To review, I’ve decided to write about the things grocery store employees see and the people we come into contact with every day. Grocery store employees, like employees of many retail stores, are for the most part disregarded as just being there. But to us, there are things we see that stick out. What I’m doing is recording some of those things.
Everyone who watches TV or reads magazines today has heard about the trash-TV reality show Jersey Shore. Most people my age, especially the girls, watch it every week. (And yes, I am admitting a secret shame in watching it too.) We all know who Pauly D. is. The trademark blowout, the fake tan and his shirts that match his tattoos all make him stand out (and the fact that he’s the best looking one in the house doesn’t hurt either). Now since the show started and became popular, you cannot go to a beach in Jersey without seeing at least 55 Pauly D. blowouts in a 3 block span. But when you actually have to do a double take to see if the reality show star himself is in your store, you know a kid went way too far with the new fad. There is a kid that comes in my store every once in awhile that makes me do a double take every time. He’s pretty tall, he’s tan, he’s pretty built (I think he’s an EMT so that explains that one) and, except for the fact that I’m pretty sure he’s of Middle Eastern descent, he looks JUST like Pauly D. It’s pretty scary actually. Pauly 2 (that’s what I call him) usually just goes to the bank branch in the store so I don’t think I’ve ever actually heard him talk so I don’t know if he sounds like Pauly D or not but one day I will find out.
Another customer we see fairly regularly is a woman. She has come through my line a few times and she’s another one that has made me do a double-take more than once. This woman looks just like Emilio Estevez. I am not trying to be mean or rude here but she does. The first time I saw her and realized it wasn’t him, but a woman, I almost started cracking up in the middle of ringing someone up. I’m pretty sure she’s a firefighter or does something that deals with firefighters because she has kind of a husky build and she’s always wearing fire department shirts and sweatshirts and still, I always think of Emilio Estevez.
Another regular, or actually I should say regulars, is a pair of twins that come in. They are brothers, about 65-ish, and they’re always together and they look alike so I’m actually assuming they’re twins. Also, I think I heard someone I work with say they were once. But either way, they come in every weekend, usually Saturday afternoons and they always have hats on. One wears a red baseball cap and I think the other one wears a blue or green one; they both wear bifocals. They’re about 5’4 and they dress similarly. They wear the old man pants (see last post) and the old man shirt that’s a button-up, either short or long sleeved with either the left or both-sided breast pocket. They even have those jackets that you always see old men in. I don’t really know how to describe them except that I always see only old men wearing them. They’re nice little guys, usually very pleasant, and they get really excited when they win a lottery game. They usually play those for about 20-30 minutes when they come.
Since I’ve sounded so cheerful about all the ones I’ve done so far, let’s go with customers that no one in the store likes. Every week this Russian family comes in. Usually it’s the mom and her daughter, sometimes the father is with them and occasionally the daughter isn’t. Even though they have been shopping at this store for so long, they still, somehow, don’t have a Customer Card (that’s not really what we call them but for the sake of anonymity we’re going with that). Every week the mom asks us to put our house card in. So we do. We start ringing up their stuff and when we’re about halfway through they stop us and say, “I only have $___.” Usually that blank can be filled in with 50 but every so often it’s different. So we keep an eye on the total and when it gets close to their amount we stop. By the time we stop, there are only a few things left on the belt. So then the mom will look at them and say, “Well… Yeah, ring this one up. I want to see how much it is.” So we ring it up. It’s on sale (the sale that they’re getting with the house card because for some unknown reason they will not get their own) and then she continues like that we’ve rung just about everything up and we have to put one or two things back. Then, and this is the best part, they pay with Access. Which means: they aren’t even really paying for it. And she gives us all that trouble over nothing. Now, in their favor, it isn’t always with Access and sometimes they will have cash but still, they always have enough to get everything except one or two small things. Oh, and they ALWAYS, without fail, get a case of Poland Spring water. A lot of the time, they’ll make it up to the register then say they ‘forgot’ to get one so we have to send a bagger back for it even though there are two of them but they always get one. And they are part of the reason I stereotype Russians and why I don’t really like them. =]
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