If I were to use the subjunctive . . .

Lying to the reader

Lying to themselves

Simply misinformed

Not paying attention

Has weird priorities

Assumed you knew

Hates you personally

Bad at communicating

Easily sidetracked

Will believe anything

Has weird prejudices

the first time I went in there I pointed at one of those extra-skinny baguettes and said “a flute, please” feeling pretty sure of myself, and the baker said “… that’s a ficelle” (you idiot) (was implied) “a flute is twice as large as a baguette.”

That’s insane, first of all, a flute is a skinny instrument. Call your fat baguette a bassoon, lady—I made some timid remark about how it would make more sense for a flute to be a skinny bread and the baker said, “In Paris it is. I thought you were from the South?”

oh, that hurt

I guess I’m from the part of the South that’s so close to Italy the bread’s waist size matters less than whether it’s got olives in it, but I left the bakery having an existential crisis over whether living in Paris had made me forget my roots

the Least Intimidating Bakery just had normal baguettes vs. seedy baguettes vs. horny baguettes (easy mode, some have seeds, some have horns), while the new bakery has breads that are only different on a molecular level—there’s a good old loaf and then another, identical loaf called a bastard? google told me a bastard is “halfway between a baguette and a bread” but denouncing them like “those are not regulation-sized bastards” would get me banned from the bakery for life

on my 2nd visit (while I stood in line discreetly googling baguette terminology) there was an English tourist who asked for a baguette while pointing at what was either a rustique or a sesame and I felt a bit worried for them, but the baker just clarified “this one?” to waive any responsibility if they found out later it wasn’t a classic baguette, then handed them the bread without educating them in a judgmental tone and I felt envious

I know it’s because she thinks the English are beyond saving but still it made me want to come back with a fake moustache and an English accent so I wouldn’t be expected to play bakery on expert mode just because I’m French. I asked for a pastry this time and the baker asked “no bread with that?” which felt cruel, like she wanted me to sprinkle myself with ashes and admit out loud that my level of bread proficiency isn’t as advanced as I once believed it was

The third time I went, I had lost all self-confidence and I hesitantly pointed at a bread and said “I’d like this, uh—what is it called?” and the baker looked at me in disbelief and said “That’s a baguette.”

God.

for the record, if that stupid bread had been flanked by a skinny bread (ficelle) and a fat one (flute) then yeah of course I would have known to call it a baguette, but in the absence of reference points I now felt lost and scared of being called a Parisian again

STOP-

Winter has arrived on Poob.

Working in retail is really fun, and the times when major fuck-ups happen, they can be either anxiety-attack inducing, or make it possible to get through the rest of your god-awful shift with a smile depending on the customer. My all-time favorite absolute fuck-up is as follows:

This kind woman is just doing her thing. She scans her membership card from her keychain. The register beeps to acknowledge the scan. We continue as usual. Neither of us notice right away, but after I’ve scanned a few more items, I hear a very quiet, “Um,” from the lady, very polite. I look at her. She is looking at the screen of my register, blinking. I, too, look.

And lo and behold. There is a charge of over four-thousand dollars ($4,000) worth of garlic bread staring us in the face. There are no words for a minute. We’re just… in awe. How did this happen? How the hell did this happen?

She didn’t even have garlic bread in her cart.

I sputter a partial apology - I was incapable of forming actual sentences in the moment - and try to void the garlic bread. Since there was no garlic bread to scan, I try to manually remove $4,000-some from this transaction.

Well, the registers don’t like it when you try to void off more than five dollars ($5) from a transaction, so naturally it pings my manager for confirmation, but she’s not by her pager.

At this point, both myself and the lady are just… dumbfounded. She’s not even mad. I’m not even all that embarrassed. Both of us are just looking at the screen. There’s a bit of laughter, but it’s mostly just… confusion.

I have to call through the whole store for my manager on the intercom because she’s not answering. She shows up, ready to override and void it, when she too, sees what exactly is being voided.

“What… did you do?”

“I genuinely. Have literally. No. Idea.”

She voids it, and I go to finish the transaction and tell the woman her total (minus the garlic bread). My register pings. It tells me that she hasn’t scanned her membership card. Odd. I distinctly remember her doing that. The woman goes to scan her card again, and I notice that her library card is stuck to her membership card. I tell her gently, and she separates the two and scans her card.

My manager, hovering nearby still, sees this and says, “I think it mistook the barcode of her other card for garlic bread, and the remaining digits were read as the price.”

And that’s when the laughter really came over us. There were no hard feelings at all. In fact, the woman was incredibly glad that the receipt still showed the garlic bread and the voiding of. I will remember it until the end of time, my only regret in the entire situation being that I didn’t take a damn picture, because she has proof and I don’t. But I swear to God it happened.

ORNITHOMIMOSAURIA

Some of the Ornithomimosaurs featured on my Youtube video dedicated to this group of dinosaurs. This poster is now available at Redbubble for prints and more HERE

Instagram

Youtube Channel

So, to keep other posts from getting giant, putting what's been happening here so I can pin this post! If it isn't pinned, we no longer need help.

Currently: Got fired (long story, I can't talk much about it atm because I am going to be getting a lawyer), trying to find a better job, applying for UI. Moved into a room for rent! Figuring out where to go from here long term. Removed the GoFundMe for now while we figure the long term plan out.

What We Need Help With: Everything. Again. Because fuck me, I guess.

How people can help: Signal boosting, PayPal, Venmo (corvidkai), CashApp (corvidkai). (Commissions are on hiatus atm because my right wrist is fucked.)

Yes, the circumstances are such that I'm going to be seeking a lawyer, so I'm going to keep my mouth mostly shut on the world wide web...for now. While I do that, I will also be applying for UI while job hunting and applying for SSDI, because fucking hell, it has been hellish trying to find work that isn't going to make things worse.

But it puts us back in a pickle. At least a cheaper pickle than it was with the hotel, but still...I'm more than a little upset. And tired. Very, very, VERY emotionally tired.

Hey everyone,

It's Your Local Bardic entity, Gallus Rostromengalus of Bread Jesus and other Weird Tumblr Story Fame.

Despite my best efforts to mitigate mt Terrible English Dental DNA, today two of my teeth broke.

I don't even have a fun story about this, it's literally terrible genetics and stress-grinding my teeth in my sleep.

I just got back from emergency surgery to get the pieces pulled and the hole in my jaw closed so I don't get an infection, but a second reconstruction surgery to give me a bone graft and dental implants will be needed so I can actually chew and use my mouth for it's intended purposes.

I do not currently have dental insurance. I haven't talked about it here much, but my husband was unemployed after getting laid off for almost all of last year. He has a job again, but it pays like 2/3rds of his previous one and the benefits are crap. Like no dental insurance until he's worked there at least a year.

So I'm on the hook for the full cost of Today's emergency surgery, Medication, and the necessary follow-up reconstruction, which my dentist estimates will cost between $5000-$7000. Our dentist has given us every discount she can and we have a payment plan, but losing half our household income has left us with no savings and credit cards at their limits. Even though I only need to come up with $500 this month to go ahead with the reconstructive surgery, I do not have any money to spare. It will also be VASTLY cheaper overall to pay for everything up front rather than pay interest over the months with the payment plan, but literally anything will help me right now.

Link To My GoFundMe

Link To My Ko-Fi

Thank you all so much, Gallus

King Ozymandias

rendered in stone with a

strident decree.

Says our dear traveller

(unsentimentally)

"All that remains is his