I can't sleep.
Mostly because a headache has decided to make itself painfully obnoxious and is preventing me from getting any actual rest. Which...do I know why I have a headache? I do not. Was it from taking a nap after work yesterday? Was it dealing with an odd grouping of people I encountered while my roomies and I were Pokémon Hunting desperately trying to find me raids to go to so I could catch the Legendary Bird Zapdos? Quite possibly as it started soon after leaving that group.
But all in all.
It's one of those headaches that doesn't let me sleep.
It's one of those headaches that is unwilling to go away quietly after I take meds and take actions to get the headache to release its hold on me.
Not the best thing to deal with when I have to get up and go to work in like an hour and a half or so.
And normally I would be trying to still sleep right now.
But.
I just woke up from a really rather stressful dream.
Which I always have weird dreams when my brain is fritzing out underneath a major headache.
But this one takes the cake.
I mean, randomly dreaming about meeting up with my next door neighbor, and going on adventures and such around town via a train and driving and worrying about getting to a destination on time...that I can handle.
But no.
My brain decided to take that dream a step further.
And actually have me dreaming about work.
Actual work work.
Not a dream version of work where it's like part electronics/grocery store/pet store like usually happens when I randomly have those work styled dreams.
No.
I dreamt that we were in the middle of a rush.
And I was on the first register.
Helping customers.
When this older lady.
With short grey hair came up to the register needing to check out.
She kinda reminded me of my Great Grandma Maren in looks...but that's about where the resemblance ended.
Because this dream customer was bonefide certified crazy.
I mean, it probably would have been a normal transaction....if I hadn't accidentally put in the wrong amount of money given to me by this said customer.
The conversation had gone normally, she'd been rather pleasant. Buying items that were dog related and such.
And her total was something like under $30.
And when I was given the cash by her, I should have been giving her $2 back or something.
But when the number popped up. it was like "You only need to give her back 97 cents."
Which we both knew wasn't right.
And I didn't want to try and mentally calculate how much I owed her.
So I pulled out the calculator that we keep at the register, to put in the cash amount she'd given me and minus that from the amount of the transaction in order to get the number of what I actually needed to return to her.
But the calculator was being dumb.
Because every time I'd tried to hit the three....a one would show up on the little calculator screen. O.o
But she and I realized in a bit that I had to hit the one in order to get the three, because somehow or another the number 1 and 3 buttons had been switched.
So finally figuring that out....
it somehow ended up being that I owed her $10 or so. (go figure dream math)
But when I turned to the register....
All my $10 bills were missing. O.o
I had $20s I had $5s I had $1s but all the $10s were missing, and those other bills looked like they weren't the correct amount either.
I mean I'd been standing there with the cash drawer open because I was trying to give money to this customer.
And apparently....I'd gotten so focused that someone had come up while I wasn't looking, and taken money straight tout of my drawer! I'd been stolen from!
But then, I noticed three stacks of bills paper-clipped together.
I know there was one that was like a stack of $100 bills. There may have been $50s or $5s and $1s.
So logically I kinda assumed that one of the managers had taken the $10s for whatever reason to help break change (which doesn't make sense when I had a stack of $100 bills there but I thought it did) and so having 'figured' out the cause of my suddenly weirdly empty drawer. I shoved the three stacks of bills into the register....may have shut it....or been about to shut it.
When I realized that that old woman...
Who'd I'd been attempting to help get the correct change for, and had been having a rather good conversation with.....was flitting about the other registers -that were also busy with customers-
And it suddenly clicked.
This woman was STEALING MONEY from us!!
Now, I'd just had training saying that if we notice a theft, we shouldn't do anything about it. Like confrontational wise and such.
We're supposed to just let the theft happen, but take down details of what the person looked like, what they took, what they were wearing, how their 'getaway car' looks, etc etc.
But I was so shocked I just exclaimed outloud "Are you stealing from us?!"
To which she smirked, and pulled out a bunch of stacks of money from her purse and handed them back to me/placed them in the register.
"Yep!" she said cheerfuly. "To teach you to not get so distracted!" was basically her reasoning.
So apparently she'd seen an opportunity to have a teaching moment and decided to take to a life of crime to see how long it would take me to notice.
And she was rather happy/proud that I had noticed.
"I was just testing you." She explained with a smile. "I don't really want these items." Gestures to cart that suddenly has more than the four items she'd originally been purchasing, but apparently was also buying.
---which...I had taken her money and given back her change....shouldn't she want the items she'd just paid for?
But she was unwilling to do so, and so I was like "Okay...have a great day."
To which she was really pleasant and such.
And I thought she had left the store....as I thought I'd saw her moving through the doors.
-Which is where things now went really wrong-
Because I turned to the next customer and said something like "Sorry for the delay, that was rather crazy." to which the next customer -a woman with chin length brown hair- agreed with.
And I suddenly felt this 'affrontery' emotion coming at me.
I look up....
and the crazy old woman hadn't left the store.
She was still at the doors.
Within ear shot.
Staring at me in an "I can't believe you just said that while I was still here!" sort of way.
Which honestly lady, after dealing with your crazy, you'd be calling your interaction crazy too. *shakes head*
But she went from being super nice to now "I must make it your mission to make your as miserable as possible."
She basically marched back to me.
With the whole "I'm going to report you to corporate and get you fired' etc etc attitude.
I had tried to ignore her, after I realized that I'd said something uncomplimentary to her within her earshot, trying to continue with the customer I was helping without saying anything further to the crazy old woman.
But she basically marched back up to me, and pushed her way in front of me to chat.
And my first response was to try and get her sympathy back up.
So I basically went with tears and trembling lips. Of "I'm s-s-sorry, it's just been a stressful day."
-She wasn't sympathetic to it.
But other customers had seen it -as we were in the middle of a rush, so I had a long line of at least eight customers waiting to be helped.
And I guess the managers also had seen my trouble.
Because while this crazy woman was randomly asking me about the vet -for her dog- and I was directing her -still trying to be nice- to the vet's section of the store behind me,
The managers came up to handle the situation and take over the register for me.
One was my old Petcare manager (who just moved to a different state in real life) and the other is our current VP manager. They kinda tagteamed taking over the register.
And I think the VP promised me quietly that they were going to go grab me lunch after this, as...I guess a reward for having to deal with crazy lady?
But they basically said "go on break Sarnic, we got this."
So I stepped away from register....
But ended up backing up on a different register.
It wasn't like the crazy old woman had just left though.
No...
she was still lurking about making a nuisance of herself.
I was trying to help customers.
But every customer I tried to help, she'd barge in again with things like "How much is this?" "do you know where this is?" "Did you know?" etc.
And I'd answer as politely as I could. Because I was trying to be nice and such.
But she wasn't having it.
Every time I'd turn back to trying to help the other customers in line...she'd be there, and when I'd look back to the customers I was trying to help...it would be a different person standing there.
I dunno if I actually managed to help the ones waiting in line or if they'd given up and gone to a different line.
...I'm thinking it's the latter, because I never got past trying to get the customer's phone numbers, or scanning the first item before the crazy old woman would interrupt and draw my attention to her again.
And she was furious that I wasn't being...helpfully helpful?
Like I was being helpful but not in the way she wanted....
Because honestly, I felt like she was just trying to make my life as miserable as possible.
And then when I wouldn't respond in the way she wanted, she'd be like "I'm so telling corporate!" "I'm totally getting you fired." "This is an outrage!"
And at one point...
I noticed on like Register 2 that one of our metal clamp thingies...
Which I have no idea the purpose of this device...to hold bags? Leashes? I dunno it was a metal thing near the card machine that customers used....was broken.
It was only hanging on by one screw intstead of it's usual two screws...
And I had no idea how it was broken.
Until I jumped back onto register one.
And the crazy old woman came up beside me -again interrupting me trying to do another transaction with a different customer.
With a "You know, I broke that metal thingy on the other register, I think this one should receive the same fate." and reached out to try and do the same thing to the metal thing on Register One.
Knee jerk reaction was for me to knock her hand away, and cover the metal thing with my own hand to prevent her from destroying our property while I continued trying to help the customer in front of me.
and the crazy old woman once more went ballistic!
"How dare you try and stop me!" she railed against me. And moved up behind me to the register itself to try and break another metal thingy there....where I again, knocked her hand away.
"I'm telling the managers about this! I'm complaining to corporate! You can't treat your customers this way!!"
It was totally crazy!!!
I mean this crazy old woman was going out of her way to make my time at the register actual torture, tormenting and harassing me as I was trying to do my job....
All because I happened to remark that "that was rather crazy" (something along those lines) to the next customer in line and she overheard!
How she thought that tormenting me would get me fired...I don't know....because trying to destroy property in order to get me to react negatively to her so that she could complain to corporate that I was a bad employee that was disrespecting customers....
It doesn't make any sense!
I mean, I already knew the managers were on my side, as they tried to get me out of the situation and such because they recognized this woman was crazy.
Honestly, if my brain had been more cooperative I probably would have actually gone on a 'dream break' and had the dream shift or something. But no, instead my brain decided that since we were in the middle of a crazy rush, I would continue to stick around and be helpful. *exhales*
Thankfully.
THANKFULLY
After that last encounter with the crazy old woman trying to destroy some random odd metal thing on the register.
I finally was able to wake up and escape from the crazy dream lady's clutches.
But....
It felt so real.
The whole dream was much more real than others,
where I still feel like it was an actual encounter in real life.
where I could have the strong possibility of going into work today (in like an hour) and when the store opens...I'll end up dealing with the crazy old woman in real life....
I really hope it doesn't happen.
lol. Kinda silly to say really.
But this dream felt so real.
This woman felt so alive.
I halfway wonder if I wasn't having a ghostly spiritual encounter....but if so....I have no idea what the crazy old woman's purpose was....
Because this woman felt like a real living breathing person. She was so real to me in that dream.
Real enough to have me anxious about going to work... *exhales*
But yah....I have the weirdest dreams when I end up with major headaches. *shakes head*
Thankfully this encounter was just that.
A dream.
Until you next read these words;
I'll be watching the leaves.
Enjoy the day!
-Sarnic Dirchi
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