Logged Off From Reality

A woman walks into the library and waves her phone in my face.

Patron: “I need to print a document from my email.”

Me: “No problem. Do you have a library card with us?”

Patron: “Yes.”

Me: “Excellent. Then you can use one of our computers to log onto your email and—”

Patron: “I don’t want to log onto your computer.”

I look around. The library is virtually empty. All but one of our computers are free.

Me: “Okay? Unfortunately, we have no way to connect your phone to our printer, so that’s the only way we are able to print anything for you.”

Patron: “But I need to print this!”

Me: “And like I said, if you’ll just log onto one of our computers—”

Patron: “I don’t want to log onto your computer!”

Me: “May I ask why not? I’ll be happy to help you if—”

Patron: *Waving phone ever more vigorously* “I need to print this!”

Me: “And like I said, it’s technically impossible for us to print from your phone, so I’m afraid the only way you can print it is from our computers.”

Patron: “I don’t want to log onto your computer!“

Me: “Again, we can’t print from your phone, but I’ll be happy to help show you how to print from the computer.”

Patron: “No! I need to print this!“

And so on and so forth with little to no variation, until she finally stormed out of the library without the printout she needed so badly that she’d rather spend five minutes arguing than two minutes in front of a computer.