Confessions of Fangirl

 
Ah, it’s Christmas Shopping Season! I know this for many reasons and amongst the clues are the phone calls I get at least once an hour that start like this:
Me: “Thanks for calling ‘our bookstore’ at ‘our location’! How can I help you today?”
Customer: “Is this ‘our bookstore’?”
Me: “Yes.”
Customer: “At ‘our location’?”
Me: “Yes.”

And I’ve had this call:
Me: “Thanks for calling ‘our bookstore’ at ‘our location’! How can I help you today?”
Customer: “Is this CVS?”
Me: “Um, no it’s ‘our bookstore’ at ‘our location’. Can I help you?”
Customer: “You’re not the CVS?”
Me: “No.”
Customer: “Oh.”  *Click*

It's amazing actually how many times a day someone hangs up on me or just ignores me in the store. 

A man comes into the store. He picks up a few things as he's looking around the store. His cell phone rings so he answers it while he continues to browse. He walks up to the front of the store to look at the bargain stuff while he chats on the phone with probably three books in his hands already. Because he's gotten stuff from the displays at the front, like hardback best sellers, he's got tagged books in his hands, meaning that they will set off the alarm. I know this because the alarm goes off when he approaches it. Most people, when they hear the alarm go off either make a run for it or move back (the latter is more common thankfully).

Now, I want to point out that this man is still on his cellphone and that the censors are pretty loud so that the whole store including the back can hear them. I make this point because the man did not move away from the censors. He continued to browse the books right beside the alarms buzzing and flashing, talking on his cell phone. I am with a customer at the computer and I can't just leave but I'm too far away to yell. After what seems like two minutes, he moves away to look at something a little farther off. Thirty seconds later, he's too close again and the alarm is going off again. This time its only for about thirty seconds. I'm taking my next customer to find something and sure enough after another few seconds he is setting off the alarm again! The cell phone, as far as I can tell never left his ear.

After another ninety seconds of the alarm, one of my coworkers gets over to him and asks him to move away. I get there just in time to see the absolute look of surprise when she tells the man that he is the reason the alarms keep sounding. At least, that's what I'm assuming he was surprised about, for all I know he could have been surprised she was asking him to move away from the alarms.