[Caesar]

What I’m thinking at work. Based on a true story.


‘Excuse me. I was first!’

Oh great. Another fat old man who can’t read. I knew he would say something. I knew it. I could see by the look in his eyes as he glanced at me. Here he comes; storming over like this is a big deal. Well it must be for him. This is probably his main source of entertainment; causing problems for simple work employees because he has no friends. Oh Jesus, he even has yellow and black teeth. Right, big friendly deceptive smile time.

‘Yes, sir. How can I help?’

‘You served that lady before me! I was first! Why didn’t you serve me at the till I was standing at?’

You b*stard. Why do the majority of my customers lack common sense or the ability to read? It’s simple enough, read the damned signs that clearly state which tills are currently in operation. But no; they just plonk their fast-food cr*p that their daily diet is comprised of at whatever till they can be bothered waddling to and expect service there and then, as if walking that whole extra metre to the till I’m standing at is too much effort. So I take a deep breath, fade the smile slightly so I still look friendly but don’t look as if I’m taking the p*ss, and reply.

‘I’m sorry sir but that till isn’t being used at the moment. This till,’ I tap the counter to emphasise the point, ‘is the one I am currently using.’ Sorry if that sounded patronising but you’re clearly not intelligent enough to have worked that out for yourself. What kind of moron expects service at an unmanned till? You, obviously.

‘And what’s wrong with that till? You saw me standing at it but you stood here doing nothing when you should have been doing your job! Instead you served the person behind me in the queue!’ He begins to mumble in some incoherent language, which I believe, is meant to be English. Using my powers of translation I deciphered his message into the following. ‘Shops these days, giving jobs to idiots. Honestly.’

I beg your pardon? I’m the idiot? Right then, that’s abuse. What I now say was your doing, Fatty, so don’t even bother asking for the manager, as if she’d take you seriously. The smile has gone, you don’t deserve it anymore.

‘Sir... Can I ask you something?’ Don’t wait for a reply in case he refuses my question and begins a fresh rant in which case I’ll never get my say in, and I’ll have to endure the full force of his disgusting breath if he keeps his mouth open for too long. ‘Can you read?’

‘What? Don’t be stupid! Of course I can!’

‘Oh good. Perhaps you’d care to read this sign for me, then.’ I indicate the no-expense-spared laminated sheet of paper sellotaped above my till. The man scrutinises the sign before replying.

‘Till Open,’ the man replies and places his hands on his hips, nodding once to himself, satisfied he gave the correct answer.

Oh my god. He hasn’t actually seen the problem yet. Any reasonable human being with an I.Q. higher than eighty could work out that the foundation of his complaint is now void.

‘And could you just read the sign above the till you chose to stand at?’

Yep, take a nice long look, you tw*t. Squinting your eyes isn’t going to change the text, mate. Just admit it... and there it is! The look of failure registers itself upon his chunky features. That’s right; it says ‘Till Closed’, doesn’t it? So what on earth possessed you to stand there?

Now the man’s round race reddens. You started this, but now you’ve humiliated yourself. Take a look around, the other customers are watching your pathetic display and you’ve just proven to everyone that you’re an attention seeker. He turns to face me once again, taking a moment to assemble his next comment.

‘Oh don’t be such a smarta*se!’ he fumes before storming out. And he’s left his shopping. Obviously wasn’t that important then if he’s so embarrassed he would rather leave then stay any longer to pay for his cr*p. Now I have to put it back. Stupid lazy a*sehole.

‘Have a nice day, sir.’

I continue with my tedious routine of scanning people’s shopping while grinning like a Cheshire cat. Beep... beep... beep. God, I’ll start hearing this in my sleep soon.

‘And that’s your change. Thank you very much. Bye.’

Thank you very much, bye. Thanks, bye. Thanks very much, bye now. Cheers now f*ck off.

Holy sh*t she’s huge! Cr*p, she was in last week, smells like a mouldy t*rd. I kid you not, she comes under the increasing category of ‘people too large and lazy to exercise, wash, or wipe their a*se properly’. And there’s her equally well fed ten year old spoilt little brat daughter, closely followed by the only man on the planet insane enough to have sex with that tub of lard, looking depressed as always. And rightly so. I know what he’s thinking: ‘Why the hell did I marry that horrible ball of flesh?’. She probably tricked him into it, or got him drunk, or something to that effect. It’s no surprise that her mouth dominates a third of her face. She doesn’t even have a neck; her head just sort of merges with her body.

‘KATEY!!’ And it’s started. The two so called parents begin their shopping trip with their usual rants at their daughter as she does whatever she damn well pleases. Do they punish her? No, just shout her name a few times to make it look like they’re making the effort of disciplining their daughter before buying her a shelf of sweets.

What the... get out of our trolleys you little cow! You’re too old and far too heavy to ride in them! The shop isn’t that big and walking around it while your mum fills the trolley with pizzas would do you some good.

Oh thank god, my favourite customer. Excellent. Not everyone who walks into the shop are total morons and this regular is one of the better ones. I wait for him to begin his rounds of our freezers before coming up behind him.

‘Excuse me, sir but I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave. We don’t serve shop lifters.’

‘Oh, darn,’ he replies to continue the joke. Although some of the surrounding customers who aren’t accustomed to our little routine turn their attention towards us expecting a showdown.

‘I’ll have to search your bags before you leave.’

‘Look, I bought that Viagra somewhere else.’

We look around at the curious faces watching, but pretending they aren’t watching, our conversation, and burst out laughing. Our audience collectively roll their eyes, shaking their heads in disapproval as if it was our fault we wasted their time. Unfortunately another rather rude customer decides to interrupt what little time I get with a fun customer and demands some proper service.

Oh what the hell? Squint eye. Cr*p, which one do I look into. I know! I’ll flicker between both of them; I’m bound to look into the right one that way. Hope she doesn’t think I’m mocking her. Nah, she probably gets it all the time. Right, left, right, left... oh b*llocks to it; I’ll just look at the bridge of her nose.

‘I’m sorry but we don’t sell those fairy cakes anymore.’

‘Why?’

‘I don’t know. We don’t get told why but they have been discontinued. We have no control over what stock we’re sent, I’m afraid.’

‘Could you have a look, please?’

Have a look? Where? I just told you we don’t have any. Looking in any random freezer isn’t going to make them magically appear. Of course I give this explanation in far more politely worded statement. That’s it, walk away. You’re welcome, and I forgive you for interrupting my awesome banter with an awesome customer.

She reminds me of another customer who waddled up to me, having to shift her body weight from one foot to the other to move forward because she lacked the ability to place one foot in front of the other. She asked if we do vouchers. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but we don’t keep them in the shop, they come through the post.’ Apparently these weren’t the vouchers she meant and wanted a ten pound gift voucher. I explain that we don’t do those type of vouchers... three times I explain that we don’t do those type of vouchers! Then she asked me to write one out for her. I’m sorry? Write one out? No. Needless to say her exit was equal as enthusiastic and polite as this last customer.