Hi, can I help you?

I stood in line and patiently waited my turn as I listened to the oriental lady in front of me give the clerk personal information about herself for their 'records'.
She confidently provided her phone number as asked, and I listened: 416-649-1559. I repeated it; 416-649-1559. I continued to repeat it to myself until I remembered it. Not for the obvious reason of memorizing a phone number -- or any number for that matter. But I did... just in case.

I waited some more...

A father and his daughter walked up behind me and waited for service. I overheard the daughter sigh as she listened to her father discuss whatever (social) life-threatening issues she may have had. "I'm not here to critique or anything, not in this situation..." he explained. I didn't intend on listening, really... but the sound traveled perfectly from where I was standing. So I did.

"Friends are like that sometimes, and you knew this before you started..." he continued.

After a brief moment of silence, the daughter finally said something. "But why? I already.."

I stopped listening.

The woman in front of me was finally getting ready to leave, and for a minute I became impatient but oddly excited that my turn was next. I straightened my posture and reached into my sweater pocket to make sure I had everything I had needed. After noticing the clerk was still occupied, I began listening again, as if un-pausing a mediocre movie.

Sadly, I can't rewind to hear what I've missed, I thought.

"Its like your roomates," said the father, "and you should have known better."

As curious as I was... I wasn't /that/ curious. I aimed my attention back to the clerk who was still busy. I tested myself by trying to repeat the phone number I had earlier memorized. I couldn't remember it.
Blast.

Finally, a clerk approaches me.
"Hi, can I help you?"
Funny how he asks as if he cares, but him and I both knew it was just a practicality.

------

He's gone on break. Its two in the morning and as if I wouldn't notice, he stopped everything he was doing to go on a break.
A break?
Pretty sure you're a little occupied right now. I don't pay you to take breaks.

I suppose I don't really pay him at all.

rephrase; I don't give him business to take breaks.

I waited, and waited... and realized, maybe not in /every/ situation, but in this one, he is the sole reason I get no sleep.
He's the reason people are late.
He is not here to 'help', it was evident from the beginning.
He is merely there to get paid, and that is all.


He went on break... HA!


I hear them talking again. This time not to each other, but to the clerk. The father asks, "My disk, it isn't being read by the computers... what should I do?"

Did you use a mac, I quietly asked myself.
I like to practice my retail and social skills as often as possible, in the least social way.

"Did you use a mac to save your information?" asked the clerk.

The clerk is young, maybe early twenties. Long black hair tied into a pony tail, with a questionable sense of experience in this department.

"Yeah?" replied the father.

The disk isn't formatted for a mac and a pc, I continued to myself.
I felt as if I was helping.

"Well, it could possibly be that its not formatted for a pc."

duh.

The clerk continued, "You'll have to go home and re-format the disk so it is also pc compatible. The father sort of raised his eyebrow while his daughter, with great defeat, threw her arms back and sighed in frustration.
"Are you serious?" she asked desperately. "I have to go BACK home and do this again? At this hour?!"

I remembered my laptop sitting comfortably in my bag.

"Can't we format it here? Don't you know how to do that? We can do that!"
The father was playing his role. You know the one, the "I'll figure everything out and fix it all for you, hunny" role.
(not that I'd be complaining.)

"We don't have macs here," explained the clerk. Apparently this is the only way to fix this problem, according to him. Not that I really know how to fix it, but I'd assume there's more than one way. "You'd have to use your mac at home to format it, then bring it back."

I have a mac sitting comfortably in my bag.

The clerk rambled on with reasons as to why formatting it there wasn't possible, but I wasn't listening anymore. I kept thinking to myself, hey, pull out your computer! Save the day!

I felt like I was watching this through a window. I couldn't hear what they were saying becayse the sound of my own debating thoughts over-powered them. I debated for a little bit. What if something happened to my computer? What if the clerk decides to help me and I have to leave them with my computer? What if I seem creepy for having over-heard them?

There were a lot of 'what ifs'.

I finally decided to say something, figured it'd be good karma to help them out. As I turned my attention back to them, I heard the daughter say, "Fine, I'll just do it again. Not a big deal." and in moments time, she and her father were out the door.

Sad, I thought, that I was unable to help them.

wrong.

I was able, I just took too long... my bad.
Is this anti-karma?

----

As the night progressed, I watched people come and go. A woman and her daughter, who must've been about early twenties, approached the counter and handed the clerk two bags of candy. "And these too." said the mother.
"Please." I thought to myslf. Damn childhood conditioning.

The clerk scanned one, the scanned the other. "This one may be expired. Are you sure you want it?" The daughter looked at the mother, who then in turn looked at the clerk and said, "How expired?"
... does it really matter?

"I'm not sure..." he responded questionably, while analyzing the package for a date. He found it, but from where I was, I couldn't tell whether or not it was a shocking amount of time passed its expirey.

The two women debated their sudden candy situation with a suprising amount of thought, in my opinion. "Ahh," the private conversation between the two now once again included the clerk, "We'll take it anyway."

They bought expired candy.

---

It was snowing while I was walking home. Those big chunky, fluffy flakes. The ones that seem to be heavier than the wind and don't blow as easily with it. The wind was blowing on my back, and so I attempted to pace myself at the same speed the snow was being blown (does that make sense, at all?). It sort of felt like being in a subway, and walking in the opposite direction of the moving train. You almost feel as if you're going nowhere until you look up at everything else around you.
I stared at the ground, attempting to shield my face from the cold, and I noticed the shadows of the snowflakes looked like millions of bugs scuttering about on the pavement.

It was cold, and it was late.
But true to any kinko's experience, it was interesting.



[story typed on my phone as experienced throughout the night]