1430 Hours

About twenty minutes before I left work, a woman came up to me and said, "I need a brown bra, not padded, without wires. Size 42D." I handed her one of the few brown bras we have in the store. "This one doesn't have a wire, I said." "And what else did I say?" she responded. I was pretty sure I hadn't heard what I had just heard so I stared at her. No one is that rude. "I said I want one with no wire and no padding," she confirmed. "Uh," I said, casting my thoughts over the racks of bras I had been meticulously re-arranging all week, "we don't have any brown bras that don't have...the only wireless, unpadded bras we have are these and these and these, but they're not brown."

The woman made a beeline for our sporty cotton bras. "Yes, these come in brown. I'd like one please." "No, we don't have any brown in the store." "but I SAW THEM." "Ma'am, it's possible they were a fall or winter color, but we're getting rid of those colors and we don't..." The woman proceeds to pull a printout out of her bag and thrusts it into my hands. "I also saw these bras online. Do you have these?" "Yes, but not in the brown you want." "Well, what DO you have?!" "Well, I can check and see if we can order it online, and then it will be shipped to you in three to five business days." "Fine."

By this point I'm only being minimally helpful. I check to see if the bra is available online. It is. I take her order without pointing out the three or four sales/coupons we have available which would take her total down, oh, fifteen dollars or so, and see her to the door. I know it's cold. The heat doesn't work too well in the part of the store where I work, so I had spent all morning either blowing on my fingers, or holding them next to the nice warm register. I know you're cranky and in a hurry. But I am twenty minutes away from going home, and it is not my fault that you didn't plan ahead for your special event that requires a brown bra.

Ladies: Please for the Love of God, if you have a special outfit that requires a strapless bra or an otherwise special purchase, unless you are a 36C, plan ahead. I can guarantee that stopping by the only plus-sized store in the Loop on your way to your party will only result in fail.

In other news, it is minus five here. The windchill broke the thermometer. I am huddled into daddy's old Packer fleece, which has lots of room for extra layers, simmering chili in the next room. There is just nothing to do but bundle up and thank God that I have a warm place to be tonight to watch South Carolina returns.