This morning the weather here in Tejas is a breezy, beautiful 63 degrees with a high expected of 75. Brrrr!!!!! Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating as to the "coldness" of our cold front (that's right, the weather man is calling this a cold front for us), but it sure does feel incredibly wonderful and fall-like for the first time this year!
My thoughts are currently focused on Halloween which, to me, is the kick-off to the holiday season! The Hubs and I are both big kids-at-heart and love to dress up and put out Halloween decorations and tell ghost stories.
Apparently, my Goblin-and-Ghoul-Loving Gene was passed down to my second daughter (in the layout above), which should come as no surprise since she was born less than 5 hours before Halloween! I am not ashamed to admit that I am always stalking her Facebook page for photos, and when I found ones of her fiance and her playing with the masks in the store, I immediately saved them to my computer just in case she were to wise up and take them down. I'm pretty sneaky like that!
I used my Fancy Pants Oct 31st collection that I am working with this month for Let's Capture Our Memories and a sketch I found on Pinterest - which is quickly becoming my go-to site for anything and everything.
I am a HUGE fan of Fancy Pants Designs, and their Halloween collection certainly does not disappoint! The papers are beautifully detailed and range from vintage to little kid cute, allowing the creative freedom to scrap just about any Halloween-themed thing you can imagine. And the rub-ons and stickers included in the collection really let me layer my layout to my heart's desire! See?
Of course, I also had to make a couple of Halloween cards. I am on a handrwritten correspondence kick these days (an art that seems to be quickly dying out), and what better way to send a handwritten note or letter than inside a pretty handmade card, right? Right!
And that wraps it up for my Halloween projects for the moment. Now, on to my rant...
I NEVER thought I would hear myself saying, "In my day we just didn't do things like that..." but here I am getting ready to do exactly that! I guess that phrase comes along with crow's feet and hairs that keep wanting to turn gray...sigh.
Yesterday, I was at the grocery store picking up a couple of items for dinner. As I went through the check-out lane, the cashier made absolutely no eye-contact with me and said not one word during our entire transaction. Nothing. Nada. Now, I know she wasn't mute and was capable of speaking English based on a question that she answered for the customer ahead of me. But when it was my turn in line, there was no friendly smile, no "how are you," not even a "did you find everything." There was NOTHING. And this was not an isolated incident. I am encountering this same lack of...anything...from the store employee at more and more stores.
Now I worked in a grocery store throughout high school so that I could earn enough money to buy a car (and clothes, and make-up, and cassette tapes). I actually had to ring up grocery items and memorize the correct department keys, not run bar codes across a scanner. And, I certainly had to speak with and be friendly towards every customer whom I checked out; I would have been fired if I had not.
Don't get me wrong, I certainly don't expect to engage in a long conversation with the cashier. But is it too much to expect a "hello" and a friendly smile? Is courtesy no longer part of the job description?! Should I say something, or should I let it go and simply mourn the passing of time and standards? What would YOU do?
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