Thursday, September 13, 2007

Yarn shop fear

No pictures or anything of yarny interest today. Just fear of going to work tomorrow. For the most part, I either like or don't mind our customers. In saying "for the most part", I refer to just about everyone who comes in except for a small, small handful of people. Considering that 1) I'm not too much of a people person and 2) Customer service really isn't my forte, I think I handle the job well....probably because I'm high on yarn fumes the whole time I'm the shop. I also sometimes like to play the sociopathic game of trying to see just how nice the person at hand can think I am. Eh. It helps me pass the time. That, and sometimes I like to see how much water I can consume from the cooler.....but that's generally only on really slow days.
Anyhow, back to the work fear. As any of you who have faced a similar situation can attest to, it is a truly horrible feeling to sit around all day waiting to see if some terrible person comes in to visit. I had a bad experience on Wednesday. Big time bad, and the woman was C.R.A.Z.Y. I was in the back room getting my cell phone out of my purse. I came back into the front, planning on going to my car to plug the phone in. This older woman was standing in the middle of the room and scared the shit out of me. She looked at me, the exclaimed, "HelOooooo! Is anyone here?". Then gave an exasperated sigh and plopped herself down in one of the chairs. What happened next was a strange conversation (predominantly me listening to her). She was an odd bird and I wondered if she might be a drunk. I decided that she was just quirky and perhaps a sufferer of Parkinson's. The long ad short of it as that she had been knitting some baby booties about 40 years ago and lost the pattern. She wanted to know if she could bring the project in and have me tell her what she was doing. I told her that if it was a fairly simple pattern that it could probably be worked out. She asked me when the next day I was working would be and I told her Friday, but that we were open everyday and anyone there would have just as good of a shot at figuring it out. So then she leaves. A minute later she comes back in and asks me where the photo shop is. I told her that it must be in the section of the shopping center by Safeway,because there's not one in our section of the shopping center. This seemed to enrage her. She walked back out but kept the door open while he started yelling at me that YES, there IS a photo shop in this section and blah, blah, blah. I apologized to her and said that I'm not 100% familiar with the area because I'm not local, but that I was sure there was not a photo shop in our strip. That sent off a rant that included telling me that she doesn't care where I'm from ad that I've got to figure out what's what and get my act together. She also was referring to me as "girlie". So she finally let of the door and stood there for a minute making exaggerated hand motions at the shop. I was literally stunned. I took a few minutes to regain the sanity that she sucked out of me, then went to my car. When I was coming back in I saw her with her face pressed up to the window of the nail salon before she stepped back and started making the same " You're a no good idiot" gestures that she was making at our door. All I have to say is that I hope my perceived total ineptitude was so great as to sour her taste for our shop all together. I have a churning feeling in my gut that tells me she'll show up again, though. I just hope it's not going to be tomorrow.

4 comments:

Lindsay said...

Isn't working at a yarn shop fabulous? God, it must be so relaxing to get to knit all day long.

Large Marge said...

Kinda like the time I had some guy yelling at me because the entire tri-state area was fogged in.
Picture fog so bad that JFK, EWR and LGA only had incoming planes for a few hours.
I did get lucky, PA cops came by and escorted him far, far away from me.

Nittany Knits said...

Try working in Arundel Mills sometime ladies. I'll take your occasional fits of crazy over the everyday horrors I get to encounter.

I will say my favorite was the deaf couple that yelled at me for taking to them because I did not know instantly that they were deaf. The yelling was in sign language. That I failed in college. Had to giggle a bit inside. I know I'm going to hell.

Lindsay said...

I totally agree with you on the ills of working in a place like that. Back when I was with Silver Diner I had a mulitiude of customer related issues. At least at the yarn shop I don't have to deal with the daily routine of dealing with asshole parents encouraging their monster children to gring mounds of chocolate cake into the furniture and windows. I think stepping away from that makes dealing with the crazy yarn folk worse though because 1) I'm not expecting it to happen since they're all out-of-the-blue events and 2) it brings back bad memories.