Buying A Coat In The Sales

Shopping after Christmas can only mean one thing… sale shopping. I decided to head into the city and try a hand at some sale shopping.

First stop was HMV to use up the vouchers I receive for Christmas. In all honestly I would prefer money, but never mind. I decided to splash my voucher on a few DVD’s including Fight Club, Babel, and The Spiderman Trilogy. I was surprised not to get IDed for buying Fight Club as it was an 18 but there we go. I guess

I needed to buy a coat, after years of wearing a worn old fleece to keep me warm in the evenings, I decided enough was enough and the time had come to purchase a decent coat once and for all.

I had been in the shop before to identify the coat so I had a fair idea of what coat I wanted to get.

I picked up the coat I thought was the one I looked at last week, but it turns out I was looking at the coat which was ¾ lengths rather than the full length one. Out of nowhere these 2 very attractive Czechoslovakian sale’s assistants came over to help me.

“Can I help with anything?” enquired the sales assistant, I was half tempted to say no at that point, but as I turned round, something at the back of me thought it would be a good idea to take up on her offer for help.

“Hi, yeah, I don’t think this is the right size for me” and I replied casually, she retorted back “Yeah, I don’t think it is, left me go at fetch another size” and she went upstairs to fetch another size. When she arrived back she held the jacket out behind my back as I put my arms in. Now that’s what I call customer service.

I looked in the mirror to see if I liked the ¾ length jacket and decided for the opinion of the sale’s assistant kindly helping me.

She was tiny, the top of her head came to wear my neck is on my body. With her hazel locks of hair and her foreign accent she started explaining her opinion on what I should be looking for.

“Is it for formal wear?” she asked

“Well it’s mainly to wear I go to the pub” I replied

She then went off for a minute to pick me out a better “More suited”, coat for me, in her view. I tried her suggested black trench coat to see what it looked like and I had just walked out of the changing room and she came over and ran her hands down from the shoulders to see I guess, if the coat fitted.

“No, a size smaller would be better suited” and she went off again and got another sized coat for me. Again she held out the coat around my back so I could put my arms in the sleeve. Her hand ran down my back and turned her head towards me and goes “That’s a good size”

Jeesh... I wish all sale assistants were all like this. She even continued with polite chit chat as I went up to the sales desk to pay for the item.

I am very pleased with the coat I’ve bought. With some help from a Czechoslovakian sales assistant, I actually purchase something the correct size for once and looks pretty good on me.

Christmas Eve

I was back to work for Christmas Eve and I continued where I left off the day before and sang my way through my work shift.

I handed out Christmas cards to everyone on the Deli workforce team and just generally was in a good mood, as I knew it was my last shift before Christmas. Nothing could dampen my spirits and the 5 hours at work flew by.

It was finally good to get home and finally relax after 3 days straight working on the Deli counter.

"Mary Is A Slapper" - The True Christmas Story

Nothing like a bit of Chemical Brothers blasting through your ipod speakers to awaken the senses whilst running work to try get in on time for the early start. You have not had a truly horrific retail experience, unless you’ve worked the week leading up to Christmas.

There I was, bright (If not awake) and early and trying to be in the best mood possible to face the day ahead.

I have adopted the attitude that by trying to make the best of work will help make work less boring and more enjoyable. The plan was for me to stay in a good mood regardless the joys of work threw at me.

Unlike Saturday where everyone seemed to be in a bad mood, they seemed less and for some odd reason I even started singing. I sang from I’m in the money which fitted well as I getting paid something like 8 quid an hour for my Sunday shift.

I then moved onto singing more Christmassy songs such as I wish it could be Christmas everyday and Deck the halls. I then moved onto songs such as Proclaimers 500 miles much to the amusement of my work colleagues.

I didn’t overly care what they thought of my singing (I knew it was crap and I know most of them think I’m odd anyway). Needless to say the singing caught on and soon it wasn’t just me singing random shit.

It was like reliving my childhood. We sang songs from Row, Row, Row Your Boat, Michael Finnegan, to Were going to the zoo tomorrow. At the time I don’t think it could have been anymore random than it was, but it was hilarious at the time.

There is also one rule, about the work place for me and that’s never ever disclose your views on religion as it’s only sure to end up in trouble. When some of my work colleagues upset the strict devout Christian, by saying “Mary must have been pregnant and only kept quiet so that Joseph would not throw her out on the street” went down like a storm in a teacup.

I wouldn’t have been so vocal about my views, but it was fairly funny to see the argument unfold. I watched from a safe distance being sure not to get involved!

How Business Studies Revision Is Not Fun

Promotion can be loosely classified as "above the line" and "below the line" promotion. The promotional activities carried out through mass media like television, radio, newspaper etc. is above the line promotion….and my Business revision goes on and on.

It’s been a pretty bad Christmas break so far… it has mainly consisted off revision, with my exams up and coming. It’s getting a little bit tedious now and I’ve been looking for an excuse to escape the revision and just get completely hammered one night.

Still it could be worse, I’d rather be doing this than be at College for another week and on the bright side I get to lie in most days to 10:30.

It seems weird this year, perhaps it’s because I’m getting older (and grumpier!), but it seems no one can be bothered to put any Christmas lights up outside to decorate their houses in my village.

Perhaps there all like me and really couldn’t care less Christmas is coming.

For me Christmas is all about taking a break for your hard work over the year, but due to my almighty fuck up at my AS exams in the summer I have to cram like there is no tomorrow for my 5 Business exams (A few of which are retakes) as a result I am unable to relax properly.

Another Coursework Piece Bites The Dust

I don’t know why I agreed to play 5 a side football again at college, but it definitely must be to do with fighting back and trying to do better than our last dismal showing in the College football tournament.

Last time we played we lost every game, but that’s thanks to one run friend that couldn’t be bothered to do much running around. This time I feel we’ll be better prepared, although I’m convinced that we’ll fare that much better than last time.

Tomorrow should be interesting to see how my team fares in a football competition.

Today I finally got my media coursework finished, which is a massive weight lifted off my shoulders.

It took to 3 am last night to get a good chunk of it done, but I’m now glad it’s finally over and done with.

All I need to cope with now is my up and coming exams.

For Sooty 17/12/07

My cat unfortunately passed away last Friday. I was pretty upset at hearing his heart attack in all its glory as I was in the other room to the cat, working out. Considering how weak his bladder control has been recently which means he has a tendency to shit at any minute of the time no matter where the place, at the time of his death, he was getting his arse cleaned from the remains of the brown stuff that was slowly drying on his fur. Then all of a sudden dies of a heart attack. Not the most dignified way to die. Rest in peace Sooty.

I have finally broken up from College and I get to see the back of that dump for 4 weeks now, although it’s not going to be the best holiday ever seeing as most of what free time I have will be filled with doing revision for my 5 up and coming business exams and the 1 economic exams.

Fun, fun, fun...

Just Sometimes

The lights are slowly going up around houses and the Christmas spirit is slowly taking over households across the nation. Same year and same traditions, and I’ve eaten all of my advent calendar chocolates by the first day of advent and also I’ve been moaning about the Christmas songs that they have been playing at work.

Christmas songs ranging from the god awful Cliff Richard, to the not so bad, but the slightly traumatizing Band Aid song, still anything beats listening to my co workers on the Deli counter.

It’s been a weird couple of weeks on the Deli counter, from seeing the absolutely hilarious German attempt of foreplay in front on a meat slicer and my very eyes to the fact that one of the supervisors from hell has given me a Christmas card with some chocolate in it. At the time I nearly chocked with shock and was surprised to see a card from her too me. I was in two minds weather to touch the chocolate, but after thinking it might have laxative somewhere in it, I can say the only time I went to the toilet after eating it was in the morning the next day.

It’s weird how my Saturday shifts on the Deli counter rely a lot of on a few of the students that work their on Saturdays. If they are not in, then work on Saturdays is pretty shitty.

I have to make do with putting up with the equivalent of a women’s bitch fest for the duration of the shift. Fair enough I moan a lot, but I am never often specifically bitch about various people for hours on end.

What makes it worse is that they seemingly get the impression I’m weird as I don’t talk that much… The only reason I don’t talk much is I don’t know what to say to them, or feel I can’t exactly join in their conversations about “That bitch with equivalent of a cat’s hairball haircut”. Occasionally when I need to go round the back to fetch some meet, I come back quiet often having interrupted something, which gives me the impression that they have been talking about me.

This was the day after I went out to the pub before.

The night before in which I very lost it again and for some reason shifted my whole mood from fine, to grumpy/grouchy in an evening.

It’s just another funny turn by me.

The same situation to some degree applies from work to going out for me to some degree. Nothing wrong with the people I go out to the pub with, but my frustration comes struggling to hold a conversation with them.

There’s me sitting at one side of the table, desperately trying to listen carefully to the people across me so I can try and join in, but I can’t hear a word being spoken in such a noisy environment. It is fucking frustrating. As a result I cannot talk and I then get in a mood as I don’t feel any need of me being there.

Overall it’s a mixture of shitty things at the moment which is making my life a complete and utter mess. From College to Work, to revision to the stress of exams, sometimes it feels like it’s a bit too much for me to cope with.

Back Into The Writing Groove

I have a habit of feeling pretty shitty when I am at work on a Saturday, and not just for the grilling I have been getting for my incompetence of loosing my locker key (Which annoyingly had all my work uniform in) consequently which has seem me making several trips down to personnel to ask them nicely if I can have another work tie…

I am then giving the equivalent of the Spanish inquisition about “What have you done with your tie?” Said personnel team bitch. Yes I was in the wrong… but I didn’t expect to me quite spoken to like that.

With the countdown to Christmas, I was asked from a work colleague if “I wanted to take part in a secret Santa” of which at the time I replied with an enthusiastic “Yes, of course. Why not?” Thinking about how most of the Deli team is made of older women, I hoping I don’t get one of their names purely as it’s going to be a nightmare trying to get a suitable gift for them.

My friend joked that I should, “Buy 5 pounds worth of meat and wrap it up”, which raised a smile to my face.

Talking about funny incidents, I was the only one currently serving on the Deli counter and these 2 Germans students (A male and a female) in which for some reason the guy starting fondling and caressing the women’s boobs right in front of me.

I think my timing could not have possibly been more perfect, I think they were just about to kiss, when I chirpily said “Can I help?” and the man replied with “No not now” in a strong German accent, when the women just gave me a fierce evil look. It was bloody hilarious.

It’s just a shame that work was somehow more fun than my evening of revision. With my up and coming exams I am now in the thick of revising hard… hopefully this time I can pull it out the bag and get the grades I want.