Rick the Spider

For whatever reason our store is infested with spiders. There's cobwebs constantly, and jarring encounters every other week during the summer. Mostly we get medium-small jumping spiders, but this is the saga of Rick. Rick was enormous. Not just leggy, but bulky, and he moved like a fucking ninja shadow of terror.

The first to encounter him was Britney. She went into our back bathroom, which doubles as our kitchen, and came out pale. "I just had the biggest spider I've ever seen run across my boot." Everyone on shift turned to look at Crystal. She's the only person at the store who's not terrified of spiders (although she is of moths). She huffed a sigh and entered the bathroom. We waited, hoping she'd come out triumphant but after five minutes she reappeared. "I couldn't get him. Rick was too crafty." "Rick?" "Yeah, that fucker was way too big to not get a name." She told us how Rick had waited poised on an electrical cord below the sink, and fled before she could get him.

Throughout the next couple weeks we'd check before going in the bathroom. "Anyone seen Rick recently?" Sometimes we had, and most times we hadn't, which was more worrying. As Rick's time with us lengthened I started getting more convinced, that as the only person to have not seen him, it would be up to me to slay him. And he appeared for our duel at the most unfortunate time.

At the time, we had our first Molly working, who was arachnophobic. I know this term is misused. I don't mean to say that Molly was afraid of spiders. She was, but mostly she was phobic. Knowing a spider was in the store would set her into a tearful panic attack.

And so it was that it was Molly and I closing when Rick finally appeared to challenge me. I was working my way across the window to the open sign, which is an obstacle course of mannequins and props. As I turned the sign off I hear Molly scream my name. I knew immediately what was going on. I darted and weaved my way back to the front. I grabbed her and shoved her to the couch to sit. "I found Rick!" She was on the edge of a meltdown, and I was all brisk efficiency. "I know you did, so just sit here and I'll take care if it, just tell me where he was and it'll be fine." Lip trembling she pointed to our sandwich board, the one that's supposed to sit on the street but instead sat leaning against the front door for weeks. I armed myself (which in this case involved a bottle of Windex and a paper towel).

I approached the sandwich board, and pulled it tentatively from the wall. Rick darted out immediately, shooting across the face of the board like a demon. In my mind he reared up and hissed a challenge at me. I growled back, and we met in deadly combat. In reality, frozen, I turned to Windex bottle to face him and without moving another muscle began to squirt him. Stunned, he fell from the board. He staggered slowly, poisoned, across the front rugs, hissing obscenities about my lack of honor.

Then I dropped the paper towel over him like a shroud and stamped down. He crunched. I allowed myself a moment to freak out internally. I'm terrified of spiders, but one does what one must. I collected his remains and brought him to the outside trash can, saying a quick tribute to his stealth and skill in combat as I disposed of him. I came back over to Molly, determinedly chirpy, "Ricks dead, and he's outside, and everything is fine. Lets close." She pulled herself together and we finished up. But as we come back into spider season I await the next challenge.

The Cousin

A few weekends back we had an all weekend party, which served two purposes. The first part was my friends being lovely and babysitting me so I can't mope over getting dumped. The second part was about entertaining Xhavier's cousin from Japan, Reno. Reno speaks almost no English, so having meaningful conversations was out, but we all got an app on our phones for translating into Japanese so we could convey short messages. The translator was set up well, not only did it translate what you said into Japanese but it translated the Japanese back to English to show you approximately what you'd said. There were some bumps in the system.

The first major bump occurred over Travis, the unwelcome roommate. He'd enter rooms just to stand slouching in the corner, looking at everyone. He would watch group meals being prepared, staring intently, and state obvious things, or ask annoyingly blatant questions. Such as, if you're cooking a pizza, he'd slouch over and ask, "Whatcha cookin', pizza?" While out and about with Xhavier, his boyfriend Makl, and Reno, this annoying roommate came up in conversation. Everyone began doing imitations of the slouch, and Reno looked confused. So Xhavier pulled out his phone and typed, "We have a terrible roommate, who we dislike." He showed it to Reno who looked up more confused. Xhavier checked the translation and "terrible" had become "wonderful." Reno was then under their impression that they disliked their wonderful roommate. He quickly retried and got the point across.

We were trying to ask her what sorts of things she liked. Xhavier and Makl are huge anime fans, and kept asking if she'd seen ones they had so there'd be something to talk about. Finally she shook her head and said she didn't really watch any. Xhavier wilted a little, and said, "Oh." Makl nudged him and said "Tell her we really like anime." There was a pause then Xhavier gestured at himself and Makl and simply said "Otaku."

The next hurdle was trying to ask if she smoked. I don't enjoy it, but it would have been an activity with Makl.  When translated it came out the same, but Reno didn't know the word marijuana, and looked at us puzzled. Xhavier and I frowned at the phone trying to think of synonyms but we could only come up with slang. "Pot, weed, grass..." we muttered. I suggested showing her a picture of a bong. Xhavier pulled it up and she asked hesitantly, "Tobacco?" and made a little X with her fingers. We shook our heads then Makl said we should just pull up a picture of weed. When we showed it to her she said, "Oh, hemp!" We exclaimed that we hadn't thought of that, but it turned out she didn't anyway.

We told her there was a raccoon that came most nights, and found out the word in Japanese is the same as in German. When Roger the raccoon showed up we bent some rules and fed him cat food. We cautioned her to be careful, since he was standing right in the open doorway, but she held out her hand before we could stop her and Roger took food directly from her hand, delighting her and terrifying us.

The next day we went out to see a local waterfall. Isaac, Xhavier, Reno and I all set out in Isaac's car. Reno and Xhavier were passing their phones back and forth conversing. All of a sudden Xhavier laughed. "She wants to know if you and Isaac are dating." I laughed too and said "Tell her he's not my type." Isaac pouted at me and Xhavier puzzled over how to express that. Finally he passed her his phone and I asked how it came out. "I just told her you're a lesbian. It came out that you have very much homosexuality." I laughed, but was very relieved when Reno said "I do not deny that." In Japan it's very under the table. They passed their phones back and forth some more and Xhavier asked, "How long were you and Taylor dating?" My stomach tightened and I shrugged
"About five months? We started texting every day in February, I dunno." They were quiet in the back for a while and Isaac sidetracked me before I got despondent. We arrived and marveled at the falls and Xhavier comes up, "You have to see this." He handed me the phone with Reno's last message on it. "Since she is lovely, I hope a person early for her can be found." I looked at Reno with the biggest grin and told her thank you in Japanese as sincerely as possible.

We went to where the falls pool and have a lip you can jump from. Isaac stripped and went up to jump in. It wasn't really warm enough for it, because the falls are mountain run off, and Reno looked at Xhavier and I saying "kowai" (which means scary, that threw me off when I thought she was calling a spider cute, since it sounds a lot like kawaii). I tried to tell her that Isaac said he wasn't crazy, which came out to "He says that he may be sane."

Later that night Kat, Christian, and Makl joined the group. We were trying to explain to Reno that Christian was shy, but his name kept translating to Christianity, and in the end it came out as, "We do not care about Christianity." So we gave up on trying to express that. Eventually though Reno noticed that Kat was loving on both Isaac and Christian and more explanations were had. The poor thing. In Japan people don't come out of the closet, and in the same day she learned I was lesbian, that Isaac, and Makl, and Christian were bi, that Xhavier was trans, and that Isaac, Kat, and Christian were in a polyamorous love triangle. By the end of it, she was floored. She asked, "Is this allowed?" And we said yes, but that we weren't normal which was the best way of expressing that we're pretty niche.

We took her on a hike up through the mountains to get a view of the bay. We kept asking if it was okay because it's a challenging near-vertical scramble, and at one point you have to climb up using a rope. She kept insisting that it was okay, that it was very pretty. At the rope I went up first and she came up after me. "Kowai!" she said when she reached the top. I grinned and nodded, and she said I'd gone up bravely and I said no, but that she was sweet to say so. We got to the peak and took pictures. As we were going down Reno kept turning to help Kat over logs and waiting up for her. Later we started all talking about how cute Reno was. We had set up computer translators so we could just type in messages and play them aloud in Japanese for her. Xhavier typed to her that everyone was talking about how cute and sweet she was. She blushed, and said no, but looked really pleased.

The entire time we did our best to include her, translating as much as we could, but we worried she might not be having fun, and what she thought of us. Isaac on her last night finally asked if she thought we were strange. She sat up straight and said, "Yes!" We all laughed, and hoped she thought in a good way.

Portland Adventures

If only the weather had been better. As I said, I recently went to Portland to visit Lia, who is one of my very favorite people. When I arrived we were at a bit of a loss on what to do. We'd planned on hiking, and most of Portland is outdoor activities, but the weather was being fractious. So we dropped my bag at her place and we went on a walk at a nearby park while the weather misted on and off at us. We chatted and caught up, and eventually the park let us out onto a playground. I saw a teeter-totter and immediately got excited. They're banned from most playgrounds now on the basis that they're dangerous, but here was a line-up of them. I bee-lined toward them and Lia followed along. We hopped on and quickly realized we were almost the same weight. Lia is taller than me, and skinnier, and has always weighed less, but we were close to perfect balance. So we scooted and leaned and after a while we were a perfectly balanced scale. We grinned at each other in delight.

Later when we described this moment to her boyfriend Adam he scoffed and said you could get any two objects to balance based on where you put them and where the fulcrum is. We told him to shut up and stop stealing the wonder out of our experience. The next day we had tentatively planned to hit the zoo, or the bookstore. When we woke up the weather hadn't improved, and from misting had turned to fully drizzling sporadically. So we bussed down to Powell's instead. For those who haven't been, it's a haven of literature. This is me in bookstores:

So we wander around Powell's, and I decide that instead of shoes without holes in them, what I really need is more books. So I debate and shuffle books around and finally settle on three while Lia flipped through whatever caught her eye. We went up and watched their printing press, smelling the glue, and laminate, and paper. Finally we decided to head back to her place after a few hours of remarking how great it would be to just live in Powell's. We chatted for a while about high school drama, and where people were now. An old fight between me and another girl got brought up, and we couldn't quite remember the details. We wondered if my old Livejournal was still around, and if I'd written about what had happened. So we pulled it up, and I had. But since we were logged in we were able to see posts I had written for my eyes only, which detailed experiences with my first boyfriend. We didn't realize at first that they were private, and I couldn't believe I'd posted stuff this explicit about my life when I finally noticed they were private.

Adam was only able to hang out with us in the evenings after he got off work, but we got along swimmingly. My favorite moment was during a discussion about banjos. I lifted my hands up and played an air-banjo, and looked up to see Adam frowning at me.

"What?" I asked. "Your banjo impression was you playing bass with a southern accent." I dropped my hands, "Oh yeah? Let's hear your banjo." And that's when he schooled me at playing imaginary banjo.

How To Sit on a Bus

So I was going on a trip to Portland recently, and took the Bolt bus. I am awful at sitting still or upright like a normal adult. I got a seat next to this smelly child who kept farting. I sat like a normal person for about ten minutes.

 When I was in high school I broke my tail bone, so it tends to ache sitting in certain ways, so I pull my leg up, and the kid looks over at me like, "Really? Even I'm sitting still." So I try to sleep.

 When we hit the first stop the smelly kid got off and I expanded to the seat next to me, with my arm up on the window.

I fidgeted, and put one leg up on the arm rest. That worked for a while.

 I gave up. Like, completely. I just bent in half and fell asleep. When I woke up the couple across the aisle from me were looking at me surreptitiously, and I'm pretty sure the girl took a picture.

 

 On the way back I went back to the leg up, fell asleep, and woke up with my leg fully on the armrest, curled over it. The guy next to me looked fairly uncomfortable.

Allergic

Having explained about the bird suit, I'll now talk about the time I almost threw up in it. It was midsummer, and the AC for the restaurant was on the fritz. Just having to walk around everyone had a thin layer of sweat coating them. The only perk to being the bird was a free meal. So on a day I was scheduled I came in early and got a shrimp plate, eating in the back while reading. The kitchen back room was the only place that was cool, so it was delightful to just sit and relax before my shift.

I finished lunch and my buddy appeared, so we started getting me fitted into the monstrosity, and already sitting in the back room I felt too hot. Most of the birds would makeshift ice packs to hang inside the suit with them, but I've never been able to stand ice against my skin, so I told my buddy I'd be fine without them. Plus some of time when they use ice packs you can see water dripping and it makes Red look incontinent.

So we start walking around the restaurant, my buddy even makes me go out onto the patio and the air is so hot in the suit I can barely breathe. My mouth is open and gasping, and she whisked me back inside but not before I start feeling nauseous. None of the hosts are allowed to sit on the benches up front during their shift, but the bird is allowed. I plopped down, staying very still, focusing on not throwing up. After a little it becomes clear to me that I need to vomit, but I can't muster the strength to tell my buddy, since you need to speak very loudly to be heard. The idea of tightening my stomach muscles to raise my voice seems equivalent to climbing seven mount Everest's in succession.  After ten minutes of sitting my buddy leaned down and asked, "Red, are you okay? You aren't moving much." Moving the head takes a lot of effort, but slowly I managed to give it a slow shake. My buddy's eyes widened, "Do you feel sick?" A tiny nod. She grabbed my hand and hauled me like a small child into the back, motioning servers to clear the way. We make it to the back and I rip the head off and grab the closest garbage can and start dry heaving over it.

While I was occupied my buddy went and got our manager. They came in while I was retching and I looked up at him in misery. "Get outta there. We'll let you do some quizzes so you still get all the hours." I could have kissed him. I got out of the suit, and I swear I could see my body steaming in the cooler air of the kitchen.

My buddy and I sat and did menu quizzes for the remaining hour, which is just to keep up knowledge of current special items. I felt fine, and I was grateful I didn't lose my dinner. So we both take off. I got in my car but I still had an odd feeling in my stomach, so I decided to take surface roads home rather than get on the freeway. I drove for a little, and I'm on this little back road when it becomes appallingly clear that I'm going to throw up. I sit up hopefully sizing up my window only to realize I'm too short to stick my head out of it while still driving competently.

I look desperately for a turn off, and as I see a right turn, I open the door and stick my head out and lose something violently pink. I look up. I'm driving into a tiny industrial complex, with no one around. I stop and throw up more, but in that incoherent way of sick people I am fixated on the idea that I need to park in a parking spot, not the middle of the lot. There were streaks and loops of bright pink over this parking lot before I was done. Parked, and safe, I leaned out fully and realized two things. As soon as I was parked I was done, and while I'd done an admirable job getting my head out the door, I'd still managed to foul the driver side door storage space.

Cue Isaac. At that point I was rooming with him, and it was clear I wasn't safe to drive. The call went something like this:

Isaac: Hello?
Me: I'm sick.
Isaac: Where are you?
Me: I don't know, I was throwing up when I turned in.
Isaac: I'm on my way.

I got off the phone then started getting a little more coherent. I called back to tell him what was around me. He showed up with his mom and she gave me the water bottle she'd brought along, and a bowl, and drove my soiled car home for me. I was sick for the rest of the night, and everyone chalked it down to the heat in the suit unsettling my stomach.

But a few weeks later I became violently ill after some shrimp sushi, so my best guess is I'm actually allergic to shrimp. I'll never know though, allergy testing is pricey as hell.

Uncircumcised

The first thing she said was, "I'm not a pervert." She was plump, middle-aged and had a look of perpetual worry on her doughy face. She kept fussing with her long brown hair. I gave her a crooked smile and said, "You're in here aren't you?" But she didn't laugh. I leaned back into the counter to let her pass me, and she looked lost. I gauged her initial reaction to be someone who would rather die in a fire than ask me about what kind of toy to get, but she seemed so helpless so I said, "Are you looking for anything?"

She looked at me like I was a bug, "Well yes, obviously, but not something I really want to talk to anyone about." I took a step back and "Let me know if you have questions" made it to my lips but not out my mouth because she immediately turned and said, "I'm looking for a dildo." I blinked, because I've never had someone flip so fast from the mold of "don't fucking look at me being in this sex shop" to "hold my hand for the love of god." So I bring her over to the mid-range ones that don't look realistic. I explained a bit about them and every time I finished explaining something she'd bog me down with more superfluous information. She'd already told me she didn't want her boyfriend to feel threatened but every time I pointed to smaller non-realistic toys and why that would be less threatening she just restated his fears. Then she asked me about G-spot toys, so I showed her those. But once I'd shown her something that was right up her alley she just kept looking at me.

I reiterated points about the toy. I handed one to her. And whenever I tried to walk away she practically grabbed me and made me repeat everything, not like she wanted to know but like she was afraid if being alone. I felt myself starting to bristle with irritation and finally pulled away. She finally comes up to a counter with a realistic toy that wasn't for G-spot, that was of a material I had just recommended against. But at this point I don't give a flying fuck, I just want her gone. When I explain about toy cleaner I blow her mind, apparently. She told me she used dish soap and I winced. When I told her no hand soap, dish soap, bleach, or alcohol should ever be used on a toy she asked me if vinegar would be acceptable. I wanted to scream that nothing in her kitchen was acceptable for sex toys but quietly said, "No." Then, inexplicably, she starts telling me about her vaginal prolapse. I stare at her while she describes the ring holding her bits in place with excruciating detail and the whole time she has a demeanor of asking a question.

 But she didn't ask a question. Finally clutching desperately at straws I ask if the ring is what she's been cleaning with dish soap and she said no, that it was just something she had to be careful of. And then she told me her boyfriend couldn't wear condoms. "You probably don't know this, but uncircumcised guys can't wear condoms." I could feel muscles in my face starting to twitch, and an epic battle raged between telling her that was utter nonsense and getting her out of the store and as far away from me as possible.

But I couldn't let it stand. "I'm sorry, but that's not true at all. Condoms are made for every guy, there's no reason someone who's uncircumcised wouldn't be able to wear them." She looked at me like I was slow, "He can't wear them, they're too small, they fall off." My nails are digging into my palm as I fight the urge to scream at this woman, "If it fell off then it was just the wrong size, they only fall off if they're too big." "No dear, I got the magnums." I could see the red haze of battle rage at the edge of my vision.

"That's my point, magnums are the large size. They must have been too big, they're meant to fit snugly so they don't fall off."  "Right, but he was too big, so they fell off." I couldn't feel my fingertips anymore because my hands were clenched so tightly, so finally I just shut up and decided not to join her in madness. My only guess is that they assumed condoms were meant to be tied in a bow at the end of the penis rather than worn but they kept falling off when they tried to have sex, snagging on her prolapse-prevention ring.

The last thing she said was that she didn't want toy cleaner because she didn't want to be dependent on something from a sex store. She went on to add that she didn't know why people were so weird about coming in here, since obviously sex was how we're all made. I stared at her with my teeth bared in what might have been considered a smile to the casual observer. But past the urge to scream at her I could her every sex ed teacher weeping the tears of disgrace that someone could be that ignorant.

Chafing

One of the worst things about when I worked at Red Robin was the bird suit. It surprises me how many people haven't seen it, but it's a mascot costume of Red the robin. You see through it's mouth, through black mesh, and it's almost impossible to see anything. So every Tuesday and Thursday from 5:30 to 6:30 Red would make an appearance. There was the bird, and the bird buddy, who kept the bird from hitting walls and knocking into trays or servers. Every host hated being the bird. The suit was incredibly hot and uncomfortable, and never got washed. The legs were yellow tights, similarly unwashed, so people also got an eyeful. Given my proportions, I made a ridiculous bird, the legs tiny and thin under the huge belly if the suit.

But for some reason every new host wanted to be the bird, at first. And of course we were never too keen on warning people how awful it was. For instance I never told the new girls that I'd almost thrown up on a day of 100 degree weather when our A/C was down. No one mentioned our inability to clean it, or the frustration of being unable to see jack all. We similarly neglected to mention the children that started bawling immediately at the monstrosity.

So it was that a new girl was exclaiming to me for weeks about how she wanted to try on the suit and I smiled a smug little smile and held my peace. And one day, it was just me and her on shift. Red is only scheduled for specific days, but on request for a birthday or a mentally retarded child, we're forced to put on the suit. Our manager came up and said there was a birthday who demanded to see Red, that he'd watch the front for us. "Perfect! She was just telling me how much she wants to be Red!" But my coworker seemed hesitant now with the actual prospect before her, "Now?" I frowned at her, "Yeah, it's fine, I'll be your buddy, I'll keep you from hitting anything, lets go."

She trails me reluctantly to dry storage where I bolt the door and we pulled down the trunk the suit is kept in. "Okay, so take off your pants, put on the tights, then step into the bird body and I'll zip you up, then we'll get the vest on, and the shoes and gloves. Head is very last." I look up and she's just standing there looking uncomfortable. "So you take off your pants and put on the tights..." She looks down and mumbles something. I frown. "Are you shy? I can face the wall while you change, I don't mind." She shakes her head miserably. "What is it? They're waiting."

In a tiny voice she whispers, "I'm not wearing underwear today." I stare at her. Jeans were the uniform, which means that she chose to wear no underwear with jeans. I'm torn between asking why the hell not and how she dealt with chafing, but she looks so mortified that I manage to bite my tongue. But one thing is certain, and it's that I'm not getting into that suit for love nor money.

 "Okay, look. There's two pairs if tights. This is the pair we don't wear as often. I'll face the wall, you put those on, then take them home and wash them afterward." We suited actions to words and I strolled her around the restaurant. Afterward she begged me to keep quiet, and I did (until now, but at least I didn't use her name, right?). I'm pretty sure those tights still haven't been laundered.

The Bacon Prank

I was on a particularly slow shift with Kat. The way our middle island is set up, there's a body form on it, so when we need to text we typically go behind the body form so we don't get yelled at for having our phones out. I was leaning against the middle island while Kat rang up two ladies, and I noticed without much interest that Kat had left her phone there. As I looked at it, her phone lit up with a text from her boyfriend, a fellow coworker. "Hey, are you spending the night? I have bacon for tomorrow morning." I swiped her phone open and texted back quickly, "Give the bacon to Reggie." (Reggie is me, for the uninformed reader). I then went into the message history and deleted the text I'd just sent from the conversation. Trying not to laugh I rejoined the conversation Kat was having with the two girls.

After a while it was time to start closing. I went into the back with my register, but forgot my count down sheet. As I was coming back up for it I spied her phone lying on the counter while she set up the vacuum in lingerie. I quickly opened it to see the confusion I'd caused. It now appeared Christian had asked if she was staying the night, then immediately after texted again saying, "Wait, does that mean you aren't staying the night?" To which Kat had replied, "What? I just got that text. I'm staying the night." Grinning, I hurriedly texted, "I just think she deserves bacon." And frantically deleted it as Kat came into view. I was laughing as I walked past her into the back. She asked what was so funny and I just shook my head.

When I came up to enter my final amounts into the computer I saw her frowning at her phone. I couldn't stop myself, nonchalantly I asked what that face was for. "Christian's being confusing." "Oh?" I asked innocently. "He's saying she can pick it up if she wants it, but I have no idea who 'she' is supposed to be, and it was right after I said I was staying the night. And earlier he asked if I was staying over, then immediately after asked if I wasn't, when I hadn't responded." Throughout this speech I had to turn my face away, unable to look at her without laughing. "Weird," I agreed.
I clocked out and left her to do the same, losing my self control in the back room I started laughing silently, grinning ear to ear. After a minute she joined me in the back, phone out. "He's saying that we should give you bacon? That you're going to come pick it up? What?" I couldn't handle it, I burst out laughing.

I explained the prank, laughing so hard I had tears in the corners of my eyes, and Kat went from bewildered to amused. Normally when we get at each others phones we just add keyboard short cuts that make common words like "the" autocorrect to obscenities, so this was a pretty groundbreaking prank. Helped pass the time too.