(I work in a call centre, in tech support.)

Customer: “So, uh, I’m dying of cancer, and I’ve only been given a few months to live…”

Me: “Oh, no! I’m so sorry to hear that!”

Customer: “Yeah, so, uh…”

(I figure that he must be calling in to add someone else to his account so they can still deal with it after he passes.)

Me: “Yes?”

Customer: “So, uh… what can I get?”

Me: “I’m sorry?”

Customer: “So, like, can I get a discount or something?”

Me: “Let me transfer you to a manager.”

(My husband has recently taken to wearing a kilt. This happens soon after at a bookstore.)

Customer: “Oh, I like your skirt!”

Husband: “Um, it’s a kilt.”

Customer: “Oh, I’m sorry. I just wanted to say I support your lifestyle.” *facepalms* “I’m just making it worse, aren’t I?”

(There is a pharmacy in the same building as my doctor’s office, but it opens at 8:30 rather than 8:00 as the office does. It has a metal gate across the entrance when closed, just like most stores in a mall do. I come in just after 8:00 and am waiting for my turn when a woman comes out from her appointment with a prescription sheet and starts hovering right in front of the pharmacy gate.)

Woman: *to the employee inside who is obviously trying to set up to open* “Excuse me… Excuse me!”

Employee: “Yes?”

Woman: “Are you open yet?”

Employee: *slight pause* “No. That’s why the gate is closed and the lights are off.”

Woman: “Oh.” *wanders away*

(Everyone else in the waiting room was trying not to laugh. Really, how much more obvious do you need it to be?)

Related:
Not Very Closed Minded, Part 29
Not Very Closed Minded, Part 28
Not Very Closed Minded, Part 27

(I am pregnant with my second child, working as a cashier. It is not long before my due date. I am ringing a woman through when she asks for cigarettes. I have to leave my till to get them behind another till, maybe ten feet away. While I wobble, she turns and looks at my backside, even turning her head. Then, she informs my coworker at the next till:)

Customer: “She’s having a boy. I can tell because of how fat her a** has gotten.”

(I come back and finish up the transaction while my coworker and her customers stare at the woman with their mouths literally open. As soon as she walks out the door, my coworker’s customer, who is also a regular, says:)

Regular: “What a b****! I don’t care what the reason is; never comment on a pregnant woman’s a**!” *to me* “Sweetheart, ignore her! You are beautiful, and good for you for working so long.”

Me: *confused* “Thank you.”

(As soon as both customers have left, my coworker explains what happened, and we spend the next several hours laughing about it. About four hours later:)

Me: “Oh, my God. I just realized something!”

Coworker: “What?”

Me: “For her to know how big my a** has gotten means she had to have been checking it out before.”

Coworker: “Okay, that just went from funny to creepy.”

(I am the idiot customer in this story. The legal drinking age in Canada is nineteen, so it is quite common to have a fake ID when younger in order to get into bars and clubs. I am fifteen and have just gotten my first fake ID, and my friends and I are going to our first ever bar to celebrate. The sign at the bar reads, “Highballs on special $5.00.” Now, being fifteen, I have no idea what a highball is, and I assume it is the name of a specific cocktail or something like that.)

Me: “I’ll have one highball, please!”

(The large, burly, bartender looks at me suspiciously.)

Bartender: “Okay… Which one?”

Me: “Just… just one highball. The highball?”

Bartender: “Yes, and which highball, exactly, do you want?”

Me: *becoming totally flustered and trying to read the sign again for the name of a specific highball* “The sign says highballs are on special! I… I want that… from the sign! The… normal highball!”

Bartender: *clearly exasperated* “Miss, you can’t just walk in and order ‘a highball.’ That’s like walking into an ice cream shop and ordering ‘an ice cream.’ There’s vanilla, chocolate, pistachio, mint—”

Me: *completely flushed now, embarrassed, and terrified that I will be thrown out of the bar any minute now, in a shrill voice* “VANILLA, THEN! I’LL TAKE A VANILLA HIGHBALL!”