2002-08-16 - 7:13 p.m.
I've had ice-cream cravings all week thanks to an ongoing listserv discussion, so this afternoon I went to the chi-chi creamery down the street. This is one of those places where you pick a flavor, pick one or more ingredients to mix in, and then watch as the guy behind the counter throws it all onto a chilled slab of granite and smooshes it together using a paddle. The people who work there are always super-cheerful and are required to sing the shop's official jingle for any customer who asks. (And no, I've never asked, in case you're wondering.)
As I walk in, there's a mother and three kids getting ready to leave. From the condition of the booth they've been sitting in, it's clear that these are the type of children that the word "demonspawn" was invented for: The table is littered with cups and wrappers, there's melted ice cream and spilled soda all over the seats and tabletop, and every single napkin has been pulled out of the dispenser and thrown around the booth and on the floor. The people in the adjoining booth, meanwhile, look like they're overjoyed to see these kids leave and probably would have already drowned the whole misbegotten brood of them if there had been a large enough body of water close by. The guy behind the counter still has a smile tightly screwed on, though.
What follows is one of my mistreatment-of-customer-service-employee pet peeves. Does the kids' mother make any effort whatsoever to clean up the slimy mess her clutch of hatchlings has made--or better yet, make the kids do it themselves? Yeah, right. There's a trash receptacle right next to the booth, but not only does this hag leave the mess, but she just stands there and watches one of the kids WIPE HIS HANDS on another customer's sweater on the way out the door.
I was too stunned to say anything. Fortunately the guy behind the counter said it better than I ever could.
"Have a nice day!" he said cheerfully. Then, once the woman with the hyena-children was out of earshot: "Fuck. Who told her she had a right to ovulate, anyway?"
Hilarity ensued.
***
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