A Ton of Fish

I had a woman call today with concerns about her fish.

You see, she'd had a couple die off within the past few days, and she was worried that the water in her tank was too cold and that was why her fish had died.

From what I could gather, her water was in the normal temperature range. As even if it's heated, fish tank water still feels cold. Even in the store that's true.
So the fact that her water felt cold to the touch....wasn't concerning.

But she didn't seem to think that there was anything else that could possibly be the cause.

So I went through other things, asking her how new the tank was and how many fish she had in the tank currently.

As sometimes the newness of the tank or how many fish were added at a time, or how many fish were in it total.

Her response was that she had 12 fish in the tank.

O.o So I double checked the size to make sure I'd heard correctly.
I had.
She had 12 fish in a 10 gallon tank.
About twice as many fish as you should have in a tank that size.
As usually a ten gallon should only have 5-6 fish in it to keep them happy.
To have more than that...usually requires more maintenance in a tank. More water changes or switching out the filter cartridges more often, that sort of thing. As the more fish in a tank, the more of a mess they make.

Considering that her tank was hardly more than a week old.
And already had 12 fish in it....

It's no surprise that a couple of them are dying off. :(

If there isn't enough space for the fish, the weakest will die off in order to make the environment more suitable for the remaining fish and give them enough space they need to do well.

I told her that usually one should only have 5-6 fish in a tank.
And her response was.
"I got as many fish as were on the box!"

O.o Apparently, there were 12 fish pictured on the box of the tank that she bought, and so she thought that she could have 12 fish in a 10 gallon tank without any issues.

I told her simply. "The box lies."

It's an issue we've had on occasion with customers, in that they think they can put a ton of fish into a fish tank simply because the picture on the box shows a lot of fish in the tank.

But simply put.
It's not true.
It's just a marketing thing. To play with your sense of abundance or whatever, to make you think you can have more than you actually can have.

No, it's best to not overcrowd your fish tanks. :S
And having 12 fish in a 10 gallon tank...is definitely overcrowding it.

So I told her to keep an eye on her fish and that she'll probably need to do water changes a little more often if she wanted to keep that many fish.
Hopefully it all turns out well for her and no more of her fish die. :S

-Sarnic Dirchi

Blue Decorations

I just got a call from my manager. Which when I'm not at work, is always a cause for concern.
Because that usually means something has gone wrong.
Thankfully, usually the 'gone wrong' is easily answered over the phone. Usually questions that nobody else at work has an answer to.

This evening though, my manager called me.
And started out with a concerning explanation of one of my coworkers.
The way it was going, it halfway sounded like she'd seriously injured herself and wouldn't be able to work, or a shift would need to be covered for her.

But thankfully.
She was fine.

However, she'd made a mistake.

We have a particular chemical in the store, that we have to be careful in using because it's rather...strong.
We use it to treat our fish, to help prevent them from getting sick.
And spilling it...can be bad.
A manager told me once that if a lot of it spilled...we'd have to call in hazmat. :S

Well...
At night, we pull out certain sections of our fish ornaments that are in our tanks that we sell fish from. We pull them out to bleach them so algae can't grow on them.

But tonight,
somehow.
O.o
Instead of pouring bleach into the container to clean the ornaments.
My coworker poured the chemical into it instead.
.....and has apparently dyed our ornaments blue.

O.o
How my coworker got the two chemicals confused....I'm not sure. As I'm pretty sure they're found in different containers.

But in any case.
My manager was just calling to tell me about our now blue ornaments.
He doesn't know if bleaching them would get rid of the blue or not.

So, just in case the bleach didn't get rid of the blue.
My manager called to warn me of the occurrence, so I wouldn't wonder what had happened when I come in in the morning.

I'm glad to be in the loop. lol.
Though now I'm super curious as to what the outcome will be in the morning with our ornaments.
Will they be blue...or back to their normal color?

-Sarnic Dirchi

Update: Ornaments were normal! Yay for not being dyed blue.

Thank You

There's a family that's begun to come into the store every now and then, since they've bought a fish tank and are working on establishing it and buying their fish a little at a time.

They're memorable for the simple reason that....
The kids tend to say Thank you after everything.

"Can I get this fish?"
"Sure."
"Thank you."

"Could you grab this fish as well?"
"Yah,"
"Thank you."

"Here let me get you a bigger bag."
"Thank you."

"Oh, fish food is over this way."
"Thank you."

It's so weird lol.
I mean it's great that the kids have been taught to thank people.
But they literally said it like 20 times in the 10 minute period I helped them out.
It was a bit of overkill after a while.

Yet, it's nice that they do it.
It's not often that people express their gratitude.
So to hear it.
It helps to brighten one's day. :)

-Sarnic Dirchi

Look! The Colors.

I had a gentleman come into the store today, specifically looking for Angelfish and Gouramis, to which I showed him where they were.
He then proceeded to ooo and awww over the fish. O.o
"Whoa! Look at that!"
"Whoa! See those colors."
"Whoa! You carry _____?!"

lol
It was one of those situations where he was so excited to see the fish, to the point I had to wonder if he'd ever walked into a Starsmet before....
Because the fish he was oooing over...we've always had.....
But I guess this particular batch was more vibrant and varied than he'd been expecting?
*shrugs* Who knows.

I do know that his happiness and excitement was contagious. lol. To the point I didn't mind that he ended up not buying any of the fish he oooed and awed over for twenty minutes. When you see someone happy.
It's a wonderful feeling to be able to participate in it. ^^

-Sarnic Dirchi

Scratched

I came to my coworker's rescue twice today while the two of us were opening the department.

I'd been working on cleaning cages -since I was the first one in.
Which meant that my coworker would be doing the cats. -cleaning their litter boxes, cages, and such.

Normally an alright task to accomplish.
But apparently today, the cats were grumpy. :(

And my poor coworker ended up getting her arm pretty scratched up, when one cat refused to go back into its cage.
So while she was cleaning her scratches and bandaging them, I went in there, and calmly was able to get the cat back into it's cage without too much fuss.
Mostly because I went slowly, let the cat sniff my hand, spoke soothingly, and then firmly grabbed it by the scruff of its neck and pulled it out from under the enclosures so it could then be placed into it's cage.

The second cat didn't injure my coworker, but was as grumpy as the one that did, so again I came to my coworker's rescue to rescue the cat.
Nearly got scratched myself on this one, but thankfully I have quick reflexes. lol.

But yah, neither one of us received further injuries today from the kitty cats.
Hopefully the scratches on my coworker heal up soon. :( They don't look fun.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Gone

Oh, my poor trusting coworkers. :(

So, back when I first was hired here at work.
The manager then, told me that I needed to buy a lock for my locker that I would have in the break room.
Because in that point of time, there were people -I believe it was some coworkers- who were known to go through other people's lockers and take what they wanted.
But occasionally we'd get thefts from people just walking into the break room as well. -As the break room, even though it's out of the main sight of customers, isn't locked.

Still, I understood the good advice of getting a lock. So I did. Keeping my things safe when I brought them to work.

But time has passed.
And...perhaps the new management has neglected to mention the need to buy locks?
Or else, my coworkers have been procrastinating buying their locks.

Too trusting really. Thinking that no one would steal their things if they're in a locker.

But apparently.
Someone did just that.
It happened over the weekend, though I just am hearing about it now.

Someone, sometime during the day, went into our break room. Saw all those lockers standing there.
And decided to open them.
All the ones that had no locks on them.
And take whatever they wanted to.

The theft was discovered later that evening.

Coworkers of mine had lost their money, wallets, credit cards, passports, medications and who knows what else.
Because they hadn't put a lock on their lockers.

One coworker was furious stating: "Maybe this will inspire the managers to finally lock the break room."

O.o
....uh....how about have it inspire you to buy a lock? As that's easier in the long run, then having a lock on a room that is constantly being accessed by people going on breaks.

*shakes head*
I feel bad for my coworkers, who lost a bit of their trust in this incident.
I mean, it's nice to believe that no one would come take your stuff.
But honestly....it's only a matter of time when things are left unattended in unlocked places. Even here in Happy Valley. :(

-Sarnic Dirchi

Added Writing

Whenever a customer is buying an animal that isn't a fish.
We have to have them fill out paperwork.

It's a simple form where you give us basic information of name and address, and we let you keep a copy so you know that you have proof you bought the creature from us and that we have certain guarantees and recommendation with the purchase yadda yadda.

lol, well today, a customer who I'd been talking with for the past 15 or 20 minutes about things they would need for the bearded dragon they were getting, took the time to write out on the paperwork "Sarnic Rocks!!"

lol. I don't know if I've ever had anyone do that before to me. ^^;; It made me feel really good.
Though now I wonder if anyone will ever see that little side note.
probably not.

But still. I know it's there. ^^

-Sarnic Dirchi

In the Bucket

I was in the middle of doing betta water changes at work today.
As we do that twice a week to ensure that the bettas water in the cups that they reside in stays clean.

And a woman walks up to me and sees the bucket of fresh water that I'm using to fill up the betta cups when I'm done emptying the dirty water into a second bucket.

She's like "Oh I didn't know all the bettas come in a single bucket."

Which if you don't know anything about bettas and saw me placing a betta in a cup that's over a bucket of water...it would make sense that I pulled the betta from the bucket to put in the cup and that the bucket would have more bettas inside of it.

However, considering the fact that bettas tend to like to kill each other when they're placed together....made having multiples in a bucket impossible.

So I told her. "Nah, they'd fight if that happened, I'm just changing the water."

And that's the extent that conversation went as she moved on to see something else.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Numbered Out There

Okay...
It's probably a bad thing to not go through and do an animal count on all our animals in the store for like three weeks in a row.

I mean, it wasn't on purpose that I didn't do the animal count the last two weeks.
I had things come up, it got busy, and I was unable to do the count.
I mean....technically it's not my job but my manager's to do the animal counts. I just do it if he's scheduled off that day or scheduled to work an evening shift.
Still...on the days where he's scheduled an evening shift...you'd think that he'd still find time to do the count...

Apparently not.

I finally had time today to do our animal count. Things progressed quickly enough with opening that I was confident that I could add this task to my list.

:S Good thing I did.
Because our Cricket Numbers were waaaaaayyy out of wack.
As every week we end up having to write off a bunch of crickets that had died off.
Not doing that for 3 weeks meant....
We hadn't written off 3 weeks worth of dead crickets.
Possibly even longer. *shrugs* Who knows. I haven't written off crickets in a while.

But seeing that our inventory said that we had 22,500 Large Crickets and 11,800 small crickets. :S Is...a bit extreme. A lot extreme.
Halfway makes sense as we get in around 6,000 crickets or so a week.
So not writing them off for 3 weeks...would mean at least 18,000 large crickets right there...

But that was bad...
As in reality we had like 3,500 large and 2,500 small crickets. :S

Ouch for our numbers this week. :S Ouch. Ouch.

Note to self. Ensure that the cricket count is done in the future.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Simple Procedure

Apparently clipping bird wings is rather complicated.
*shakes head*
lol.

Let me explain.

So I had a customer today who wanted to buy a bird and get the wings clipped.
Which we do as a free service when they're buying the bird. But we don't do it again after that point.
And I explained that to the customer.
Who was like "So how do we clip the wings then? If we can't bring them back to you, do they need to be clipped again?"

Well...yes they do need to be clipped again as the feathers are just like finger nails. They grow back.
But most people can do it themselves. Unless they aren't confident in it, then the customers can take them to a vet.

However, I explained the process to the customer....who kinda gave off the impression that this was 'too hard' for them to do.

It wasn't.
And to show them so.
I caught the bird they wanted.
Made sure it was secure so that it wouldn't get loose in the store.
And then showed the customer what I was talking about two minutes earlier and the process of how to do it.

To which they commented. "You make it seem so easy!"

Because it is easy.
Pull out the wing. Clip the feathers. Don't clip too high and you're good. *shakes head*

It's interesting how people make things out to be more difficult than they actually are. :) lol

-Sarnic Dirchi

The Brave One

I've gotten rather used to people being pretty skittish around the crickets we have in the store.
It's probably due to us currently leaving the lid off our large cricket container.
As it's been getting too humid within the confines there, with how many crickets we're currently getting in. And so we've left the lid off to try and keep the crickets alive.

So people, who realize that the lid is off the crickets....tend to back away rather quickly from that area. Afraid that the crickets will jump out at them. Which, with how deep the container is...is rather impossible. lol.

In any case.
Having gotten used to people shying away from the podium.
It was rather surprising to have a little girl march right up to the crickets, and stick her hand in within -since the lid was still off.
And then pull it back up for me to see a single cricket perched on her finger so she could look at it.
Lol. She showed no fear whatsoever, seemed rather taken by the cricket in all actuality. lol.

I later decided she's one of those 'tactile' learners. Who has to basically 'touch' everything in order to understand it. Because she would touch the water the fish were in, the containers the crickets go in, the nets, basically anything she could reach, she would touch at least once.

I was kinda glad for her to leave in the end. It was just a bit too much for her to constantly be everywhere trying to touch everything. :S

-Sarnic Dirchi

The Morning Call

It was one of those rare days where I was scheduled to come into the store later than normal. Like literally I was scheduled to come in just as we opened our doors officially to customers.

I walked in the doors and waved to my coworker who'd already been there for a couple of hours -when I would usually come into the store- and saw that she was already on the phone with a customer.

(gotta love those early morning callers)

I didn't think much of it as I went to clock in.

But like thirty seconds after I'd clocked in for my work shift, and was checking the schedule to see who was working where and when.

My coworker comes in and asks me if I've clocked in yet.

Which I had. I just hadn't had the opportunity to take off my coat and put away my bag yet.

She then asks me if I know anything about canister filters.

Which I know the basics of, though I've only cleaned them, I haven't set up a brand new one or anything.

But I have more experience with most things in the department than other people.

So I picked up the phone to answer the call that my coworker had put on hold.

It was a simple enough problem.

Guy had come in the night before and bought one of our canister filters for his new tank and was setting it up.

Only he got stuck on one of the steps. Not quite understanding what the wording was trying to convey.

Which from my understanding he just needed to 'prime the pump.' Or -use a small pump to get all the air out of the hoses and get water into said hoses, so that when you turn on the pump it's pumping water and not nothing.

lol. It was rather funny, as he read out the instructions. And it wasn't like I'd set up a pump before.

But thanks to me fiddling with the one canister filter that we have on one of our display fish tanks, I was able to piece together which step he was trying to complete. And explain to him the difference between the intake hose and the out take hose and why the compressor that would help to move the air out of the hoses needed to be on one side and not the other and what to do next etc.

I felt rather proud of myself after hanging up with that customer. lol As I was able to help and explain to him what he needed to do without even laying eyes on the product. :) Woot!

I hope it worked lol

At least he didn't call back while I was on shift, so I'm guessing it must be running smoothly now. :)

-Sarnic Dirchi

On Hold...Again

It can be rather frustrating to be put on hold.
Especially if someone picks up....only to put you on hold again.

That's part of the reason why I don't like to answer work calls that I know have most likely been put on hold. Especially since I know they're probably people on hold with the Groomers.
As for whatever reason, they tend to be grumpier about being put on hold.
More than likely because the groomers end up taking forever to get in touch with if they're busy with customers in person.

In any case.
Today, the work phones all rang out. Signaling that more than likely...someone had just 'expired' their hold time.

I picked up with the standard greeting.
and the woman on the other started the conversation with: "Please don't put me on hold again, I've already been put on hold twice."

O.o Almost I can see the groomers doing that, but it seems unlikely.
But I said "Alright, what can I help you with?" Hoping that she wasn't about to ask me a grooming question.
Unfortunately, that's exactly what she asked. She wanted to know if we had an opening for tomorrow in grooming to give her dog a bath and a shave.

And I had to tell her. "I'm sorry, I don't know, I'm not in the grooming department."
To which she sounded nearly to the point of pulling out her hair. "I'm not even in the grooming dept anymore?!"
To which I reassured her. "It's what happens when you're put on hold for too long, you go to the main store, but don't worry, I'm walking over to the groomers now to see if we can set up an appointment for you.

I suppose I could have ignored her wishes and just put her on hold again. But I decided to be nice. And ended up playing a bit of the 'middle man' as I relayed the questions and answers between the groomer and the customer.
I ended up putting them on hold for like 10 seconds so the groomers could pick up the conversation themselves on their work phone.

But hey, at least she got her results finally. :)

-Sarnic Dirchi

Still Cold

There's always a trend at work.
Where similar problems or wants pop up multiple times in a row.

This week's trend appears to be people who don't understand how to take care of reptiles.

As I had a customer come into the store today.
With questions about her Tortoise.

Her concern was that he wasn't really moving around much.
Which tortoises don't always move around, reptiles only are so active after all.

But if the customer was concerned that the tortoise wasn't moving around...
That's usually a dead give away that they're not warm enough.

So I asked the customer if they had heat.
Which it did.

But....its her set up that's the problem.

As you see.
She's keeping the tortoise in one of those Guinea Pig cages.
The ones with the plastic tray on the bottom and the wire cage above.
Which....isn't a big problem....
Except that she's keeping the tortoise in the basement, because she has a basement apt.
Which means...it's colder there.
An open air wire cage would do better in a warmer upstairs environment.
Which could be fixed if she had the heat on in the apt.
But she doesn't.

So who knows how warm it actually is in her place. 50s? 40s? After all it's been cold enough to snow here.

*shakes head*
Yah, basically if she wants the Tortoise to move about, she's going to need to warm up the environment a bit more.
Either by turning up the heat in her apt. Buying stronger bulbs to bask on the tortoise, or buying a glass cage for the tortoise so that the heat is a bit more trapped so it can't leave the area as quickly as it can in an open air cage.

Hopefully it goes well for her and the tortoise. :S

-Sarnic Dirchi

Here In Person

I had a customer come into the store today.
Who looked familiar.
Meaning that I'd helped them before in some fashion.

Which ended up being true.
I believe I'd helped this particular guy buy a Bearded Dragon for his daughter.
At least that's what he told me. It seems familiar. But with how many people I help....it's hard to know for sure.

However, what I ended up realizing within like two seconds of talking to this customer wasn't the fact that I'd helped him before.
No, it was the fact that I'd talked to him before.
Recently.
Like....
Yesterday Morning.
On the phone.

Yah. The customer I mentioned in yesterday's post....came into the store today.
O.o
I would have thought that if he was wanting to get a new bulb for his bearded dragon he would have come in yesterday. Though the way he'd made it sound on the phone, I'd thought he already had one.

However, I did have my worst suspicions concerned. The lightbulb he's using right now for his bearded dragon isn't a heating bulb.
Poor thing is probably too cold as the bulb won't naturally get that hot.
*shakes head*

What's interesting though.
Is that the customer basically brought up all the same concerns that we'd talked about yesterday on the phone. The Heat. The Crickets. The lack of money.

At least he bought the bearded dragon some crickets and mealworms today, if not the bulb.

lol It's always interesting to deal with customers who you know you talked to, but they don't know they talked to you.
I wonder if they ever put two and two together when I end up giving them the same answers I gave them on the phone, that we're one and the same, or if they just assume that everyone will give the same answer.

So curious....

-Sarnic Dirchi

Why Do You Have This Pet?

It was one of those phone calls that I answered already not in a good mood.
Mostly because I never like it when customers call the store before we're officially open.
There's a reason why we come into the store before we're open. It's so that we can get things DONE when there aren't customers there to slow everything down.
Same goes to phone calls.

So automatically, I didn't like this customer because they called before we were opened which interrupted me in my opening tasks.

*shakes head* Not that the customer knew that...

In any case.
The customer on the phone was calling because he was concerned for his bearded dragon.
You see, the 75watt bulb that he'd had in the tank before had shattered,
and so he'd replaced it with a 60watt bulb instead.
And now he was concerned as to why it seemed to be colder in the tank.

....
It's these sort of questions that make me wonder what people are thinking. *shakes head*
Logically, wouldn't it make sense that if 60 is less than 75....then the ability to heat up the same space would be less as well?
Apparently it doesn't make sense. *shakes head* As the customer didn't seem to realize that a lesser wattage would mean lesser heat.
>.< Not that he was giving proper heat with that 60 watt....he made it sound like he'd just used a normal lightbulb instead of an actual heat bulb.

My ire rose as the conversation continued and we established that he has absolutely no idea how to take care of a Bearded Dragon.
As he was surprised to learn that bearded dragons like to have the hotspots in their cages be 90-100 degrees. He was surprised to find out that you can increase the temperature the bearded dragon was getting by simply moving a branch closer to the light bulb.

In any case, I convinced him that he would need to switch back to at least a 75 watt bulb in order to give his Bearded Dragon more heat so it wouldn't get so cold.

And then he asked another question.
"So when I handle the bearded dragon he's rather jumpy and doesn't want to sit still. Plus when I reach my hand into the cage, the bearded dragon will open it's mouth at me. I don't want to get bitten. Why is he doing that?"

O.o Considering Bearded Dragons are really mellow pets....that don't really move around. The fact that the bearded dragon was 'jumpy' usually indicates that they sense something is wrong with the person. As there are people that animals will take an instant dislike to. -Not that I told the guy that.

Instead I asked how long they'd had the bearded dragon for -as if it had only been a few days then I would have said he was stressing the poor creature out- 
Their answer was about 3 weeks.
Alright, so it wasn't stress more than likely. Which probably meant they needed more food. So I said to the customer that Bearded Dragons's bites aren't that painful. Just like a pinch. And in the store, if the bearded dragons are opening their mouths it usually means that they're grumpy because they're more than likely hungry. So what were you feeding it?
"Ah. Mealworms."
I think I heard freeze dried....which isn't the best because bearded dragons like to hunt. So like their food live.
"What about Crickets?" I asked him.
"Ah...yah...we haven't been able to feed it those for a bit now because we kinda ran out of money."

*exhales*
....Not exactly the answer I wanted to hear.
If you can't afford to feed your pet....why did you get it in the first place? If they're short on money, that probably indicates that the Bearded Dragon is barely being fed. If they're doing meal worms it wouldn't have surprised me if they were only giving one or two at a time.

And considering that growing bearded dragons could eat up to 20 small crickets in one go...if not more....
It's no wonder that the bearded dragon is opening it's mouth at the owner.
He's probably starving.

I mean, in the store we usually do 5 or so mealworms (more if they're eating them) and at least 10 crickets (and more if they're eating them.)

So basically the poor bearded dragon was starving and too cold.
*exhales*
Hopefully, with the information that he needs more heat and more food the owner will be able to take better care of it....

But yah, not a fun conversation to have early in the morning. Definitely got my irritation levels up early today. *shakes head*

-Sarnic Dirchi

Scared Of Them?

Sometimes I don't understand people's logic.

So, for some reason, today at work, more customers than usual were commenting about our crickets.

Mostly on the fact that they hate the creatures and think that they're creepy. O.o
Which is weird, as they're hardly the creepiest things to deal with.
Spiders? Yah. They're creepy.
Crickets? It's not like they bite, or sting, or do things like that.

They just crawl around, hop around, nothing major.

Yet people don't like them.
lol. I'd probably understand better if I hadn't been catching them for the past four years at work, and even before that in fields when I was younger.

They're just bugs.

In any case.
The amusing thing about today is that there was a family that came into the store.
A Mom, Dad, and Son who all shared a 'fear' as you will, of the crickets.

The Father tried to put the lid on the cricket bin back on.
-We'd taken it off as it was getting too humid in the container and the crickets were dying, so we were leaving the lid off to keep it from getting too stuffy inside. -
And the Mom was like "Gah! I hate crickets! What if they jump out?"

That's everyone's concern. What if they jump out?
lol. They can't.
The container is too deep for them to do so even with the lid off.

In any case.
The young boy was fascinated/scared of the crickets as well.
He kept saying "Dad! The crickets scare me!"

O.o But then...it was like he was asking for trouble.
For he'd stare at the crickets wide eyed, give a tiny shriek, dart off to his parents...only to drag them or just return by himself, to stare at them once more.

O.o

So. Weird.
Maybe he was trying to face his fear?
If so...it wasn't working....but hey....whatever floats your boat I suppose. :)

-Sarnic Dirchi

Proper Spots

It's only taken us like six months.
To finally set the reptile planner.

As with our animals, in the store, they're not supposed to be placed willy nilly in the habitats.
We actually have set cages in each section for the animals to go into.
And as we add in animals or take away animals, the cages that the animals are in can change. Moved from cage 1 to cage 2 etc.

We have that for all the animals.
The Fish,
The Birds,
The Small Pets.
And the Reptiles.

And usually they're switched around a couple of times a year. Usually towards Summer and then again Towards Winter.

Out of the four listed above.
Only the Small Pets do we disregard the planner. We end up going through hamsters and guinea pigs fast enough that when a cage empties out, if there's no more of that type of animal available to bring out, we just stick a different breed into the slot. That way, we keep our cages full and customers mostly happy.

The other three sections, it's pretty easy to keep them to planner.
Birds. Super easy.
Fish, Pretty easy.

Reptiles....should have been easy.

But it wasn't.
Why?

Because for whatever reason. We ended up having two resets super close together.
Like they had us reset the reptiles in April...
and then again in July.
Super close together.

And in that first reset.
Whoever was in charge of deciding what animals we would be selling.
Thought it would be a good idea for basically half of the cages to become snake habitats.
Mostly of the ball python varieties and their morphs.

Only, we set the planner.
And no snakes came.
Week after week.
Month after month.
The cages sat empty because the snakes we were supposed to be getting in.
Never showed up.

Until.
They did.
We got in a bunch of our new snakes!

And then...like a week or two later....
In the reptile shipment....
We got in animals....that we shouldn't have been carrying anymore.
Like the Chinese Water Dragon. And I believe the Asian Forest Scorpion.

Confused, I checked the planner again.
And discovered.
That they'd updated the reptiles once more.
To bring back the animals they said we weren't going to be getting in, and getting rid of.....

You guessed it.
The snakes we'd finally gotten in.

Now. Suddenly they no longer had a spot in our planner.
Yet, I still had them.
Which meant, I had to get super creative on ensuring that all the various reptiles had a cage to call home.

And that meant....that I couldn't place our animals in their expected locations.
Mostly...because two of the snakes we got in....were super big! Like already a year old when they came in. O.o
And in the original reset....they were supposed to go into our smallest cages. Ha.
They were waaaaaay too small for snakes their size.
And so I moved them into larger cages.
Which meant the reptiles in those larger cages needed to be placed in different cages...
And so commenced a bit of ring around the rosie.

But finally.
FINALLY.
Today while I was cleaning cages.
I was able to place the animals in their spots!!
We'd finally sold the snakes that we weren't carrying any more.

It only took like six months. lol.

Watch.
In the next couple of weeks or so, we're going to get a notice that the planner is being reset again. And I'll have to move everyone around once more. :)
But for now.
It's complete! Ha!

-Sarnic Dirchi 

Self Counted

Mmm Gotta love the impatient customers.

I had left the dept for a lil bit to ask a manager a question.
I hadn't thought much of it since I knew I had a coworker in the dept to cover any help that was needed.
Apparently it wasn't enough help though. Or they'd gotten pulled away or something.

Because as I rounded the corner to head back to the fish/cricket area.
I saw a customer.
Standing at the podium, finishing tying off a bag of crickets.
That he'd obviously just bagged.
Himself.

Which he wasn't supposed to do.
We don't let customers bag their own crickets. >.<
Obviously though, he was impatient for help and so did it himself.

I gently took the bag from him after confirming that the number of crickets in the bag was the number he specified he was taking and helpfully wrote the number on the bag for him.

I was nice.
Though I wanted to go. "DON'T TOUCH MY CRICKETS I WILL BAG THEM FOR YOU JUST WAIT A BIT NEXT TIME OKAY?!"

lol. At least he was honest in his counting though. :)
Still needs practice on his bagging skills though.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Covered Lights

O.o
My managers notice the oddest things.

So there I was. Doing this and that.
When my Head Manager asked me: "Did you drive in the dark today?"
O.o
Uh.... "Yah." was my response. After all I came in the morning. And the sun doesn't ever rise before I go into work....so yah. I drove in the dark. "Why?"
"How were you able to see?!" He exclaimed. "Your head lights were completely covered in snow when I came in!"

*blinks*
It took me a second.
But then I was like. "No, I cleared them off before I came in."

As it's been snowing here for the past 24 hours or so. So when I went out to drive to work this morning...my car was covered in like a foot of snow. But as I cleared off the windows, I made sure to clear off the headlights as well so I could see.
So the fact that my manager said that my head lights were covered....confused me.
Because I'd been able to see just fine on the drive into work. So obviously my headlights hadn't been covered then.

A glance out the doors -as my manager insisted that they were covered- showed me the potential cause as to why he believed that I'd been crazy enough to drive with covered head lights.

My guess is that because I'd been driving, my engine was warm.
As I hadn't cleared off all the snow on the hood of my car before driving. I think the warmth of the engine softened the snow on the hood. Causing it to slide.
Forward. And down.
Covering my headlights.

lol.
I couldn't convince my manager that I hadn't driven with covered head lights.
So I basically went with. "Cus I'm amazing." As that's usually a good answer to most things. As honestly, my coworkers are probably beginning to believe it. lol

-Sarnic Dirchi

And...How Many Is That?

It's always the same scenario.

It's the customer who asks "Can I get some crickets."
I then respond with "Large or Small"
They say the size.
I then ask "How many."
And they either answer right away or spend a couple minutes deciding how many crickets they need.

Today's customer actually knew the size of crickets they wanted.
They wanted small.

But when I asked him how many crickets he needed he said: "About two weeks worth."

O.o
.....
Keep in mind, the conversation above.
Where I ask, size and number of crickets.

But the number of crickets people get depends on the type of animal they are feeding.
Is it a spider where they only need like 2 a week?
Or is it a Bearded Dragon that will eat like 60 crickets a week?

So when the customer said "two weeks worth"
That literally could be any number.

So I was like "How many is that?"
And he was clueless.

Just like I was clueless.
Because I could bag him up 100 or I could bag up four or any number inbetween and I wouldn't know if it was right or not.

Lucky me....I know how to ask questions. And I think to ask them. *shakes head*

The question to ask when people don't know how many crickets they need is to ask them what type of pet they're feeding.
Because like I said, there's usually a trend of how many crickets particular animals will eat a week.

His response.
A wolf spider.

....okay....
I'm only familiar with tarantulas but spiders probably aren't that different.
Which meant that the spider would be eating 2-5 a week.

So I think I ended up getting the customer 10 small crickets.

*shakes head*

He would have gotten them a lot faster if he'd just told me a number instead of this whole "Two weeks worth." info.

-Sarnic Dirchi