At Least Pencils Isn't Flipping Us The Bird

Unlike other retailers, Pencils will be closed all day for Thanksgiving. Naturally, we have to be at work at 5:30 AM the next day for "Black Friday" and all the insanity that will present. In jest, I asked William, who happens to be African-American, if he was offended by the expression, "Black Friday". "Black Friday, brown Friday, yellow Friday.... I don't give a shit what they call it," was his thoughtful response. I tried to continue the conversation by injecting that the term "Black Friday" seems to target a certain ethnic group and a marketing ploy to entice them to spend money." "If a bunch of homey's want to come into Pencils and buy some piece of shit HP Laptop and get a bunch of other shit they don't need rammed down their throat, what do I care?" he then replied. He seemed to be in a bad mood, probably because Matt told him to be at work Friday at 5AM instead of 5:30.

From A Land Down Under

Last night three mates from Australia, who were in town for a business convention, ran into Pencils to scoop up 3 Toshiba laptops. They primarily wanted to watch movies on the 24 hour plane journey home, but the sale price didn't hurt either... until Matt started to ring them out. Of course they weren't going to buy any bullshit extended warranty or Microsoft Office, so Matt was looking to take a big hit (loss). The one guy who most resembled Crocodile Dundee slapped down his American Express card and told Matt to put all 3 computers on his tab. Because the sale is over $1000 (or some predetermined bullshit amount) Matt that tells him, "I need to see 2 forms of ID." The customer whips out his passport and tells Matt his driver's license is back at the hotel. "Sorry, Matt says, "I can't authorize this without seeing 2 forms of ID." Now I'm hoping these guys are smart enough to each pay for their own computers separately, which will circumvent Matt's little deception. Thankfully, I see Matt's shit-eating grin disappear when the other 2 guys whip out credit cards and say to Matt, "We'll each pay for our own then." If only Matt had pissed them off enough to get a "Bloomin' Onion" rammed up his ass.

Porn Starz

My manager Matt prides himself in diagnosing customer's computer problems even before they reach the tech bench at Pencils. "See that guy walking in with his laptop? It's filled with porn and loaded with viruses," he proudly professed to me. Even though I have my CompTia A+ Certification (and Matt doesn't), he rarely lets me work on computers when we're both working the same shift. He usually parks his fat ass behind the bench and mindlessly watches the anti-virus software run while I'm either stacking toner cartridges or trying to keep customers from being ripped-off. On slow evenings when Matt is off, I usually cruise through the customer's hard drives looking for embarrassing photos they forgot to delete before they left off their computer for repair. Thankfully, nothing too bizarre has popped up. I requested a box of latex gloves and Lysol spray from the Kenn, the store manager, explaining that Matt told me there could be "fluids" all over the computers we get in for repair. He looked at me as if to say, "are you serious?" when I added, "You know what I'm talking about Kenn... I heard that you downloaded "Sorest Rump" last week and loved it.

Like Father Like Son

As a joke, my biological son Danny put on my Pencils shirt and said, "Look dad, I'm a Easy Wrecknician too!" His mother and her husband think Danny is bright kid, but I'm not so sure. Granted, he has a sense of humor and is a little ADDHD, but he seems not be firing on all 4 cylinders if you ask me. "Look Danny," I told him, "Go ahead and fool around and don't take school seriously and YOU WILL end up working at Pencils for minimum wage and no benefits. For a second, something seemed to sink into his thick skull, because he replied, "I'd rather work at McDonald's flippin' burgers."