Ways to anger your bookseller (long, sorry)

[Palsgraf]

57. Please don't yell at me for not having the book you'd ordered over-the-phone and I allegedly left a message on your machine stating that it's in ... when you had really called our bookstore in San Diego (489 miles away) instead of the bookstore in Berkeley. And when you realize your mistake, the proper next step is to apologize for your rant, not continue to complain and blame me.

[TYFSOK]

I used to work at a B&N, in the area where they opened the first one that wasn't in New York...

52. Don't move the cafe tables halfway across the store. (I think there is a war story about that one.)
53. You know that psych class experiment? The one where you sit in the cafe and methodically destroy a book that, unbeknown to the onlookers, you actually brought in with you, just to see how they react? Well, don't do it. It's been done, and you don't have the informed consent of your experimental subjects.
54. We are not a research library. Although we don't mind if you wanna have a study group at the store, we do mind if you clear off one of our display tables to do it. Also, if you're doing research, we suggest you go to an ACTUAL library, where you can check out books.
54a. No, you can't use the copy machine. In fact, I refuse to confirm or deny that we actually HAVE a copy machine.
55. If you want free cheat codes for your games, I suggest you use the internet, rather than ripping open our polybagged game magazines with no intent to buy.
55a. No, you can't use the copy machine.
55b. No, I'm not going to loan you a pen and some paper.
56. Actual quote from me: "Sir, we are trying to sell those books. We'd appreciate it if you wouldn't sit on the stacks." Response: "All the chairs are taken!" My response: See #54.

[Antisocial_Worker]

Before, during, or after?

While her parents were bolting from the store dragging her along by one arm, she had this sort of dreamy and quite frankly, stoned, look on her face. If you want my opinion, she had either wanted to leave or wanted something bought for her, her parents refused and she lodged a protest. They were leaving, and so she got what she wanted, and as far as she was concerned, God was in His heaven and all was right with the world.

[Amalthea]

46. Do not meticulously comb the store for any book that might ostensibly contain an image of boobies -- including Dr. Susan Love's Breast Book and then remove said books from shelves, and proceed to meticulously comb through the books in search of the aforementioned images of boobies.

Oh my gosh, we get this ALL the time! Photography books, art books, graphics design books, I mean places you wouldn't necessarily think of, these guys can sniff out boobies from a mile away. And then they hide the books where no one will ever find them, except for others of their kind. Which is okay, since no one will actually BUY these books so it's not like I'll ever need to look for them on the shelf.

49. DO NOT think that any of the following information about a book is helpful. I cannot enter any of these into my search program to help you locate a book:
Color of book
Picture on cover of book
Size of book
General location of where you saw the book six months ago or at another store(i.e. "Well, it was on a table near the front of the store when I was in one of your Texas stores a few weeks ago", and I actually got that exact information today. She had no other information on the book other than it was oversized and had writings by a bunch of western authors. Great.)
Gender of author
Occupation of author
Number of kids author has
The fact that the author has a spouse who has some sort of disease that you can't remember the name of
Television show author appeared on a few weeks ago
Only one word in the title, especially a very common word such as "she" (especially since if I tried putting in "she" I would also get every book with a word that starts with "she")
A brief summary of what the book is about

50. If you know EXACTLY what you are looking for but don't actually know anything about it that will help me locate it, DO NOT get mad at me when I can't find it. If you wanted it so badly, why didn't you write down the title instead of memorizing the color of the cover?

51. If you did write down the title but left it at home, DO NOT come into the bookstore until you have the chance to go home and retrieve the title. Trust me, 9 out of 10 customers who say "I wrote down the title, but I left it at home. I think it was called..." have memories that have mangled the title so badly that either I don't find the book or only find it because I've worked there for 4 years and have a million titles floating around in my brain.

[BlakeMP]

In that case, 38) Do NOT come into my store with the tiny aisles, walk right up to the manga, and grab the newest edition of whatever series you've been reading, and plop down on our dirty, disgusting floor, blocking foot traffic, paying customers, and the like, to read. I will pick you up by the shoulders and throw you out of the store.

39) Same for a manga series you've never read that now has some thirty books to it, and attempt to read them all in one sitting.

I'm not a bookseller, but as a customer, I see this all the damn time. If it's so good, how about you actually PAY for it and read it at HOME? Damn cheapskates.

[Kusanagi]

That was a sight to see. You should've seen the look on that kid's face.

Before, during, or after?

[Antisocial_Worker]

Pardon me, but can you direct me to the bookstore in which said young lady works? Just out of curiousity, mind you.

I don't know what she's doing these days actually, but she was one of the sweetest people I ever worked with. And cultured, too. She was originally from Biloxi, but grew up in Ankara, Turkey.

This made me laugh my silly little ass off. Literally. I no longer am a possessor of an ass. I am now sitting on my spine. No ass. Thanks to you.

Airport windsock indeed.

That was a sight to see. You should've seen the look on that kid's face.

[Kusanagi]

In that case, 38) Do NOT come into my store with the tiny aisles, walk right up to the manga, and grab the newest edition of whatever series you've been reading, and plop down on our dirty, disgusting floor, blocking foot traffic, paying customers, and the like, to read. I will pick you up by the shoulders and throw you out of the store.

I'm a little guilty of this one

[Jester]

30. Do not insist that the bookseller in the tight sweater that shows off her enormous hooters, and the short little skirt that can be easily looked up be the one to climb the ladders to get an overstocked book for you.

Pardon me, but can you direct me to the bookstore in which said young lady works? Just out of curiousity, mind you.

33. If you do allow your 5-year-old daughter to do the preceding, do not flee from the store clutching said daughter by one arm, causing her to flap like an airport windsock in the breeze as you run from the scene.

This made me laugh my silly little ass off. Literally. I no longer am a possessor of an ass. I am now sitting on my spine. No ass. Thanks to you.

Airport windsock indeed.

[Cedophile]

32. Do not allow your 5-year-old daughter to drop trou in the kids books, take a dump on the floor, and then jump up and down in it, leaving clear shoeprints in the feces that, if one were so inclined, would be the perfect sort of shoeprints of which to make a plaster cast like they're always doing on CSI.

I now perfectly understand the fabled "cat face" that SC's do. Because this reading made me do it. EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW

[Antisocial_Worker]

46. Do not meticulously comb the store for any book that might ostensibly contain an image of boobies -- including Dr. Susan Love's Breast Book and then remove said books from shelves, and proceed to meticulously comb through the books in search of the aforementioned images of boobies.

47. Especially do not do the preceding if you are a middle-aged man who bears a marked resemblance to Toad of Toad Hall, wearing thick, bleary, Mr. Peepers spectacles that warp your appearance even further. And especially do not do the preceding while allowing your tongue to flick in and out as you search for boobies, as though you are attempting to snare passing winged insects.

48. Do not remove the naughty magazines from their plastic bags, open them to a particularly hot page, and prop them open among the childrens magazines.

[Threesidedorchid]

Dalvenja I'm at the same chain... and you're so right about the coupons etc. = more than the 10% flat discount (esp. w/ the holiday credit).

just adding a couple:

do not 'order' a doubled cupped large hot water, split the water into two cups, and then reach over my counter for the cocoa powder (incidentally spilling the syrup bottles all over the place) so that you and your husband can have free 'hot cocoa'.

do not dispose of your half finished pasry/drink by stashing it on a shelf, behind the books -- that doesn't make it magically disappear.

don't walk past 6 displays of the bestseller you're looking for just to ask me where it is.

oh the list goes on and on...

[Primer]

40. If you see me leaving the register, and somebody else come back in, please do not wait for me to get off my hour lunch break just so that I will be the one to wait on you. The other cashiers are perfectly capable of helping you, too.

41. If I tell you that the book you want to special order in February will not be released until December, please do not call me back every day asking if it's come in yet.

42. Please, please, please, have more of a description of the book you want me to find than "It's blue, and it has a woman's torso on the cover." (Yes, I found it. No she did not want me to hold it at the counter for her. It turned out to be a secret shopper over the phone. That was in 1981, and I still remember the title: Callanetics.)

[Bliss]

Number 32 makes me want to curl up and quietly die

[Imogene]

I can be considered a book seller, since, we sell Mangas at my store.

In that case, 38) Do NOT come into my store with the tiny aisles, walk right up to the manga, and grab the newest edition of whatever series you've been reading, and plop down on our dirty, disgusting floor, blocking foot traffic, paying customers, and the like, to read. I will pick you up by the shoulders and throw you out of the store.

39) Same for a manga series you've never read that now has some thirty books to it, and attempt to read them all in one sitting.