“Donner, party of 1.”

…. I’m standing at the outside door by my classroom before school this morning.  I’m holding the door open, enjoying the breeze and smell of breakfast in the air.  One of my coworkers walks up from the parking lot and I say to her as I sniff the air:

“Kinda smells like toast out here.”

“Yeah, that’s the crematorium next door, they must be burning bodies today.”

…. Lost my appetite after that.  May not ever be able to enjoy toast again.

Good night at the Chevron.

…..Got a $5 tip from a guy buying a case of Corona. 

…..He just left it there on the counter and when I called after him “Sir, you left your change.” he says “No, that’s your tip.”

…..Could use more days like that.

Healthy laugh, maybe too healthy.

Old picture of the week?, month?, quarter?, whatever.

…. In 1998 I went to Denver with 4 other teachers from my school for a Mid-Level Conference.  The other math teacher on the jaunt was Ms. T, an older, naive, somewhat conservative lady that for some reason still loved my off-the-wall humor.  (One day at school I rolled her through the halls on her chair, between classes when the halls were full). 

…. We were driving through Denver in our rental car, she had us stopping here and there looking for a Symphony chocolate bar she was craving.  When I saw this adult bookstore I pulled into the parking lot and told her that I was pretty sure that they had some in there.  I don’t remember how I convinced her that it was a convenience store or how I knew they had her candy in there, but she was all ready to head in there asking for a Symphony Bar.  I also have no idea what she would have ended up bringing out, but I just couldn’t let her go in.  We all got a good laugh, and then decided to pose for this picture to give to our principal (who just happens to be my principal again now). 

So, here are 5 teachers standing under the sign for a triple-x book store.  On the left is the Social Studies teacher, then the science teacher, two math teachers and an english teacher. Yup, this principal hired me back despite this picture.

Just a suggestion.

…. I know I rant and rave about panhandlers at the Chevron a lot, but I’m not completely immune to the plight of my fellow man.  Which is why when earlier this week some guy at a Sinclair I stopped at asked me for money for gas I didn’t say no, completely.  I didn’t give him any cash but I did ask him which pump he was on, went inside and used my debit card to put $5 on it for him.  I bring this up not because I want a few verbal pats on the back, but because of what happened at the Chevron tonight. 

…. Some guy came in and prepaid for his gas.  When he came back to get his change he asked if “that lady came in and got 20 bucks in gas.”  She was a perfectly respectable looking woman in a minivan with some story about running out of gas and needing to get home, but she never came in to get the gas, she just bought a pack of smokes and took off with the change.  He wasn’t happy, with himself – not us, he felt like he got ripped off.  Scammed is what he got.

…. So, here is my suggestion:  If it ever happens to you that you feel someone really is in need and you want to help out, but you don’t want to get scammed, there is a couple things you can do to curb that fear;

1. Don’t give them cash, be sure to prepay for their gas.  It may take a couple of minutes out of your day, but that way you are sure they are using it for gas.
2. Prepay with a credit or debit card.  If you prepay with cash, they could pump 37 cents and then come in and get the change.  With a credit card if they only pump 37 cents that’s all you get charged and when they go in for the change they’ll be told there isn’t any.  If you are afraid that they will get a receipt with your credit card number on it, look at yours next time you use a card.  It only prints the last 4 digits for a reason – they would have to figure out the other 12 digits from 1,000,000,000,000* different possibilities.

*I come up with that number thusly: There are 10 possibilities for each of the 12 digits (0 through 9, repeatable), so the number of possibilities is 10 to the 12th power, or a 1 with 12 zeros after it.  Voila, you just got a mini-course on permutations.