The One About Gas Stations

Category: weekleez

The One About Gas Station Attendants
March 26, 2002

whoa, what’s this? a weekly? on tuesday? is this bizzaro world? woo hoo!  SPRING BREAK!  wow, with no school i actually have extra time.   

hi kids,  

you know, god blesses me with weekleez everyday. i mean, not a day goes by without something odd and horrible or odd and hilarious happening to me. and it’s usually simple things. things like little snippets of conversation, observations, elevators, customers, the occasional anal probe, you know, simple things. and sometimes it’s a re-occurring theme, like customers, stepping in dog poop, and, would you believe, gas station attendants?
yep, for some reason gas station attendants like to talk to me. apparently i have one of “those” faces. one of those faces that says, “hey, what’s on your mind? you can tell me anything. and please, by all means, make me feel uncomfortable by talking about things you never talk about with complete strangers.” yeah, one of those faces.  

the following stories are all true.   

right, so there’s this crazy lady that works at one of the gas stations close to my house, we’ll call it a Flell Station. (Flell is actually a dutch and british oil company. which by the way, Flell just bought out the Flennzoil – Flaker State Company. as if anyone cares.)  

so i’m in there buying gas and a bucket of cola, and this old lady working the register says, “hey, remember when you gave me this?” and she points to a tiny speck of paper on her cash register.
and i say, “uhhhh…”
and she says, “this chinese proverb. you remember. you gave it to me.”
“i did?”
“yeah, you gave it to me. i read it all the time. even the customers read it. you gave it to me. everyone just loves it.”
“i gave you a chinese proverb?”
“yes and everyone just loves to read it.”
“um, maybe you have me confused with someone else. i’m not in the habit of giving out chinese – “
“no it was you i remember. you gave it to me.”
well, i wanted to stay and argue with her ’cause you know, it was kinda funny, but i was running late for work so i just said, “oh well. ok then.” and left.  

a couple weeks later i go in and it’s the same lady working and this time she’s a little more crazy. so i go up to pay for my gas and the lady says, “mmm, those clouds sure do look mean don’t they?” and i’m thinking “it’s not supposed to rain today…”  and i look outside and i’ll be darned if it’s not the most beautiful day of the year. blue sky as far as the eye can see, and oh yeah, no clouds. 
so i look back at her, and she’s looking out the window and shaking her head ominously. yikes!  this lady is crazy! non compos mentis. derp!  

an even couple more months later i walk in and there she is, in her own fog of confusion, and i swear she says, “hey, remember when you gave me this chinese proverb?”  
ok, now i’m starting to doubt my own sanity right? i mean, maybe i did give her a chinese proverb. NO! i refuse to believe it!
“i gave you a proverb? me, with the pink hair?”
“yeah you gave me this chinese proverb, don’t you remember?”
so i smile really big and say, “i sure do!  does everybody read it?”
“oh yes! everyone loves it!”
“great!”  run jaimie, run!  

now just to prove how insane this lady really is i have yet another story to tell, but in this story there’s a bad word.  and so i just want to warn you now, you might not like this word, actually i hope you hate this word. i hate it, but this is how crazy this freak is.  

so i’m at the Flell, dig?
and it’s a monday, yo?
and it’s early morning, bling?
and that crazy loon behind the counter asks me if the banks will be opened today.  and i’m thinking, what? and then i remember it’s martin luther king jr day.  and i say that the banks probably aren’t opened because they take off all the holidays they can get their hands on. and this loony git says, “but i gotta work today.” and i’m all who cares lady, everyone’s gotta work today please take my money so i can leave now. and then she says, “back when i used to work at the textile mill we would get this day off. i guess that’s the only thing that nigger ever did for me.”
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!  WHAT?! SHUT UP LADY!  AAAAAAA!!!
and i look around frantically hoping that there’s no one else (black or white) that has heard the filth and dribble that has just spewed forth from her pie hole and GEEZ LOUISE IT’S NOT EVEN 7:30 IN THE MORNING AND I GOTTA HEAR CRAP LIKE THAT?! i don’t know how that crazy has lasted so long. i mean, wouldn’t you think that somewhere in the Gas Station Attendant’s Handbook in the chapter titled How to Stay Alive it suggests things like, “Do not use racial slurs in polite conversation.” and “Do not engage in polite conversation.”  

now there’s another gas station in town and there’s a nice lady that works there, but she says things like, “hey hon, how’re you doing sweetheart? that’ll be $16.00 darlin’,  have a nice day, hon.” she’s very nice but it’s so hard not to laugh. especially when you’re third in line and she says that over and over. but at least she’s not insane.  

and so not too long ago i walk into a Flexxon station and the lady at the register is fanning the air around her and says to me, “whoa, i am so sorry about the smell. i just had a chili cheese dog.”
don’t laugh jaimie, do not laugh. if you start laughing you won’t be able to stop. think about unfunny things. American Pie II. Tom Green. Martha Stewart….
ok we all know about the adverse effects of a chili cheese dog right? but it was just such an unexpected thing to hear from a total stranger, y’know? and the thing is, if i laugh i won’t be able to stop, but it was so funny. and i manage to get control of myself and say, “yeah, know the feeling.” and she says, “hoo! that is ripe!”
i lost it. i laughed the whole way home. in fact, i’m laughing now.  

ok last story. sunday night my leetle brahther and i were driving home from Dothan, AL.  and for those of you not familiar with south alabama, Dothan is near the florida state line.  and it seems like the closer you get to florida the more “twilight zone” it gets. i mean, i actually saw a sign that read, “Scenic Dirt Road. Turn Here.” which i think translates to, “hey stoopid yankee tourists! pull over here so’s we can rape the men and kill the wimmin!” or something like that. i mean, we’re talkin’ No Man’s Land. of course, maybe it really was a scenic dirt road.  you know, if single-wides and churches are scenic. anyway, gas station.  

so Dothan is the kind of place where they “roll the sidewalks up at dark”. so when we got there we made sure to set our watches back about 20 years and we were fine. so we stop at a fillin’ station, for inside joke’s sake we’ll call it the “honeysuckle convenience store”. so i walk in and look around the aisles and the dude behind the counter asks if he could help me and i ask him where the medicine aisle is and he points me to it and cool.

so i walk up to pay for my gas and some mylanta and ask the dude where the bathrooms are. and he points and says,
“i guess that’s why you need the mylanta.”
and instead of answering truthfully with, “well actually, you know when you get one of those horrible gas pains that feel like you have a huge, rusted spike running right through you, and every time you breathe it feels like satan himself is twisting that huge, rusted spike, and you wish on all that is holy that you were dead so you wouldn’t have to feel the pain anymore? yeah, well i wish i felt that good right now. and you guys don’t have any gas-x so i’m stuck buying this $5, 2oz. bottle of phreakin’ mint phreakin’ mylanta.” but i didn’t say that. i wish i had.
instead i said, “er, roadtrip, you know how it is.”  

so mr. nosy says in a very enthusiastic voice, “yeah i know what you mean! sometimes you wanna just stick a cork in it!” and he does this weird hand gesture involving his thumb and well anyway…  

so i said, “uhhhhhh yeah… i mean, no! er, what? i gotta go..bye.”  

there are some crazy cats out there kids.  and the majority of them work at gas stations. maybe it has something to do with the fumes.   
gosh, don’t i have the most fun everywhere i go?  

next week’s epitomb: fun at the bank!
jaimie “one of those faces” pickle

Tags:

No Comments

Comments are closed.