"I DON'T LIKE BEING RUSHED!"
...was the phrase once screamed into my face by an irate Christmas shopper when I'd quietly asked her to sort the entire contents of her handbag somewhere else. At least she did move away, albeit still shouting abuse at me. She may not have liked being rushed but I don't think she'd have been entirely enamoured of being punched by the queue of people built up behind her waiting to use the only working cash machine around either - the one she'd decided to sort her handbag on having got her own cash.

And then there was the highly intelligent - or maybe just very very high - regular user of one of the public libraries I've frequented on the staff side of the desk. Bringing back a DVD she'd borrowed, except she wasn't. Opening the case revealed a very badly made copy.

"I'm sorry Madam, I can't accept this."
"Why not?"
"It's not one of our DVDs."
"Yes it is. You can see from the case."
"The case is original but the disk isn't."
(Getting huffy) "It's the one I borrowed."
"Er, no. This is a copy. It's easy to tell because the disk has a blank label and it's coloured on the recorded side - our disks are official releases and they're clearly printed on the label..."
(Louder) "This is the disk I borrowed."
"I'm sorry, that's not possible. Our barcode and security tags go on the disk and you can see they're not here. We couldn't possibly have issued this to you."
Customer snatches back DVD and stalks out. She returns later the same day and slams the disk on the returns desk.
"Sorry, Madam, I can't accept this."
"It's the disk I borrowed. Look, there's the barcode and security tag."
"I can see that Madam. I can also see they've been peeled off the original disk and stuck on here. Quite badly actually, they're covered in fingermarks and scrunched up. The barcode does correspond to the original disk though which proves you still have it." At this point the options were explained to her to (a) return the original, (b) pay for the original, or (c) continue to insist the home-pirated version was ours in which case we would ask some nice uniformed people from the police station to look at it for us. She left with the disk and we never saw it or her again - which wasn't the most satisfying end to the story but it's the true, if dull, one.
(cisco, Sun 7 Sep 2008, 21:34, 1 reply)

are people really that stupid?

it's scary.
( grey matter, Sun 7 Sep 2008, 23:31, closed)