Why I'm Thin...

My experience yesterday reinforced my belief in education. I was dangerously low on both eggs and motor oil and I'd promised the Lovely Jules that we would have an oil changing party soon. We'd gone to the trouble of squeezing in, in front of her Chevy pickup, that she keeps tightly stored against her garage wall, to check to see what size engine she has, and now all that was left was to buy the oil and filter.

Costco near Paradise Valley Mall was my destination. I chose that one because I was going to spontaneously call Noel and ask her to meet me there for a mid-afternoon rendezvous, but once I got there, I forgot all about her and started shopping. Suddenly I remembered that I had my Costco year end check in my pocket and I'd be able to use it to soften the blow of my bill. As an Executive Member, Costco refunds 2% of my annual purchases at the end of the year in a Costco check, rendering the $100 charge for this membership economical.

When I checked out, my net bill was like $40 and didn't seem to bother my finances too much. Hell, the case of oil was $30! My next stop was Checker, where I have a wholesale account, to purchase the oil filters. Here lies the reason for this story. I thought you'd be wondering.

After waiting my turn at the back counter, a young man that had not taken time to brush his teeth for quite some time, greeted me.

"May I help you sir?"

"Yes, I'd like 2 oil filters for an 01 Chevy pickup with a 5.3 engine and an 04 Toyota Corolla, they all have the same 4 cylinder engines and it's for resale."

That's when the young man walked away from me to chase down those oil filters. He quickly walked to a shelf and with each hand took one off the shelf. I noticed this young man from the rear, that he was extremely thin and wore his Levi's so low that he had to keep his legs apart, to keep his pants from falling to the floor. He had prison issued tattoos covering his arms with the ever popular spider web around his elbows. I marvelled how he kept his pants well below his buttocks and they didn't fall down. I suspected they were safety pinned to his underwear (if he wore any).

He returned, handed me the oil filters and remarked that the big one was for the truck. He then said to me, "That will be $9.98" and I handed him a 20 dollar bill and he made change and gave me my receipt. I inspected my receipt and was shocked to see that he had not given me a discount or waived the sales tax, as I am a wholesale customer and am registered with the state accordingly, with a resale number. That's when it happened.

He put his hands on his hips and acted like he wanted to fight me. He turned all red and screamed that I can't just walk in here and claim to be a wholesale customer and expect him to issue me a discount. I have to give him my resale number and other things. I was going to say, "Yes, I can" when I realized this dude was out of control and was not really meant to be in a job where he deals with humans. He needed to be in a machine shop somewhere AWAY from people, but with the economy the way it is, this is the result. I calmly told him that I did indeed have a resale number and WAS indeed again, a wholesale customer, but it's fine and not worth the extra work to correct. It only meant a $3 discount or 1/3 of the cost to correct, but I could see him coming over the counter to kill me to satisfy his needs and simply left. I COULD have gone to McDonald's and ordered off the dollar menu, but instead went hungry :(