I’m shopping at a discount shop. At the tills, they have bottles of Coke for a few pence each. The woman in front of me places her items on the till, spots the pile, and then asks:

Customer: “What’s wrong with the Coke? Is it out of date?”

Cashier: “No, but it nearly is.”

Customer: *Accusingly* “This one says it’s out of date!”

Cashier: “That is the best before date, and that’s today.”

Customer: “Let me have a look.”

She begins to paw through the bottles. Each one of them (surprise, surprise) has today’s date on it. She then turns to the guy with her and has a conversation about whether it’s safe to drink, what happens to the Coke after the date, how it’s just a conspiracy etc., etc. — all while the line behind her grows.

Me: “If 5p is such a topic of conversation for you, I’m happy to buy you one myself. But if we could hurry this along?”

Customer: “Some people have no idea of patience.”

Me: “Nor do some people have any appreciation of others, it seems.”

She finally pays and leaves. I place down my items and the cashier puts a bottle in my bag.

Me: “Oh, I was joking about buying a bottle.”

Cashier: “Oh, don’t worry about it; I’m throwing these out later. I didn’t realise there would be such drama over some cheap Coke — may as well give them away.”

Me: “Thanks!”

It was only a few pence but a nice gesture. The Coke tasted fine and probably would have for days after that. I wonder if that woman takes all her purchases that seriously; she must have no time for anything else in the world.

I entered a 200-km Audax (non-competitive cycling event), and I have a day return train ticket from London. I am just recovering from a broken clavicle, and it turns out this ride is a bit much for me at my current level of fitness. When I realise I am not going to finish the ride in time to qualify, I slow down and wend my gentle way back to the station to take me home.

I am hungry and tired and the temperature is dropping. I find I have missed the last train back to London, but no worries; it’s only four hours until the first morning train, so I can just curl up in the waiting room until it comes. It’s warm enough, and I am so tired that I will probably have a nice sleep. My biggest concern is whether I need a new ticket.

A train employee comes in and asks me where I am going. I tell her London. She points to the depart board where there is only one train, heading away from London, arriving in a little while. She tells me once that train departs, the station will close until the first train in the morning. She looks very concerned and walks away. 

I am too tired to be worried. I know it’s impossible after midnight to book a hotel room online for the same night, and the idea of cycling around to find a hotel with a manned reception or calling random hotels sounds harder than the alternative of just finding a bus shelter and curling up until the station reopens. I won’t die at 3°C, and I am unlikely to come to harm. It’s been a hard day, and it’s just going to be a little harder.

Meanwhile, my heroine is apparently more worried than I am. Maybe she knows her town better than I do and doesn’t want to leave a woman sleeping rough near the train station. Or maybe I just look as pathetic as I feel. Whatever the reason, she has obviously been thinking hard about how to keep me safe or warm or both.

Train Worker: “I’ve worked out what you should do. Catch the train to Peterborough. When it gets there, just stay where you are. An hour later, it will leave again, coming back through Stevenage and on to London. I will let the guard on board know what you are doing.”

So that was it. A concerned rail worker went out of her way to make sure I was warm and safe the whole way back to London. I even got enough sleep to make the cycle from Kings Cross station to my home pleasant — London before six is a delightful place to cycle. She was so careful of my welfare that it would not have surprised me if she was considering inviting me into her home before alighting on a better solution.

I filled in a very positive customer feedback form, which was actually rather difficult, as the form assumed I was making a complaint! Oh, and the gates were open when I got to London, so I didn’t have to buy a new ticket.

Related:
If They’re Willing, There’s Usually A Way

I’m working the front of house. I’m dressed smartly as the restaurant is reasonably formal — mid- to high-end food and prices. As our system is down, I’m carrying a clipboard with the reserved list, so it’s pretty obvious that I’m working.

A woman my age walks in alone; no one seems to be following her.

Me: “Good morning. Do you have a reservation?”

Woman: “Oh, no. Do I need one?”

Me: “We do have some tables available. How many are dining today?”

Woman: “Well, it’s—”

A guy dressed in a sideways cap, tracksuit, and very bright trainers (sneakers) walks in and speaks to me.

Guy: “Hey, what you talking to her for?”

Me: “Excuse me?”

Woman: *Sighs* “He works here. He was trying to find us a table.”

Guy: “Hmm, I know what these guys are like, though.”

Me: “Was it just you two today?”

Guy: “Yeah, find us a booth.”

Me: “We don’t have ‘booths’ but I can certainly find you somewhere private.”

I stuck them way back away from view. I checked on them. The guy was on his phone and it all felt very awkward. We got busy quickly, and I was asked to move on a guy out front who was disturbing our guests

Surprise, surprise, it was the guy from earlier. I could smell what he was smoking from a mile off. I eventually managed to get him to move around the corner, but he didn’t go without a fight.

I managed to miss the theatrics, but apparently, he stormed out before the bill was paid. I checked on the woman he was with, and she was pretty calm.

Turns out this was some sort of last chance/reconciliation dinner. She told me she had some amazing-sounding job offer out of the country, but he wanted to stay to work on his rap career.

I bought her a dessert. She left a tip and I wished her well.

A couple of weeks later, we got a card through the door thanking me for the support and a small note that she was on the way to the airport… alone.

I hope she does great.

I’m waiting for a friend at her work, standing around the back. It’s dingy, wet, and full of signs to keep clear, warnings, no smoking, no entry, etc.

A guy rushes out of one of the doors carrying something from the restaurant. He fairly aggressively questions me and, happy that I’m there for a good reason, warns me to keep clear as he will be coming through the doors and won’t be held responsible.

Fine, whatever. I can read; I was already well clear.

As I continue to wait, a woman walks over, stands uncomfortably close — right in front of me, like she is cutting in some imaginary line. Then, worse, she lights up a cigarette.

Me: “Can you move down a bit?”

Nothing, she just looks at me, not even a recognition that I spoke. Perhaps she doesn’t speak English?

Me: “You, move, that way?”

I do a “go away” motion with my hands.

She rolls her eyes at me. The door slams open and I take a small step back away from her. Almost in slow motion, a massive cooking pot hits the ground, and brown-grey water splashes toward us. I manage to stay dry, but it covers the woman’s shoes up to her knees.

Woman: “My new shoes! You f****** idiot! You stupid idiot!”

Guy: “Sorry, sorry. Are you okay?”

Woman: “Do I look okay? Look at my shoes!”

Guy: *To me* “You okay?”

Me: “I’m fine. I read the signs. Keep clear! Very obvious.”

This sent the woman into a rage; the noise and language were shocking.

After trying to force her way through the staff entrance, she marched off to the front of the restaurant to complain. Unfortunately, my friend turned up shortly afterward so I didn’t get to see the fallout.

I worked for a couple of years at a major historic tourist attraction in London. It was good fun and I immensely enjoyed it, although things could sometimes be manic busy, and although most customers were friendly, some could be somewhat… unpleasant. It was tame as anywhere really. It also had some attractions for children, and while staffing these I came to learn just how entitled — and irresponsible — some parents can truly be.

One of the features in the gardens was a maze. It was not particularly for children, although they could go in if they wanted and a lot of them liked it. Parents could take pushchairs in if they want, although the staff had the right to make parents leave pushchairs (strollers for Americans) outside if it got very busy inside.

That day was a hot summer Saturday, and it had been very busy. However, by the mid-afternoon, throughflow had thinned out a bit and I was staffing the maze on my own as I had done before. I still had three or four groups coming through every minute, and I had made the decision to ask parents to leave their pushchairs outside the maze.

A lady stalked up to me with her ticket and a baby in a pushchair. I scanned her ticket but politely told her that she needed to leave her pushchair outside. She huffed at me and put her pushchair in a line with all the others. Meanwhile, another group of tourists had come up and I was busy scanning their tickets. I paid little attention to the lady as she walked past. However, as I rapidly scanned through all the new tourists, I glanced at her pushchair and realised… the baby was still inside!

I quickly ran into the maze, and after only a few seconds, I saw the lady. She saw me and hissed angrily.

Lady: “What are you doing here? I’ve left my baby out there with you!”

Me: “I know, and you’re not allowed to do that. You’ll have to come out and take the baby in with you.”

Lady: “But can’t you look after him?”

My duties in the maze included scanning tickets, selling tickets, advising visitors, and managing the many groups of unruly French, German, and Spanish teenagers on language exchanges. My duties did not include looking after babies.

Me: “Madam. I’m here to look after the maze. I’m not here to perform babysitting services for you! I have to walk around quite a bit and I cannot spend all my time looking after your baby. Children, including babies, are allowed in the maze, but not pushchairs. I’m afraid you’ll either have to take the baby with you or leave the maze.”

Lady: *Whining* “It’s the first break from him I’ve had all day!”

Me: “Nonetheless, if you won’t come and get your baby, I’m going to have to call security.”

The baby had been unattended for more than a minute now. As I spoke, I brought my radio up to my mouth and hovered my finger over the send button.

Me: “Also, you don’t know me. How do you know I’m not some old paedophile you’ve left your kid with?”

Just to be clear, I’m not.

She had no answer.

Me: “Now, are you going to get your baby, or do I have to call security?”

She snorted and angrily marched out of the maze and grabbed the baby, who luckily was still there. In hindsight, I should have just called security and let them deal with it and not let the baby out of my sight, regardless of what a b**** his mother was, but all was well that ended well.

She ended up taking the baby around the maze, and about twenty minutes later, she came to get the (now empty) pushchair. The look of pure hate she gave me would have alarmed The Rock, but luckily, off she went and I was not troubled by her again.

You are supposed to always want customers to come back again, but there are some exceptions. She was definitely one of them.