Saturday ...

... Was a work day. As luck would have it, I was posted on the fireworks till (well away from the others), as I am the only Saturday till operator who is over eighteen and hence able to sell fireworks. This means that I am isolated right at the end of the checkout ... and have to bear the full brunt of the last-minute, post-Bonfire-Night shoppers. Jenny and I had a quick chat, but she procured a highly suspicious headache at lunch time and announced that she was ill--could she go home, thank you very much? The boss's answer was "take some paracetamol", but sadly that didn't help. Grinning, she said in melting tones over the phone to the boss: 'I still have a splitting headache and would very much like to go home--please sir, I beg you sir.' The boss couldn't help but yield to her charm (she has that effect on some of us) and gave in. She was all smiles as she left the building, the devious girl.

And Sunday

Chloe, Frances and I were keeping the hordes of customers at bay yesterday. Some of them were really nasty, for example:

A man gives a bulb planter to Frances, who is on the till next to me. The item has no barcode. As Frances has only worked at Wyevale for a couple of weeks, she turns and asks me what to do. I take the bulb planter, and say to the man: 'I need a code for this. Could you show me where you picked it up?' (A perfectly reasonable question, in my opinion.)

The man looks down his nose at me. 'I don't run errands for your staff.' He speaks with an exaggerated upper-class lisp.

I smile awkwardly. 'Okay, sorry, I'll just go and look for it.'

After five minutes of searching, I return with the code and battle my way through the enormous queue to the checkout. I give the code to Frances, who is looking uncomfortable as the man lectures her on the principle of The Customer Is Always Right.

Frances gives me a hopeless look. 'The gentleman says--' she begins, only to be cut off by a sniff from the customer.

'I demand,' declares the man, 'to see some management. Management! At once, do you hear?'

'I'm afraid this is the manager's day off,' I say, my heart sinking at the prospect of a complaint being aimed at Frances and myself.

'Then I wish to see the person who is in charge!' More pathetic snivelling, more looking down his nose. His eyes are, by this point, locked in a permanent squint.

Luckily, both of the floor managers are busy, and I tell him so. He glares at his watch, then glares at Frances, then glares at me--again, down his nose. 'You haven't heard the last of this. Outrageous service. Outrageous, I tell you! I will phone the manager first thing tomorrow morning and give him a piece of my mind!' With that cliched warning, he stalks (or rather waddles) out of the store, clutching his precious bulb-planter to his chest and proclaiming in a loud voice, to no-one in particular, that 'This establishment could do with some new staff!'

We talked about it later. It turns out that Chloe had to deal with someone who was tired of waiting in the queue for a whole minute. The woman in question barged her way to the front, threw her goods on the counter, and said 'It is disgraceful that I am being forced to wait! In future I will visit Notcutts instead!' (Notcutts is the other large garden centre in Woodbridge). Chloe usually works Saturdays only, and so doesn't have to deal with these kind of people very much. But I've seen it all before.

I think some people just like being nasty to shop workers--and I've noticed that the old-age penshioners are usually the worst. Sometimes it's hard not to just thump your fist down on the counter and yell at them to grow up.