Smorgasbord

This is what happens when I'm stuck guarding the back door at Target while the real guard is taking her break. We need a guard because since we have construction going on in the store, there are lots of people coming and going. My job is to make sure no one unauthorized enters or exits the building. And that no one authorized or unauthorized leaves with a flatscreen.

It's a very boring job, actually, because all you can really do is sit there. I doodled a bit at first; I sketched a shopping cart that was parked a few feet away. I tried to make a crossword puzzle (harder than you would think). Then I finally wrote up two lists, which I thought I would share with you.

10 Things I Hate:
1. When people don't laugh at my jokes. Come on folks; surely you can spare a pity laugh at least!
2. Cardboard. It's heavier than it looks, it gives you awful paper cuts, and it is absolutely no fun to handle for hours on end while building gaudy yellow back-to-school shelf displays.
3. First Impressions.
4. Walmart.
5. Allergies. I've been waking up with Voldemort-red eyes for a good week now.
6. That awkward moment when you're walking towards someone who's also walking towards you, but you're still so far away that you don't know if you should start the eye contact right away, or just look to the side or at the ground until you're within 'hey' distance.
7. Fluorescent lighting.
8. Dirty hands.
9. School supply displays in stores on July 1st.
10. Leaving my car headlights on.

10 Things I Love:
1. Conversations like this:
Me: (looking at a pile of boxes of various sizes that we had to unpack and shelve) "I hate to use this word, but what we have here is a smorgasbord"
Matt: (coworker) "What, is that like a Harry Potter term?"
Me: "Uh, not exactly."
*Note-as I was writing up this list, Matt actually walked up and tried to see what I was writing. I covered the list with my arm and had to think of some dumb excuse, because I didn't want him to be insulted or anything. Not that I'm quite making fun of him; it was just a funny/awkward moment.
2. Nice people.
3. Driveway basketball.
4. Movie trailers.
5. Getting through a yellow light right before it turns red so that all the cars behind you have to stop.
6. Subaru Outbacks. Don't ask me why.
7. When men (or women, I guess) smell good.
8. The jar on my dresser that's halfway full of spare change. I can't wait to cash that baby in!
9. When people have smiles that crinkle up the corners of their eyes.
10. Chickadees.

That's all, folks. By the way, I think I love my new hair. For awhile back there I felt like Jo in Little Women after she sold her hair for money for her sick father. Well, my father is fine; he's sleeping on the couch currently. And I feel good and confidant and happy.