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| Oh how I miss you, Tar-ghetto. |
The
first ever job I ever had was working at Target—for two and a half
years, I did the retail thing, and let me tell you, there’s not a day
goes by that I don’t miss it. Well, maybe not, but I do look back on those innocent days
fondly--in part because
it was just
so weird. Here is the first installment of what could be
others in
Weird Things I Saw Working at Target. Believe me, I saw some weird freaking things.
Today's story is one I will call The Purse Incident. When
I began my illustrious career at Target, I was a “cart attendant.” This was a fancy way of
saying I was the general “b-tch” at the store. My main duties consisted
of collecting carts from the parking lot, cashiering if needed, and
picking up hangers and
those little plastic CD holders (remember those?) from the checkout
lanes. Easy enough.
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| Off to the women's restroom! |
Unfortunately,
that wasn’t my entire job. There were other situations that could arise
on a given day. If there was puke in an aisle, guess who came to clean
it up? Me, of course. Spill in aisle three? I was on the way. Someone
spray sh-t
all over the bathroom stall? Yeah, me to the rescue. (Ladies, I am looking at you, the women’s
restroom was ALWAYS worse than the men’s!)
However,
out of all the nasty duties I had dumped on me (perhaps a poor choice of words), my least favorite duty was emptying the trash cans in the front of
the store. Why, you may ask? It doesn't seem too hard, does it? The reason is simple: nearly every time I did this,
someone I knew came
into the store. It is impossible to look good while trying in vain to
stop a leaking trash bag--leaking because someone chucked an entire Big
Gulp soda in the bag. You are the lowest employee on the Target employee
totem pole and everyone knows it. Good stuff.
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| This might be a better candle idea than Trash in the Summer. |
So
that brings me to the purse story. It was a hot summer day, though
still early in the morning which means someone forgot to empty the trash
the night before and I hope they burn in hell. The trash had fermented
rather nicely by the time
I got to it, emitting that beautiful summer trash smell. Coming soon
from Yankee Candle. . .
When
I went to switch out the trash, I happened to notice that there was a
purse sitting on top. Since purse snatchers were not uncommon, I opened
it up to make certain the purset didn’t belong to anyone—it was ratty
and beat up, but you
never know. The purse was empty, so I threw it back in and went over to
the other trash can, paying it no mind.
I
was going about my work, moving as fast as I could, when I noticed an
out of “costume” transvestite walk up to the can I had just emptied.
Yes, I knew he was a transvestite despite being out of costume--there
was a group of them that
shopped there regularly. I paid him little mind because they would
often fish through the ashtray on top for any cigarettes not fully
smoked, which always disgusted me. Then again, waste not, want not,
right? (For the record, this was not only a transvestite
thing by any means. It happened quite often, but it was commonplace to
see many of them doing it. And I apologize if I am using the word
transvestite wrong—he was a male cross-dresser and I think it is the
right word? Maybe?)
After
I bagged up the rest of the trash, the cross-dresser transvestite walked over and
asked if I had seen a purse. Well, as you know, I had. Weird, but OK, I
live to serve. I opened up the bag and since the purse was conveniently
on top, I let him
take a look. I didn’t know how it got there, and I didn’t really care,
but if he wanted it, he could have it.
So
he stood there examining the purse while I pushed my flatbed loaded
with putrid garbage into the store. Just as I entered, he approached me
again, handing me back the purse. He seemed upset as he did, and waved his arms around while he talked to me.
“No no no, this isn’t the one. There was ANOTHER purse that I was looking for! Did you see another one in there?”
Can’t say that I did.
He
asked to look through the bag o' trash, and who was I to deny him? I was nobody,
that’s who—the low man on the totem pole, the guy that took out trash and
cleaned up the puke. I let him have at it.
But
while he was digging through the trash, all I could do was stand there and
wonder how in the hell this guy could be looking for a purse in a trash
can where I just happened to find one, and yet somehow it was not the
right purse. How is this even possible?
As for the other purse, he never did find it in
that trash can, and he left dejected. Sorry dude.
