Difficult phone calls make me nervous. At the moment there are a couple of numbers that my fingers don’t really want to dial. People who have made me promises, people who haven’t delivered… part of me wishes that everybody (including myself) simply let their yes be yes and their no be no.

I remind myself that these phone calls pale into insignificance when I compare them to the dreadful phone calls I had to make as a Veterinary surgeon. It is important to ask questions first and to always remember that there are imperfect human beings on both ends of the line. I also believe that confrontation provides us with an opportunity to strengthen rather than weaken relationships.

Man I wish I didn’t have to make these phone calls…

Hmmm busy times in Beverly Hills. I am truly loving life in America though.

In the last 24 hours I have been interviewed on “Animal Talk” radio in regards to our 3-legged dog casting campaign for our feature film Lucky & Rich. I am in the middle of creating “World 3-legged Dog Idol” an online internet show which will involve a weekly challenges and an audience vote… until only one tripod champion remains.

Please click the link below and check out our 12 tripod finalists, they are all incredible and they each tell their own uniquely courageous story….

“World 3-legged Dog Idol.“

If you have a contact in the Pet Food Industry we’d love to talk to you in regards to sponsoring this incredibly funny, whacky, inspirational campaign. We believe we can provide you with a huge amount of goodwill and exposure with very little financial risk.

End of Sales Pitch.

Hell hath no powers of analysis like a woman dumped. That, anyway, is the message I got from Sophie Calle’s exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery. Calle has made a career out of recording her journeys and experiences, and creating strange experiments and inviting strangers to participate. The first one I knew of was Sleep, when she invited strangers to sleep in her bed, photographed them and asked them to talk about the experience. It’s the kind of art that makes some people roll their eyes. The same people, I imagine, who ‘don’t read poetry.’ What’s the point? they ask in frustration, to which the only answer is, what’s the point of anything?

This project began when she received an email from a lover telling her it was over. He sounds like a real bounder – one line was something along the lines of ‘you always said you didn’t want to be the fourth girlfriend and I am sparing you that indignity by dumping you’. So, like any artist worth her salt, she cannibalises her heartbreak unflinchingly, and comes up smiling – or at least, no longer weeping – with a brilliant new exhibition. Good for her.

She chooses 107 women of various professions and ages to analyse the letter. Sort of what you do with friends when this kind of thing happens, but taken several stages further. And the exhibition is a record of their responses – images of them reading the letter, written reactions to it, video footage of an actor reciting it, even a short story written by a children’s author that makes it into a sort of fairytale. A proofreader marks up repetitions. A young writer boils the email, eats it and declares: it tastes of cowardice.

A headhunter concludes that the man ‘would be used profitably from time to time in companies that are restructuring’, while Calle’s mother’s no-nonsense words are gradually obscured by blurred glass.

Others are very funny. A clinical pychologist ends with ‘he must have a small kitchen, and cook up tasty little meals. He must have charm but not be classically handsome. He is an authentic manipulator, perverse, psychologically dangerous and/or a great writer. To be avoided at all costs.’

Another writer, Christine Angot, is more blunt: ‘If Sophie had loved his as much as she said, she wouldn’t have summoned a whole squadron of women to help her get over it. The choir you have formed around this letter is the choir of death.’ Jeez, Angot, tell us what you really think.

A police captain responds wisely: I understand Madame Calle’s complaint, but in penal terms it is not admissible, for their appears to be no financial loss, and as for the moral prejudice, it is inherent in all amorous relationships, for don’t we all fall in love at our own risk? And my favourite is a young schoolgirl’s response: he says he would have liked things to turn out differently. That means they are going to turn out badly. It is sad.

It’s somehow a very writerly exhibition, not just because there is so much language, but because it looks closely at motivation, and the way an imaginary, unseen character can be perceived in so many different ways, yet have a kind of coherency, too. She builds this man out of words and reactions and even though you never see him you find yourself responding to him, and to her. I suspect she has well and truly got the bloke out of her system by now, but my analysis would be succinct. You dodged a bullet, Sophie. Be grateful.

It’s on until January 3 & the gallery now has a new restaurant, too.

Last summer I was sitting on the train going home from a 24 hour shift at work in Väsby, it was a Sunday night and I was going to meet my best friend A at my place for a relaxing movie night. Working with teenagers for long shifts can be a handful even if I love my job, so I was already longing for the 35 min ride home to be over when I entered the train. On the same train was a dark haired girl that had been on the same buss as me towards the train station. She had to run so she wouldn’t miss the buss and consequently the train that only goes once every half hour, I remember that I thought she was pretty and wondered for myself where she had her roots since she looked like she could have the same origin as me. She stumbled on to the buss while putting her shoes on, which she had taken off to run faster and now sat down in front of me. While trying to catch her breath she smiled and said – I made it! I smiled back and can now not remember what I replied to her but the conversation ended there, with me still wondering where she got all her colours. After we got of the buss I lost her in the crowd. 

Not more than five minutes after the train had rolled of the platform it stopped, not even getting to the next station. The voice from above (the driver, not god!) announced; “we will be standing here for a minute”. My first thought was; GREAT probably someone has jumped infront of the damn train again! Just my luck being tired and going to meet my friend… why does this always happens when I AM taking the damn train! Around ten minutes later the voice said that it looks like we would be standing here for a while, making my prediction become true (it was not the first time this happened to me, nor was it the first time this specific summer). I messaged my friend that I would be late and after sitting there for some time being pissed about why people didn’t choose to take their life in a simpler, less painful and less annoying to others way, I got restless and walked through the train cart to the beginning of it, inside of course since we were all held hostages until further notice. From the window I got a glance of the guy before they covered him up with black plastic, one part of him was lying further away detached. I turned back and started walking towards my seat again feeling ashamed for thinking of the inconvenience this caused me when a person, a fellow human being actually was feeling so unhappy with life that he choose not to be a part of it anymore…

So why do people choose to take their lives?

According to Emile Durkheim a sociologist active in the late ninetieth century who studied suicide statistics, the suicide rate of different countries are fairly stable over time, i.e. if around 20 people choose to take their life in Sweden and 35 in England this year there will be about the same amount of people choosing to take their lives next year as well. What this means is basically that there is a predetermined rate of people that will take their own lives, that there are people walking around not knowing not aware of the fact that they will commit suicide. Even though Durkheim’s study has some methodological problems with some countries not willing to report the actual suicide rate, foremost due to religion where it is considered a sin to commit suicide, he drew the conclusion that the rate of suicide in different countries were a reflection of the level of integration in society. Basically meaning that the more people felt connected to other people the less chance of them committing suicide… So I reckoned if loneliness, the feeling of not being integrated with others was the reason to commit suicide then I would probably jump in front of a train as well, making people acknowledge the fact that I was there and they didn’t take the time, forcing them to take the time even though it was to late…

As I was walking towards my seat in the train I saw the girl from the buss, I sat down next to her and we started talking about the man lying outside the train. The girl from the buss told me that she came from Iraq and was studying to be a doctor. The voice from above (still not god people!) announced that we would be turning back to the station we came from and that there would be busses going from there. I called my friend that had gotten tired of waiting for me and had started to drive towards where I was. I told her what station to meet me at and when we got there she was already waiting in the car, on the way to my place we dropped of the girl from the buss at her boyfriend’s house just before changing FB names. When we got home I thought what a precarious day… someone taking their life perhaps because of involuntary isolation from other people caused two strangers to become friends. The death of a man making a connection between strangers, giving them a reason to start talking, giving me a opportunity to ask the question I was bouncing in my head from the moment I saw this stranger. I felt angry with myself for needing a reason to start a conversation with a stranger, angry because I felt I needed a reason to speak my mind, angry for the damn norms speaking through me telling me what was and was not appropriate to ask strangers, angry that someone didn’t break those norms before it was to late for the stranger lying on the track.

We are getting ready to go back to the Pet Corporates and seek sponsorship for our “Make a 3-legged dog into a movie star campaign.” You can help me in a really simple way…

Each of these incredibly talented 12 finalists now have their own face-book fan pages. By becoming a FAN of your favourite tripod you will help be helping us and your tripod more than you can imagine.

More fans means more leverage with Pet Food companies… No pressure but if you want too you can also encourage your friends and fellow dog lovers to support their favorite tripod on facebook too. Click on the links below…

Aussie Red – Australia
Bean Collins – Canada
Bradley Montana – USA
Chopper Keys – USA
Jinks Gardner – USA
Maty Kerstetter-Ouchida – USA
Mickey Bassant – New Zealand
Rocky Nuzzolilo – USA
Smudge Woods – USA
Tom Ford – USA
Torpedo Contreras – West Indies
Wit’l Van Brunt – USA

‘Talking to Strangers’ is a new anthology from Sweatdrop Studios, which is debuting at the upcoming October London MCM Expo.  Its a black and white book that boasts a page count of 228 at a standard price of £7 (but will have a special price of £6 over the Expo weekend).  More information, plus page samples, can be found on the thread over on their forums.

This comic is a collection of short stories written by Fehed Said (who also wrote The Clarence Principle) and illustrated by a variety of up-and-coming UK manga talent.  The book features work by

• Sonia Leong, whose work most recently appears in the ‘Domo’ manga, but who also has several other both professional and personal comic titles in print.
• Nana Li, recently the artist for SelfMadeHero’s Manga Shakespeare version of ‘Twelfth Night’
• Chloe Citrine, creator of the popular webcomic ‘Rainbow Carousel’ (of which print volume 1 has now also been released)
• Faye Yong, who most recently worked on the Manga Shakespeare version of ‘The Merchant of Venice’
• Wing Yun Man, who works as an artist for Eyeko Makeup, and has recently been drawing their webcomic

But don’t worry if you can’t make it to Expo!  Sweatdrop assure us that will we be available from their online shop soon after the event.  This promises to be a world-class release, so do keep an eye out for it if you’re going to the show ^_^

Check it out.

Not surprisingly, good grammar and spelling will take you far. Few people would want to go out with someone who types “wats up.” This isn’t middle school.

NTKOG #25: The kind of girl who, in an apparent desire to conserve body heat or show off her killer pheramones, stands really close to other people in public places. Like, will-show-up-in-your-dang-X-rays close.

I am: fiercely protective of my personal space. What? Couches were totally designed for an occupancy of one!

I am not: super into communing with strangers on any sort of physical or near-physical basis, as I learned with my failed experiment in hugging.

The Scene: Today, a treat: a medley of standing-too-close-ness, prepared three ways. If you choose to imagine this as a movie-style montage, may I recommend The Police’s “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” for background music?

What? I just like to be able to watch your uvula dangle as we're talking.

First: Waiting at my T stop on the way to work, I approach the median, which is littered with commuters in their iPod and Starbucks bubbles, each the last survivor of their own personal nuclear holocaust. Or at least you’d think, given the grim devotion with which they avoid acknowledging each other. I scan my victims and choose to stand behind a quite pretty Indian girl wearing a silky orange blouse — one of the few brave survivors sans earbuds. I am so close I can tell you her brand of shampoo (Garnier) and that she might want to consider switching to moisturizing.

For a few moments she stands still — in no small part, I’m sure, because the slightest swivel in either direction would cause her bag to make contact with my person. Then a quick glance back at me. She takes a long pace forward, and I sway slightly in her new direction. She glances back again and takes a book out of her bag, managing, while she does so, to angle herself further away. I take the hint and fall back a few strides into my own morning-fake-apocalypse bubble.

Second: After work and a quick jaunt at the fabric store (where I ended up buying a silky orange fabric for my drapes — subliminal imprinting?), I waited to board a bus to Harvard Square. When I got on, the bus was filled to less than a quarter capacity, with several rows of empty seats. I plumped myself down next to the only other person in the back right of the bus. She casts curious sidelong glances at me while, stop by stop, the bus empties down to just her, me, and one other guy.

Finally she broadly pantomimes that she needs to leave, so I let her out into the aisle, where she stands for the next six stops. We end up exiting the bus at the same place, her rushing a bit ahead.

Third: Once at Harvard Square, I am about half an hour early for the class I am taking, so I look for a place to rest my weary, persona-space-allergic bones. On the shallow white steps of some puritan building or another, a couple sits alone, having a spirited conversation. Casually casting my eyes away, I settle myself one small step below them, only inches away from the man.

Unfortunately, it becomes quickly apparently that their conversation was of a private nature. He is a professor, it seems, and she is explaining in great detail the nature of family emergency that has prevented her from completing her work. As soon as I sit, she sputters out a few words in clunky, impeded phrases, then informs him that she has to run to another class, but they can finish their discussion later.

The man, however, appears unbothered, and remains seated for the next twenty minutes, while he and I both read. Not together, but kind of together, in an oh-the-enormity-of-humanity no personal space kind of way. It’s nice, a little bit, to pretend we are friends sharing a comfortable silence.

The Verdict: Good lord. This was awkward, but not as awkward as I’d imagined it would be. It turns out that accidentally lingering too close to another living person does not, contrary to popular belief, induce spontaneous respiratory shut-down in 100% of cases. In fact, people were, though weirded out, rather nice about it. Not even one snarled “Dude!” or overtly hostile grimace. Just lots of passive-aggressive pantomime — the same types that I perform on a regular basis in these situations.

It kind of makes me wonder whether other guardians of personal space go around, like me, wondering why everyone else seems so much more comfortable being physically close to strangers, and whether it is in some way cold and a bit inhuman to recoil from casual contact. And, I mean, I would ask people about it. But I don’t want to get that close.

Stranger: hey
You: Hey, haven’t seen you on here in awhile
You: How have you been?
Stranger: good
Stranger: m or f
You: M
Stranger: gay?
You: No, sorry, man. But I do like some pretty gay music, if that counts.
You: We can bust it to some Air Supply if you want. I won’t judge.
Stranger: age?
You: 20’s. You?
Stranger: 17
Stranger: are u horny?
You: Uhhh…not for another guy
Stranger:
You: Sorry, man! My penis is the only one I touch.
You: But maybe we could cuddle or something.
Stranger: maby
Stranger: have u got any gay friends?
You: I have a couple of female gay friends
You: But no guys.
Stranger:
You: You’re my first!
Stranger: can i see your penis
You: Well, you’re underage
You: I could get arrested for that
You: I mean, really, I could get arrested just for HAVING this thing
You: So I don’t need two strikes!
Stranger: pleaseee??
You: There are plenty of readily available penises all over the place
You: You’re on the internet, man. It’s a virtual sausage shack.
Stranger: ok
Stranger: bye

http://omegle.com

I’ve been doing a lot of sleeping. I had no idea just how tired I was until I finally stopped… Living hand to mouth without always knowing how I was going to eat or where I was going to sleep in LA has taken it’s toll.

This short break back home in Kiwi-land is exactly what I needed to recharge my batteries. While I have been sleeping some good things have been happening though. The William Morris Agency in New York have asked to see the screenplay for “Lucky & Rich” as they represent Nestle Purina who love our “Help Find Scrap” casting search…

So since good things are happening I’m going to keep on sleeping…

So I am sitting in a low slung bungalow on the outskirts of West Auckland staring at the green, green grass of home. And for my English friends who constantly enjoyed bombarding me with sheep jokes I can see at-least five of my favourite woolly friends… Samson, Delilah, Rudy Trudy, Beth Ann and Roger… yes I know them all by name.

Actually I am using this time to catch up on some rest and recharge the motor whilst my passport renewed and I apply for an O1 Entertainment visa so I can return to LA as soon as possible. I have generally regarded rest as a waste of time which is probably why I feel pretty tired right now.

So I’m going to spend the week doing what I did at the start of the year; resting, praying and re-ordering my life so it is refocussed and a little more sustainable. I know that there are some very big challenges ahead and I want to be fully charged and ready to go when i head back to LA.

Think of it as pre-season training.

Glory be!

My modem broke and I was without internet access at home for a little over a week. Granted, I could check my email and stuff from work, but I don’t blog from there. And I wasn’t about to try it from my phone. Anyway, now that I’ve caught up on about 9 days worth of friends’ tweets, I’m back to blogging. I massively reduced my internet usage while it wasn’t working. I was a lot more productive!

A conversation with a friend led me to an interesting realization: Men are expected (according to society and all) to approach women they find attractive, while women are to be chased. However, men are not as good at reading social cues as women are, so they freeze up during the approach because they can’t tell if the woman wants it.

The friend offered this metaphor: “It’s like God gave all women red plumage, and then made all men red-green colorblind.”

So true.

1. Before you move to Hollywood at least 3 well meaning friends try to convince you that what you are doing is extremely difficult if not impossible – Tick.
2. A “Producer” arranges to meet you at a bar but he never shows up or returns your calls – Tick.
3. You secure your first Agent only to find out that he/she is completely useless – Tick.
4. You secure a large film deal only to have it fall through – Tick.
5. You run out of money completely and have to rely on good friends to support you – Tick.
6. You’re parents are concerned and want you to come home – Tick.
7. Some Jerk says that “he can make it so you never work” and then adds “you will never make a film or be part of a film that more than a few of your friends watch” – Tick.

Here is the real kicker and final part of the story in this series of blogs about my friend Don. Sometimes when you help a stranger in need you may unwittingly be helping a king. The person you help may look homeless, they may appear destitute but there maybe a great and divine reason for their current predicament.

Perhaps all people are kings and perhaps when we help someone less fortunate than ourselves this is the attitude we should carry… such an attitude would certainly help us in part to restore our humanity.

Anyway in Don’s case he really did help a couple of people who I believe will be part of our modern day royalty… business and technology leaders.

The Genius in Vegas is a good king and he was so amazed at the incredible kindness and generosity that Don showed him that he has promised to give him a stake in his future kingdom and turn his hundred into millions.

So you find yourself wallowing in a financial crisis, you are sinking fast and up to your neck in quicksand. There are people watching you; you thought they were your friends, but nobody lifts a finger or opens their wallet. They come up with some reasonable excuses… they just can’t help.

I couldn’t help my friend, the female “Geni” in LA because I was pretty much broke and stuck in a mansion in Vegas; but I knew she was in quicksand and didn’t have anything to eat so I took the plunge and contacted my friend Don. I was thinking that perhaps he could order her a pizza and maybe i could pay him back when I finally did a film deal.

But Don doesn’t do things by halves, he hopped in his crappy car and drove an hour across town, he walked in the door and gave my friend a stranger to him $100. That’s why I salute Don, because he doesn’t just talk about helping people, he doesn’t even just help his friends… Don is an inspiration to me because he will help anyone…

I wonder if we really “earn” our money? Much of our success seems to eventuate from our natural talents that we did not choose and a random chain of events and circumstances that occurred outside of our control; still we always have the choice to use our money or time however we choose.

Which makes the actions of Don William, Peter Frankovich, Michal Mitha and Samaya Lin all the more extraordinary. I mean for some reason in the last six weeks they actually choose to contact me and offer me financial support as I follow my extraordinarily strange film-making dream. Their timing was impeccable; in each case their offer arrived as I was down to my last few cents.

In each case their generosity allowed me to “pay it forward” and financially support an incredible family of people who work at a technology company in Burbank, California. These people have developed revolutionary on-line video technology and had been placed under extreme financial pressure through no fault of their own…

To be continued…

I met a man called Don in LA four week ago; at first glance there is nothing at all remarkable about Don, he is in his early seventies, he dresses very humbly and if he walked passed you right now you probably wouldn’t notice him.

You wouldn’t know that Don has a PHD and you wouldn’t know that he has helped literally tens of thousands of people who are struggling to come to terms with life on the street. I don’t think Don has that much money, the car that he drives can’t be worth more than a grand. But I will say that there is a light and a magic in Don’s eyes that I can’t describe; he’s the only man over seventy who has ever poked his tongue out at me and laughed.

I have already benefited so much from his kindness; when I first met him I have to admit that I was in a bind. I had been chasing my film-making dream so hard that for a couple of days I had nothing to eat except old pizza in the work fridge and some stale cola. Don bought me coffee and at the end of our talk, he pressed $80 into my hand… little did he know that his gift was going to start a chain of events that would change HIS life forever…

P:S: To be continued

Ask any great actor what really makes great acting they will invariably reply listening. Traditionally we think of listening as simply something you do with your ears but it is so much more than that…

Listening could be better described as “engagement.” When actors have great chemistry on screen it is really that they are “engaging” with each other.

It is tempting to also think of listening as a short term thing; but real engagement and trust take place in ordinary life when people really listen to each other over a long period of time. Bad listening is pretty much the essence of poor communication.

Often when I am lonely or bored I realize that it is because I haven’t taken the time to listen.

I have been hanging out with some very entrepreneurial people in LA and it is fascinating to see how differently these people think.

One guy just told me that he works 80 hours/day. Of course I laughed at such a huge exaggeration until he simply said… four computers twenty hours/day.

Another thing I’ve noticed is the absence of fear or greed in respect to money. Running out of cash is not a major concern to someone who’s made and lost millions eight times already.

The other thing that really stands out is a “lack” of finite planning and a high regard for intuition and vision. The great thing about hanging out with people like this is a small amount rubs off and it changes the way you think.

There are a lot of things you can do to help yourself, often it seems that almost all positive change or growth comes through a conscious decision. But sometimes good things happen outside of our choices and control, some people would calls these things co-incidences or acts of fate I like to think of them as miracles.

Do you believe in miracles? What tangible experiences have you had that you cannot explain?

For me I get more of a glimpse of what I believe to be the “miraculous” when I find myself feeling powerless to do just about anything. It’s like being a swimmer caught in a dangerous rip, while you keep on swimming against the current no one will come and rescue you. But once you give up and raise your hand… it’s then that a miracle can happen.

P:S: Write your best miracle story or argument for or against miracles in seven sentences or less. Try to avoid using language that a normal person wouldn’t understand

Someone made a comment about how I’m always smiling and friendly with everyone- which I didn’t think was really true, but as I looked back over the past few days, I realized that I was constantly talking to strangers- in the booth, on the monorail, at the hotel- and it always seemed like there was a “really? Oh I know that place…” or a “me too!” involved. I love to be reminded that even though we’re all so different and living different lives, when you actually engage with a stranger, there always seems to be some coincidence or event that brings you together just for a few minutes, and reminds you that you’re not the only person in the world.

I hate forced interations with strangers. Growing up the main rule in life is ‘don’t talk to strangers’ and now just because I’m an adult I’m supposed to put on a happy face and have small talk with every idiot that decides to strike up a conversation?! I’m sorry but I really don’t think I should have to shoot the shit with the checkout person at the grocery store! Grocery shopping is bad enough on it’s own (having to maneuver a dirty cart full of thawing and spoiling food through the obstacle course of oversized carts with plastic cars full of kids, food displays, arguing couples and crouched shoppers) without having to finish it off by telling the check out person how my day is going. If I had any idea how to ring up produce I’d do self checkout every time and if I had any kind of disposable income I’d order my groceries online and have them delivered - I just can’t justify the inflated prices no matter how tempting it is.

I knew I was in trouble this morning at the grocery store only after I’d emptied half of the contents of my cart onto the conveyor belt so there was no going back. While the lady in front of me was telling the check out boy (he was probably about 19 years old) about her pool party, I noticed there were two blank-faced teenagers manning the plastic bags. They both had ribbons pinned to their shirts that proclaimed “I’m New!” and there was a woman circling the lane in pleated pants and a button down denim shirt with a pin the read “Trainer.”  It was like the perfect storm of my own personal checkout hell - a chatty customer and four people tending to the transaction. Not only that, but after the customer was sent on her way the trainer stopped the presses and gave the check out boy a lecture because he didn’t instruct the previous customer to ‘have a great day.’

As you can imagine after getting reamed for not being friendly enough he was all geared up for me.

COB (checkout boy): Hi! Did you find everything ok?

Me: (trying to be polite) Yes. Thanks.

COB: So how’s your day going?

Me: uh, it’s good. (it’s 7 AM how good can my day really be going already?)

COB: Good to hear! Good to hear!

Me: (silence)

COB: So! Are you enjoying your weekend?

Me: Uh, I guess. (really? you want to know about my weekend? We aren’t on a date dude. You don’t have to fill the silences. Silence is good. It’s the talking that is awkward here)

COB: Good to hear! Good to hear!

Me: (didn’t you just say that?)

COB: Oh! That’s a lot of chicken. Are you having a barbecue?

Me: Uh, no. Just buying chicken.

Trainer Lady: (to tweedle dee and tweedle dum – the new baggers) Make sure the bags aren’t too heavy!

Tweedle Dee and Dum: (nodding silently)

Me: (how much training can bagging groceries really take? There is nothing to learn. Everyone has bagged groceries before – except Beyonce I’m sure)

COB: (as he slams a jar of spaghetti sauce into the side of the scanner) Oops! Don’t worry. It didn’t break. I may be messy but I’m quick.

Me: (that’s probably the last thing I ever want to hear a 19 year old boy say – especially when he’s handling my food. Where is Trainer Lady now? Shouldn’t he get a talking to about that comment?)

 COB: It’s hot out there huh?

Me: (we live in Arizona! It’s August! Of course it’s hot!) Yep.

COB: (realizing he’s done scanning and there is still a mountain of food yet to be bagged) Ok! We’ll just get these things bagged up and get you out of here!

Me: (crickets)

COB: (handing me my receipt) You saved $24.03 today! Have a great day!

Me: (standing awkwardly because Tweedle Dum has disappeared and Tweedle Dee is still bagging so I’m not exactly leaving yet) Uh, thanks you too.

COB: (realizing he blew his ‘have a great day’ load a little too early starts shifting his weight awkwardly)

45 seconds later:

Tweedle Dee: Ok, here you go. Have a great day.

Me: Uh, thanks you too.

Trainer Lady: (giving Tweedle Dee the stink eye) Do you need any help out today?

Me: Nope I’m ok.

Trainer Lady: Ok then! Have a great day!

Me: (practically running ou the door) Uh, thanks you too.

Look I understand this isn’t life or death and I could probably stand to be a little friendlier but can’t I just buy my groceries in peace? I’m all for customer service. Say hello, please, thank you and have a nice day and leave it at that. I really don’t want the 20 questions about how things are going and I certainly don’t need the running commentary on what I bought. And for the love of God just one “have a great day” will do – and if you don’t mind, please save it for when I’m actually leaving!

The first thing I’m going to do when I get my life back from Beyonce is hire someone to do all of my grocery shopping for me.