Compared to some of the places I’ve worked in The Hamptons my job this summer doesn’t seem to attract the most extreme type of obnoxious customer, but this morning was an exception worth noting.
Occasionally adult women come in shopping for themselves rather than their children, and shockingly the clothes sometimes fit– for example: the 40 something, clearly anorexic woman who came in with her husband today. First she interrupted me while I was clearly in the middle of helping another customer–just your standard hamptons obnoxiousness.
Then when I attempted to answer her question, she interrupted my answer with another question…repeatedly for 5 minutes– bite your tongue she’ll leave soon obnoxiousness.
When we finally found a pair of jeans that didn’t have sequins, embroidered hearts or other details clearly designed with a child in mind she went to the fitting room to try them on. ‘Perfect’ she said, I’ll wear them now, and she handed me the tag. As I started to ring her up she wandered away from the counter to shop some more– totally expected obnoxiousness, everyone’s doing it these days.
She chooses a few pair of girls socks, and puts them on the counter. ‘Are those all the socks?’ she asks as I start to ring them up. I show her where the boys socks are, and she decides to get them instead. As I am deleting the girls socks and ringing up the boys socks, she takes off her shoes and socks so she can put the new ones on, meanwhile tossing her crumpled dirty socks and jeans on the counter. Gross. I pull out a bag and offer it to her. She says ‘You have my old jeans.’ Grr. I use the jeans to pick up the icky socks without touching them and put them in the bag. OBNOXIOUS!
She’s on her way out of the store, but no. she’s back. She wants to know if the jeans are going to set off the door alarm. There’s a tag inside I say but you’ll have to take the jeans off to cut it out. ‘Ok’ she says, so I pull the scissors out of the drawer. She’s looking inside her waistband for the sensor. I tell her it’s farther down the leg, and try to hand her the scissors, but she comes behind the counter unbuttoning the jeans. ‘Where is it?’ I describe what it looks like. She pulls down her pants completely trying to find it. I try to look away and not see her gross anorexic legs and granny panties, but she wants ME to cut the tag for her. Off the charts obnoxious! What the hell? Who does that?
- L
Share This