My theater has just reopened after being closed due to the health crisis. It’s a very slow day and the rest of the lobby staff has been sent on break while I work the lobby by myself. For the last eight years, my theater has had assigned seating.

An angry-looking man comes in to buy tickets.

Me: *Gesturing to the screen* “All right, sir, let me know where you’d like to sit.”

Customer: *Exploding* “I have to pick my own seat?! This is f****** ridiculous! It wasn’t like this the last time I came in!”

He stands there screaming at me for several moments before he finally picks a seat.

Me: “All right, sir, your total will be $6.”

Customer: *Exploding again* “This is highway robbery! $6 for a movie?! Unbelievable!”

He stands there screaming at me for about thirty seconds over a price I have absolutely no control over until he finally shuts up and pays by literally throwing a wad of $1 bills at me.

Customer: *Still fuming* “I want popcorn! Where do I go for that?!”

Me: “I’ll meet you at the concession stand.”

I walk over to the concession stand. The customer looks at the menu above my head and then looks down at me.

Customer: *Exploding yet again* “Oh, f*** you! I can’t believe you charge so much for snacks!”

Me: “Sir, I don’t set the prices.”

Customer: “I want a manager right now, you a**hole!”

I run to the office and fetch my manager, who ends up standing there and getting screamed at for two minutes straight by this d****ebag, again over prices that are set by corporate and that we have absolutely no control over. My manager leaves, shaking her head.

Unfortunately, corporate has made it repeatedly clear that we’re not allowed to refuse service to customers or ban them despite what they do, so I’m forced to continue the transaction. Despite his fury, he still decides to buy some popcorn and a soda. He literally throws his money at me again.

We used to have self-serve stations for butter, salt, napkins, straws, and soda. However, due to the health crisis, we’ve shut down the self-serve butter stations and now give customers pre-measured cups of butter, along with napkins and salt packets, to avoid having too many people touching the same surfaces. Additionally, we have a staff member whose job is to stand at the soda machines and pour sodas for customers, again to avoid having too many people touching the same surfaces.

I hand the customer some pre-measured butter, salt packets, and napkins.

Me: “Here’s some butter and salt for your popcorn, and some napkins.”

Customer: *Exploding yet again* “I have to put butter on my own popcorn?! You lazy p***k! It’s never, ever been like this! Lazy! When did this bulls*** start?!”

Me: “Sir, we’ve had self-serve butter for over ten years. The only difference now is that we give it to you in cups.”

Customer: “Bulls***! F****** liar!”

The customer notices the salt packets, clutches his chest, and bellows like a banshee.

Customer: “OH, MY GOD! I HAVE TO PUT MY OWN SALT ON?! ARE YOU F****** SERIOUS?! GO TO H***! AND WHERE DO I GET MY F****** SODA?!”

Me: *Completely through with the guy* “I’ll meet you at the soda machines.”

I wander over to the soda machine with his cup.

Me: “What do you want?”

Customer: “I CAN’T POUR MY OWN SODA?! WHAT THE F***?! DO I LOOK LIKE A F****** TODDLER TO YOU?!”

Me: “Sir, you just yelled at me because you have to put your own butter and salt on. Now you’re mad I’m pouring your soda for you?”

Customer: “GO F*** YOURSELF!”

I poured his soda without making any eye contact, shoved it at him, and wandered back to the box office without another word. He then yelled at the ticket-taker for asking to see his ticket. He later came out and demanded our corporate number because he wanted to “report us for being worthless p***ks.” Nothing ever came of it. I genuinely think he was just in a bad mood and wanted to be a jerk to feel better. He got mad about literally every step of the movie-going process.

A college kid was staying in a room on our top floor when he thought he would clean off his gun without taking the bullet out of the chamber. The gun went off and shot a hole through the ceiling, and it also managed to go through and burst the water main pipe. The whole left side of the hotel building on each floor flooded

One of the children staying here — about four years old — is still shaken up from his horrible experience three weeks ago — the family had a house fire and watched their house burn down, losing everything they own — so when the pipe burst and the water flooded the floors, the poor child was crying and shaken up even more.

The police and detectives brought in their canine and found that the college kid had cocaine in the room, and he was arrested. He started freaking out.

College Kid: “I don’t want to get in trouble! My dad has worked on the police force for twenty years!”

The fire chief just laughed as he passed the front desk.

Fire Chief: “Don’t do drugs, kids!”

My workplace has big Black Friday sales. For working Black Friday, we basically get a one-time-use coupon for a very heavy discount on anything that we can add to our normal employee discount. It only lasts a few weeks before expiring, so we have to use it quickly.

I only work there for one holiday season, so I only go through Black Friday once, but it is a nightmare. I definitely earn that coupon.

A few weeks after Black Friday, and about a week after the coupons expire, I come into work for my shift. During our lunch break, I hear some of my coworkers talking about somebody being crazy. I ask them what they’re talking about.

One of the employees that worked on Black Friday had apparently forgotten that the Black Friday working coupons had an expiration date. Apparently, the day before, she had decided to try and make a really big purchase using the coupon, and the cashier said it had expired. She lost her mind, screaming at the cashier and demanding they take it. She said that since she had worked for it and it was their duty to take it no matter what, and she wouldn’t accept having worked Black Friday and not getting that discount. Several managers, including the store manager, had to come deal with her, and eventually she was escorted off the property. She wasn’t fired for her outburst but received some disciplinary action.

The employee apparently snapped over the managers daring to refuse her. The next day, maybe twelve hours after she tried to use her coupon she returned to the store with a knife, a shotgun, and a blowtorch, intent on killing her manager and her coworkers and setting the building on fire. She somehow dropped her knife on the way in, and when she got into the store, her gun jammed. Left with just the blowtorch, she started to try and set the mat in the entrance on fire.

She was quickly tackled by security and restrained until police arrived and she was arrested. She was, of course, fired, and faced some pretty heavy charges. I don’t remember the charges; all I remember is seeing her mugshot online with her in a straitjacket.

Thankfully, nobody was harmed, and no damage was done to the store.

Related:
The Couponator 26: Father’s Day
The Couponator 25: The Cheese Explosion
The Couponator 24: My Funds, My Rules
The Couponator 23: The Time Destroyer
The Couponator 22: Coupons Of Mass Consumption

A mother and her bride-to-be daughter were in to look at the wedding cake they’d ordered for the wedding that was scheduled in two days. Seeing a cake on the counter, the bride started ranting and raving about how this cake was wrong and it wasn’t at all what she ordered. She then proceeded to smash the cake with her fists.

Well, she was right. It was nothing like she ordered. It was what another couple had ordered for their wedding.

The police let her clean her hands before they put on the handcuffs.

I work in a retail outlet store. A mother has come in with her child and has basically used me as her personal shop assistant since she came in.

Mother: “Get these for me in a size 12.5.”

Me: “Sorry, ma’am, we don’t sell half sizes.”

Mother: “What?!”

She got so mad that we didn’t sell half sizes that she threw her CHILD’s shoes at me and stormed out of the shop.

She came back a few minutes later, remembering her shoeless child.