April 4, 2011

Who needs the gym when you've got The Home Depot?

The Home Depot is exhausting me. In a good way. I've logged 5 consecutive days over 12,000 steps on my pedometer. Two of those days crested at 19,500 steps. To compare, my record while working at Licorice International was only 10,000. And I only got that one day when I put in a full work out before work.

There are three distinct areas of the "Garden Department". In total, they account for at least one-third of the store. I bust my behind to help customers in each of these areas, and I rack up the miles in the process. Now that the weather has warmed up, I've added a new skill: hauling and loading mulch. I've been assisting customers with these 50-pound sacks of sopping wet wood chunks. "Did you say 25 or 28 bags?" Sorry, lower back, I'm still working on that lifting technique.

Working at The Home Depot is the absolute last thing I expected to be doing a year out of college. Funny how that works, isn't it? But here I am, apron and all. I water plants, I help customers choose a lawnmower or grill, and I do my best with the multiple communication technologies that are supposed to help me broadcast my unending stream of questions. When I come home at night, my feet are warped to my shoes, my jeans smell like rotting mulch, and my ears ring with the sounds of our store phones, the walkies, and other devices that go "ding." Ding ding Ding Ding DING!!!

I feel much better after I eat dinner and recount the most annoying customer or my best use of Spanish vocabulary. I am grateful that I finally got a job with plenty of available hours and friendly coworkers. However, I am also grateful that I only have a few months of this job. It's hard!

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