Posted on Ubersite by MANSWINE
It took me a long time to write this. Half because the therapy to get over it took longer than I thought and half because, well, I'm lazy.

This is hands down the worst customer story that's ever happened too me. Worse than the death threat, worse than the mother breast feeding her 5 year old in front of me, worse than all the morons that call in and it may not sound like it, but if you try to imagine the experience and you'll understand.

It's a slow day and I'm not doing much. I work at a cell phone booth in a mall and as you can imagine it's not the most exciting job in the world. To interrupt my boredom a customer come in and I instantly regard her as possibly the smelliest person in the world. She comes up and leans on my desk causing it to audibly creak. She is notably overweight and followed by the second smelliest person only can be assumed as her boyfriend. Oddly, he's is notably underweight. These two have only taken one shower in their entire lives and that's the free one they give you at the hospital when your born. Their clothes used to be white but now are a rather gross colour yellow. I wish I was making this up. Soon after they graced me with their presents the air around me began to smell a different. A lot different. A lot different in a bad way.

I've seen, err...smelt, tons of stinky customers. These two were among the top ten slinkiest but the woman(I think) that was leaning on my desk is different in that she had some sort of tracheotomy done. Maybe a nursing student can explain it too me someday but she had a small tube in her throat that she would breathe through. Like her clothes, it too used to be white. Whenever she talked she would cover it with her thumb.

"Check my credit" she breathed in a Darth Vader like way.

"Sure" I squeaked trying to hold my breath as the air around me was now questionably poisonous. I knew a credit check takes 5 minutes or so and I knew I couldn't last.

As I am furiously typing her info up she stands across from me. Breathing. Heavy. I'm wearing a short sleeve shirt and I can fully feel the warm breath from her tube spray directly on my bare skin. It's hard to write how gross that is. Read it again and put some thought to it.

My brain screams "Holy crap man! Skin reports that it can feel her nasty tube breath."

"Yes thank you brain I am aware" I reply.

"Dude we're going to have to light ourselves on fire. It's the only way."

"I agree brain, I'll go get some gas later."

"Hey man, I hate to add to our problems but lungs report that they are low on air."

Soon I'll have to take a breath. I don't like the idea of that as I'm sure a hefty whiff of body odour would make me vomit. I just hit submit on her application. Won't be long now. Maybe I can last. Then, like my life is some cartoon or something, manual review flashes on my screen. I have to call the credit queue to get her credit score. That will take another 5 minutes at least. I pick up the phone and hit speed dial. "Your wait time is...one...minute..." say the robotic man on the phone. Good news but I'm totally out of air. I must breathe.

"NNNOOOO" screams my brain.

I take a breath. Big mistake. Always listen to your brain, even if you might pass out. The air totally smelled different. Different? Yes different, instead of the B.O. enriched air I had expected it was a pungent cigarette odour. "Cigarette odour?" I wonder. How's the air smell like...then it hits me...By Zeus' beard I just inhaled her nasty tube breath. The air that is in my lungs now used to reside in her nasty cancerous throat.

"Lungs taking heavy damage sir!" says my brain in panic.

That was it for me. I'm out. No sir. I can't handle this. The combination of my skin feeling like it's infected and my lungs now filled with B.O./fat-woman-cig-smoke was too much for me. I lean over and pull out the trash bin. My body takes a vote on whether to puke or not. 49% of me said yes, but my stomach had the deciding vote and it voted no. I leaned back up looking rather pale and gagging.

"You ok?" she breathed.

"Super peachy" I said, apparently near death I talk like a queer.

The credit evaluation had begun but it would still take too long, I wouldn't last another breath. Ah! We keep disinfectant hand sanitizer under the counter. Clutching my salvation I smear it all over my hands, then holding the phone closer to my face I breathe from my hands. In comes the sweet purifying alcoholic aroma. AAHH! I think I could feel the fight going on in my lungs. Johnson and Johnson vs. tube breath.

"Credit comes back a $500 per line" customer rep says.

"Super! Thanks!" I hang up on the rep and inform the customer of the ridiculous amount of money we want to charger her for her business. She scoffs as I expected and turns to make her departure. End.In.Sight. But then a card is exchanged between her and her boyfriend. Oh no, no no no. You can't want...

"Check his credit too."

Damnation! What have I done to deserve this.

She hands me his prison ID.

"Ha ha, oh you know, sorry we need a drivers license from the DMV. I can't use this. Sorry."

"All right thanks anyway, bye."

"Bye."

You know for stinky people they were very nice and polite. They might have been pleasant customers to have if it wasn't for the whole almost made me puke in a trashcan thing.
(menashem, Mon 26 Mar 2007, 18:00, Reply)