the home depot chronicles, part 34

i’ve been thinking about writing, or at least detailing my more interesting stories from being a professional shopper. granted, i’m not solely a shopper, nor am i a personal assistant type shopper. i do a lot of the shopping for the santa fe opera scene shop during the winter, and about the same for the electric shop during the summer. yet, i’ve have so many fantastic, and fantastically maddening tales. . . . i mentioned it to my roommate as well. she is also a shopper- she works in the prop shop for the opera, come to think of it, i have another friend, who’s worked as a prop shopper for a couple of theatres. . . man, we could put together a BOOK! too bad, i didn’t write it all down as it happened. . . now i’ll have to make use of my poor memory. . . . but not today!

i’d spent the better half of the day driving from place to place in albuquerque, dropping off broken equipment and picking up a few other items. i only had one place left to go before heading back to the opera to finish out my day. . . home depot. most of my best stories happen here. all i can think is, ‘when will a lowe’s or something move into santa fe? home depot needs some serious competition.’ trust me, whenever feasible i take my business to smaller, more helpful hardware stores. . . . but i still get to home depot anywhere from 2 to 5 times a week on average. . . . sometimes as much as three times a day. . .. those are really bad days.

so, there i was, on a very long line with 3 items.* a couple packages of zip ties, and a broom, that’s it. finally it was my turn, the cashier scanned the two bags of zip ties and then grabbed the broom. the upc had been ripped off the cardboard packaging. i hadn’t noticed. . . and since i abhor having to wait for a price check, i’m usually very careful to make sure everything has it’s pricing. i’m especially careful when i need to have something cut, like a piece of molding or some electrical wire. i ask for the sku# as well as a sticker from the worker that made the cut, so there is no question. . . . but there i am, with no bar code. the cashier looks as me and says, ‘there’s no bar code.’ i say, ‘damn, i didn’t even notice.’ she stares at me a while, and i can see the wheels turning. i know exactly what she’s thinking, she wants me to go get a different one. but no way am i rolling over and acting like it’s my fault that the upc was ripped off her company’s merchandise. so i stand there and stare back. she picks up her walkie and says, ‘well i can call someone, or you can go get another.’ at this point i have a very rapid argument in my head. the first side went something like this, ‘well, doesn’t this company employ and pay people on the floor, in part for this purpose? and why should i be doing my job as well as your co-worker’s job?’. . . . but then i quickly thought of all the wonderful (sniff sniff. . . that would be sarcasm) help i’ve received on the floor of this fine establishment. i smiled real big and said, ‘well, i bet i’ll be faster.’ and turned on my heels. i really wish i had added a, ‘won’t i?’ to the end of it, just for added rhetorical snarkiness. after all, the store has just had some major remodeling. . . and it takes me a couple extra minutes to find whatever i’m looking for, now that it’s all moved around. . . . and if it takes me a couple extra minutes, then it will take their employees at least double what it takes me. i arrive back, with my upc emblazened broom, pay, and leave. . . . seething.

of course the rest of my day went to suit. my computer died, well actually exploded yesterday- no shrapnel. . . just a big POP and fizzle. i got a new tower the same day, but the program i use to budget wasn’t working. that got fixed shortly after i got back to the opera. i started going over some of the receipts, and went to print. . . but that function wasn’t working. . .right at a few minutes to five. . . so IT is gone, and i don’t get to finish anything. arg.

it’s possible that dealing with home depot is just slightly less annoying than dealing with sprint customer service. it’s a good thing there are no infants in my day to day life. . . days like this make me want to punch babies.




*note, there is always a long line. there are only about 2 or 3 cashiers at one time. an extra cashier will try to persuade you to move to the self check out which will promptly break down, or won’t scan your large package or read it on it’s weight sensor correctly, then prompting you to ‘please place package in bag area“ for 3 minutes before the manager resets it, or it will need a paper receipt roll change as you go to pay. in my case, i still need to have the cashier come around to check my tax exempt card, then hunt down the proper tax exempt forms which are (usually) readily available at a non self check out station. . . all in all, more trouble than standing in line for a while.