Saturday 9 August 2008

SCHOOL UNIFORMS

School Uniforms aaarrrghhhhhh!

One week left arrrrggghhhhhhh!

Customers aaarrrrgghhhhh!

eBay aaarrrggghhhhhhhhh!

Picture the scene, Unit full of boxes, boxes that contain polo shirts, sweatshirts etc etc, all sorted into schools and me working to clear these boxes and deliver uniforms to all my waiting customers. Each customer is given time, my undivided attention and leave with complete, unmistakable confirmation that I will call when their uniform is ready for collection before the schools return on the 18th August. The phone goes, I ignore it if I have a customer, you see there is an answering machine, the purpose being to allow the caller to leave a message, but no the caller calls again because the first time they didn't want to leave a message but then decides maybe they will and so they call back, by that time I've nearly broken my neck falling over boxes to answer the bloody phone. I stop the machine to hear the customer and we have a typical conversation which goes like this;

'Hello Windy'
'Yes'
'It's Mrs Brown'
'Hi'
'I was wondering if my school stuff was ready yet?'
'What school is it?'
'it's The Primary School'
'Have I called you?'
'No'
'Well guess what? your f**king uniform's not ready yet'

Obviously that's not the conversation, but by God I would like to have that conversation. I am grateful to people and their business and these are only the newcomers that do that, they don't realise by calling me constantly that they are in fact holding up their own uniforms. As the years go by they will learn to trust that I will have their uniforms ready in time for going back to school.

Just a mild touch of stress at this time in the year, hence release on the blog.

Hope you're all fine and I'll be over to visit soon. Take care. xx

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh dear! Schools are stressful full stop..!

I guess you need a lot of patience. How do you get on with Ebay. I heard recently that they are very expensive to sell.

CJ xx

Maggie May said...

I think that stress is a feature in MY life at the moment too.
I have been off line for nearly 3 weeks and there are still teething problems with this new cable.

Suzy said...

Yep, the beginning of school again.

Amazing how the time rolls round so fast...

take care of yourself.

Love,

Suzy

Expat mum said...

Gosh I'm so glad that a) we don't go back till September 5th and b) we don't wear uniforms.
In the immortal words of Kate Bush "Breathe".

Tim Atkinson said...

The fact that shops have 'Back to School' promotions before we've even broken up gets rather irritating. What if we abolish uniforms? Not much good for business, I suppose.

She's like the wind said...

Hi CJ - I actually like this time of year due to the buzz and dealing with all the children, I love children.....well other peoples children and I did this business partly because I wanted to take the stress out of buying uniforms and I love children, just a shame I didn't realise the stress I would put myself under!! Ebay has been good and as long as you work it properly and know what you're doing, I do okay, but it's taken a while to work it all out and I don't have as much time to spend on it as I'd like. A little bit of profit is always better than none after all. xx

She's like the wind said...

Hi Maggie, now you see I love modern technology but when it doesn't go right it has to be the most frustrating thing EVER! Good luck and I'll be back to read you shortly. xx

She's like the wind said...

Hi Suzy - you are sooo right and it has been the fastest summer this year. Hope you are well. xx

She's like the wind said...

Hi Expatmum, September 5th, when did your kids stop for holidays? I'm looking forward to the routine again, I work better with routine and by god so do the kids, talk about crabbit! Now about the lack of uniform thing, I am glad we do have uniforms not only because I would be out of business if we didn't but it would be a fashion parade with little Miss Windy every morning in life and I don't think I could handle that. Poor girl is still getting over having to wear a green uniform! xx

She's like the wind said...

The dotterel - welcome and very nice to meet you, I'm not normally this rude about my customers, I was under a lot of pressure you see.....I hate the back to school thingy too and I don't do that. My business was built on the principal of making sure parents got what they wanted at affordable prices and I give all the help and guidance I can, based on my own personal motherly experience. Am I selling it to you? Abolish uniforms - never xx

menopausaloldbag (MOB) said...

Glad the cat's back and safe and well. School stuff - too stressful for words but thankfully that is all behind me now.

She's like the wind said...

Hi MOB - I'm also very very glad the cats back, just getting over the back to school period and straight into the corporate stuff. Can't complain at being so busy. xx