My ma sent me here to fill up her car with gas.
Which went…read morefine.
Then since I rarely have a chance to see 400 beers I thought, "Why not pick up a 6-pack."?
So I wandered around checking them all out, and thinking, you know, if these were in some sort of recognizable ORDER this would be a lot simpler. As they appear completely random to the shopper.
I finally chose a nice Dogfish Ale, marked 10.99.
I feel it to find it's warm, as they all were. What's the point of having everything in refrigerated cases and they're all at 65 degrees?
Seeing the hopeless nature of desiring a cold beer, obviously my bad,
I go up to the registers, and the guy rings up $13.99, $15 bucks even with tax.
I'm like... WHAT?
That's about FORTY percent more than shown on the shelf.
But I'm already there and I just figure I'll buy it and never come back.
So I sigh and stick my credit card in the slot.
[CARD DOES NOT READ.]
Now I know my card is fine, I'd just used it, and I pay my bills.
"Try again" the guy says.
[Remove Card, DECLINED.]
Now I KNOW I'm not the issue here, so I pull out another card.
Register boy is getting irritated.
"Sometime she not work right mon."
He leans through the plexiglas and takes my card, waving it around the machine.
[DOES NOT READ]
I take the card back and attempt to slot it in place again.
"Swopyacah" he says through his mask.
"Swopyacah".
Nope, still not registering as an English phrase.
Can you translate that to the local language? I ask.
"SWOPYACAH!" he orders, and grabs my card again and
SWIPES MY CARD. Mystery solved.
Finally the crappy machine registers my card, ringing up the usurious
fifteen buck price.
"Oh by the way, I said, this beer is marked 10.99 on the shelf over there, and now it's 13.99."
"Well I didn't do it." He intones, shrugging all semblance of working there.
"NO, I can see you're not responsible in any way...I'm telling you so you can make a note and then go correct the problem and the next guy, who might be having a bad day, won't get pissed off when he gets jacked for an extra FORTY PERCENT and smash the six pack on the floor."
I didn't bother to listen to whatever mealymouthed excuse came next as I was out the door, never to return.