(I am at the hospital for a scheduled CT scan. While my surgeon has faxed an order for the scan, the hospital will not do one without bloodwork. An order for that has not come through.)

Tech: “You’ll have to reschedule. We cannot contact your doctor for the bloodwork order.”

Me: “I got up early, drank two bottles of white slime before I came for my appointment. We are not rescheduling.”

(They get another doctor to sign a bloodwork order. I finally get down to the CT lab. The nurse comes at me with a needle.)

Me: “Wait. No. Oh, h*** no!”

Nurse: “Don’t like needles? I assure you; we’re very good at what we do.”

Me: “I am quite sure you are. But I’ve been there, done that. If you inject that dye, my kidneys will shut down. Then you will slap my butt in the hospital, and feed me Lasix like they are jellybeans. Then you will pump me full of saline to flush that dye out of my kidneys, and I will pee like a race horse for 24 hours. Not gonna happen today.”

Nurse: “Oh. OH!”

(There is more whispering and consulting.)

Nurse: “The doctor says we can do the scan without the dye.”

Me: “Thank you. I knew you would see it my way.”

(We’re selling tons of over-the-counter, store-brand medications at buy one, get one free. I ring up a lady who has two bottles of cough syrup with her. She keeps a stern eye on the cash register monitor as I check them through.)

Lady: “That’s not right.”

Me: “What isn’t?”

Lady: “The coupon says buy one at $6.99, get the other one free.”

Me: “Precisely. You’re getting both of these for $6.99.”

Lady: “But one’s ringing up as $3.50 and the other at $3.49.”

Me: “That’s correct. The register divides these differences automatically.”

Lady: *growing fidgety* “But that’s not what the coupon says.”

Me: *after a pause* “Well, $3.50 plus $3.49 is $6.99.”

Lady: “So this is how you scam customers!”

Me: “Ma’am, I’m pretty certain that we here at [Drugstore Chain] do not scam our customers when even basic math can rule out any differences.”

Lady: “I only want one. Put this other one back; I don’t want it. I’m not paying an extra $3.49 for this. The ad said buy one, get one free, and I’m not getting that one for free.”

Me: *head-desk*

This story is part of our Pi Day Math roundup!

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(This was before hybrid cars or electric cars were mainstream. A man called about his Lexus that just stopped working after a few days, so we had it towed back to the dealership.)

Customer: “I don’t know what happened; the car just stopped while I was driving, and almost caused an accident because of you people!”

Me: “Okay, let’s take a look.”

(I couldn’t find any obvious issue, and all the free mechanics were giving the car a full once-over, trying to figure out the problem.)

Customer: “I spent tens of thousands on this car! How the h*** can you sell anything that would crap out in two days?!”

(Just then I noticed the gas gauge was on ‘Empty’. I put a little gas in the engine and started it up.)

Customer: “What?! For that amount of money, with the technologies these days, you still need to use gas?!”

Me: “Good afternoon, ma’am; how can I help you?”

Customer: “Don’t call me ma’am; that’s rude! That’s like me calling you stupid!”

Me: “I apologize… I was just trying to be courteous.”

Customer: “I want to speak to the manager.”

Manager: “What seems to be the problem, ma’am?”

Customer: “You’re stupid, and he’s stupid, and everybody that works here is stupid! I’m leaving!”

Me: “Have a great day, ma’am!”

(It is October 30th, during a year when the Pirates Of The Caribbean movies have been very popular.)

Customer: “Hi, can you help me find a costume? I’m looking for a Jack Sparrow costume for my son.”

Me: “Ah, well, I can tell you that Jack was a very popular character this year, and unfortunately we are out of all our Jack Sparrow costumes, even adults. But we–”

Customer: “What! That’s outrageous! How can you be out of the most popular costume?”

Me: “Well, we’ve tried to keep up with demand, but I guess a lot of people shopped early this year. We sold out of many of the most popular costumes, Jack Sparrow being one of them. We have other pirate items.”

Customer: “No, no, no! He wants to be Jack! I can’t believe this! This is the fifth costume shop I have been to today and no one has this costume! Why don’t you people keep more of them around?”

Me: “I’m very sorry, ma’am. If you like, I would be happy to help you pull together a Jack Sparrow costume out of items we do have.”

Customer: *walking away* “Outrageous! How can a store be out of the most popular Halloween costumes when Halloween is tomorrow?!”

This story is part of our Halloween roundup!

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