My Record of Work: The Annoying, the Interesting, and the Just Plain Weird--The Year 2004.

7/31/04

Some lady on the phone did one of my pet peeves: She had two books to look for and immediately after telling me the first one, she launched into giving me the information for the second one. I didn't recognize the first one, but the second one was a popular book and I told her, "Oh, yeah I know we have that one" (because I was in a position where I could glance over and SEE it on the shelf). She replied, "Well, what about the first one?" Lady, I haven't even gotten to the computer yet and you've already given me twice the information I can normally handle . . . I told her that I hadn't been able to do both at once. Her pace was like bam-bam-bam, just so you know. "I'm looking for this book, and the author is so-and-so. Then I'm looking for this book--" "Oh, we have that one." "Well do you have the first one though?" News flash people, I don't need prompting.

Some lady standing in front of the Hallmark section stopped me and said, "Is this card section new?" We had just put up the part where it's gonna hold Christmas ornaments (oh God), so I thought maybe she was talking about that and asked for clarification, but she said, "No, I mean the whole card section, isn't this new?" I told her just simply, "No," with kind of a blank expression. She just stared and said, "It ISN'T?" I said "no" again and then she just kept looking at me like I was supposed to change my mind and tell her it was new, so since I was trying to go on my lunch break I just kinda shrugged and walked away. I wonder what that was all about? I've worked here four years and that card section hasn't actually even MOVED, much less appeared. It's like a huge old Hallmark WING of the store. I promise you it has always been there. Hehehe. That amused me.

7/28/04

I guess I'll get it off my chest and mention that my very first customer was this horrid dick who is now going on my Top Ten Worst Customers Ever. And since I've been doing this page for more than four years, that's pretty tough to do nowadays. You have to be supreme in the art of whingery in order to find yourself a spot on THERE. That said. . . .

I walked up to the customer service desk this morning to see a woman holding a little sample cup from our café, and greeted her and asked what she needed. "I'm looking for this book and I don't know what it's called," she said, and right there I'm like, oh, fuggin' great. She went on to say that it was a book of poems written by Chinese women and it was like a really old book . . . "I think it was called Blue Moon, Crescent Moon, something like that."

Hmm. Didn't ring any bells, and our computer really isn't set up to operate on input such as "vague ideas regarding the ethnicity of the authors, age of the book, and the word 'moon' maybe in the title." It's keyword-operated. Maybe if I had something more like a Google search engine or something, I would have been able to do something with that, but she had pretty much given me no information I could use.

So, I explained to her that if we didn't know author or title, all we could really do is go to the poetry section and see if she could recognize it--not that there's any guarantee we carry it. She kind of made an "oh yeah?" face and said, "Well, THAT'S funny, because I came into a bookstore in Tampa with this same information, and they went crazy on the computer and were able to find the book and bring it to me."

I tried to think of a good way to explain to her about how we really need keywords and that her suggested titles would undoubtedly bring up a ridiculous number of hits, and I got as far as saying, "Well, just knowing that 'moon' is in the title--" when she cut me off with, "OKAY, I'm not going to waste my time." And walked away. Uh-huh. I said, "All right!" after her, but I really wish I'd said, "That makes two of us!"

So, in just a couple sentences this woman managed to bring my competence into question and insult me on top of it. I have to say this: As soon as you come into a bookstore and you have no title and no author, YOU'RE WRONG. If you are ill-prepared to ask for what you want, consider yourself lucky if anyone can help you. This was the bookstore equivalent of going into a grocery store and saying to the clerk, "I had this really good food the other day. I ate it with eggs. I don't know what it's called or what it really looks like, but I remember the taste and it complemented the eggs perfectly. Where do you have stuff like that?" or going into a clothing store and saying, "This model was wearing a really nice shirt in a catalog. I don't remember who the designer of the shirt was or what it looks like, but I do know it was a red shirt and had buttons. Can you show me where to look?"

So maybe the Barnes & Noble she went to has a better system for looking stuff up--that is, IF she ever went to a bookstore about this in the first place. What strikes me as odd is that she claimed to have already been to another bookstore "with this same information," and while I can understand why she might not have bought the book right then, WHY WOULD SHE HAVE NOT TAKEN NOTE OF THE TITLE OR AUTHOR? You've gone into a bookstore TWICE with no specific information? Once I can understand, provided you are understanding about it if no one can help you. But twice? TWICE she has shopped for the book and didn't bother to get the title when she had a chance?

And perhaps if she WAS given the book by a B&N employee, it's very possible that the person was just knowledgeable in that area, also--people don't take that into account. Poetry geek? Sure. I'm the kids' book geek--someone wanders in and says, "Yeah it's this book for children where the kid finds a dog in front of a supermarket?" I give them Because of Winn-Dixie. "Um, I don't know who wrote it or what it's called, but it's blue with a dragon on the cover?" I give them Eragon (and choke down some bile while I do it). Point is, most other employees probably wouldn't have been able to answer those. You happened to get the one who can take that vague information and get a hit in their brain. Once you EXPECT it without being PREPARED, YOU ARE WRONG. Because let's just say running a search on "Crescent Moon" brought up the delightful number of 19,234 hits, and considering we know it's "something like that," we're not even warm yet. All I can say to this lady now that I've gathered my wits a bit is this: Don't you DARE blame your lack of preparation on the incompetence of others. Oh yeah, and eat my ass.

So. Beyond this lady, I also had just a host of assholes today. Something in the air, I'm sure. Or it's just a signal to be on your worst behavior if you happen to be in a retail store and you meet someone wearing a name tag.

I was standing in the aisle unloading some Kids' shipment when some lady stepped out into the aisle about fifteen feet away and said "UM!" really loud. So I looked at her. Apparently "Um" means "Excuse me, could you please help me find a book?" because then she started hollering her question. Holding a hardback copy of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and our book magazine BookPage, she showed me the back of the magazine and said, "Where do you have this?" It was an ad for the book she was carrying, but in paperback. I explained that it hadn't been released in paperback yet--in a couple days it was due. "Well then explain to me what it is doing being advertised in your paper!" she blurted. I replied that it was an advertisement for a book about to be released, that happens all the time. "But I have THIS ONE!" she said, and showed me the hardback. I don't get what the purpose of that was--I'm guessing she thinks that if there's a hardback, there's always a paperback. I explained again that the paperback was not yet released, and she complained that if it wasn't released it should SAY that on the ad. I agreed, but then I had a brainstorm and said, "Hey, well isn't that August's paper?" She gave me a look and said, "I JUST picked it up, honey!" I replied that it was the August issue (after checking it), and that they always jump the gun on putting those things out, it's for the next month which is why they didn't say it isn't out yet because once August starts it WILL be out. So there. I WIN! Hahaha. (Sad when dealing with customers feels like a battle. . . . )

I dealt with a weird customer here--she wasn't a jerk at all, actually it was quite the contrary, but it was strange to me. She came up to me while I was shelving a misplaced book in Reference, and asked me if it was okay that she left a bunch of books on a table over there, because she didn't know where they went and didn't want to reshelve them wrong. Boo. I wasn't going to just give her my blessing to leave shit all over the place, so I kinda said, "Well, people leave stuff for us to clean up all the time," without making it sound like that was all right with me, so she attempted again to explain to me, telling me that she had been SURE when she picked them up that she was going to purchase them so she hadn't really paid attention to where they went. She led me to the books, obviously thinking this was REALLY important, and then when we got there she realized she remembered where about half the books were and decided to put them back herself while I agreed to take the other half. I thought it was amusing, it was like making a deal with her. Most people just leave their books, and maybe once in a while we'll get lucky and get to clean up their café garbage too.

Something else not annoying but weird: Some guy walked up and asked me about some obscure book that was not even available if you order it from the publisher or something. I explained the whole thing to him about how it probably hasn't been distributed through the usual channels for whatever reason or is already out of print (despite having had a paperback released in December of last year), and he agreed to look on the Internet and left. Immediately--as in, the woman who walked up heard the end of our conversation--I was asked for this book AGAIN. It was wild. This lady had a copy of an ad or something, but I had never heard of the book or the author and it was not in our system except to say that it existed, so . . . I dunno. I have not been asked for that book before or since.

Some woman just committed a whole bunch of pet peeves in a row. First of all, she asked me to point her to the fitness section and then when I got her going it turned out she was looking for a specific book--ya know, it's a lot easier to start with the specific so I can ask the COMPUTER if we even HAVE it before I actually take you all the way to the section then have to go BACK to the computer and then possibly BACK AGAIN to the section if it says we carry it. I explained this to the lady gently (no, not all of it, just that I was going to check the 'puter), and when I presented to her the idea that I wanted to do that in case it was a book we didn't even carry (and therefore we'd be wasting our time), she replied, "My doctor said you had it." Well, unless your doctor called us up and asked us to hold a copy under your name, there is no guarantee of that, lady. I wonder what makes doctors and whoever else tell people that "This store has it," and also I wonder if it's more like "Well, the general bookstores usually have it, check at your local store" which translates in their brain to "THIS STORE HAS IT." Anyway. So I checked and it was a book we carried so I came back and told her who the author was and began searching for the book. She explained to me that I was looking in the wrong place because "It'd be by this book right here, it's the same kind of exercise as this one so it should be right in THIS area." Okay, who the hell works here, me or you? And since we know the answer to that question, perhaps you'd like to switch places and be the book expert? Because YOU asked for MY help and I think we need to get that straight before we move on. (Especially considering she was looking in the area she claimed it "would be" in and obviously it wasn't there. That logic does not seem to seep into some brains though.) So I replied, "Well, the section's organized by AUTHOR," and I promptly located the R's and found six copies of her book. I win! Again!

Had a guy come up to Customer Service and ask if I'd help him find the most recent book by a popular author. I didn't happen to know what the most recent one was so I looked it up, and told him the title. He replied, "And you don't have it." With a period. Yeah, I don't know why. "Well, the computer says we're supposed to," I told him, and he acted surprised when I offered to go check the shelf for him. "Yeah, take me back there," he said, walking around the desk in the wrong direction. I pointed forward to give him some indication that we weren't GOING to go "back there," but he only figured it out when I came around the desk and started walking toward the front. "Oh, you moved everything around!" he exclaimed. I agreed and said that a few months ago we remodeled and now all the fiction's in the front. At this point he made it clear to me that he'd gone "back there" and hadn't found it, and that was why he'd thought we didn't have any. So . . . he went to the back of the store where there used to be fiction paperbacks and encountered huge neverending shelves of sports books and reference tomes and decided, "Gee, they must not have fiction anymore"? Come on! Just ask someone where the stuff moved, bookstores don't just excise the fiction section! (We had his book, by the way.)

I was on the phone and a woman was waiting for me at the desk besides, and just as I was finishing up on the phone another guy came to the desk. I'd already told the woman I'd be right with her, and when the guy came I repeated that I'd be right with him. When I got off and started helping the lady, the dude said, "I'll just come back." (It wasn't nasty or anything, but it was kinda like, *sigh*, I just don't have time for this right now.) He did indeed come back after I was done helping the lady, and it turned out he was only checking up on an application he'd turned in. I explained happily that there'd be no information from anyone except a manager who wasn't here at the moment, and I gave him all the info and when to check back. He thanked me and asked for my name again (why do they do that??) and I gave it to him, at which point he stuck out his hand over the counter to shake. So I reached to shake too . . . and he MOVED his hand.

I was kinda rattled by that and noticed he was now holding his hand far off to my right looking expectant, and I sorta half-heartedly reached again but he snatched his hand back again. Umkay. He said, "Wrong hand." Yes, actually, I shake with my left, goddamn it. Is that your business? I turn it the other way around so I can shake people's right hands, and I've pretty much always done it and didn't even realize that that was his problem. I gave him my right hand, annoyed, and said, "Oh, I see, it's GOT to be this one." I wasn't playing, I was pissed off--it's not his job to teach me the proper way to do shit. I know you're "supposed" to wear socks that match too, but I've been ignoring that for twelve years. He informed me that the point is to do it right to left, and spun around and stalked off. ::sigh::

A dude came up and asked if we still had any of the ever-popular 9/11 Commission Report. I told him we'd been out a couple days and he immediately came back with, "Can you call Borders and see if they have any?" I was kinda stunned by that--I don't really MIND the idea of checking out the competition if I can't help you, but just to ask me to fucking call my competition for you and serve up business for them? I mean . . . that's just tacky. I guess I seemed surprised when I repeated, "Can I CALL BORDERS?" because the guy replied, "Up there they said you would." So I got stuck calling them for him and they had one to hold. Grr. If it were me I'd at least just ask to borrow the phone and a phone book. But now I'm being petty, I guess.

Last one for today. Some lady came in with this like neon green GED book under her arm, approached me, patted the book, and said, "I need to find another one of these." I took one look at it and knew we didn't carry it and told her so. She replied, "Up at the front they said you did!" Sure, up at the cash register they have access to the inventory, you've got me fooled 'cause it's not like I work here or anything. I replied that we had GED books but not that one. She acted incredulous and said, "Well, I don't need it to be THIS one! I just need another GED book, this one's from my school, I know you don't got this one!" Yeah, that's obvious, because I should know when you pat a book and say "I need this" it doesn't actually mean THAT one. So I took her to the GED section and she took one look and wanted me to decide which one she should get (another pet peeve), and I wouldn't let her do that to me because people who are not babies can pick for themselves, so I told her she could browse through and pick one based on price and which layout she liked best. She replied, "Well I don't like ANY of 'em, I don't like school." Well I kind of picked that up from context.

(Later on as I'd been trying to go on my break and use the toilet for the last forty fucking minutes, I encountered this woman's father, whose speech was difficult to understand because he had no teeth, and he recognized me even though I was on break with no apron and stopped me just to ask me if I took good care of his daughter. I replied, "Well, I assume so," and walked off. Just what I need, I finally get to go on break and a weird old dude wants to ask me unimportant questions to kill time. No! MY time dammit! I'm off the clock!)

7/27/04

Some lady asked one of the other associates if we have a program "where you can check out the book without having to buy it." I think what you're talking about is, well, a LIBRARY! Do people not understand that bookstores do not lend books?

7/26/04

I didn't know how to take this customer today. She was nice and obviously competent and stuff, but then she did several things that are usually on my pet peeve list, so I reluctantly decided I wanted to complain about it on here. First of all she was looking for a book and she'd already combed the shelf for it, and it wasn't there. I offered to give it a second look and she said, "Okay, but it ISN'T there," and ya know, I believed her but normally I feel obligated to look anyway since in 90% of these sorts of cases the person wasn't looking in the right spot or overlooked it. Well, that wasn't the case this time, she'd been in the right area, but amusingly she pointed out a part of the shelf to me and said, "It's supposed to be right HERE," and was standing in a completely different letter of the alphabet than belonged to this book's author. I was doubly annoyed by that because a) I don't honestly need to be told how the alphabet works and b) that's the H shelf, dammit! So I agreed with her that we were probably just out, and she asked if I had any in the back. That question is horrific. If it was in the back and we knew it, it probably wouldn't be there long. Because our purpose is to get stuff OUT of the back room and on the shelf so people can buy it. Anyway. I told her that wasn't the case and she asked me to call the other store. I did that and they didn't have it either. But then she dropped the bomb: "It says it has an August release date." August? Last I checked it's still July right now. Sure enough, I zoomed in for a more detailed view of this book and it's a book we're carrying WHEN IT GETS HERE--with a listing of an August release date. I asked why she was looking for it now if she KNEW it wasn't released 'til August, and she explained that books without a firm on-sale date sometimes wander onto the shelves early. Well, actually that's true, but . . . jeez, after all that we're looking for a book that's not even SUPPOSED to be there yet? She asked about a second one too and I was pulling it up when she told me that one's released in August too. What's the deal? I offered advance order options but she declined and split. I feel bad about writing about that here because she wasn't rude at all, but I was confused/annoyed by the whole August date thing and telling me the alphabet.

A woman was looking for an audio version of a book and when we went to the section I only found the tape. I pulled it off the shelf and said, "Well, here's the cassette," and she replied immediately, "Is it a CD?" Blink blink. Yeah. When people do this sort of thing I usually just repeat what I just said in the exact same tone of voice so they can notice that hey wait a minute, she already answered my question and I just wasn't listening. Jeeez.

A lady went to the register and handed our cashier a paper like she was looking for some books. He told her that she could go to Customer Service if she needed help finding some books, and she replied, "No, you don't FIND these." He had no idea what she was talking about but sent her to Customer Service, where I showed up to help. "Yes, I'd like to redeem this," she said, pushing the paper at me, and I was like huh? (We're not doing any kind of program where "redeeming" anything exists, so I was understandably confused.) I said, "Excuse me?" and she kinda looked annoyed and opened the paper at me and slid it in my direction with a pinched look, but we noticed at the same time that the paper said a different store's name on it. The other lady who was with her protested, "But I thought it was this store." Er . . . well, turns out no! Blargh.

Someone on the phone said, "I'm looking for a book?" You know, with the obvious question mark at the end. I replied, "Yes?" and she goes, "Well . . . can you help?" No, asshole, I just answer the phone and tell people to fuck off. What the hell?

Some lady told me her friggin' life story on the phone today. I had one customer waiting on the phone for me to check the shelf for her book and one customer standing in front of me with a slack-jawed "Hey when is it my turn?" look, so it was pretty annoying. She called the wrong store, first of all--it was the other store that ordered for her--and I was able to tell in the computer that only one of her four books had come in so I warned her that it wasn't the complete order, just one book. So that was where she decided to tell me she knew it would take a long time, she had ordered them back in December for someone and they didn't come 'til February and then when he got them she liked them so much she decided she wanted a set of her own, so she placed an order, and blah blah, then she started repeating bits of the story, and would not shut up. I kept trying to find a pause to just kind of make her call the other store to put a note on her book about letting it stay there 'til the others arrive or whatever, but she just kept blabbing. And you want to know what the jackass of it is? This was BEFORE my coffee. This happened at the stroke of nine, two phone calls and an in-store customer. Why me????

7/25/04

On Sundays people like to call and ask our hours. Usually the first five or six phone calls I get are people either asking if we're open or asking when we close. Had one lady call today and ask for our closing time, and then she said, "And you're open at noon?" It was about ten right then. What I want to know is a) Why did she think we open at noon since we never do? b) Since she obviously didn't know when we open, why would she suggest a time for me like that? c) Why would I answer the phone if we weren't open, shouldn't it be an answering machine? d) If we weren't open, why would I invite her to solicit help from me by asking, "How can I help you?" on the phone? C'mon, it ain't a puzzle, but you gotta put it together!

A really gruffly attituded guy needed my help today, and he interrupted my work on a display by asking if I could help him find a book if I had a second. I asked which one and he pointed at the desk and was like, "Don't you need to go over THERE?" I told him that would depend on what books he was looking for--I tend to know a lot of them off the top of my head. Well, that wasn't the case this time and I dug in the computer for his titles. They were all by an author whose name wasn't even in our database. None of his titles struck home either. So I told him they were unavailable. (He had some publishing information and one of them was listed as being published in 1950, so I assume probably out of print.) Then he pulled a pamphlet out and tossed it at me and said, "How about that one?" I picked it up and saw it was an ad for a Dummies book I'd never heard of, and as I was typing it in he was like, "See the name of it?" tapping the paper. Dude, I'm not having difficulty helping you, so I don't need prompting. I told him the book wasn't in the system and then happened to notice that the pamphlet said, "Not available in stores or on the Internet!" and I pointed that out to him. He said he'd already known that but wasn't sure if they were just SAYING that to try to get people to buy from their offer. I told him in this case they seemed to be telling the truth. Then he went away.

A family with a preteen son asked for help with a book and I found it for them. The kid looked appalled at the length of the book--oh, so we're dealing with school reading!--and opened it and said, "I can't read those words, they're too small." The dad was making a sort of slack-jawed face at the words, and the mom said, "I think yer daddy can't read it neither!" The dad agreed with this and said the writing was too small. "I can SEE it," he said, "I just can't READ it." Bewildered by regular-size type, the family returned the book to the shelf and deliberated over what they should do. I wonder if they're going to try to get an audio version or something? Too bad they don't make one.

A couple women came back to Customer Service and wanted their discount card looked up. Feh. That's the register's job. But I have a utility on my computer that lets me do it, so I started to. "Will it still be in the system since mine's over a year old?" the woman asked, and I told her it'd show up but if it's definitely over a year old it's therefore automatically expired as they last one year. Suddenly she was waffling on whether it was more than a year. So the other woman said, "Well have her check, give her a last name." Too bad I need to be the one asking the questions, hon . . . I know what information I need to look up a card! Anyway, I found her in the computer with a card that expired in 2001 (yeah, I'd say more than a year), and then they oh-welled and tried to check out at my desk. ::sigh:: Now THAT'S one I *can* pawn off on the register.

And this pissed me right off too. I got called to the register to take care of a return and some lady had a book with no receipt. I told her she could do an exchange and she was like, "No." So I said, no, really, that's the only thing I can offer, if you want to get something that's the same price or more we can exchange, but I will not give you credit or money without a receipt. "No," she said, "I can't find anything I want instead." So I explained again that there was nothing else I could do, this isn't some kind of choice here. Either you present a receipt, or you give me something to trade for it, or you take your book and leave and come back when you have a receipt. She then explained to me that she thought she had the receipt in her purse but it must be at home because it is not in her purse now. She completed her explanation and just looked at me. Now is this where I'm supposed to go, "Oh, you just FORGOT the receipt? That's a different story!" It's NOT a different story. You don't have a damn receipt! Finally I repeated it again and she goes, "It is very hard for me to come out here because it is far away, I live far away." (She was a tad foreign. However, if you know enough English to argue with me about money, then you know enough English for me to tell you to fuck off.) Well, I just spread my hands and said, "If you want I can call my manager and have him tell you the same thing, if you want to hear it from him." (My manager is pretty notoriously unbending on returns without receipts.) She argued that she thought *I* was the manager person. I said I wasn't a manager, but I could do returns. But there's nothing I can do without a receipt. She just told me again that she'd thought she brought it but it wasn't in her purse, and just looked at me again like I was supposed to start helping her or changing my mind. I shrugged and said, "Well, what do you want me to do?" She replied, "I don't know!" and kept staring at me. Okay. "Well," I said, "your only choice for me to be able to do anything is to either go pick something out that you can trade this for, or take it home and come back with the receipt. That's all I can do for you." Then I asked her if there was anything I could help her with when she was in the store and she said no and left. I immediately had to do another return (though this was for a nice lady with a receipt and a club card, easy peasy!), so I didn't get to immediately run into the inspiration section and tear my hair out while screaming.

7/24/04

Today some dude came to the customer service desk acting all condescendingly amused (like "boy it sure is AMUSING that this is the case HUH?") about the fact that there are lots of books about hating Bush but there are none about hating John Kerry. "It's pretty funny that that's how it is, ISN'T it?" he presented to me, and I told him I could look and see if anything came up in the computer. As I was searching, I just had to listen to him go on about how that's so strange that there are so many anti-Bush books and yet no anti-John Kerry books and "maybe your store is prejudice." (I love how people say "prejudice" when they mean "prejudiced.") I found one book we were supposed to carry, and pointed out that there's a lot of anti-leftist stuff in there too if he cared, but he kept going on about how it's funny there's all this "I hate Bush" stuff. I replied, "Well, maybe as it gets closer to election time you'll see more." Fact is . . . HELLO . . . BUSH HAS ALREADY HAD FOUR YEARS IN OFFICE. He's had more of a chance to screw shit up. Not to mention that his public speaking lends itself to humorous documentation better than any politician since Dan Quayle. But the real reason is that we are prejudiced, since actually they are trying to spread propaganda and somehow Republicans' money doesn't spend the same. (THAT, my dears, is our corporate agenda. MONEY.)

On the exact opposite end of the spectrum, I had some dude come in and ask for science project books and he started talking about people erroneously thinking science is irrelevant, and started going off about people who just think they have all the answers because they're religious and they think they don't need to know "science" and how people are out there who really think we didn't go to the moon. (He also made a really amusing crack about how weirdly about half the people who are Flat-Earthers actually have satellite TV, which wouldn't work very well if the Earth was flat, guys.) Interestingly enough, except for the fact that I totally liked this guy and thought he was making great points and was amusing, he reminded me strangely of the Wal-Mart preacher I once encountered, because his fly was down as he passionately ranted. You gotta hear the Wal-Mart Preacher Story if you haven't heard it already.

7/21/04

Some little kid was really cute today. He was looking at a book and he told his daddy, "This book weighs five moneys." Haha. I thought it was adorable.

Tales from the cash register: My cashier was asked by a customer where the books that have specifically to do with Florida were. He gave her directions to the travel section and specified that in Travel there is a subsection for Florida books. She replied very indignantly to this, "I don't want FICTION." Since he'd said nothing at all about fiction and the section does not have fiction (except for some stuff by local authors and stuff), he was understandably confused by the comment, and replied, "I know." She looked kind of startled and replied, "Oh, okay," and followed his directions. Bleargh.

7/20/04

Ordering FUBARs today, people keep on not listening to me when I talk. Imagine, if you can, for a moment, that you are a dipstick, and that you've decided to ask a question but not really listen to the answer. Now, it's one thing if you didn't hear me, or you wanted to clarify, or even if you're having a daft moment and your brain doesn't catch up until your mouth has already said something you didn't need repeated. But. What I do not understand is why I can tell a phone customer today that we'd have to order a book, to which he replied, "So you don't have it?" I don't understand. I don't understand. True, very minor sin. But you CALLED me asking for information. How is it that when I say "We'd have to order it," you have to say "So you don't have it?" and actually sit there and wait for me to answer that?? No, dorkass, I routinely tell people "I'd have to order it" when I have copies sitting here for them to buy. This also was followed up by a girl calling and asking if we had a book, and when I told her "I'd have to order that," she asked for a price and when I gave it to her she replied, "And you do have it?" URGH!

This was amusing to me. Early this morning a girl called and said, crisply, "Do you sell coffee there at your establishment?" I told her we indeed had a coffee shop and she said, "Oh, thank GOODNESS." And that was all she wanted! I guess caffeine was REALLY important to her book-oriented plans today.

A lady called and asked a book to be held for her, acting like she thought it might be a problem. Obviously, we hold books all the time, but she doesn't have to know that to avoid being a jerk. What did kinda puzzle me is that when I told her it was no problem because we hold books for days or even a week sometimes and we don't mind, she replied with an assurance that she would be in today and tried to finish my sentence about holding the book with "I know, as long as I come in today." I don't have a problem with this, lady. Gah.

7/19/04

Hah, my cashier had an amusing thing. He had a semi-disorganized woman in his line with a guy waiting behind her. She got frazzled and had to look all through her purse and pull out all these gift certificates and then got confused on something else and argued with the cashier about something that she didn't understand and had misinterpreted. Finally the guy behind her said, "Wow, somebody ought to be FILMING this comedy routine." They both kinda laughed (the cashier and the frazzled lady), but the dude was dead serious. After the woman packed up and left, the dude started going on about how he was reminded of those candid comedy shows and he just couldn't believe how all over the place that woman was and how she ought to get her act together because she was so screwed up that it looked like an act. The cashier was like, "OMG, what a dick!"

Haha. I had a lady come up to me in Kids' and say, "Now I'm looking for these LITTLE books." Pause. (Okay, now we are describing approximately one third of the kids' section. . . . ) She took a breath after a time and added, "They're not very big at all." Okay! Now we're getting somewhere. They're little and they're also NOT BIG. And so far, we have NO information about what the fuck the books are! (Turned out she wanted some sort of touch-and-feel series. They're actually not very big, believe it or not. Sort of smallish in fact.)

I got a great compliment today. I helped a lady on the phone, and even though I was doing totally routine things (looking up her books, finding them on the shelf, offering to hold them), she was so grateful and kept thanking me, and then at the end she was like, "What's your name again? I tell you what, you have been SO helpful to me today. You are an asset to your company." Big grin from me. I need to hear those kinds of things, even if I'm just doing my damn job.

7/17/04

One Asshole today, and it's not even mine! (I had some mildly annoying customers but I decided they weren't worth the time it would take to write them up.) Today our cashier was accosted by a woman looking for an author she couldn't find. "She's written DOZENS of books," the woman insisted, and yet she couldn't find a one. Since the author's last name was one of those names that starts with "van," sometimes our company and/or our shelving employees (or even a well-meaning customer) will be jerks and file the book under the part of the last name that comes after "van" instead of just under V like it should. When our cashier asked the lady if she'd checked under the other letter in case, the lady got all whiny and said, "NO, I looked for it in the S's," and stormed out. He called after her that he wasn't being condescending, but she didn't understand and kept going. Fine.

7/14/04

Some guy came up with a hardcover book priced at $45.00. He asked me incredulously if that was "still" the price. Thinking he maybe found it mistakenly put on a sale table, I explained that it had the usual full price sticker so that was indeed the price. The guy replied, "But it was published in 1998!" He went on to explain that that was awfully old to still be full price; don't we mark them down after a while? Urk. Well, if a book's age is what dictates its price, they should be paying us to take Shakespeare books home, huh?

Phone call: "Do you have tee wise?"

"Do I have what?"

"T-Y's. Beanie Babies?"

Oh. Jeez, they're not called "T-Y's." The company is Ty. They're not called that. Bleh. I told him that we sell them and he wanted to know if we had a certain one and I checked and we didn't. Then he wanted to know if we had any South Park books. I repeated back "South Park books?" just to make sure (and also because I didn't know there WERE any), and he replied, "Yes, it's a show on Comedy Central--" and I'm like, "I KNOW what it is." Jeez.

We got really slammed early in the morning and I kept having to answer phone calls. Some girl wanted my help at Customer Service and went to the register to have me called, and when she walked up there and saw me leaving the desk to help a person on the phone, she just started following me around like she had to make sure that she was next and wanted to make it obvious that she wanted help--you know, because I planned to do everything in my power to avoid helping. She went back up to the register and harassed the register girl about it, too, and the register girl pointed at me and reassured her that I was indeed planning to go back to the desk to help her after I was not freaking busy, jeez.

Some lady looking at CDs wanted to know "how do you tell how much these are?" I tried to take the CD case from her so I could show her the price was on the back, but she just kept holding onto it and wouldn't friggin' give it to me. Strangely this happens a lot. They hold the product and say "how much is this?" and expect the answer to come out of my mouth. Grr.

A guy wanted a book that didn't have its title or author in our database. After arguing with him for a while about whether I was at the end of the line as far as being able to help him, he hung up. Then he called back and said, "I have an idea," and told me vaguely what subject it was about and said, "Can you check under that?" Yeah, because when you had specifics and they didn't work, it makes a lot of sense to try any book about an entire chunk of history and just dig through thousands of titles to find some book that was probably vanity published or something. (He saw it advertised on TV. Can you say "This book is not sold in stores"?)

Some guy was rooting through the sale books and found on clearance the SECOND volume of some book. He asked about the availability of the first volume, and I found it was out of print. "So all these five-dollar books are what, just overflow?" I said that was essentially right, they were books that never sold for whatever reason. He replied, "Well, if they're going to put ONE volume on overflow, they should be sure to send BOTH volumes, doesn't that only make sense?" No, dude; it makes a LOT more sense that an orphaned second volume of a series that isn't selling would be on the five-buck table. You don't understand how retail works, do you? Volume one sells and then a lot fewer people come back for volume two.

God, I heard some lady tell her kid she wasn't going to buy him something because "We'll just have to see what Santa brings." IT IS JU-FUCKING-LY. Santa's fat jolly ass is in the pool right now! Not thinking about what to get your son! FUCK YOU! Keep Christmas AWAY! (At least until mid-October.)

And lastly, hahaha, someone turned in an application that said they were studying "writting" in college. The application had at least three other misspelled words on it. Doggone it, this boy's gonna be a writter!

7/13/04

Some lady on her cell phone informed someone that she was at "Books-A-Gazillion" today. Wow, we went from a million to a gazillion books.

A lady came up to my desk and wanted help finding an M. Scott Peck book. I knew the book (it's always been steadily popular) and told her we normally carry it in the self-help section, and before I could offer to take her there, she interrupted and said, "And is that over THERE?" pointing behind her to a completely wrong spot. I don't know why she wouldn't just leave her random guessing out and let me help her, since I tend to think I was doing a pretty good job up to that point. I told her that in fact Self-Help was behind me, and said I would show her where to look. I took her back there and was able to find the book as well as another by the same author. As I moved the other book I pointed out that it was a related title, and she said, "No, that's a DIFFERENT book." I know. Which is why I didn't say, "Hey look, two of the same book!" You know, because I can't tell that two books with different titles aren't in fact the same book. I think that's my peeve of the week. People who tell me painfully obvious things as if I need to know.

I was helping a bunch of people in a row. No one was waiting an exceptionally long time, but when one lady was in line at Customer Service while I was helping another guy, I was just finishing with him when the phone rang. I answered it, and it was just someone who wanted to talk to our café so I put the guy on hold and paged the café manager. The phone beeps when it's on hold so that I will know it's holding, and it sounds like a ring, so as I turned to the woman who was waiting and the phone made its beep, she thought it was ringing again. Guess what she did? She looked panicked and said, "DON'T ANSWER IT!" Heh. As if I would just let the phone ring because it was her turn. I mean sure I would help her before I'd help whoever was on the phone, but I'm not gonna just let the phone ring! Anyway I assured her that the phone wasn't ringing, but she's like, "I heard a ring!" I know, I know, it's the phone beeping, I reassured her. From there we were fine. ::sigh::

A kid and his mom came in to look for books on his high school reading list. They were the type who just comes up and says the title of the book instead of, you know, dealing with me like a person and using a complete sentence. Anyway, I treated them as a computer would (since they seemed determined to interact with me through commands), and just wordlessly left the desk to look for the book. There is a school reading list collection on the back shelves of the customer service desk, but none of the kid's book were actually there, so I offered a minimal explanation that sometimes school reading list books are there but I would have to go look in the literature section for it now since there weren't any copies in the display. The kid replied, "It's Eastside High School." Oh yes, well obviously I needed to know your school's name, since I already commenced looking for the book with no obvious confusion about what I was doing. ::sigh:: Another thing I hate, when people offer me information that is irrelevant and expect that it is the key piece that will make my eyes light up and my hand produce the book shortly after going up my ass to retrieve it. Anyway, I got the book and the mom took it, looked at me (not the book), and said, "What's this one about?" I told her I hadn't read it. I asked if she needed anything else and she said she found the other one: It was a Shakespeare book. She opened it and said, "Ooh, but they've got it done up in the form of a PLAY." The kid groaned about having to read that. I commented that generally you're going to find play format since it is fucking SHAKESPEARE and he wrote drama productions. (I left out the word "fucking," if you're curious.) The woman again began to ponder without looking at the back of the book what her son's other assignment might be about. Try reading the synopsis, lady--that's what it's there for. Not that it matters since he has to read it no matter what.

A lady asked me where the Consumer Reports magazines were and I told her usually we kept product information and reference magazines sort of close to the TV, and walked her over there. On the way she commented that she'd thought it would be with the home magazines. That's evident, since you were standing in Home with a glazed look on your face refusing to step out of that box. Anyway, I got her over there and pointed out that there were two different Consumer Reports, one that was issued once a year for the whole year's buying guide, and one that was more frequent and much skinnier. I showed them both to her, and said generally if she wants to find that type of thing this is the section. Guess what she said back? "Well, what about Consumer Reports, do you have those?" I just fail to see how she missed the whole part where I pointed out the physical magazines and picked one of them up and flipped through it and showed it to her and held it in front of her face and put it back when she didn't take it from me. I'm thinking maybe her brain was in screen saver mode when I was, you know, ANSWERING HER QUESTION. Because she came back on acting like I'd just spewed nothing but dogshit. I continue to maintain that I should not have to deal with people who ask me questions and then are not prepared to receive the answer. It's like asking someone for a phone number and when they start reciting interrupting with "hold on, let me get a pen!" God.

I found some stuffed animals scattered on the floor in my Winnie-the-Pooh section, and started grumbling to myself as I picked them up. Then I collapsed into giggles when I realized that one of the things I'd muttered included the phrase "Pooh avalanche." That's pretty funny.

7/12/04

A lady called about a popular book we don't carry. I told her we didn't carry it but could order it. As she was clarifying her options trying to figure out if she wanted to order it, I mentioned that the book was available in paperback, and she goes, "Oh, is that one there in the store?" Yeah lady. I only tell people I "have" it if it's hardback, paperbacks I *might* mention as an afterthought. ::sigh::

A lady was asking me for an oddly titled book and spelled it for me. I couldn't find it in the computer and the author also was not listed. When I told her so, she just repeated the title and spelled it for me again and looked at me expectantly. Lady, were you not listening? Did I in any way indicate that the problem was that I didn't know what the fuck I was putting in the computer? Turned out it was actually just a MOVIE, and she was expecting that there would automatically be a book for it.

Some guy told me he was having no luck finding cassette tapes that teach Spanish. I went to the section with him and he said, "They're all CDs, don't you have any tapes?" I began looking at the likely prospects, but as soon as I found a tape I realized he was not beside me anymore, having gone away to check on his son. Presently he came back. I had found five cassette versions by that point and was still going, but yet he opened with, "So there's no tapes, huh?" I guess he walked into the section, happened to notice that the first two he checked were CDs, and gave up completely. Grr.

A lady called about a newly released book with a title that had been used by several authors. So when I asked for clarification on the author, she told me it was a multi-author work. I checked the shelf where the computer said it would be, and it wasn't there, so I told the lady we hadn't gotten any yet or were out. She replied with, "Well, it's a new book," and completely started repeating everything she'd ALREADY TOLD ME. I don't understand why "we don't have it" constitutes "I didn't look for it right." Grr!

I was talking to my friend Jeaux, but from afar it's not like you could tell I wasn't helping a customer. So I was annoyed when some old lady was all "Excuse me! Excuse me!" and interrupted me talking to him. But I went to help her anyway because in reality I was just talking to my friend. "Did you MOVE the travel section?" she asked incredulously. I told her we had remodeled, yes, and that Travel was now where Cooking used to be. I took her back there, and on the way she acquired a companion who had come in with her and they were talking about the remodel, and she's like, "Now why would they do that?" I replied that actually it was because we'd needed more room and the execs thought this would be a good way to get it. The lady replied, "Oh," but then in her next breath said, "I wonder why they would do that?" To. Get. More. ROOM!! I just told you! Does it not make sense? Blergh.

Yes, some more disturbing covers. Now, these were phoned in by a guy. He opened by giving me the author of a book and eventually admitting that the book he was hoping to find was entitled Booty Boys. Okay. And it's not really that disturbing, though it is unusual to be asked for a book glorifying guys' asses by some dude on the phone.

But after I showed this picture to everyone and we stood around for fifteen minutes giggling like children about it, one of my coworkers decided it'd be fun to order in a copy under our general manager's name. Maybe he'll like it! Wow we're immature.

A lady came up and wanted help finding a book in Health. Turned out she'd been looking for a diet book in the section where we have books about illnesses, and complained, "The sign said it was by subject, but I couldn't find anything on the subject," and so I looked it up and told her it was because she had been looking in a different section, it was considered a weight loss diet book so I took her there. As I zoomed in on the right section, she caught sight of the alternative health section and said, "Oh, Alternative Health, well let me check there, that might be where it is." Lady, this is not a guessing game or a free-for-all--we don't just make shit up. The computer says it goes one place, so that's where it GOES, we don't just say, "Oh, well this is sort of alternative healthish too so I'll put some copies there." I found the book, by the way.

An older gentleman went to the register and asked for help to Customer Service, so I was called. He met me there and made some comment about where I'd been hiding or something. I was not particularly amused but I wasn't offended either, and joked, "Yeah, I was trying to hide," or something, but then he observed that I was not taking his comment lightheartedly and assured me he wasn't riding my butt. I happily helped him after that and he started commenting on my energy, "Wow, you just bounce around this place, don't you?" and stuff. Finally he said, "You're just really adorable, you're so cute," or something like that, and said we needed to get some man half his age to come in and sweep me away. I told him that was okay, I'd rather they stay far away. He took his book and went to the register, and proceeded to ask my coworker if I was single and commented, "I bet she's fun to work with. She's really something!" and junk. Man, it's nice to be appreciated. But it was a little strange since I was just doin' my job. . . .

Some young dude called and wanted a book that we had in stock, but didn't want me to hold him a copy. He proceeded from there to tell me all about how great the book was and how it had a section on acquisitions that he really liked. I just wondered why he thought I'd care. ::shrug::

A lady stopped me in the kids' section to ask me if I was working in the magazines. Do I look like I'm working in the magazines? I told her no and then she said, "Is there someone working in the magazines?" You've been back there, you tell me. Or not. Because no, there isn't. Just ask me a question, okay? She wanted some magazine someone had written down for her and they had spelled the word "college" like "collage." Brilliant.

I had a lady call about audio books and she wanted prices, and I told her there was an abridged and an unabridged and they cost different amounts. She then had to ask me what unabridged and abridged meant. Oy.

I had a lady on the phone and after she gave me book information I told her I would check and proceeded to punch it up on the computer. As I was sifting through the information she called, "Hello?" like I was gone or something, and I was like, "Yes?" and she said, "Do you HAVE it?" Good God. I told you I was looking. I hate hate HATE being prompted.

This wasn't mine, but it pissed me off anyway! In the café, two snotty girls were all prissy about their drink order, and the one girl was very specific about wanting a VANILLA frappé with a VANILLA base, with caramel syrup, and "make sure to add whipped cream with caramel on it too." Well, that stuff comes with it, so she assured the customer that it would be made how she wanted and then gave it to her. In a moment she was back and demanding to know why there wasn't coffee in the drink. "Because you asked for the vanilla base, not the coffee base," the café girl said, but the girl said it was supposed to have coffee, so she re-made the drink even though it wasn't her fault and gave it to her free of charge. Guess what? In another minute she was BACK and said, "This still doesn't taste right, I want my money back." In refunding the girl's cash, she mentioned that she makes a hundred of these drinks a day, so if it isn't what she wanted she's ordering the wrong thing. What-ever!

Some guy went to the checkout and bought an instructional sex book. He requested it be put in a bag, and the cashier said fine but then he goes, "NOW." Oh, obviously he wanted to hide it from someone! He quick put it in a bag, and the dude ran it out to the car. In the meantime, the guy's wife came to the checkout and asked the cashier if he remembered what book that guy bought. He said no. Hahaha. He said he should have been paid a bribe sum or hush money. Maybe from both. ::snicker::

7/11/04

A guy called me early this morning wanting to pay for a book with a credit card over the phone. I told him the only way I can accept a credit card payment for a book is to order it shipped to his house through the website. I offered him several options after he said he would do that; see, if you order it yourself on the 'Net, like on our website, then you will not pay retail price, prices online are always lower. If we do it through the store, it charges retail price. He wanted to know the price difference and I looked it up and found it to be a fifteen-dollar difference! But you know what? He wanted to be smart instead, and pay the full price for it plus shipping and tax, because . . . he's got our number here . . . "If you order on the Internet, they require your e-mail address, and then that address gets sent to everyone in the United States, and you've got a mess on your hands." So he decided to pay retail price because he thinks we're gonna sell his e-mail account to people so he'll get spam. Okay, fine . . . but if that's the issue, why not just create a free mail account and have communcation mails sent there, and then after you get the book, delete the free account or let it expire? I don't get why his desire to have no spam was strong enough to make him pay almost twenty extra dollars. Some people don't quite think everything through, do they?

I overheard a kid begging his mom to let him get a Deltora Quest book. Mom didn't seem to have a problem with it; she told him he could get it, but then said, "But I want you to promise me you'll READ it. I keep buying you books and then we get them home and you never read them." Silence from the kid. Mom presses on: "So, if I get it, will you read it?" THE KID STARTED TO RECONSIDER. "Welllll, I'm not sure," he waffled, and I was just kind of stuck standing in the aisle panting with perplexity. Why the hell would the kid beg his mom for a book when he had no illusions about the fact that he probably wouldn't read it? I mean, I've heard this argument before, the kid is all about reading until he actually sits down to do it, but then still wants more books . . . but this, I don't get. "Yeah, I don't know if I'll actually want to READ it." So what the hell are you asking for it for then??

7/10/04

Back from vacation and God what a mess. Horrifying! And what's worse is that as I was cleaning it up (it took all day), people were messing it up as fast as I was cleaning. It amazes me how the section can fall to SHIT in a matter of nine days. Is this how every other section is and I just don't notice?

Some kid was talking about The Passion of the Christ or whatever, and said he didn't like the part where children were turned into demons. (I haven't seen it, I only know what he said.) The kid was whining to Mom about how that was too scary, and "Why would they show something like that?" Mom replied, "Because it's TRUE, that's how it really happened!" Amazing to me that people will just automatically believe a movie just because some of what was in it matches their favorite religious text. Mel Gibson knows all, you know, so if he shows children getting possessed by demons, you'd better believe they really did. Now you can have nightmares that it will happen to you, kid; happy now, Mom?

Some lady returned a book because her husband had bought the wrong one, and then she needed help finding the right one. Unfortunately there was no guarantee that the book she wanted even existed, because she was one of those people who expected me to have an easy way to find a book that would tell her values of a particular type of dishes. So I kept pointing out books that had dishware values, and she kept pulling them out and then purposely setting them down in the wrong place, saying things like, "And I don't know where I got that one from. I'll just put it here and you can put it back later." Well thanks a lot, lady! (I mean, they do this all the time, but rarely are they so blatant about the fact that they expect me to pick up after them!) Finally she said, "Well, you don't have what I want, so I guess I'll stop messing up your books." Right on.

And another return mishap: I asked a lady why she was returning something and she told me that it was because it was a terrible book, that she had read seven pages of it and couldn't get into it at all so she had to return it. Yes, you return books because you don't LIKE them. Next time I'm going to experiment at the grocery store with different kinds of cheeses, and I'll return all the ones that didn't suit my fancy. And she was all annoying with the return, too; when I commented that she'd just barely waited long enough for me to be able to do it (she had written a check and we have a ten-day waiting period policy for checks), she huffily informed me that there was no such thing because the check had gone through THAT DAY, holding out her receipt as some kind of proof. Lady, I understand how checks work, and I understand that you think it comes right out of your account like a debit card. I also understand that you are mistaken, and "electronic processing" does not mean "immediate," and we still have a damn policy that I know better than you do so you're invited to keep your mouth shut on dictating what I can accept. Especially since the whole thing was moot anyway considering I was telling her I *would* accept it, dammit! So I didn't feel bad for being kind of snotty to her when I explained the above in much more diplomatic words. Meh.

I think I need a vacation! OH DAMN!

Last thing is just something cool. A lady asked me if I happened to know of a certain book, and I had never heard of it before. She looked all surprised and said, "I think this is the FIRST time I've ever asked you a kids' book question that you didn't know the answer to before!" I kiddingly told her it was a sign of the apocalypse. It makes me feel good that some regular customers recognize my awesomeosity.