The details of this story reminded me of something that happened to me a few months ago. I was in my local German budget chain supermarket — no, not that one, the other one. It was evening, and I hadn’t eaten all day. I felt a little shaky but basically fine. I brought my basket up to the register and waited in line.

I don’t know if it was a coincidence or if suddenly standing still after moving around had some effect, but I suddenly started feeling absolutely awful — dizziness, nausea, blurry vision, the works. I’m not in the habit of eating or drinking anything before I’ve paid for it, but this felt like a legitimate emergency, so I grabbed a small bottle of orange juice out of my basket and chugged it. Too little, too late. My legs were about to go, so I caught the cashier’s eye and said:

Me: “Excuse me. I’m so sorry, but I need to sit down.”

(This is England, after all.) Then, I staggered a few steps out of the line and flopped down on the ground.

When I knew what was going on again, there was a very nice manager helping me put my head between my knees and asking me how I was doing. When I explained that I was pretty sure it was just a low blood sugar thing, he whipped an unopened tube of dextrose gel out of his pocket like some sort of first-aid Batman! Turns out he was diabetic and always had some on him.

Between the sitting and the sugar, I began to feel better quickly. I was very embarrassed and inclined to just scrape myself up and stagger home — not a very bright idea, but I wasn’t firing on all cylinders. The manager kindly but firmly bullied me into staying put while he called an ambulance. Due to the ambulance service staffing crisis, it took twenty-five minutes just to get through to emergency services on the phone.

During that time:

• The lady who had been behind me in line came over and put a bag down next to me. She had bought all the groceries I left behind — an embarrassing assortment of ready meals and junk food, because of COURSE it couldn’t happen on a day when I was buying a respectable assortment of fresh vegetables. She refused to take any payment.
• The young couple who had been behind HER came over to keep me company and chat with me while I waited for the ambulance.
• Everyone who walked past said something along the lines of, “Feel better soon!” or, “Take care!”

Finally, the manager got through to emergency services, and the ambulance turned up quite quickly after that. The paramedics checked me out, kindly refrained from commenting on the fact that I was wearing a fuzzy pyjama top under my coat — Murphy’s law was in full force for me that day — and decided that the most sensible thing to do was just to get me home and let me go to bed. After making me swear a blood oath that I would go to my doctor and get checked out as soon as possible, they drove me right to my door.

The whole thing was simultaneously mortifying and heartwarming. I felt daft because I had brought it on myself, but every single person present was so kind to me. Of course, I went back to thank all the staff later, and I sent a glowing email to their corporate people about how well I had been treated. And I’m more careful now not to shop hungry!

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Best Be Quiet Or They’ll Sip You A New One

Many years ago, I worked as a call centre trainer for one of the UK’s handful of private medical insurers. We had a small problem with new starters getting back to their inductions late from lunch, and my manager told me how to deal with them: lock the door once lunch ended, and they’d have to hang around outside awkwardly on the call centre floor for a few minutes (until I let them in) while they learnt their lesson. It seemed like a good enough solution; they wouldn’t really miss anything, but they should feel awkward enough waiting out on the call centre floor to not keep doing it.

After a year or so, a more senior training role came up in another department, and I went to an interview. During the interview, I was asked what I’d do if someone was late. I relayed my (fairly successful) approach of locking them out for a minutes to think about what they’d done. 

A couple of weeks later, I got some great news! I’d been promoted to the new position. 

New Boss: “We really liked how you took the time to think about your answers to our interview questions. Also, we loved your sense of humour when you joked about locking trainees out of the training room! Could you imagine if we did that?!”

Suffice to say, I stopped locking late trainees out of the room, and I never did tell my new boss that I was absolutely, deadly serious.

Our call wait times are slightly longer than usual, but I haven’t had a caller wait longer than twenty minutes today.

Caller: “I’ve been on hold for over an hour!

I ignore the lie as I can see he’s been waiting for fourteen minutes.

Me: “I apologize for the wait time, sir. We are busier than usual today. How can I help you, sir?

Caller: “You had me on hold for almost two hours, and that is unacceptable! What will you do for me?”

Me: “As I said, sir, I apologise for the time you had to wait on hold, but you’re through to an agent now, so I will do everything I can to assist you with your query.”

Caller: “This is ridiculous! You have us poor people on hold for almost three hours, and you won’t even do anything to compensate us! I want to speak to your manager!”

Me: “I can get them on the line for you. Hold, please.”

I link my manager to my call, but I can still hear the conversation.

Manager: “Sir, I am told you wish to complain about the hold times?”

Caller: “Yes! I was on hold for four f****** hours and your agent isn’t doing anything for me!”

Manager: “Sir, all we can do is apologize for the time you had to wait, but you’re through to us now and we’re happy to help with your query. I must ask you not to swear or use abusive language, as we have a one-warning policy to protect our staff—”

Caller: “I’ve been on hold for five hours, and I demand f****** compensation for this!”

Manager: “Sir, at the rate your hold time keeps increasing, I fear it’ll be longer than phones have actually been invented by the time you’re done complaining. I don’t think our lines are equipped to handle that kind of paradox, so I am going to terminate this call if you’re unable to calm down.”

Caller: “I’ve been on hold for six f****** hours and—”

 Manager: *Click*

I work in a souvenir and gift shop, so we are used to getting a lot of tourists. A man from the USA has placed some items on the counter, and I scan them and place them in a bag. 

Me: “That will be £44.12.”

Customer: “Do I give you this now?”

He hands me a membership card to a USA-based store that I recognize from the Internet.

Me: “Uh, no, sir. That’s a Target membership card. You need to give me money.”

Customer: “Oh, I use money to buy these things.”

Me: “Uh… yes, sir.” 

Customer: “Don’t use that tone with me! I’ve never been to England before!”

I work in a huge, famous toy store in London. I am assisting customers on the floor near our rather sizeable collection of puzzles.

Customer: “What are these?”

Me: “Those are puzzles.”

Customer: “Are they board games?”

Me: “No, they’re puzzles. You put the pieces together to build up the picture on the box.”

Customer: “I don’t understand.”

I pick up a box to demonstrate.

Me: “The picture on the front of this box has been split into a thousand pieces that connect together. You rebuild the picture by figuring out how the pieces come together. It can be very therapeutic.”

Customer: “So, it’s like sudoku?”

Me: “What? No, sir. Here, one of these boxes isn’t sealed. Let me show you.”

I open the box and show him the plastic bag inside containing all the pieces.

Customer: “So, it is like sudoku! You lied to me.”

Me: “Sir, sudoku is a Japanese number puzzle. This is just a picture puzzle.”

Customer: “Well, I call these sudokus.”

Me: “Do you want one, sir?”

Customer: “Oh, no, thanks. They’re way too difficult for me.”

Me: *Under my breath* “Shocking.”