The end of an era.

Tonight was my last night as an employee of Alaska's largest Canadian-owned liquor store chain. I'm tired, my feet hurt, and because I have to be at my new, real job at 8.30am, I bailed on hanging out and drinking with my friend/coworker after the closing shift. I'm a responsible adult, at times.

Working in the liquor store was an adventure for sure. Every day was something different and new and while the work was often tedious, sometimes mind-numbing, I was never ever bored. I met some good people that I hope to remain in contact with for a very long time, and I got to meet some of Anchorage's most...special...clientele. Mostly, I learned that people are, for whatever reason, very drawn to my personality, and that no matter how hard life gets, there is always someone who is worse off than me, and it teaches me to be thankful for what I have.

To Omar, Roberta, Kenny, Cody, Aviq and my favorite regulars: It's been fun.

On to bigger and better things.

Stay tuned to this blog for meanderings on stand-up comedy in Anchorage and whatever else I decide is worthy of a read.

Land, ho!

It's amazing how many nautical phrases can be used to describe prostitution. Land, ho. Makes me chuckle.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, it is nearing the end of a very brief era. I recently landed a job at the Anchorage Press and put in my "take this job and shove it" note to the powers-that-be at the liquor store.

We are nearing the end of my liquor store memoirs. It's been an interesting ride, a brief ride (story of my life?) but it's almost over and soon I will have nights and weekends to myself again. It's about damn time.

In other news, due to my recent announcement of the imminent escape from the store, the clientele has stepped up their efforts in annoying me.

Three more shifts and I'm done.

Hooray!

...and some big, 'Merican breasts!

Sometimes, my customers are too cute for words. Last night's shift in my Spenard store was slow, all things considered, but many of my regulars were in for their usual purchases and it was nice to see them after the weekend off last week. Many of them asked questions about my sprained right hand, which I was all too glad to answer - fighting off a date rapist makes me quite the badass, you know, especially when I am pretty sure I was under the influence of GHB or something similar thereto.

Anyway, toward the end of the evening this young man (22 years old, I checked his passport) from the Motherland (at first I couldn't remember if it was Motherland or Fatherland, but it was pointed out to me by Square that Germany is the Fatherland. Of course!) of Russia came in, fresh-faced and innocent, purchasing a 12 pack of Budweiser beer. His accent was charming, and he was so polite and so nice, we chatted for a bit. He was clearly uncomfortable with his English (which was very good, by the way) and I learned he had crossed the Pacific to work in Alaska for the summer, doing construction.

"I haff alvays vanted to come to 'Merica und haff a Bud-viser beer. It's bin a dream ov mine for years und years."

How freaking cute is that?

Of course, I quickly informed him that if he was going to come to America for the beer, he should make sure he samples the goods from the local Alaskan brewers - Midnite Sun, Moose's Tooth, Glacier Brewhouse, etc. His accent and mannerisms reminded me so much of Steve Martin and Dan Akroyd's Czech brothers, the "Wild und Crazaaay Guys!" from Saturday Night Live, I half expected him to add "Yah, und I vud also like to touch some big 'Merican breasts!"

Luckily he didn't wear tight slacks to show off his bulge. Or stick tuna sandwiches under each arm so he smells like no other man.

Haff a....how is it? A good one? A good night? Or day?

Yah.

Haff a good one.

The Horror

I wish there was a theme to this week's blog, but I'm afraid there isn't. Today I did my closing shift after only 4 hours of sleep and an entire afternoon nursing a weird-feeling hangover after playing games and guitars with friends until indecent hours, holding myself up by sheer force of will and back-to-back energy drinks that probably should not have been consumed on an empty stomach. As a result, despite my usual cheerful demeanor, I was easily irritated by everything today, and this unfortunate circumstance was compounded by the fact that every obnoxious douchebag within a ten-mile radius decided they needed to buy booze from me today.

Oh, Patience, you and I have never been friends. But today especially, I couldn't stand your company. And now, let us rant.

-Listen, lady. Just because your boyfriend came in earlier to buy something and I called him "hun," does not mean I was flirting with him. I just called you "darlin'" and I clearly don't want to have anything to do with you outside of this transaction. I'm friendly. Get over it. You don't need to come into a liquor store to buy a soda so you can get your eyes full of the harlot who apparently can't get enough of your premature-balding boyfriend with the beer gut and the flip flops.

-Get off your phone when you get to my counter. I know that "Kevin said she was a bitch and I was all like oh. em. gee. Really? I can't believe Kevin said that, did he totally say that or was he like, saying something similar to that but not really saying that?" but you have a transaction to carry out with me, and I have a series of questions to ask you that will get longer the more you pretend I can't hear about forgetting to remove your false eyelashes before sleeping with the guy and waking up with your eyes glued shut somehow. Now you have to give me TWO forms of ID, your date of birth, the zip code on the card, tell me what year you graduated high school, and the capital of Estonia. Answer wrong, and your beer stays here. Just hang up already and treat me like a human being.

-For the fiftieth time, you cannot have my phone number. You smell funny. Like kerosene and despair.

-It is not my fault that we are out of your favorite cigarette. It's called supply and demand. Sometimes we sell out of things if there is more demand than supply. I certainly wasn't sitting in the back of the store chain-smoking your precious menthol shorts while chuckling darkly to myself about how this will really ruin your day, Random Douche #87.

-You are not funny. When I ask if you have your ID on you, take it out of your wallet or purse or pocket or cleavage and hand it to me politely. The next time you respond "No, just my fake one," or give me a completely different birthdate when I ask you for it, I will confiscate your driver's license and proceed to make a Private Party Arrest while we wait for APD to send us an officer in response. Think you're funny now? The police won't think so when they see you've wasted everyone's time trying to outwit a fucking stand-up comedian with a college education. I are smartest. Duh.

-I really don't want to hear about your personal life unless I ask for it. When I ask, "Will that be all for you today?" I'm not really asking, "And tell me everything you've ever done for the last 5 years, and be descriptive." I don't care that you're buying this beer because you've been in the garden all day and you can't wait for your prize azaleas or begonias or whatever it is that gardeners plant these days. Just buy it and get out so I can get back to Facebook on my iPhone.

-Facebook for iPhone, you SUCK when it comes to your chat function. Either that or all my friends suck for not responding to my chat messages while I'm at work feeling miserable and downhearted because I hate my job and miss my friends. Either way, someone out there is doing a great job sucking.

-I had a customer actually tell me today that I was too cheerful for my own good and that I shouldn't be this happy to be at work. Trust me, darling. I'm NOT happy to be at work. I'd rather be anywhere else than behind this counter, dancing stupidly to "Poker Face" by Lady GaGa for the thirteenth time this shift because it plays ALL THE TIME on EVERY STATION we're allowed to listen to at the store, but such is my current lot in life so shut your face or I'll unleash The Horror of my True Feelings upon you. Trust me, you don't want that.

Dammit, I'm all worked up now and I've got to get some sleep.

WANTED: One new job that doesn't suck ass and smell like unwashed miscreants.

Be Prepared

Imagine my surprise when I flopped into bed on Friday night/Saturday morning with nothing to write about on my busiest shift. Surely, thought I, this would be a rare occasion. However, after the week I had last week it was a welcome diversion from the norm and I actually slept pretty well.

Sunday night's shift, however, seemed determined to make up for the lack of Weird on Friday.

I suppose the real title of this blog should be "How Not To Hit On The Liquor Store Chick Volume 2," but that's not very witty and I know you expect better of me than that. Nevertheless, last night's clientele seemed determined to test my "I don't give my phone number to customers" rule.

Most of the gentlemen (term applied loosely in nearly every case) went the standard route, asking me what my plans were after work. Taking a leaf out of the screenplay for romantic comedy "Sliding Doors" (starring Gwyneth Paltrow and John Hannah and thoroughly intoxicating me as a pre-teen desperate for a European boyfriend) I calmly retorted something along the lines of, "Well, let me think. After standing on my feet for 8 hours on this concrete floor, stocking the cooler with cases of beer, dusting the shelves, restocking the shelves, and finally mopping and locking up at one in the morning, I'm planning to drive home, wash off the sleaze and the smell of the hopelessness that this place reeks of, and go to sleep by myself. Though there is every possibility that one or both of my cats will snuggle with me for heat." In most cases, that encouraged them to leave me be for the remainder of the transaction.

Some soldiers, however, are not noted for their powerful comprehension of sarcasm. "Well, why don't I give you a call sometime? You can get some friends together and I can get some friends together and we can really party." No. I don't think so. For one thing, I'm not about to meet a stranger and his strange friends, all of whom have weapons and hand-to-hand combat training, in their hotel room with the intention of drinking myself out of the ability to make educated and rational decisions. For another, I'm not about to subject any of my friends to the same thing. I ain't a-stoopid. My coworker came to my rescue, knowing the expression on my face as she has used it many times herself in an effort to get me to rescue her from the endless ocean of obnoxious men. Strolling behind my register, she offhandedly remarked, "Your phone was ringing in the back room, I didn't answer it, but it was your boyfriend calling."

Booyah. Thank you, darling.

Our next contestant on "Who Wants The Liquor Store Chick's Phone Number?" is a semi-regular whom I've seen before. Carding him anyway (the gas station down the street failed a government sting and lost their ability to sell tobacco products, so we are being ultra diligent) before ringing him up for his cigarettes, I said something to the effect of "I know I've seen you in here before, but because I can't remember your name I'm cheating so I can remember it next time without asking for it." Laughing and flirting with me, he pulled a ten dollar bill out of his pocket as I finished ringing him up, and his total came to twelve something. "Oops," he said, "I'm going to have to get cash out of my other pocket." As he pulled his hand out of said pocket, a roll of condoms fell out onto my counter.

Really? Not only do you feel you need to keep them in your pocket, you feel you need to carry 4 or 5 at a time? That doesnt make you look sexy, it makes you look like you don't know what you're doing.

"Oh no," he said in a clearly un-surprised voice. "How embarassing. But I guess it's better to be prepared, right? You never know when you're going to need them, right? By the way, what are you doing later?"

I'm definitely not doing you.

The Lion, the Witch, and the Peacoat.

I admit, some of the regular customers in Spenard are a little out there. If, by a little, we mean as far out as it gets. Tonight's tale will be a bit short, seing as Sunday nights yield very little story-worthy action, just sore feet and an aching brain and dry hands from the overuse of hand sanitizer. I hate touching money. Ew. Gross. Yes, I'm a little OCD, let's move on.

So, as I've said, some of my regulars are a little out there. There's this older guy who comes in on Sundays for a soda and a pint of whatever strikes his fancy at the time. My first Sunday night at work he came in wearing a full length black wool peacoat, which I complimented him on. Now that the temperature is in the near-to-80s, he has elected for a shorter, black leather coat. Suits him much better, in my opinion, and I told him so.

Somehow, in his mind, a compliment on his full length peacoat followed by a better compliment on the leather coat added up to "give her your peacoat" in this guy's head, and about an hour after I sold him his goods he returned with his full length peacoat in hand, as a gift to me.

What
the
hell?

In addition, he goes on to say that he has left his name and phone number in the pocket and that I should call him sometime so that we can get to know each other outside of the liquor store.

Bold, man. That's bold. I've gotten pretty good at fending off the admirers at work with various excuses. "Sorry, it's against company policy to date customers." "Sorry, I have a huge jealous boyfriend who does martial arts." (That one is usually reserved for the persistant guys, because I know a guy who fits the description who would probably give them a karate sandwich if I asked.) "Sorry, I'm a huge lesbian. As of just now." "No, I don't think that I would ever answer the phone if you called me because, frankly, you scare me just a little." All very good and valid excuses meant to protect me from giving my personal information out.

Smooth move, giving it to me first. I gave him 5 points for creativity, but unfortunately, you need at least a thousand points to get my phone number. Better luck next time.

Speaking of collecting points, Joe is getting more points every time he comes in. There's a fine line between being obnoxiously flirty and just flirty enough, and this guy Joe toes the line with skill and precision. Everytime he comes in, he flirts just enough to make me smile. This evening, he came in for his regular 6 pack of well-chosen microbrew, a pack of whatever cigarettes he fancies at the time, and a lighter. He greets me with "Hello, beautiful, how's the greatest part of my day doing today?" Totally cheesy, but I eat it up anyway. By the time the transaction is finished, hes realized he's forgotten a lighter. "See what happens? I flirt with you and then I forget what I came in for." Bwaha. I am a weapon of mass distraction.

Please note the absence of a lion and a witch in this blog. Until that last sentence, that is.

Also, the super cute Deaf guy came in again today. Is it sad that the only ASL I remember is how to flirt with people?

It's the Fuzz!

First of all, before I even clocked on tonight, I had to put out a fire. Literally. Someone threw a lit cigarette into the trash can outside and it lit up. I had to play bucket brigade. Now I'm a firefighter, too - I am an endless fountain of awesome.

Well, it had to happen sometime. It's Spenard, I should have known not to grow complacent in my surroundings and not expect something super cool and dangerous to go down at some point. My first ever shift involving the police (besides the plainclothes cop who comes in after his shift is over on his way home to get out of his suit) was tonight, after my coworker watched a guy shuffle suspiciously around the store and walk to the door without speaking to either of us. As he reached the door, my coworker, who had been watching the guy on our cameras, approached him and asked him where the bottle of Grey Goose was that he had seen in his hand.

Normally, in this situation, the person will either produce the bottle because they will be in less trouble that way, or they open their coats to prove there is nothing in them and are free to go. Normally.

This guy flipped. He started shouting obscenities at my coworker and threatened to take him outside and kick his ass. I reached for the phone to call the police as my coworker let the guy go, rather than let the situation escalate, and the customers I had just finished ringing up ran outside and got the guy's license plate number as he sped away.

I love my regular customers. They will go to the ends of the earth for me. We called the Anchorage Police Department and our own security guy, filed a case number and pulled the tapes. What happens from there is not my problem anymore. Boop boop boop. Excitement all around.

Why is it our lifters always take off with vodka? At least this time it was Belvedere, something from the top shelf instead of something cheap, plastic, and guaranteed to give you a wicked hangover.

In other news, tonight was the only time in my entire life one of the older gentlemen has not grinned broadly when I call them "darlin'." He actually put his hand up in front of my face and said "I don't appreciate that. My wife wouldn't want you calling me that. Waitresses do that all the time and they don't get tipped."

Well, that's because you're an asshole. Would you rather I call you that? Don't put your hand in my personal space because I was trying to be friendly. Everyone else loves me when I do it.

Talk to the hand.

Accent on Service

The closing shift on a Sunday night in a liquor store is almost painfully slow compared to the hustle and/or bustle of a Friday night. The shelves stay stocked, the bottles in the stacker boxes gather dust, and I spend more time than necessary staring at my fingernails and wondering why my polish never stays on for longer than a day before it chips horribly.

Sunday nights are, for the most part, boring. When I get bored, I get a little weird. Weirder than normal, actually. On my Friday night shift, someone watching the security tapes will undoubtedly be treated to footage of me dancing like an idiot to whatever song is playing on the radio, bouncing up and down as I get excited about something stupid, and making a general fool of myself. Friday nights are fun and I feed off the energy of my customers. Sunday nights, the footage of me is rather subdued, as I check my phone for text messages in the long gaps between shoppers. My brain starts meandering, I start daydreaming, and before I know it, I've let my brain do whatever it wants.

Which is where it gets interesting.

As a veteran of the stage, I've spent over half my young life learning to adapt my own physical traits and my voice to create a character that is distinctly not me. It's a skill and an art form, certainly, but these days, my acting abilities are used fucking with my customers.

I didn't intend to do it, I really didn't. But a man came in about halfway through my shift and purchased a 6-pack of Guiness. For those of you who aren't history geeks like myself, Guiness had a birthday April 25th, 250 years old. The man buying his Guiness shares that birthday, only not so old. We chatted a bit, and before he had finished four sentences I had picked up his beautiful Irish brogue. I can't help myself. If I hear an accent, I will pick it up almost instantly, and it takes me forever to get rid of it. When I returned from Holland after a week, it took me almost a month before the Dutch mannerisms and slang dissolved from my vocabulary. So, since I was bored, I made no effort to rid myself of the Irish accent. I laid it on thick for the rest of the evening, just to see how people would react to it. The results are in, and this is what I've discovered:

-The sleazier guys wont hit on me if I sound foreign. My standard fare of foisting off date offers or phone number requests diminished instantly as soon as I sounded snooty and European.

-People don't notice that you're not answering their questions directly when you speak with an accent. I was frequently asked "Where are you from? What accent is that?" To which I would reply, "It's Irish." Which is true. It's an Irish accent. It's just not real.

-My coworkers are endlessly amused by me.

-It's hard to sing along with the song on the radio when you're faking an accent.

-I'm apparently good at faking accents because I have a diverse vocabulary that already includes some European slang.

I'm sure there's more things that are interesting about faking an accent at work, but those are the really crucial ones. Sometimes, when nothing blog-worthy happens in my Spenard Paradise, I have to make my own fun.

It's Hard Out There For A Pimp.

Friday night in my slice of paradise, the Spenard store. Despite my general distaste for going to work on a Friday night, I didn't complain much beyond some dark muttering to myself as I dragged myself off my cozy couch with my blanket and my TV shows on the internet. In a mere 8 hours I would be on my way home, exhausted, with sore feet and probably a sore back from the various tasks involved in running a liquor store, but it would be another adventure, almost certainly.

The first thing I am greeted with when I get to work is the breaking news that I have failed an in-house sting. I am diligent about carding my customers, to the point of annoying some of the regulars and older people. Apparently, the one time I was either too distracted or too busy to ask to see someone's ID, it's apparently a friggin spy reporting back to upper management. Awesome. So, now instead of working next Friday night on my normal shift, I have to sit through another class to re-certify for my TiPS certification. That's my punishment? To sit through a class where I already know all the answers? And on top of that, since the class takes all day, I officially don't have to work next Friday night?

Awesome. I have next Friday night off. I'm going to have a life for once next weekend, hooray!

So, I sign my form on the failure slip (which, by the way, also says I was very sweet, pleasant, helpful, and professional, so suck it) I clock in and get back to my normal duties. I'm on the busy cash register, as usual, and eyeing all the customers with a newfound suspicion, wondering which one of them ratted me out to the Fuzz. Friday night brings in most of the regulars - the Japanese businessman who comes in once a week for a fifth of Crown Royal ("You always smile, you are so pleasant. It really brightens the whole store, your smile."), the obnoxiously flirty guys who keep asking me when I'm going to go to the movies with them (the answer to that is never), a guy I actually went to elementary school with and his bottle of sparkling asti spumante, and the girl who works at the Bear Tooth who comes in every Friday night after her shift for a bottle of chilled chardonnay. My regulars, who know me and love me, and make my job easier by always having exact change or bailing me out by giving me their small bills when I'm running low. I love them all and all of them love me. Because the system works - the system called Reciprocity.

Five points to the first person who names the quote in that last paragraph. Musical and character and song for full marks.

But, as it's been said in song and rhyme, it's hard out there for a pimp. At least, that's what I assume, because last night I met my first pimp, who came in with two of his professional ladies. I knew what the relationship dynamic was the instant they walked in - instinct or intuition, I'm not sure, but I knew I was dealing with, er, business partners. The girls were dressed up in tight jeans and heels with too much makeup and too many pieces of bling, each with an air of a bruised and beaten housewife who is too proud to admit that she's unhappy. The man they were with displayed his diamonds on his chest as he brought a case of beer to my counter and allowed the girls to select a pint each of their choice. Their IDs were valid, and as I began ringing up the items, I mused to myself about how these girls fell into a life of prostitution. It is, of course, one of the world's oldest professions, and in some cultures is even a noble profession. In Anchorage, Alaska, however, the life is hard and usually painfully brief, as the culture of indifference ignores the dangers they face on the street - not only from clientele but from the pimps who are supposed to protect them. My musing was brought to a sudden and screeching halt when, as I handed over the receipt (can pimps write off liquor purchases for their professional ladies?), he looked me up and down appraisingly and opened his mouth.

"You know, you're a fine looking girl. How much they pay you to work here? You know what? It doesn't even matter. I can guarantee that you'll make more money if you come and work for me. You have a unique look about you. You can look Asian, you can look white. You're very versatile. You'd be a money maker for sure. What do you say?"

What DO you say in a situation like that besides "No flippin' way, buster!" or some variant thereof?

I wish I could remember exactly what I said. I hope it was more acidic and witty than "No flippin' way, buster!" but I'm afraid we'll never know, because evidently I have the attention span of a squirrel and can't remember trivial things like the punchline to my blog.

It may be hard out there for a pimp, but it's also hard to be a stand-up comedian working in a liquor store, who apparently can be a chameleon prostitute. Me love you long time.

Beautiful Language

I know, this is the second post of the day. But I can't let my blog become disorganized and address two different dates in the same post, and I've been lazy and not updating as quickly as I should. So shut up and keep reading, because this one is going to be short and sweet.

Sunday night, Spenard store. Closing with a filler employee as my regular coworker called out sick with some sort of illness that may or may not have been a severe case of spring fever on a beautiful Sunday evening. The store was slow, and since I was technically the regular employee with seniority, I got to be the awesome person and run the show. I got a key to the store (technically borrowed, but now they know I can be trusted with one and I will get my own), was entrusted with the balance of the change bank (which came out even as it was supposed to. Hooray for advanced math skills! Thanks, college education!), and the general operation of the store. It was a fun evening, all in all, with a lot of new faces that had just flown in from all sorts of places and shared stories with me. I wore my Amsterdam shirt and was able to talk about the beauty of my favorite city and tell some of my amusing stories.

Then, I glanced over at two guys in the wine department. Both were tall, good-looking, slender men, selecting a chardonnay. Nothing out of the ordinary, until I realized they were communicating in American Sign Language. I took ASL for two semesters in college, and while I've lost a lot of the vocabulary due to lack of practice, I picked up the general feel of the conversation.

When they arrived at my counter, I rang them up and ran his debit card. As I waited for the receipt to print out, the man paying for the wine turned to his friend and signed rapidly - first he shook his right hand as though he had burned it, then pointed to me, then waved his fingers in a circle around his face and opened his hand like a starburst. The second man nodded his right hand up and down vigorously and repeated the sign on his own face, three times with three starbursts. Translation: "WOW. She is beautiful." "Yes. Very very beautiful."

I tried not to grin or blush as I handed him his receipt. He signed "thank you" by placing his fingers under his chin with the back of his hand facing me and drawing them across his chin in my direction.

I signed back.

I drew my fingers across my chin in a mirror image of his last sign, then pointed at him, raised my pinky finger against my chest, pointed my index finger at my head, pointed at him, waved my fingers in a circle around my face with my own starburst, and then held up two fingers.

"Thank you. I think you're beautiful, too."

Zing.