive.

Later at work I made sad eyes at Christian. "I'm being so good, and not asking about the blatant conspiracy, that happened right in front of me." He frowned, "Yeah, I'm kinda mad at her about that." I shrugged, and he continued, "I'll just have to yell at her when she gets here." Then he looked like he wanted to punch himself in the face. He's always emphasizing that we can't keep secrets. I couldn't stop grinning, and every time he saw my little smile he'd yell, "But you still don't know when!"

A few days went by, and then early Thursday morning I got a text from her saying she was fighting with her parents. I was concerned, but she wouldn't give me any details. She said she'd tell me that night. She told me how hot it was in Arizona, how she was watching her brother play Rayman. She stopped texting for three hours, then said she'd fallen asleep. She sent me a picture of her dog, and then a bit before we closed for the night, she told me she was going to bed. I feebly protested that she was going to tell me about that morning, and she said she didn't feel well. I wished her goodnight.

I got home, cross and tired, ready for bed. I was at this point convinced that Christian had lied to me, that the fight meant she wouldn't be coming to visit/at all. I passed Molly and Kat in the living room, saying I was going to bed. They wished me good night. I opened my door and petted Leeloo as she greeted me, bending to fill her food bowl. Then I looked up and saw my bed was unmade. I cursed and went back downstairs to pull my sheets from the dryer. I nodded to Molly and Kat who had paused Breaking Bad and were looking like I had interrupted something.

It was immediately apparent that my sheets were not dry. I gritted my teeth and set them to run another cycle, heading back upstairs. I plopped into my computer chair, texting my dissatisfaction with life to a friend. From behind me I heard a soft, "Hey." I was startled, and thought it was Molly, but I hadn't heard my door open, and in an attempt to pretend I wasn't taken off guard, without turning, or looking up, I gave a tiny shrug and the most nonchalant "Hey" back. And then I froze, because it wasn't Molly's voice, and I put my phone down and turned, and Taylor was standing there. My eyes got huge, "Hey!" I was up like a shot and we hugged for most of the rest of the night.

She boarded the plane at about 1pm, hence her three hour nap. She went back 37 weeks on her Instagram to find the picture of her dog she sent me. Molly and Kat had paused their show the first time I went upstairs to listen at the foot of the stairs, and Taylor watched me fill up Leeloo's food bowl, convinced I'd look up and see her hiding there in my closet.

My Birthday

So, it had a pretty rocky start. I get pretty unbalanced emotionally when I haven't eaten, or I'm tired. On the 18th, I had to work a close that went to 12:30am, so I was technically working half an hour on my birthday. I'd been having stomach problems, and pretty much all I'd eaten was cupcakes, which is never a good decision. I was simultaneously extremely tired, and the end result was like an emotional roller coaster lacking brakes and on fire. The day had started so well, with my coworkers setting up early balloons, and bringing cupcakes, but as the day wore on I was getting more tired and hysterical. Part of it was that Taylor wouldn't be seeing me for my birthday. Part of it was that I always have awful birthday luck, and I was afraid that it was going to be a terrible day. Most of it was tired/hungry hysteria. By 11 I was on the verge of tears, and my wig and costume were starting to get on my nerves.

The last guy in the store was an inbred cretinous lump of meat. And I understand that while I was very emotionally biased when I met him, I still feel I could light him on fire with few qualms. He stayed in until 12:15. I announced loudly that we were closed more than once, and that it was now officially my birthday, without directly stating they should get the hell out of the store. He meandered up to the register like a bovine on muscle relaxants and proceeded to grill me about massage oils. I gave perfunctory answers and finally showed him some. His wife tried to hustle him, and he just refused to budge. When he got to the register he began counting out pennies rather than having me break a $20. When they finally left Dorothy and I both started screaming our irritation with him.

My mood was even worse, and on the drive home a sad song came up on shuffle as I was parking, and I lost it. It was about 12:45, and I was sitting in my car sobbing hysterically for no real reason at all. Taylor was texting me asking if I was going to bed, and I said I couldn't go inside yet. I was waiting until I didn't look like I'd been sobbing, so Molly, Kat, and Christian wouldn't worry if they saw me. Plus I had no actual reason to be upset, which is hard to explain. Finally, at 1am, I got out of my car. As I approached the house I noted how odd it was that none of our lights were on. Everyone was asleep? Kat and Christian normally stay up until 3 or 4. I shrugged, and went to open the door. It was locked. I rattled the handle a moment, then pulled out my key. As the door swung open, the house was totally dark except a single candle, and "Still Alive" began to play.

I shut the door carefully behind me, and turned on a light. I assumed the roommates were going to jump out at me, but they didn't. I stared at the Portal cake, with my plush turret and companion cube, and felt like I was filling up with love and affection. After a moment I stepped further inside and peeked around the corner into the kitchen to see all three friends grinning at me. We turned lights on, and laughed, and took pictures. They told me about setting up the surprise, how they'd been waiting for me for an hour. We stayed up until 2am laughing hysterically.

I woke up the next morning filled with contentment. I was going to be alone until 4, when Molly got home, and the party was on hold until 8:30 when Christian got home, but I decided there was nothing wrong with spending time by myself. I'd go to breakfast I decided. I headed downtown and saw that the Farmer's Market was going on. I usually work Saturdays and miss them. As I strolled around I saw two of my favorite customers running their food stand. They had brisket, and I decided to skip crepes and get some. I went and got cash, then strolled down. They both grinned at me as I approached, asking how I'd been. He commented how my haircut made me look thinner, and she assured me she could put the meat back on my bones. I love getting to see them running the booth, because I never have to pay, and I never order for myself. They gave me a plate of brisket, macaroni, deep fried corn bread, beans, rice, and salad and asked how Taylor was doing. I went looking for a place to sit and found an empty table.

I sat down at a table, breathing in the misty chill air, feeling totally content. I decided to go find a used book store when two older women sat down to keep me company and I forgot all about it. I'm pretty certain one of them was Susan Sarandon. We talked about books, and languages, places we'd been, and food. We talked for two hours until we got too chilly to sit anymore and said our goodbyes.

I headed home and Taylor called. We talked for two hours while she waited on a layover in Denver. I waited patiently until Molly got home, then bounced around her like a happy puppy demanding she go to the used book store with me. We went to two. When Kat and Christian got off work, we decided to head to dinner. I was feeling nauseated, and said it was their choice where we went. We ended up in a corner of Olive Garden, with the best server. He kept calling us "friend" and did extra nice things like filling up my no-refill drink, giving us an extra entree to take home free, not singing for my birthday, and giving us a million chocolate mints with our checks. We tipped him handsomely and headed home.

Molly presented me with a cooperative board game called Pandemic so we'd have stuff to play at the house, and Kat and Christian presented me with New Leaf and Pokemon X. They asked if I wanted to play the game or watch a movie, and we ended up cuddled up together on Kat and Christian's bed watching Moulin Rouge. I wasn't that tired initially, but I ended up sandwiched comfortably between Kat and Christian, tucked up against his chest while she played with my hair. It was warm, and I was feeling utterly loved, and dozed off for the last half of the movie.

The next day my parents presented me with a towel warmer, a new towel, and a rack to go over the bathroom door, as well as boot covers. It was hands down the best birthday I've ever had. 

The Break In

I haven't ever been robbed, but once when I was at the STORE further south, we did have a break-in. Parts of the break-in were really masterfully done, and parts of it were just baffling. The way the store was set up he broke into an area below an etagere, and it wasn't on camera. It didn't even fully set off the alarms. He snuck in through the floor level glass pane and managed to stay off camera the whole time. He broke in near DVDs, and we thought he was probably aiming to steal them, only to be foiled by the fact that we take them out of the cases and store them separately.

So, unable to steal DVDs he chooses the next best thing. And by next best I mean have you guys ever smelled a Basix dildo? I've said it before, but I'll say it again, if your toy smells, it should not be going inside you. Basix not only smell terrible, they sweat this awful greasy chemical sweat. This would-be thief decided he needed a backpack full of exclusively Basix dildos. Big 10" ones. And several bottles of Anal-eaze. For those that don't know, that's a powerful anesthetic, you can put anything up your butt that you want, and oh my goodness will you regret it the next day because it doesn't stop your muscles from tearing under unexpected strain.

So he crams his bag full of the two worst possible choices in the store, all the while managing to avoid cameras. Then he exits the store. It seems he tripped the alarm on his way out. They found him a few blocks away, running, Basix dildos flying from his backpack as he ran. They arrested him, and he sobbingly confessed, "I stole all the dongs!" When relating this story recently I added that it could have been a brilliant break-in. He could have taken one or two expensive toys, and walked into the nearby coffee shop to sit calmly for an hour or two before busing away. That probably would have been easier to accomplish if he hadn't been on hard drugs. Still. Running away while dildos fly out of your bag is rather a giveaway, don't you  think?

The Polaroid Prank

When I was in high school my friend group and I had a close relationship with our German teacher. We loved him to death. We'd spend optional periods in his classroom hanging out and joking with him. We'd also tease him mercilessly about his in depth power point presentations. At one point he got a Chinese yoyo that said "Sprach auf Deutsch" (Speak in German). He'd bop people on the face with it when they were speaking English in class.

At one point, I was speaking German but it was while he was talking. He bopped me with the paper toy, "Pass auf!" (Pay attention) and I became mortally offended. I really hate when things touch my face, which is a weird hang up but as soon as it happened I fell still and was instantly filled with quiet wrath. I would destroy the toy, but I could bide my time.

It so happened that a few days later I got my chance. Our classroom was facing the blackboard and Herr Antley was writing. He turned to explain something then set the yoyo down on the front row of desks. The very front row of desks were empty, there were three or four people in the next and I was in the third row back. But there were no people between me and the yoyo. As soon as he turned his back I was up and over my desk in a flash. Silently I darted over the second row, stretched forward and snatched the yoyo.

 I was absolutely silent and I was seated at my desk as he turned back around. The entire class saw me do this. And no one said a word. He turned back around and looked down where he'd put the yoyo, slightly puzzled. He then brushed it off, thinking he'd misplaced it.

Now, I could have burned the yoyo or thrown it away. But I was a senior and I wanted to do a senior prank. The big class one was a flop and Herr Antley was my favorite teacher. I didn't have a plan but I figured something would turn up. It turned up in the form of a used Polaroid camera in a thrift shop. I saw it and my plan dropped fully formed in my mind. I went out and bought a stack of film for it. This was near the beginning of the year.

I took a Polaroid of the yoyo against the windshield of my car on a rainy day. I made a friend who didn't have him as a teacher write on the bottom, "I've run away. I can no longer agree with your methods. I won't be misused. Regretfully yours." I left the picture in his mailbox, anonymously, a week or two after having stolen it.

He was clearly agitated that day in class. He asked if someone had taken it. We sat in silence and I sweated but to my classmates credit not a single finger pointed at me. The next Polaroid was the yoyo sitting on the seat of Isaac's bike, about two months later. "I've taken up some hobbies. Biking is fun. I still miss you sometimes, but I can't come back." I left it in the CD slot of his Mac, sticking out obviously.

He started tacking up the Polaroids, keeping them on his cork board. I sent a few, one every couple months. One was the yoyo and Kat (she went to a different school, I was covering my tracks), "I found a date to prom. I think I'm finally fitting in!" There were a few others. Each one was delivered differently and anonymously.

Our school has a tradition for graduation where all the teachers form double rows to make a column and hold out yardsticks to make a tunnel. It lets out at the buses that carry us away for the graduation ceremony. You stop and bid your favorite teachers goodbye. I decided to return the yoyo then. As we were walking down the column I stopped in front of Herr Antley. I smiled sweetly, pulled out the yoyo, and bopped him on the nose.

 "Du?! Es war du?!" (You?! It was you?!") He told me he thought it was Nick and Ted, our resident troublemakers. I gave the yoyo back and we hugged.

A few of my friends were the year below me. They told me Herr Antley still has the Polaroids up and delights in telling people about it.

Safe Sex DVD

I have now met the worst human.

He came in this morning, livid. There was no ramp up as I told him no, he came in spitting mad. He thumped his black bag on the counter and said, "I want credit back for this. She said it was the best, but it's not!" I kept a calm polite demeanor, feeling slightly ridiculous having to deal with this dressed as a pirate. I asked what it was. He angrily ripped a DVD from its black bag, with a receipt. "I'm sorry, personal products like that are final sale, we-" "I didn't pay this amount of money for a safe sex DVD!" I blinked at him, "I'm sorry sir, but that DVD is pornographic-" "This packaging is totally misleading! Look at it!" I held back the response that I've seen it plenty of times. It was a Wicked Pictures movie, which is a full length film with a plot, and "acting" but it was certainly X rated. On the cover Jessica Drake wound herself around a beefy guy. I looked back at him. I was confused, it was very clearly porn, and not an instructional, I didn't know what was making him say it was a safe sex DVD.

Our receipts clearly state that all personal products are final sale. "Sir, I'm very sorry, but we can't take returns on movies, they're personal product-" "Everything in here could be considered personal product!" I looked at him, refraining from saying that, yes, that's the point. I tried a different tactic,  "You can see on your receipt your cashier circled that specifically." He exploded, "Oh cause she circled it?! That doesn't mean she said it to me! She could have been saying anything as she circled it! I'm 67, you think I get sprung watching a safe sex DVD?! I don't! I shop here all the time!" My mouth curled a little at that. I was thinking his problem more likely lay with his age than the porn.  Not to mention with the frequency I'm at the store, having never seen him, I have reason to doubt he was a frequent shopper.

But then it dawns on me what his complaint is. "Sir, are you upset that the actors wore condoms?" "Yes!" I stood there for a moment, just confused. It's not like they take time to show the actors putting a condom on, it just cuts to explicit content, and it's on. The only difference is a slight sheen. The knowledge that they're protecting their bodies is something that would disturb very few people. They even take it off for money shots. "I'm sorry, every Wicked movie does that, they believe in the stars being protected-" "That's not something I would ever pay to see!" At this point I set down a firm no. He stood there and yelled at me for five minutes while I stood with a polite look of concern on my face, and he left me with the satisfaction that he had to keep the porn that was so abhorrent to him. He can take that shit to corporate for all I care, I refuse to reward someone for thinking sexual health is a turn off.

Kid Friendly

It becomes ridiculously easy to forget what is appropriate when you work in a store like mine. It stops being a taboo subject when you're around it all the time. I've been told to shut up when loudly discussing erotica, and I've caught myself mid-spiel at family gatherings educating my Nana on silicone lube. It's pretty pervasive. I'm not the only one to have these problems, and it's not just the mind set, it's the stuff you accumulate. Like giant plush penis pillows, and bottles of lube spread in a cavalier fashion around the house. Molly was spending the day with her four year old brother, and brought him to her apartment. She was surprised to realize her apartment wasn't as PG as she thought. By that I mean she had invested in a naked man calendar which was displayed prominently on the wall. The month it was on was a close-up of the guys dick while he leans back and and gives the viewer smouldery eyes.

Her kid brother looks up at the picture and stares. Molly had that "oh, fuck" feeling when he calmly announced, "That's his penis!" She agreed and distracted him with her cat Luna. He then wanted to watch a movie. She was telling me this story and at this point she said her movie pick was Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. "Molly! That's not really kid appropriate!" She replied indignantly that there wasn't any really overt sex, she thought it would be fine. And it was until the bit where Scott pokes the lesbian behind the knee and she explodes during an orgasm. Her brother watched intently and ten minutes later into the movie asked why she had been moaning. Molly said that's just how she exploded and he seemed to accept this. She was hoping he would forget about it. The next day in the car he said, "Remember that part where he poked her knee?" And then he started to imitate her moans. Molly is in such deep shit when he parrots her in front of their parents.

Kegel Balls

We get a lot of people who are irrationally worried about losing kegel balls. For the less informed readers, kegel balls are inserted vaginally to work out the muscles, or to just feel awesome. There's lot of different kinds like the ben wa balls, glass beads, and ones with rubber coated ball bearings inside plastic domes held together with a girdle. The idea is you insert them and then walk around and do normal stuff and they feel great, and it works your muscles out simultaneously. But a ridiculous amount of people are afraid of losing them. I often want to sit women down with an anatomy book. "Here is your vagina. It's a closed circuit, the balls can't go any further in you, and you can just squeeze them right out!"

Marina came in to visit recently. She left to go work at her clinic full-time, and she related to Crystal and I how she'd gotten kegel balls stuck inside her. At first I scoffed in disbelief, but she said, "No, really!" They were the glass beads, so there's no string to draw them out with. She got so nervous she couldn't relax her muscles enough to make them let go. She ran downstairs naked to her roommate, frantic. "I need your help!"

They contemplated her roommate getting very much closer to her, and they toyed with the idea of going to the hospital to get them removed. "Would you have gone to your clinic?" I asked her, figuring her coworkers would be able to take it in stride. "I would rather die! I was going to drive to the one farther south." Eventually her roommate made her spread her legs and talked her through breathing exercises and forced her to calm down enough that she was able to get them out, but now I feel bad for thinking all those women who were afraid of losing them were silly. Granted if you're not nervous in the first place it wouldn't happen, but that's not much consolation when you're naked doing calming breathing exercises with your roommate.

Random Facts

About Me

Hey!

Wanna hear some random facts about me?
Almost every drawing I’ve done for this blog has been on the same canvas. I only have two layers, and once a drawing is complete I save it in Paint in the same file name, and erase everything from the canvas. It’s sort’ve cathartic, like the monks who make intricate sand drawings just to blow them away- except mine are stupid doodles, and not intricate works of art.

I draw my hair on the wrong side, because of mirrors. When I sat down with a mirror to draw myself, it never occurred to me that the mirror was flipping the perspective, and I was drawing it wrong. That’s why in my selfies, my fringe of hair is on the right, when I draw it on the left. At this point I’m so invested in the left hand hair fringe, that it seems weird to change now.

The Bet

Neil Gaiman is my favorite author, hands down. I have almost everything he's ever written. I've been sharing him a bunch with Taylor, reading short stories over the phone, and lending her my copy of Fragile Things. When I was in Sacramento she gave me a call as I was between activities. I flopped down outside on the curb to talk to her. She said she was off her mountain and down in town, in the local bookstore. I urged her to pick up a copy of American Gods, and she said that the bookstore didn't carry any Neil Gaiman.

"That's crazy," I told her, "He's currently on the New York Times bestseller list, he's had three of his books made into major motion pictures, as well as having won several awards on a bunch of his novels. If they sell books, they sell Neil Gaiman." She insisted no, they had none of his books in stock and we went back and forth until I finally said, "I bet you." I could hear her eyebrow raise over the phone. "A for real bet?" "A for real bet. If I win, and they have at least one of his books, you have to send me one of your shirts to wear." I waited for her stakes, and she hummed and thought and finally burst out laughing. "If I win, I want you to use the word 'cum-dumpster' in a sentence." I turned bright red. "What?" "You have to say it, and not like, 'I have to say this word', you have to casually slip it in- to a family member, not some stranger. And you have to say it before you leave Sacramento."

I know I work where I do, and I know that it shouldn't be a big deal, but there's a lot of words that I don't like in my vernacular, and "cum-dumpster" is definitely a no-go for me. Not to mention I was with the more conservative side of my family- relatively speaking. Hesitantly I said, "You're on. But I want to be on the phone while you ask the clerk, no cheating." She went inside and asked if they carried any Neil Gaiman. To my horror the clerk said she'd never heard of him, and that she'd look him up.

To her credit, Taylor was thorough. "Try fantasy, or he writes some books for kids and young adults." The clerk went through each section and I started getting redder and redder, contemplating a near future in which I'd agreed to alienate a family member. There was a long pause in the conversation, and I could feel Taylor getting excited as victory beckoned. "Oh," the clerk said, "We do have one copy of Coraline." Taylor huffed out an annoyed breath and I whooped on my end of the call, laughing with relief.

That was some time ago, but I just got my package in the mail. Taylor always has the best shirts, with little pockets on the chest. But she also sent a copy of Coraline, wrapped and signed.

Addiction

Our dryer has been broken for a few weeks now. I've been putting off major laundry waiting for them to fix it. We could still use it, but it took upwards of five full cycles to dry anything, and since the weather has been muggy air drying wasn't so much an option. Also laundromats are things that happen to other people. So I stalled on washing my bedding or anything but necessities, but they finally came in to fix it.

I just finished a load of clothes and started on my bedding. I've been having a severe case of bachelor bed. (Bachelor Bed: A condition where you surround yourself in stuff that seemed like a good idea at the time and it never leaves the bed. In my case: headphones, stuffed toys, bits of string, and so many books. Oh, and you also never actually make the bed). As I was bringing down my comforter I was about to shove it in the washer when I thought I heard the riffle of pages. Horrified I started shaking it out, wondering if I had accidentally washed a book with my first load and my sheets.
I calmed down when I remembered shaking the sheets out, and I had moved all the spare books that had been littering my bed when I took the sheets off, so there wasn't one in my comforter either. But I had a moment after that when I was still holding my comforter and I just thought, "I think this is when you know you have a problem."

The Triforce

It always surprises me a little when people are so taken aback at my nerdiness. I don't know what vibe I give off but apparently gamer and nerd aren't part of it.

There was a couple up at my counter. They wanted to sign up for our membership, which requires an email. I hate it when people spell it, I have a touch of dyslexia, and the letters jumble impossibly in my head. So he begins to spell his email and I ask him politely to say each letter slowly. He repeats himself. Normally when someone goes to the trouble of spelling it, it's because it's a random series of letters or a particular way of spelling a name. But when I looked at what he'd spelled it was "Optimus." I looked at him almost offended, "Didn't you think I'd know who Optimus Prime is?" He looked surprised then embarrassed and said he supposed not.

Another guy was blown away that I recognized the Triforce tattoo on his hand. When I saw it I grinned, "Is that the Triforce?" He looked startled and admitted it was. I wondered aloud that he had them all filled in rather than picking either courage, wisdom, or power.

 He stared at me, and then asked if I'd played Ocarina of Time. "Of course I have. Who hasn't played that?" Evidentially every female he knew. He said there was a line about getting to keep the whole Triforce if the world was in balance. He stayed and chatted with me for a while. I asked if he'd played Skyward Sword yet, since I enjoyed it a lot. He said he couldn't and showed me that he only had one arm. Like a stellar human being, I said that sucked because he couldn't play any of the Wii games. He gave me an odd look and said, "For other reasons too."

 I blushed and launched into talking about how fun the Wii U was, since he said he could use the controls. After gushing about the Nintendo Land mechanics for the Luigi's Mansion mini game I stopped and said, "Oh, I'm sorry, I must be boring you." He had been listening intently, but I didn't want to monopolize the conversation. After a beat he stuttered, "No, you're not boring me! I guess I should go though." He told me his name and we shook hands.

For some reason, I knew immediately after the interaction that he'd be posting a Missed Connection on Craigslist. He expressed interest by saying I was the only genetically female person who had correctly identified his tattoo. I got back to him saying that I was stoked with having met him, and wanted to get a coffee, but was sadly attracted to women. He never got back to me. This Halloween I really want to be Sheik if I can throw together a passable cosplay, and I keep imagining that he's going to choose the day I wear it to work to come back in, and it's going to be all sorts of hilariously awkward.

Mystery Cow

There is a mystery cow by my house, and it is driving me crazy. Most nights during the summer I’ve had my window open to enjoy the fresh air. And most mornings- not all, I have heard a cow lowing. I live in a residential area, still in the city. There’s tiny yards but no one even keeps chickens, let alone livestock! I’m like a block away from a car dealer for crying out loud!
It doesn’t happen every morning, but when I hear it, it’s always the exact same- probably not a real cow. But it sounds just like one, and I know. Every night I spend at my parents house or when I house sit for them I have to listen to their cows bawling and bellowing to be fed. This sound is just like that.
I’ve become slightly obsessed. I’ve started to believe there’s a pick up truck with a trained cow in a trailer. On randomized mornings, the truck will drive by our street and cue the cow. The cow will low in the exact same way every time as its been trained and their final goal is to drive me out of my mind. And every morning I wake up just a little less certain about my grip on reality.

Delicate Flower

When I was a kid my best friend was the little boy across the street. We loved fighting with each other almost as much as we liked playing with each other, and we spent most days together. We'd run around barefoot and set fireworks off into the swamp behind his house, and he'd let me watch him play video games. (The few times we played together and I won he'd turn the console off in a huff and sent me home.)

About every other weekend we'd have a sleepover. His room had two beds, and I had a bunk bed. We'd take turns, but I remember going to his house more because they had structured dinners, video games, and his parents didn't care if we watched South Park. And that went along for years. But about when I turned 11 things changed a bit.

Nick and I discovered hickeys. And I don't mean we gave them to each other. We discovered that we could give ourselves bruises just by sucking on our arms and legs, and we thought they looked bad ass. I'd given myself one on my upper arm, above my arm pit. But I sensed without being told that my parents wouldn't be happy to see this. So I'd covered it with a band aid. It was a day or two later when I forgot about it. My mom came into the bathroom when I was getting out of the shower and saw my arm.

There was a big fuss. I remember even my Nana being told, and expressing loud doubt as to whether I could even reach my arm there with my mouth. I turned my head and showed her. But it was clear because I'd tried to hide it that all the adults thought hanky panky was going on. I don't even know why they thought I'd let Nick suck on my arm, but adults, y'know?

So it was a few weeks later that I asked if I could spend the night at Nick's. My parents were reluctant, which confused me. They said yes, but then when I was about to leave, my dad stopped me and sat me down. I remember he didn't want to look at me. "So... You're a delicate flower." I turned green. My older siblings had already riddled my psyche with the horrors of sex, and I very much didn't want to be listening to this. "And Nick is a bee," he continued, oblivious to my mounting nausea, "and if you're not careful, he'll sting you. And if he does, just make sure you use protection. And there's no need to tell Nick we had this talk." Yeah right. And I mean, real quick, props to my parents for saying to use protection rather than forbidding me and being sex positive but also, goddamn, 11 was too young for that shit.

I ran over and spilled the whole bizarre conversation within moments. We sat in awkward silence and then laughed for a long time. We tried to forget about it, but that was definitely our last sleepover. Sometimes we still see each other, and when we do, occasionally one of us will say, "Do you remember our last sleep over...?" And we'll start laughing incoherently, with phrases like, "delicate flower" and "be careful, he'll sting you" thrown in.

Invertabrate

I'm cold blooded. My body temperature always seems several degrees lower than that of other people. My friends and I are in a constant temperature battle, especially at work. I hate air conditioning, it's possibly the biggest bane on my existence. Everyone but me likes to keep the store at 66, and a cold 66 at that. 66 outside doesn't seem that cold because there isn't a fake refrigerator chill to the air. So every night on my lunch I leave the freezing cold store front to sit in front of the space heater we have in the back. Christian caught me so close to it that I was turning bright red but I still felt cold.

One night I was closing with Dorothy and she came back to grab the vacuum. She saw me counting the money with the space heater on full blast next to me. "Are you seriously cold?!" She asked. "I'm always cold." I told her with a sad look.  "Reggie, you're such an invertebrate!" I looked up from counting and blinked a few times. "I don't have a spine?" She frowned, "What? I mean you're like a lizard."

 "That's what an invertebrate is- something without a spine. Do you mean I'm cold blooded?" She looked confused "Oh, is that what that is? Yeah, cold blooded." I started laughing at her and she glared and left the back room.

  Now every time I say I'm cold everyone says, "You're such an invertebrate."

It's Probably Dairy

This was my favorite part of my trip to Sacramento, and I hesitated to write it because I do try not to write anything that will offend the audience (ie: my friends and family) but this was just too funny.

I was having really bad stomach cramps the whole trip. I'm highly inclined to believe this was due to stress, but everyone had a theory. At dinner, my aunt Lianne told me it was probably dairy. As soon as she said it my cousin Jon and his girlfriend Alia either looked away or snickered quietly. I asked them about it later. "She thinks everything is because of dairy." Jon told me. Alia agreed, adding, "I had a rash on my leg once and she thought it was dairy. I cut out dairy for two weeks only to find it was a bacterial rash. Or when Jon had hay fever-" "She said that was dairy too."

It became a running joke through the trip. Low sex drive? Probably dairy. Cancer if you've smoked all your life? Probably dairy.

The best one though was on our last night. My sisters baby kept fussing through dinner. I looked over to Jon and Alia and with a straight face said, "It's probably all the dairy in his diet." We all three burst out laughing to my sisters indignation. "He doesn't have any dairy! I'm not a cow!" We stared at her and I said, "Any milk product is dairy... It's still dairy if it's goat milk, and it's still dairy if it's human milk." The table got thoughtful and finally she agreed that it was likely all the dairy in his diet, that she'd have to cut it out if she wanted him to stop fussing.

Feed Me

I feel there may be some biological reason related to how fucking happy I get when people feed me. My brains is saying, “This person is promoting your survival, love them unabashedly.” But it might just be me.

Today two girls were checking out at my register. I was bantering with them a little, and one suddenly says, “Hey, would you like an Olive Garden breadstick?” I stared at her, and nodded slowly, feeling like she might be trying to trick me. She pulled out a napkin bundle from her purse and handed it to me. It was five Olive Garden breadsticks, still warm. “They didn’t give me a box, and my purse is already going to smell forever- plus I like making people smile.” As soon as she’d pulled out the bundle I had a giant grin on my face. She handed me the whole thing, and I was so flustered and happy I was practically incoherent. I thanked her profusely. She asked if that was the creepiest thing to ever happen in my store and I said no, it was the best thing to ever happen in my store.

Me and Christian feasted on the breadsticks and he couldn’t get over how ecstatic I was. Every time I looked at the breadstick I was eating I would just start giggling and grinning and making little happy sounds. Looking back on it only a few hours later I can see that it’s unbalanced how happy I got simply from someone sharing food with me. Christian asked if that’s all it takes to get into my pants, and without a second of hesitation I told him yes. He stared at me, “You didn’t even think about it.” “Nope.” I told him. “That’s all it takes. Once I took an apple slice from a stranger in Pike Place Market, and he was my best friend forever after that.” He laughed and said, “I’ve given you food before.” I spread my arms, “Take me, I’m yours.”

The Dorothy Prank

When Dorothy first came to work with us, we weren't sure how to react. Our hours were already getting cut, and they hired this new person to make hours even scarcer. We found out later that because we hasn't been acclimating well to Cindy as an outside hire for our manager, Dorothy was a just-in-case-you-quit hire. We were told specifically not to train her, that she'd be fully under Cindy's tutelage- which was laughable because Cindy was new herself and didn't have any product knowledge and was still asking me about basic store operations. But the long and the short of it was we didn't get to know Dorothy for weeks. And so we started an elaborate prank.

How things actually stood: I was dating Taylor, Kat was dating Christian and Isaac, and Molly was single. But Molly and Christian lived in the same apartment complex, and this simple interaction resulted in weeks of plot development.

Dorothy: (Somehow under the impression Molly and Christian were dating) Aww, you guys are cute. Do you live together?
Molly: (confused) Well... Sorta.

When she relayed to us that Dorothy thought they were dating, we jumped on board. How we set it up: Molly and Christian were dating, Molly was becoming increasingly jealous of Kat, who Christian was sleeping with on the side, and since I'd already been gushing about Taylor we wrote me in as a one-night stand with him months ago, who he was trying to hook back up with.

Every shift we had with Dorothy someone would drop a remark. When Kat told me in front of Dorothy that Christian had helped her pick new glasses frames, I asked if Molly was jealous. She said a little, that they weren't able to spend a lot of time together. We tried to make each statement innocuous enough that they weren't direct comments. We never said who was dating who. When Dorothy asked me I shrugged and said it was complicated.

Christian and I practiced flirting, which we were ridiculously bad at. He'd wink at me and I'd burst out laughing, or I'd give him a come-hither look and he'd snort.

But the best part about our prank was when we forgot about it. We'd laid all this ground work and then simultaneously we all forgot about it. Months later, Molly remembered, and asked Dorothy if she'd picked up on our back story. Apparently she'd gone home to her roommate and said, "I think all my coworkers have sex with each other." It had been just as confusing to her when we stopped as when we'd started and instead of picking up on all the nuances of our carefully planned backstop she just assumed we were sex fiends.

Condoms and Pins

At STORE we have a display of condoms that inflate. It lets you see the texturing and ribbing on the different varieties as well as how big each brand is. But to keep them from popping one condom has to have a hole in it. If we change out any of them, we usually have to poke a new hole to keep the air pressure stable. But it worries people when we walk away from the condom table carrying a pin, talking about poking holes.

Walking