I am Hispanic and was born and raised in Texas. I am working the checkout lanes with my manager, who is also Hispanic. I am scanning a customer’s items when our super-old checkout gives me a static shock. I react quickly and shout a quick little Spanish word I learned from my grandmother that is used whenever she stubs her toe.

Almost immediately, my customer bellows at the top of his voice:

Customer: “MANAGERRRRR!”

Me: “I can call a manager for you, sir; there is no need to raise your voice.”

Customer: “MANAGERRRRR!”

My manager, who is one lane over, tries to call out over this customer’s wailing.

Manager: “Sir! I am a manager! How can I help you?!”

Customer: “You are a manager? No, no. I need a real manager! I don’t want anyone here speaking Spanish in my presence! This is America!“

My manager immediately looks at me and starts speaking to me in loud Spanish.

Me: “Oh, si! Si!”

My manager continues throwing copious amounts of Spanish at me, and I keep nodding and responding with, “Si! Si!”

Customer: “Are you trying to piss me off?!”

Manager: *Switching to English* “Well, considering you’re a racist piece of s***, I would be remiss as a human if I wasn’t trying to piss you off.”

Customer: “I’m going to report you both to the store manager!”

The customer goes over to our customer service desk to complain about us. The customer my manager was serving is smiling at both of us.

Manager’s Customer: “That was awesome!”

Manager: “You know what’s better? I can’t actually speak any Spanish.”

Manager’s Customer: “But you just spoke Spanish!”

Manager: “I was quoting my Abuela’s salsa recipe.”

Me: “And you know what’s even better? I can’t speak any Spanish either. I was just nodding and going, ‘Si, Si!'”

The manager’s customer is laughing at this point.

Manager: “But you know what’s best of all?”

Manager’s Customer: “Oh, lord, tell me!”

Manager: “That customer has gone to the customer service desk to complain to the store manager… who is Colombian.”

Related:
Totally Estúpido! Part 26
Totally Estúpido! Part 25
Totally Estúpido! Part 24
Totally Estúpido! Part 23
Totally Estúpido! Part 22

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A male customer comes up to my register and buys a cucumber and a tube of personal lubricant. Then, he heads to the restroom. He exits empty-handed twenty minutes later and goes back to shopping.

A little while later, a maintenance worker stops by my register.

Maintenance: “I just found this cucumber and this empty tube of [lubricant] in the restroom…”

I was the only one working in our store one day. I was halfway through cleaning when I had to take a phone call. There were no customers at the time, so I just left the spray-and-wipe bottle and cleaning cloth on the display shelves as I ducked behind the counter.

When I finished the call, I was just about to go back to cleaning when a customer rushed in. He saw the bottle and cloth and immediately grabbed them and started frantically spraying a banner we had up. I walked over as he was furiously wiping it and asked him what on earth he was doing.

Customer: “I saw you had a sign saying you’re hiring. Check out what a good job I can do!”

Baffled, I nervously responded:

Me: “You don’t have to do that, man. It’s all good.”

But he didn’t stop. He was in such a frenzy that I was apprehensive to push any further, so I let him continue while I grabbed the phone. I punched in the number for security but held my finger over the call button while standing near the only door I could lock from the other side.

By this point, the customer had unhooked the banner from its stand and laid it on the floor, and he was on his hands and knees scrubbing it like a serial killer scrubs a blood stain. The entire time, I had no clue what he would do next.

Eventually, he put the banner back up, returned the cleaning supplies to me, and left without another word. It took me a moment to process what had just happened.

I’m not gonna lie, though; he did a pretty good job with the banner.

Many years ago, I worked in a large international chain of building supply stores. Company culture was mostly okay. However, our higher-ups did not like to handle any problem that did not involve the police. We were left to our own devices, and most of the time, things worked themselves out.

Then, we had one floor manager who would be very familiar to any reader of Not Always Working. He was totally incompetent in everything, besides making everybody around him miserable. He used every shred of his power to make every situation worse, mess up our schedules, and cut our bonuses.

One day, my shift decided to retaliate. Our chain took much pride in a store-brand glue, used mainly for tiling, but capable of gluing almost any materials together. You might see where this is going.

On their lunch break, the guys took a forklift to the parking lot. Carefully, so as to not damage anything, they lifted [Floor Manager]’s car and glued all four wheels to the concrete with [Glue]. Four hours later, we all left for home… except for [Floor Manager], who, despite having a gigantic warehouse full of tools and supplies at hand, spent a good part of the evening dislodging his car from the parking lot.

Well, he cried up a storm. I do not know how [Floor Manager] managed it, but the country branch CEO, by far the biggest boss I ever met, came to our store to investigate. He called the whole shift into the conference room, greeted us very civilly, and first asked to hear everything from [Floor Manager]. [Floor Manager] told him everything.

Then, [CEO] turned to us.

CEO: “Gentlemen, is this all true?”

We said yes.

CEO: “You really used [Glue] to completely immobilize a car?”

We, being of a somewhat 47-Ronin mindset, again affirmed. CEO nodded and pulled out his phone.

CEO: “[Personal Assistant]? Send somebody from Public Relations to [Our Store]. Local guys just figured out a perfect plot for a [Glue] TV ad.”

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A few years ago, I got an email from someone who got my name from a client of mine. The person who emailed me asked if I was open to redesigning their flyers and data sheets to which I said yes; I was happy to help.

Because they had a small budget, I had to use stock images to represent their workers, finding the most appropriate photos available. The person I was working with looked at my design and the photos I used.

Client: “Hmm, the uniforms aren’t what our workers wear. Can you get the people in the photos to try on different uniforms and hats with our company logo?”

Me: “These are stock images.”

Client: “Yes, I know, but can you ask them anyway?”