Yes, I Can Smile, but You're Not Nathan Fillion.

My jobs are driving me to drink.  I’ve been thinking about including a drink review section to this blog, since I have so many ideas and new and interesting things I want to talk about and share with people, so you may start seeing that as a feature.

Tonight I was drinking Sambuca and gin.  Not together, because that would taste like Satan’s candied asshole.  I keep my Sambuca in the freezer because I like sipping it straight, but nice and icy cold.  I love black licorice.  I can’t have black licorice, because it’s full of wheat flour, which is my kryptonite, or my palladium poisoning, however nerdy you want to get.

My current gin of choice is Plymouth Gin.  What’s that, you ask?  It’s not London Dry, the most popular style of gin, as sold under the names Gordon’s, Beefeater, Tanqueray and Bombay Sapphire.  Plymouth Gin is a smoother, slightly sweeter gin, made by Coates and Co. starting in 1793.  It’s the only surviving gin to be specifically named in the Savoy Cocktail Book, which is the first and most important bible of Mixology.  Most importantly, it doesn’t have all the super bitter and strong botanicals of Bombay, a ‘new’ style of gin.  Put simply, it doesn’t taste like you just sucked off an angry smurf that hasn’t washed his dick in a week.  In January of this year I had the pleasure of trying out Fentiman’s sodas.  They are pretty much amazing and super tasty.  I like Plymouth Gin mixed with the Rose Lemonade, it’s just the right amount of sweet and floral.  If you can’t get Fentiman’s where you live (try organic markets and natural foods stores), then grab some normal lemonade and add a dash of rose water.  I found regular rose water at the local Superstore, so it’s more common.

Gin is a tricky spirit.  It’s not like vodka where you can mix it with almost anything and it’ll be good.  Depending on what you want to mix it with, you need different gins.  A stronger gin like Bombay and Tanqueray need to be mixed with something that has a stronger flavour, in my opinion, and they tend to make bad martinis.  Too bitter.  If you want a good martini, you need an ‘older’ style of gin, like Gordon’s or Beefeater, Plymouth or Oxley.  They have fewer bitter herbs, so they mix better with vermouth and fortified wines.

It’s been a bit longer between entries than ‘normal’ I guess, but I’ve been trying to wait until I had something to talk about other than ‘this shitty person did this horrible thing to me’ and ‘this guy said this awful sexist thing to me’.  Honestly, I think my days of customer service jobs are coming to, if not the end, then at least the third act.  I don’t know how much more I can take; these jobs truly lower my opinion of humanity more than they raise it.

I think it was Thursday last week when the following story takes place.  There’s a guy at the liquor store that I’ve been having some issues with for several months.  By ‘issues’, I mean we used to get along and he would be nice, until one day I guess I was looking a little down or something, and instead of asking me how I was and trying to be nice and cheer me up, he decided that ‘his cashier’ revealing that she’s merely human and displaying something other than champagne-bubbly cheerfulness at seeing his messy-haired head was unacceptable.  He said two of the most offensive and reprehensible words that you can say to anyone, let alone a cashier:

‘Cheer up!’

Rage.

Pardon me for being human and displaying a range of emotions rather than cardboard peppiness.  There’s a big difference between ‘not bringing my problems to work’ and revealing that I’m not actually a robot programmed to always smile and felate my customers.  If your ego can’t handle that a cashier, even a person you see a couple times a week, has moods and maybe has something in her life that is keeping her from being I-just-met-Nathan-Fillion-happy when she sees you, perhaps the cashier is not the problem.  Yes, that’s a level of happiness.  I met Mr. Fillion recently and my face nearly split in half from smiling so hard.  It was every bit as lady-gasmic as it sounds.

Ever since that first time, Skinny Messy Guy (SMG) has done nothing but harass me.  The first thing he usually tells me is that hated, two-word command (as if I were a puppy), usually followed by some other mildly rude words.

‘Why can’t you smile?’

‘What’s wrong with you?’

‘You look grumpy.’

‘You should smile, I’m here.’

‘Why are you always so bitchy looking?’

‘BECAUSE I HAVE TO LOOK AT YOUR STUPID, ARROGANT FACE EVERY TIME YOU COME HERE, THAT’S FUCKING WHY.’

I think SMG thinks he’s more charming and funny that he really is.  Either that or he’s (unconsciously) using ‘pick-up artist’ techniques and criticising me in order to make me feel like I have to win his approval, and thereby drawing me in to a dependant relationship.  He has flirted with me before, saying shit like he’ll eventually get in my pants, or I’ll eventually find out what he’s like in bed.  It’s usually worse when it’s just me and him in the store.  None of this ever really happens if other staff members are there.  Problem is, he has a girlfriend, and a kid, and is a self-absorbed motherfucker, and I would rather eat my own shit than see him naked.

About a week ago, he came in and did the whole ‘cheer-up’ routine, except his girlfriend was with him.  I ignored him, helped other customers, and when he had purchased his beer and was leaving, he made some rude comment about me looking bitchy and I just turned to him and said, ‘You and I have discussed this before and you know – ‘ and he cut me off to say something like, ‘yeah whatever’ and went out the door.  I spoke to my boss that night, and asked her to say something to him.  She agreed.  The next day he came in and was polite as all get out, just said ‘hi’, ‘how are you’, and ‘thanks’ as he was leaving.  I was pleasantly surprised, but figured maybe his girlfriend had given him shit for being a total asswipe to me.

Cue this Thursday.  He came in; it was a lull between busy periods.  He grabs his 8-pack, comes up to the counter and we have what I thought was a fairly normal conversation.  Until he decided he wanted to show me his tan line and so he pulled down his shorts.  Like, bare-assedness, full cheeks, pulled down and said, ‘Look at my tan line!’

I didn’t, of course, and just said, ‘Jesus, SMG, I don’t want to see your ass!’  He got mad, and yelled at me to just look, and I refused, so he angrily pulled his shorts back up and left, all the while abusing me verbally.

Honestly?  I could charge him with sexual assault for that shit.  I won’t, but it would probably stick if I was adamant.  It would be different if he was a friend, but you don’t go up to someone who very obviously doesn’t like you, who you constantly verbally abuse, and try to force her to look at your naked ass cheeks.

Later on that night, Grandpa came in.  Not my bio-grandpa, no relation at all.  I call him grandpa because he came in one night and announced his son had just had his second child, making him a grandpa again, and from then on I told him I was calling him grandpa.  He’s totally cool with it, he’s awesome like that.  We have some good talks, cheer each other up, and get along really well.  He’s not quite old enough to be my actual grandpa, but, as my boss said, at least I’m not calling him Daddy.  That’d be weird.

I told Grandpa about SMG, since he’s one of the customers who I don’t treat like customers, I treat like a friend.  He was upset on my behalf, and made a snarky comment that cheered me up.  Sadly, I can’t remember it, but I blame that on the two accidental glutenings this week, the fact that’s it was 2 days ago, it is now 1 am, and that I’ve had several drinks.  Just imagine something funny and witty, yet slightly disparaging towards SMG and his ‘manliness.’  It made me feel better about my day, and if I ever remember what it was, I’ll be sure to let you know.