Talking To Who?

 It's funny...how entitled people can be. How customers can think you're a mind reader. Or think that because they speak you're listening.

Like...there I was. Bagging up fish. 

I wasn't looking up. I was focused on the task at hand.

When I hear a voice say "Can you get me some crickets when you're done?"

I look up in time to see two girls passing by. Not even looking at me. And they continue walking along the fishwall to the front of the store.

A glance around shows me that I'm the only worker in the area.

And that there are other customers nearby.

But I had no idea who this girl was talking to.

Like I knew she was talking to me.

But like she didn't even wait for me to acknowledge if I'd heard her or not before she kept walking. 

It was just weird. I mean...I can't read minds. Saying that you 'want crickets' doesn't mean I automatically know what size of crickets the customer wanted nor how many she wanted me to get.

*shakes head*

So I just pushed it to the side and continued on with my task and finished helping the customer I was helping and then helped the other people who were still at the fish wall because again...the customer who randomly walked by and told me to bag her some crickets...wasn't around. Therefore her 'need' became a lower priority on my list because again, I couldn't even be sure she was talking to me when she didn't even stick around long enough to ensure that I had actually heard her and would help her.

She did come back eventually and I did bag up the number and size of crickets that she wanted after I asked her what amount and size she wanted.

But yah....kinda a weird occurrence that. 

-Sarnic Dirchi

Counting Crickets

 I honestly don't like it when people expect me to Math for them. 

Especially first thing in the morning.

And today. I had two different people want me to Math for them within like the first half hour of the store being open. 

*exhales*

The first customer was like "Hey I need $20 worth of crickets."

.... 

.....

....

Like dude....I have no idea how many crickets you can get for twenty bucks. Most people just say "Hey I need a dozen" "60" "20" and we call it good.

Because we don't sell crickets in 'bundles' like "Hey this box has $5 worth of crickets in it."

No our prebagged bags have numbers to them. "6, 12, 24 etc" saying how many crickets are in the bag.

But it's up to you to math it out yourself.

*exhales*

Like...$20?

I can tell you that you can get 10 small crickets for $1.30 because they're 13 cents each.

But like the price goes down as you get more.

And as you get more...it gets more complicated...to figure out just how many crickets you get for so much money.

*exhales*

Honestly....it was probably just the early morning hour. Because like. The lowest we go for crickets is 11 cents for the smalls if you get 76 or more.

If the crickets had been 10 cents each then $20 worth of crickets would be like 200 crickets. 

Knowing that they're 11 cents...I probably could have just done 175 and called it good.

Though I did actually math it out and guesstimated that around 180 would be $20.

Of course that's before Tax. But hey. I doubt most people know how taxing works or what price gets added to your overall cost.

But yah.

Frustrating. That the customer expected me to know this information like right away.

Like dude. I haven't taken math since high school. And at this early hour I'm not in the mood to math things out.

*shakes head*

The other customer was slightly more simple.

They wanted 15 small crickets.

Easy enough to grab.

But then they were like "How much is that?"

Like...I have no idea?

The crickets are 13 cents each.

10 would be $1.30

Adding 5 more would put the total to around $2 or so. 

....

Yah.

I don't like mathing first thing. 

-Sarnic Dirchi

No I Don't Have Any

 With the cold weather that hit like...73% of the United States last week....we've been experiencing shortages in many of our animal shipments.

As it's been too cold to ship things out and such.

To the point where we received a notice that most of our shipments have been cancelled until things 'warm up' basically. 

Which....isn't good...when people are wanting creatures and we don't have them.

The major issue has been with our reptile food. Aka the crickets and the worms and such.

As I only ever receive my worms on Thursday.

But because of the cold...that shipment didn't show up.

And my crickets...well we haven't gotten any since...I don't know? Wednesday? When we usually get shipments in at least twice a week--though with how much they've been shorting us in our shipments we've been getting in shipments practically daily....

Only for us to get nothing.

Like by Saturday I was out of crickets.

And I keep having people call asking if we have any...and we don't.

And they want to know when we're going to get more in.

And we basically have to shrug and go "maybe tomorrow" 

Which I've been saying "Maybe tomorrow" since Saturday. 

But because of the weather...we've got nothing and because there's no crickets people are turning to other bugs to buy in the meantime and since I only had a minimal supply of those they ended up selling rather quickly and yah....

It's not fun to run out of things.

Because I don't like telling people no.

And today has been quite the "no" day.

Not just with crickets but with like....everything.

Like fish? We haven't gotten in like Angelfish or Clown Loaches or a handful of other types in over a month.

Birds? They didn't send me any so I've been out of birds for a week.

Guinea Pigs? Sold them all.

Reptiles? Ha. We only have like two frogs and four anoles left. Everything else? Empty.

Hamsters? We've sold through enough that we're back to only using 6 of the 16 cages we have available.

We're low on everything.

And I have no idea when we'll be getting anything in. Like will the weather have warmed up enough in the U.S. to ship things around again? To be able to get all our creatures in? Who knows. It's the waiting game at this point.

-Sarnic Dirchi

NOT Self Serve

I don't understand some customers.

Like...we're in the middle of a pandemic....and yet there are some individuals out there who think it's okay to touch things that they shouldn't be touching.

Like today I discovered a customer at our cricket podium...bagging his own crickets.

Which is not something we ever let customers do. It's not a self serve station. We bag up the crickets for the customers.

Mostly because many customers lie. And they would probably bag up 100 crickets and then claim they were only buying like 10. *shakes head*

But yah, this guy just went a head and gave himself 6 large crickets while I was like "Dude, you can't do that."

Did he care? Nope. 

He didn't even properly put things away. Just left them willy nilly. XP 

It had me seeing red.

Like...dude...I don't know if you're new here, but the cricket podium is NOT self serve. DO NOT TOUCH. And like we have a button on said podium that lets you call help to you.

And it was even more infuriating because like...I'd been gone from that podium for maybe two minutes? You couldn't wait 2 minutes to have someone help you? 

Plus it meant that I had to go through and wipe down and sanitize everything he'd potentially touched to be safe.

Yah. Did not like this guy. At all.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Wanted Dead

 So there's this customer that comes into the store.

That is rather obsessed with well...'saving things'

Pretty sure they come from the great depression era where you use a thing until it's completely dust and save everything 'just in case' it comes in handy later.

For a long while this customer would come get the eggs that our Finches and Canaries would lay and would ask us to save them so that they could then take them, freeze dry them?? do something to them to make them 'collectable' and like make dioramas or whatever to give to schools? I honestly don't know.

But it's been around a year or so since we've done that for that customer.

Mostly because we started selling the birds in our store faster and therefore didn't give them time to lay eggs. But also because the customer stopped asking for them. It could be that they had enough of it...or else enough new people are now working in the store that don't know about this that the customer gave it up.

In any case.

I've also seen this customer try and save cardboard images of like dogs and cats that were headers on displays we were no longer needing. And yah....basically if they see anything getting thrown away they want to double check and make sure they can't use it or repurpose it in some way first.

It's about 50/50 with this customer on their success rate of convincing us to give them things. Some items we're like 'sure have at it' but others we're like 'no we can't do that.'

Today's event included our crickets. 

As apparently the customer is now caring for a spider and needed to get some crickets to feed it. 

When I found the customer they were peering into our small cricket bin. Like lid up head stuck into the bin peering inside.

And I was like "Can I help you?" 

And they were like "Do you sell the dead crickets?"

Because I'd received in a cold shipment of crickets earlier and hadn't yet swept up the dead that had come in as I was waiting to see if any of them would come out of hibernation as sometimes the cold doesn't kill them just makes them sleep.

But most of the time customer want the live crickets because the creatures that eat them like to hunt for their food.

So I was like "No we don't sell the dead ones."

I mean...we do sell the freeze dried dead crickets. There's canned versions and bottled versions of them that customers can buy.

But sell dead ones from the live cricket bin? No. We don't do that. 

Mostly because it can be a biohazard? As we don't know what the creature died from and we don't want to risk getting a person sick from handling the dead creature, or have their pet get sick from eating the freshly dead creature. Plus like...the ammonia that the dead crickets give off can stink rather bad. 

And the customer wasn't fazed at all. They were like "Oh, if you don't sell them can I just have some? My spider will eat them."

Again no. For the reasons stated above. It's a safety issue. 

*shakes head* It reminds me of the people who want to buy the dead goldfish on occasion. Most want it for filming but occasionally they want them for other reasons and like....No we don't sell them and we don't give them away just for safety and public image and such.

So yah, this customer didn't get their dead crickets.

But I did catch them like 5 live ones to go feed to their spider. *shakes head*

-Sarnic Dirchi

Wrong Wrong Wrong

 It was a day for weird animal shenanigans apparently.

Mostly because like ALL the animals came into the store today. *shakes head* 

Like usually on Friday's I only expect to get in our Fish Shipment...if our Truck is in on time. Which surprisingly it was for once. It arrived before 10 am which is a miracle honestly because the trucks have been showing up towards the late afternoon for the past little while. 

But it was great news as it would give me something to do during my shift.

And overall putting out the fish went without hassle....except I got in a bag of fish that were labeled "4 bolivian ram cichlids" and when I looked at the bag to see if there were any dead within it...I could immediately see that 2 of them were not in fact bolivian rams. No they definitely were 2 blue acara cichlids instead.

And while the other 2 cichlids in that bag appeared at first to be the bolivians....upon placing them in the tank and seeing them with the other bolivians we had already there...I realized that the other two were convict cichlids instead.

So they sent me 2 blue acaras and 2 convicts....instead of 4 bolivians. *shakes head* 

But we also got in our reptile shipment today as well and the paperwork said we were only getting in 1 ball python....but there were 2 in the box. O_o 

I later discovered that there was a second invoice behind the first that showed this second ball python on it.

But it was weird to look at the first invoice and realize that they sent us one snake extra.

*exhales* I notified the company about the 2 ball pythons before I realized that there was a second invoice for the 2nd python....so hopefully we don't end up with 3 in the system when I should only have 2.

In any case. 

We also ended up getting a cricket shipment in that was supposed to have 7,500 large crickets in it. But in typical fashion 4,100 of them were missing. 

And we also received in our small pet/bird shipment today too because the delivery ended up having truck issues and couldn't deliver them yesterday. And for once all the animals in our shipment showed up.

One of them being a chinchilla. 

And I'm used to them being a certain size.

But the chinchilla we got in today is like twice the size of the one already in the cage. He has to be fully grown and he's giant!! lol *shakes head* 

So yah...it's just been a weird day when it comes to animals. 

-Sarnic Dirchi

Chameleon Fascination

 Had a homeless guy come into the store today and become fascinated with our chameleon. 

As the chameleon had come to the front of its cage and appeared to be interacting with him as he put his finger up next to it. 

As I was walking past, he turned to me and asked if he could hold the chameleon. 

I had to tell him that due to the pandemic, we aren't allowing the handling of pets unless the individual is planning to buy the animal that day.

To which the dude went on a spiel of how he had worked for some institute of health/science/something and he and his team had eradicated viruses so they no longer existed.

*shakes head*

No...pretty sure you didn't get rid of all viruses. Especially since my state broke a new record on reported covid cases today. 

And even if he had destroyed all viruses...I still couldn't let him hold the pet per our current policies. 

He didn't like that much...

And a little while later he wandered by our fish wall asking if we had any crickets. To which I showed him them and he asked if the chameleon would eat little crickets.

I could see where he was heading. Either he wanted to buy some crickets to feed to our chameleon, or else he wanted us to feed the chameleon so he could watch. 

I had to shut him down again though by telling him that we'd already fed the chameleon this morning.

It didn't dissuade him though. He mentioned coming back tomorrow then to feed the chameleon then.

I wonder if he'll actually come...hopefully I'm not around if he does. 

-Sarnic Dirchi

Stay.

I never quite understand the people who walk away.

Like when I'm trying to help a customer and I tell them to "stay here, I'll be right back." only to find them gone when I return to where I left the customer and I end up having to hunt all over the store for them to either find them somewhere else or that they left the store in the two minutes I left them to wait for.

*exhales* It's irritating. Like I can get being bored and not wanting to stay in one spot.

But it does make it difficult for the worker to find you if they can't find you where they left you.

It makes even less sense to press a button requesting assistance...and then walk away from the button.

Which is what happened today. As I had a customer press the button on our cricket podium requesting help.

But the ten seconds it took me to get from behind the fish wall to in front of the fish wall to help the customer...they'd completely vanished. No one was in sight.

No, I ended up finding the customer five aisles away looking at water bottles meant for rabbits and guinea pigs and other small pets.

And like...he needed crickets as well.

But he didn't stay by the podium to get those crickets.

And he's lucky that I went hunting for him, otherwise the dude may have never gotten his crickets...because it's not like we know exactly who pressed the button until we get over to the podium to see who was standing there.

I could see the guy probably thinking that it would take a couple of minutes for somebody to get over to him and he probably remembered that he needed to get a water bottle and thought he could grab the water bottle and then come back to the podium before anyone got to him....

I could see that happening.

But still. If you press a button....it's a good idea to stay by the button.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Cricket Traps

 We had the pest control guy come into the store today to check the traps he'd set around the store to...well trap the pests that could potentially enter the store.

Namely bugs like spiders, or ants, or larger animals like mice--though that hasn't been an issue...really.....

I mean he did end up catching a mouse in one of the traps...but it was one of our 'for sale' mice that had escaped from his cage and vanished.

Y_Y;; kinda wish we'd found him before he died. *exhales* Note to keep in mind if one escapes again. Check the traps daily just in case.

In any case.

The dude mentioned that he was surprised at how many crickets he could catch in our store. Like 50-60 each time he comes in.

Which wasn't that surprising to me because like....we sell crickets....and said crickets get loose all the time.

However....

The pest control dude hadn't known that lol.

He just thought we had a high influx of crickets in the store randomly.

*shakes head* lol it made more sense to him when I showed him where we kept our crickets and told him that we sell them and that they escape.

He was like "Oooooh"

Yep.

So yah. Finding crickets in the traps? Not surprising at all. lol

-Sarnic Dirchi

$5 Worth

I had a customer come into the store today who wanted to get some crickets.

To which I responded that while I had small crickets, I was out of my large.

Typically...the customer then was like  "How big are your large crickets?"

....I don't know why customers can't hear certain words.

Like "Do you want Small OR Large?" and without fail the customer will say "Medium"

And apparently if I say "We're out of large crickets." Customers don't hear the fact that we're OUT of crickets aka we don't have that size. *shakes head*

So I had to repeat myself "I don't have any large crickets, I only have small."

Which is always a conundrum to customers. 

In any case the customer was like "I need $5 worth of small crickets" 

Which is another thing I hate when customers do. It's not like I know how many crickets certain amounts will cost. 

Usually people just tell me an amount of crickets not a dollar amount.

So I had to mentally calculate first thing in the morning how many crickets a customer could get for $5.

It's around 35.

So I bagged up that amount and gave it to the customer.

To which the customer was like "This is the amount for $5?! How much are the crickets?!" 

To which I had to explain that the smalls are 14 cents each unless you buy a certain amount and then the price goes down a penny. Over 36 would be 13, 51 would be 12, 76+ would be 11 cents each. 

And the customer was like "Then I want the 76!"

*exhales* Which 76 crickets isn't $5 it's more than that....and like if you wanted 76 why did you not say 76 crickets in the first place. *shakes head* 

-Sarnic Dirchi

All the Crickets

We got in a mountain of crickets today.

Okay it wasn't a 'mountain'
But we got in far more crickets today than we usually do.
Which was really nice actually, as we've been going through a cricket shortage.

So to actually get in a ton of crickets that will probably last us the weekend instead of running out after a day is really really gratifiying.

Though in typical fashion.
The shipments of crickets were shorted.
Like they have been for the past two years or so.

As I was supposed to get in around 5,000 large crickets and 5,500 small crickets.

But only got in around 2,000 large crickets and 2,700 small crickets.

Sooo not the best of shipments.
But having over 2,000 crickets available to sell to customers compared to the paltry 400-500 we'd been receiving the past couple of weeks was really nice.

Hopefully they'll last us until our next shipment comes in.
But we'll see.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Apologies

Had a customer come into the store today wanting crickets.
Which lucky him, he came in just as our bug shipment came in, so he could get the large crickets that he wanted to get instead of the smalls that I had had available until that point. 

He looked familiar but I didn't place him as anyone in particular.
Until he apologized for how he had acted the last time he'd come into the store.

Which it took a bit more conversation to place him.
But this was the customer who had tried to bag his own crickets and got upset at me that there was 'no sign' saying that he couldn't bag his own crickets. That this wasn't a 'self serve' station.

Honestly, I probably wouldn't have connected him with the past event unless he brought it up.

But I'm glad that he took the time to apologize for his behavior.
Because it definitely made the interaction this time around easier. 

-Sarnic Dirchi

No Medium Ever

It's funny in a way.
How many customers are shocked that we don't carry 'medium' crickets.
Because like...we've never carried medium crickets.
For the past 8 years we've never carried medium crickets.

It's always large or small.
Never medium.

And yet without fail.
If I ask a customer if they want large or small
They respond with medium.
*shakes head*
I should just give them the large crickets because most of the time that's the size of cricket that they want.

But yah...I got that again today.
A customer wanting medium crickets.
And acting surprised that I didn't have any.
"When are you gonna get more?"

Never.
It's small OR large.
There's no medium available.
*shakes head*
Silly silly customer. 

-Sarnic Dirchi

Crickets?

I had a customer come into the store today wanting some large crickets.
And while I had gotten some in on Tuesday.
By the end of Wednesday...I was completely out of them again.
And unfortunately for the customer he'd come in a tad too early for my expected shipment of Thursday crickets where hopefully I would be getting in some large crickets.
As my shipment yesterday had only contained smalls. *shakes head* 

But the customer couldn't exactly come back later.
So he requested I give him 30 smalls since we were out of large.
Which I did.

HOWEVER.

Just as he reached the counter to check out.
Our delivery guy came in with our bug shipment.
A shipment which, when I checked, did have Large Crickets in the boxes woot!
(Though they shorted me 63 containers of Mealworms. >_< booo ) 

But the customer happened to notice.
And so requested if we had large, to get the 30 large crickets he'd originally come in to get.

Which took a little bit of time as I had to reach the level the crickets were on and open the box and dump the box into the bin so I could actually get the crickets he needed.

But hey!
He got the crickets so woot! 

-Sarnic Dirchi 

Out of Stock

Customers have the weirdest expectations.
Like...I don't know how many times I've been helping or working nearby and a customer presses the button on our cricket podium requesting assistance...and I'm like...right there.

Like I get that there are some individuals who just want to be helped as quickly as possible and so expect there to be more workers waiting in the shadows to come help them...when in reality it's just me available on the floor.
Or like....there are customers who 'don't want to bother me' when they see me doing a task and so press the button to request someone else to help them....like...I was right there....and again...it's not like we have multiple people waiting in the shadows to come out and help. If I do have other employees with me, they're usually busy doing other tasks as well. And calling for them to come assist only means that you're interrupting their task...
Like...I don't get the logic of it.

But today....today was *shakes head*

We're out of crickets.
We've posted signs saying that we're out of crickets.
On both sides of the cricket podium and on the button itself so that people won't call us over requesting crickets when we don't have them.

Customers can't read.
Or observe.

As I was literally on a ladder right next to the cricket podium. Like a foot away from the cricket podium, scrubbing tanks.

And this customer comes into the store....and is totally oblivious to everything.
Because she comes right in and presses the button.

And I'm just like "...I'm right here."
"Oh perfect!" she says...and I don't know if she realized I was actually there on the ladder or not or if she was just so oblivious to everything but her phone that she didn't realize i was there.
But her next words were "I need 20 Large Crickets."

And I just had to like...shake my head?
Because how oblivious can you be to NOT READ the sign RIGHT BELOW the button saying CRICKETS OUT OF STOCK?

Apparently completely oblivious.
Or she just can't read.
Or like....apparently as other workers have told me...people just don't believe the signs are true and will go ask other associates around the store to make sure we're actually out of crickets.

But she was totally like ?!!?! WHAT?!?!!? when I told her we were out of crickets.

Like lady...the sign is right there?
*shakes head*

-Sarnic Dirchi

On the Loose

Had a family come into the store today who were all gung ho about buying a leopard gecko for their kids.
They had the cage and everything that the leopard gecko needed to do well.
And as I was about to give them the paperwork....the mother was like "Do the crickets escape?"

To which I simply said "Yes."
To which she was like ()_() 
And I was like: "Yah, it's only a matter of time before they get loose"

To which the children were like "How?!"
And I proceeded to list just how they could get loose.

And the mom was like "Nope nope nope nope nope." 
Because she didn't want to have to deal with any loose crickets in the house that might chirp at night.

The family ended up buying a fish tank instead to put fish in. 

-Sarnic Dirchi

A Foot Away

So we have a button on our cricket podium that people can press if no one is standing nearby that will notify us over the radios that a customer needs help over by the fish/crickets. 

It hasn't really been used that much because it's still pretty new.

I have noticed though that people tend to choose  to press it....when I'm standing nearby...but usually I'm helping another person.

Like it's interesting.
I can see why they would press the button.
Because the only worker they see is busy.
And they're probably hoping to get help sooner by calling over a second person.

Unfortunately for them. We're on a skeleton crew.
So oftentimes only one person is available to help...and if I'm busy helping another customer...they just have to wait their turn. 

Today though was different.

Because I wasn't helping anyone.

No I was literally standing like a foot away from the cricket podium. 
As I was on the ladder scrubbing the fish tanks closest to the podium. 

My back was to it though.
As I was focused on scrubbing the tanks.

but then I hear the call over the radio. Where a customer needed help at the fish wall. 

So I look up.
And there's this girl standing right there.

Like...I'm literally only a foot away from the cricket podium.

*shakes head*
She could have just been like "umm, excuse me, could you get me some crickets?" 

No need to press the button.
I was standing right there.

But the customer was like "Oh I didn't want to disturb you." 

Well....considering I was the only person in my department. She was gonna disturb me even if I wasn't standing at right there two feet away from her. *shakes head*

Like...I'm glad she didn't want to interrupt my task. But at the same time...you could have just asked me outright for help. 

We don't have people just standing around waiting to help customers. We're all busy with some task. So no matter what, you're interrupting us. 

In any case.
I helped the customer answer her questions about bugs and habitats for lizards as her family had caught a wild lizard and wanted to care for it. 

But yah...literally standing a foot away.
*shakes head*

-Sarnic Dirchi

Still Miffed

So last week? I think it was last week. Idk time goes weird. maybe it was the week before last week.

We had a shortage in crickets.

To the point where we spent a week with a sign posted over the cricket containers saying that customers couldn't buy more than 51 crickets. 

Which...when we occasionally have customers come in who want 100-200 crickets at a time....can make them rather unhappy.

Which was the case with one of my regular customers who routinely gets 150 large crickets like every week. Every other week? 

Again who knows what's going on with time.

Often enough that I see this customer constantly.

And they were not happy when they came in to get their usual 150 crickets and could only buy 51 of them that week.

It wasn't like we were purposely being difficult.

It was just what corporate wanted us to do because we knew there was a shortage coming and we weren't quite sure for how long it would last. 

Thankfully it was only like...a week and a half maybe? Before we went back to having our normal cricket shipments.

But I think this customer is still miffed at us for the last time they came into the store and only let them buy 51. 

As I heard the call over the radio that a customer needed help over by the fish/crickets.

And when I rounded the corner I saw this regular customer with their friend pressing the button for maybe the third time.

And I was like "Can I get you your 150?" because I saw that they had grabbed like three bags of the prebagged crickets and figured they wanted their 150 again. 

Which I didn't have any issues with this week because again, the shortage is over and customers can buy however many crickets they want.

But the customer was like "I have 110 here, will that ring up for the discount even if they're bagged separately?" 

"Yes?" Was my response. 

And they quickly left.

So yah....

Since the customer didn't stick around to chitchat like usual...I'm guessing they're still miffed at us for limiting the amount of crickets they could get last week.

*exhales*

Yah....maybe they'll be more chill next week.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Press the Button

It had been rather crazy at work today. Like barely room to breathe sort of crazy where it was basically going from customer to customer to customer helping them. 
But I found a moment to step behind the fishwall for a breather. Like maybe for two minutes tops. 
And when I came out with my manager who had also paused behind the fishwall for a breather, we discovered a man and his son trying to bag their own crickets.

My manager was quick to point out "That's not a self service station, sir."

To which the guy flippantly stated "Well, there was no one standing here."

Like...yah...there wasn't anyone standing there. It's not like we hire someone just to stand at the cricket podium their entire shift waiting for people to come get crickets. 
It wasn't even a thing before the whole pandemic hit. 
And it's even less of a thing now when we're on a skeleton crew and there's only three people in the store and it's a busy saturday afternoon where everyone has come in needing help and we're trying to ensure people don't wait too long to get assistance even though it's nearly impossible when there's just me in the department because we only have three people and the third person is currently backing up the cashier. 

*exhales* 
But like. We literally had been away from the podium for two minutes and the dude didn't even try to find anyone or ask for help.

We were like "There's a button to call for service."

"I don't see it." Was his response. He said it in such a way that I could tell he thought we were making it up. 
We gestured to the button on the podium that said "Need an associate press here" on it. 

In any case.
I ended up helping him finish get his small crickets that he'd been attempting to bag.
And sent him on his way while I went to go help other customers in the department.

It may have been like ten minutes later that our radios rang with the 'there's a customer waiting in aquatics' voice indicating that someone had pressed the button and needed help.

Finishing up as quickly as I could with the customer I was helping, I made my way over to the cricket podium and rounded the corner in time to see the boy that the man had been with running away from the podium to the doors where the man waited where they quickly left the store.

...
...
... 
I'm guessing they were testing the button?? *shakes head* I'm not sure. Or was it just a vindictive thing? Who knows. 

Still.
Gotta love dealing with the self-entitled customers who think they're in the right when they're not.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Few Crickets Big Need

Gotta love those days when you're low on crickets.
Because like...maybe you'll be able to make it through the day without running out.
Especially if customers don't need crickets today.
Or if they only need small quantities under like 20 each or something.

Maybe. Just maybe we could eke it out until our Cricket Shipment comes in.

Or not.

Because of course the first customers I help in the morning are people wanting a ton of small crickets.
Small crickets that we don't really have many of.

And the first customer wanted me to bag them up 80 small crickets.

Which when I was pretty certain I only had like maybe 200ish left...is a lot of crickets.

And then the second customer came in.
And wanted 76 crickets.

*exhales*

Which meant that I probably only had like...maybe 50 or at most a 100 crickets left for the rest of the day...and we'd only been open for like maybe an hour. 

Not. 
Good.

*shakes head*

Why do the customers need the big amount of crickets right when you don't have that many??

-Sarnic Dirchi