That one brain cell
Dec. 23rd, 2024 09:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
offcntrYou know how, in some interactions, there's only one brain cell between the bunch of you, and you're pretty sure it isn't yours?
A couple came into the booth, because she spotted the squirrel painted mug. They've moved from Eugene to Lowell, and only just seen their first squirrel, used to see them all the time in Eugene. He asked if she wanted to buy it and she nodded like a bobble-head. So I took it off the shelf, wrapped it, bagged it, and set it on my chair. Recorded the sale in my notebook. He took out a hundred-dollar bill to pay for it, and I asked him to hold onto it while I sorted out the change. While I do so, we're talking about my drawings, the paint brushes I actually make from squirrel tail, I'm counting three singles, a twenty, and the fifty from the back of the pouch, count them out again to him and he goes to put them back in his wallet. Wait a minute, I say, You didn't give me the hundred back. Oh, that's right, and he pulls it out, we joke about the one brain cell, and they turn to leave.
Wait, she says, Did we get our mug?
So I give them the bag, and we laugh again, and two minutes later, as I'm entering the transaction into Square--we track all our sales, cash and card, makes it much easier to balance the books--I realize I charged them for a $27 tall mug, not a $25 painted mug. I go looking in the direction they left; they're not in my aisle, nor down across the front, so I double back in the next aisle over, and fortunately find them there, just behind my back neighbor. You didn't have to do that, she said. I did, I said. It's not just the guilt; not having the books balance would have driven me crazy.
A couple came into the booth, because she spotted the squirrel painted mug. They've moved from Eugene to Lowell, and only just seen their first squirrel, used to see them all the time in Eugene. He asked if she wanted to buy it and she nodded like a bobble-head. So I took it off the shelf, wrapped it, bagged it, and set it on my chair. Recorded the sale in my notebook. He took out a hundred-dollar bill to pay for it, and I asked him to hold onto it while I sorted out the change. While I do so, we're talking about my drawings, the paint brushes I actually make from squirrel tail, I'm counting three singles, a twenty, and the fifty from the back of the pouch, count them out again to him and he goes to put them back in his wallet. Wait a minute, I say, You didn't give me the hundred back. Oh, that's right, and he pulls it out, we joke about the one brain cell, and they turn to leave.
Wait, she says, Did we get our mug?
So I give them the bag, and we laugh again, and two minutes later, as I'm entering the transaction into Square--we track all our sales, cash and card, makes it much easier to balance the books--I realize I charged them for a $27 tall mug, not a $25 painted mug. I go looking in the direction they left; they're not in my aisle, nor down across the front, so I double back in the next aisle over, and fortunately find them there, just behind my back neighbor. You didn't have to do that, she said. I did, I said. It's not just the guilt; not having the books balance would have driven me crazy.