Actual Conversations With Real People, Vol. 2

Today UBP presents another installment of Actual Conversations With Real People. These are, yes, actual conversations I've had with real people. Today's real person is *drumroll* a Deli Worker.

Me: "I'd like a tuna salad sandwich on wheat toast, please."

Deli Worker: "What would you like on it?"

Me: "Just lettuce and onions, please."

Deli Worker: "Any mayo or mustard on that?"

Me: "No thank you, just lettuce and onions."

Deli Worker: "Any cheese?"

Me: "No thank you."

Deli Worker: "Tomato?"

Me: (big sigh) "No thank you."

~ FIN ~

Drugstore Cowboy

Many of you surely read my heartbreaking account of a trip to the drug store to buy NyQuil. That experience has stayed with me, because such an unfortunate situation would not have occured if drug stores did not have the curious habit of understaffing their cash registers.

I've consulted hundreds of some two friends about this, and the problem appears to be universal. Be it CVS, Rite Aid, Long's or Walgreens, drug stores consistently staff only one cash register no matter how many people are in line. These drug stores often have as many as six cash register stations, but I can only conclude that these are for show and that the registers themselves are inoperable. It's certainly not a question of staffing, because whenever I'm seventeenth in line behind fifteen fat people buying Ben & Jerry's and one nervous teenage girl fiddling with a pregnancy test, I see smocked and nametagged employees wandering around the store in great numbers. They often congregate together and eye the line blankly as if to say, "Wow, there are a lot of people in line. I wonder if this is something somebody should be addressing."

Eventually, one of the frustrated and hungry Ben & Jerry's lovers will berate the person behind the operable cash register. "Hey, why can't you open another register? There are three employees over there playing grab ass and peeling security tags off of the Jagermeister!" The response will invariably be, "They're on break." I've never seen so many people on break at one time as I have in a drug store. It seems like the ratio of employees on break to employees actually working is at least five to one. How is this possible? I mean, everyone loves taking a break, but this is ridiculous.

I decided that I needed to get to the bottom of this. I donned all black clothes, put on a ski mask, and searched the internet for answers. You will be shocked at what I found. I'm about to blow the lid off this thing. Apparently, this behavior is not only tolerated by the corporate bigwigs, but encouraged. All you need to do is check out this sample Rite Aid store floor plan and it will all become clear.

Dateline, here I come!