The Courage of a Chicken

 

Evidently my sister Jodi, is exploited in the retail world no matter where she goes.  Here is her latest experience in her own words:

[So today I am at PETCO and this woman asked me about a litter box. I politely replied I don’t know. She then went on for approximately 5 minutes to explain to me what she was looking for. Keep in mind I am wearing a black T-shirt that says “Beer Wench” and does not resembles a Petco blue work shirt. So, she finally finishes her explanation of what litter box she is looking for and I reply, “I don’t know Ma’am. I don’t work here”. She went ape sh*t! Started yelling and screaming at me about incompetent help and cursing at me. Remind me to whip off the sign on my forehead that says, “If you’re a complete nut, PLEASE talk to me”.]

 

I have no idea why this happens to her, except maybe that her karma exudes “Ask me, I probably know the answer.”  My first version of the last sentence was, “Ask me, I am a know-it-all.”  But that is not the vibes she gives off at all.  I really think she is surrounded by an aurora that says “I am a capable person.”  To be a capable person you have to have common sense, courage and confidence.  None of which I have. [I gave all of mine to Jodi] I have been known to toss that first full shovel of snow against the wind. This means I have to find my way back into the house to wipe off my glasses and shake off a foot of snow in the house.  Snow which will melt, I will forget about and slip on my first step back into the house.  I have also ignored the wind direction during those awkward occasions on a road trip when I have had to squat and pee outside.  I usually end up peeing on and into one of my shoes.  (Depending on which way the wind is blowing)  But, hey, how is this for common sense.  I take the dry sock, wipe off the wet shoe and then throw both socks across the fence into a pasture.  I feel like I give the cows something to think about when they see neon pink glowing out of a patch of grass.  Then I walk back to the car barefoot picking up every sticker weed on the way.  I use the floral blossom body mist I carry in my purse to spray my urine soaked shoe until everyone else in the car is about ready to gag.  Then that night when I get back home I have 3 blisters on each foot because I was shopping for 5 hours without wearing any socks.  And no, I didn’t have the common sense to buy a pair of socks first.  Then there is the issue of electricity.  I have in my time waited 15 minutes for a piece of toast before I realized the toaster wasn’t plugged in.  I have, after an hour, taken raw chicken out of the oven which I forgot to set to bake.  I have vacuumed three rooms before I realized that it is set to “attachments.”  And always during a blackout my first thought is to light a candle and watch some TV.

When it comes to courage, I have the same amount as a chicken (Chicken Little to be exact.)  I have not at this point made a sequential comprehensive list of the things that I am afraid of like Adrian Monk.  If I did, very near the top would be alarm clocks on the floor.  Right after that would be ice. I swear this winter has been the iciest that I can ever remember.  Just walking from my car into the library strikes fear in my heart that I am going to fall and break the 5^th metatarsal in my other foot.  The problem is that my common sense tells me to slowly shuffle along the ice which is exactly what cases me to nearly slip and nearly fall every day.   I wish I would have asked Santa for a pair of cleats for Christmas.  Actually once I make it safely inside the library that is when a person needs more courage.  The oil boom has brought in a somewhat scarier clientele then what I am use to.  In one of my other blogs I mentioned the guy that was so excited because he just got an e-mail from his dog.  The last I heard they were corresponding on a regular basis.  Last when I was working in the evening this guy came up to the desk and asked for a Band-Aid.  One of his fingers was a bloody mangled mess.  He told me that he just got bit by a dog that was hanging around outside.   I frantically went looking for antiseptic, nervously watched to see if he dripped blood on the circulation desk and fervently prayed that Cujo wouldn’t be waiting for me by my car after I closed up for the night.  There was no foaming-at- the-mouth dog when I left that evening but I found out the next day that a homeless guy had hid from me when I locked up for the night.  He got a few hours of warm rested sleep before the motion sensor alarm went off and the police had to search the library to find him.  It was never really made clear where this guy was hiding.  Unofficially, the police found him buried under the huge stuffed animals in the children’s story-time area.  With this knowledge I don’t even want to speculate what made the motion sensors go off at midnight.  Because of this incident it has been brought to the attention of the entire staff the in the evening the people on staff that are shelving books in that area should spread out the stuffed animals.  That way if the animals are all bunched up together at closing time it would make sense to move the animals around and make sure noon is hiding underneath them.  When they told me this, I bawkked. (like a chicken) What if I lift up long Mr. Crocodile and find long Mr. Naked Man?  In reply my co-worker told me to use a broom handle and just poke it into the pile of stuffed animals.  I guess I have a totally different imagination.  When I picture myself sticking a broom handle into a mound of stuff animals I conjure up a whole bunch of different scenarios of what could happen and none of them turn out very well.  One outcome involves me no longer having possession of the broom, some poking, me running like a chicken without its head.  At this point I think I might be better off trying to make friends with Cujo and convincing him to become the library guard dog.