Adventures in Bookselling

Right before Thanksgiving I took a part time job at a friend's book store. It's actually a pretty ideal job, easy to do once you know how to run the software plus it is a small enough business that there will most likely be plenty of time for me to do course work those two days a week.
I laughed when the owner warned me that the hardest part of the job was the customers but I had no idea how right she was. I started working just as the holiday shopping began to ramp up and and some of the characters that have come in are so ridiculous that I have been telling the owner if she ever closes shop, she should write a book.
Just today I had the worst kind of customer come in, the cranky old sourpuss. These are the old women for whom nothing is ever right, you know when they walk in the door with their tight lipped grimaces and tight gray perms that they are the type to send food back endlessly at a restaurant, complain about their kids/grandkids but then grouse about how they never visit, etc. Today's COS had a list of books and authors in her hands but refused any help to show her where any of them might be (alphabetically arranged but apparently still unclear), complained that the stairs leading up to the used book room were too steep (even though I offered to go up for her and bring down any books by authors she was looking for), and then before she left made sure to let me know that she'll be heading to a different bookstore in the next town over where the books are easier to find. Because it is necessary to ruin someone else's day for the fun of it.
I started just as the holiday shopping was ramping up and that was the best time for me to get to know the next worst kind of customer-the one who saw this book? with that red or maybe green cover? on that morning show? and don't know genre, author, or any of the keywords in the title. These customers will drape themselves across the counter while you are searching on google, trying to see the screen and offer more "helpful" hints-I think it was a man? And then after the show, this cook was on? On one memorable occasion I had a cranky old sourpuss who also fit this category and who, when Google and I could not read her mind was so rude and slammed the door so hard that her daughter came back to apologize later.
Then there are the outright lunatics. One morning, a man called with a loud booming voice and at first, I thought maybe he was just a little slow and I tried to humor him on the phone. After about fifteen minutes of listening to him go on and on about his living situation and his financial situation and his inability to spell, I began to realize he was actually a certifiable nutjob. Not only did his voice give me chills but he kept repeating "My name is Robert J. Smith but you can call me Chris". Turned out later that his name seemed so familiar because it is actually the name of one of the local ambulance chaser law firms. He called four more times in the next half hour until we convinced him that if he came in and prepaid, we'd order the very expensive rare seafood cookbook and it would be in before Christmas. He did come in the following week (just as scary in person as on the phone) and prepay for the book and then proceeded to call daily to check on it's status.
There are also the regulars--the guy who orders Catholic books and has asked me to call the monks a few counties over to find out where they get their books, the guy who orders these huge graphic novels, the guy who comes in reeking of cigarette smoke so strongly that it lingers for hours after he leaves, the girl who orders every book in a series based on television (Murder She Wrote, Monk, etc), the Vietnam vet who watches the history channel all day and then calls to say "find me a book on the Japanese bombing of Australia in 1942 and a book on the rules of rugby" and of course, the nice book club ladies who seem uninteresting but then will order books with half naked firemen on the cover.
Working here has been an eye opening social experiment for me. I'm not invested enough that the cranks or the loons can upset me and it certainly makes for some interesting stories to tell my husband when I get home. I think it's going to be a nice diversion as I head into the school/kids/work chaos.

Proof that I am not exaggerating:
http://www.halushki.com/2009/02/retail-book-store-pass-fail.html