Ok, it seems like every week, there is always something interesting that happens to the place I work at, and for some reason, I’m there to witness these crazy things that happen, or just to run into the most interesting people, that you’ll ever meet.
Low rise tenement/low income housing, I’ve been in a lot of these things all across Belleville, and let me tell you, there are A LOT of these buildings here. Its good on one hand, that it helps people that really need it, but bad on the other because, it attracts a lot of bad people who are able bodied, but sit around all day and suck off the system. Anyways, there always seems to be a plethora of interesting people in these buildings, now I’m not talking about interesting as in to talk to, its more of an interesting as in who these people are. So when I go out on the truck to deliver free stuff to people who need them, I usually end up delivering them to these low-rises. First off, there are no elevators in these buildings, so when you have to deliver gigantic couches that are heavy as hell, up 3-4 flights of stairs, down narrow hallways, and into these puny apartments, its enough to make you hate life, because there is a stove to go with that couch.
Anyways, sometimes if your lucky, you actually get to go deep inside these apartments, like with this one lady, she had something like 5 cats (I am allergic to cats by the way) and we had to make a delivery to her place, upon arriving, we (the driver and I) run into a deaf woman, a blind woman, and a bunch of odd rubberneckers peering out from their doors. So I am in this woman’s apartment dropping off some boxes of goods, and one of her cats just start hissing madly at the box, and me. I seriously thought it was going to gnaw my finger off. But anyways, after bringing a sofa into her apt, I’m supposed to get her to sign a sheet of paper, and leave, because there are other people that need stuff too, and their stuff is not going to arrive on its own, unfortunately, the lady asks me to screw on the legs to the chair, with the Deaf, the blind lady, and the receiver of the goods, who could have done it her self. Now I am not being mean or anything, its just that first of all, its not my job to put the dishes, and the forks into your cupboards, or put legs on a couch, secondly, there are other people that need their stuff as soon as possible, I can’t cater to the needs of every individual there. Unfortunately, there are people that actually ask me to rearrange their furniture. Expecting us to cater to their every need, when they are receiving the stuff for free! There is another thing I don’t like when we are delivering this stuff to some “needy” people, and they have several able bodied people (males) that could easily help out to carry this stuff in, but just stand around, and point to where they want their furniture (like we’re Leons). Seriously now, they are in perfect shape, they could easily go out, get a job and PAY for this stuff from the store, but they don’t. There have been many scammers that do it to us many times, its unfortunate, but it does happen a lot.
This one day when the driver and I loading on peoples vouchers (AKA free stuff), a coworker called the houses to check if the person was home so that when we deliver to their place, they’ll be there to get it.
So when the woman receiving the stuff picked up, and said she was at home, she began to talk about how depressed and suicidal she was, then remarked about how she had a razor. The coworker quickly hung up the phone after a prompt warning. But we were to deliver to her place anyways. This woman lived in a loft in one of the downtown buildings, now, it may sound like lofts are amazing, I have to go out and say, these lofts are terrible, many of them are dilapidated dumps, with absentee landlords only there to collect the checks every month. So the best part is, there is only one way in, from the main street, so we had to park this big ass cube truck, half on the curb, and half on the street, in downtown, now if you been downtown, you know how small the street is. Anyways, upon arriving at the woman’s apt, we knocked waited, and no one answered the door…hmm I wonder why she isn’t there? So when we were leaving the hallway, the driver noticed dried up blood splattered all around the hallway, and stairs. It was an interesting observation, and we promptly left the building.
There are many low rise tenements around town that are really poorly maintained, with the most shiftiest people in them, again, not all shifty some are really awesome people. I think one day someone is going to go beserker and go on a shooting spree when I am delivering stuff to their place.
A few days ago, around lunchtime, I returned from getting my lunch across the street at the 7 Days Burger house which has 2 for 1 Burgers (Clearly a plug), When I entered the store, there was this long line up at the cash, and a woman standing there yelling bad things at the manager, about the store, and the customers. I minded my own business and went upstairs to the eating area because I didn’t want to get involved in the petty squabbling among the customers.
When another employee returned from the downstaris, she told me what just unfolded (the yelling is still happening at this point). A woman accused another woman of butting inline, and then the other woman got mad and slapped her in the face(there is more, but I’ll get to it). It was kind of funny to hear, so when the situation was contained, and the lady was banned from the store, the boss reviewed the tape with us, and it was quite the scene.
here’s what went down. The woman is a usual at our store, so the clerks knew who she was. What happened was that she put her stuff down at the counter so that she could get checked out, but what happens was she put the stuff down, left the line (there were a few people behind her) and decides to check out the stand of stuff behind the counter (not exactly behind, but a bit to the right). Expecting for the rest of the line to wait for her she takes her time, the lady at the cash doesn’t know what to do, so she checks out the second lady in line, but right in the middle of the checkout, the woman comes back into the line, expecting the lady to cash her out, the other lady tells her to wait, so when she hears this, she just starts talking trash about her, and the store. It was insane I heard her say that everyone in the store was ignorant, and that people should wait in line…So on an so fourth. With the other lady RIGHT BESIDE her, she began calling her ignorant, stupid, and many other names. Well the other woman got fed up, and gave her a nice slap in the face, then a fight almost broke out, but the other woman’s husband split them up. And after calling an employee an alcoholic making a huge scene and basically pissing off everyone in the store, the woman was finally kicked out. A few hours later, the pigs came, and asked a bunch of questions, thankfully I didn’t have to deal with them (because I really didn’t see anything), and we all know how much I Love the Police.
work is great
