No Eliza Doolittle

Today, I got some additional proof that some bipeds are raised in barns (aka: good education is becoming rare - and I don't care if I end up sounding like a snob).

I was shopping in a store (big name that exploits its employees and pays them peanuts for long hours) and I'd reached the end of the queue I'd selected when it happened: a young employee with an empty supermarket trolley drove into an old lady. 

This is what happened:

1) The old lady was hurt and protested.

2) The young employee apologized.

3) The old lady simply said: 'Now, that's going to leave a mark.'

4) The young employee blew a fuse and growled: 'I apologized. What do you want? Me kissing your feet?'

5) The old lady was rather angry and added: 'I wasn't moving, and you collided with me. You were supposed to pay attention with your trolley.'

6) The young employee started going away as she said again: 'I already apologized. Do you want me to lick your feet or sumthin'?'

The young gal might be exploited in her job, but she clearly wasn't paying attention (in fact, I suspect that she might have been waving at a colleague in the next aisle).

And now's the moment when you can feel free to call me old-fashioned, but when you work in a shop, clients (or patrons, or customers, or whatever you call the nice people coming to your shop to spend money to pay for your wages by the end of the month) are Royals. They're always right, and you're always wrong.

You're entitled to growl and curse and howl in the staff room, at home and at the pub, but at work, the client is a deity.

I hope the old lady's feeling better now.

It's clear that the young employee is in that store by chance, and it certainly wasn't her career of choice, but she'll never get a better job in retail, if she shows that she's been raised in a barn (this flower girl will never leave Covent Garden and dance with a prince).

Point 3 should really have gone: 'I apologize again, Ma'am. I'm dreadfully sorry. Would it help if I rubbed or massaged the area where I hit you? I am so terribly sorry. I feel so bad.' (that doesn't cost a penny, and the old lady, I'm sure would have felt a lot better whereas the young employee, in the end, made her sound - and probably - feel like an old bat with unreasonable demands).

When one works in a store, one must keep in mind that a complaining client may well ask to meet the manager to have a little not-so-friendly chat. Basically, learn elementary strategy and don't shoot yourself in the foot: a ton of fake honey will take you farther than a haughty growl.

This doesn't only apply to people stuck in unpleasant jobs, the same goes for a few people who have a lot of money and who behave as if the world belongs to them. Usually, that lot is the kind of bipeds the non-barbarians despise.

I know I do sound like an old bat now, but I was taught to behave properly.

I see some very nice young people, as well as some old twats (just last week, I caught an old lady on the bus with her feet on the seat in front of her!).

What I call "being raised in a barn" has nothing to do with birth or/and money. It's all about treating the rest of the world like crap because you think you're better.