yesterday night

Closing during a 5 hour shift the day before christmas eve in a retail job. truly the definition of hell on earth. People came in all night long (here's a hint to the place i work) until we finally closed and locked our doors at midnight. Everyone wanted ribbons, boxes, wrapping paper, and ....Christmas TREES!?!?! its the day before christmas eve and your looking for a good tree?!?! moments where everyone in the store thinks "have you never experienced Christmas before?" because the locals of the area know that there are no good looking trees, if any, available so late into the holiday. i question my communities sanity and drove home most cautiously last night. "Beware the weirdos" indeed. thanks for that warning dad.

i actually worked most of my night in the grocery section of the store (ok its ridiculously obvious where i work) and had to deal with people getting ready to prepare christmas dinners and breakfasts. i'll never understand how people know ahead of time what they'll be making and yet still choose to wait until the last minute of the day before theyre making it to actually go out and buy their ingredients. its the holidays, every special ingredient you only need once or twice during the year is what everybody needs once or twice a year. that weird fried onion thing that goes on top of green bean casserole has been sold out for 48 hours, and i told a total of 16 guests just that yesterday night. people were angry and shocked by the stores lack of stocking and preperation. im shocked that they think we'd know what would be the hot item ingredient this year. last year it was corn... we still have plenty of that.
everyone tells me that i shouldnt expect something i consider common sense to be known to shoppers that have never worked retail. but really this type of thing happens every year everywhere. buy your holiday crap in advance and you wont have to end up in a retail store at 11:30 at night trying to find light colored corn syrup that doesnt exist and having to settle for something else. i planned to make punpkin pie this thanksgiving i bought two cans of pumpkin pie filling two weeks before thanksgiving. one for the pie and one for if i jacked up the first pie. to all the last minute shoppers leave me alone and stop yelling at me and my coworkers for things we have no control over, i dont do the product ordering, and leave the manager out of this too, all theyll tell you is what ive told you, "we're out, we will get some more back in, we get shipments every morning but we dont know whats in the trucks till we open the boxes and see for ourselves and would you like us to check another store's availability for you?" thats all anyone can do when theres nothing in stock. so stop asking me to check the backroom, when i say we're out i mean theres literally nothing in the entire store that falls under the category of what your looking for. leave and be mad at yourself for waiting till the last minute to shop in one of the main shopping centers in my community.