Well, while that aspect of Maui is really sucking right now everything else is pretty good. My knee has pretty much healed up and I'm back to running for real again. Did just over 70 miles last week and even got in a quality 17 mile run with the last 4 miles being around 6:45 and faster. Considering the hills in this area that is pretty balling. Feeling pretty confident about this marathon coming up in January. I could possibly be looking at my first marathon win if I continue to improve over the next couple months. I still wish it did not start at 5:45 though.
Barnes and Noble is going well. Everyone loves me there (not exaggerating either) and the bosses apparently think I am amazing when it comes to selling the new Nook Colors. I've been at it for just over a week and right now am the 2nd best seller in the store. Considering the person in 1st works twice the hours I do I really feel I am number 1. But the benefit is that they are giving me whatever hours I want. I can call in the morning and ask to come in and work that afternoon and our store manager literally gets giddy with excitement. She actually likes to stand there and watch me try selling this thing to people. Her exact words "Geez Louis, it seems like you've been doing this forever and not just 5 days." Apparently she didn't realize I'm a born bullshitter. By the way, selling these things are not easy. You are trying to get people to buy a $250 product when they are mostly coming in to buy a book or just look around. On average people sell about 1 or 2 of theses every couple days. I'm selling 2-4 of these in 4-6 hour shifts. Yeah, I'm that good.
Which leads me to the best story everrrrrrrrr: Carson, California.
So this past Wednesday I was trying to sell Nooks at the front door of the store. As people walk in I offer to show it to them. This one guy comes in to use the bathroom. I point him in the direction and tell him to stop by after and check out our new Nook Colors. And he does. I go through my routine, show him the bells and whistles of it. I joke around with him and explain the benefits of this over things like the Kindle (Amazon version) and the IPad. After I'm done he is unsure but I think I can hook him. I ask him what he's unsure about and he tells me he just isn't a book reader. He usually just reads magazines and newspapers. I hear the swiss of the ball as I go through how he can download any major magazine or newspaper in the world for fractions of the price of actual subscriptions and purchases. He takes one, a 2 year warranty, and cover for it.
After the purchase he comes over as I'm talking to my boss and hands me a card. He asks me my plans for the near future and I explain how I'm in Maui until late May then its off to Cape Cod for the summer. He then tells me to give him a call come this fall if I' looking for a job. He is the general manager of a car dealership chain for GM in Carson, Cali. He offers me a job in his main store. He'll put me up in his home until I can get my feet under me if I have no place to stay. With that he walks away after making me promise to keep it in mind. "You'll make a shitload of money if you can sell cars like you can sell these things. I read like 3 books a year and you got me to buy one."
My boss just looks at me and laughs. Then she says to me "You ARE coming back here in the fall right?" I just awkwardly laugh. A free place to stay, a job, southern california? I kept the card.
Thanksgiving turned out to be better than I expected. Jon, Matt and I were invited
to hang with a handful of their Hula Grille friends at this kid jake's place for dinner and festivities. So I offered to cook the turkey and we all went over there for the evening. MAssive amounts of food were consumed along with mixed drinks and wine. I am pretty sure over the course of the evening even I downed like half a bottle of wine. Some epic battles in scrabble were played, stories and adventures were shared by all.
It may have not been any classic McGrails Thanksgiving but it was a good time and definitly beat sitting around my apartment watching useless reruns. The one downside: The 2 mile walk back to our apartment with leftovers at 12:30AM with it starting to rain on us. Thankfully the three of us were still buzzed from the
night's festivities.
Other than that things have been mellow. Did some snorkling with Jon and Kelsey; one
of the girls I work with. Was a good time. Water was pretty rough due to strong waves coming in so there was not too much to see other than schools of fish. Am planning on buying a surf board within the nxt month. We live near some killer surfing locations. I am kicking myself right now because I just finished downloading some killer pictures of Kapalua trail and I accidently deleted some of the bst pictures. The more I go out there on my runs the more I fall in love with it. The crazy thing is that it is not even a long trail to run on. It stretches less than 2 miles and I have to run like 3 1/2 miles just to get to it. There is jsut something about it, the running along the cliff edge as waves crash below you. Leaping across the rocks while waves are crashing aroun you. It is like something from another worl almost. It has quickly become my fallback running destination. Kind of like the cemetary back home.
I was hoping to be able to post this amazing picture of a massive rainbow stretching across the sky and disappearing into this cliff jutting into the ocean. Oh well, I guess you'll just have to come and visit to see it.
Well it's time to go relax for a couple hours before bed. Busy day tomorrow opening a new back account since the only Bank of America location here is near the airport and it tuns out it is only a mortgage lending branch. So I have like 3 paychecks sitting in my room being useless.
Also, I strongly suggest everyone try this: Make a peanutbutter and jelly sandwich using 2 smores poptarts as bread. Mike, you remember these from our skiing trips right? Well they're back. Trust me people, you'll fall in love with them.
Til next time...
I don't wanna turn 29 on Tuesday!
No comments:
Post a Comment