This -N- That, number 7

Giving The Devil Her Due, redux... In an earlier post I had mentioned maybe I should give "Mz. Waffleboot" some benefit of the doubt regarding her abrasive behavior, since the kind of people she has to work with on the Flow Team are some real idiots. I was thinking maybe I've been unreasonable, looking at her personality all wrong.

I had an experience a couple of days ago that set me straight.

I was talking briefly with some guy that I hardly know on the Flow Team, just making chit-chat. I asked him how things were. "Hey, life would be fantastic, if only [Waffleboot] was gone!..." he said, very emphatically, without a care as to who was listening. Ohhh....Kkkaaaaayyy....I guess that was pretty clear enough! Seems I'm not the only one who has the same viewpoint.

There's A Hole In My Bucket, Dear Liza, Dear Liza...(#2). Our company has a very strong customer service ethic. For that reason, they've placed electronic call buttons all around the store, so that guests can get help on those rare occasions they can't find us. Here's the catch: corporate doesn't allow us enough payroll to fully staff the floor, so most of the time we're helping two or more guests at a time, when we're not stocking a backflow of freight, running price checks, carryouts, and trying to finish our zoning before close. Small wonder then that the number of button pushes have gone up. Corporate gets unhappy when customers use the guest assistance buttons, and boy do they tell us.

Now, I'm no rocket scientist, but I thought our goal was to help as many guests as we can -- so if I wuz one 'o dem super-duper hie ed-juh-ma-kated eggs-ek-you- tif types, I would actually WANT the customers to push the buttons, so I could be sure I've helped them all. It just gets me -- they put the buttons in, but they don't want the customers to have to use them. W.T.F.? What kind of chicken-scratch bullshit logic is that?

SAY WHAT, NOW?....Another joke-wad called me up while I'm at the electronics counter cryin' about his PlayStation-2. He scratched a disk, and wanted to know how to fix it. He said that a tech support guy told him to put "vaginal cream" on it, and he wanted to know what I thought. I kid you not...I am not making this up. I told him I had no idea, and that he'd better talk to Sony, the manufacturer. Either somebody was playing a joke on me, or there's some people out there who really are that stupid. I'm praying they're not elected to public office.