Neighborhood ChitChat

I had a customer call this morning.
Wanting to know if we carried love birds.
And when I told her we didn't.
She asked what sort of birds we carried.

So I told her.

....only to have her ask me to repeat myself....because I had listed them too fast for her to comprehend.

-Yes I was totally wondering if I would end up in another A-r-K/C scenario.

But thankfully it didn't happen that way.

Lol.
So it turns out the customer was calling because she'd recently had her parakeet die.
And she was looking to get a new bird, and had not yet decided if she wanted to get another parakeet, or if she wanted to try a different species of bird.

The funny thing...
Is that she was quite the rambler.
I was reminded of those neighborhood chats you have with your next door neighbor on the phone, where you basically just call to shoot the breeze.

Because the woman told me the life story of like three of her birds, and experiences she'd had watching people deal with birds, and how she thinks, and how her neighbor thinks, and eventually the conversation wound its way to left-handed people and how all three of her kids were lefties...

lol.
Normally I'm less than a fan of these sort of rambling conversations.
Mostly because, since I'm at work, I kinda want people to get to the point of what they need so I can answer their question and move onto the next customer in line.

But she'd called in the morning, when we were really slow.
Like no people in the store whatsoever.
And since I wasn't needing to help customers in the store.
I just let her chat to me on the phone while I worked on scrubbing fish tanks.
After all, I didn't need my ears in order to scrub. lol. And I could easily keep the phone to my ear while doing this task.
So I let her blabber on. (admittedly I was trying to find a way to end the conversation, but couldn't find any good openings.)

But in the end. After letting her talk to me on the phone for 30 minutes.
She told me how grateful she was for me being willing to listen to her talk.
As she confirmed what I'd been thinking, that she'd been feeling rather lonely living by herself.

So I was glad that I was able to give her a bit of conversation and interaction in her day. :) I like helping people, and the stories she told me were actually quite entertaining lol.

So while she may not come in to get a bird, at least I made a phone friend today. :)

-Sarnic Dirchi

How Do You Spell That?

Besides catching evil parakeets and putting back fish ornaments into the tanks,
I have to say that my least favorite thing to do at work is answer the phone.

Because you never quite know what sort of situation you're going to find yourself in when you pick up the phone.
It could be as simple as "Do you guys carry guinea pigs? How much are they?" And you're good.
Or it could be a question that involves more than a two second answer.
Or it could be that the customer just needs to be transferred back to the grooming department because they ended up ringing out to the main part of the store.

It used to not be so bad, because my store has specific phones for specific calls. One for customer service, one for dog training, one for my department, two for grooming, etc.

But the past couple of weeks....
Something has gone wonky with our phone system where the division of calls to specific depts between the phones....doesn't always happen. (that or else the managers have gotten really bad at answering the other phones.)

So I've been answering a lot more phone calls recently where customers aren't always asking questions relating to my department.

*shakes head*
In any case.

This particular phone call was kinda in my dept.
As it's not uncommon for me to field questions in relation to the adoption groups that come into the store, as customers are always calling and asking when they're going to be in our store or what kind of dogs they bring in, how much fees are, etc.

So I picked up the ringing phone for probably the twelfth time in the last hour.
And on the other end of the line was an older woman.
She sounded like a grandmother.
Who was insistent that she wanted a teacup yorkie female dog.
And that she'd been told that our adoption groups came in this Saturday, and that she wanted to know if they had any teacup yorkies.

To which I started to explain to her that the adoption group wasn't coming in today and that they commonly have mixed breeds. It's rare for them to have full breeds in their adoption events.

But she interrupted me, asking me to speak slower. Because she's a 'slow thinker' (her words not mine) and she needed to comprehend what I was saying.
So again, I repeated it. I didn't have adoptions today. I would have them next Saturday. They'd be coming in about 1. Call back then. I don't know what dogs they carry. Usually they're mutts.

I basically had to repeat that information three times. With her repeating back to me what I was saying to her.

It was a very long conversation....which I wouldn't have minded...only I was by myself in the department (due to a scheduling error) and I had at least three other customers waiting for me to help them. (I shouldn't have answered the phone but I thought it would be a quick question and the managers had yet to really pick up the calls, I felt like, and this one was actually my dept specific)
So while I was explaining the adoptions to her, I was also catching fish and counting crickets and such.
-Which by the way it's not the easiest to count while listening to another person talking, but I managed.

In any case. Because we didn't have any dogs today, the woman on the phone wanted to know what other places could be carrying dogs. So I gave her the names of a few. But couldn't give her the phone numbers to the places because I don't have that at work.

Beyond wanting the phone numbers, she also wanted to know how to spell the names.
And one of the names of the local pet stores has "Ark" in it's name.

But for whatever reason. She couldn't comprehend that word.
Ark.
Like in Noah's Ark?

Yah no.
She had me spell it out and it basically went like so.

Me on phone with customer: Ark.
Customer: And how do you spell that?
Me: A-r-k
Customer: A-R-C??
Me: No, K...
Customer: C?
Me: No, K as in Kitten
Customer: C?
Me: K
Customer: So A-R-C
Me: *gives up* Yes.

Really....I must have tried to probably spell ark out to her at least a dozen times before I gave up on it and let her spell it out as ARC.

Because for what ever reason she couldn't hear the difference in what I was saying.

Which is weird.

You'd think that 'KAY" would be noticeably different from "SEA"

But to her, no it wasn't.

Whenever I said "K" she would hear "C"

*shakes head*

Hopefully she managed to find that store...because I did what I could to get her on the right track....

-Sarnic Dirchi

A Wet Fish Feeder

One of my coworkers came up to me after calling me over to the fish wall today.
He started out our conversation with a string of compliments. "Sarnic, you're a smart, capable, knowledgeable person."
This could only mean that he needed my help with a customer. lol.
"Depends on the situation I suppose." Was my response. "What do you need?"
"I have a customer" (ha called it.) "that has an issue I'm not quite sure how to answer."
"Okay, what is it?"
To which....he had me follow him to the customer so that the customer could explain their situation.

It was one of the more...obscure questions I've gotten.

In the fact that the guy has an automatic fish feeder, but he's noticed that the food within the feeder has been getting wet...despite the fact that there isn't a way for water to get inside.
So he was wondering if it was the humidity causing it.

To which I confirmed that, yes indeed it could be that.
Because no matter what you do, water will evaporate from your tank.
And evaporating liquid always moves up.
The fish feeders have to have a hole where the food comes out, so it makes sense that moisture would go up inside of the feeder and then get 'stuck' there, hence their food getting wet.

The customer then followed up with a more difficult question.
The question of: How do I get it to stop?
*blinks* Ummm.....

Honestly, I didn't know off the top of my head.
You can't really stop water from evaporating....
My first response was along the lines of: Well....you could just stop using the automatic feeder....
The next was a bit more helpful. "It may be that particular brand that has the issue, you could try a different automatic feeder and see if it's still an issue."

But then, in a burst of inspiration, as I was trying to think what else could cause the humidity to happen...
I asked the customer if his fish feeder was by his filter.
As maybe with fresh flowing water nearby, there's a bit more moisture being given off which would mean a higher likely hood of water making its way to places it shouldn't be.

The customer was like: "You know...it's actually right by the filter."
So I suggested that he move the feeder away from the filter and place it in a different spot in his tank to see if that would help.

Yay for finding the solutions!! lol.

-Sarnic Dirchi

Too Small

I can't help feeling a bit of triumph whenever I convince a customer to not purchase a pet.

Which probably sounds a bit weird since I work in a pet store where our goal is to sell pets (and everything they need to live) to people.

But because I have the ability to sell pets to everyone.

Doesn't mean I just let the person buy whatever pet they want.

I want to make sure that the animal gets a good life and has all the things they need to survive.

So when I find out that the customer doesn't have all these things, or doesn't want to spend the money on it, or just doesn't care, I try to lead them away from a purchase that would more than likely end up with the animal suffering.

In most cases this involves placing fish in bowls.

Other cases involve buying a reptile that will get too big for the small tank the customer wants.

But in regards to today.

It was fish.

I had a handful of teenage customers come into the store today.

To buy fish.

Originally I thought they were just looking around.

Until I heard them seriously debating about what fish to get.

Basically I tuned into them when they were saying "I want to get this black fish. (a black moor goldfish, and this yellow fish (an African cichlid), and a tiger barb as well!"

To which I had to interject.

"You don't want to put them in the same tank because the barb will nip the fishes fins and the cichlid would kill the other fish."

Of course, this was breaking news to them. (it is to most people that all fish don't get along with each other.)

It was funny actually, because the girl who wanted the fish was more concerned that the goldfish would eat the other fish as she'd asked me earlier "Would that fish eat other fish?"

No...not usually. I mean, it has happened before (I've been told by customers) but usually they're pretty mellow.

But after hearing they wanted to get multiple fish I then proceeded with the usual questions.

Which consisted first of "Is this for a bowl or a tank?"

To which, unsurprisingly they said a bowl.

And that's when I had to go to work.

Because the goldfish they wanted, would not live in a bowl. The fish they wanted needs at least a 30 gallon tank to do well. (as the goldfish was already of the size to need at bare minimum a twenty gallon tank if you wanted to have other fish in with it.)

*shakes head*

It's rather difficult though, currently, to talk people out of certain fish.

Because other fish I would offer, like the betta fish, I'm currently basically out of.

Why? Because we didn't get in our shipment of fish last week due to a system error at the company.

Which means that I have very limited selection of fish. (as we end up selling at least 75% of the fish we get in within a week. So by the end of two weeks? Yah...our tanks are basically empty.)

In any case.

I usually try to offer a betta fish as the option for a bowl. Because at least they are hardier and can tolerate small spaces. They also don't need to do water changes as often.

While a goldfish in a bowl....even a small one...you usually need to change the water multiple times a week to keep them alive and healthy.

The goldfish they wanted? Yah, I doubt he'd be able to move in the bowl they had in mind.

I mean, the girl was like "What if the bowl was this big?!" Giving the dimensions of like two feet wide and two feet deep.

To which I was like...no.

(mostly because I didn't believe the bowl was that large.)

But they were insistent.

Even though I kept telling them it wasn't a good idea.

I directed them towards the feeder goldfish that would be a slightly better option just because they were smaller.

And had half of the girls convinced, but not the one who wanted the big one. *shakes head*

In the end.

I finally managed to convince them to come back in a couple of days, when I told them that we'd be getting in smaller sizes of the black moors then.

To which one of the girls was like "Well that's what we wanted originally."

And so, the others ended up buying a couple of feeder goldfish to tide them over.

And then they'll come back later to get their black moor.

I kinda hope they won't do so.

But even if they do I won't know as they'll be coming back on my day off.

But at least, for now, I managed to save the larger goldfish from a cramped fate.

So yay! :)

-Sarnic Dirchi

A Creepy Decoration

We've gotten in some new fish decorations at work.
Which is always exciting. Because after a time...
It gets rather boring to have to face the same old products time and time again.
So whenever new things are brought in, I quite like being able to look at the new decorations and see what we're going to be selling now.

However,
There is one decoration that we got in that's...well creepy.
Everyone in the store agrees.

See.

Totally Creepy!

Who wants a skeleton portrayal of the Titanic Scene at the Front of the Boat in their fish tank?

I mean, if it were anywhere near Halloween, this would make more sense.

But as it stands....we're nowhere near the holiday.

So why?!

It's creepy. *shakes head*

Yet, for the past couple of days.

I've been playing around with the thought....

That it would be fun to take this decoration....

And place it in random spots around the store for customers/coworkers to come across.

lol.

I think it would be rather fun.

To have it moved to a different spot every day.

Especially if I could manage to do it without anyone realizing I was the one who was placing this ornament in random locations. lol.

Maybe closer to Halloween.... ;)

-Sarnic Dirchi

Fish Questions

It's always fun to try and answer customer's questions...especially when you know that if they had thought about the question they were going to ask for a few seconds longer before speaking it out loud...they would have figured out the answer themselves.

Today I had a couple of boys come into my store. They were probably in their late teens or early twenties.
And like all new college students looking for something random to do.
They'd come into the store to buy a fish for a bowl.
(Because that's the 'in' thing to do in College Town.)

It was the typical conversation really.
Which involved me crushing the guy's dreams of buying 'fancy' fish for their bowl, and religating them back to Bettas and, if they were willing to make more work for themselves, goldfish instead since all the other fish need a filter and a heater to do well.

One guy decided to grab a betta.
The other a goldfish.
(both being put in separate bowls)
And so while I was catching the goldfish...

One of the guys asked me:
"Do fish drink the same water that they live in?"

O_o
Ummmm....
You know if you thought about that for two seconds longer....you would have know the answer to that.
Yes. Yes they do.
Where else would they get their water from? *shakes head*
Though I was thinking "Technically they drink air if they go to the surface" but fish constantly have water flowing through their gills to keep them alive. So basically their drinking water too.

But for whatever reason...this seemed to flabbergast the guy.
"You mean....they drink the same water that they pee in?! They're basically drinking their own pee?"
Again. O_o
I mean....it's one of those things that you subconsciously know, but don't consciously think about until it's brought up. But....yah.... hence why you do water changes or have a filter in your tank. To help keep the water clean.

*shakes head*
lol. I later brought up that question to my coworkers and friends.
And their responses were:

 "Oh, we have a separate system set up that drips water into the tank and the fish go over to it to drink from it."

"Nah, you need to place a bowl of water in their tank for them to drink from." "But only every few days, they don't need to drink from it everyday."

"No, they just pee in a corner and somehow it doesn't disperse to the rest of the tank."

haha.

I love the crazy responses my friends/coworkers come up with. ^^

In any case.

It didn't stop there with that question.

No a minute or so later, as that same customer was staring at all our Goldfish in our tanks. He said "I really want to just buy all of these fish and release them into the ocean, just to see what will happen."

To which I quickly responded. "They would die."

He seemed shocked by that. So I clarified.

"These fish are fresh water fish, the ocean is salt water, so they wouldn't live long."

His friend found it rather amusing that I corrected the guy more than once today.  "Well, she's just correcting you left and right today isn't she?" he said.

Yes. Yes I am.

lol.

*shakes head*

Honestly, he could have saved himself the trouble if he actually thought about his statements/questions before speaking them out loud.

Ah well.

It was a great source of amusement for me today. :)

-Sarnic Dirchi

Silent Communication

Whenever I have a child come up to me saying that they have a question, or that their parental figure needs help. I'm always halfway annoyed and halfway impressed. Impressed that the child took the initiative to come find me to help them. Annoyed because I have no idea what they need help with until they take me to the location where they need help.
Often times the child comes to me because the parents don't speak English. Other times, they just got tired of waiting around and went searching for help.
In this case.
It was a bit of both.

The child came looking for help.
Because he really wanted to get a turtle.
And he was prepared to act as an interpreter to his mother who didn't really speak English.

However.
His need to be the 'middle man' was negated.
Because they were using sign language to communicate.
And guess who knows sign language?
Yep! Me!!

^-^
Which made communication a lot easier lol.
As I spent like 30 minutes talking to them about turtles and their care.

lol.
It was a fun chat, giving them information and tips.
And I was happy to be able to ease their understanding. :)

Though trying to interact with other customers and coworkers after spending so much time signing is always difficult for me lol.
I end up half signing half speaking for an hour or so afterwards. lol.

It didn't help my struggle to not sign everything, when the customer came back a couple of hours later and we signed again for a good amount of time.

Still. They ended up buying the turtle. So yay. ^^

-Sarnic Dirchi