Feast of the Immaculate Conception

Hello friends. The Catholics out there know that Dec. 8 is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception (aka "All of the responsibility and none of the fun"). The Catholic schools take the day off, which means that a lot of Catholic kids come to Santaland on a weekday, and it's busier than usual. Also, there were many school groups.

There was a line to get in at 8:35am. Santaland opens at 9am. Shortcake went right to work on the Front line, wearing the headset, and stayed there for awhile. She manned the line while it was slow, and when it got long (around 10am). It became so long, we went to Crossroads, and it was all the way back Parade Hallway (think Sunday proportions). It wasn't a long line, time-wise, but it was long, distance-wise, simply because school groups take up more space, but not more time than a regular visit.

After a short break, Shortcake was sent to Crossroads, which turned into Parade hallway, which turned into Main exit, where she stayed until she was sent to Usher. By this point in time, Shortcake had crashed again, despite a snack on her previous break. Lunch was invigorating. Turns out food will give you energy, along with conversations about Disney villains, terrible teen movies, Zac Efron's bangs, and a Mulan sing-a-long starring Pip and Figgy.

Shrotcake went back to Ushering, much revived, and met a New York sports fan. He liked the Giants and the Rangers, but he was most emphatic about the Yankees. At which point in time Shortcake stopped being friends with him. Shortcake is a Cubs fan, and it is just not fair that the Yankees have 28 World Series Championships, and the Cubs have not won in 102 years. Really, 28 is just showing off.

After a mere 45 minutes of Ushering, Shortcake was sent on another 10 minute break. At which point in time she was sent to Gatekeeper, which she rocked for only 30 minutes, and was then sent to the Front line. It felt like the managers didn't want Shortcake to work the last two hours of her shift since they kept moving her around.

Mullet Tuesday?

So there was a second little boy with what appeared to be a mullet today. Turns out it wasn't a mullet. He just had long hair, and his parents had slicked his hair back.

Shortcake started the day as Gatekeeper, and it was slow. Fa La La was at the snowglobe, and he may have gone a little crazy trying to entertain himself. He was given a jingle bell necklace, so he invented a game where he put his hands behind his back and hit the bell from shoulder to shoulder just by moving his torso. This was "really fun." Picture the jingle bell/shoulder equivalent of Ball in a Cup, and you have an idea of how much fun this game was. Then Fa La La played with some of the toys, climbed over some boxes, and laid on the railing. Shortcake turned her back for a second, and when she turned back he had disappeared. He reappeared from behind a Christmas tree, after his disembodied voice called out "I was looking for tinsel to wrap around my body." He then proceeded to take multi-colored metal streamer ornaments off the tree and put them under his hat, so they looked like metallic, shiny pigtails a la Pippi Longstocking.

The Usher elves basically entertained themselves by gossiping about Santaland. After about 2 1/2 hours of that, Shortcake went on a break and then went to the Front line. It was a little long since there were a lot of school groups. Shortcake crashed around noon, but got her second wind, which was good since lunch wasn't until 2pm. After lunch Shortcake Ushered, and ran into a tree about 5 times because Ushering involves running backwards. She teased Pip a lot, and Pip jumped out and scared her groups while Shortcake brought them to Santa. Teddy Bear was in the house; and it was nice to see Teddy Bear not on the front line.

The Tick Loves Santa

It's in 2 parts on YouTube. If you like The Tick and Santa, here's a combination.

Part 1

Part 2

Mullet Monday

Shortcake was on the front line for the first half of the day. There was a line before Santaland opened, and right after it opened, the managers realized some lights were out. So Shortcake had to hold the line until 9:30, when the lights could be fixed and people could be let in. The line started to pick up around 10am, and it was a steady 20-30 min. wait until 12:30pm when it finally disappeared.

The New York Times came by to take a photo of Santa. A camera crew spent the morning following Spritz around and watching Santa. Apparently, they were supposed to do a news story on a followup to The Santaland Diaries by David Sedaris.

Shortcake saw a blond boy with a mullet. But it wasn't well-cared for. It reminded Shortcake a lot of the years that her brother decided to have a rat tail, just because everyone else wanted him to cut it off.

After lunch Shortcake was Gatekeeper, which went quickly. Gatekeeper is the most physically demanding position because one arm must always be kept behind the back. This sounds easy, but leave your arm behind your back without moving it for an hour and half. It starts to hurt. Then Shortcake was sent to usher, which was fun. She was working with lots of good elves: Bobble, Shortcake, Figgy, Silver Mist, Sparkles, Happy, Snowglobe, etc.

Another strawboss agreed on the need for an International Strawboss Sign Language.

After her shift, Shortcake proceeded to geek out in the locker room with Figgy and Frostbite. They posited that Santa could, indeed, be a Time Lord whose TARDIS was in the shape of a sleigh. And since the TARDIS is a time machine, that's how he visits all the children in one night. And Mrs. Clause is his companion. And if Santa doesn't always look the same from year to year it's because he regenerated.

This came out of a conversation about Wizard Rock (Shortcake is attending the New York Yule Ball featuring Harry and the Potters and Draco and the Malfoys) which led to a conversation about T-Rock (about Doctor Who), and the geek level in the locker room reached epic proportions. It was possibly uncontainable.

Happy St. Nicholas Day! Shortcake gave M&Ms to her fellow elves, managers and Santa. Bobble brought in cookies. She received some earrings, the book The Littlest Angel, some running gear, and an ornament for her tree.

Crowd Control

The store opened at 9am today. There was an hour wait to see Santa by 9:20am. Shortcake started on the front line and within 5 minutes was at Crossroads. 5 minutes later she was at the bank in Parade hallway. 30 minutes later she was in HR, manning the back of the elevator hallway and the HR banks (when necessary). She stayed there until lunch. After lunch she was at Crossroads for 30 minutes, then went to the Front Line, with headset, and stayed there until 4:30 (staying an extra half hour past her shift). By the end of the day, the line was down to about a 45 min. wait. But still.

Here's the deal people. An hour wait is normal for a weekend. If you can't handle waiting an hour, don't come on Saturday or Sunday. There is no shorter wait time if you come late at night or early in the morning. Weekends have long waits. Period. There were some people who couldn't handle the wait. And there were some people who said "This is short! Last year we went all through the HR bank and around in a square. This is great!" So, thank you to those people who had some perspective. Thank you to the people who verified that the line does indeed move quickly. Thank you to the Village elves who kept the line moving, so people didn't have to stay too long in HR.

Some people were treated to Shortcake's "Turn Around" song which goes to the tune of "Total Eclipse of the Heart:"

TURN AROUND
na na na na na na na na na na na na na naaaa na na na
TURN AROUND
na na na na na na na na na na na na na naaaa na na na
TURN AROUND
na na na na na na na na na na na na na naaaa na na na (fade into silence)

Clearly, Shortcake should not leave the North Pole to become a singer.

In other news, one of the managers cut her hand quite badly on the freight elevator. It was at the beginning of the day, and she was bleeding and had to leave Macy's. She's probably fine, but Shortcake will have an update tomorrow.

Public Service Announcement

If you would like to visit Shortcake at Macy's, you will want to come this week. Dec. 6-9, Monday-Thursday, 9am-5pm. 9am-10am is good (there's never a line) and mid-afternoon (12pm-3pm) is usually good. And no line you encounter will look anything like a weekend line.

If you come after this week or on a weekend, Shortcake is absolved of all responsibility. She warned you.

Village Thursday

Shortcake spent the entire day in the Village. Well, there was this brief 5 minute stint in the maze at the very beginning of the day when she was Town Crier. That was a massive failure. She just didn't know what to say. Luckily, they needed a Photo/Santa elf, and Shortcake was available. She Photo-ed for about 4 1/2 hours until lunch and then Santa-ed afterwards. Babies will not smile for Shortcake. They will look at her magic bell, but they will not smile.

Shortcake and Strawboss Vic have decided to create an International Strawboss Sign Language that will be dispersed to all elves and strawbosses. Every signal must be simple and one handed. Manager/Strawboss Chris has a few started like "hold" and "special" and "speed up," but more need to be developed. This will be Shortcake's project. It is good to have a challenge.

Also, for lunch, Shortcake had a salad. Vegetables had been too long absent from her diet.

Also, Jersey Boys is still entertaining. If you were wondering.

Last night Shortcake went to her first ever Hannukah party. She got two glitter tattoos. Here's an AWESOME dragon:
And a pretty rose:
No worries, they last about a week. No permanent reminders of temporary feelings here.

OH! And Figgy brought his girlfriend in to visit Santa today, so Shortcake got to meet her. Which was exciting.