[sharkchomp]

For the last two weeks I have helped open a new store. I don't really want to say for who since they made us a sign a paper saying they will fire us if we say bad stuff about them on facebook or blogs, etc - even though what I am going to say is nice.

So I helped open this store. There was nothing in it but about 6 small boxes. Seriously four walls, a tiled floor. In the first day we unloaded 2 trucks, put up almost all the shelves on the sales floor and in the back. The shelves in the back are really high like 20 feet. The second day we completed putting up every shelf and the floor shelves. The thrid day we had all the check out counters installed. In two weeks we had all the signs up, all the stock put up and labeled. And a lot of the stock is fairly heavy. Some of it over 60 pounds a piece! This was with 13 people. Really, an amazing amount of work. The store could have opened tomorrow but the phone lines weren't installed til today and it's a 24 hour download. So it'll be monday.

But shewww it was hard on the body. I sure as shit am not 20 anymore lol and people that were in their 20's were complaining of being sore and shit. I'm a night owl and I can usually get 4 or 5 hours sleep, get up the next and shit it n get it, but whoa nelly! No fucking way. It was all I could do to stay up til 10 pm. Some people told me they were a sleep on their couches by 8:30 - and they didn't get home til 7:00! Then it was 105 outside temps but the airconditioning was running 24 hours a day (the ac guy said the units weren't hooked up the thermostats and that the IT person would hook them up). I'm not shitting you, if it wasn't in the low 60's it was in the upper 50's. I'm pretty damned hearty and even I had to bring a winter shirt. Even the big muscular men complained about it being cold - and they were the ones doing the really heavy work. Finally after the ac guy came back they started turning the ac breakers off and on as needed.

The cool thing though is meeting all those people. These two guys loved music and on our breaks they would stand outside and sing and dance. Aw hell I learned words to songs that I could never make out. It was great watching them. One of them flirted with me which I thought was pretty funny, rather amusing and almost endearing. He had personality plus, no gaydar but still a good guy.

There was a girl from New Orleans who moved up here after Katrina. They had lost everything. She was really cool, listening to her life story and she knows a shit ton about cars. She taught me a lot, and even some of the guys too. She also had no filter and I'm quite sure her favorite word was fuck.

There was poor lady who I went to lunch with everyday who lives in a trailer in the middle of BFT (bum fuck tennessee). I've worked with her a few times before. It kindly made me sad as she told me her story over time. One of her husbands had died and some jerkoffs broke into her trailer and stole guns from her grandpa, rings and jewelry from her dead husband, money she had saved to pay her property taxes. It made me sad to see her struggle. She doesn't even have air conditioning and everyone knows how hot trailers get.

One really weird guy but I suppose there's always one of those. One christian girl who is very sheltered but also very sweet. One really good looking guy - think of George Clooney but with a large dose of sarcasm. Another guy who's really young and felt secure enough with me to talk about his aging dog that has arthritis. I think some of the other guys gave him shit for loving that old dog but hell, he's had her since he was 7 years old. He showed me a picture of her and OMG I wanted to hug her! I gave him lots of advice that may help her feel better as I had a dog with really bad hips and she made it til she was 16 and a half.

There was the 3 people who ran the show, traveling from town to town opening stores. I can just imagine the pressure they're under. One guy - the supervisor would walk around talking to himself. One time he stopped near me and picked a box up, then set it back down saying "it'll be ok, it'll all be ok." That's stress management there.

All in all it was really cool. So many personalities and not one fight or argument, just 16 people working to get it done.

~~~shark~~~~~~~