I used to work at a coffee shop in college that was a couple of blocks away from a homeless shelter. That meant that at about 7 am, we’d have a whole mess of homeless people show up and buy a cup of coffee (free refills), and sit there ALL DAY AND NIGHT until we closed at 2 am, which made for some very stinky couches. On my very first day working there, I went to the register to help the first customer in line. He ordered a large coffee, and then asked me what my cup size was. I thought I must have misunderstood, so I asked him to repeat himself. He pointed at my boobs, leaving no room for doubt, and again asked me my cup size. I was only 18, and didn’t want to get fired for pissing off my first customer, so I just calmly walked over and informed the manager, who kicked him out. I mean, yes, I have big boobs, but not big enough that they should be the topic of conversation with total strangers!
We also had a customer there who must have had some kind of job, because he did have money to pay for his food and drinks, but he was there for about 8-10 hours a day playing counterstrike on the computers we had over in the corner. He was very friendly, but would never discuss anything about himself. Once, his car broke down, and I offered him a ride home. He would only give me a general sense of the area where he lived, and once I got to that area he told me to drop him off because he was going to walk the last mile or so. It was later explained to me by another customer that he was just government-conspiracy-tinfoil-hat crazy, and didn’t want anyone to know where he lived. That’s why he wouldn’t play counterstrike from home either.
That place was full of crazies though. We had a guy who called himself Cloud and would sing Stevie Nicks songs every time we had an open mic night. We had this old guy…don’t remember his name…who wore this crazy mountain man getup (leather fringed vest, black leather cowboy hat, feathers in his hair, Wyatt Earp mustache, huge carved walking stick) and told everyone he was a bounty hunter. He would work security at some of the bars around town, even though he was maybe 70 years old. That coffeeshop had some of the strangest people I have ever met, and it was completely awesome. It was like Starbucks’ evil twin.
I also had a friend in high school who worked at a Radio Shack. This lady came in one day and was browsing around, and she had her young son with her (maybe 4-5 years old). She told my friend that her son needed to go to the bathroom. My friend informed her that their store had no bathroom, and that she’d have to take her kid down to the Publix that was about 4 stores down if he needed to use a bathroom. She got crazy angry and started yelling at him about how they had to have a bathroom for employees, and that they were evil for not letting her son use it. In fact, they didn’t have a bathroom and employees had to walk to Publix to go to the bathroom too. Anyway, she kept yelling, and they ask her to leave, so she tells her kid to pee on the floor. He whips his little willy out and does it! Pissed right on the carpet in the middle of Radio Shack. She then stormed out with her child, who will no doubt need years of therapy from growing up with a mother like that. It turned out not being so bad for my friend, because the whole place was carpeted with those stick-down carpet squares. They just peeled up the nasty square and put down a clean one.