I work in the same hobbystore that Gabrielle Proctor does, and I've got plenty of good stories about sucky customers. Here is by far my favorite.
Just over a year ago, the former manager and I were shutting the store down. On week nights we close strictly at 1900 (read 7:00pm for those on the 12-hour). Manager and I had already had a tough time getting the last few customers to file out. We locked the doors and just finished closing out the registers when a dude in his rusty, once-was-white, jacked-up pick-up pulls up to the front door at 1930. This truck has an engine with an unhealthy rumble, and it also featured an array of ghetto KC lights on the grille and roof of the truck (attached to wood boards via duct-tape). He gets out of the truck, which is still rumbling, and walks up to the door. He reads the CLOSED sign very carefully and then makes plaintive glance at me. I smile and shake my head. But he's not satisfied, so he pulls the door and is frusterated to find it's not open.
"I wanna look a minute" he shouts in his redneck voice. I tell him we're closed and proceed to continue entering the end-of-day information. I'm a little relieved when he climbs back into his wanna-be monster truck and starts his rumbling engine again. But he doesn't leave. To express his desire to get in, he revs his engine loudly. When manager and I look, he honks his horn.
It plays dixie.
Manager and I chuckle, which must only infuriate him furter. He revs his engine again. Manager turns the lights out, the biggest "go away" signal we have. His response is to turn his lights on to full bright, including his taped-on wanna-be KC stadium lights, and toot his dixie horn again.
We're not opening, so he gets angry, revs his engine, and begins to back out of his space. He stops to honk his horn a couple of times, but idles his sick engine a little too long and it stalls as he's shifting gears.
He tries to crank it. It won't start on the first try, nor the second, the third, or the fourth. Finally, it cranks, and to make sure we understood he was hot stuff, he honked his horn for attention, the revved the engine louder and louder. I can only imagine the RPM needle climbing into the dangerous reds. Suddenly, we hear a sound like a gunshot and see a bump rise up in his hood. He'd thrown a rod!
You would think this whole situation would have humbled him, but he's still determined to look cool. Instead of opening the door like a washed and civilized human being, he cranks the window down and tries to climb out a la Dukes of Hazzard. But he catches his shoelace on the lock pin of his door and he falls, slamming his face into the asphalt and breaking his nose!
We set the alarm and walk out chuckling as poor redneck still trying to free his foot from the lock pin, cussing as profusely as his nose is bleeding.
Just over a year ago, the former manager and I were shutting the store down. On week nights we close strictly at 1900 (read 7:00pm for those on the 12-hour). Manager and I had already had a tough time getting the last few customers to file out. We locked the doors and just finished closing out the registers when a dude in his rusty, once-was-white, jacked-up pick-up pulls up to the front door at 1930. This truck has an engine with an unhealthy rumble, and it also featured an array of ghetto KC lights on the grille and roof of the truck (attached to wood boards via duct-tape). He gets out of the truck, which is still rumbling, and walks up to the door. He reads the CLOSED sign very carefully and then makes plaintive glance at me. I smile and shake my head. But he's not satisfied, so he pulls the door and is frusterated to find it's not open.
"I wanna look a minute" he shouts in his redneck voice. I tell him we're closed and proceed to continue entering the end-of-day information. I'm a little relieved when he climbs back into his wanna-be monster truck and starts his rumbling engine again. But he doesn't leave. To express his desire to get in, he revs his engine loudly. When manager and I look, he honks his horn.
It plays dixie.
Manager and I chuckle, which must only infuriate him furter. He revs his engine again. Manager turns the lights out, the biggest "go away" signal we have. His response is to turn his lights on to full bright, including his taped-on wanna-be KC stadium lights, and toot his dixie horn again.
We're not opening, so he gets angry, revs his engine, and begins to back out of his space. He stops to honk his horn a couple of times, but idles his sick engine a little too long and it stalls as he's shifting gears.
He tries to crank it. It won't start on the first try, nor the second, the third, or the fourth. Finally, it cranks, and to make sure we understood he was hot stuff, he honked his horn for attention, the revved the engine louder and louder. I can only imagine the RPM needle climbing into the dangerous reds. Suddenly, we hear a sound like a gunshot and see a bump rise up in his hood. He'd thrown a rod!
You would think this whole situation would have humbled him, but he's still determined to look cool. Instead of opening the door like a washed and civilized human being, he cranks the window down and tries to climb out a la Dukes of Hazzard. But he catches his shoelace on the lock pin of his door and he falls, slamming his face into the asphalt and breaking his nose!
We set the alarm and walk out chuckling as poor redneck still trying to free his foot from the lock pin, cussing as profusely as his nose is bleeding.
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