Damn You Vacuum Man!

Five years ago I needed a new vacuum cleaner for the house, so I start checking the local stores to find something to replace the ol’ Phantom Fury. After talking with a friend, I head down to a little, independent vacuum salesman with a tiny shop in the worst part of town. When your vacuum dealer is wedged between an auto body paint supply and a pawn shop, and across the street is the porn store, you might want to keep driving. Nonetheless, I stop and head inside to see what he has.

I couldn’t imagine what this guy could offer because, let’s just say, if he sells one vacuum every week, he is probably ecstatic. I find a Hoover and he sells me on the 5 years of free bags and 2 years of in-house warranty including free belts. Free belts?...You kidding me? He is also a repair man, so I think it might be nice to have a local place to drop it off if we have problems. Plus, 5 years of bags? That is a whole lot of free bags. (BTW: He strongly opposed the bagless vacs and I listened.)

I head up to the counter and pay and then ask for my bags. Then it hits he…he has no intentions of giving anyone 5 years of bags, and here’s why. He hands me a little punch card with 10 circles on it. In order to get your free bags, you must come in for a single package every six months. My months were Jan. and July. If you don’t come in during those months, in the years indicated on the punch card, you are out of luck. Further, he will keep no record of your purchase, so you must have the original punch card to get your bags. I’ve already paid, but am a little angry that he is setting up a seemingly impossible scenario.

How often do you think about vacuum bags? Can you keep a punched business card for 5 years? Of course not, nobody can…but me. I decided right then and there that this guy wouldn’t beat me. He sold on me on something and then, like mail-in rebates, set up so many hoops to jump through that nobody could negotiate successfully. He had no idea who the hell he was dealing with.

So my wife and I make a vow right then and there to beat the vacuum man. We had our months marked and took in that raggedy little punch card every 6 months for 4 ½ years. We had some close call, hitting the last week, if not the last day of the month. I could see the disgust in this eyes every time we walked in for free bags and didn’t buy a thing. It was a thing of beauty. I had him on the ropes, we were so close.

But alas, we lost. Yesterday, August first, my wife calls me in horror.

“I forgot the vacuum bags” is all she says. She didn’t have to remind me that July was our month, gone, never to return, no more bags for you.

“Nnnnnnnnnooooooooooooooooooooooooo!” I shriek, as the receiver drops from my shaking hand.

The vacuum bag Nazi won. He knew it the whole time. Game over.

Vacuum man, I’ll see YOU in HELL!

Lessons from a bounty hunter

I’ve mentioned that I used to work in a couple of auto parts store. I started out as a stock boy, delivery boy, and then moved on to counterman/manager/outside salesman over the course of about 8 years. We had some interesting people come through on a regular basis, but one of the most colorful had to be the guy known only as “The Bounty Hunter”.

1st encounter: I am in the back stock room doing inventory of the restock items, checking numbers and marking them off the list, when I am brutally attacked from behind. I’m 15 years old by the way. My arms are pulled back behind by back, handcuffs are slapped on them and I am torn over the back of the chair and dragged backwards kicking and trying to free myself. He drags me through the front of the store and out the front door and as I look up I see all of the countermen laughing. He stands me up outside and takes off the handcuffs and says “you have always got to be prepared for an attack. I could have had you in a car and gone forever, right in front of everyone, and you didn’t do a thing about it.” I had never met the guy before in my life. He says “I’m the bounty hunter”. The bounty hunter…not a bounty hunter..THE bounty hunter, and that is how he is known to everyone to this day, if he is still alive, that is.

He was older and had a weathered face, gristly looking dude, the kind of guy you would look at and say he is either homeless or a killer and most likely, both.

2^nd encounter: I am helping a customer at the front counter and he walks in the side door. The customer leaves and he walks up with a 12 gauge assault shotgun with a mounted flashlight and a shell tube that must hold at least 10 shells. He throws it on the counter and says “Have you ever seen a ‘Can’ gun before?” I say “A can gun?” He says “Yup, Mexi-can, Puertori-can, Afri-can.” Now, when a racist has a gun, maybe this isn’t the time to call him out, so I just giggle and say a little prayer that he does not attack me again.

3^rd encounter: Again, I’m helping someone at the counter. He doesn’t wait for the person to leave, but strolls up (he kinda had a limp) and as I turn my attention to the customer, he throws a leg up on the counter. A frikin’ leg. It is a prosthetic. He unstrapped the thing and threw it on the counter. One legged bastard got me again. He then tells me how he has been shot, stabbed, run over..”And those are just wounds from my Ex’s, hehehe.”

4^th and 5^th encounter: I mention to him that I wanted to find a switch blade knife, and did he know where I could find one. He pulled one out of his pocket and I admired it. Next time in, he threw me one and said, “you can have it”. It had a pink pearl handle, but still was awesome. I’m still not sure if that was another way for him to call me a girl, but I still have it 16 years later. He was now handing out illegal weapons to minors.

6^th encounter: I get bold and ask him what the toughest guy he ever took into custody was like. He says “I’ve taken some big guys but I’ll pick them any day over a woman. Women are mean and it may not hurt the same when they punch you, but they’ll run you over with their damn car. I’ve never had a guy try to run me over, but women will run you down, they want you dead.”

Sometime later: He came in fairly often, always with a wacky story and life advice for me. I’m not sure if he had already given all of this advice to the others and I was just a new kid, but he had information just for me. The most memorable was his mandate on sex. He said “Do you want to know the secret of keeping a woman happy in the bedroom?”

“I’m listening.”

“You take this to heart and you will be the best lover ANY woman has ever had.
When it comes to Sex, treat a whore like a queen and treat a queen like a whore.”

Who says you can’t get a life lesson from a one legged, racist, scarred and battered, bad-ass bounty hunter?

May I help you?

I really hate to sound like the old grandpa that says “Back in my day people were polite, they believed in hard work, and the customer was always right.” I’m only 32, but wow, grandpa was right. Have you been to a store lately? I am stunned at the lack of customer service everywhere.

Here is a little background info. I worked as a counterman and delivery boy for about 8 years at a couple of different auto part stores. I worked with the public, mechanics, vendors, drivers, etc. This is a few years back, but my wage never exceeded $6.50/hr. so it is not like I made any money. Still, I always tried to help the customer, greeted them, thanked them, and generally tried to do my job.

Flash forward a few years and I walk into Autozone to pick up a generic door handle or something. I am happy to see they carry the same line of accessories that I used to sell, so I know what is available. The shelf is empty so I go to the counter. The two people working the counter are talking with one another and make me wait literally 5 min. until they finish their personal conversation to help me. When I tell them what I want, they tell me which isle to check. I inform them that it isn’t in stock. They look in the computer and say they don’t make it. I ask if they have a catalogue because I know right where it is if they will let me look. They reiterate that the computer shows nothing. I reiterate that I know it is available for special order and I see the book right there behind them. In anger and disgust they tell me I am wrong and say “Sorry, I don’t know what to tell you.” I leave, angry.

Next, I need a little piece of vacuum hose. Because Autozone hasn’t been the best, I go to a Shuck’s. I walk in with hose in hand and wait for 15min this time for the man to finish with the person in front of me. On at least 5 occasions he looked up at me and what I had in my hand. 15min. later, when it is my turn, I take two steps forward and he says “Nope, dealer item.” Thanks, you could have said that 15 min. earlier. Never-the-less, I ask if I can look at their vacuum hoses, he says nope, we have nothing like that. I say, “You don’t have bulk vacuum hose?” He says, “Well, yes..but not that size.” I point to the exact size that they do have and I need five feet behind him and he angrily goes back to cut me some. Now I am holding a 6 inch piece of hose. He says, how much do you want? I hold up the hose and say “This much”. He says, “Sorry, we can’t sell anything less than one foot”…. and starts to walk back to me like I am going to leave. What the hell? So I say, “Then I guess I will take a foot.” Again, visibly angry, he walks back over, chops off a foot of it and then throws it at me. I go up and pay feeling like a jack ball, an angry jack ball.

So these are just a couple of examples at auto part stores, but it seems to be everywhere. There is no pride in work, no more “Thank you” at the end of transactions, no acknowledgment that a customer is standing two feet away waiting for help. What is going on?

Last week, a lady waited on my wife in Wal-Mart…I know, I know. She was filthy. Stained shirt (new spaghetti over old grime), greasy- uncombed hair, and reeking of cabbage and salted meats. I’m talking worse than disgusting, and she was handling our food. You can be the poorest piece of mountain trash in Boise and still be reasonably clean.

I won’t even go into the customer service at Circuit City, if you have ever walked in those doors, you know.

So, I have a message for all of you people that work with the public daily. I don’t care that you only make minimum wage. I don’t care that you still live at home at the age of 40. I really don’t care that your girlfriend was out with your brother last night and you are in a bad mood. When I pay you, say “Thank you”, for your company’s sake. When I stand next to you with that inquisitive look on my face, say “May I help you?”, and make it sound like you are not frustrated with the question. Finally, when I ask you something you don’t know, ask someone else, don’t feed me a line of crap that you don’t have it because this is frickin’ Wal-Mart. You have everything.