Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Life at a Bookstore



My crazy life in a bookstore... where-o-where is my sanity!  
Devyn Dawson

My life in a bookstore…

I work in a big bookstore, with a million books (wink)and every shift has at least one customer that knows the store better than you.  Well, they think they do.  Here is my life surrounded with books.

Customer - “Hi, I’m looking for a book.”

Me - “Great, we have plenty.”

Customer - “It has a blue cover and is by that one author, you know that eccentric one that lives in the mountains?”

Me - “Do you know what other books they have written?  Maybe the title of the book?”

Customer - “If I knew the title, I wouldn’t need you.”

Me - Silently telling myself to be nice.  “We have a lot of books with blue covers, most authors are slightly eccentric and I need something more to go by.  Genre, what the book is about, is it a recent release?”

Customer - “I don’t remember.  Oh, I think the publisher is Penguin.”

Me - Silently strangling the stranger.  Smile, Devyn…bite your tongue.  “You want a blue book that is published by Penguin and that is all we have to go by.  That makes it a bit difficult to figure out.  Why don’t you walk around and see if it comes to you, you can call us if need be.”

Customer - “Are you the only person working?  Is there a manager?  You are absolutely no help!” 

Me - “Yes, let me get you the manager on duty.”  I page…. And manager arrives, I say.. “This customer would like a blue book by penguin and an eccentric author.  Not sure if it is a recent release or what it is about.” I look at customer, and smile sweetly… “Right?”

Customer - “This person is no help, you should hire competent employees.”

Me - Oh someone is going to whack the customer….not me, not me, not me!  I think to myself.

Later - New customer (btw, no book was found for above customer)

Customer - “Hi, I’m looking for a book.” (they all start out like that) “Can you suggest something to me?”

Me - “Sure, what kind of book would you like?  Fiction?  Love story, crime, true crime, funny, teen, sci-fi, maybe paranormal?”

Customer - “Just show me something.”

Me - I walk the person around the store and get shot down at every suggestion.

Customer - “I have to go, I don’t like to read and everything sounds dumb.”

Me - Really?  Book reading is dumb.   Makes me go…. Hmmmmm

I have tons of stories about the bookstore.  Stay tuned for more of my stories

4 comments:

  1. Hysterical!! I have a good friend who works in big book store, I'm going to send her the link. lolololol

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  2. Totally has to be a true couple of stories, every time go in B&N store there is a person asking the CS person something similar and not sure how they do it but they keep their cool!

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  3. Hilarious! Had both my husband and myself laughing hysterically! Thanks for the share! At first we wondered if it was true..then we thought about the general populace and decided it had to be!

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  4. I can just imagine this. It's almost scary how ignorant people can behave. Very funny post! .... much sympathy to you. :)

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