I'm going to get my way, even if I have to curse up a storm

This is going to be "Sweeps Week" at Behind the Counter. I spent both days, Saturday & Sunday, on the 2-11 shift and dealt with the absolute dregs of humanity. It was a major effort just to move when I got off work tonight, the negative energy was just so powerful.

But the people were just fantastically awful. It seemed like they just came in waves, each one worst than the last. In one five-hour stretch Saturday afternoon I had been cursed out twice and screamed out two more times. Today, I had a woman go on a crying jag to try and get her way, while another one let loose a stream of profanity that would make sailors blush with shame. Others were just plain kooky, thieves or stupid.

Everyone is in luck this week. It's going to be a post-a-day celebration. Call your friends. Call your moms. Call your grams. Call your baby-daddy. Get your popcorn and a cold can of Tab. That's right. At least one post a day - all week. Maybe more. All in celebration of MY WORST TWO DAYS EVER!!!!!!

PART ONE:
The first five hours Saturday were really the worst. I should have taken that as setting the tone for the rest of the week.

This woman comes in with jewelry box. It's the huge, five drawer kind. We sold them at Christmas, mind you, and now they're on final markdown from $79 to $35. The one she bought at the store across town was damaged and she wants to know if we have one.

I'm like - you're looking for seven-month-old merchandise? It has been marked down to half-price? She's like "How do you know it's on markdown?" Everything at Wal-Mart tht's not $1.00 and that ends in two zeroes is on markdown! I look in the computer and tell her we don't have any more. I tell her the regular Wal-Marts (non-Supercenters) have larger furniture sections. People screw this up ALL the time. They think SuperCenters have all the stuff, but if you just want STUFF, go to a regular Wal-Mart.

Anyway. She thanks me for the advice, decides she will hang on to the one she's got in case she can maybe fix it or exchange it later. Like an hour later, she comes back. Somewhere, they dug one up back in furniture. I don't know if it got returned or what.

There's a line like eight people deep, someone else is helping me at the service desk. She hollers over at me "Look, we found one!" I tell her that I'm glad she got one.

She winds up not getting me to do the exchange. Which is actually a bad thing. Because the computer was wrong and showed that we didn't have any more of the merchandise, it had never been marked down at our store. It was still at the level up from $35, which was $45. When the other girl does the exchange, the one from OUR store rings up at $45, so she tell the woman that she owes $10 plus tax.

Now the woman's husband was up there by this time, and you would have though the girl asked for his family jewels, instead of a tenner.

He goes "We paid $35 for the first f****** one and I'm going to pay $35 for the second f****** one. Now you get a g****** manager up here right f****** now and I'm not leaving from this spot until you do."

Now honestly. There was no need for all that. Yeah. Our store basically eats that $10 as a courtesy to the customer. We COULD charge them $10 more, because realistically, that specific piece of merchandise was NOT priced at $35. The OTHER store chose to price those items at $35 and move them off the sales floor, i.e. sell them. We DID NOT. Whatever. Whenever customers exchange the exact same item though, they always get it for the same price. It has to be EXACTLY the same though. Size, color, everything.

It's just bad luck it was busy and they got someone who was inexperienced. People who can spend half the day Saturday running around town looking for something to put their jewelry in obviously never had to worry about paying the bills on $8.50 an hour.

So, all this ruckus gets sorted eventually, but the people behind this man gave him a HUGE berth as he wheeeled the cart and left.