Now, as I said, BabySis™ left her job at Pier 1 a couple of weeks ago, but her manager had not taken back her employee discount card (as he technically was supposed to). So she offered to use her employee discount to take even more off for us. My mom is very good at making mountains out of mole hills and actually had to leave the store while we waited in line because she was so overcome with visions of her daughter getting arrested for using an employee discount where she was no longer an employee (which afterwards she kept referring to as embezzlement to which I would chime in, “no, it’d actually be fraud”). Meanwhile, BabySis™ had somehow not noticed the text printed in bold black letters on the front of her card which read “Expires March 31, 2008.” So we get up to the register and she hands the card to the person working the register who, also doesn’t notice the March 31 expiration date, and proceeds to unsuccessfully try and scan it. Failing to get it to take, he calls over another employee to try. She notices the expiration date and the conversation goes something like this:

P1 Employee: This is your old card, you should have gotten a new one recently from your store.

BabySis™: No, it’s the new one, I know because they just went from 20% off up to 25%.

P1 Employee: Well see it says it expired March 31st.

BabySis™: Oh, I didnt’ really look at it too closely, I don’t use it that much.

P1 Employee: That’s ok, we can just call your store to confirm.

BabySis™: (some what sheepishly) That’s ok, it’s already on clearance.

P1 Employee: Are you sure? It’ll only take a minute.

BabySis™: No, it’s already alot off, don’t worry about it.

Now I find this whole exchange to be quite amusing, and it’s all I can do to keep from cracking up laughing. My mom on the other hand is almost certainly sitting outside wondering what’s taking so long and imagining that police cars are about to rush up lights flashing and guns drawn to take out the girl with the expired employee discount card.

In the end, we didn’t get the employee discount (but still got the mirror as the clearance price was great on its own), BabySis™ didn’t get “found out,” and my mom made it through without having a total nervous break down. And the rest of their visit we all (more for the benefit of my mom than sister) took turns razzing BabySis™ about being a fugitive of the law.