Yesterday, during her lunchbreak, Gym Ninja visited Sports Direct to have a mooch for some plain black sports gear she could have customised with her company logo.
Seriously, HOW hard is it to find gym gear with discreet branding? Answer: VERY hard! If Gym Ninja DID manage to find something, it invariably meant it wasn't in her size. So, having spent 30 minutes trawling around and 5 minutes trying various styles on, Gym Ninja settled for two plain cotton snug fitting vests (the logo would look good across the front or back) at £1.99 each, a Reebok cotton snug fit T Shirt with a v neck at £7.00 (again, ideal for branding) and an LA Gear lycra black gym top at £5.99. Oh, and she also managed to find a khaki vest top at £1.99 to replace her near-dead favourite gym top! Army Ninja rocks!
Today, rooting through the bag, Gym Ninja discovered she'd been charged twice for the Reebok T Shirt. Grrr! So, she rang the store....
After about 4 minutes of ringing out, Mr Gormless answered..
"Hullo?"
Gym Ninja explained her predicament having been charged for a 2nd top she didn't have.
*cue silence*
"Er, if you'd like 'to bring it back to the store..." He began to say....
"Oh but I can't as you're not local to me you see. Oh and as I don't HAVE The extra top you charged me for, I couldn't bring it back anyway could I?", Explained Gym Ninja.
"Can you take it back to another store near you?", Asked Gormless.
OK..so he's not getting the fact that GN does NOT have a top to bring back...
"Er, yeh, but how does THAT help YOU check your stock levels"? Asked Gym Ninja.
The phone went quiet. Gormless was 'thinking'....
"I'd check on the system but it's down. Ring back at 3pm" He replied, and hung up!
HOW annoying! It's going to get VERY complicated, Gym Ninja can tell!
At 4pm GN rang back and spoke to a woman. Always FAR easier to explain to a woman. She was fairly understanding and suggested she made a note of this till receipt detail and sellotape it to the relevant till, so when Gym Ninja goes and returns the top, (AHHHR, There IS no top to return) to another store, they can ring up and ask about the sellotaped note.
Hmmm.
Convinced this will work?
Nope-neither was Gym Ninja.
Today, Gym Ninja received a call from Stumps. If you recall, Stumps was Gym Ninja's victim during one of her practical assessments for the Personal Training Diploma. The girl with no sense of balance/stability/co-ordination? Yep-you remember her now eh? Well, Stumps is about to do a charity fund raising gallop on a real live horse (!) at Cheltenham. BIG thing in the horse world apparently. In fact, with Stumps' permission GN may post a link so you can sponsor her if you wish? Or see if she falls off the horse... ;-)
So...Stumps is trying to moderate her eating and get into exercise...apparently she is now at the running stage whereby she, and Gym Ninja paraphrases Stumps' own words here, 'Doesn't feel like she is being chased by her own arse!'. A phrase GN took to mean that she now is in control of her running? Gym Ninja has already had to scold Stumps over the 'phone for scoffing bad things. She's also talked Stumps out of eating 2 Weight Watchers meals with added veg, in favour of frozen fresh fish and veg. FAR less (as in none) addictive chemicals for the body to stash into the fat stores you see. So Stumps DOES listen to Gym Ninja YAY!
Today called to say she was on route to buy some Maximuscle Promax Diet. Stumps also boasted that in her car was a couple of Promax Crisp bars and a Promax Meal bar. Oh and that she had also just quaffed a Maxi-Milk (and then moaned about the quality of the straw ruining an otherwise wonderful experience!). Yep, Stumps was actually making a purpose trip to a store to stock up because Gym Ninja told her it was good. Stumps even said that the store manager had even tried to talk her out of buying Maximuscle stuff and instead to buy Met-RX as it was 'just the same'. Er not it's not Mr. But Stumps stood firm. She didn't want any old tosh and told the guy so. Bless!
So, a 'well done Stumps' to Stumps everyone. She's our horse-based fountain of amusing stories no doubt.....oh and has already said she feels less hungry and gets less tired since she started adding the supplements to her healthy diet. This is excellent news!...Stumps....an invoice for Gym Ninja's advice is winging it's way to you about now.......
Anyway, back to the Sports Direct story. Gym Ninja headed to the local store today, armed with her receipt.
Queuing behind some women ordering a personalised Football shirt for their baby (*sigh*), Gym Ninja eyed up the two staff...hmm...who will serve Gym Ninja then? The stroppy girl chewing gum, OR, the girl related to Cowlashes who has glued on some fake eyelashes to enhance/detract from the overall tacky fabric of their staff uniform?
Turned out Cousin of Cowlashes served Gym Ninja. This is how it went..
"Hi, I bought a few items from your Salford store and they charged me twice for this last item. They said they'd stuck the details to their till with sellotape if you'd like to call and check so you can refund me please?"
Cousin of Cowlashes looked a bit confused and then shouted over the supervisor.
"Er, this lady says that...er...charged twice but she got it from Salford and they sellotaped it to the till and...er..."
Would you like ME to explain?" Offered Gym Ninja.
Cousin of Cowlashes nodded. So Gym Ninja did. The supervisor looked at the receipt, nodded and said..
"OK, refund her please".
That was it!
No checking, no stock level verification, no requesting info from the sellotaped piece of paper in Salford. WOW! Marvelous even!!!!
Gym Ninja has her faith in Sports Direct returned! YAY!
That's your lot for today. Tomorrow you can hear ALL about Gym Ninja's hour of spin and the adventure in the Printing shop, where Gym Ninja is attempting to get some tops emblazoned (!) with her Personal Training company name....
What's NOT to look forward to eh?
Taraaaa!
Gym Ninja x
