Bag o' bling: Part 1 :)

Six pound bag of jewelry from Salvation Army :)

On Monday, I went out to thrift just a little bit, because I didn't want to leave the dog alone for long, and it was a holiday so not all of the stores were open. Salvation Army had a 50% off all clothing sale, but I didn't buy any clothing. I bought some art and this here bag of jewelry.

Now Salvation Army employees are my favorite. They work really hard, and so many of them have told me how much they appreciate their jobs. Sometimes they recognize me and are a little too friendly, but this is not the norm. So Monday, I got in the only line available. All of the employees were taking the day to clean the entire store, so the only line available was with someone who I'd never seen before, selling fifty hardcover books to a well-dressed woman who appeared to be purchasing books for a model home or something.

Now the cashier was slow with the books. All she really had to do was count them, but for some reason she was ringing them up one at a time. The customer was being super patient too. Off to the side was a man with a scraped-up face, who smelled like cigarettes and looked like he may have been drinking. But he was smiling and not bothering anyone, just patiently waiting to buy a new shirt. So I got behind book lady, and the cashier starts to have an anxiety surge of some kind. She turns to face scrape man and says, "The line is over there!" and points to me. She says it several times because he doesn't move very quickly. He doesn't want to crowd model home woman, so he stands off to the side. The cashier starts yelling at him, "That's not the line! This is the line!" and points to me (we're dealing with a very small space, there are carts involved, and clothing racks in the way). I tried to be calm and encouraging to her. The guy was doing his best and not being a nuisance, but she was clearly disturbed by his face and smell and couldn't get over her fear of him. They reached some sort of detente when he started to get frustrated by her ridiculous demands, and she went back to the books.

In the middle of all of this, and a line of three people behind model home woman, a manager came over to get something and said, "Let me know if you need any help, k hon?" The cashier is in so much distress at this point that she can't even respond, and the manager walks away. Face scrape man yells "She needs help!" He rushes over to the manager, points to the cashier, and repeats, "She needs help!"

All three of us in line moved across the store to the other register. When I left, the cashier was still ringing up the books.

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