Shop 'til you drop?

Yesterday I hit the mall, seeing as my to-do list of errands and shopping was getting pretty long and some of it was getting pretty urgent (e.g., I still hadn't shopped for the 2 Operation Christmas Child (OCC henceforth) boxes we were responsible for and they were due this morning). Granted, hitting Scarborough Town/Clown Centre on a Saturday afternoon is a slightly insane thing to do, but when it's gotta get done, it's gotta get done.

I want to tell an entertaining story about my experience at the Bay, but before I do, let me put it in context by telling you all I did before I went to the Bay:

• I submitted some digital files to Wal-Mart's photo centre for 1 hour printing.
• I photocopied some things I needed for two mail-in rebate applications (to get back some of the $$$ I spent on Martin's computer) and sat on one of Shopper's Drug Mart's convenient chairs cutting and taping together all the things I needed to to complete the rebate (talk about jumping through hoops :-P...and yes, I did bring my own scissors and tape with me to the mall to look after this!).
• I sent off the rebate applications via the post office in Shopper's (which for some reason wasn't closed on Remembrance Day like I thought it would've been).
• I bought a bag of stuff at Shopper's for the OCC boxes (plus a couple small things for me).
• I hit the convenient Ministry of Transportation kiosk to renew our license plate sticker. It charges a "convenience fee" of $1 to get the sticker there rather than by waiting in line at one of their offices. My time and stress relief is worth that $1.
  
• Because Dollarama only takes cash, I stood in the massive line at the bank's ATMs (one of the machines was busted, boo) to take out cash to spend at Dollarama. I wish the lineup here was like the (nonexistent) lineup that was at the Ministry of Transportation kiosk.
  
• I spent a lot of time at Dollarama getting 3 more regular-sized bags of stuff for the OCC boxes (every year I do these boxes I find it takes me a long time to figure out if I have everything I want to get that will still fit in the box).
• Now toting 4 bags of stuff, and feeling the fact that I ate nothing all day before beginning my shopping other than a 100 calorie package of light cookies (and it is now after 3 p.m.), I stop at Gateway Newstands in the mall and buy a lemonade and spend a few minutes chugging down half the bottle.
  
• I head back to Wal-Mart to pick up my photos (for the World Outreach bulletin board at church). I look for (in 2 different departments) and do not find photo corners (turns out I have some here at home already, so no biggie).
• Still toting 4 bags of stuff, I go to the Bay where I want to buy a belated wedding present (as in the bride and groom have been married for a few months now). Once I get upstairs to the floor where the gift registry stuff and the furniture is, I find a comfortable chair and sit for a while, chugging down the remainder of my lemonade. A sales clerk asks if I have any questions...I tell him I'm just taking a break and he says no problem. However, another sales clerk comes along a couple minutes later and gives me a dirty look, so I get up soon thereafter.

Okay, so at this point I am tired of shopping, I am still burdened with 4 bags of stuff, I just want to go home, but I am determined not to put off getting this wedding present any longer than I already have. This is where the adventure begins.

Standing at the gift registry computer, I print off all 7 pages of the couple's gift registry. As I am doing so, saleslady #1 is walking up to me and asking how I am. Or is she? She is not looking at me...is she talking to someone behind me? No one seems to respond to her question, but I do not feel she is addressing me, so I start to say "good" or whatever but she is walking past me. <*Shrug*>.

I look at the list and set about looking for things that I can 1) afford and 2) find in the store (let's leave well enough alone any discussion of previous registry shopping I've done at the Bay that would explain my wondering how possible this task is going to be). Saleslady #2 asks me if I need any help. I tell her that first I'll have to pick something (seeing as I only barely started looking at the list) and then try to find it and I'll let her know if I need any help. Okay, she leaves...or, rather, is already leaving.

I originally settle on a set of bath coordinates (y'know, the toothbrush holder and such). As I am walking towards the area I know I will find these items if they are in the store, saleslady #3 says to/asks me, "You printed it out?" Um, what? A registry? Well, yes, that's why I have a printed registry in my hands...I just say "yes" to her and we both keep going. (Given futher interactions I witnessed in the store, I now think she may have thought I was a registering bride who'd just printed off her list for confirmation, which may have surprised her as it seems the staff usually do that printing for their registrants.)

I get to the area where all the bath coordinates are. I see various toothbrush holders and so on but am unable to find the ones my friend registered for in the store. Okay, fine, I have run into this problem at the Bay before; I'll just choose something else.

I see a $65 jug on the list and decide to get that. However, when I get to the area where said jug is being sold (once I figure out where that is) I see the jug and realize it is only about 6" tall. I figure that even though this jug is not cheap, it looks too cheap to make that the only present we give, so I stand there looking at the registry list and start thinking of other options.

It turns out that the dish set my friend registered for is right beside the gift registry area where the salespeople talk to brides and grooms and so on and give them the scanners and explain the process and so on. There are a lot of salespeople in this area, some interacting with couples/ladies and some not. Saleslady #4 sees me trying to figure out what I'm doing and offers her help, though she seems to look down her nose at the 4 bags of stuff I have plunked on the floor next to me. I explain that I was going to get the jug but that despite the price think it's too small to be the only thing I give and, when asked, I give her the price range I'm looking at spending. She takes the jug (which I'd already decided I didn't really want to buy) and goes off to see how much it is (since there is a sale on), but is unable to find a scanner. I point out that there is a cash desk right "over there," but no, she is looking for a scanner to find out the price. She disappears for a while and comes back telling me the new price (it's still about $60). By this point I've already decided maybe I'll get a pair of teacups and saucers instead and have started to look for the ones my friend has registered for. I find the teacups but the saucers I find don't have the right code. Saleslady #4 comes back when I have been looking through the dishes on display for a while and starts trying to find the right saucers for me. She is unable to find them and enlists saleslady #5 to go and look in the back while she continues to check the ones I've already checked.

Saleslady #6 comes by to see how things are going. Her and saleslady #4 decide together that the saucers I want really aren't on display (gee, am I glad I already figured that out for myself). I think at this point saleslady #6 comments that they need to place an order for them, and she takes off not too long after this exchange. Well, saleslady #5 still hasn't come back from checking out the back (I don't actually know which lady was #5 so I don't know if she ever came back), so saleslady #4 takes off for a while, presumably until #5 can tell us what the story is with the stock in the back. I am alone for a bit of time now...and during this time, saleslady #7 asks me if I need any help. I explain to her that I am already being looked after (though I don't tell her by how many people). Saleslady #7 leaves.

Eventually, I decide that I am going to get 4 mugs for my friend instead of the pair of cups and saucers. Saleslady #4 (don't know when she came back) helps me look for them for a little bit, pointing out for me that there are 2 different styles of the white mugs on display (which I'd already discovered). I ask about whether they only come as-is (separate pieces on display) or whether they come in a box or whatnot; saleslady #4 tells me they can put the pieces in a box for me if I'd like and I tell her that would be great. We haven't yet found the 4 mugs I'll be taking home at this point but from what I can see I am confident there are enough of them somewhere on that stand.

If I remember right at this point, saleslady #4 starts to transition me to dealing with saleslady #8 at this point, and they are asking me if I have a points card and/or HBC card, and start explaining to me how everything is already 10% off and I'll save another 10% if I get the card and there is no fee for the card. I can see that even if I do nothing else with this card, it will save me money for free that day, so okay, I decide to sign up. After all, the sign-up for such cards is usually fairly quick and painless.

Saleslady #4 and #8 hand me over to saleslady #9. Thankfully, saleslady #9 pretty much remains with me for the rest of my time in the department. However, saleslady #9, while she knows what she is doing, is pretty thorough, which takes her longer to get things done. It takes us a couple minutes to clarify that yes, I will fill in my personal information on this form myself and she does not need to fill it in for me while I dictate. I am seated at a table in the gift registry area, where I remain like some guest of honour while the salesladies carry out my wishes (but without the kind of speed I wished for). Eventually she goes off with the completed form to set me up with an HBC credit card and points card. She is gone for some time. Eventually she returns with a cash register slip that will act as my temporary HBC credit card until my plastic card arrives in the mail. I am serious, it was a cash register slip giving my account # and credit limit...not even a thick paper temporary credit-card-shaped card. Anyway, something gets screwed up with the one points card so she has to get another one for me and put that points card # down as my points card instead.

Once I am finally set up in the Bay credit and points system, saleslady #9 starts to retrieve for me the mugs I want from the display stand. She finds 3 almost right away but is having difficulty finding a 4th. I know that there are some hanging on the hooks on the part of the stand that are over her head and point them out to her; she is gracious enough to make a "stupid me" gesture when she is finally able to find the 4th mug. She offers a box; that would be great, I tell her. She delegates saleslady #10 to look after getting my mugs packed into a box for me while #9 processes my purchase on my new HBC credit card and gives me points on my new HBC points card for the purchase. I start to peel the price tags off the mugs; #9 tells me they will do that for me, but #10 is taking forever to come out with the packaging materials and I want to make sure the labels come off so I do the peeling myself.

Saleslady #10 takes some time to find the boxes, tissue paper and styrofoam peanuts in the back room but eventually finds them and comes out to package the mugs for me. Apparently it had been quite warm in the department earlier in the day because I heard one of the ladies (#7, I think?) complaining about it and at least 2 electric oscillating fans are helping to cool off the area. Saleslady #10 takes some time to figure out that if the fans are blowing around the tissue paper and styrofoam peanuts are preventing her from wrapping up my purchase easily at my table, maybe she should move to another table that is not right beside a fan. It also takes her some time to do the packaging, but I'm still waiting for #9 to finish processing my purchase so I guess that's not a big deal.

Saleslady #9 brings me my receipt and gift receipt and also offers to giftwrap my purchase for me. That's a good idea; remember I said I was tired of shopping at this point and really didn't want to have to find wrapping paper and a card and so on and get the present wrapped to give the gift to my friend today (which is the next time I'd see her...I suppose it could have waited until another time I'd see her, but remember this present is already sort of late and I just want to get it done with). Plus I am sitting at a table while all these ladies serve me so why not...doesn't take any more effort on my part. Saleslady #9 says she will "honour me" and give me the giftwrapping for free. Yay! That is a good thing. Oh, but it is not #9 who will be doing the wrapping; it is #10, who took a long time just to package my purchase. #10 begins to do the wrapping while #9 finds a card and envelope for me and has me fill them out. Hmm, hadn't planned on coming up with the message right then and there, but I do so and sign the card for both me and my husband in the sloppiest chicken scratch I've ever written in (remember I was tired at this point and hadn't had much to eat, either).

#9 begins to help other people for a while (because there are a few other people in the area needing attention and #9's efforts to get other ladies to help them don't seem to be working out...she did tell a customer that they would have to wait because I had "been waiting for a long time"), but when she sees me looking tired and not all that happy (mostly due to being tired with shopping, though somewhat annoyed that this young salesperson was taking so long to do a very simple wrapping job) sitting around several minutes later still, she goes over and helps #10 do the wrapping. Finally, I am handed a large yellow paper bag with the wrapped present inside with a nice bow and the envelope with my card inside stuck to the present. I retrieve my 4 regular-sized bags of purchases from other stores, and #9 decides that I look too awkward and I need those bags put all into a large Bay bag, so she goes to get one for me and works it around my other 4 bags. #9 then decides that that really does need double-bagging, so she goes back to the back to get a 2nd large Bay bag for me (during her absence, I contemplate just leaving, but I don't) and then returns and works it around the other large Bay bag for me. So...can I go now? Apparently, yes. I thank the woman (though at this point I am feeling more like I am thanking her for allowing me to leave rather than for serving me with great thoroughness but while eating up a good deal of my time) and get the heck out of there as fast as I can in my tired, slightly annoyed state. I will say, though, that I was glad to have that one large double-bagged Bay bag rather than the 4 individual smaller ones; so much easier to dump one bag (plus the paper bag with the gift in it) in the trunk and retrieve it once I got home than to deal with the 4 smaller bags with those annoying theft-preventing (hahaha) stickers on them that Wal-Mart insisted on sticking on them when I went to retrieve the photos from there prior to my Bay adventure.

So, there you go, I interacted with about 10 different people at the Bay to purchase a simple wedding present, and that doesn't include the salesman in the furniture department who told me no problem for me to take a break sitting in one of the chairs or the other salesman there who looked down his nose at me. At least I was seated in the gift registry area for much of my gift-purchasing time...that was a nice touch...though, like I said, there were others coming and going who needed attention as well and I felt like I, who was just a friend of a bride and groom purchasing something from a registry, got better treatment in a lot of ways than some of the brides and grooms who were milling around trying to set up their registries. Saleslady #9 was good about sticking to serving me and trying to get other salesladies to help the other customers out, but for some reason that help was not all that forthcoming for those who needed it from those other ladies...and several of the other salesladies who had interacted with me earlier in my shopping experience that day just didn't seem to be around when these other people needed the help I had been receiving!

There, that is my Bay adventure. Doesn't that sound like a ton of fun?

You know, I've done a lot of talking already...so I won't tell you about the Price Chopper shopping/parking lot adventure I had later that day...or the traffic adventures Jen and I had with confused Torontonians later in the day when I took her out for a belated birthday dinner. Let's just say that at the end of the day, I was exhausted and not really feeling like dealing with people anymore! I even actually criticized our waiter out loud to Jen at the restaurant...not a big deal for most people, but I am normally the person who defends anyone who is criticized and tries to see situations from the perspective of the one I'm thinking of criticizing. I still tipped him more generously than I thought he deserved, but for me to have expressed dissatisfaction over things that weren't that badly out of line about him I must have had a rough day. Ah well. That day is over. I ended up pretty stiff and sore this morning due to my shopping and lugging yesterday (and maybe from not really having had anything to eat until Jen and I went out and gorged ourselves and then added fancy Lick's ice creams covered with hot fudge), but I'm feeling better now.

Time for me to go out and do some shopping at Staples now. I do need things from there to improve my practicum binders so that they'll be sufficiently impressive when my York professors come to do a site visit at my host school and observe my teaching and my binders. Really, though, getting a good office supply fix can't hurt my mood, either :). Hopefully I will return from there without having had any adventures of the sort that I had while shopping yesterday :-P. Wish me luck!