Have you ever wondered where some people get their brains calculators from? A recent trip to Walgreens left me pondering that very question.
There was a large bin of items for 75% off. Most of it was Easter things, but there were some non-Eastery items, and one such item looked desirable to me. So I picked it up and asked the cashier at the check out if it was included in the 75% off. She didn’t know, so she asked the manager, who happened to be standing right there. The manager said it wasn’t supposed to be, but since it was in the bin she told the cashier to ring it up 75% off. Sweet.
But because the item wasn’t on clearance the cashier had to figure out what the total would be. 75% off an $11 item. I think it took me all of 20 seconds to figure it out, and I told her the total should be $2.75.
She looked at me, a little amazed. She hadn’t yet been able to pull the calculator out of the drawer. “Really?”
“Yes, I believe so.”
“Well, let me just check” – she had, after all, managed to pull her handy dandy calculator out of the drawer, so she might as well use it now.
She clicks in some numbers and then rings up my item at $2.50.
“Wait! It should be $2.75.”
“No, my calculator said $2.50.”
“But 75% off $11 is $2.75.”
“But my calculator said $2.50 – is that ok?”
Um… no, it’s not ok that even with the aid of a calculator you can’t figure out a basic math skill. But I didn’t say that. Oh how I wanted to. But I didn’t. I don’t like to make people hate me. And I really just wanted to get out of the store. So I said “Sure, that’s ok.” Even though I didn’t really want to.
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5 comments:
Haha. I used to do math in my head faster than the other girls could do math with a calculator in my barista days. Ironically, it's my worst subject.
Once we were at Six Flags and the cash registers at one of the snack stops was on the fritz and did not calculate the change due to the customer when the register opened.
We bought something for $4.75 and I gave the guy a $10. He had to use a calculator for the change, except the worst part was...he couldn't figure out how to use the calculator.
It's $5.25, I told him.
He looked at me and said that he couldn't take my word for it. LOL Ummmmm......ok!
How funny!! Remember the girl cutting fabric for me. I wanted one yard, and she had folded it somehow so she was going to cut 2 yards off. I said, "No, I only want one yard, you are cutting 2". She said in a very condescending voice, "No, this is how we cut fabric here". I said "oh, OK" and got 2 for the price of one!! Silly girl...
mum
That's pretty funny. Though I will say that while I have always been really good at math, when you're standing at a cash register (especially with a ton of people waiting impatiently in line) your brain does have the tendency to freeze up and make you look like you should have failed 1st grade. ;o)
I have to confess, you probably came up with that amount faster than I would have =)
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