catching up

I'm not often freaked out by customers. Usually, I'm either amused or annoyed by the asshats every retailer has to deal with; I've gotten used to most of the crap that is shoved at us every day.

The guy I had today was not what I would call usual.

When I got to work, my coworker T was running away from the cash registers, where she works. She shoved the head cashier key at me and informed me that she would be back at her station momentarily. Um, okay.

When I got to the register, I saw a guy standing at her register. He moved over to where I was standing and, staring intently at the counter, he pushed a twenty dollar bill at me. I asked him what he was paying for and he started babbling about how a book that he had put on hold had been reshelved even though he has requested that it remain on hold until he could get to the store. He told me that he had brought in his paycheck on Saturday and that not even that had been accepted as payment for the book.

As you can probably guess, we have never accepted paychecks as payment.

The man also told me that T was searching for his book, which greatly relieved me. Maybe I wouldn't have to deal with him!

He was mumbling and his syntax was weird and I had a really hard time follow what he was saying, except for the phrases he repeated several times. To make matters even *better*, he reeked of alcohol. He was also blocking my register while other customers waited. I asked him if he needed anything other than the book that T was looking for.

"Nah, I'll just mumblemumble and wait here for that lady to come back with the book. Mumblemumble."

"Actually, I'd really appreciate it if you could wait by her register, because I can't ring anyone up while you are in front of my register." *hopeful smile*

His completely reasonable response was to bang his fists loudly on my counter and continue to mumble while still staring down, his face hidden by his baseball hat.

I actually jumped back. It was seriously the most bizarre thing I had ever seen.

I was greatly relieved that T then arrived with the book. I was less relieved when she handed the book to me rather than take it to her register to ring him up there. Thanks, T!

He continued to babble at my counter about the injustice of the whole thing as I rang him up VERY QUICKLY, but at least he stopped abusing it.

He was the creepiest and strangest customer I have ever dealt with.

And if I ever find out who reshelved the damn book early....