Back to the Drear

It's overcast today, so overcast that the sunrise was nothing more than a paler and paler graying of the light.  Bah.  If I have to get up before the crack of dawn I want dawn to CRACK, I want some drama, a blast of color, not just a pallid ooze into being.

I had customers yesterday.  Paying ones.  Big paying ones.  A guy came in to buy a new mask ($70) and ended up buying two .5mm suits, a snorkel, two pairs of booties, and two pairs of fins along with his mask for a grand total of just over $600--and that was with a volume discount, plus I threw in 2 bottles of defog.  See? I do remember what to do with a customer--upsell.  Actually he pretty much sold himself, I just came up with an answer to comments like, "I was thinking of fins..." and "what about a thinner suit?"  The other guy came in for books & tables to start learning a specialty, and the third came in for an airfill.  Hey, customers all count whether they spend six bucks or six hundred.  One thing I'll miss not working next week is INVENTORY.  Mrs. Boss says they'll do one while they're both there; I say hallelujah, leave me out of it, that way if there's a discrepancy (and there will be, there always is) nobody can blame moi.

I think I might be able to get to the cuff of my second sweater sleeve later today, tomorrow for sure (I'm almost at the end of the khaki now), then all I'll have to do is do the neckline, wash it, block it (pat it into shape while it dries), and I'll have a new cardi.  That's only taken me 4 1/2 years to knit.  I'm great at starting; I need to up my finishing game but I'm working on it.

This is the last day I have to work and then I'll have 10 days off.  No, really, I counted them.  Ten days.  In a row.  (without pay but... *shrugs*)  A lot of relaxation and goofing off can happen in 10 days.  *nods confidently*  Maybe even some sleeping in.  Although I kind of don't like waking up much past 7 o'clock because then it seems like I'm burning daylight.  Speaking of daylight, it's barely making it today, these are some thick clouds.  I'm okay with it as long as there's no *looks around furtively and whispers* snow.  I know the deer hunters want it for tracking (gun season opens Saturday) but I'll pass.

November 21--Man Ray, Jacqueline Goddard.  When the lightning flashed Gwen looked like a photo negative.  Even with the curtains drawn, the flash was so bright it hurt her eyes.  The storm had to be right overhead because the lightning and thunder overlapped.  The sound rattled the silverware in the drawer and made her clap her hands over her ears.  She sat on the second last step of the stairs in the hall with her jeans-clad knees drawn up nearly to her chin.  She had almost rolled into a ball to protect herself from the assault of noise and light.  The rain came, pounding on the roof like fists, and flinging chips of hail at the windows like it was trying to break into the house.

The clock just chimed 8 o'clock, time for breakfast and work going.  Oh, Durwood's van had to be towed in yesterday because it wouldn't start and evidently wasn't the battery so I got to park in the garage when I came home from work.  That was odd, I never get to park in the garage anymore.  Fingers crossed I remember to open the garage door before I back out of the driveway.
--Barbara