Contagion

There is an Indian woman who walks with her hips jutted out. She comes in pretty frequently. And she frequently startles me. She is very unfortunate looking, but I think she is friendly. She speaks only Hindi, although some of her words sound English, which leads me to believe we are in a conversation. We are not. Although she chatters on as if we are. And somehow we make it through transactions.

There was another woman who came in today. This one had an exceptionally awesome mullet; the defining line between party and business was drawn with a part on the top of her head, in front of her ears. She spent a long time going through the sweats we just got in. While she was in line I overheard her phone conversation and it made me uneasy:
"Well, apparently I got myself a respiratory illness. ... yeah, it was pretty bad. ... I went through a whole bottle of Robitussin .. I was sick for eighteen days....No, Arthur took me. ...Bless his heart. ...I think I'm feeling better, but I came in to buy more meds. Ok, I'll let you go."
OMG, ma'am if you are sick you need to get the hell away from me. Sometimes I really do get nervous. And her appearance in my store made my sort-of symptoms that much worse.

My face allowed someone to tell me a personal story again. This girl says she just got out of court, and she was having a real good day. I wondered how, and she said because she was in there for having a bowl in the car while driving (using it too? I do not know). And because she had no priors, the judge sentenced her to a psych eval and some classes. She is one of the first to go through this new program that will prevent first-timers from having to go to jail. She was super-excited. Sounds like a good plan to me.