(We offer layaway and sometimes allow customers to have more than one at a time. This particular customer whom I recognize is paying off one layaway, paying on another, and starting a new one on a busy sale day, so the counter is surrounded by customers.)

Me: “So, you would like to pick up your coat, pay on your other layaway, and put these items into layaway?”

Customer: *furiously chomping on gum* “Yes.”

Me: “Okay, would you like to pay for those separately or all in one transaction?”

(I’d prefer to run a credit card once rather than three individual times.)

Customer: *drops a crumpled pile of cash on the counter that is not enough for the total*

Me: “Okay, how would you like me to do this?”

Customer: *condescendingly over her glasses* “Is it too complicated for you?”

Me: “…”

Me: “Thank you for calling [Company] service desk. May I have your last name, please?”

Caller: “Yes, it is [Common Last Name].”

Me: “And may I have your first name, please?”

Caller: “Where can I find that?”

Me: “Well, tell your manager to request one for you at HR.”

Caller: “What?”

Me: “Or you may find it on your driver’s license…”

(A coworker and I are working box office one night. This particular summer night we are open late for a midnight premiere, but with fans also come the weirdos. Three ladies, probably in their 50s and obviously intoxicated, approach my till.)

Customer #1: “Hi. We’ll take three senior citizens for [Movie #1], please.”

Me: “I’m very sorry, but our last showing for [Movie #1] was at six. We do, however, have a showing for tomorrow at—“

Customer #1: *interrupting* “Okay, well, how about three tickets to [Movie #2].”

Me: “I’m sorry, that movie comes out tomorrow and we don’t have a showing for today.”

Customer #1: “Well, you are showing [Early Premiere Movie], so why not [Movie #2]?”

Me: “[Early Premiere Movie] is an extremely popular film that gets to premiere early for fans. [Movie #2] isn’t as big.”

Customer #2: “Okay, okay, don’t listen to her. We want three tickets to [Movie #3].”

Me: “We can definitely do that. That’ll be $32.85.”

Customer #3: “What?! I am not paying that much to go see a movie.”

(The three begin discussing their plans. Eventually, [Customer #3] turns to me.)

Customer #3: “So, we’re gonna go bowling. Do you know of any bowling places that have a bar?”

Customer #2: “What do you mean, any bowling places with bars? He’s not a day over thirteen; he doesn’t know anything about drinking.”

(After this, [Customer #2] notices my name tag, showing that my favorite movie is ‘Jurassic Park.’)

Customer #2: “Jurassic Park is your favorite movie? How old are you? That movie wasn’t even out when you were born!”

Me: “I’m seventeen, and yes, it was. It was released in 1993; I was born in 1998.”

Customer #2: “See, you can’t like that movie; you weren’t even born when it came out.”

(I stare, kind of dumbfounded, as my coworker is trying to keep her laughter inside. Luckily, [Customer #3] finds a nearby bowling alley and bar that is open.)

Customer #3: “Okay, ladies, I found one; let’s leave babyface here.”

(The three women left the theater and my coworker let out all her chuckles. I told my supervisor, who also lost it, eventually leading to my nickname that lasted until the day I left: Babyface)

This happened in the early 1990s. We sold a remote-controlled car called the “Red Arrow.” It was fast, large, and rather expensive. The store manager sold one to a customer.

A day or two later, he was back with his car and said it didn’t work. The manager tested it out and it didn’t work for him, either, so he wrote up a repair ticket, put it in a box, and sent it off to our repair center in another town. A few days later, it came back with a note which read, “Tested; unable to find anything wrong.” The customer picked it up, and everything was presumably cool.

The day after that, the customer was back. The car still didn’t work. My boss checked it out again, and yup, it didn’t work, so he wrote up another ticket, boxed it up, and sent it off to the repair center. Once again, it came back with the information that the repair techs could find nothing wrong with it. Once again, the customer — now somewhat annoyed, since he’d bought the car a week ago and it had spent more time in repair than it had with him — took it home.

As chance had it, I hadn’t been a part of any of these transactions. There were usually no more than two of us on, and the manager had dealt with him all three times he was in. The fourth time he showed up, though, he got me. I always opened — because, frankly, the manager hated to get up early — and when I got there to open the next day, the customer — now furious — was standing outside waiting. He looked like he was about to hurl the car through our plate-glass window.

I let him in and took a look at the car. I popped in the big NiCd battery pack to run the motors and got some AA batteries out of the drawer where we kept test stuff for the electronics. As the customer was saying, “Oh, I didn’t know you had to put batteries there!” I set it on the floor and ran it up and down the aisles a few times.

The battery compartment in the Red Arrow wasn’t completely obvious: they went into a panel that snapped over the slot for the NiCd pack. Since the customer hadn’t read the manual, he didn’t know where they went. Mind you, I hadn’t read the manual, either, but I knew the system needed power for the electronics as well as the motors, so I looked at it for a moment and spotted the label. I can see the customer not figuring it out, though, he had to be fairly dense to not read the manual after the repair center returned it as tested and okay not once, but twice. But, seriously, our store manager couldn’t figure it out, either?

(It’s the back-to-school season at the office supply store where I work. I’m working in the print shop when I see a customer come in and spend a few minutes looking at our display of three-ring binders on a table by the entrance. The binders are offered in trendy colors and patterns, and occasionally have popular memes or emojis on them, so I assume the customer is trying to decide which one she wants. Then, one by one, she takes the binders off the little wooden display stand that’s keeping them from falling over, picks up the display itself, and brings it to my counter.)

Customer: “I want to buy this.”

Me: “Unfortunately, ma’am, we don’t sell those here in the store. They’re part of our display.”

Customer: “Well, sell me this one and buy another!”

Me: “Ma’am, even if I had the ability to arbitrarily key something into my register to sell this to you, I can’t just get another one. These are shipped to the store from our corporate office and sometimes take longer than six weeks to reach us due to back-ordering.”

Customer: “But it was on your table! That means it’s a product and you have to sell it to me!”

Me: “Again, ma’am, I can’t sell that item to you. If you’d like, I can take you over to our desk accessories aisle and see if there’s something similar that will work for you?”

Customer: “NO! I don’t see what’s so difficult about selling this to me!”

Me: “I’d sell it to you if I could, ma’am, but it’s not for sale, and I don’t have a way to process a transaction for it through the register. And I’d get into trouble or fired for taking your cash without a legitimate sale.”

(The customer shoved the item across the counter and stormed off to do the rest of her shopping, and I had to go and reset the entire display table. Thanks, lady!)