*A man comes in with a friend, wanting to bring in a guest. This happens a lot, so we have a specific form for it. The guest begins to fill it out, and then asks my coworker a question:*
Guest: Um, ma’am, what does it mean by initial here?
Coworker: …It means you need to out your initials on the line..?
Guest: Oh. Okay.

At a movie store, you have your regulars. And then, you have your regulars that are maybe a little cooky or just uncomfortable sometimes. There’s this one customer – mouth breather, constantly sick with bronchitis and is always sweaty. She’s nice enough, but sometimes says weird things. This was one of those times.

As she is leaving, she points out the dark brown stain that is on her shirt. Okay, no worries. Starts telling me how she spilled Dr. Pepper on it. Aw, shucks. I HATE when that happens.

Lady: “Hey, you know my boyfriend is black, right?”
Me: “Oh, yeah! Of course I do. You guys are regulars!”
Lady: “Next time you see him, tell him you saw the stain from breast feeding him.”

Wait. What.

I had a look of confusion and horror as she died laughing. Was she telling me of some weird fetish thing? I don’t understand.

Lady: “You know, because he’s black! The stain is brown because I was breast feeding him CHOCOLATE milk!”

I tried so hard to laugh along with her, but all I wanted to do was to shoo her out the door because she was screaming this information practically, and I didn’t want to make other customers uncomfortable. Weirdest conversation I have ever had.

Just the other night when I was helping close our store and boxing our left over pastries for donation, this older man in a grey hoodie walks in. A family just left so he snuck in after they left. That’s how he got through the locked door. He comes up to the bakery display asking for half-priced pastries. I explained to him that we just closed and we do not have half-priced deals anyways. He said that he wanted pastries. I explained that we were closed and that I didn’t have a cash register open for me to sell him anything. He then proceed to say that I should just give him something then. I explain that my manager just did counts for the donation so they would know that I would be stealing from the company and I was not going to do that. He then proceeded to tell me that I looked sexy and foxy just standing right in front of him in my pretty glasses. I told him that we were closed and I could not help him out. He mumbled something about something he was thinking of doing (I could not understand what he was saying). I told him I could not help him out. He finally turned around and walked out the door telling everyone closing “goodnight”. My co-worker made sure the door was fully shut when he left.

This conversation takes place at least once a week.
Customer: I am looking for (out of season item).
Me: I’m not sure if we have any left, but if we do, they will be on the clearance racks.
Customer: Where’s the clearance racks?
Me: Right over there.
Points to racks with large, bright yellow signs that say “clearance” with bright yellow Mylar balloons on them that say “clearance”.

(This happened at my home. I kept getting calls asking for a Dr. [Doctor] of the dialysis department of a nearby hospital. A woman called a few times, leaving a message on my mailbox, saying that she’s worried about her husband and why nobody would call her back. So I decided to call her and tell her she’s the wrong number.)
Woman: “[Woman]?”
Me: “Hello, my name is [My Name]. You called me several times and left messages on my mailbox, asking for a Dr. [Doctor] of the dialysis department of [Hospital].”
Woman: “Yes! Oh, thank you for calling me back! I’ve been so worried that I didn’t hear anything from you, and I was never able to reach anyone!”
Me: “Not surprising. You have the wrong number. This is a private number, I am not associated with the hospital.”
Woman: “Oh… but… it says on the flyer right here. They have these flyers they give to patients with contact information.”
Me: “Can you double check please?”
Woman: “Of course… let’s see… is it [My Number]?”
Me: “Well… that’s my number. Maybe there’s a typo on there. I just checked, the number is actually…” (so the number is identical, with an additional 8 at the end, so 12348 instead of 1234.)
Woman: “Wait… oh THERE it is! I did not see the 8, the fold is in the way!”
(Turns out the flyer was folded in such a way that the fold line ran through the 8, obscuring it. Which is the reason why people kept calling me instead of the hospital. The woman thanked me profoundly and I called the hospital about it. They promised me to fold the flyers differently next time. I had two more erranous calls, and none ever since.)