Bummed out as I’m sitting at the Starbucks inside this newly constructed Target, on Trueman Boulevard in Hilliard. Just watching the traffic zip up and down this fairly inconsequential street is enough to give me a bad case of the blues, thinking how it was deserted just a handful of months ago, and that the relentless march of progress cannot be stopped.
Before wrongly accused of hypocrisy – I’m guilty of biting the hand from which my food is delivered, sure, but not hypocrisy – let me state for the record that I work here. I sit at one of these tables every morning that I’m scheduled, for breaks and lunch, at these windows facing the street. And while watching interiors of cities as they are transformed and repurposed can be a thing of beauty, a marvel to hold up to the light and admire, something about plowing that which was formerly frontier will always bring out the inner treehugger, somehow, even when one wasn’t entirely sure such an inner voice existed. And I’m sure that with or without my presence, this Target would continue to exist.
Since the Target went up, they’ve built another strip mall on this road already, in between the Home Depot and Cheeseburgers In Paradise. A Radio Shack sits there, who knows what else. And of course this line of concrete shopping options will likely extend north clear up to Davidson Road, soon enough, where Trueman truly ends. In time, who knows, I can see Trueman being expanded until at least Hayden Run. As will Britton someday, too, Trueman’s vaguely parallel counterpart on the other side of the I-270 outerbelt.
Such developments are tolerable when population and lack of space demands it. But sometimes you can’t escape feeling certain acres are bulldozed specifically because they are new, because formerly occupied plots are considered passe. Such as, one other restaurant sitting across the outerbelt, one of those carbon copy “western” steakhouses (I can’t keep them straight, can’t remember which franchises I’ve frequented and which I haven’t as they all look exactly the same), sits deserted, it has been for a couple of years now. Texas Roadhouse was lined out the building when I was dating Jill in this neck of the woods eight years ago, but at present there’s nary a soul dining there. And a Chili’s just closed at this exit as well, demolished and replaced by another goddamn CVS – a development which would otherwise be deplorable, except that I happen to kind of respect that they at least used an existing retail space rather than dropping a bomb in some field on the edge of town. All of these establishments existed along a busy corridor, Cemetery Road, which is itself an exit off of I-270, yet none of those could survive. And even so, they’re still building a bunch of new restaurants along this stretch? I guess the failure of past tenants explains why movers and shakers involved with some of these newer companies declined to take over shuttered locations, but I wonder what makes them feel so confident about their own demographic studies and carefully razed coordinates.
II.
Okay, so the above was written in either 2005 or 2006, i.e. roughly 20 years ago. But what does this area look like now? A couple of these I already know off the top of my head: Cheeseburger In Paradise? Completely toast. Radio Shack? This one is toast as well. The Home Depot, however, survives. And while the Target still looks refreshingly modern on the outside, its exterior, in an opinion probably influenced by the relative emptiness of their parking lot (even at rush hour on a Friday afternoon), makes me think that this location was never of the company’s top performing outposts.
It seemed totally apparent, when this Target was built, that the Trueman Blvd corridor would immediately blow up with all manner of retail and traffic. And while it seems this is eventually coming, it’s somewhat refreshing that it still has not done so as of this writing. As it stands, this store is in a funky, out of the way spot that is almost counterintuitive now, one that you wouldn’t just stumble upon in your travels without looking it up on a map app first.
Farther north, there are some isolated businesses here and there, and of course this TruePointe development is coming. For the time being, though, a surprising lack of development marks much of the rest – which I would not have bet any money on, twenty years after I sat out that window looking at this road.
I wound up working at this Target for a little over a year, from the fall of 2005 to the very end of 2006. This was during a positively nutso era, even by my standards, that I’ll be discussing very soon on other posts here. But anyway, I took this on as a “second” job, pretty much by necessity…even though the hours were mostly 4am to 12:30pm, five days a week. It ended up being a pretty cool gig, though, and the schedule not too horrific after I got used to it.
We all worked together as a team, unloading the semi truck, then stocking the shelves in whatever section they’d assigned each of us that day. And all took our breaks from 8-8:30am, which is one of those periods that I wrote the above little poetic mini-essay about Trueman. We had a Starbucks there, so I got locked into this weird little ritual, stumbled upon by sheer happenstance. I would order a coffee, and sip at it here and there, while nodding off at the table. Occasionally awake with a start, take another sip, and lightly doze off again. Repeat. But then would come out of these half our breaks positively on fire with the energy level (and it was amusing to me, recently, to read some online piece, where the writer was saying he had this similarly accidental epiphany, after drinking coffee one day and then taking a nap, after which he was firing on all cylinders; I couldn’t help but think of this Target era, with a warm smile, and recall haphazardly making the same discovery.)
Before the nickname was ever bestowed upon Albert Pujols (I think?) they began calling me The Machine – management figures, even, not just random employees. I was usually assigned to MMB, which I think stood for multimedia & books, because I’d developed some methods for flying through that category with maximum speed and organization. But even so, every so often the odd management person would question things, and argue with a straight face that if I would just do things the same way as everybody else, I would be even faster! After overcoming my bewilderment, I typically responded by asking if they ever maybe thought that my methods were the reason I was quicker than the rest of the employees.
When I was hired, it turned I already knew exactly one employee who was part of this late night stock team – M.J., this short, slightly older lady who coincidentally enough was also an original cast member at the Bethel Road Kroger, same as me. I probably hadn’t seen her in about 7 years, though, until bumping into her here. As far as memorable occurrences, I would have to say at the forefront is something that merely occurred on the way to work one morning, and which I thankfully didn’t even see. Dozens of employees arrived and reported that day that these two dipshit guys, who looked to be maybe in their early twenties, were streaking buck naked back and forth across Cemetery Road. They were clearly timing their runs to startle oncoming motorists, at which point they’d hide on the other side of the street and wait for the next one, before crossing again.
How I was spared this sight, I’m not quite sure. If only the same were applied to everybody else on the really rad morning I was pulled over by some cop, directly in front of our store, for having expired plates and too loud of a muffler. And then had to answer a bazillion questions all day, from every employee who passed us before parking. As far as the actual work, though, I would tell anyone that Target was actually a great company to work for. For the first handful of days, in fact, I couldn’t stop laughing, before finally catching myself and pausing to analyze what was so funny, exactly. Thinking about it this way was when it first occurred to me: everything they were doing here actually made sense! It was as though my brain reflexively couldn’t believe it, that a company would so consistently behave in a manner so logical and sane. I’m sure any of you who have ever worked in retail, or for that matter maybe held a job, period, can relate.
Well, a part of my big master plan, and a major component of my working here in the first place, concerned wheels I was setting in motion for transferring to another of their locations, elsewhere. I wanted to have a job already secured upon arrival there, and succeeded on that front. But it just wasn’t the same. For starters, they had their stock crew working 10pm to 6:30am there, instead, and even an unrepentant night owl like me just couldn’t hack those hours. I lasted about 5 months before throwing in the towel. The people were also on balance not quite as hilarious, which is no small consideration. Another factor that can’t be overlooked is that the head honcho at that new location, Rodolfo, was not exactly anybody I would ever wish to sit down with dinner or for that matter even a quick donut with. And it still cracks me up to think that my manager here, at store #1969, Bridget, actually had to converse with that lunatic over the phone, while they negotiated the details of my transfer.
“Whoa!” she related to me, eyes wide, after speaking to him for the first time, telling me how insanely intense this dude sounded.
I guess I should have already smelled disaster. I didn’t know how good I already had it, here at Trueman Boulevard.
Details of my little MMB (music, movies, books) empire:
F1 (movies) wraps from discount section, to comedy, drama (around corner) to action and horror, to fitness, westerns, musical, classics: all still considered F1, though 2 different walls
F2 (books) 4 way – side 1 (faces aisle) best seller paperback, rest seasonal
F3 (magazines) don’t deal with
F4 paperbacks
F5 (books) 4 way: side 1 trade best seller, 2 (counterclockwise) pregnancy, 3 fitness, 4 cooking
F6 trade paperbacks
F7 teen trade/hardcover
F8 hardcover
F9 kids books
F10 (video) 4 way: side 1 kids’ new release, other 3 sides assorted kids’ movies
F11 kids’ coloring books
2006: work notes
January 5
Guys in the backstock room have nothing better to do (see no people) than make wisecracks, hone their repartee all day, every day:
(1) Richard brings back fresh skid of backstock
Steve – what’s this? I thought you said there wasn’t any more
Richard – a gift
Steve – Christmas is over, dude!
Richard – I’m getting a head start on next year
(2) Richard brings back another skid
Steve – is that everything?
Richard – as far as I know
Steve – yeah, well, try not to know anything else
(my throat’s incredibly sore, from this cold, I’m trying not to laugh at their antics – because it hurts – but can’t help myself) (what is laughter?) (chemical reaction?) (very strange when I think about it like this, that it’s a bodily function you technically can’t control)
January 9
Work 4:30am – 1:30pm. Most of it in backroom. Learned how to do pulls today, and Steve (backroom manager) is impressed by my speed, not at this necessarily, but at everything I do, yet to me this stuff you could sleepwalk through. Literally. I mostly daydream about something else while I’m doing it, pondering lines I’m struggling over in my book, etc.
January 12
In at 4:30, spent day in back room helping Steve w/ “bounce back” – cleaning up storage aisles (nothing on top racks, everything forward & to left within rack.
February 16
Off today at 10, then (one no truck day a week is cool to work, I’ve decided today, but no more; glad I get the other two off)
March 4
I’m in on one hour of sleep. We’re getting an insane amount of spring stationary in – skids upon skids of it – like nothing I’ve ever seen before. It comes down so fast I’m shoveling it onto floor, then, when unable to move, get pallets (extra ones) over against the two unused bays and stack with a fury there. David comes over to my side, to stand at the 38/30 skid spot, and something, first, about his body language is cracking me up – almost motionless, completely expressionless, just a swat of his right hand knocking these boxes onto the floor. Ben’s helping me stack now and is wheeling the skids away as they fill.
“David, you have to stop working like this, man!” Ben says, distressed at the mess, in his thick Middle Eastern accent.
David doesn’t acknowledge, doesn’t change anything – swat swat swat, boomp, boomp, boomp, the boxes pile up on the floor. I’m so tired it’s almost painful to laugh, but I can’t stop.
March 7
Truck only 1400 pieces but seems to take forever (yet in reality only hour & a half as always) because Easter candy (2nd day in a row) and for some reason office/stationary backstock is getting bombarded, and it’s just me w/ the occasional hand from Richard at the end on this side (he’s been working Flow more often, at least 2 days/wk. Rick quit; Corey’s still here, by the way, but only works the bare minimum to keep himself “on payroll.”)
Left stocking “MMB” and electronics both this morning, though Matt at least bowls out the electronics part of it and separates repack boxes into shopping carts. The station they always play overhead in the morning of “80s, 90s, and now” is instead replaced by top 40 station no one ever puts on, except that for some outrageous reason they play Amish Paradise by Weird Al this morning, I can’t believe my ears. That dude rocks – what a career. David Gilmour’s first solo record in 22 yrs drops today, which I only just heard about last week, too bad I don’t have $ to buy. Jeff here at 4 am also because Tuesday is “street date” day and it kills me not to buy this CD.
Alarm clock going off in one of the aisles, and I finally figure out it’s coming from inside one of the boxes on the shelf. Bugging the hell out of me but don’t have time to sort through them, open it, shut it off, etc. Eventually (store manager) Chris Stoffel, cracking up, tracks down Jeff, shows him – Jeff shuts it off. “That’s funky!” Chris says – thick glasses, big 1970s moustache, and off kilter slang that doesn’t quite wash: yeah, these bigwigs are always the same.
Dan and I knock out this backstock because the AP chick is coming (asset protection) and they like to have MMB/elec backstock done by 8. In reality, it takes us till about 9, but I don’t mind because taking 1st break later seems to break up the day even better. Then “light duty” backstock – Steve throws two pallets’ worth of Easter candy up to me & I stow it, and one pallet of home furnishings. Next thing I know, it’s time to split, w/ the usual 15 min overtime I’ve been trying lately to pick up every day.
One hilarious tidbit: Toby fired for stealing wine, a camera, and apparently a CD. The wine he drank back here one night while stocking, and left the bottle, empty, over in the pets backstock aisle w/ cork stuffed back inside. When it happened last week, Cole was bemoaning what nerve someone had to not only drink it, but discard his empty in such fashion.
“Don’t they have cameras down all these aisles?” I wonder.
“Most of them are dummies,” he says.
Today, in the backstock room, Toby’s the hot topic. His girlfriend has a baby on the way, too. “That’s really dumb,” Richard says. And it wasn’t just that he drank that one bottle, but apparently smuggled another one out that got him busted.
“How do you steal a bottle of wine?” Steve marvels.
“Very carefully?” I suggest.
“That bulge in my pocket, guys…….” the other (backstock room) Jason jokes.
“…..you’re not just happy to see us?” Steve returns.
March 22
Bridget tells Don that Carrie said he looked nicest of all the people on Flow Team “because you always wear a belt and your shirt’s tucked in.” Don fiddles with his collar and beams at us. This is after lunch – Don, Bobby, Chad, and I are tearing through the backstock. Overheard conversation:
Bobby: “you need to stop ballin our bosses just to get them to talk nice about you (to Don)
Bobby: “at least I don’t wear a back brace to cover up how big my stomach is (to Chad) (has sore back this week)
March 27
Chad and I are in the truck this morning (this is only my 3rd time being inside the semi, unloading it, instead of on the line – all in the past two weeks) and he asks me, “what are you up to, now, Doctor?” As in, he means that I have now elevated beyond my original nickname of The Machine. So now he’s referring to me as The Doctor instead, although that one hasn’t quite caught on with everyone just yet.
Fucked up day. Truck late, so we’re all just standing around waiting on it.
March 28
Helene startles Chad by walking into our backstock room. “You’re lucky this is the Hilliard Target,” Chad jokes, “some of the other ones you could’ve been shot for that.” Don and I cracking up. How did I not find these guys cool at first? Chad can just clear his throat, even, and somehow that is hilarious.
Bobby cracking up (works toys) because Matt’s stressing out – Bridget revised the schedule late last week and some people don’t show up today, because trucks are coming on Wednesday instead of Thursday now. And Bridget’s off today, Jason P. went home at 8 (sick), Matt is mostly alone on the management front.
“If ever there was a day to fuck with Matt, this is it,” Bobby tells me. Chad cracking up, too – and what’s hysterical is that I never said anything to anyone, about how hilarious I think it is when Matt’s freaking out, but apparently they feel the same way. Well, a few people consider it being “harassed” by him, the rest of us think of it more as a comedy show.
March 29
More of same. I’m done with working both electronics and MMB by 7:30, so Matt asks me to help seasonal finish (Tom). I get 5 boxes done, during which time Matt sends Chad over to pitch in as well, before Matt then asks me to go help Don with toys instead. Get 4 boxes done there before Matt reappears with apologetic grin, asks me to return to seasonal instead. Brings out a very optimistic (read: delusional) skid for us to work at 7:40, before then taking it back at 8.
“I think it’s cute,” I hear Chad telling Bobby.
“Dude, that’s the word I was gonna use!” Bobby says.
You feel like telling the guy: chill, bro! Otherwise you are looking at a massive coronary by about age 37! (Real age, that is, since he’s just 24; in something like a “dog years” type concept, though, he would be about 86 by then) And Target is not going to give a fuck about you when that happens! You should enjoy, like, your final 13 years, instead of stressing over this place!
The funniest and I guess you could say most ironic thing about management types like this, though, is that there is absolutely NO WAY this is more productive than him just leaving us right where we were, doing whatever.
Well, anyway…at our 8am huddle, Kermit’s railing about someone sticking a box of picture frames with just one of them damaged in his damaged pile.
“We just wanted you to stick your hand in there,” Amy jokes.
“Well, I’ve had my hands in a lot of boxes…,” Kermit grins – he’s got an admittedly sharp and somewhat edgy sense of humor at times, for an older guy – and everyone busts out laughing. Before he concludes, “…but I don’t need to stick mine in one full of glass.”
Funny how some guys come across as dirty old men, but some, like Kermit, can pull off – they’re just funny, and harmless.
April 4
Becky has a major meltdown 5 minutes after we start unloading truck and is removed from line. Tina mysteriously disappears without a word said, returns. Yolanda starts yelling at her – Bridget has to break up fight. Hilarious. Henceforth, Becky is no longer first person on push side.
April 7
Matt, surprised I’m done with MMB so soon and have already moved onto helping Don with electronics, says, “you’re done already?”
“Yeah.”
“So this is backstock?”
“Yeah.”
All panting and half panicky and racing onto the scene like always, like skidding to a halt he’s running so fast, of course, as though the building were on fire and we were racing against the flames to knock this out for some reason before we were able to leave. Which, come to think of it, is probably exactly what would happen in that scenario.
“He annoying,” Don says to me, after Matt walks off. Headphones on, blaring rap music at a volume I can hear without them. “I didn’t even hear what he said.”
A word about my daily routines at this day job. Someday it will seem amazing to me I was actually able to wake up at 2:30 in the morning back during the holidays and report to Target at 3. But otherwise, it’s always been hit the snooze button at 3:30, wake up for good when it goes off again at 3:39. Start a pot of coffee, make a sandwich for first break, take a piece of fruit for lunch. That’s it. I fiddled w/ yogurt briefly, but got tired of dealing with taking a spoon, keeping it clean, etc. Always a sandwich and fruit, tucked into my coat pocket, carrying my thermos and a book. Finally finished The Recognitions the other day – after months and months, and losing the book twice for short periods of time – which makes life a bit easier (current books much lighter) and varied.
Don and I finish electronics by 7:15, go over to help aisles A & B. Matt makes his 7:30 announcement to start cleaning up.
“He’s such a dork,” Amy says.
“I thought that was your boy,” I joke.
“Uh…uh…uh…,” she stammers, imitating him.
Only 24 years old but essentially middle aged, I swear – he acts the part one hundred percent. Even wears his hair in the “George Jefferson crescent roll bald look,” as Miles refers to that particular hair style. A good guy, but still, wow, you feel like telling him, chill out dude. Or the odds of you living past a third heart attack by about the age of 40 are probably not so hot.
April 19
Kermit at the morning huddle: “yeah I just wanted to say I don’t think it’s Target brand for there to be yellow fluid on the toilet seat. So…if your hardware doesn’t extend past the toilet seat, might I suggest you lift up the toilet seat?”
A speech like this is funny because – well, no, I guess it would still be funny coming from a supervisor – but it’s even funnier stemming from a random coworker who is in no way anyone’s boss. So of course we’re all cracking up.
On break I’m sitting in my car listening to headphones and writing. An apple and coffee for lunch today. Dylan’s Like A Rolling Stone playing. Vicki says this is the best spring ever – if rain, only at night, it’s sunny and warm every day.
April 28
Call off today, though it turns out to be a blessing in disguise. Michael replaces me on the backstock side of the line and flips out – no one’s sure why. But apparently it all comes down to either Amy or Richard said something to piss him off, and he stormed out of the building, never to return. Just like that, he’s history.
May 1
Michael (AKA “New Gedroe”) shows up this morning, three days after he walked off the job. As if he’s just going to jump back into the mix like nothing ever happened. Pouring rain outside, rolls up on his bicycle, in Target shirt but oddly jeans instead of khakis. “In a monsoon,” Chad describes it. Bridget intercepts him in the lobby as we’re entering, he takes a hike.
May 3
Just before “morning huddle.” It’s funny how sometimes verbal interaction between a large number of employees can flow so seamlessly comical, it’s almost like a movie. But not often. At the time of this occurrence, half the people are baling boxes, the other half standing around waiting for huddle to begin.
Ann: (just passing through) anyone got any good jokes?
Richard: no but we got a bad joke – Matt! We got Matt!
(I alone hear this and laugh) (a short pause follows)
Richard: Jason laughed
Matt: huh?
(Richard repeats comment)
(Matt just stands there blinking at him, as though unable to process comment)
Jason: he’s gonna laugh when you get written up for insubordination
(at this, Matt laughs)
Richard: that’s not insubordinate, that’s disrespectful! You can’t write someone up for being disrespectful
Tom: we’ve already had our raises
Sach: (walking into our midst) alright, this meeting’s adjourned. (Shouting all the way down to light duty backstock room, trying to compel them to stop what they’re doing and join us) COME ON, FUCKERS!
Jim: (completely aghast – not joking) What did he say? (looks to us for support, then mutters) That ticks me off…
May 23
Sach is what I’ve always kind of thought of as Doug Lite: often the same sense of humor and mannerisms, but not quite as extreme. Well today he calls Bridget “asshole” as she’s trying to run our morning huddle, just goofing off; she asks him not to do that, so he then calls her “dick” instead. So of course she calls him into her office afterwards.
It’s one of those situations where he had genuinely just been clowning, but since she’s made such a big deal about it he’s now officially pissed off for real. Leaving her office, he kicks the door leading out to the sales floor, on the sales floor side (which means customers can see it). So now the red wall has a white splinter mark, door won’t close. Management stumbles upon this and has at least repainted the thing within an hour, doesn’t know he did it. Not much they can do about the not-properly-closing part at the moment, however.
May 27
Dominic’s last day. I always feel so bad – never have the first clue what to say. Not that you know these people so tremendously well, but you’re worked across the line from them every goddamn 4am for months. Yet there is nothing to say when someone quits, nothing that isn’t either empty and lame, or over the top and cheesy.
The team suffers each loss of a link, so how does the operation continue? Our strengths/weaknesses amount to nothing – an illusion, that’s all. They just need a body to fill the void.
Sometime around early June, our store reports that since it opened 9 months earlier, we’ve already recycled 2500 trees’ worth of cardboard. And Sach was eventually fired for kicking in that door.
June 12
(Unloading truck in the morning; heavy furniture coming down the line, for the last – bulk- backstock pallet)
Amy – get over there and help him!
Richard – he doesn’t need my help….(squeezes one of my biceps) wait, yeah he does
Amy – you’re not looking much meatier, there
Richard – let’s try to keep our eyes above the waist, lady
(A couple minutes later, as I’m back down at the front of the line)
Becky – we got the perfect couple down there at the other end (Amy and Richard)
Tom – yeah, two complainers
(they’ve no sooner said this, than we hear a conversation drifting down to us from that other end….)
Richard – it’d be nice if we had a pacesetter that actually set a pace
Amy – COME! ON!
June 16
-Don: (80+ degree day) “Bridget walkin around in that sweatshirt like she cold or somethin…”
Yolanda: “Well when you’re not doing anything, you do get cold”
-on the line, 5 gigantic boxes of Rubbermaid style containers (Steritech I think?)
Richard: “yeah and if all 5 of these go out there (not marked backstock) I’ll kiss someone’s ass”
Becky: “they’re not paying anyone enough for you to do that”
-Becky (on me, telling others): “he’s the quiet type and those are always very bad boys”
-Becky (later, in backstock, to Don): “You gotta watch Jason cause he’s one of those quiet types, and they’re always the worst. That’s why he comes in so tired in the morning – he stays out all night, showers, changes, and comes right in”
me: “sometimes”
Becky: “ah ha! I knew it!”
June 22
on 8am break I fall asleep in my car for one hour. To make up for it, I clock out for one hour lunch at 10 but only actually go for half an hour. Matt & Bridget were freaking out & looking for me during my extended absence, of course.
July 29
another 2000+ piece truck (all week) – this time myself (of course) alone on backstock line. Tom-Becky-Richard-David-Dan goes push line, until halfway thru they pull Dan to bowl. (Dan wears batting gloves on line). Becky distressed because David refuses to budge from spot to retrieve boxes. “What is he gonna do just stand there and watch Richard work?” she groans. Her sayings and mannerisms remind me of Jill. People have given up – make no effort – saying anything to David. Even though he’s very intelligent and comprehends English fully, his own replies in English are not very fluent. Thus they perceive a language barrier, because they can’t “make” David get with the program the way they can us. Guess you’d call this “diplomatic immunity.”
August 2
Truck only 1000, but Bobby unloading (1st time in months), w/ Don. Everyone groaning horror stories, how bad this week has been – 3 people every day push side; yesterday no Bridget no Jason just Matt, & unload doesn’t start till 4:45. I’m cracking up all day picturing him freaking out. Hardly any 27/40 for me today (elec/MMB) but all of yesterday’s still undone, plus Thursday’s MMB, plus today’s autofill awaits me, eats up all my day – & still not quite finished. But I love it: this, & backstocking it, the only part of job I truly enjoy.
September 3
Cole and Richard are pissed off about Jason B. calling off again, therefore conspire to have everyone call off next Sunday. “I’ll give you 50 bucks,” Richard tells me. These two remind me of guys I’d work with in the union atmosphere at Kroger. “He’s called off at least 50, 60 times in the year we’ve been open,” Cole says, mystified why Bridget doesn’t can him, “yet, we had this one kid – he was 15 minutes late every day, but he was here – every day, and they let him go.”
September 9
Matt H more hilarious freakouts. Twice pulls me from backstocking electronics, says, “I’ll have Maggie do it when she gets in,” but it never gets done. (Maggie sexy quiet not enough attention new girl wears thongs to work every day, easily visible, nice body, bends over a lot, often wears a bandanna.)
September 18
Amanda our adorable new human resources person – I think sexiest chick at my Target – is around in the early morning taking a poll, which of us are willing to work overnight come November (not I,) versus which of us are willing to come in at 3am instead of 4 (I said ok.) She approaches Ricky and me as we’re in F50/51, working electronics. She has her glasses on, which I don’t believe I’ve seen before, but anyway, as she’s asking – cutest squeaky voice, and a bubbly personality.
And as luck would have it, I have a viable pretense for dropping into her office later, having a seat at her desk. First thing this morning when I came in, Bridget was at the door and I told her the news of my move. “Oh no!” she said, “a lot of people are gonna be heartbroken…..” which would have seemed an impossible comment, say, just a few months ago, but the more I think about it, I guess she’s right. Just like anywhere I’m a nobody when I start, because I don’t have much to say. But over time in some roundabout fashion people are won over, I make friends even without often ever having a “real” conversation w/ any of them, it’s just my zany always upbeat cheerful friendly hardworking self winning them over without any direct effort to. They slowly befriend me. And now I guess I do feel fairly popular here, though apparently too bizarre still to have much luck w/ the females at this particular establishment – maybe that would’ve taken two years instead of just this one.
Bridget tells me to get w/ Amanda about arranging my transfer. Eight o’clock I’m in the coffee shop on our first break, reading a book, and I hear Amanda pipe up around the corner, talking to the counter girl and some other coworkers in line w/ her: “I should have never tried the pumpkin spice latte! Now I’m addicted!” she jokes, in sweet chipper voice. A few minutes later I’m in her office and she’s sipping on said pumpkin spice latte and we’re chatting.
“Normally this takes awhile to approve, but trust me,” she says, “holiday season, they’re gonna want you.”
“Yeah, everybody’s desperate,” I agree, and she nearly chokes, giggles sweetly over top of her plastic lid.
Janine is technically the biggest knockout we have working at our store, with a body that is an absolute 10 and a face that’s probably a 9, but I don’t know, she’s friendly, but there’s something almost dweeby about her, strange as that is to say, she definitely doesn’t carry herself in a sexy manner. Whereas sales floor Amy (not to be confused w/ crunked up flow team Amy) positively oozes sexiness, though having not much of a body – tanned, and always wearing this scrumpdiddyumptious perfume, an alluring vaguely gravely voice, swings her hips, great sense of humor – and there’s something about Christina that’s sluttily enticing, too. And a number of the cashier teenyboppers have absolutely drop dead figures and angelically divine profiles. But out of all of them, I swear I’d take this Amanda over any. She just has that special something – you can never define it, and maybe nobody else would agree (or at least not for the same reasons, or as strongly), but for me she’s just IT. Out of any girl at any of my three jobs right now, actually. And I thought so pretty much the first day I ever laid eyes on her.
September 23
James sprinting back, as I’m sorting combos, to reclaim toboggan he’d taken off during truck unloading
September 25
For some reason our truck wasn’t “recognized” by the system, which meant everything we unloaded today had to go out to the floor, unless it was stamped TRANSITION on the box and we knew for sure it was backstock. Otherwise, everything had to be checked to see if it would push. I’m cracking up for some reason to see our ragtag crew this morning, what’s left of it, what it’s devolved into at this point. Ricky and James the unloaders today, the latter wearing this hilarious toboggan for the first 1/4, roughly, of our unload. Took forever, till almost 6. I had an easy day, with only a bunch of combo boxes to sort through, and the couple dozen boxes marked Transition. Becky, Richard, Amy, and Don on the push side of the line, with Ben (first time I’ve seen this) scanning. And me. That’s it.
They’ve got Matt H. coming in at 4:30 now instead of 4, to spread out the coverage a tiny bit more. Richard tries telling him about yesterday, but Matt either doesn’t believe him or doesn’t think it a big deal. Later, I’m kneeling down on the floor sorting through the repacks as boxes zip past me overhead on the line.
Richard: did you fall down or are you taking a nap?
Amy: he’s missing in action.
Richard: he’s missing more than that.
Matt’s freakouts making no sense again. Has me on MMB and Ricky doing electronics, which is fairly normal, except there are a bazillion white repacks (electronics) and I’m the only one w/ a gun. But tells me to give Ricky my gun when I’m done, head over to C & D (the domestics aisle – bed, bath, curtains, frames, pictures, plants, vacuums, etc) because “they need help badly” (he’s panting, having dashed over to tell me this, I heard him coming a mile away), yet has told Amy, who’s working over in C & D at the moment that “when you’re done, uh, if you could head over and there’s a pallet of baby and two skids of shoes, then if you have time you can help them in soft lines.” I have a ton of videos myself, it takes me until about 7:15 to make it over there.
“You’re messy,” Amy says, mock chidingly, of my empties at the end of each aisle method.
“Eh, someone else will come along and pick it up,” I tell her, only half kidding.
“Now I wanna know how that works,” she says.
“You should try it sometimes,” I insist, “you’d be surprised.”
Amy, one aisle over from me, tells hilarious story about running into old coworker Michael (“New Gedroe” as I thought of him) at the video store and the instant he saw her, he literally ran out of the building. “Mom, what did you do to that guy?” her son asks, thoroughly puzzled. I relate my own recent Michael sightings, on consecutive days: Tuesday, stopping into the Shell station here in Hilliard as I begin making my way on foot all the way down to Bob’s, and he’s working there; then, the very next night, Michael’s in the frozen aisle at Kroger the same time I am, then at the U-Scans the same time I am, and the employee overseeing these is on the verge of losing his cool because Michael can’t seem to get the hang of using this U-Scan. Which I would wager money he’s used a quarter of a million times before. “HIT THE GO BACK BUTTON!” the guy finally shouts at Michael. What a weirdo.
Bridget materializes w/ a troubled look on her face, she’s on a mission to speak w/ Amy in “low” voices the next aisle over. Apparently trying to gauge Amy’s latest beef w/ Matt. She recites the line I’ve quoted above (about heading over to work baby, shoes, and soft lines) and adds, “then he comes back fifteen minutes later, and tells me the exact same thing! I told him, stop harassing me! That’s what it is, he’s harassing me,” she says.
Reaching me, though, Bridget’s cracking up – says she’s spoken to the logistics coordinator at the store where I’m transferring, he called her this morning at 4am and “he sounded reaaaaaaaaaaallllllyyyyyy hyper, I think he said his name was Rodolfo, he kept asking me if you were a good employee, what your attendance was like, were you here on time, what you knew, I’m like, man, this guy is way too hyper for four in the morning,” and I’m thinking, great, I’m going to be working for another Matt Hawkins. But she put in a good recommendation: “I told him you were really fast and that you worked good with people but worked good by yourself too.”
By this time Amy and James and I have knocked out most of C & D, and the lights come on at 8am. Working our way back up C, getting the last bowled out boxes pushed, we encounter James, a good five minutes after we’ve last seen him, picking up my trash from the very aisle where Amy made her notorious comment earlier.
“I’ve just got some trash here to pick up,” James explains, almost apologetically, because it’s the last thing left in this section.
“I see that,” I tell him, and Amy starts cracking up.
“I see that,” she repeats, “you should have said, I created that!”
-today James wore a fishing hat on the job instead
September 30
Most ungodly mountain of backstock (and by “backstock” I mean: 20 unopened white repack boxes) I’ve ever seen, including my stuff from Monday; also a box of assorted check lane candies I’d found in here on Sunday, & set outside door then.
October 1
-Tina tries to get sent home for “toothache”
-tall redhead Matt is on ladder in PHAR backstock aisle; Cole preparing to pitch various varieties of tampons from this huge recently torn down end cap display
Matt: “where should I put these?”
Cole: “Oh, put them where they’ll fit?! (everyone laughs) I’m sorry but you walked right into that one.”
me: (handing box that fell on floor to Cole) “here, this one fell out.”
October 7
today was Tina’s last day, Cindy has 14 more & Becky 11. “Man what are we gonna do for the next 11 days,” Don mumbles at our end of the line after hearing another one of Becky’s dumb wisecracks. Bored, he keeps wandering to the front to check status of truck, critique Becky’s pallet stacking (“what is this?”), etc.
“What it is is they won’t shut up,” Richard says of Ricky & James, the reason our unload takes an eternity, “that and Ben waits till he has about 35 boxes to push them, then they fly past so fast Amy doesn’t even have time to scan them. I kid you not I had her PDA in my lap earlier cause he knocked it out her hands pushing boxes.”
“Oh Ben tears me up,” Joyce says, “that’s why when I’m scannin I have him stand behind me & push.”
Don & I knock out toys, then electronics, then MMB. I love working with this guy – he & David the two most unintentionally hilarious people here. Better still, they share no names when it comes to the “names” quandary section of my Ceiling novel, where all this crap will end up.
October 8
15 min late today, though I don’t feel as tired as I thought I would. Don has “the WAV” out on sales floor loading stuff up onto the risers. Redheaded Matt & me are outside last thing, as far as our pulls go – just barely daybreak – in these 4 semi trailers they have parked this year, stocked with product, to make holidays smoother: all bulk diaper, paper, pets & plastics are stored there now. PDAs don’t work out there, so you have to write down all your pulls, then go out & retrieve them, delete them from gun when you get back inside. Matt’s talking about how he & Steve plan to go bowhunting for deer together – his family has land outside Logan, Steve owns land in Hilliard area.
Earlier, slightly: green coat hanging on hooks by freezer (also worn outside), I pull frozen. Ridiculously small rooms, total chaos, pulls & backstock tend to sit here for days. One open ended cage has bagged ice, another ice cream; another rack on wheels has the whole F section (A-E against walls), you’re always maneuvering these around to get at what you need. Trying to operate PDA w/ gloves on.
October 14
Western/classics now combined. Country music expanded, gospel browser format now, soundtracks & comps reduced. 8 pallets of Halloween candy (all Halloween is on flex) on 1800 piece truck. Richard, pissed off at pile of boxes marked 38 on line in front of him, swipes all of them to the floor – flying every which way – with one vicious swing (“there we go!” I cheer.) Then, later – because David, instead of moving one centimeter to his right (it’s the most hilarious thing I’ve ever seen) to drop a box onto a pallet past his designated 3 pallet “section” (today 36 – baby; 35 – shoes; 37 – toys), he’ll just shove it on down, even if the next person (Richard today) happens to be a half mile away – Richard keeps getting these 38 boxes way down at the end of the line, where he’s helping Amy unload all the Halloween crap. Richard finally walks over to David & seethes, “stop doing this!”
-Overheard chatter from soft lines later as I’m working MMB:
- Joyce: “that’s why when I need a jacket a lot of times I’ll look over in men’s”
- Amy: “ok, we’ve got a giant, and we’ve got a munchkin!” (everyone howls w/ laughter)
-Matt comes over to tell me to go to toys when I’m done
-Matt comes over to tell me to forget about toys, to go to HBA (health & beauty acces.) when I’m done.
“Veda’s going to soft lines, because everyone over there’s leaving at 10:30,” he rues.
-David a whole stream of hilarities this morning, though. Comes up to front door same time as me (usually 5 min late, somehow today I’m miraculously 15 min early), wearing some crazy fitted cap that’s half cabby/half baseball. “Too cold,” he grimaces (35 degrees when I pedaled past clock), “maybe I find other other job. Especially when it snow.”
During a break in our unload, I start to root through a combo box; he says, “psshew!” & shakes his head, “save for later Jason!” Adds, almost under breath, “take it easy.”
October 16
(Truck done but line still piled up, mostly w/ soft lines stuff)
(Amy says something to Richard about helping, but jokingly. He was up at the front of the line all day, she’s at the back)
Richard: hey, my name’s Tom and I’m gonna just keep pushing boxes anyway
Amy: okay Tom I bet you miss your girlfriend Becky
Richard: Yeah, about as much as you miss Tina
Amy: I do miss Tina….crazy chicken bone throwing woman
(I’m not sure what this means)
-though 1800 piece truck, it takes us almost two hours. And I’ve got a normal amount of electronics, MMB. But Matt says, “when you’re done with that, uh, just go ahead and knock out toys.” Right. I’m cracking up all morning about this one – not even done w/ what I’ve got by eight, much less starting toys, much less “knocking out” toys. But it isn’t like he’s telling you this stuff because he’s hoping to motivate you, like some managers do, it’s their managerial style; it isn’t like he’s hoping to kick you into gear, knowing it’s unlikely to get accomplished, but that more will be accomplished this way by kicking you into gear; he’s more like some little kid who really really believes it’s going to happen, and is disappointed it doesn’t, not in you, but that his crazy schemes have failed to materialize, even though this is a recurring pattern, it’s happened the other 364 days this year as well, and the same percentage of the days the year before.
Another thing I wonder about: the goatee. It seems like a strange personal accessory for a guy like him to insist upon. I wonder if he thinks it makes him look older.
-Haika really flirty today toward the end of my shirt. Sure I’d like to hit that. She strikes me as one of those still youthful and partying late 30s/early 40s women who look for older guys with money to hitch, but hook up with younger guys for fun.
-and an xtra friendly hello this morning from Amanda, passing her as she stands in the front end morning huddle, as I’m en route to the coffee shop. Today her eyes are green.
November 4
Steve in on no sleep (domestic troubles) looks rough but (of course) in zany mood. Takes talking grim reaper – Halloween prop that stands in yard – shakes it & says “if any more people quit, we’ll be down to a skeleton crew!” Then tapes sign to it saying YOU BRING IT BACK, YOU STO (sic) IT. Places it to where it blocks backroom entrance. We both agree Janine looking her hottest ever today – maroon shirt flimsy & tight, & her breasts have never looked so huge. Why would she wear that to work? Wow. Forget what I said about Amanda: I might “vibe” with her the best, but you’d be insane not to pick Janine as your 1st choice
November 11
-they were playing Rumors by Timex Social Club on the radio this morning at Target, 5am-ish, the “whatever weekend” one of these stations always has. I only know who does this song because it’s on one of my old school rap compilations cassettes from like 1984. But I’d certainly never heard the song on the radio before, had never heard anything about it, was not aware of its ever having been a hit.
-Matt H freaking out as usual. I come in and he lets me in the front door, says to head over to MMB, that there’s one shopping cart of movies that still needs pushed but that “it’s already sorted out.” What does he mean by sorted out? Dumped out of the box into the shopping cart, apparently. He also instructs me to backstock electronics/MMB when I’m done here, and then help backstock in light duty. Well not only is this movie mountain a complete nightmare, there’s a box full of CDs on the undercarriage of the shopping cart, and there’s the whole electronics/MMB pull for the day waiting here, too. Two hours later and I’m mostly done with the movies – still have to run up to checklanes w/ one batch of movies and CDs, to this endcap in the back end of store with still others – done with books and about halfway done with CDs – also a holiday display of these back in G – and haven’t even looked at the electronics pull. First he comes out and says, um, forget about, um, backstocking electronics/MMB, just go straight to light duty when I’m done. Then five minutes later he comes back out again and says just leave this stuff – to dump all my sorted out groups of stuff into one repack hodgepodge, thus wasting a ton of effort on my part, as the next guy is just going to have to sort all this crap out again – and head back to, um, help them knock out the light duty backstock.
I don’t really care, and in fact find this entire episode hilarious, but there’s no denying his freakouts set everyone back a great deal – not to mention that some of what I have established as backstock and take back to set by the electronics door with me was clearly “subtract 99″ stuff from yesterday, but was never treated as such, thus pulled again today – a waste of that guy’s time – had to be sifted through today – a waste of my time. And, now, I’m saying screw it, I’m not marking it as such, either, so someone can waste their time backstocking it again tonight, someone can waste their time pulling it tomorrow, and I can waste my time looking at it again, also tomorrow. Why not.
November 12
Matt H opens the door for me and fat (“John Candy”) Chris, immediately flapping his jaws. I spent much of my shift the past two days stowing toys, which was nigh impossible, as we’re already out of room; what it meant was a lot of rearranging for very little progress. Now today they purge six pallets of toys casestock at random – wiping out the four top shelves (two aisles) of toys backstock – to see if any of it would push. Quite a bit did; what happens that’s unique to top shelves is that you’ll have five boxes stacked atop one another, and when someone’s up that high pulling autofills in the morning, if it’s calling for a case at the bottom of that stack, a lot of these lazy bastards just “burn” the pull, i.e. input it as if they’ve yanked the case when in fact they haven’t. Because it is admittedly a royal nightmare at times moving all those boxes around way up there in the rafters just to get at the one at the bottom. Still…..I’m roped into this project, trying to push them out onto the shelves with everyone else, which basically makes you feel like you’re wasting your time. It all pays the same, though. Still, you get an idea why any corporation is ultimately inefficient – too much slack in the line from the top to the bottom, even a micro-top to the micro-bottom. The system this company has in place for everything is actually extremely efficient, except when you input these deadbeats we actually have working said concepts. But the reason they can only seem to hire deadbeats is because the job doesn’t pay all that well – yet the reason it can’t afford to pay all that well is because there’s so many hours wasted as a result of these deadbeats. And so if you’re sitting in some office high up on the ivory tower, you don’t know these particulars, all you know is that crew A gets B dollars to do job C. I mean, essentially, my last two days, the entirety of them, were a complete waste of time to this company – not my fault, but because of all the people not doing their job ahead of me. I spend two days stowing these toys, we turn right around and yank them back off the shelves at random (well, six pallets’ worth, which is maybe half a day’s work at optimum speed, which I wasn’t achieving w/ all the rearranging) and push them.
For comic relief, of course, we always have Matt H’s insanities to lighten the mood. James joins us (me and Cindy and two people from the sales floor) out here pushing toys, says to me, “these all have to go out, right? We can’t backstock any of it?”
“Nooooooo,” I emphatically demur, “they just pulled this stuff off at random.”
“Oh,” James chuckles, “Matt told me he checked, and all of it should go out, he said.”
“This is six pallets’ worth of stuff!” I howl.
Looking for the riser schematic later, I ask the guys in the backroom – currently John Candy Chris and Matt E – if they’ve seen that booklet anywhere. Chris Stoffel overhears and tells me “don’t worry about that. If you’ve got a lot of something and there’s a hole, throw it up there.” I can’t resist telling these guys what Matt H said about all the toys going out, and they’re cracking up. And it isn’t like the guy is trying to be “motivational,” he sincerely believes it might. In the breakroom on our lunches, fat Chris is chirping like a Chihuahua as he regales Matt E with the story of how Hawkins accosted us at the door this morning.
“He’s like (rup-bup-bup-a-bup-bup-bup) and I’m thinking, oh my god, it’s too early for this, give me a chance to wake up…….”
“It’s definitely easy for him to get under your skin,” Matt agrees, “he said something to me when I came in this morning about, yeah, uh, just head to the back room and start doing pulls. Oh, okay, so basically, you’re saying DO THE EXACT SAME THING I’VE DONE EVERY SUNDAY THIS ENTIRE YEAR? OKAY, THANKS! I’M PRETTY SURE I KNOW HOW TO DO MY JOB BY THIS POINT!”
November 14
Steve and me standing outside at 4am, 35 degrees, and Matt H lets us in. Jesus Christ what have I done to deserve this. Rubbing his head already freaking out, says truck was 1800 but pulls 1400 and already asking if we can stay over! Steve says he’s out at 7am because of school; I tell Matt I doubt it.
“Man!” Steve bitches to me at the time clock, “can you give me a chance to get in the door and get my head clear and warm up before you start flapping your gums, Matt!?”
