A customer is checking out but is going very slowly because she absolutely refuses to slow down her conversation on her phone as she goes. What makes it worse is that she has her phone on loudspeaker, and she’s just holding the phone about a foot in front of her so that everyone can hear the conversation.

This is annoying me and the other customers in line, so I get the idea that if she’s going to include all of us in her conversation, we can also contribute.

Me: “She should leave him. He’s probably cheating.”

Customer: “Uh… what?”

The next customer in line sees what I have started and chimes in.

Next Customer: “Is he a Sagittarius? They are the worst.”

Me: “He could be. I heard this year is their angstiest year.”

Customer: “Uh… Excuse me, do you mind?!”

Me: “Yes, I do mind, but you’re doing it anyway, so I’m just throwing my two cents in.”

Next Customer: “Does your friend on the other line know that all of lane six knows her boyfriend gave her an STI?” *Shouts in the direction of the phone* “Stay strong, Sharon! The pus will stop eventually!”

Customer: *Running away, leaving her shopping behind* “Oh, my God, you’re all freaks!”

Worth it.

During high school, I worked at a burger joint.

There was this one woman who would always come into drive-thru during the afternoon and ask for a junior burger with extra onions — and I mean a LOT of extra onions. And no matter how many we put in, she always came into the store and b****ed that there weren’t enough. Still, this was in the middle of the afternoon, so we didn’t care.

However, one day, we had four buses full of US Army enlistees at the store at the same time. (Convoys of chartered buses would go by periodically, and they usually stopped at our store because the bus drivers knew my boss.)

These people were always the nicest, most respectful people you can possibly imagine, which was a welcome change after dealing with a**holes the whole day. They also always ordered a crap-ton of food — all king size, tons of double and triple burgers, the whole nine yards. My boss would always have me give them the “senior discount” — 15% off — and they enjoyed that immensely because it said that they were getting a senior discount on their receipts.

Anyway, as nice as they were, they strained our store to the limit because they ordered so much food.

We were almost literally going hammer and tongs to keep up, and then our regular came into the drive-thru.

Manager: “Just grab two handfuls of onions and put them on the sandwich; we don’t need a scene when we’re as far behind as we are.”

I did so. I could barely close the f***er because of all the onions, but I managed it, and we gave it to her.

Remember, the store was completely full of US Army enlistees. They probably had not had fast food for weeks — I think they were going from boot camp to get their first assignments — and the line was out the door.

Suddenly, the woman was pushing her way past all of these people, rudely shoving them out of her way. She came up to the counter and started screaming.

Customer: “This doesn’t have enough f****** onions!”

My manager was angry, so she took the sandwich and handed it to me.

Manager: “Do whatever the h*** you want with it.”

I dumped the ENTIRE F****** TUB of onions on this burger. Then, I wrapped it up really, REALLY tight and taped it shut. (The wrappers were somewhat elastic.) My boss handed it to the woman, and she opened it right on the counter.

Customer: “I need to make sure you idiots have put on enough this time!”

This was even though this burger wrapper was almost three times bigger than normal.

That, plus the elasticity of the wrapper, meant that there was an onion explosion all over her.

It was so dramatic, and so freaking awesome, that all the troops were trying not to laugh. One of their officers was standing right next to the woman, waiting by the counter for his food, and finally, he just gave up and started laughing his a** off.

She didn’t come back for a month, and she never, EVER complained about not having enough onions.

A customer approaches the customer service desk with their phone screen open to a form. They approach my manager.

Customer: “Your online feedback form is only asking me how I’d like to resolve my complaint, but I wanted to leave a compliment.”

Manager: “Oh, yes, the system is used to receiving negative feedback. We don’t… uh… get people filling out the form just to say thank you.”

Customer: “Well, that’s a little sad. Still, which option should I select?”

Manager: “There should be an option to select ‘other’?”

Customer: “Ah, yes, here it is, and… oh, dear.”

Manager: “Is there an issue?”

Customer: “Now it’s asking me on a scale of one to ten how dissatisfied I was with your service, one being the least satisfied and ten being the… ‘most least satisfied’? Who wrote this?!”

Manager: “Honestly, I don’t know.”

Customer: “Actually, I am going to leave a complaint! I’m going to complain that all I can do is complain! You’ve been wonderful! Thank you!”

I work in the produce department. We cull a lot of bruised apples and “less than favorable” stuff and mark it down for dirt cheap, just so we don’t have to waste it completely.

Today, we have red bell peppers on sale for cheap, around $.99 a pound, when they’re normally $3.99 or so. There’s only about one case of peppers left because they’re selling so well.

We have an old lady who comes in almost every day just to kill time and moan to us workers about everything she hates in life, from modern-day prices to the Internet, and everything else. I’ve also seen her trying to damage canned goods to get them discounted.

She walks up to me just as I have just put the last case of peppers on the shelf, showing me another package of peppers.

Customer: “These are damaged; they should be marked down.”

I just stare at her as she has obviously just shoved her thumb through each and every one of them to try and fool me. I have literally just put the newer peppers out, and none of them were in that sorry state.

Me: “I’m sorry, but when they’re that damaged, we can’t sell them, even at a discount. I’ll go throw these in the garbage.”

Customer: “Oh, don’t be wasteful. I’ll take them for like fifty cents or so.”

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am, but it appears that someone has intentionally and maliciously damaged these peppers by piercing them with their fingers. I am sure you wouldn’t want some stranger’s fingers all over your bell peppers, and I can’t legally sell an item I know to be purposefully damaged, so into the garbage they go!”

She sighs, caught between admitting she did it and admitting defeat.

Customer: “Fine. I’ll take one of your normal discounted peppers, then.”

Me: “Oh, I’m sorry, ma’am, but we just sold the very last one. Such a shame. It’s almost as if you could have had a chance to take that one if you hadn’t had the bad luck to stumble upon this sabotaged one. Oh, well!”

She stared at me with a sour expression, and I smiled my customer service smile back. I made sure I watched her for the next ten minutes as she browsed our produce, checking to see if I was looking when she wanted to damage something else. She took herself away empty-handed.

I volunteer in a charity bookshop. I’ve just finished serving a customer when another comes up to me.

Customer: “This book has writing in it.”

Me: “Some of our books will. They’re secondhand.”

Customer: “It’s all over!”

I take the book, thinking it might have been missed as we usually don’t sell books if there is significant notation. I skim through and can’t see anything.

Me: “Could you show me, please? I can’t see anything.”

He grabs the book back and opens the front cover before pushing it in my face.

Me: “Sir, that’s the author’s signature.”

Customer: “I want a discount. I can’t give this as a gift!”

Me: “I can assure you, whoever you gift that book to will be pleased it has the author’s signature in it.”

Customer: *Grumbling* “You don’t know what you’re talking about. This book is completely ruined. It should be thrown away.”

He left it on the counter, and I put it back on the shelf.

Sometime later, a woman came in and asked about the same book. Thinking nothing of it, I took her to it and watched as she opened the cover and stared in awe as she clocked the signature. She bought it immediately.

After she left, I heard her shout, “You’re a f****** idiot!” and turned to see her just outside the door berating the man who had been in before. He looked like he was close to bursting a blood vessel.