I detest this when the cashier is being nosey. I am a waitress. You have no idea. I carry a lot of one dollar bills. I always get the cashier saying stuff like “I know what you do for a living”. My hubby was with me one time when this happened at Walmart. The dude comes out with “I know what you do for a living”. Hubby says “Well honey how did he know you are a stripper”. “Seen the show have you?”. I didn’t know if I should beat hubby for saying stuff like that or hug him because it really shut the guys mouth up.
Zoinks! Where do you live that this is considered acceptable?
Mangetout: Saying “I plan to pay for it and walking out of here unmolested.” would be more of a “conversation killer” over here on this side of the Atlantic. We don’t use the word “unmolested” in that way, usually. But given our usual American usage of the word “molest,” that would have been a really excellent response to an inquiry about petroleum jelly.
Kind of off topic, but a friend of mine in a research lab once submitted a reimbursement form for three things: nuts, ice and vaseline.
Turned out all three (1/4-20 nuts for a mounting fixture, dry ice for some freeze clamps and vaseline as a mold release agent) were critical for an experiment, but he didn’t explain that on the form. His boss got a call from corporate asking why an employee would need “nuts, ice and vaseline” in such quantitites.
dantheman: Yep, that used to be my username (including .sig at the bottom for this post). I already discussed that with my husband but he doesn’t want to bother. Since he’s the one who knows which cashier it is and the one who was there, I figure it won’t carry as much weight if he’s not the one who’s writing it.
AwSnappity: You mean there are other drugstores in the Chicago area besides Walgreens? 
Here are some clues - it’s right next to a Metra/Amtrak train line and is in the western suburbs, does that ring a bell? I’m afraid I don’t know what she looked like.
Tomcat: My husband has done another embarrassing product purchase for me before - when I was at home in intense discomfort and pain with a urinary tract infection, he ran out to buy me some Uristat (OTC medication that relieves said discomfort). A guy in line made some snide remark about it, my husband told him off saying that he must be the kind of jerk who would prefer that his girlfriend suffered instead of going out to help her, and the female cashier gave him a “good for you” comment. I think she meant it regarding the telling-off as well as on helping me out.
We were required to ask this (or something similar) where I used to work. And it sucked.
Well, let me ask you this - has this happened before? Maybe not to this extent, but in some way?
I guess I can understand his reluctance, but if there’s been a pattern something probably should be done.
Never seen it happen before, nope. (And I can think of a few purchases offhand that might get “nosy cashier” attention.) This store has enough employee turnover that I suspect she might be gone within a few months, too. If not, I’ll be ready should the situation arise.
I can think of a million (non-sexual) things that a man might be doing with petroleum jelly. Hell, it’s a staple around my house. Now, if he were also buying a copy of Hustler, some toy handcuffs, a six-pack of candy necklaces, a cheese grater, duct tape and a feather duster, I might giggle to myself later, but I would NEVAHHHHHH! say a goddamn thing to him beyond the price of his goods and the amount of his change.
The noive!
Oh, and a slight hijack–Ferret Herder, next time try Nair Roll-On Sugaring Wax. It comes with little cloth strips, and washes off with water. It’s changed my life.
That’s only 6; Steve Martin did 20. Here’s some help:
Seductive
A: What did you have in mind?
Very Paranoid
A: Why?! What did the Pharmacist tell you!?
Handy
A: My door squeaks & Home Depot is closed.
Scary
A: My wife was hoping you’d ask. What time do you get off work?
Stupid
A: You haven’t eaten Szechuan Double Cooked Pork have you?
Educational
I’m a mathematician. By the way, you’re out of pencils…
Prankster
A: I’m putting it in my roomate’s shoe. Sssssh!!!
Parental
A: They sure make those thermometers Big these days…
Beauty Queen
A: Why, make my smile Last, Sugar…
Rainman
A: Put it on my sandwich with Peanut butter. Got to have peanut butter & jelly on Fridays…
Good Samaritan
A:I’m buying it for some under-age kids outside.
Sick
A: I just LOVE the smell…
Dick Van Dyke
A: Do you know a better way to get a toe out of a bathtub faucet…?
911
A: Under Megan’s Law, this is the closest I can come…
There’s one clerk at the CVS that happens to be on the most direct route between my home and work who feels obliged to make a comment on each and every thing anyone buys. Like, she’ll study the greeting card for a moment and then say, “Oh, do you have a daughter who is six? How cute.” and then pick up your Hershey bar and say “I like the ones with nuts better,” and then its “I’ve never tried this brand of shampoo,” and on and on.
Which is damn annoying. For the occasional embarassment factor (do I really want my choices in menstrual products debated in front of the other customers?) and the way it makes the line go three times as slowly as it needs to.
Mind, she never makes deliberately offensive comments. She’s just superfriendly and interested in everything, and appears to be, uh, ‘developmentally handicapped.’ (Apologies it that is no longer the currently acceptable term.)
So what can you do?
Answer: I go out of my way to hit a different store if I plan to buy anything I’m the least bit sensitive about.
Does that work better than that Nad’s sugaring stuff? That took off maybe half the hair, plus it attracted ants to my bathroom because I could never seem to clean up all of the little drips of the product. From what I can tell, this wax “worked”, as the hair is definitely gone once I managed to remove the wax.
For the record, the petroleum jelly didn’t exactly work wonders - as I was reduced to getting a blunt table knife and scraping at my leg with it, plus alternating icing it with an ice pack to make the stuff more brittle - but I didn’t think my husband would find it humorous to be sent back to buy the other product the instructions claimed would help: baby oil.
A: It isn’t for me, it is for the voices in my head.
The one I hate is “Did you find everything you were looking for?” Well, no, actually I was looking for Class A drugs and Dom Perignon, but I had to settle for this frozen pizza and Diet Dr. Pepper.
But, having worked as a cashier, there were times when I was sorely tempted to ask why a customer was getting something. Like the time one lady came through with 40 packets of instant gravy. Each packet made two liters of gravy. How many people would that feed–about 400?
At one place, we were told to ask the customer if they couldn’t find something if they were leaving emptyhanded. Can’t have that, you know!
Bathtubs take a lot to fill, evidently.
A: It’s not for me it’s for my goat.
A: My son needs it for choir practice.
Wow :eek:
I am surprised at the lack of tact some people have.
Thankfully, I have NEVER experienced anything like the above situations. And, I’m really not sure how I would react. I have a tendency to react obnoxiously to obnoxious people. But if my SO were around I would probably catch myself.
Even still, there is NO way I would let someone who deals with the public get away with something as rude and offensive as that without making a comment to management. But that’s just me.
I remember the time when I needed 2.5 lbs of latex for something…
Do you have ANY idea how many condoms make up 2.5 lbs of latex.
Jesus christ.
So when the cashier looked at me oddly I said the only thing I could think of.
“My GF asked if her 3 sisters could join us for the weekend.”
“May I ask what you are planning on doing with this?”
“I’m disposing of a body.”
Last year at Passover I went to the grocery store to pick up my matzoh and other stuff we eat for the holiday. I was completely appalled that the rolling french bread cart was smack dab in front of the special shelving area where they’d put out all the Passover food. I literally had to roll it slightly out of the way and walk around behind it to get to the matzohs.
When I went to the checkout line there happened to be a manager doing cashier duty, so I mentioned to him that it was a little insulting to have warm, fresh bread shoved in front of the matzohs, explaining that the whole point of Passover is that we can’t have any bread products. He was very apologetic and assured me he’d have it moved to some other location as soon as possible.
With that, the little bagger girl picks up my jar of gefilte fish, holds it up in the air, turns to the bagger in the line next to her and proclaims, “EEEEEEWWW! This looks like something they’d make them eat on Fear Factor!”
I was so stunned and so furious I started shaking! And I said to the manager, [sarcasm on] “And it’s really appropriate to have your employees make disparaging remarks about the food I buy!!”
Her head dropped – she wouldn’t even make eye contact with me. She bagged the rest of my stuff as fast as possible, the manager apologized again all over himself, assured me he’d take care of it, I said, “I hope so!” and took my groceries and left.
I don’t hope he fired her over it, but I sure hope she got a severe reprimand. At the very least, she learned a valuable life lesson that day.
Stupid little snot.