# Oops! I shoplifted! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 20, 2002, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019 "2002-12-20T14:51:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Homebrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Homebrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Homebrew)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/41 "2002-12-20T20:06:15Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by auntie em \* > \*\*Bon Voyage. Pack lightly. And may you get nice and brown. \*\* So can you get a refund on the present? ---
**Author:** ![auntie\_em](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@auntie\_em](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auntie_em)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/42 "2002-12-20T20:10:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Homebrew \* > \*\*So can you get a refund on the present? \*\* Who cares? I’m no longer the one giving it to him. The PRESENT, I mean . . . get your mind outta there. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![SkipMagic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skipmagic/32/20706_2.png) [@SkipMagic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SkipMagic)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/43 "2002-12-20T20:15:23Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by auntie em \* > \*\*The PRESENT, I mean . . . get your mind outta there. 😃 \*\* Damn good thing you cleared _that one_ up. There are only so many things I’ll do to get in good with your family. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![auntie\_em](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@auntie\_em](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auntie_em)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/44 "2002-12-20T20:24:39Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by SkipMagic \* > \*\*Damn good thing you cleared _that one_ up. There are only so many things I’ll do to get in good with your family. :eek: \*\* Aww, c’mon . . . I think Nana kinda likes ya . . . ---
**Author:** ![SkipMagic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skipmagic/32/20706_2.png) [@SkipMagic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SkipMagic)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/45 "2002-12-20T20:29:41Z")
Heh-heh… Awww… ---
**Author:** ![White\_Lightning](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@White\_Lightning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/White_Lightning)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/46 "2002-12-20T21:27:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by \*\*Jake \*\*\* > BTW were you refering to El Cerrito CA? She was, as she said, because it’s where I live. Sorry to continue the hijack but I’m curious as to why you’re interested in my hometown, **Jake**. More germane material: Yesterday I found out that I accidentally had an order shipped to a customer twice: once by Expedited shipping, as she requested, and then again by regular Ground. It turned out that the cost we pay on that item was less than what it would have cost us to have the duplicate one sent back, so I had the pleasure yesterday evening of calling the customer to let her know that we had inadvertently shipped her order twice and that she was welcome to keep the extra item. I told her “Merry Christmas.” ---
**Author:** ![CRorex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dfb087/32.png) [@CRorex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CRorex)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/47 "2002-12-20T21:36:45Z")
I had a similar experience in college. My roommate and I accidently ended up with an 18 liter box of wine one night. I think it was an accident, I don’t remember the next few days. ---
**Author:** ![auntie\_em](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@auntie\_em](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auntie_em)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/48 "2002-12-20T21:47:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CRorex \* > \*\*I had a similar experience in college. > > My roommate and I accidently ended up with an 18 liter box of wine one night. > > I think it was an accident, I don’t remember the next few days. \*\* OK, but do you remember the story of how you got the wine in the first place? I want to hear it! And do you have any left?😃 ---
**Author:** ![Inky\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7feea3/32.png) [@Inky\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inky_1)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/49 "2002-12-20T21:58:33Z")
Last year I was faced with **The Mystery of The Imposter Shoes**!! One day I was tying up the laces on my shoes when I suddenly realized that they weren’t my shoes at all. They sure _looked_ like my shoes, same size and all but just a little bit different and newer. I racked my brain trying to figure out who would try to replace my shoes with imposters, even thinking that my girlfriend might have ruined them and tried a switcheroo on the sly. Then it occured to me, I had been trying on shoes a few weeks previous and probably replaced my old shoes in the shoe box and walked out in these. I’ve never felt more of a heel. Ummm… didn’t go back to the store. ---
**Author:** ![auntie\_em](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@auntie\_em](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auntie_em)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/50 "2002-12-20T22:10:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by White Lightning \* > \*\*More germane material: Yesterday I found out that I accidentally had an order shipped to a customer twice: once by Expedited shipping, as she requested, and then again by regular Ground. It turned out that the cost we pay on that item was less than what it would have cost us to have the duplicate one sent back, so I had the pleasure yesterday evening of calling the customer to let her know that we had inadvertently shipped her order twice and that she was welcome to keep the extra item. I told her “Merry Christmas.” \*\* You don’t by any chance work for [girlshop.com](http://girlshop.com), do you? I ordered a b-day gift for a friend in October (to be delivered directly to her, since she lives a few states away), and I got two confirmation e-mails. I pretty much blew it off. Then I got two snail-mail confirmations. Still, my credit card had only been charged once (I called to check at that point), and the order number was the same on all FOUR of the confirmations I received, so I figured there was just a hiccup in the system, and that she would receive just ONE gift. I was wrong. She sent a thank-you note, saying that she’d gotten two of them, and that she figured that I’d meant for one of them to go to a mutual friend of ours (ours is sort of a “friendship threesome”). . . so she went ahead and sent it to her. I decided to think of it as a 2-for-1 sale. ---
**Author:** ![White\_Lightning](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@White\_Lightning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/White_Lightning)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/51 "2002-12-20T23:17:14Z")
I think I’d be too embarrassed to tell people if I worked for “[girlshop.com](http://girlshop.com).” Cool story, though. Good deal for you. ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2002, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/52 "2002-12-20T23:24:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Incubus \* > \*\*Back when I was working at a grocery bagger, I used to go to starbucks during my breaks. One time I went there a brand new girl was working there; she looked just barely old enough to work and looked quite nervous. Well, it turns out she was so nervous that when I gave her my order she just relayed it to the coffie-maker guy and didn’t ring me up. Since I have this ritual where I give them the money when the total comes on the screen and they tell me how much, I forgot to pay her- I just asked her for a carmel macchiato, they made it, and I left with it. Back at work I was trying to remember if I actually PAID for it- I realized I didn’t so after work went back and gave them the 3.50 for the beverage. I felt sorry for the girl that messed up- I remember what a nervous wreck I was the first day of my first job. \*\* This reminds me of a recent experience I had. Both of our experiences illustrate how much we all operate by unconscious habit. I often buy lunch at the deli counter of a Wawa near where I work. You enter your order on a touch screen which prints out your order on a small slip of paper and also sends it to the people behind the deli counter. You then go to the register, hand them the slip, and pay for the order. They then stamp the slip “paid” and hand it to you along with a bag for your order, which you then pick up at the deli counter. One day there was a new woman working at the register. I walked up and handed her the slip. She rang up the order and then immediately stamped the slip and handed me the bag and the slip. I started to turn away and she said, in an obviously exasperated voice, “you have to pay me!” She then said “You’re the third person who did that today!” We both remarked on how strange that was and I made some dumb joke about it maybe being caused by the weather. I then paid, picked up my lunch at the counter and left. I was feeling kind of stupid until later in the day it hit me that the problem was that she was doing things out of order. I had followed the same routine so many times that it had become unconscious habit and when she handed me the slip my brain said “now go get your sandwich”. The same thing had happened to at least two other people. ---
**Author:** ![Lucki\_Chaarms](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lucki\_Chaarms](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucki_Chaarms)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/53 "2002-12-21T00:02:48Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Kalhoun \* > \*\*I once walked out of a store with a pair of jeans over my arm. I had been looking for a sweater or something and completely forgot I was holding the jeans. I got outside the door, looked at the jeans, and SCREAMED! AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH! \*\* There is a great deal of potential here for a comedic sketch/scene starring Steve Martin or Mike Myers of the “So I Married an Axe Murderer” Vintage. LC ---
**Author:** ![rocking\_chair](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocking_chair/32/2918_2.png) [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/54 "2002-12-21T00:52:08Z")
things had been a bit odd in the stationary supply place. once when i ordered padded envelopes, i got a seth thomas wall clock, with a sticker saying padded envelopes. the envelopes are hanging on the wall, keeping excellent time, because we couldn’t figure out how to deal with the paper work to send them back. a few weeks ago i got 4 large boxes of the wrong folders. i opened each box in the hope that one of them would have the right folders. no luck with the correct folder… however one of them did contain a pair of brand new size 11 sneakers! since i am not known as “big foot,” the first size 11 to arrive in my area got a new pair of sneakers. ---
**Author:** ![Marine\_One](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marine_one/32/3461_2.png) [@Marine\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marine_One)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/55 "2002-12-21T02:00:53Z")
In the same something for nothing subject: Went to the grocery store a few years ago, got home and started to unload everything. Then I unloaded another sack: Celery, batteries, cheese…wacko veggies… **Hey…this isn’t mine!** I’ve got somebody’s groceries! eek… How did that happen? Do I take it back? Are the people that lost it back at the store? Wrongly, I just kept it. Didn’t know what else to do. It was paid for, of course, by the people that lost it. The store was in a fairly rich neighborhood, so part of my rationalization was they could afford to lose it. ---
**Author:** ![wedgerat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@wedgerat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wedgerat)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/56 "2002-12-21T03:39:35Z")
Mom and I were shopping around at Wal-Mart, and I picked out a video. We didn’t have a cart, we were just carrying our items. So I stuck it under my arm. You can see where this is going, can’t you? We get a few more items, mostly groceries. We then check out, and start to walk out the door. The buzzer goes off. The greeter comes up to us, and tells us to wave each bag through the scanner. The mom waves her bags through the scanner, none of them go off. I try my bag. It goes off. We look through the bag. Nothing that would have a theft-prevention-device. Just food. So we try again. Buzz for me, nothing for the greeter. We do this for a few minutes. I decide to try with my other arm. I shift the tape from under my right arm to under my left arm. Mom and the greeter stare at me. Mom laughs histerically. I mean, non-stop laughter for 5 minutes straight. The greeter asks her if she meant to get the tape. She nods, wiping away tears. We go back and pay for the tape. Well, at least _I_ didn’t have to return it! ---
**Author:** ![AntaresJB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c2a13f/32.png) [@AntaresJB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AntaresJB)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/57 "2002-12-21T06:21:44Z")
This is slightly different, but still close to the topic… a friend and I were in a second-hand thrift shop dealie a few weeks ago, she had picked out a coat a few days earlier and had them hold it for her til she had the money for it. When we went back, she decided to look for some jeans as well, so she tried on a pair, they fit. She comes up and whispers to me “These pants have a bonus, I’ll tell you in a minute when she (the store-owner-lady) isn’t around.” And she tries on a few other pairs of jeans and decides to buy them and a few other things. I was confused cuz I thought she didn’t have that much money… then she comes up while the store owner’s busy with something else and tells me how she found $40 in the pocket of the first pair of jeans she tried on, presumably left there by their previous owner! So she bought a bunch more stuff than originally planned and still walked out of that store with a $7 profit. We considered it just luck and a sort-of gift. 🙂 In other news, I accidentally shoplifted from Wal-Mart the other night. I was getting shoes and floor mats for my car and some other shopping cart-worthy things, then decided to pick up a concealer stick in the makeup department… didn’t want to stick it in the cart for fear of it falling through the bars and being lost, so stuck it in my coat pocket and promptly forgot about it. I was home by the time I realized it, soo… ::shrug:: I think it was $1.67 or something (yeah, I use cheap makeup.) so I didn’t worry too much about it. ---
**Author:** ![Kaboodle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8edcca/32.png) [@Kaboodle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaboodle)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/58 "2002-12-21T06:49:47Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by AntaresJB \* > \*\*\didn’t want to stick it in the cart for fear of it falling through the bars and being lost, so stuck it in my coat pocket and promptly forgot about it.\ \*\* When I was younger my mother gave me an article from the newspaper. The story was about a young child shopping with his mother. He picked up a Christmas present for her but didn’t want her to see it so he held it under his coat. He wasn’t attempting to hide that he was holding something (his hand stayed inside his coat). Store security picked him up and detained him because he was concealing an item from view. I am not in law enforcement and the laws in your area may vary but you are tempting fate by putting items you intend to buy in your pockets or otherwise hiding them. ---
**Author:** ![effac3d](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b487fb/32.png) [@effac3d](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/effac3d)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/59 "2002-12-21T07:24:50Z")
Since when is concealing an item from view a crime? Seems to me the crime occurs when you leave the store without paying. ---
**Author:** ![Flamsterette\_X](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/41988e/32.png) [@Flamsterette\_X](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flamsterette_X)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2002, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019/60 "2002-12-21T07:36:07Z")
Once I inadvertently shoplifted a big bos of laundry detergent. It was at the very bottom of my cart, in the space reserved for heavy items. I didn’t realize I’d got it for free until I got out of the store. Of course, I went back in and paid for it… F\_X [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-i-shoplifted/144019.md?page=4)