Worked at a gas station/general store/ice cream shop for ~8yrs after high school. The amount of morons I've encountered far out numbers the handful of lovely customers that walked through those doors. Luckily my boss was rather lenient with the rules and I could tell off the customers that were complete jerks. I've only had to raise my voice a few times but oh boy did I get the message across that counter and into their thick skulls. I like to think I'm a very patient and easy going person but oh man you get me going and that ginger side of me shines through like a holy beam of common sense that so many seem to be lacking. Those few times I was truly enraged, some regulars overheard the conversation between me and the offender and they even said they could tell I meant business.
Group of young people comes in, they grab multiple cases of beer and expect me to be cool with them buying it when clearly only one has an ID that verifies they are 21. Tell them no because to any sane person it looks like someone buying alcohol for a bunch of teens. Wouldn't ya know it not 5mins later their mommy calls saying I should have let them purchase it because it is for them (the parents). Told them to send in only the of-age kids because I can't really let kids carry out alcohol.
Now for the most stressful part of my time there, ice cream. People are jerks and it only takes one bad customer to ruin your day. I was an all-rounder, I could stock and do the dirty work, do ice cream, and man the till (cashier). When opening the store you don't get any help until 3pm or so depending on if it is a holiday. Ice cream opens at noon and generally the people at the till take priority over ice cream customers. There I was one fateful Sunday afternoon doing my best to keep everything running smoothly. No one was at the register so I slap on some gloves and hop over to the icecream. Of course this group of people wants a bunch of soft serve stuff like shakes and flurries. I'm trying to get the whole group served so they can checkout and leave as opposed to hopping back and forth and taking a long time. I look to the register and there are a couple people waiting but I've only got one more person to serve so I finish off the group before heading over. Lady at the till says "why didn't you check me out, I know you saw me waiting". I say, "Ma'am I have lines on both sides, I'm doing what I can". "Well you should have come over as soon as you saw me waiting". The audacity! I've never had such attitude with anyone even if I had to wait, I feel terrible as it is just flagging someone down when I'm waiting in line.
Regulars come in wanting their usual ice cream order, 2 soft serves and one hand dipped. Tell them the soft serve was out of order (we often had issues with the darn thing). "I don't see how that's my problem." Excuse me? I try to explain the issue and she says it again! Like lady, the machine is dead, end of story. Bite me.
How about the truly crazy people? The druggies and alcoholics? We had some whack job come in to get this and that, whatever. He leaves and then runs back in saying "call 911! My GF just ODed!". So we go out there and the chick is completely passed out on the pavement, dude keeps yelling "what did you take, what did you take!" Then he splashes his fountain soda on her face and she kinda snaps out of it. By this time we had already called 911 and they were on their way. Dude throws the girl into the back seat and speeds off. A few moments later the EMS arrives and I tell them they took off. The EMS guy (a regular) says it happens all the time. Crazy.
Another time I offhandedly asked a regular if he wanted his regular (a pint of whatever) and he said "no thank, I've switched to greener pastures" I asked what he meant and he goes "oh ya know, ecstasy". Completely baffled I say, "I hope that works out for you".
As for alcoholics, oh boy are there a bunch of them out there. One fella would come in multiple times a day to get a few shots of Smirnoff and/or a pint. I had turned him away after the second stop during my shift. Joked to the stocker he was gonna drink himself to death and not 2 days later he was in the papers, found dead with empty vodka bottles scattered around the house. Not to mention the time I feared for my life when I turned away an already drunk and angry guy who came in fuming mad over what I'm sure was his fault for road rage.
How about them murderers? Wouldn't ya know it, a very pleasant and easy going regular who lived right across the street killed a child. Yellow tape, cops needing the security camera's tapes, questioning of who was working that night (thankfully not me), the whole workup. I saw that poor baby walking in the candy isle not a few days prior. Terrible.
Coworkers, you can't live without them and you certainly can't live with them. I will forever remember the time I banned a coworker who quit out of nowhere, knowing we were short staffed, no 2 weeks notice, and on a holiday! He handed I his keys and came back the next day acting like everything was perfectly okay. Told him to give us some space because he royally screwed over me and my only other coworker, us 2 die-hards. He stayed away for a while but the little sh*t came back in the day before my last day (after my 2 weeks notice). I could have rung his neck.
I had lived a rather sheltered life in my teen years and let me tell you, you learn a lot about the real world working in retail/customer service. People are crazy, men are weird, women are Karens and kids are brats. But I've met a few good people out there, ones I miss seeing on a regular basis. Glad I quit though, it was getting depressing working there. Those big trees on the side of the road, ones I'd pass every day on my way to work... they were calling my name. Couple that with the nauseating feeling I got whenever I got just a few minutes away from the store, oof I stayed there way too long. Possibly the worst part, boss man never even showed his appreciation.
