I’m not talking about going out to dinner and getting a severed finger in your clam chowder, or getting your own finger severed during a manicure. I mean do you complain about things that, in the long run, you’d probably forget about, anyway?
I have a friend who is pretty picky about anything for which she is paying. She’s nice and polite, but is not afraid to speak up if she’s not getting the experience she wants out of a situation. (Case in point: The other day she and I went to Crate & Barrel and then out to dinner. She asked a C&B employee to look in the back and find her another box of paperwhite bulbs, because all of the boxes out out for purchase had (IMO, minor) flaws, and she wanted to give them as a gift. Then, at dinner, she asked for another straw because the server had placed the first straw he brought her on the table (and she won’t put anything in her mouth that has touched the table - except, apparently, the silverware), and asked for another bun for her sandwich because the first was too dried out. Again, I stress that she was polite and friendly, but I probably would have overlooked at least two of the three things she complained about.)
So two fairly recent occurrences in my life have got this friend encouraging me to complain (as incentive, she recites a veritable litany of free stuff she’s gotten by complaining).
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A couple of months ago, I went to the supermarket and bought, among other things, a bottle of white wine vinegar. Somehow I got through the entire process of taking it off the shelf, putting it into my basket, scanning it at the self-checkout, bagging it and taking it home before I noticed a spider (not so itsy-bitsy) dangling inside the bottle, suspended in the vinegar by a couple of cobwebs. (The sad thing is, I *really * wanted to show it to SkipMagic, who was out for the day, so instead of returning it to the store, I just went and bought another bottle (checking carefully for spiders first) to use.)
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The other day, after an exhaustive search (six local stores and the internet) for a size 9.5 pair of Kenneth Cole boots in a camel color, I finally decided to give up and buy the boots in black. Only one place (the store where I originally saw them) even carried the camel color; the rest carried them in either just black, or black and espresso. So I went back to the store where I’d seen them originally, and asked to try on the black ones. At some point early in the transaction I mentioned to the shoe salesman that I’d been trying to find them in camel, and wasn’t able to.
And that’s when he began talking straight out of his ass.
“Believe it or not,” Annoying Sales Person (ASP) said, “the black ones are even MORE rare than the camel-colored.”
I said nothing, zipping up the right boot in silence. (Please take this moment to review my earlier statement about how EVERY damn store - on-line or off - carried the black ones, fewer carried the espresso, and ONE - this very store - carried the camel.)
As I checked out the new kicks in the mirror, ASP coiled and struck again:
“You know, Kenneth Cole makes some very nice boots. Those right there are VERY high-quality leather.”
:dubious:
Again, I was silent. (Please take this moment to picture me thinking, “Oh yeah, buttcup? Then all that ‘Synthetic Upper’ jazz I noted in the item description when shopping for the boots on-line must have been French for ‘Real Nice Flap o’ Cow Ass’.”
At that point, I just started tuning him out. I knew when I walked in the store that I was going to buy the black boots (which I think is what made the ‘sales pitch’ even more annoying), so I thought that I could avoid more ass-talking if I simply stopped listening.
And then he got in one more strike.
As I handed him the box and said, “I’ll take them,” he exclaimed, “Wow - I wish ALL women were as decisive as you are!”
:mad:
WHAT??!??!?
I didn’t speak a word to him as the sale rang through, because I was too busy counting the moments until I could walk away from him (I almost always choose “flight” over “fight”). Once I had, though (after he wrote his name on my receipt and said, “Ask for me next time - I’ll give you red-carpet treatment!”), I was (quite possibly overly-) annoyed the whole way home. The lying, the patronizing . . . I didn’t have to take this! Why, I should take the damn boots back just to keep that ass-gabber from getting that commission!
But of course I didn’t. I mean, who really wants to go back to the mall at this time of year? :eek:
So tell me, y’all . . . would you complain in either of these instances? My (aforementioned) friend says I should absolutely call the boot store and complain about ASP (I might get free boots, she says), AND she has taken it upon HERSELF to call the vinegar company and complain about the spider (because I told her flat-out that I wasn’t going to do it; I mean, how could I complain when I actually kept the bottle because I thought my husband would find it really cool to have his own personal pickled arachnid?).
My husband recommends writing a letter to the boot store about ASP. Other people (whom I also consider smart and reasonable) have said, "Meh - forget about it and put that energy into finding the boots in the color you want. I mean, hey, maybe he really did think they were leather . . . "
And I still haven’t really decided what I’m going to do. But I’d definitely say (in answer to my own OP), that I am not, for the most part, a Person Who Complains.
