Code Adam

The intercom buzzing interrupted his retail trance: "Code Adam."

Adam groaned. A Code Adam meant that one, his coworkers would be making fun of his name all day and, two, that someone had lost their brat in the store.

Again.

They were up to fifteen that week.

He dutifully put down the box of toys that people had been too lazy to put back and walked around, looking for any little kids that were either alone or pissing their pants. He hoped it wasn't the second one (for the fifth fucking time).

What kind of parents was it this time?

Adam took a peek up at the counter. Yep, overweight soccer mom with a fake Gucci ensemble, massive manicured nails and a voice like a belt sander to the ears. His favorite. Probably let her precious little Jeffrey or Tarquin or whatever name she thought sounded edgy or unique play while she yacked on her phone.

He cupped his ear, hoping to catch those magic words. "-I can't believe you didn't watch him better!"

Aha! There it was. Adam rolled his eyes outwardly but sort of snickered on the inside. These retail-hating assholes always blamed them, the retail monkeys, for not taking care of their precious little monsters.

"He's such a good boy!"

Or, his favorite, "Don't tell me how to parent my child!"

Then parent them, he always thought while he nodded and groveled for his pitiful job.

They all searched while attempting to keep up with shoppers who didn't give two fucks about anything else but getting checked out to shut their bleating spawn up. When told no one could leave the store for a bit, there was more than a few threats to call: the manager, corporate, the police, lawyers, whatever.

By the time he had circled around, Adam noticed the police actually were there.

His heart sank a little. That was the fifteenth kid that they hadn't been able to track down. Now he almost felt a little bad for the clawed soccer mom -- her tears seemed hysterical and genuine.

Adam sighed and went back to work. He was sure he'd get the gossip later, but noted the details: young toddler, blonde hair, green eyes and wearing a blue jumper with some obscure cartoon character on the front.

Fifteen kids in one damned week. How effective could the code be if it seemed to fail every damned time?

He tried to think and couple his love of crime shows: had there been any suspicious repeat customers in? Anyone that looked shady? Customers all sort of looked the same to him, except for the four hundred pound woman that had smuggled dolls in her cleavage; no one even attempted to stop her.

No one came to mind.

His trudge to the stock room felt heavier than normal. All that was left was those stupid, massive dolls that had grown in popularity. Adam heaved the box onto the trolley and rolled it out, attempting to avoid squishing any little monsters.

These things were so creepy. They never looked the same, either. First there was a bunch of blank-eyed little girls with their lips flapping around. Supposedly, they talked, but he avoided pressing the button like the plague.

Three girls in cute little outfits, some oddly ghetto looking dolls and a few little boy dolls. Adam had no idea why -- he couldn't imagine a fan of dolls wanting a dead-eyed looking ginger kid, a wide-eyed boy with some epic dreadlocks or some blonde kid that looked like he'd peed his overalls.

Oh well. Corporate knows best.

Why Retail Work Represents Everything Wrong with America

Customer Service aka Satan's Backside. 

Retail is the worst. There are tons of pages, forums and blogs dedicated to talking about how fucking awful it is to work retail, customer service or food service -- and those reasons pretty much represent everything wrong with America.

For one, the corporations make no sense. They send confusing messages, demand that their workers sell credit cards or do fishy things with their hours so they can remain profitable e.g only letting them work part-time so they don't have to pay for health insurance or benefits, bullying workers to work off the clock or out of their job description, firing them for not meeting arbitrary sales goals, rules or just generally because most of the states are "right-to-work" states.

So, you're underpaid, overworked, made to deal with shady nonsense, poor working conditions and major corporations that pretty much control your lives. You get no say in things, you just have to keep your head down and work unless you want to be a rebel OR have the gift of nepotism or favoritism at your side.

You know those coworkers. They're the ones that seemingly cannot get fired, their slack given to you, cannot be argued or blamed for anything because someone higher up is either related to them or likes them (or they're banging, take your pick).

Better yet, you get to deal with customers. Oh, the everlasting joy of customers. They scream at you, they threaten you, they let their little crotch spawn ruin things -- they can be the worst people on Earth and, better still, you can't fight back :) . Joy!

The scene is set: a major business full of white blood pricks is now looming over you, doing shady shit in the background, allowing the abuse of the rules that are supposed to protect you and diligently fighting any kind of union or effort to make things more fair for the workers. You can't live off of your wage, you can't get benefits and you're treated like shit.

Sound familiar?

It should. It's pretty much a mirror of what is happening with the American government these days. Poor wages, poor benefits, money being given to the rich, big corporations taking power away from the people. Yeah. Sounds about right.

The people that are meant to be protecting and helping you are constantly screwing you over. You can't fight back for fear of losing your job, and forget unemployment in most cases.

We are the lowly peons watching our bank accounts drain while the rich get richer.

God bless America.