When I go to a restaurant I hope a waitress takes my order. When I walk in a store I hope a clerk asks me what I am looking for. I look at the beach as a great big restaurant/store with clerks asking me for an order. After the first day even newbies that travel with me have the no thank you thing down (maybe it's just me but if I am awake I have already communicated no thank you with a smile and w/o words before the sell is asked for). I have never experienced the being woken by a clerk, but I would venture to say it would only happen once, by the time I had spent 30 minutes of their time (keeping them from other sales) graciuosley explaining without letting the clerk get a word in why I was enjoying my nap and then still said no thank you I would have to imagine the clerk would avoid me like the plague. Furthermore IMHO most of the clerks on the beach if told no thank you once realize that you are not in the market for their goods and or services and are not going to waste their valuable time by asking again. Even another observation IMHO is that newbies that travel with me think there are thousands of clerks on the beach, but after a couple days with a little coaching they realize there is only a limited community with many of that group practicing in a limited stretch of the beach.
Now where is the Patti Man?
Take a side trip here. When I first ventured to Jamaica I was told rightly or wrongly (the source would have me believe rightly) that when someone says RESPECT to me it would equate to me saying THANK YOU. I have used that definition over the years and it has served me very well. My other observation that like me languages foreign to me the context of the sentence can change positions in comparision the the form followed in english, in the hills I notice that not only do I have to find the words but then put them into the order that my englisg sentence understands. It's funny what the conclusions that can be jumped to if you are interpeting a sentence in the wrong order.
