signs you're aging too quickly
you have at least one cat that you look forward to seeing daily.you work at bingo halls and enjoy it.
the idea of understanding how to deal with old, cranky people by speaking their language.
you complain about your lower back and knees.
the idea of staying out past eleven is painful.
all right. let's be honest here folks. i need to get out and start living again. i've stopped for far too long. sure, i hang out with a few of my friends. but i need to get out and get living. go out and meet new people. maybe go to a few bars, head to the city with manny every once and awhile and visit those clubs he'd mentioned. have adventures. i need to live like my age, not like i'm fifty.
and man do i live like i'm fifty. here's how my day went:
my alarm went off at seven. didn't actually get moving until eight-forty, when i realized that showering was a beneficial venture for me. i did so, got dressed, and in no time we were headed to jamaica queens. tops bingo hall. me, maria, mama, mickey, nyrae and mary. got there about ten-thirty, set up books and such. tried to hope that more people would show up so we wouldn't get stuck shelling out cash to just a few who didn't spend much in the first place.
quick lesson to all the normal people out there:
books = paper games. the ones people use the dabbing markers on.
boards = the regular wooden boards people play on.
lines = for paper games (referred to as "specials"), whenever the first line (the first straight row of BINGO that comes out), someone wins. always named after the B in the line.
powerball = a number that's put out at the beginning of the game. if you win on a fullcard with that number by yourself, you get the powerball, which is progressive, so each week the amount goes up until someone wins it (it always caps out at 6,000, though.)
king = if you win on a special or a lapboard, by yourself, and your male, the number you win on is your number, and you're the king for the game. every time that number comes out, you get ten bucks.
queen = same, but female.
if there are any more that i need to explain, i'll do it as i go.
so the queen in the morning game was obnoxious. her name's rita. but i saw marsha (who's a sweetheart) and i got a tip. this morning i called the jackpot, which is the biggest game we have. the full-card win is eight hundred dollars. and this woman, beverly, won it on her own, so she gave me thirty bucks. which was so nice. mama nearly got into a fight with this jamaican lady who just kept telling mama to shut up.
let it be known. do not tell mama mickey to shut up. she will probably cut you. i mean, the woman looks like a turtle, and walks like a penguin, but she's amazing and will kick your ass. fantastic woman. and her daughter is rough and tough too (nyrae). so great. where did i leave off now?
mickey is absolutely fucking crazy. i just need to throw that out there. she's this short, fifty-something turkish lady who doesn't know how to dress and only has a passable grasp on the english language. every time she opens her mouth i have to register my brain as awake and hope it can figure out what she's saying; not because of her accent (which by no means is particularly thick) but because of her inability to make logical sense. ever. i mean it, this woman is absolutely crazy. i wish i had a better example. but at the moment, i can't think of any.
blame it on the fact that i'm exhausted, have caffeine in my system from the coffee i probably shouldn't have drank, pepsi and the knowledge that tomorrow i have to get up early to go to my uncle peter's funeral. it's out in yonkers, and i hear emily (his daughter) won't be there. understandably so, from what my mom and dad and aunt have all said, she's been a mess. but when your dad just suddenly dies (well... he had cancer, so) it's not an easy thing to cope with.
heneway.
mary is one of my favorites to work with. we always get along, make shit up as we go, and are constantly picking on each other. toward the end of the day, she grabbed a cigarette and walked out, came back in having forgotten her lighter and this ensued:
mary: man, my brain needs to work.
me: you need to have one for it to work.
mary: -turns, looks shocked-
me: let it sink in while you go smoke your cigarette. you'll get it eventually.
mary: all right weisenheimer.
nyrae didn't get to telling me any stories yet today, which is sad. but she was also exhausted (she works for the UPS, didn't get home til five, slept for like... three maybe four hours, then came to the game.)
and she had work again tonight. she does way too much. love her to death, that woman.
so next up was the quick trip to my uncle's, the long wait for felipe to get to my uncle's as well (they'd gone to the queens zoo, got stuck on the cross island), got home, inhaled some food real quick, left around four thirty to head back to queens, this time maspeth.
it's so much better working at maspeth. there are less problems to be had. well, usually there a less problems to be had.
the working crew for tonight (it wasn't my aunt's game, it was lori's): me, mary, maria, mickey (again... jesus), rachel, sue, annette and freddie.
annette: awesome. she does lines, i love her, she's real quick-witted.
rachel: i wanted to ring her neck tonight. when you're up calling, whenever you do the regular bingo round on a special (the whole just one line thing, five numbers) you have to put the first one into the computer by the number on the paper. she forgot. it screwed up the computers because i haven't done it in months, so i obviously didn't remember. i should've. anyway, it messed up and i had to get the computers fixed. again.
- segue. the computers screwed up at the very beginning. the very beginning. we had the early bird to do, and none of the computers were going through the system. they'd show up on the board, it'd be lit up, but the computers wouldn't register. so i had to sit there, call the ball, put it in its slot, make the next ball visible in the camera, then go over to the computer and click on the number. god forbid i forget one, they'd kill me. people at bingo halls are vicious. - end
freddie i met for the first time tonight. he's a slightly sassy, possibly gay spanish man who has way too much energy. of all the things i remember, standing next to him as he babbled in spanish to cooka about sue's boobs and how he could swim in them (i was behind him laughing my ass off at the idea of it - because sue's boobs are no spring chickens, if you know what i mean) and mary's calling trying not to blubber out the numbers wrong while laughing next to me. that guy could run like nobodies business. he musta ran to every person he called back numbers for, because i'd be maybe a fourth of the way there and he'd already be half done and onto the next person. and he kissed my cheek hello. oh man! when i was calling the blue special, the queen came out and whenever that happens, you have to say "Pay the Queen", so the person running the game knows, and he looks up at me and puts his hand on his hips and says "where's my money?!"
if i could have a steady two-day, one-double-day with the bingo hall, i'd quit barnes and noble.
anything said in this blog is purely opinion, and does not reflect the opinions or thoughts of the barnes and noble corporation.
how lame is that. i have to put that there so i don't get in trouble. guess what, barnes and noble sucks, doesn't pay its employees well and has no idea how to understand the customer half of the time.
so ha.
RIGHT.
so sue is this huge breasted woman who seems a bit more abrasive than others. but whatever. lori ran the game, and i love her, she's awesome. you already heard about mickey (who actually had a shining moment tonight, briefly) and mary, who i love. i don't know, she and i are two peas in a fucked up pod of rejects. it's great. we act like five year olds, make suicide pacts to shoot each other before we have to call again, throw candy at each other. it's great.
i had one lady pull me aside to tell me i had a really nice figure. i just smiled and smiled and smiled, per usual.
chikee was there today. she bought everything from me, again. forgot my name. again. but she's just too much to pass up on. a few of the other people remembered me too, which was nice.
can you tell i'm over-worked and happed up on caffeine? i'm making little to no sense here.
the computers practically crashed tonight. we had to stop the game mid-call, tell everyone to logout, then log back in. this was when mickey had her shining moment; she walked over to me, maria and annette and threw her hands down and got real serious and just said "okay, i have a question. does mary have any idea what the fuck she's doing?"
and we just lost it. it wasn't particularly hilarious, but we all died, we were too tired and mary kept going nuts on the computers. it reminded me of the time me, my mom, maria and diana were playing pay me at the table and my mom asked us how sharon was doing, and without thinking i just said "who cares?" and di and maria laughed so hard. through her chastising i could tell my mom was chuckling.
that was also the time that they all flopped their bra-less boobs onto the table out of amusement. obviously, my lack-there-of was not able to participate in that excursion.
right. computers broke down, we had to stay a whole hour later than usual. people just kept bitchin' and moanin'. per usual. i just wanted to rest and nearly fell asleep on a table. however, i did successfully stay away from the guy with bed bugs. (gross, by the way.)
the myriad of old spanish ladies, the old white ladies, the random eastern europeans, the old men who don't know how to bathe, the blind woman who doesn't know how to bathe and the women who just say psst psst or hey you to get your attention instead of your name which they know, never ceases to amaze me. there's a few laws when it comes to bingo. if you're around my age, you have to be there with a family member who's a regular. to work at a bingo hall you have to own at least one bingo related shirt that is clever and yet incredibly silly. if you work regularly at bingo hall, you have to have your favorites and least favorites. if you don't waddle, have boobs the size of torpedoes, speak spanish fluently, have some kind of accent, look like that creepy guy who keeps people's skins in his basement or a chronic smoker with no where else to spend your social security checks, you're not really allowed to be here without getting glanced at funny.
although... that's not all entirely true. but my head hurts way too much to think about this anymore.
i have uncle peter's funeral tomorrow, shopping with joey to do, a story to write, reading to finish... i've got all my work cut out for me for the next few days. i should try to get some of it done now. hump day is reached. and i haven't really lived yet this vacation. and let's be honest, unless i go out drinking with hobbit and corey tomorrow night like i said i would, i won't be living too much, because i have no time and too much work today.
so much for relaxation, right? so much so much so much for relaxation.
i think i'll leave oz a singing voicemail tomorrow. gray or blue by jaymay, perhaps.
let's be swedish tonight baby.
-aleey
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