Still in Gainesville? I need to know so I can quit aggravating the piss out of cashiers in case it’s you. 
That’s my father too. But he knows which cashiers to go to who won’t be too anal about it, because he wouldn’t want to hold people up either.
He usually pays about 20% of the ticket price of his groceries so it’s worth the extra trouble.
Wow, you’re one fearless risk taker. Who could have known how popular the pointless spill-over of a pile-on from that thread to this one would be?
True story
Said woman was ahead of me performing this type of domestic activity on the end of the shelf provided so I politely slid my intended purchase towards the cashier and the woman snapped at me (and I quote):
“Hey, I’m not done here yet”
Are you sending this message from your jail cell having been arrested after your murderous rampage? No jury will convict you, I think you were justified. How did you get access to a computer?
My favorite was at the little bodega around the corner from my son’s dojo. I had the audacity to get in line behind a woman who demanded the clerk read her mind about her lottery tickets because I wanted to buy my son a cold soda.
“No. I want this for the Mega-millions too.”
“But those numbers are on a pick-6 card.”
“Just Do it. harumph”
(soda starts to get warm; I swap it out for another cold one.)
“Ok lady that $20.”
“No, its $25. I told you I wanted to buy these numbers twice. Why aren’t you listening to me? Do it now.”
(I count out exact change. I have time to do the math on 6% sales tax in my head and add that in. I arrange money in my left & soda in my right so I can just pay and get out…assuming I ever get to the counter. Line of people now behind me is now 3 people deep.))
“Ok lady, here are you lottery tickets.”
(Empress Entitlement then starts matching all the numbers in 25 groups 6 of her lottery tickets to make sure he hasn’t made any mistakes. Gives me look of death for daring to try to hand the clerk money around her body of rudeness and buy the soda. Line of people behind me is now 7 people deep.)
This is exactly why I am glad that very few places in Ontario will take cheques. Whenever I’m checking out at a department store I always seem to get stuck behind the dipshit who
A) Brings three items of clothing to the checkout that have no tags, which forces the cashier to call a department clerk to come by and try and find matching items of clothing that do have tags,
B) Decides they don’t want at least one of those items once they find out what the price is,
C) Insists that at least one of the items in their cart is priced differently than what comes up on the screen - and are always wrong because the sale is on a different size or style of the same product,
D) Attempts to pay with exact change, which invariably includes a great deal of small change picked out of the purse three pennies at a time, and then counted individually once extracted,
E) Drops at least two of those coins – usually in-between counts,
F) Fails to come up with exact change, requiring an additional bill to be located and extracted,
G) Pays, and then counts the change very carefully,
H) Disputes the change given,
I) Discovers that they did, in fact, get the correct change back, and they just fail at basic arithmetic after all,
J) Repacks the purse with the care and careful consideration due someone playing performing brain surgery – at the counter, and
K) Spends several minutes putting everything back into their cart, which they will take out to their car and leave in the middle of the parkway.
Throw cheques into that mess and I might go postal.
Gah. Fucking lottery people. Every time I go into a convenience store I wind up waiting ten minutes for a pack of cigarettes or a soda because someone needs to pick individual numbers for thirty seven different lottery tickets.
I’m always baffled at how people can wait in line for a few minutes, and yet STILL be entirely unprepared for their transaction. It’s not just at the grocery store. How do you get to the head of the line at Dunkin Donuts and not know what you want? It’s Dunkin Donuts! They don’t exactly have an extensive menu. And even worse, how do you get to the subway and then stand IN THE TURNSTILE looking for your subway pass?!?!? Did you not *intentionally * walk or drive to the train station? Are you somehow shocked to find yourself here?
At this time, I’d like to post about a related issue. I KNOW that my eyes are corrected to at least 20/40. I’ve had a recent exam at the DL bureau AND at my opthamologist’s. I can’t read the damn menu at fast food places until I’m at the counter. Now, sometimes, I can find an empty spot at the counter and examine the menu until I’ve decided what I want. I rarely eat fast food, so I don’t have a standard order. Even at the counter, it’s impossible to read some menus. SOMEBODY, somewhere, needs to make menus in a bigger font.
Don’t get me started about Starbuck’s. I haven’t been to one of those since the last century, partly because I couldn’t make out the menu, and partly because I don’t like the way their coffee tastes.
They exist across cultures. In Japan there are the tiny yet fearsome old ladies who haunt the train stations, despite having apparently only recently grasped the concept of money, let alone public railways. Burdened with the mysterious and bulky packages that only Japanese old ladies can accumulate in a trip to the department store and scowling their wizened old arses off, they fearlessly elbow their way to the front of the queue to the ticket machine for a train that’s leaving in 45 seconds - and then stop.
[oba-san stream of consciousness] Money. Money money money money money. Oh, I know what money is. I have money somewhere. I’ll just hunt in my voluminous undergarments for my old lady purse. Of course, I’ll have to put my shopping somewhere safe first. We never had money when I was a girl. If you wanted to go somewhere, you gave just the stationmaster a chicken and a jar of homemade pickles. Not that we had stations. Or trains. Ah, my purse. Now, how much is a ticket? Why don’t they make these signs bigger - I need my glasses. Let me just fumble in my voluminous outergarments. 200 yen? It’s an outrage. When I was a lass, 200 yen would buy you a medium-sized hippopotamus and still leave change for an gibbon. Not that we had zoos. Now, where’s that change slot? My fingers aren’t what they used to be - perhaps I should take my gloves off. And my glasses. No, wait, now the change slots gone again. I’ll just put them back on. Now then - how does this thing work? Oh, the coins go in the slot. I don’t trust these new-fangled slots. 10 yen, 20 yen, 30 yen…[oba-san SOC]
[Me SOC] FUCK FUCK FUCKITTY FUCK FUCK FUCK GET A BLEEDING MOVE ON YOU DERANGED OLD BAT I HAVE A FUCKING TRAIN TO CATCH IN 15 SECONDS FUCK FUCK FUCKING FUCK…[/Me SOC]
I somehow missed this earlier, despite it being quoted so many times! These people…no matter how much you bargain, you are not going to get your groceries for fre. You still have to pay! So while you’re arguing, you COULD GET YOUR MONEY OUT!!!
Oops. That’s like the third time I pushed a thread over to two pages this week.
I fucking burst out laughing every time I read the title of this post.
LOL
“your entire fucking purse”
I had one of these crazy people once (ok, like every day) when I was a cashier at a gas station.
It’s 10:59. I’ve already cleaned the coffee pots and vacuumed in preparation for closing at 11:00. I grab the keys, walk to the front door, and am only milliseconds from inserting key into lock when some crazy old bat almost hits me in the face with the door.
“Oh, are you closed?”
“No, I haven’t shut down the registers yet, although I am closing. How can I help you?” Heck, I try to be nice.
“I’ll just be a minute. I need $20 dollars on that station wagon.” Ring up sale, authorize pump, hold hand out expectantly. “Oh! Just a minute, where did I put that money?” <Digging through a purse so large I literally doubt it would meet airline specifications for carry-on luggage. Pulling out wads of receipts, empty gum wrappers, bottles of pills, her latest knitting project, paper clips, rubber bands, jars of strawberry preserves, and finally, a wallet the size of a briefcase.> Guess what? After checking every pocket and zippered compartment, there’s no money in it. “Oh, let me just run out to my car, I’ve misplaced my money.” If she hadn’t left half her shit on the counter I would have locked the door, told her through the window that the gas pumps shut off automatically at 11:00, and directed her to the gas station a few miles down the road.
She dawdles out to her station wagon, and I watch through the glass. It’s piled to the roof full of crap, no bullshit, and it takes her at least 10 minutes to rummage around and find her money. She comes back in with cash, pays for the gas, and then proceeds to try to fit all of her shit back in the body-bag she’s using for a pocket book. Halfway through this, she realizes somehow that she didn’t have as much money as she thought. (“I thought I had X dollars, where did the rest go?”) So she pulls everything out again and starts digging around for the misplaced money.
“You don’t mind, dear, do you?”
“Actually, ma’am, I was supposed to close 15 minutes ago.”
“Oh, I’ll just be another minute.”
She keeps digging around, and empties the entire contents of this massive handbag on the counter. I swear to Og, she could have comfortably housed a family of four in that thing, and fed them for weeks on the random crackers and bottles of water she had stuffed in there. I’m trying not to be rude, but it’s nearly 11:30, I’ve been there since noon, and I still have to finish my paperwork and count out the drawer. So all I can do is stand there, slack-jawed, amazed at the spectacular amount of shit she lugs around on a daily basis. Wetnaps, aspirin, several pairs of glasses, extra socks, plastic baggies, nuts, bolts, a wrench, and Og knows what else. I don’t press the issue, I’ve already told her I was closing twice, so nothing less than screaming at her to fuck off is going to get her out of here.
She eventually solves the mystery of the vanishing greenbacks and finally replaces the contents of her mammoth handbag, leaving me extremely bad-tempered and almost an hour late getting home. Really, she might have been one of those pack-rat types afflicted with Hoard and Clutter syndrome or whatever they’re calling it, but don’t foist your insanity upon me. She obviously had some inkling that this might inconvenience me, because she asked if I minded, but apparently didn’t give a shit.
In retrospect, I should have swept the entire contents of her purse into (several) plastic bags, handed them over, and politely (or not) escorted her out.
Nice, but I think mine will be more popular.
A trap door that opens 5 seconds after the completion of the transaction.
I’ve always wanted to start a band called the checkbook calligraphers, except that I can’t sing or play an instrument.
I recently started a job as a cashier at a busy grocery store. In the short space of time I’ve worked there, I’ve developed a seething hatred of the Esteemed Gentry of Entitlement. Fuck you for breaking my fragile spirit. You will all pay.
Okay, not really, but a girl can dream…
From Some Fantastic 
I work in a cafe (yeah everyone should know this by now!), and I love the people who arrive and pour over our menu for a few minutes…while standing at the register, blocking the five people behind them who just want to grab a loaf of bread.
They peer at the menu and then they look up at the bread shelves. Back to the menu. Lean back and peer at the cabinets of sweets. And ten minutes and fifteen deep line later, decide that we don’t have anything that appeals to their refined tastes and leave.
We do get some really nice people who will pick up a menu and stand back from the register. I like them.
We had a bad moment in McD’s one day; my father, brother and I driving from Sydney to Canberra. We stopped off at the Macca’s halfway and it’s important to note that my brother is short sighted, sometimes in more ways than one. We get to the counter and my brother, shockingly enough, has to CHOOSE SOMETHING TO EAT! And he’s left his glasses in the car. Can’t see a damn thing on the menu. Dad and I ordered and my brother had a teenage, tired cranky about how we couldn’t expect him to choose something when HE CAN’T READ THE MENU!
I handed him the keys and a smack on the back of the head.
Well, if they don’t, that’s called shoplifting.
“No, officer, don’t cuff me. I know I have a ‘get out of jail Free’ card in here somewhere…” rummage rummage rummage