As The Station Turns 7/27

 Despite the date I didn't go buy a lottery ticket.

When I got to work Mrs. Late Guy was there. What the heck? I thought I was covering her shift today. Oh wait, this is Monday and I'm covering her shift tomorrow. For once she had gotten out of her drawer before I got there so I could count in and go to work instead of waiting. I don't know why they don't do this every Monday. 

Mrs. Late Guy had closed her drawer early because Mr. Late Guy had to do something across the street at the Haunted Station and she was going over there to cover the register. While she was gone I was busier than heck but as soon as she came back the place dropped off to nothing. It's odd how every Monday is like that. She decided to do some of the side work including dumping all the outside trash and giving the restrooms a good once over. I forgive her for yesterday. And since business was slow for the rest of the day I didn't have to do them before I left so that worked out well. 

A lot of drivers are carrying fleet cards that they need to authorize on their phones before they can use them. The problem is that there are several FAA towers on the mountains around town and there are phone companies that don't have towers in the area. Once you are in our little valley you are cut off. They want to know if they can use the station's wifi but I don't have the code, and I'm not going to let them link to my phone, that leads to all kinds of problems. Today I sent a driver to McDonalds since they have free wifi. btw, they rebuilt McDonalds a few years back but it sits next to a drainage creek and is slowly sinking, they are in the middle of redoing their drive thru, again.

A semi came in and his turn signal was hanging off the bumper by its wires. Mrs. Late Guy was laughing hard at the site, dangling there, blinking away. The guy saw it and jammed it back in place. I figure he would at least buy some tape for it. I hope they don't do a serious examination at the border checkpoint. 

Today was Break Down Day. One truck was sitting out back with blocks behind the wheel. The woman came in and was crying and wanted to know if she could use the phone, Mrs. Late Guy let her. I have no idea what was going on there but about a half hour later they were gone. Then there was a guy who ran out of gas, he was parked behind the station and didn't have enough gas to pull around to the pump, dude, you pulled into a gas station, fill up and then go park. He found an old antifreeze bottle, got a gallon, got his truck started and then filled up. Logic is in short supply in the world today.

A guy was mumbling under his breath about the price of things as if I personally set them just to make his life more difficult. I've considered getting cards with the words "Complaint Line" printed on them along with the number for the White House. Go ahead and call and tell them you aren't happy with prices in the modern world. Anyhow he went out his card wouldn't work at the pump. He came in to complain but turned around and left before I got a chance to say anything. Thankfully he left but since his bank is blocking his card it wasn't going to work anywhere else.

Yesterday I left the windows at my house open and as the day went along the clouds rolled in, there was lightning on the horizon and I kept my fingers crossed until I got off work. Thankfully no rain. Today I closed the windows and it poured....off in the distance, it never rained in town. However it's been so dry that when I looked out the window I saw smoke at a distance, great a wildfire. However it was on a big time ranch and they must have sent out a crew, they stomped it down quickly. 

I looked out and a group of girls were doing pushups on the lot. I don't know if I would put my hands on the ground out there, who knows what kind of nasty stuff has been on it.

Some spammer called and asked for the old owner. Sorry dude, you'll have to call some other time. 

The ice maker broke down over the weekend but now it's back up and running. Since it was slow I filled the hoppers on the soda machines and the bags in the freezer. When the Graveyard Shift came in the immediately checked it. They annoy the crap out of me because they want to claim they are the only ones who do anything.

The Boss came by, he wanted to make sure I remembered that I am covering shifts this and next week. He was pretending to steal money out of the charity jar and then dropped a couple of quarters into it. I pulled out a fake $100 I carry around, to drop in interesting places, and pretended I was going to put it in the jar. He said if I did he would replace it with one of his own. I verified, that if I dropped it in the jar he was going to give me a $100 bill. He said yes. I said he had better take a good look at the bill before I did it. He said he could take it and give it to the Dyslexic woman and she'd probably take it even though it's really obvious that it is fake. I told him the Graveyard Shift Guy would too.

The Boss also told me the new bridge project was going to be pushed back until next year, they've already put it off for three years. The company wants to rent the lower lot at the Haunted Station for their trucks so he talks to them on a regular basis. Oh well, 6 months until the fun starts. Also I do a daily photo of the same thing on Instagram and picked the view because I knew things were going to change. Perhaps I'll come up with something new for the rest of the year since it's not really interesting.

it was towards the end of the night and I looked out, there were two cars sitting at the pumps but they weren't getting any fuel. After a while I got annoyed. I decided that the way to get rid of them was to pretend I was going to the restroom and then they would actually do something. Sure enough, they drove off. I seriously need to think about mopping the floor the next time I buy a lottery ticket, it seems to make things happen.

Early in the day everyone paid with twenties and I had to drop change out of the safe, even break open a couple of rolls of coins. At the end of the night everyone paid me with their loose change and I had to roll coins. The ebb and flow of money makes me laugh.