I work in an indie bookshop. It is two days before Christmas. We’re packed so there’s three of us working. Ten large boxes arrive (it’s a mixture of restock and customer order) so we start sorting through it. Our usual process for customer orders is that we ring them up to let them know their order has arrived. Simple concept, right? Apparently not.

A guy comes in:

Customer: *Demanding.* “Get my order!”

We look up his order: three flat kids’ books.

Me: “Sir, we haven’t called you to pick these up yet, and the books haven’t arrived yet, but I reckon they might be in the remaining seven boxes we have yet to unpack.”

Customer: “Then get me my books!”

Me: “You’re going to have to wait while we sort through them.”

He gets angrier and angrier, eventually resorting to assaulting my coworker who’s shelving books. We threaten to call the police. Some of the other customers butt in and tell him to stop. We give the angry man a refund and tell him to get out and never come back.

When we eventually got to the end of the ten boxes, his books were nowhere to be seen. I think they arrived after Christmas, so we popped them on the shelves and sold them out of spite.

I work for a bookstore that specializes in religious books. They carry other things, too, but it is safe to say that the bulk of our customers are religious.

This particular holiday season, corporate mandates that we wish customers “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.” They are very strong in their “demand” and we’re all fearful of what might happen if we slip up.

I make no errors the first few weeks in my wording and most customers don’t even notice. The few that do just comment on the state of the world or something along those lines.

Then, SHE comes in.

From the beginning, she is a difficult customer — the kind that believes that the few dollars they spend in the store every few months pays for your salary and that you owe them for keeping you employed. If you have worked retail, you know Her.

I make recommendations, answer questions, and help her pick out a few Christmas gifts. It takes forever! Finally, I check her out, and as she’s walking away I say, “Thanks for shopping with us, and Happy Holidays!” 

She stops like she hit an invisible wall. Slowly, she turns towards me with her mouth all screwed up. 

Customer: “What did you just wish me?”

I respond normally because I naively think that people don’t really go around screaming at retail workers for extending well wishes for the holidays.

Me: “I wished you a Happy Holiday! Is anything wrong?”

Customer: “How dare you?! You should be wishing me a Merry Christmas! Do you not believe in Christ? This place most of all should be celebrating the religious aspects of our holiday.”

Me: “I meant no offense. That is what my bosses have asked me to say to try to be more inclusive and avoid offending anyone.” 

Customer: “I doubt that. You are one of those people, aren’t you?! Sowing Satan’s thoughts! I will get you fired!” 

I can’t speak as I am completely stunned. 

Customer: “Well, enjoy your Christmas unemployed!”

She slams the door. Later, I recount the story to my manager. He laughs and laughs.

Manager: “Welcome to holiday retail. She won’t make a complaint; she’s too busy terrorizing other people elsewhere.”

He was right. And I was no longer naive.

Related:
Tis The Season For Unreason, Part 6
Tis The Season For Unreason, Part 5
Tis The Season For Unreason, Part 4
Tis The Season For Unreason, Part 3
Tis The Season For Unreason, Part 2

An elderly man comes into the bookstore.

Customer: “I’m looking for a book for my grandson.”

Me: “What kind of books does he like?”

Customer: “Well his mother gave me a list of rules. The books can’t have princes or princesses. No knights. No dragons or other fantasy animals, and certainly no talking animals! No men that have to save women. No…”

In the end, he can’t buy a book for none of them get past the rules; it’s the saddest thing.

Me: “May I suggest a toy? We have a selection here.”

Customer: “Ah, yes. The rules for those are: no plastic, nothing that has to be built or put together, nothing that might have a sharp edge, nothing battery powered…”

In the end, he couldn’t get the poor boy anything.

I read a lot of fantasy and sci-fi, but I’ve always avoided those epic series that take up an entire shelf in the store. You know the ones — six, eight, ten books, all doorstops nearly 1,000 pages long. It’s just a personal preference; I don’t like waiting decades to see how the story ends.

I’m working in a bookstore, and a coworker whose taste I trust finally talks me into giving one of the more famous of these series a try. I enjoy the first two books well enough, but the third is a struggle; it’s downright boring, and after a week I’m barely halfway through. The next time I see my coworker, we talk about it.

Coworker: “How are you liking [Series]?”

Me: “I thought the first two were great, but I just cannot get into the third one. Tell me it gets better?”

Coworker: “Oh, yeah, the middle books really drag, but things pick up again in the sixth!”

Me: “So, just 3,000 more pages until the good stuff.”

I did not finish the series.

Working in a bookshop, I will occasionally get a very, very vague request, somewhere along the lines of “The cover was blue,” “It had a dog and the dog died,” and so forth. This particular customer told us that he had read the book in high school, and it was about a guy who had lost part of his soul in a ritual and was kicked out of a magic academy, only to gain his soul back in an epic battle in the end. I was delighted because I knew exactly what book he meant.

Me: “Oh, you mean [Book #1]!”

Coworker #1: “No, isn’t it [Book #2]? I swear it was [Book #2].”

Me: “Are you sure? It sounds exactly like [Book #1].”

Coworker #2: “What book are you talking about? It sounds familiar.”

The customer explains again.

Coworker #2: “Oh! That’s [Book #3]! Let me show you.”

Customer: “The cover had a man with a stopwatch or pocket watch on it, I think.”

Me: “It sounds exactly like [Book #1]!”

Coworker #1: “It sounds exactly like [Book #2]!”

Coworker #2: “It sounds exactly like [Book #3]!”

Customer: “I guess it’s a popular plot or something. No one else has known, either. I’ll go try some other shop, I guess.”

Me: “Please, let us know when you do find it! Have a good day!”

We have a wager going for the book. The prize is a cookie from the café next door.