recepticle=Tuesday, January 23, 2007
low-fat versus non-fat
as not-really-promised, i experienced not one but two spectacularly moronic encounters with customers who, between them, share the IQ of a cheesecake.
idiot #1: [points at the display counter]
lawrie: i'm sorry, can i help you?
idiot #1: [points more insistently at the counter]
lawrie: [worried that i'm dealing with a mute] would you like a rainbow stick?
idiot #1: yeah.
lawrie: okay... [grabs a packet] you just need to pull out the tab at the bottom, and those are spare batteries.
idiot #1: prove it.
lawrie: excuse me?
idiot #1: prove it works.
lawrie: i don't understand.
idiot #1: do everything you just said. get it out of the packet and prove it works.
lawrie: are you kidding?
idiot #1: no. you'll look like an idiot if it doesn't work, won't you?
lawrie: [rolls eyes, then opens the packet] there, see?
idiot #1: oh... is that all you had to do? pull out that tab?
lawrie: yes. just like i said less than a minute ago.
idiot #1: what are these? spare batteries?
lawrie: ...yes.
idiot #1: oh right.
idiot's wife: you can be such a wanker sometimes.
and on the penultimate show, an angry man comes storming out of the auditorium at the interval...
angry man: excuse me! excuse me!
lawrie: can i help?
angry man: [points at a flashing spinner] did you know there are children in there waving these things about during the whole of the first half?
lawrie: um... yes. it's a panto.
angry man: well it's not acceptable! it's very distracting!
lawrie: i'm not sure what you want me to say. it's a panto; children are meant to have fun.
angry man: someone should go in there and stop them from doing it!
lawrie: well sir, it is a children's show, and the kids love this kind of thing. we couldn't stop them from waving around this flashy stuff even if we wanted to.
angry man: yes there is! you could stop bloody selling it!
lawrie: unfortunately i'm not authorised to make that kind of decision: i'm not the director of the theatre, as indicated by the fact that i'm selling merchandise.
angry man: did you know there's a child on the end of my row and he's been waving one of those bloody spinners throughout the entire performance! i'm hardly able to concentrate on the panto!
lawrie: concentrate? it's a panto.
- posted by lawrie at 1:03 PM ~ comments
Thursday, January 18, 2007
the abyss gazes also into you
as the panto draws inexorably to its close and the crowds thin out, so too do my comical interactions with the obesely moronic public. in what will more than likely be my final post concerning my current part-time job (save for something spectacular during my last three days), i've decided to present here a compendium of some of the most common stupid questions i get almost every day. to understand this mass idiocy, you have to understand that everything is labelled and priced at least twice and everything that blinks and flashes and spins is switched on for display purposes, making my little hut look like a christmas tree threw up all over it. so! let us begin:
woman: how much is it?
lawrie: sorry, how much is what?
woman: everything.
lawrie: do you want to buy everything?
woman: no! i just mean... [points] how much is that?
lawrie: £4.50.
woman: [points at something else] and that?
lawrie: three pounds. we have a price list. look, it's here.
woman: oh. [squints at list] what's a 'rainbow stick'?
lawrie: it's this thing here. the one labelled 'rainbow stick'. with the price on the label. and on the list. you pointed at it not twenty seconds ago.
woman: i see. how much is it?
another common one:
man: so, what have you got?
lawrie: uh... everything you see here.
man: i see. what does it do?
lawrie: what does what do?
man: everything.
lawrie: generally, most things flash and blink and spin around.
man: [points at a currently flashing fluffy wand. labelled, of course] what's that?
lawrie: it's a fluffy wand. it's £3.50.
man: what does it do?
lawrie: it... it flashes. just like it's doing. right now. you can see it, right?
man: i see. how much is it?
and the kids are no better:
boy: i want a foam thumb!
lawrie: okay, what colour would you like, we have ora...
boy: i want a blue one!
lawrie: we don't have blue. we have orange, green or yellow.
boy: a red one!
lawrie: orange. green. yellow. no red. no other colours.
boy's sister: do you have any pink ones?
another kid's favourite is 'i only have a pound to spend, but i want everything':
irritating kid: [has spent five minutes poring over the price list] what's a coolie hat?
lawrie: [points at labelled coolie hat in display case]
irritating kid: oh. what's a chinese fan?
lawrie: [points at small chinese paper fan, also labelled]
irritating kid: oh. how much is this? [grabs a rainbow spinner]
lawrie: that's £4.50.
irritating kid: oh. how much are the finger lasers? [grabs a pack of finger lasers]
lawrie: they're £3.50 for a pack of four.
irritating kid: can't i just buy one?
lawrie: no.
irritating kid: oh. do you have anything for fifty pence?
one of my personal favourites is perhaps one of the most innocuous items: a police truncheon. you all know what a police truncheon is, right? a slender black stick that bobbies of old used to beat criminals about the head with. our police truncheons are soft hollow plastic and make a horribly irritating squeaky noise. what amazes me is that about seventy-five percent of all customers cannot read the word 'truncheon'.
woman: what's a 'police tench'?
man: what's a 'police trunk'?
boy: what's a 'police tunk.. trunknon'?
girl: what's a 'police trenky-on'?
uncle: what's a 'police tunsh?'
grandma: what's a 'police trunchy... trunk... tun... one of those?'
we also have a 'rapier sword', which, in retrospect, may have been an unfortunate name to grant something that will be requested mostly by semi-literate idiots.
woman: can i have a rappier sword?
man: can i have a rap sword?
grandma: can i have a rappy sword?
uncle: what's a 'rape sword'?
boy: can i have a rape sword? i want a rape sword, mum. can i have the rape sword?
mum: please stop saying that, jeremy. can he have one of those, uh... rape swords?
- posted by lawrie at 1:52 PM ~ comments
Thursday, January 04, 2007
money makes the flashy spinners go round
for those of you who haven't read any previous posts: i am currently selling plastic junk embedded with blinky lights to kids so that they may wave them around in a theatre, eat their own weight in candy and ice-cream (in the middle of winter), destroy said plastic junk in a sugar-fuelled frenzy and then demand a swap at the end. i also use a 100-year old carbon-paper-type machine to swipe credit cards with, which takes approximately half a day to complete a single transaction.
woman: can i have a flashy wand?
lawrie: that will be three pounds, please.
woman: [fishes out credit card]
lawrie: [groans] is it a visa or mastercard?
woman: oh... um, neither of those, it's a debit card.
lawrie: [looks at card] it's a visa, it's fine.
woman: no, i don't think it is. look, it says 'debit card'.
lawrie: it also says 'visa'.
woman: well... if you're sure.
lawrie: would you like to pay by cash instead?
woman: oh, no.
minutes later...
lawrie:... that will be £11.50 please.
grandma: [pushes past about £200 worth of ten-pound notes to get her credit card]
lawrie: [groans, then starts filling out carbon slip] ... if you'd like to sign, please.
grandma: where do i sign?
lawrie: the bit where it says 'customer signature'
grandma: where's that?
lawrie: [points] right there.
grandma: [signs slip]
lawrie: [swipes card. receipt goes 'crease! crumple! tear!'] oh, jesus. i'll have to fill out another slip.
grandma: could you hurry up?
lawrie: would you like to pay in cash?
grandma: oh, no.
later still...
man: do you take credit cards?
lawrie: no.
- posted by lawrie at 1:27 PM ~ comments