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I work the overnight shift in a convenience store. We're in a residential neighborhood, so its pretty nice, and I see a lot of the same faces each night.
So a frequent customer comes in the store about 11:30, wanders around for a while, then asks me if we still aren't giving out free cups for water, and I tell him that unfortunately we aren't: the owner has decided we don't do that anymore.
(The reason, I suspect, has to do with the number of people filling them with soda instead of water, or filling them with chili and cheese that's for the hot dogs and nachos, or using "can I have a cup?" to distract the clerk while their friend stuffs a bottle of wine down his pants, but I digress.)
He then leaves.
He comes back a few minutes later and asks if he left his cell phone on the counter. He didn't. He looks around the store, then goes back outside, only to return in a few minutes. Lather, rinse, repeat.
He asks if he can use the phone, and I tell him that I am not allowed to let people use the phone, but I will give him money for the payphone, and I pull $0.50 from my pocket and give it to him.
He comes back in a few minutes and says the pay phone doesn't seem to be working: nobody could hear him, and can he use the phone. I let him use my cell phone.
He calls his mother and asks her to call his phone repeatedly, so he can try to find it by the ringing. Nothing in the store rings, so he goes searching outside again.
Eventually, Mom walks over to help him search, and they search one of our outside trash cans thinking he set it on top and then it fell in, somehow. By the time mom arrives I have a couple of police officers enjoying a rare break and talking to each other in a corner of my store.
Eventually the officers leave, and son asks me if there is any way I can "rewind the cameras", and I tell him I can't do that right now, no.
An hour later, however, I have a few minutes when there is nobody in the store, so I decide to check the cameras and see what I can see. As a result, I left a message with the daytime Manager to give to him when he comes in again:
Per his request, I checked the cameras, and they clearly show he had his phone in his hand when he left the store.
They also clearly show that he took a can of Pepsi out of our cooler and then slipped it into a pocket in his pants, and never paid for it.
They also clearly show that, when he was in the store looking for his phone and saw a police car turn into our parking lot, he placed a spoon and a syringe behind some bottles of wine on a shelf.
So a frequent customer comes in the store about 11:30, wanders around for a while, then asks me if we still aren't giving out free cups for water, and I tell him that unfortunately we aren't: the owner has decided we don't do that anymore.
(The reason, I suspect, has to do with the number of people filling them with soda instead of water, or filling them with chili and cheese that's for the hot dogs and nachos, or using "can I have a cup?" to distract the clerk while their friend stuffs a bottle of wine down his pants, but I digress.)
He then leaves.
He comes back a few minutes later and asks if he left his cell phone on the counter. He didn't. He looks around the store, then goes back outside, only to return in a few minutes. Lather, rinse, repeat.
He asks if he can use the phone, and I tell him that I am not allowed to let people use the phone, but I will give him money for the payphone, and I pull $0.50 from my pocket and give it to him.
He comes back in a few minutes and says the pay phone doesn't seem to be working: nobody could hear him, and can he use the phone. I let him use my cell phone.
He calls his mother and asks her to call his phone repeatedly, so he can try to find it by the ringing. Nothing in the store rings, so he goes searching outside again.
Eventually, Mom walks over to help him search, and they search one of our outside trash cans thinking he set it on top and then it fell in, somehow. By the time mom arrives I have a couple of police officers enjoying a rare break and talking to each other in a corner of my store.
Eventually the officers leave, and son asks me if there is any way I can "rewind the cameras", and I tell him I can't do that right now, no.
An hour later, however, I have a few minutes when there is nobody in the store, so I decide to check the cameras and see what I can see. As a result, I left a message with the daytime Manager to give to him when he comes in again:
Per his request, I checked the cameras, and they clearly show he had his phone in his hand when he left the store.
They also clearly show that he took a can of Pepsi out of our cooler and then slipped it into a pocket in his pants, and never paid for it.
They also clearly show that, when he was in the store looking for his phone and saw a police car turn into our parking lot, he placed a spoon and a syringe behind some bottles of wine on a shelf.
That's amazing! He caught--himself. Caper of the century, he is. 
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