"You tried to shred a book?!?"

[customersruinmylife]

Just had a hilarious sighting at a stationary store. The characters:

SC = Lady who has no idea she is holding up the line.
M = Poor Manager Lady

M: Hi there, can I help?
SC: Could I speak to the manager please?
M: Of course. I'm the manager, how can I help?
SC: No you're not!
M: Excuse me?
SC: You're not the manager! The manager has a beard!
M: Oh...no one that works here has a beard. Maybe you are mistaken.
SC: Nope! It was the manager with the beard that helped me last time. I want to speak to him!
M: I'm sorry, I don't know who you are referring to. Is there anything I can help you with?
SC: I want to return this.

She places a plastic bag on top of the counter. It has a paper shredder inside that looks as though it has seen better days.

SC: This is the second shredder I have bought from you guys and it is the second shredder that has died on me!
M: OK then, let me just have a look....

Manager's face looks like this:

M: Ma'am...did you try and shred a book?
SC: Yes! And it went crazy, got clogged up and overheated! I don't think these are very safe you know!
M: Ma'am, did you read the manual before you started shredding?
SC: No! Whats the point? How hard can it be? You put something in it and it shreds it! But all this thing did was overheat! What if the paper caught fire?
M: These shredders are only designed to shred a maximum of five pieces of paper at a time. They cannot handle 300 page novels!
SC: .....
M: .....
SC: So what are you saying?
M: I'm saying that there was probably nothing wrong with the shredder in the first place.
SC: So can I get a refund?
M: I will allow you to exchange it, or I will give you store credit.
SC: I don't want another! It's dangerous!
M: Would you like the store credit instead?
SC: Fine.

Manager began processing the return, shaking her head as she did it.

SC: Maybe you should recall all those shredders! They are quite clearly dangerous! They overheat!
M: I will look into it.

SC left. Manager let out a HUGE sigh.

[Bright_Star]

Who'd be stupid enought to try to shred a book?

[LillFilly]

WOW.

That's all I can say. Don't those shredders say ON THE TOP OF THE MACHINE the max number of papers to shred at one time???

Maybe a book counted as 1 to her.

Guess they'll have to include 'do not shred books in this machine' on the warning label. But I bet even if it said that someone will still try and complain 'well I thought it only meant HARDCOVERS!'

Just WOW.

[Dave0523]

How'd she manage to get a book through that little slot on top?

--Dave

[Ghel]

WHY would anyone want to shred a book? Shredding is for things that have personal information - things that you don't want anybody else to get hold of.

Maybe she thought it was easier than hosting a book burning?

Most shredders say right on the box how many pages they'll shred at once. I'm amazed that your manager allowed the return.

[mariamousie1]

Let me guess- was the book Harry Potter?

[mattm04]

How do you even fit a book in in the first place.

[Lingering Grin]

You know they make book shredders...

they're called Wood Chippers


Of course, they'll pretty much shred anything.

[McGoddess09]

OMG! BLASHPHEMY!

Poor little book. It did nothing wrong to her.

[powerboy]

OMG! BLASHPHEMY!

Poor little book. It did nothing wrong to her.

Maybe the book had big words .

[PepperElf]

plus... you're suppose to take a sheet of paper and drizzle oil on it and run it through the shredder every so often.

once every 15 minutes if you're doing non-stop shredding.

i should know. i had to shred unneeded documents for a command that was closing... two days of constant shredding


granted... yes I can understand needing to shred a book (if maybe it was a classified book)... but there's no reason you can't rip the pages out and do them a few at a time.


which reminds me... after i get out of class today, i need to head to target to get some oil for my new shredder. (i'm organizing all my boxes of papers at the moment)

[ralerin]

For pepperelf-Why do you need to oil the paper?

[Andara Bledin]

Maybe the book had big words .

Yeah, it must have insulted her intelligence.

For pepperelf-Why do you need to oil the paper?

For the same reason you would oil any edged metal tool; for maintenance.
HERE is a lovely page about how to oil your shredder, and it includes a link to a page describing why as well.

^-.-^

[WhiteRose]

when i worked for a humanities office and a business office i had to oil the machines or they wouldn't shred as efficiently...

[HawaiianShirts]

She tried to shred a book, then complained about the shredder not working properly... Wow. And she didn't even listen to the manager explaining the page limit of the shredder. Part of me wishes I'd been there to see that one. That woman needed some good derisive laughter directed at her.

She sounds a bit like my mom, actually. Mom's been known to try making some kitchen implement do something it's not designed to do (say, put ice cubes into a salad shooter in an attempt to create snow cones), then, when the device breaks, she'll complain that it was worthless and that she should never have wasted her money on it. (Sometimes she'll also state that it must have been designed by a man, just because she's still bitter about the divorce... that happened 19 years ago.)

Maybe the book had big words .

"HA!"
(That's what I shouted after reading that reply.)