h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

we have book and cd club store in our town the people who worked there were are to get costumers by phone. one time they decided to target me. normaly they would call once a year, but this time they called 5 or 6 times the 6th time I asked from manager and explained.he said was policy to try atleast once, but he was not douig with it, so one them called me 7th time this I asked again I said he that I will call the police let him charged with intmidation. he got scared and remove my name from the list...I got only one call in last few years

*sets scene*
i'm working as a pool lifeguard last saturday,
the pool has individual changing cubicals seperated by walls which extend from the floor to approximately 9 feet above it, the walls are about 2 inches wide, and the cubicals are arranged in blocks of 6, (2 rows of 3 back to back - open topped) all cubicals can be seen from the lifeguard chair (where i am sitting)
everythings been quiet, so imagine my surprise when all of a sudden a naked 2 year old boy suddenly appears on top of the wall, supported by his dad. who then lets go so his son could crawl across the top of these cubicals, for no reason whatsoever. he was then extremely shocked that i asked him to get his son down from there.


that has got to be one of the weirdest customers.

I had a laugh yesterday with a customer on the phone.
He was forgien and I couldn't understand one word he was saying...so he was ranting and raving down the phone to me...I'm like 'uhhhhh' . After 30 minutes of him going on and on I got fed up and left him on the phone while I went to serve some customers. 20 mins later he was still on the phone rambingly on! Presumabely his wife came on next and was worse, I needed the toilet so left the phone and went, served more customers...25 mins later the woman was still on the phone...I just said 'Thank you for calling your comments are appreciated goodbye'

also last saturday, had a man come in, asking if we rented out toes???

Steve Davis once came into the shop I worked at.

There is nothing more to this story.

This is not exactly customers... although they seem to *think* they are.

I live in Amish country, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Tourist trap, right? People come by the carload and busload to gawk at the Amish, a quiet separatist sect of Christians who just want to be left alone by the outside world. The tourists enjoy seeing them in their plain dress (what the tourists most likely see as "costumes"), working in their fields (probably interpreted by tourists as putting on a good show).

It's not at all unusual for the police departments to recieve calls from angry tourists about amish who turn and walk away when asked to pose for pictures by the tourists, as if these people are hired by the county to dress up in their odd looking clothes to entertain them! The tourists don't bother to find out anything about the Amish other than the fact that they wear old fashioned clothes and farm with horses instead of tractors. Had they researched them at all, they'd know that Amish don't believe in photography (they believe photographs to be graven images), and will not pose for pictures.

Granted, this whole issue is complicated by the fact that many Amish, because of the extremely limited and constantly dwindling availability of land to farm in the county these have resorted to running businesses aimed at attracting the tourist trade, giving the area a Colonial Williamsburg type of atmosphere. They sell their homemade quilts and furniture, among other items that are generally made by machine in large factories (but they still make by hand) just to support their large families, with the end result that the uninformed tourist just assumes this is another type of Williamsburg, I guess.

For an example of a stupid parent: I was on the bus once many years ago, going along Sussex Street near the Rideau Falls. There was a parent walking along beside the overlook to the falls. There was a very small child RUNNING ALONG THE RETAINING WALL ABOVE THE FALLS!

Anyone who had held the hand of a small child knows that their little hand can slip out of yours so very easily.... I was panic-struck.

Being very familliar with the Rideau Falls, I know that there is a very small outcrop about 10 feet below the retaining wall and about 3 feet at its widest. However, even if the child managed to land on it, they would likely, at that distance bounce right off the edge and into the falls.

In regards to the person asking if you sold "toes"... I once had a woman from an Eastern European country asking about something that sounded like "pyjamas". This was when I worked at Towers Dept. store, so she could have been looking for anything.

She was a lovely lady and we walked about the store while she said "No" at the various departments, narrowing down what she was looking for. Eventually we got to the Stationary Dept. She was overjoyed to see the packages of looseleaf paper.... it was obviously not exactly what she was looking for but finally, finally, we discovered that she was looking for fancy stationary paper with the matching envelopes... We parted friends and she had a new word for her vocabulary.....

We used to get people in at Chapters looking for cigarettes.... they would get really cheesed off when they were told that we didn't carry cigarettes. These weren't tourists who didn't know you can't buy cigarettes from anyplce but grocery or corner stores, a few pharmacists, and tobaccanists, either... Thses were locals.

Ohhhhhh! .....and they were so put out to have to walk across the street to the tobaccanist's, too. Poor things.

For an example of a stupid parent: I was on the bus once many years ago, going along Sussex Street near the Rideau Falls. There was a parent walking along beside the overlook to the falls. There was a very small child RUNNING ALONG THE RETAINING WALL ABOVE THE FALLS!

Anyone who had held the hand of a small child knows that their little hand can slip out of yours so very easily.... I was panic-struck.

Being very familliar with the Rideau Falls, I know that there is a very small outcrop about 10 feet below the retaining wall and about 3 feet at its widest. However, even if the child managed to land on it, they would likely, at that distance bounce right off the edge and into the falls.

In regards to the person asking if you sold "toes"... I once had a woman from an Eastern European country asking about something that sounded like "pyjamas". This was when I worked at Towers Dept. store, so she could have been looking for anything.

She was a lovely lady and we walked about the store while she said "No" at the various departments, narrowing down what she was looking for. Eventually we got to the Stationary Dept. She was overjoyed to see the packages of looseleaf paper.... it was obviously not exactly what she was looking for but finally, finally, we discovered that she was looking for fancy stationary paper with the matching envelopes... We parted friends and she had a new word for her vocabulary.....

We used to get people in at Chapters looking for cigarettes.... they would get really cheesed off when they were told that we didn't carry cigarettes. These weren't tourists who didn't know you can't buy cigarettes from anyplce but grocery or corner stores, a few pharmacists, and tobaccanists, either... Thses were locals.

Ohhhhhh! .....and they were so put out to have to walk across the street to the tobaccanist's, too. Poor things.

Sorry about the number of duplicate posts.... I have been finding that I have been getting either time-outs or "this page is not available" recently, only to find that it posted anyway... Yeesh!

Tis interesting how these things work, ie what you expect to be sold in what shop. I was wandering my merry way home the other night after another surreal experience of Mr Branson's wonderous mechanical conveyance devices when I stopped off in the news agents to buy some baccy.
There was a young lady in front of me trying to buy something and having some difficulty, obviously not an english speaker and the staff had no idea what she was about. Anyway, she left and the staff were talking saying she wanted to buy bus tickets or something. I asked if she had sounded Italian which she apparently had. It was only because I had been to Rome many years ago which meant that I knew that in Italy (well Rome anyway!) they sell bus tickets in news agents as a matter of course. Once explained, it was obvious why she was there and why she was attempting to buy said tickets.

Such a small thing and yet it caused such confusion. i looked for her when I left the shop but she had gone unfortunately so I couldn;t explain.

Bus tickets and passes are also sold in corner shops (newsagents) in Canada (well, Ottawa, anyway).

Some shops do and some don't.... which makes it difficult to know exactly which will or won't. You can't always see the sticker for OCTranspo (Ottawa bus company) in amongst all the million other stickers adorning store windows and doors.

before i get told off for bookmarking, i would like to point out that i am using a soft leather bookmark that will not harm the book in any way.

xx

My bookmark is the bit of paper the library give us stamped with the date the books are due back, so my library books are never overdue,and pages are never *dog-earred*

nice one!

xx

I was in the chippy a few hours ago (as a customer). A woman behind me in the queue was ordering fish and chips: "Can I have cod and chips?"

"large or small?" asks the girl serving behind the counter.

"I just want fish and chips" says the woman

"Would you like a large or a small portion?"

At this point a slightly confused look comes into the woman's eyes. "I don't know, I just want fish and chips"

"But we do either a large or small-szed fish and chips; which would you like?"

"Can't I have sort of a regular, normal size..."

Unfortunately I had to leave then but I do wonder how much she actually got in the end, and how long it took.

Special notice to everybody who 'bookmarks' this and other conversations:

I use Alabaster, and there's a little link I can click on to subscribe to a conversation. This means I will be notified whenever something new is posted. This is better than a bookmark which I would have to check for my self periodically. I'm sure this feature is available in all the other skins.

I do symphatize with the woman in the fish & chip store. I have tried ordering some food, and then having to stand for five minutes answering questions about what shape and size I want for every little item. You just want to shout out "Just give me some bl**dy food!!!"

I'm with you there Xanatic. I wish I could remember an instance, apart from the first time I ever went into a newly opened Wendys in London - must have been one of the first Wendys in the UK. When asked what do you want on it, my reaction was And on being given the long list of options my eyes glazed over and I think I said something like 'Errrrr... everything '

We had a new worker at the store a while ago who bombarded each and every customer with a plethora of questions: "Do you want to listen to any of the cd's first? Did you find everything ok? Do you know that the green stickers mean that the cd is scratched? Are you ready to check out? Did you check in any bags?" and more besides

All in the name of customer service.

I used to work for NCR, the company that makes all the cash registers and ATMs. I worked in the call center department, sending out technicians if an ATM broke down. One day I got a call from a woman, who had just had an ATM swallow her credit card. There can be a number of reasons for that, so we don't send out techs unless the bank tells us the machine swallows then often. This woman told me she was on the way to pick up her children, went to get some money and the machine swallows her card. It was a saturday, and I told her she had to call the bank's own help-line. But she needed money right now, and insisted it was our problem. As she said in a higly ironic tone "It's your money. I hardly imagine the bank puts their own money in the machine." In case you were wondering, we sell the machines empty, not with a life time supply of notes in it. And she also refused to tell me where she was. At first she was only willing to tell em she was somewhere in England. But after a while she was willing to admit she was "In front of a bank. In Wales." She just wouldn't get off the phone, while at the same time being as unhelpful as she could. Which didn't endear me to help her.