The hoarders are currently at their worst and I, like many others, am trying to get by on what we can. Having no luck at the big supermarket, I drop into my local independent corner stop to try my luck.

As I turn the corner, I watch a woman clear the refrigerator of all the milk left. It must be a dozen large bottles of milk. She smirks at me as she sees me waiting.

After she waddles off, I find someone who works there.

Me: “I don’t suppose you have any more milk?”

Worker: “Is there none in the fridge?”

Me: “No, someone took everything left.”

Worker: “I’m not sure we have had a delivery yet; let me look in the back.”

He disappears and comes back with one of each type.

Me: “Oh, thank you. It’s hard getting the kids to bed without their milk.”

Worker: “No worries. She did us both a favour, really.”

Me: “Who?”

Worker: “You said a woman took the lot earlier? My boss just told me to empty the fridge as that was all going out of date soon.”

When I think of hoarders, I think of that woman, buying dozens of pints of soon to be rancid milk.

I’m a manager at a convenience store and I have been a cashier for years. Some mornings, I work alone while I wait for my cashier to come in after taking her kids to school. Of course, doing managerial work plus being a cashier takes me all over the store, and most times I have to eat on the clock. Then, I have to go to the bathroom.

What makes me mad is the fact that I put a sign up saying I will be back in five minutes, lock the door, and don’t let anyone in, and people still won’t read the sign, will yank the door so hard I can hear it all the way in the back, and sometimes will bang on it like they’re dying.

One time, a customer just needs the receipt from one of the pumps and starts hitting the door insistently. Mind you, when I’m alone, I don’t take my phone to the bathroom with me so I can get the store opened as soon as possible, but this time, I think what I ate was bad, so I am there a little longer than anticipated.

This guy bangs the door like he is being robbed. When I finally open the door, he’s furious.

Customer: “I want my receipt! Why are you not open? What’s going on?!”

Me: “Well, sir, I had to take a s***. What do you want?!”

I guess people expect us service providers to be robots.

I’m an observer here. [Customer #1] is approaching the register with a basket of prepared sandwiches, snacks, and drinks. [Customer #2] comes up shortly after, dressed for the beach, with a bottle of sunscreen.

Customer #2: “You should let me go first. I just have this one thing and I’m in a hurry.”

[Customer #1] looks at how [Customer #2] is dressed.

Customer #1: “I’m an ER doctor on my lunch break. If you seriously think it’s more important for you to get to the beach than for me to get back to my patients, then go ahead.”

[Customer #2] slunk to the back of the line.

Come payday, I get my check on a card and usually hit the ATM to pull out cash for bills. As the card and ATM charge two different fees, I try to only hit the ATM once each payday. This time, I have a thirty-dollar bill due and a fifty-dollar bill due. Easy enough; I just need to split a twenty.

I go into the store to buy food with my card and split the twenty.

Me: *To the cashier* “How are you today, sir?”

The cashier is new; I’ve never seen him before. He says nothing to me but rings everything up silently.

Me: “I’d like to pay by card, but can y’all split this twenty for me?”

Cashier: “No. You can use cash or card, not both.”

Me: “Okie doke, no problem.”

I pay with a card and we finish the transaction.

Me: “Now can you split this twenty?”

Cashier: “Nope. You have to buy something first.”

Me: “Okay?”

I grab a candy which comes out to eighty-eight cents after tax, and I lay down twenty-one dollars.

Me: “I’d like that change in fives or tens, please.”

Cashier: “I don’t have any tens.”

Me: “Okay, fives are fine, too.”

The cashier hits the button for exact change, the drawer pops out, and he tries to hand me the twenty back with no coins.

Me: “Sorry, but I need fives. Or even ones. I don’t need a twenty.” 

The manager comes over and redoes the transaction, having to tell the cashier to type in that I gave him twenty-one dollars for the eighty-eight-cent candy.

The cashier hands me four fives, zero coins. Then, he slams the drawer, turns away without a word, and simply walks off.

Me: “I didn’t get… Never mind.” 

If that’s how he acts to polite customers, he won’t last long.

There’s a public park next to our store situated on a popular walking trail. During this particular summer, the city has closed the public parking lot that gave you access to the trail due to road work, so people take it upon themselves to think that they can park in our parking lot — for free — and use the park. Most of the time, if they come in and purchase something, my boss — who also happens to be a lawyer — will let them park there. There are two incidents, however, that stick out in my mind.

A woman with THAT haircut parks in our lot and goes to the park. My boss comes outside.

Boss: “You can’t park in our lot if you’re not a customer.”

She starts screaming and yelling at us.

Woman: “I’ll be sending a letter to the city mayor about this!”

Boss: “Go ahead. You send her a letter and I will send her two.”

The second incident involves a man who parks his car DIRECTLY IN FRONT OF OUR WINDOWS and then tries walking to the park.

Boss: “Sir, you need to move your car.”

Man: “No.”

Boss: “Either you need to move the car or I will move it for you.”

Man: “No.”

He then ignores my boss and waves him off.

My boss gets our large commercial truck we use to move things and parks it directly behind this man’s car. Then, he gets on the phone and calls a tow truck. The man comes over and begins complaining.

Boss: “Are you going to move it now?”

Finally, after much complaining, he agrees to move his car.

I get that the city had no backup plan for parking and many of the people who wanted to use this park could not because they didn’t want to purchase anything from our store. The city’s lack of planning isn’t everyone else’s fault, but still, I wonder to this day: why do people think that because a city closed the public parking lot it gives them the right to park wherever they want?

Related:
A Parking Spot Of Bother