I'm back from fabric shopping and a couple pounds heavier with pretty pink chiffon-y pleated sweetness for Miss Elizabeth's curtains.
I shop for fabric locally on a weekly basis at two fabric stores, and I've been shopping at both stores for over four years.
The first of my two local fabric stores is the GREATEST FABRIC STORE ON EARTH. As soon as I walk up to the cutting counter, the women greet me by name and we talk about babies, husbands and sewing. They cut my fabric quickly, fold it neatly, print my ticket and I'm on my way in a matter of minutes.
The second of the local fabric stores, which happens to be a nationwide chain, has employees which cause me much vexation. I visit their store every week and I recognize the same cutters, yet, until recently, have never recognized me in the four years I've shopped with them.
For those in "the fabric know," this is the same store where the employees ask EVERY TIME YOU HAVE FABRIC CUT,
"What are you making?"
The first ten dozen times I was in the store I explained that I made Renaissance gowns for a living. They never remembered me, and they asked over and over and over again, "What are you making?"
My friend Amber told me that her branch of this chain of stores asks the same question every time she shops with them, and they never remembered her either. Now she plays with them.
Buying: 26 yards of pink taffeta
cutter asks: What are you making?
Amber: Funeral shrouds.
So, the last time I shopped with them I played too.
Buying: 18 yards of bright red glitter organza
cutter asks: What are you making?
Me: Winnebago covers.
They remember me now.
This store always has a fairly long line of people waiting to have their fabric cut, so they installed a paper number machine. You pull a ticket as you approach the counter and they have a lit sign displaying their current customer number. Paper numbers suck, but at least they're eliminating line budgers. Line budgers suck worse than paper numbers.
The cutters are slow. Unbearably slow. Painfully, unspeakably, I-would-rather-slice-papercuts-across-the-length-of-my-tongue-than-wait-in-this-line slow. It wouldn't be so intolerable if it was an affliction over which they had no control - but these cutters are DELIBERATELY slow.
I have seen them with a line of 10 or more customers STOP cutting fabric to take 5 minutes to re-roll all the bolts up in tidy fabric bundles, walk over, put them back on the shelves, and then stop to pick fingernail lint before announcing the next number. (I can't help but wonder why they don't re-roll the fabric and put it away when there aren't people waiting in line)
Today there were eight people waiting in line. An elderly gentleman was being waited on with 5 neatly rolled remnants. The gal counted them up, rolled out some yardage, cut if for him and was preparing to hand him his slip:
"Do you have a basket?"
"No. I don't need one. Thank you."
"Right over there (points with her scissors) are some baskets. You need one."
"No, really I don't. I carried these over without one. I don't need one now."
"Right over there- (points again with her scissors) hand me one."
"There aren't any."
The woman stopped cutting, speaking, breathing. She placed her scissors on the cutting table and looked directly past the long line of customers waiting for her next move, and she did the unspeakable.
With a line of eight customers waiting to have their fabric cut, she sauntered out from behind the counter, right past the lot of us, proceeded all the way to the front of the store, STOPPED TO CHAT WITH THE CASHIER, grabbed a half dozen baskets, meandered back through the line of annoyed numbered ticket holders, shot the baskets to the floor, did a' mosey on back around the counter and told the man, "Hand me one of those baskets."
The man, obviously stunned, stared at her for one brief moment in utter disbelief, handed her a basket. She took the remnants, put them in the basket, handed him his ticket, completed a fingernail lint pick and called the next number.
It's during these moments that in my mind I pen my best letters of complaint.
Now, I know you're going to tell me that I'm simply too rushed and hurried and I should slow down to savor these moments of leisure - and you're right. I could be spending the time counting fabric bolts on the wall, or flipping through KNIT THIS magazine.
But I'm a purposeful shopper. I don't like wandering through store aisles, fingering fabrics and looking for diaphanous qualities. I'm a list-driven woman. I follow my lists to the letter. I know where every product is on the shelf before I even enter the store. I plot my course, I walk the least number of steps possible, cut, bag and DRIVE HOME.
I've never actually written a complaint letter though. Why would I when I can just come here and bitch about it on the internet?
Peace, 'til next