Yeah, no, Walmart.

My tiny order from Walmart, with Georgie's favorite treats, some fancy new wet food, and a hunk of water buffalo horn as a chew toy (I felt a twinge there for the poor buffalo and hoped it had a merciful end, as I hope for all of us in the animal realm who cling to life so dearly with our pounding hearts) refused to arrive by noon today as the ap claimed it would.  However, a msassive paper sack of gross and YOMMY pastries (including TWINKIES!) arrived, next to a plastic sack of uncut taco toppings, lettuce and roma tomatoes and a giant sack of "Mexican cheese mix" (including the orange road cone* cheese I loathe). I ordered none of these items.

I double-checked the ap to make sure Critter (the brain tumor) hadn't ordered these, either, and checked with Jim.  Nope.  I called my next door neighbors out of the blue (texting might take until next week, you never know how busy people are anymore) to find out if it was supposed to be theirs.  Nope.  

Dreading it, but seeing no way to avoid it, I called the Wallmart store I get my orders from.  The operator made me look up the Order Number.  That did narrow it down.  A bit.  

He said, "Well, that order came from another store and it was delivered by an uber driver,  So you could call over there and find out what happened."

"Yeah.  Um, no, I'm not going to do that." I said.  I said that!

In her latest Netflix standup, Kathleen Madigan refers to 30-somethings as the "Yeah....no," generation, because they so easily dismiss stupid obligations, the kind we older people would fall for and assume responsibility for because we "should".  She expresses admiration foe this attitude, and I am 100% WITH HER.  I believe we create the Big ASSHOLE BOSSES (including but not limited to TRUMP) by agreeing to run our asses off and work to exhaustion, to working weekends and even at times for no pay, by acting like thirsty codependents to our jobs and putting ourselves and our lives second, and this codependency makes the Bosses think waay too much of themselves; they start to think they are emperors of some kind because we are acting like slaves. It's similar to the way that even marginally good-looking men develop toxic narcissism from being thirstily chased as a prize by too many desperate women; they start to believe the hype, get bloated egoes and float above common humanity. In this way, I think the work ethic I was raised with created a host of problems, including wealth inequality, employee abuse, growing poverty, and Trump himself as a social phenom. He represents The Winner at the top of the stack, the One Who Took it All.  That's why he's a literal golden idol. He won it ALL, the champagne and caviar dreams, the nude model wife who stays thin and keeps her damn mouth shut, the gold palace above New York, and now ALL THE POWER IN THE WORLD.  He might be a loser, but he is still the living parade float figure of The Winner, and that's what his people, especially his MEN, love so much about him.  That it could be DONE.  That he did it.  And they can help him do it again, they can be PART of the Big Win.It makes THEM winners, too.  If he does it by selling his own country to Vladimir Putin, he still WON, and that's what matters the MOST. Being the WINNER.  If it's by Machiaveillian means, well, whatever it takes is just what Maciavelli talked about, right?  If he cheats on his taxes, that makes him "smart".  Fuck "character".  "Character" could cost you the win.

I did not win with Walmart service.  And I refused to help them out.  I was not going to be an unpaid employee for walmart.  I just said No.  And after a life of overwork in corporate media, it was a breeze.  When the operator told me to call the other store and do their work FOR THEM, 

I replied, "Yeah.  Um, no, I'm not going to do that." as a lifelong codependent I was just a bit shocked at the easy-breezy way the reply came out of me, and the ease and breeziness of it.

"OK, well," he was just as at ease and in the same breeze, "You could call 1-800-WALMART and talk to them."

I actually did this.  The crisp, bright robot voice joyfully told me I might qualify for an exciting prize.I had already heard this bullshit number from some other bureaucratic phoner I was forced to make this year, so I hung up and considered myself off the hook, the recipient of some free shitty groceries.

I reordered my doggy supplies right before Jim remarked, "So, get a refund."

Woops. I never do things right.

Now just getting the refund would probably be a nightmare, explaining that I needed a refund for the order BEFORE the reorder.....I dreaded the conversation already...

*I call it road cone cheese because you could only get cheese that color by milking a road cone.  Milk from cows is not Halloween orange.  I'm from Maine.  In New England we have pale milk in midwinter and we deal with it, we don't dye it.  All the great cheeses, which include not only Vermont white cheddar, but also so many of the great cheeses from Portuguese cuisine like Monchego, Peccorino,Romano, Mozarella, etc., are WHITE cheeses.  The color on the surface of a great mac n' cheese comes from being slowly baked with a breadcrumb abd butter topping and is honestly earned, although a very light sprinkling of paprika, or even cayenne(particularly in the case of LOBSTER mac n' cheese) is, in some cases, tolerated.