Store Thieves

[Merriweather]

I think it might have been two. But it's still fantastic.

Oh geez, that means there's even more of them that are that dumb
I remembr in the one I saw, it was by a building, the post was holding up a roof over a walkway. So definitely not those two.

[Pizzacommando]

My company does a secret santa program every year for needy children. We get a big christmas tree set up with tags stating the child's age and what they would like, customers take the tags and buy gifts for the kids, and in return get a coupon for their generosity. Under the tree we put a bunch of nicely wrapped (but empty) boxes. One night I saw a little kid hanging around the entrance to the store, staring at all the shiny "presents." A couple minutes later, when he thought nobody was watching, he grabbed one of the boxes and ran out the door.

[Dadeo]

In high school I worked in a mall that was big enough to have two of our stores in it. I worked in the east side store and my buddy worked in the west side. He calls our store and tells us some punk just grabbed a (cheap) car stereo of the front of store display and hoofed it off in our direction and to keep an eye out for him. He gets about halfway through describing him and the little pecker walks into our store and tries to return the stereo. We say "no problem, just let me grab a return sheet from the back" and call the cops from the back room. We just stalled the "return" until they showed up.

[Divra]

Best one I can think of isn't really one of mine, but it happened where I work. One night a few years ago, before I started, someone actually managed to steal a barstool from the bar. Someone knew who he was, so awesome boss tracked him down... and told him he could keep it. He figured that if someone wanted one bad enough to steal it, and had the 1337 sk1llz to get it past two bartenders, 1 busboy, 1 cloakroom girl and 2 bouncers, he deserved to keep it.

And no, before someone asks, this is not a tall tale, I've met the guy and seen the stool.

[Kogarashi]

She goes through my line with what should have been a $70 costume (The Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland, if memory serves right), but when I scan it it comes up as an 8-pack of camo cups (sadly, not pink camo) for...$1.50.

"Funny...this doesn't look like a pack of drink cups...let's fix that..."

I had a few ladies way back at my first cashiering job who would do stuff like that, except we could never prove it, so we couldn't really have her arrested for it. But it played out basically the same. Lady would come up with an item that should be expensive (like a comforter set that normally rings up at $35 minimum). The UPC code, if it was even still in the zippered plastic bag the blanket came in, would ring up at something like $5, as a "patterned fleece throw." I would then check the barcode in the bag, see that it was loose and ripped from something else, and reach in to pull it out, thus uncovering the real barcode. Lady would respond, "What are you doing? as if I was ripping up the precious blanket. I would cheerfully reply, "Oh, someone slipped the wrong barcode in here and the comforter rang up the wrong price. I'm just fixing that. Kids are always doing that as a joke here." Like as not, once the lady saw that the blanket was not going to be $5, she'd say she didn't want it after all and leave.

She'd pull this with barcodes peeled from picnicware and other things slapped onto small appliances and the like. You know, as if the machines wouldn't show us what exactly we were ringing, or as if the cashiers would believe that a $50 appliance is really on sale for $1.

And then there were the ones who'd peel clearance stickers off of merch in the clearance aisle and stick them onto clothing tags, often over the barcode (as if we'd manually ring up the price instead of scanning the barcode; the system is changed so that the UPC reflects the current price, you know). Nevermind that it's painfully obvious with those small price stickers when they've been peeled and restuck, or that as often as not, the red clearance tag would show a higher price than the green "regular price" tag.

But like I said, we never had any concrete proof that it was her and not the punk kids I'd always blame it on, so we couldn't have her arrested or banned.

[wolfie]

He also used to supplement the family chow by poaching deer and rabbits. I thought it was nice the local cops and game warden didn't bust him for it.

Just curious - I realize the laws may vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Any Australians out there - what is the penalty "down under" for poaching rabbits?

[RealUnimportant]

Just curious - I realize the laws may vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Any Australians out there - what is the penalty "down under" for poaching rabbits?

I don't think you can poach nationally despised vermin...

[fireheart]

Just curious - I realize the laws may vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Any Australians out there - what is the penalty "down under" for poaching rabbits?

I actually did check this up.

The law does vary from state to state, but the general rule of consensus is that rabbits are vermin so you ARE allowed to poach them on your own property: so if a rabbit pops up, you have every right to shoot it.

[Kristev]

What an awful place to be a bunny.

[XCashier]

What an awful place to be a bunny.

To be fair, they are considered an invasive species, not pets. They're non-native, breed like crazy and destroy crops and native species. So it's hardly surprising they're not too well liked Down Under.

[dalesys]

What an awful place to be a bunny.

But what a wonderful place to be Elmer Fudd.

[fireheart]

But what a wonderful place to be Elmer Fudd.

Do you come fwom a land down undew? (doo doo doo doo)

Whewa wimmen glow and men plundew? (doo doo doo doo)

[Orgaloth]

My uncle goes rabbiting on a weekly basis, using both traps and ferrets. As mentioned previously, they are vermin, and can be trapped on your own property, and if you ask the farmers, they'll generally let you set traps in the fields they don't have livestock (don't want to have their sheep or work dogs injured by rabbit traps).

If you want to shoot Kangaroos, Emus or other Aussie native animal, you need a permit. I've done my fair share of hunting, you name an Aussie animal, I've probably shot and ate it (no Koalas though).

[Merriweather]

To be fair, they are considered an invasive species, not pets. They're non-native, breed like crazy and destroy crops and native species. So it's hardly surprising they're not too well liked Down Under.

i always thought how horrible it was for a farmer to shoot a poor bunny, even if it did get into his garden (memories of Peter Rabbit and all that ). Then we went up to Scotland for a week, and stayed in a little cottage on the Tay. We go out for a day of sightseeing, then come home to the cottage. Turn into the little lane leading to it - and there were rabbits. A lot of rabbits. Rabbits, rabbits everywhere. Even walking down the lane at night, they bound around in front of us. One night we were on a main (for that area ) road, and the median between lanes, as well as the entire shoulder of the road, was practically shoulder to shoulder bunnies, hundreds, maybe thousands of little eyes reflected by our headlights.
We're not talking a bunny sitting in a garden munching a carrot, we're talking invasion of the lupus, they could have given a giant harvester a run for it's money.

I kinda understood the farmers shooting them after that (not that I could ever shoot one, or want to know about it personally, I still remember my hand-sewn set of Flopsy, & Mopsy I had as a child too well. But in theory, at least, I get it now

[AccountingDrone]

I still remember my hand-sewn set of Flopsy, & Mopsy

and hasanpfeffer ....

rabbit is tasty