Posted by That Kid with the Helmet at ac8907e2.ipt.aol.com on July 09, 2001 at 17:04:45:
In Reply to: Re: Are you or have you ever been.....A Clerk??? posted by Mister Smosh on July 09, 2001 at 15:52:25:
I worked as a supermarket bag boy when I was in high school.
My favorite "retail hell" story requires you to know three things about the store where I worked: 1. Part of my job was pushing customers' groceries out to their cars. 2. The rows in the parking lot were divided by median strip like barriers, and the only way to cross them while pushing a cart was through a central walkway. 3. It was quite common for customers at this store to let their kids ride in the lower part of the carts, even in the parking lot. 4. People driving through the lot almost *always* recognized that pedestrians had the right of way (except for the occasional pack of obnoxious gangsta-wannabe kids, but that's a whole different story).
So one day, I'm hauling this one soccer mom's cart out with her daughter riding on the bottom, and as soon as we entered the lot, a car was coming towards us and of course stopped. Normally people understodd the traffic rules, but THIS woman arrived at the conclusion that I was some kind of maniac who deliberately pushed kids into oncoming traffic. Then I started to turn towards the walkway, but she pointed straight ahead and said "This way, please!" I delicately explained to her that pushing a cart over those barriers wouldn't be a good idea, especially with a kid in the cart, and her response was "As long as you don't push my child in front of a car!"
On the other hand, the GOOD thing about this job was that the management only had one complaint about my performance: that I took too many days off. Considering that I was the guy who accepted tips in violation of store policy, took unauthorized breaks just to read magazines, and made it a point to "accidentally" come in a few minutes late and "accidentally" leave a few minutes late pretty much every day, I think I was actually doing them a favor by taking so much time off.