Declined

A young man brought two energy drinks, a Coke and a sandwich to the register. Total just over $10.

He swipes a credit card.

"I'm sorry," I say. "That card has been declined."

"That's strange," he says, which is funny, because that's the first thing EVERYONE says when their credit card is declined.

"Do you have another form of payment?" I ask.

"Let's just take off the sandwich," he says.

And so begins the triage. I was expecting the Coke would be first, but I misjudged him.

"I'm sorry," I say, after he's swiped the card a second time. "It says insufficient funds."

"I don't know why it would be." The second thing EVERYONE says. "Let's take off the pop, too."

Ahh. Now we're down to the bare essentials. Two energy drinks prove more valuable than the meager sustenance of the sandwich or the sugary kick of the Coke.

By this time the guy is visibly flustered by his economic situation. But, truth is, I feel a little bit sorry for him, and certainly don't pass too much judgment when a credit card doesn't work.

The third time, the $6 transaction goes through, and I wonder if he'll be hungry at lunch time.

The rubber match

I must hear it at least once a shift: "Do you sell condoms?"

Well, no, the store does not.

I'm thinking I'll bolt a condom vending machine onto the back of my truck and park it near the door. Charge a buck each. I'd make a killing.

I'll call my new venture "Where the Rubbers Meet the Road."

'Don't say it that way!'

3 a.m.: Two young men walk in. The first grabs a can of Monster and comes up to the counter.

"Do you guys sell condoms?" he asks.

"No, I'm afraid not," I reply.

"Then what am I going to do about this girl that keeps texting me?" he says, just as the phone in his hand chirps.

"Sorry, I can't help you," I say.

The second man then walks up with a bag of chips.

"Hey! Did you get our condoms?" he asks.

"Don't say it THAT way!," the first man says and giggles.

Have I got an offer for you

3:20 a.m.: I'm outside sweeping the lot when a beat-up sedan pulls up and the driver rolls down her window.

"Excuse me."

"Yes."

"Would you like two soft tacos?"

Pause

"Noooo," I answer. "I'm good."

"OK," she responds and heads into the store.

Later, after she'd left, I mention the taco offer to my co-worker.

"That was so weird," my co-worker said. "She was in here offering tacos to the other customers."

For some reason, that made me feel better.

"You know, I've been married for a long time," I said. "I probably wouldn't recognize a proposition if I heard one."

A poor little lamb, who has lost her way

You would think that New Year's Eve on the graveyard shift would be filled with tales of drunken debauchery, but the only story of the night didn't involve alcohol at all.

A young woman walked into the store about 2 a.m., and approached my co-worker and I with the telling words, "You're going to think I'm crazy, but ..."

Other than knowing she was in Rochester, this woman had no idea where she was.

The woman said she was visiting from St. Paul and she and a friend had checked into a hotel room earlier in the day. The woman had her friend drop her off at a hair salon, and after getting her hair done had convinced the stylist to give her a ride back to the hotel. Trouble is, the woman couldn't remember the name of the hotel, and the stylist dropped her off at the wrong one.

When the woman realized she was in the wrong hotel, she asked the people at the front counter for help. They advised her to try the hotel down the street. It was raining and about 40 degrees when the woman walked to the next hotel. Again, the wrong one. So she tried the next, and the next (there are nearly a dozen hotels in the vicinity of our store).

When she ran out of nearby hotels, she ended up in our store.  By then, the weather had deteriorated, with a strong wind from the north blowing snow.

She had a cellphone, but the friend she had rented the room with wasn't answering her phone. She had the key card for the hotel, but there was no hotel name on it. "Wilkommen" was no help.

Her friend had actually paid for the room, so she had no receipt. No credit cards. She had $15 in cash.

As she told her story, she became nearly hysterical.

"How can anyone forget their hotel?" she cried. "It's just crazy."

My co-worker worked to calm her down, trying to help her remember things about the hotel.

"It was new. It was off by it's own. It wasn't near anything."

"There was a really busy street nearby, with barriers. There was some construction going on."

"The drive from the hotel to the hair salon didn't take very long. The salon was by a Kmart."

Based on that information, she wasn't anywhere near her hotel. Other than that, the description matched dozens of Rochester hotels.

My co-worker talked with the woman for about 30 minutes, trying to narrow down the scope. But after awhile we knew it was fruitless.

We asked the woman to call the police non-emergency line, but the dispatcher said the police couldn't help her.

After another 10 minutes of tears, I called the police myself and explained the situation.

"Is she creating a scene?" the dispatcher asked.

"No."

"Is she drunk?"

"No."

"Do you think it's a mental health issue?"

"No. She's just lost and has no resources. I just can't send her out into the snow in the middle of the night."

"I just don't know what we can do."

A cabbie rolled in after his shift, and the woman started talking to him, thinking he might know about the hotel. They spent about 10 minutes talking outside, but the cabbie eventually left by himself.

A few minutes later, I saw the woman get into a car with an elderly man who had just bought a cup of coffee. As they were leaving, a Police Community Service Officer pulled in. The officer asked about the woman, and I pointed to the car headed up the street.

"She got a ride from some old codger. I don't know where he's taking her, but there they go."

"Weird," the CSO said, and left.

How do you know my name?

Arizona Tea

2:35 a.m.: Two drunk women, a blonde and a brunette (this is important), stroll the aisles looking for snack food.

The brunette stops in front of the cold drink coolers and stares. I ask if I can help her find something.

"My friend in the car wants a pina colada," she states. "Not one with alcohol, I know I'm not in a bar."

"Well, we have an entire wall devoted to cold drinks, can you help me narrow it down a bit."

"Shit! I don't know," she says. "I'll call him."

A minute or two later, I'm on the other side of the store when she announces, "Brian, I found it. See? Penis colada."

I walk over to take a look. "It does not say penis colada."

"Yes, it does. Right there. Penis colada."

Fine. It's not productive to argue with a drunk customer.

Moments later, she and her blonde friend are at the checkout.

"Ring up my penis colada," the brunette says loudly, thinking it's just the funniest thing in the world.

"It does not say penis colada," the blonde says.

"See," I tell the brunette.

"So, you're siding with her? You're going with the blonde, eh? You like blondes, Brian?"

"No," I answer, willing to play the game since there was no one else in line. "I like gingers."

The expression on her face suddenly changes.

"How do you know my name?" the brunette asks, incredulous. "Are you a psychic?" Then spins to the blonde, "You told him my name!?"

Peppered with assault

Fightnews.com

"Then I started hitting her," the young woman relates over her cell phone. Everyone in the store overhears.

"She pulled my hair, so I grabbed a bunch of her hair and pulled her down to the floor. Then I got on top of her and started hitting her over and over again.

"It was awesome."

No. It was assault.

Consider me edified

Photo by Robyn Lee

4:14 a.m.: Four people, a middle-aged couple and a younger couple (I'm guessing the older couple's daughter and the daughter's boyfriend), enter the store and disperse.

The younger woman is staggering and belligerent, yelling obscenities at the boyfriend.

The older woman grabs a bag of nacho chips and inspects it much too closely.

The older man walks up to the counter with a bottle of water and a pack of gum and turns, waiting for the others.

"Drunk," he says to me, gesturing to the others and making a hang loose sign with his right hand and drinking from his thumb.

"Yeah, " I say. "We see that a lot."

The younger couple approach the counter. She's wearing a dress that is much too high, and he's wearing jeans that are much too low.

"Brian!" the young man blurts. "Girl!"

"Consider me edified," I respond.

The older woman slides a bag of tortilla chips and a cup of nacho cheese onto the counter. In the process, she nearly tips over a donut display near the register.

The older man pays for all of the snacks and tries to hustle everyone out, but the older woman has a question.

"Canni get hanaaaenoes?" she asks me.

"I'm sorry, I didn't understand."

"Hnaaaenoes? Can I getem withis?"

"I'm sorry, I still don't understand what you're saying."

"I 'pligize. I'm drunk."

"Yes. I realize that."

"Halaanepeos?"

"Jalapenos?"

"Yes!"

"Sure, they're right there on the condiment counter. Help yourself."

The older man stands in the door and watches his wife navigate her way to the condiment counter. Then he looks my way and makes that same tippling motion with his hand.

Hang loose, Dude.

One Adam-12, One Adam-12, see the man

Photo by Scott Davidson

3:15 a.m.: There are no customers in the store, so I prepare to do my outside chores: Hauling out trash, recycling cardboard, sweeping up the parking lot, etc.

But, there's a car parked next to one of the pumps, and I don't dare leave the store unoccupied until the car leaves.

3:30 a.m: The car is still there. Lights on. Just sitting there. I've seen no one go in or out. No one pumped any gas.

3:35 a.m.: I stand in the window in full view of the suspicious car (a beat up, white Ford Probe) and pretend to dial the police. This works with most of the people who like to smoke pot in the parking lot. The car does not move.

3:40 a.m.: Still no movement of the car or its occupant(s). Since it's dark, and the cars' lights are on, I can't even tell if someone is in it.

3:45 a.m.: I call the police non-emergency line and ask if an officer could drive through the lot, maybe scare the car's occupants off.

3:50 a.m.: A squad car pulls up behind the Probe and an officer, one of the store's regulars, walks up to the driver's window and shines a flashlight inside.

3:55 a.m.: A second squad car pulls up. The second officer helps a young woman out of the driver's door of the Probe and the sobriety dance begins: Hold your arms straight out and touch your nose, follow the light with your eyes, stand on one foot ...

From my perspective (passing by as I took out the trash), I couldn't tell how the nose or the light test went, but I did see that "stand on one foot" was not happening.

4:10 a.m.: The woman is helped into the back seat of one of the squad cars while the other officer removes the Probe's plates and moves the beater to an out-of-the-way spot in the lot.

4:15 a.m.: The first officer on the scene comes in and asks me a few questions: name, phone, address, how long the car was in the lot, etc.

"She says she'll take care of the car when she gets out of jail, but that might be a while," the cop says. "She blew a two-one, and it's her second DUI."

Bummer for her ... just because I had to take out the trash.

Checking on the twins

Photo by Misha Popovikj

1:15 a.m.: A woman joins the line at the checkout and I notice that she keeps looking down into her shirt.

I don't know if it's the switch to summer weather or simply the fashion of the times, but many of the women who've come into the store lately seem preoccupied with their breasts. It's amazing the number of women who have no compunctions about adjusting the ladies while fueling their cars, waiting to pay for Marlboro Lights or checking out the beef jerky.

I even had one woman who had Lil Wayne in her top ... she carried her cell phone in her brassiere.

But this woman is different. She isn't primping or plumping, she's peering.

Just as it was time for me to ring up her snacks, she says, "Oh, the blood stain is gone."

"Whoa!" I say, holding up my hands.

"No. No," she laughs. "I work at a nursing home, and one of the patients had a bloody nose and it got everywhere."

"I was truly frightened there for a moment."

"No, my boob's not hemorrhaging or anything," she laughs again.

Good to know. All I've got for medical emergencies are three-inch Band-Aids.