I love [my obnoxious, yet highly creative friend] but she just keeps bombarding me with ideas and things she wants to do and I frankly don’t have the energy. She just shows up at the store daily and stays for hours leaning against the counter taking up tons of real estate… head back, eyes closed, deep in thought, large tablet with scribbled plans nobody will ever make and loud. Did I mention loud. She’d get an important call about employment (yep, the unemployed hang out with me daily) and get on her 1997 cell phone head set and wander around the store, yelling buzzwords and giggling loudly. I guess they were deaf in 1997. I can’t get anything done. I suppose I could tell her I have work to do and kindly show her the door. But this one is volatile and frequently goes off on rants about how I’m not a good friend, not attentive enough etc etc. Letting her wander is frankly, all about less damage control today. And, if I piss her off enough, she’ll send in one of her co-conspirators to explain to me what being a good friend is. I’m not sure when I became her target. Need to find her someone else to torment.

While [obnoxious yet highly creative friend] was here, [evil evil consignor] comes in the door. Looking disheveled with wet hair… she looks worn out and angry. The scowl on her face tells me she’s obviously already pissed at me for not returning her email, but damn How would you respond to this irrational thinking?

“I’m here to pick up my stuff.” She announces with no emotion. Usually she is happy to see me, friendly, occasionally entertaining… but now that I have taken away what she wants, she hates me.

I sent an email stating we were downsizing consignment, please come pick up your things and then the return email went a little something like this… “My computer just crashed, then we had a rat infestation, my husband tells me he might leave me because I’m, get this, too bossy, my son just hit puberty, my daughter has been sick, we had to put our dog down, our roof fell off then YOU send me this email. I don’t need this from YOU, my life already sucks, thanks for making it worse. Why can’t you just hold onto my things because I really need the extra money. I think you should be running your business different. The reason you don’t have enough foot traffic is because your landscaping in the front doesn’t pop out enough. I know where you can get these 5 foot tall planters…” Blah blah blah, something about hating me and not wanting to speak to me again and that it’s all my fault she isn’t the Rachel Ray of eclectic yard decor. A ray of sunshine, she is. All this over 20-something bottles with wire and seashells hanging off of them. Wire. Dangles. Rust. Dirt. It’s part of the “charm”.

So, we have a few words, she takes her things with her and says something like “Well, maybe we’ll talk again someday, mmmaybe we won’t!” With an audible “humph!” and she pushes her way out the door. A very junior high “have a nice life” statement. She’ll be missed.

At least my friend noticed what a strange interaction it was. We had a moment of bonding as she realized that sometimes this cute little store could be an estrogen war zone. I sort of regret spilling those beans to her because it was a moment of weakness. I let my guard completely down and being the control freak that she is… she started using these bits of information against me over the course of a few weeks. She’s a crafty one… she figured out my buttons and weaknesses quickly.

She must be destroyed.