Shoplifter Thwarted

It was Monday, I had just gotten to work.  Another associate and I were on the floor while the two managers were in the back doing some important paper work and such.  There has never been a time when four employees were all on the clock at the same time, it just NEVER happens, except this one time.  My associate was helping another customer and I was casually putting clothes away when an older woman about 60-70 years of age, who looked upper middle class walked in.  I greeted her, asked if I could help her find anything, and then told her about all our wonderful sales.  She was one of those customers that didn't want help.  I let her alone and continued putting away clothes when suddenly I heard a hanger whack wood.  I turned and looked and saw an empty hanger where our last leopard sweater was hung.  I thought it strange for a old woman to pull a sweater off of a hanger like that.  Only men do that, and in a women's clothing stores, men hardly even touch the clothes.  The old woman wasn't trying on the sweater and walked away from the area with out it in her arm.  I suspected shoplifting!


I approached the old woman who was meandering aimlessly around and again asked if I could help her find anything.  She responded with, "Where is your sale?"  Kind of an odd response since I had already shown it to her.  I watched her closely as I straightened the clothes  as she continued to wander.  She went back to her original area of the empty hanger.  I though, "Oh good, maybe she is going to ditch whatever she was going to steal."  I watched her closely and could see through the rack what she was about to do.  As I watched her hopefully become a good person again, I was appalled!  She did not take it out of her purse, but put it in her purse!  Apparently she had not taken it the first time, probably because I turned and looked when the hanger banged.  She was now stealing it!

I could not let this happen!  I approached her again and asked if I could assist her.  Corporate doesn't want lowly associates accusing people of stealing, so all I could do was pester her with questions till she changed her mind about stealing.  She refused help, but I could see it in her eyes that she knew that I knew.  I beelined to my associate who was helping a customer and interrupted her, which is not supposed to happen.  I whispered in her ear that the lady over there was shoplifting.  My associates reaction was perfect.  She gasped and said, "NO ?!?!  What do we do?"  Her voice and expression was enough to scare the old lady because now both associates on the floor knew her crime.   I ran into the back room where the two managers were working and told them there was a lady shoplifting.  They ran out and now with four employees on the floor, the lady knew she couldn't steal any more.

 So she started trying on the sweater.  The sweater was a size large and she was obviously more of a size small.  Corporate always puts out fliers for the back room the associates can read about shoplifters and how to spot them.  On the latest flier that I read last Tuesday, it talked about how shoplifters will grab clothing with no regard for size.  It was just one more clue she was trying to shoplift.  One of the managers approached the old woman and asked if she could help her.  The old woman responded that she would buy the sweater.  I thought, "Yea, she is trying to amend her wrong!"

The manager helping her asked her name at the cash register as we ask all of our customers.  The old woman said, "Eloise, but there is a 'u' in there."  I though, "That is really strange."  The old woman wrote out a check, but since we do electronic checks, it was immediately denied.  The manager asked for a driver's license.  The old woman pulled out her wallet to look for it, but could not find it.  The manager could see the wallet and told us later that there was NOTHING in the wallet.  No cash, no credit cards, no ID, nothing but the check book.  She had obviously stolen the wallet from the true Eloise.  Its a good thing for Eloise to have frozen/canceled her checks and credit cards.  The manager told her she could not purchase the sweater without ID.  The old woman was frustrated.

She put her purse on her shoulder, but she did not do it like a normal person with both straps, but only used one strap.  She used the strap that was farthest away from her, that sure makes it convenient to shove things into a purse, now doesn't it.  The manager noted that she had missed a strap, the old woman became flustered and just shoved the entire purse into her armpit.  When the old woman did this the manager saw that it was completely empty!  No normal woman ONLY caries an empty wallet in her large purse.  The two managers and I all stared her down till she left the store empty handed.

A little bit about us

BYU WON!!!!!! Yea, now they are only 2-4!  We have been watching all the games at Charles' sister's house because she is the only one with cable.  She has two little kids and on Saturday while we were there we were in charge of babysitting them while their parents went out.  It was fun to teach their kids about football.

Charles is almost done with his second class for his MBA!  Two classes down, a million more to go.

This next Saturday is Charles' birthday party if you want to come!!!

In my Hearing Science class our teacher looked in everybody's ears with a camera thing and projected it onto the screen for everyone to see.  It was disgusting, but very cool at the same time.  Apparently I had ear infections as a child even though I don't remember any because there was a small spider web shape on my eardrum.  There was one girl who had lots of ear infections and it looked as though a white worm was coiled up in her eardrum.  There was another girl that had had her eardrums replaced as a child and when I looked at it, I wasn't sure where the eardrums were.  There was so much scar tissue and such, it looked awful.

Charles still doesn't know if his job is permanent.  But soon he will have worked there so long he can start applying for other jobs in the company.

Finally cooling down here in Utah after it was 90 at the beginning of October.   Yea!  Since all of our winter clothes were used to cushion all of our breakable things like dishes.  We will see if we stay warm this winter.

Dinner with cousins because Aunt Quenta came into town.  It was LOTS of fun to hang with everyone!

For Charles' birthday,  his friend, BJ gave him lots of fruit and mberry which is this little pill thing that after it dissolves in your mouth that it will make everything taste sweet.  It suggested eating such things as lemons and cheese.  We were both quite excited at trying this new thing.  So on Saturday Charles and I both tried it out.  Charles went first.  After it completely dissolved he stuck three slices of lemon into his mouth.  It was supposed to taste like lemon aid, but it was just as powerful as regular lemons are.  So it continued, he tried other things with no change.  I decided that I would try it because maybe that was a fluke that it didn't work.  I went through the same steps and when I had my chunk of lemon it did nothing.  Well, there are more in the package, maybe we will do a little bit more research on maybe why it didn't work.  Maybe we will try it later.

I LOVE Toblerone chocolate!  It is delicious!  The other day when Charles was at Maceys he saw a bar of Ferrara chocolate.  He decided that it looked similar and I might enjoy it as much as Toblerones.  It was yummy, but I think that my first love with Toblerone chocolate will always hold fast.  Maybe in the next life there will be something that is even better, but for now, it is as close as I can get.

Over a month ago Charles lost his wedding ring.  Fortunately we had boughten it off of ebay for about $30.  We looked and looked and finally gave it up as being lost forever.  We went back to ebay and bought him two rings.  We figured he would now have a spare incase he looses the other.  There may or not be an old saying about once you buy a replacement or ask for help you will find it, but it holds fast and true.  Once the rings came in the mail, Charles' dad found his original wedding ring.  Now Charles has three wedding rings to choose from each day.  The nice thing is that although he has three rings, we didn't even spend near $100 for all of them.

Tribute to Charles

Charles is such a wonderful husband and I am excited it is his 30th birthday!  Here are lots of pictures of Charles over the last year of his life.

 

 

 

Happy Birthday Charles!

Haircuts all around . . .

On Saturday, Charles' dad, Tom, cut my hair into lots of layers.  I just love how my hair is now!

Charles' hair has been getting as long as mine, so I cut it down to the nub.

Charles is not talking about any of BYU's last few games in which they have lost everyone.  I am glad that we didn't buy All Sports Passes this year. (Now Charles Talking) BYU Football is like the seasons.  They have seasons when they're great and seasons when they're not so great.  The goal is to minimize the bad seasons and maximize the good seasons.  I've already hunkered down for this winter.  I'm just praying that summer will come before next August. 

Charles still doesn't know if his job is permanent even though the second deadline has come and gone.  Charles will probably stay a temp until the day he starts his own company.  I can't wait! (Now Charles Talking)  I'm not going to attempt too much until I've finished my masters degree.  But you all just wait...big things will happen in my professional life.  I hope.  In the mean time, I'll just write a book or something.  If anyone has a good idea for the title of it, scream.

General Conference is as wonderful as always!  Hearing the words of the prophet and the apostles is such an amazing thing to know how to become better.

During conference I finished sewing our Halloween costumes!  I can't wait!

We ate out at Sam Hawk for Charles' friend's, BJ, birthday.  It is DELICIOUS Korean food and I recommend that if you are ever in need of food in Provo, go there!  I LOVE it!  (Now Charles Talking)  When Annette says the Korean food is delicious, what she really means is that it is so hot that it could burn the corrosion off of your battery terminals.  In fact, it just might burn through your whole battery.  She has quite a tolerance to spicy hot foods that I could only dream of having.  But, it does have good flavor and if you're a masochist like me, you'll eat it anyway and enjoy the tears streaming down your face.

Random thoughts by Annette

I have decided that everyone should work three genres of jobs in their lives.  These three genres are food, sales/retail, and menial labor.  I have worked these three types of jobs and think it has built my character... 

...it has given me greater respect for those people who do it.  I understand them better and have compassion on them.  I think about how I could make their job easier and less awful whenever I interact with them.

This Saturday Charles and I went to DI for a fun outing in the morning.  I REALLY like DI!  There were a lot of really neat things there.  Charles has always wanted some glass mixing bowls like what his parents have, so while we were there I saw a bowl that looked exactly like the one his parents have.  Charles was so excited!  He ended up getting four bowls that are similar and all stack nicely.  As we were picking them out, a lady started telling us all about them and how they are from the 60's, she must be a frequent DI shopper.

As well when we were at DI, I saw all of the goblets.  I have always loved goblets and since they were so cheap I got eight of them.  We also got our friend's birthday present there, they were salt and pepper shakers in the shape of a barrel with wooded handles with "Idaho" written on the side.  They were really cute.  I think I will be doing more of my shopping at DI for everything from now on.  I am still a little bit sketchy on the clothes there.  I did however get two sweaters there, one for me and one for Charles.  The sweaters are part of our Halloween costumes that I have started to think about.  I am proud of myself for figuring out our costumes before the 31st.  I don't know if I should let the entire world know my fabulous idea though, but I'll give you a clue...

ER Visit and fun things like that

I know, I know, everyone is thinking that we like to visit the ER and just hang out there.  Unfortunately I was the patient in intense pain and scared I was going to die.  I had woken up with pain and then after taking a shower and throwing up my body went numb, started shaking uncontrollably with my muscles constricting and I could not do anything.  Before the worst started I called Charles to come home NOW.  He came home saw that I was completely pale, so he rushed me over to the ER at the BYU Health Center.  I threw up again and and they gave me an IV and a shot for pain.  They took a blood and urine sample.  They said that it al looked normal and they would only know more information if it happened again.  They hypothesized that I was simply dehydrated, but I am quite a bit skeptical of that.  Others have hypothesized of an ovarian cyst, I was talking to one of my friends during lunch and she said that the exact same things happened to her, including the convolutions.  But with her they actually had her go to a real hospital where they did more tests.  But I feel better now and surely don't want it to ever happen again to know why it happened.

As well on Saturday, Charles helped his sister with a fundraiser that she put on on Saturday.  It was a large yard sale and bake sale and since we have a vehicle with a towing ability and have friends with a trailer, Charles spent a lot of time hauling donated things to the fundraiser to be sold.  As well he would haul items to people houses if they couldn't.  He provided a great service to the cause.  They said it was pretty successful, but because they had SOOO much donated, they will be re-holding the yard sale again next Saturday.

Charles' coworker had a little party in which we attended.  It was interesting.  We were the only "true Utahns" there, as she put it.  It was an interesting experience to be around a bunch of people that were drinking, but it really didn't feel like we shouldn't be there.  They are used to the Mormon culture and didn't even think twice about us not drinking.  Most people that do drink and aren't used to Mormons, think it is absolutely strange that people wouldn't at least drink socially.  We did leave once the hard alcohol came out and they started taking shots.

Our Life as it is Now..

I finished my Summer classes and am now starting Fall semester with Hearing Science, Speech Anatomy, Biology 100 (yes, I know that I am a senior, but I really just haven't wanted to take this class), and English 316.  I am pretty excited, I have never had a semester with so few classes and am excited to be back in school.  Other good news that recently happened was as work.  I get payed $10 an hour, but my boss told me that this year they were doing 3% raises for people who have worked there since February 1st, unfortunately I didn't get hired till February 4th.  She didn't know if I would get the raise.  I thought, no big deal, what my salary would be $10.30 an hour.  So on Friday when I looked at my pay check I saw that my hourly rate was $12 an hour!  Wow I don't know how that happened, but I hope that wasn't an error on their part. . . I guess we will see next Friday.  Could they take it away if they made a mistake?

My baby, I mean my computer, recently went to the hospital, I mean the Apple Store, in Salt Lake for a simple repair on the hinge.  Since it was still under warranty it was fixed for free, but when I got it back the screen no longer lit up hardly at all when I turned on the computer.  So we rushed the baby to the ER, sorry, I mean we dropped my Mac back at the Apple Store again.  They said that since it was  their fault it completely broke and was not repairable that they gave me a credit for a new computer, I did although decide to upgrade to a MacBook Pro, 13".  It is so beautiful!!!  Now I have a new baby (my computer is my temporary baby till we have a few of our own, but before that I have my Mac)

On Sunday Charles and I substituted for a primary class of ten year olds.  I forgot what ten year olds are like, short attention span.  I think we did a fairly good job of teaching.  We got through all of the scriptural material about half way through the class and then spent the next half of class applying it in our lives.  It was hard to tie some of their random comments into the lesson, but I think it worked out all right.

On Friday my Mom and Larry came into town and took us and all my cousins who are hear at school out to Brickoven.  It was a fun dinner with everyone!  It was fun to hear what everyone was up to and such.