Pages
Stay In Touch
More
© 2021 The Somerville Times. All rights reserved.
So
it's Thursday, December 31st, the last day of the year, and the decade.
New Year's Eve day! I get up at 7am, walk the dog and head to BJ's with
a hefty New Year's Eve shopping list. I pull into the parking lot and
discover it doesn't open until 9am, so I head over to Dunkin Donuts in
Wellington Circle, grab a coffee and a paper and head back to sit in
the parking lot at BJ's for 40 minutes until 9am. I finally get into
the home of the humongous cans, and do my shopping thing. I then hit
Shaw's for some more items. One son was going to a pot-luck New Year's
Eve sleepover, and the other one was staying with me – and I needed
supplies for both events. I then pop into I-Party for an array of
noisemakers, hats, poppers and other festive paraphernalia. I left the
house at 7:45am and return at 11am with the shopping list completed.
Oh, I got $60 cash back when I was at BJ's, and tucked it into my
wallet. There were three twenty dollar bills.
I drop my kid and
his friend off in Westford as the snow begins to peter out. I drive
back to Somerville and at about 5pm, I take my other son to a
restaurant for Chinese food in Medford. Of course we bump into a few
Somerville friends there. On the way back, I go into a certain store
for a certain item and that's when my night took a turn for the worse.
I can't mention the store because you will figure it out and that would
be slander or something. Here is the first of three possible scenarios
of what happened:
#1 – I believe I gave the guy the wrong amount
of money. I mistook a twenty for a single. Here's what ticked me off.
When I said, "I think I gave you too much money," the guy says very
harshly and speedily "no, you gave me twenty-two dollars," and moved
onto the next guy in line. He didn't even bother to look in the drawer
or directly into my eyes for that matter. I have been in this joint
many, many times – he knows me and he still coldly brushed me off. I
didn't want to cause a scene, so I just left – confused and perplexed
(you know me, quiet as a church mouse!).
#2 – I was searching
for two singles and I may have put a twenty on top of the item I was
purchasing. The twenty could have fallen off and the guy behind me
could have scooped it up.
#3 – I spent one of the twenties somewhere else and only had 2 twenties left in my wallet.
I
went over my day again and again and could not remember spending any
cash except for the coffee and paper, which I paid for in small bills –
before I got the 3 twenty's at BJ's. I used my debit card for
everything I purchased that day. I was going to go to the store the
next day and ask if the guy came up with twenty extra bucks when he
counted the drawer, but decided not to. I didn't want to accuse anyone
of anything. I felt slightly better when I found a big plastic Poland
Spring water jug in the back of my closet with some change in it. I
took the change to Coin Star at Shaw's and got $22.44. I was now
even-Steven. However, it still bugs me. Why did the clerk brush me off
so quickly? The place wasn't exactly mobbed. He didn't even look in the
cash register.
So here is what I have decided to do – I will
never, ever step foot in that store again as long as I live, just in
case he did rip me off. And I will always wonder if I was taken for a
ride. Maybe the guy behind me picked it up and stuffed it in his
pocket. Perhaps I just forgot spending the twenty bucks elsewhere.
Maybe
I should do what my father used to say to me over and over and that was
"slow down!" I am always in a rush. Haste makes waste and all that
crap. It could have been that I did give the guy two twenties and a one
instead of one twenty and two singles. In that case I deserved to be
ripped off, but what happened to honest people? Maybe it's Karma and
"what goes around comes around" and blah, blah, blah. I was once given
too much change and I never said anything to the cashier. That was
dishonest, so maybe it came back to bite me you know where!
Oh,
I forgot one more thing that happened to me on New Year's Eve. It had
just started to snow pretty hard, so I decided to turn my truck around
in the driveway to face out toward the street. I am backing the huge
eco-unfriendly Chevy Tahoe up and all of a sudden…BOOM! I smash into
the back of my ex-wife's Lexus which was parked in my yard (my house is
near Davis Square, so she parks in my driveway and takes the T to
work). Mom now has a very nice impression of my trailer hitch cracked
into her rear bumper.
We have the same insurance company and we
have a $1,000 deductible so we are not putting in a claim. It would
affect our rates also. Lucky me! Once again, I wasn't paying attention!
Where was my mind? I am always in a big hurry to go nowhere. I am
taking it for an estimate from a friend of mine who owns his own auto
body shop. I used to sing Karaoke with his father and he always takes
very good care of my auto body needs.
So all in all, I was
pretty anxious to see 2009 slip away. It wasn't the best of decades for
me, and the last day was a real kick in the pants. It was a great
decade if you consider the fact that I am still here!
If the
store clerk is reading this, you can send me the 20 bucks in care of
the Newspaper – if the drawer came out even, I apologize. If the guy
behind me picked it up – beware of Karma my dishonest, portly friend.
Of
course if I can remember spending the twenty before I entered the
store, I am sorry for wasting everyone's time. In that case I should
have done the story about the Mayoral Inauguration! Oh well.
Congratulations Joe! I hope you enjoyed the songs by the cast members
of Project STAR's production of "Back in the 'Ville" at your party
after you were sworn in.
Join me at Amelia's Kitchen in Teele
Square every Thurs night from 7pm to 9pm. Enjoy keyboards, comedy and
calamari! You can email Jimmy directly at jimmydel@rcn.com.
If you found this article of interest, please consider sharing it.
Reader Comments