Post Punk Kitchen Forum

This wasn't a bad customer, but I thought it was cute. We give discounts to various groups of people, including students with a valid student card. I ended up having this conversation the other day:

Me: Do you have a discount card from the store, or maybe a student card?
Customer: I'm sorry. I don't understand.
Me: Are you a student?
Customer: No. I am French.

She was elderly, so I don't think she was even aware of the slang meaning. When she originally contacted us, she said, "I'm looking for a nice pussy, and I hope you can find one for me."

Oh, that definition's been around for well over 100 years.

She knew what she was saying.

"I'm looking for a book."
"Okay, what book are you looking for?"
"I don't remember the name of it."
*after 5 minutes of complaining that we don't have the book she's looking for, the same book she doesn't know the title or author of*
"That book would be right here if we had any but it looks like we're out. Let me check and see if we have any in the back."
"This is ridiculous! You're supposed to sell this book in this store!"
"I apologize, we are completely out of the book."
"You are supposed to sell this book here! I guess I'll just have to go to your competitor then! HA!"
"Oh, wait a minute! I just magically found a whole stack of that exact book hiding behind my ear! This is just your day!"
Oh wait, no. If we are out of something then we are out of it. I'm not hiding it on you to peas you off so threatening to go to our competitor isn't going to make any product magically appear.

It ended with her going on a dialogue about heaven and religious experiences.

"Do I have to pay for this back here?"
"Yes, I'm sorry. It's store policy. I can't ring your other purchases up back here. Just this."
"OH FORGET IT THEN! GOD! I'm not going to pay for that back here and then pay for these up front! Then I would have TWO swipes on my credit card! I guess I'll just have to go to your competitor and buy it there! GOD!"
Go for it! Not only will you waste more time and money driving there but you will still have two swipes on your credit card. You sure showed me. This experience will definitely make me change my evil, evil ways.

Yesterday this guy came in asking for x product, which we have never carried. It's something our one competitor on the island carries, and has for the 10 some years they've been open. He was not ready to take my polite assertion, and demanded that he could talk to someone who knew stuff about our product because he'd come "all the way from Vancouver" to buy said made-up product. He also told me I was wrong about various things I told him about our business, including the very real FACT that we've only been open for six years. I was nothing but polite to him, but he stormed out and flagged down another employee who was driving a tractor on the farm to demand to talk to him. He told him everything I did and the man was totally nice and gracious to my male employee after he was a total dick to me. Then he came back inside and bought a large amount of product that the tractor driver recommended (and which I previously politely recommended), and treated me like he was doing me personally the biggest favour that I surely did not deserve. No sir, I do not want your business. His wife kept following him around, wincing at everything he said.

I don't normally let customers get to me but this guy was really slimy.

I always feel bad for these people's significant others. If he's that much of a jerk to a polite stranger... You sound like you handled the situation with a cool head, though!

I always love when difficult customers say they'll take their business elsewhere. I always think to myself, "For the love of God, muthafuckin' please DO take your business elsewhere, asswad." Like never seeing them again in my life is some sort of penalty, meanwhile, it's the best thing EVAR.

Dear Lard, vijita, that guy sound awful!



We recently lost a regular customer who was a total pain in the asparagus. He would put piles and piles of expensive books on reserve for months at a time, even though our policy is to hold books for one week, with the occasional extension to two. I'm not sure why we got into the habit of making an exception for him but it just fed into his entitled-jerk persona. So last week, the manager asked if he'd be able to buy all of the books (some of which had been there since last March) by the end of January and the guy just blew up, yelling and screaming that we'd lost him as a customer and how he was never coming back. Pretty much everyone's response upon hearing about the situation was "OH, THANK GOD!!!"

I remember when I used to work for this allergist and she had this dick patient who needed to be tested for an allergy to bees. So the doctor schedules bee venom testing once a month, it's very precise, she has to use fresh venom, yadda yadda and I'd try and schedule this crasshole for an appointment and he could never make it because he was always "playing golf" the same afternoon the doc had her "bee clinic" and then he'd lay it on our office saying that if he got stung by a bee, he might die, etc., and it would be our fault because we didn't accommodate HIS schedule and after a couple of months of trying to schedule an appointment for "bee day" with him and him not budging from his golf day and bisqueing on and on at me because I couldn't swing the doctor's whole schedule for him, I finally just hung up on him mid-harangue and he called me right back and said "don't hang up!" because the game was ON baby and he hit my last nerve and I said "all I want to hear from you is that you are scheduling your appointment. If you have anything else to say to me, I'm hanging up because I'm done listening to you," and he was perfectly agreeable from then on. He never came in for his bee testing though. I guess golf is more important than death.

We had a lady call today because she discharged the day before yesterday (she left against medical advice) and someone had sent her some mail that she was waiting on. I told her that our policy with mail for discharged patients is to return everything to sender, we are unable to hold anything for anyone who isn't here. She freaked the fork out and wanted to file a formal complaint and sue us and report us to DHH. Because. we. sent. her. mail. back.

Let your dog get covered in fleas. Complain about $5 charge for flea shampoo. It's more expensive and I have to stand at the tub with your dog for 10 minutes that I could be doing something else. Shut up plzkthx.

I just had the following exchange with a library patron:

Me: You need to come back and talk to regular staff for that.
Patron: So I can come back tomorrow?
Me: No, tomorrow is an institute holiday so regular staff will not be here. They'll be here again on Tuesday.
Patron: Tomorrow is Monday, not a weekend why can't I come tomorrow?
Me: Yes, but it is on a weekend schedule because it's an institute holiday. The university is not in session.
Patron: So can I come in tomorrow?

Repeat a couple times. Sometimes I wonder why I put up with working in the library. And then I remember they pay me to sit around doing homework.

I love that I get to be rude to annoying customers at the pub I work at some weekends. It's awesome.

I'm guarding the gallery our Open exhibition is in and for some reason they've put loads of ceramics and unglazed canvasses at the perfect height to be knocked by backpacks or fondled by children.

I had to tell a middle aged woman not to touch the artwork, and she just moved away without really acknowledging me, and then I had to tell her again with a different piece! People are so entitled. And this is stuff that other members of the public have spent hours making and it's got to be on display for another couple of months. I really hope I'm not on the same gallery tomorrow!

I waited on this table last night that I actually really love, but I thought that what this man said to me was just so...irritating. I hate it when people just assume I can't do my job, which is basically to remember the things that you ordered, and then bring them to you. Anyway, he had ordered a draft beer and a soda, and everyone else had ordered sodas or bottled beers. The bottled beers go up on the bar right beside our soda station, and then the bartender pours the drafts afterward and puts them at the other end of the bar. It's dumb, but it's our system.

So I was passing out all of the sodas and bottled beers while she poured this guy's draft. They are sitting at the table right by the end of the bar, so he could see the bartender pouring his beer, if he felt like looking up. But when I set down his soda, he said, 'I wanted that beer, too.' Sigh. I know, guy. It's not ready yet, but it will be in .2 seconds if you could just please be patient. Then later his soda was low and I was asking him if he wanted a refill, but he was so deep into watching this basketball game on tv that he wasn't listening and his drink wasn't within my reach, so I couldn't just grab it. I asked him twice if he wanted a refill, and he ignored me. The next time I was at his table, he was like, 'Oh, when you get a minute, I need a refill.' This is a table I'm familiar with, so I pulled one of my classic 'sassy waitress don't give a damn'-isms and said to him, 'Sure! I have a minute right now! To be fair, I asked you earlier if you wanted a refill, and you completely ignored me. Just so you don't think I'm a terrible waitress, haha!' (I wouldn't have said this if I wasn't familiar with the table, this kind of shiitake happens all the time and I would never say that to strangers that I didn't think would get my horrible sense of humor.) And to my utter delight, he said, 'I know, I heard. They all told me how rude I was to you. I agree, you're not a bad server!' It kind of made my night, that plus the fact that he tipped me $16 on his $50 check. THANK YOU, guy, seriously, I have bills that need paying.