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Wherein I attempt to hold a candle to GK's posting style. Auto shop tales.
Background: I own a shop that specializes in a high-end European make of car. We are to quick lube places as a spouse is to a hooker. Much of my daily grief arises from people trying to finagle a "quickie."
Let a smile be your umbrella on a busy, busy day A lady dropped in mid-afternoon on a busy Friday to inquire about services. In the midst of a too-long conversation about prices, why we use synthetic oil, when to bring the car (Oh you can't jus' do it now?) and when's the best day to bring it, she suddenly stopped mid-sentence and asked me point blank:
"Do you ever smile?"
I nodded.
"No seriously, don't you ever smile?"
"Sometimes," I responded noncomittally, hoping we could get the discussion back on the rails and along to the next station.
"Are you always so poker-faced?" Christopher Cross on a Crutch, you're not going to let this go, are you? "Taking care of peoples' cars is serious business to me, maam."
"But you do smile." SIGGGGGGGGH! I forced a wan smile.
"I just wanted to make sure you could SMILE!" I rose, indicating that the discussion was concluding and another customer was approaching. But, instead of a deadly smite that would render her own smile unto that of a jack-o-lantern, I smiled large and asked when she planned to drop the car off for service. Sensing that the conversation was out of her control, not to return, she said she'd be back "next week," which is a euphemism for "never."
Kicking and screaming This cat called me 4 times in 2 days with questions about how much for an oil change, how long does it take, oh you CAN'T do it while I wait if I come in at 4, how much to just reset the service light, and attempts to regale me with his discussions with his motorhead friends. Finally he shows up near 4 in the afternoon, full of "Remember me, I'm the guy who called about the oil change," yet missing the irony of me having to answer the phone three times as we talked. I told him we don't take in oil changes at this hour and went through the whole program AGAIN. He responded, "Okay, I'll call you tomorrow."
Sooooo, nearing 4 o'clock again, he arrives the next day offering, "I can wait, I know you're busy." I actually had an idle tech, so I started writing him up. I handed him the clipboard, and he looked down at it with the price, didn't even get the pen into a writing grip, and said, "You know, I'm just not ready to switch to synthetic." He started in with his motorhead friends' 40-years-obsolete opinions of synthetic, but I led him to his car as he spoke, and abandoned him there as the phone shrilled again. (There's more but he's gone for good after this visit, voluntarily.)
The opposite of what you just said? It seems mostly women play this passive-aggressive game. The formula is simple.
Ask question > Get answer you didn't want > Huffily state, So it's not (the opposite of what you just said?" > Expect the person to become profusely apologetic and bend reality
Example, lady in her 60s calls about her husband's car which was running late on repairs, and finishing it at ALL that day required some of my attention. We had already postponed some of the work because they HAD to have the car back, so a late delivery was already made clear. "Is R's car ready?" No, we;re still working on it with difficulty, but it will be ready for sure at 6. (It is 5 now.) "So, it's not ready now?" Oh FFS lady! There's working on it, and there's finished working on it! I just said we're working on it still, and when it WILL be ready. Unless this is Shroedinger's Car, it cannot exist in both states simultaneously, and when you drop your husband off at the curb 5 minutes later and speed off, his act of observing the situation will in fact freeze it in the state of not-ready, in more ways than one. It also freezes your reputation as "Getting b##chy in your years." Funny, she wasn't like this before retirement.
Polite to a (serious) fault This rather strange fellow stops in once in a while to ask for advice. STUPID advice. Last time, it was, "What's the best port to add Sea Foam to my intake with the engine running, cause I need to clean the carbon out, my motorhead friends said it's really good." All of this is couched in three times as long of simpering, "I know you're busy, I just had one question, I don't want to take up too much of your time..." His "simple" questions always manage to have several tiers of wrongness to them, and unlike his motorhead friends (my GOD there are a lot of those in the world- full of advice but never pick up a wrench themselves), I do NOT have time to chat on about running P1ss Foam through the rubber intake sleeves on his manifold.
Unlike the usual stream of misguided advice-seeker non-customers, this guy is harder to brush off; he has something REALLY wrong with his legs; I mean like crushed pelvis and shattered femurs healed while astride a horse wrong. Too proud to use a cane, and too polite to not park "in my way" in the spots I try to keep open near the office, he parks in the farthest spot and LABORIOUSLY works his way up to the office. Then after leaving, I have to watch him steady himself on all the more-expensive-than-his cars as he passes, and I have to go detail the whole row so customers don't wonder about random hand prints on their hoods and make sure he hasn't cracked or dislodged a grille.
Extreme multi-tasking I realize that modern life is busy and it's hard to part with the car when repairs and maintenance are needed, but when you arrive with an asymptomatic check engine light that's been on for weeks, we can't do a proper diagnostic workup and have you down the road in 5 minutes. The fact that you have GROCERIES IN THE CAR INCLUDING FROZEN GOODS does NOT help maintain your car, OR your dignity when it provokes a serious WTF face.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand rest.
Let a smile be your umbrella on a busy, busy day A lady dropped in mid-afternoon on a busy Friday to inquire about services. In the midst of a too-long conversation about prices, why we use synthetic oil, when to bring the car (Oh you can't jus' do it now?) and when's the best day to bring it, she suddenly stopped mid-sentence and asked me point blank:
"Do you ever smile?"
I nodded.
"No seriously, don't you ever smile?"
"Sometimes," I responded noncomittally, hoping we could get the discussion back on the rails and along to the next station.
"Are you always so poker-faced?" Christopher Cross on a Crutch, you're not going to let this go, are you? "Taking care of peoples' cars is serious business to me, maam."
"But you do smile." SIGGGGGGGGH! I forced a wan smile.
"I just wanted to make sure you could SMILE!" I rose, indicating that the discussion was concluding and another customer was approaching. But, instead of a deadly smite that would render her own smile unto that of a jack-o-lantern, I smiled large and asked when she planned to drop the car off for service. Sensing that the conversation was out of her control, not to return, she said she'd be back "next week," which is a euphemism for "never."
Kicking and screaming This cat called me 4 times in 2 days with questions about how much for an oil change, how long does it take, oh you CAN'T do it while I wait if I come in at 4, how much to just reset the service light, and attempts to regale me with his discussions with his motorhead friends. Finally he shows up near 4 in the afternoon, full of "Remember me, I'm the guy who called about the oil change," yet missing the irony of me having to answer the phone three times as we talked. I told him we don't take in oil changes at this hour and went through the whole program AGAIN. He responded, "Okay, I'll call you tomorrow."
Sooooo, nearing 4 o'clock again, he arrives the next day offering, "I can wait, I know you're busy." I actually had an idle tech, so I started writing him up. I handed him the clipboard, and he looked down at it with the price, didn't even get the pen into a writing grip, and said, "You know, I'm just not ready to switch to synthetic." He started in with his motorhead friends' 40-years-obsolete opinions of synthetic, but I led him to his car as he spoke, and abandoned him there as the phone shrilled again. (There's more but he's gone for good after this visit, voluntarily.)
The opposite of what you just said? It seems mostly women play this passive-aggressive game. The formula is simple.
Ask question > Get answer you didn't want > Huffily state, So it's not (the opposite of what you just said?" > Expect the person to become profusely apologetic and bend reality
Example, lady in her 60s calls about her husband's car which was running late on repairs, and finishing it at ALL that day required some of my attention. We had already postponed some of the work because they HAD to have the car back, so a late delivery was already made clear. "Is R's car ready?" No, we;re still working on it with difficulty, but it will be ready for sure at 6. (It is 5 now.) "So, it's not ready now?" Oh FFS lady! There's working on it, and there's finished working on it! I just said we're working on it still, and when it WILL be ready. Unless this is Shroedinger's Car, it cannot exist in both states simultaneously, and when you drop your husband off at the curb 5 minutes later and speed off, his act of observing the situation will in fact freeze it in the state of not-ready, in more ways than one. It also freezes your reputation as "Getting b##chy in your years." Funny, she wasn't like this before retirement.
Polite to a (serious) fault This rather strange fellow stops in once in a while to ask for advice. STUPID advice. Last time, it was, "What's the best port to add Sea Foam to my intake with the engine running, cause I need to clean the carbon out, my motorhead friends said it's really good." All of this is couched in three times as long of simpering, "I know you're busy, I just had one question, I don't want to take up too much of your time..." His "simple" questions always manage to have several tiers of wrongness to them, and unlike his motorhead friends (my GOD there are a lot of those in the world- full of advice but never pick up a wrench themselves), I do NOT have time to chat on about running P1ss Foam through the rubber intake sleeves on his manifold.
Unlike the usual stream of misguided advice-seeker non-customers, this guy is harder to brush off; he has something REALLY wrong with his legs; I mean like crushed pelvis and shattered femurs healed while astride a horse wrong. Too proud to use a cane, and too polite to not park "in my way" in the spots I try to keep open near the office, he parks in the farthest spot and LABORIOUSLY works his way up to the office. Then after leaving, I have to watch him steady himself on all the more-expensive-than-his cars as he passes, and I have to go detail the whole row so customers don't wonder about random hand prints on their hoods and make sure he hasn't cracked or dislodged a grille.
Extreme multi-tasking I realize that modern life is busy and it's hard to part with the car when repairs and maintenance are needed, but when you arrive with an asymptomatic check engine light that's been on for weeks, we can't do a proper diagnostic workup and have you down the road in 5 minutes. The fact that you have GROCERIES IN THE CAR INCLUDING FROZEN GOODS does NOT help maintain your car, OR your dignity when it provokes a serious WTF face.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand rest.
Wow.... just... Wow. Automotive SC's are some of the worst!
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