(A teenage girl comes in and looks at the ice cream for a while. We only have 16 ice cream flavors at a time. My dad owns the shop.)

Customer: “Can I have more than one sample?”

Me: “Sure.”

Dad: *making a joke he often makes to put people at ease* “You can have up to 16!” *walks away*

(The customer then proceeds to ask for a sample of about 10 of our 16 ice cream flavors, and doesn’t bat an eye as my smile slowly fades. I admit that by then I looked pretty irritated. When she has sampled quite a few, her friends come in.)

Customer #2: “You’re sampling all of them?!”

Customer #1: “They said I could.”

(They both look at me questioningly.)

Me: *in a thoroughly bad mood by now* “Yes, technically. But it is kind of silly.”

Customer #1: “Oh. I didn’t know that. Can I have a sample of [flavor]?”

(She continues to do this until she has tried them all, including vanilla. She and her friends go sit down and wait for their teacher, who is treating them all to whatever they want. After they have all ordered, while they are receiving their dishes of ice cream, the teacher pays. [Customer #1] accepts her medium dish.)

Customer #1: “Can I have some cookie dough pieces on top?”

(It costs 60 cents for a candy, and the teacher has already paid for everyone and sat down.)

Me: “Yes, but you’ll have to pay for it.”

(She didn’t say anything. I added the cookie dough and she went and hit up her teacher for 60 cents.)

(I am at my part-time job during high school. The owners are pretty conservative and religious people.)

Boss: “[My Name], do you have a strong wind?”

Me: “…?”

Boss: “Do you have a strong wind?”

Me: “I’m sorry, sir. I don’t understand.”

Boss: *sigh* “Can you blow hard?”

Me: “Yes, sir, but [Coworker] plays the tuba in band. She can blow harder.”

(To this day, I can’t remember what he needed us to do that prompted him to ask that question!)

(I work at a hole-in-the-wall tourist trap antique store that also sells ice cream. I am still a newbie so I am only trained to serve the ice cream. There are only two people working today. My coworker is on her lunch break and ice cream lines are out the door. Everyone has been very easy-going until my next customer and her two young boys.)

Me: “Hi, what can I get for you?”

Customer: “They will have two small scoops of rainbow sherbet in bowls, and I will have one medium scoop of chocolate, in a bowl, as well.”

(With the bowls being one size, we judge the scoop size off of the size of the cone that the scoop would have gone into and charge accordingly. Watching me like a hawk, the woman repeatedly asks me if they are the correct size every time I hand her the bowls with the scooped ice cream, and also repeatedly tells me she expects to pay a certain amount based on the prices on the menu board.)

Me: “Yes, ma’am, your total is [amount larger than she expected].”

Customer: “No, no, that’s not right. I expect to pay [amount].”

(She appears to be getting more angry by the second.)

Me: “All right, let me go back and do it again.”

(It turns out I have gotten so worked up with how many people there are that I accidentally charged her for three medium scoops. I apologize and run the transaction again, and it turns out to be less than what she was expecting to pay. This still doesn’t please her.)

Customer: “Um, no. I am expecting to pay [amount]! You will charge me for the right amount, now!”

(At this point, the line is way out the door and my coworker comes back and asks me to move on to the next customer, who is being very polite and waiting very quietly with the other customers in line. While I help the next group, I overhear my coworker and the other woman.)

Coworker: “Ma’am, the register does not make mistakes, and it turns out it is less than what you were expecting to pay, even with tax. Now, with all due respect, we do have more customers that need to be taken care of, so will you please take your change?”

(Meanwhile, her two boys have been eating their ice cream during this entire ordeal, and before they leave, their mother looks at their half-eaten ice cream and looks back at us.)

Customer: *very loudly* “Excuse me! My sons’ ice cream has melted; they need a new scoop.”

Coworker: “I’m sorry, ma’am, but your boys have been eating their ice cream; it has not melted. We need to move on to customers who have not been helped yet.”

Customer: *yelling* “Are you serious?! You guys are f****** pathetic!” *pointing at me* “F*** you, b****!”

(I could feel the shocked expression on my face, and could see that her two boys had the same looks on their faces as they walked out with their mother. Thankfully, we got a lot of sympathy tips that day.)

(Our sugar-free flavors of ice cream change often. This week, the soft serve is pistachio. I’m training, so I let the newbie take the order while I answer questions.)

Customer: “What are your sugar-free flavors?”

Newbie: “Soft-serve pistachio and hand-dipped strawberry.”

Customer: “Is there any chocolate in the pistachio?”

Newbie: *looks at me, since she hasn’t had orders for it yet*

Me: “No, it’s pistachio.”

Customer: “What color is the pistachio?”

Me: “It’s green.”

Customer: “So, is it, like, minty?”

Me: “It’s pistachio.”

Customer: “So, there’s no mint?”

Me: “It’s pistachio. Like the nut.”

(We have four sizes based on number of scoops: toddler, small, medium, and large. People tend to refer to the “toddler” size as the “kiddie” size, but we know what they mean. A woman and her maybe three- or four-year-old girl come in while I am working with my other coworker.)

Mom: “She will take a kiddie cup, vanilla.”

Me: “All right!”

(I add one scoop to the Styrofoam cup and hand it to the mother, who then hands it to the girl. The girl pouts.)

Little Girl: “Aw, Mommy! I wanted the kitty cup!”

(We all started laughing at the sheer cuteness. My coworker took back the “kiddie” cup and drew a kitty picture on the cup with a sharpie, making it the “kitty” cup she wanted. They were both very pleased, and left a nice tip!)