I went to work with a stomach virus today. It was over fourty-eight hours old.
I also worked with Soul today. Soul, as his name implies, is a very interesting person to work with; I find it easiest to hold a conversation with him at any given point because we tend to share common interests more often than not.
(I must confess I am terrible at giving nicknames.)
It was a slow morning. Aside from getting Warioware D.I.Y. shipped in, we didn't have much to do. Which was fine, because Soul spent the first hour talking me into buying a PlayStation 3.
My poor wallet.
A customer walks in. The man is wearing a leather jacket, sporting a buzzcut and a fuzzy light blonde mustache. He is with a woman, roughly the same age. Probably only a few years older than me. He spends a few minutes standing around in the PS2 aisles before picking a few titles up while Soul and I run next door to request a movie to be played over the various television sets mounted between both stores (a movie rental store is next door, and our stores are connected).
We pick Fantastic Mr. Fox.
As I head back to the register, the customer approaches me with cases in hand. He has picked out three PS2 games:
- Grand Theft Auto: Vice City
- Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus
- Fantavision
As I ring him up, thinking nothing of his choices, he asks if we can search for a game in our system. I, of course, tell him yes we can. The man mentions it's a bit hard to spell, so he begins spelling it out for me as I force thoughts of how socially inept the man must be around authority figures out of my head.
"S, U, I."
Sui? Something in the back of my mind clicks.
"K."
No way.
There's no way this guy knows about the Suikoden series. Not in this rural city. This is the country. People don't play those games here.
"O."
I can't believe it.
"Suikoden?" I blurt out without thinking.
He nods. And it turns out we don't have any in stock. I banter a bit about how difficult it would be to find those games in this area - or in general, and he remarks that he's been looking for them for a long time.
Soul pulls the discs and hands them to me. The customer pays and leaves, and I wish him luck in finding any of the Suikoden games he's looking for.
My face wears a look of disbelief as the credits for Fantastic Mr. Fox play.
It was then I realized my stomach virus hadn't bothered me all morning.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
Rollin' Around
I found myself thankful for grabbing Queen and pulling her over when I did as our latest customer walked in. A woman in her 40s, at least, and my height, but with considerable more weight on her. Her curly red hair hangs loosely around her, and nearly every part of her skin was beginning to sag. A particular spot below her neck was raw and chunks of skin were beginning to peel off. Yet, I generally don't pay too much attention to appearances with customers; it was when she opened her mouth that my attention was bought.
From what I was able to gather as Queen talked with the woman, she was looking for an Xbox360 to buy from us, though she didn't have a clue about much of anything she was talking about; we spent a good ten minutes explaining the difference between controllers, wires, hard drives, games, save files, et cetera.
And then the woman browsed through our games. She picked up Sonic the Hedgehog - "This the one where you curl up 'nto a ball, rollin' 'round an' shit." - and she later bought it with the system, along with a few sports and racing games.
I watched Queen ring her up, helping a few customers here and there as the woman talked and checked her phone, which periodically went off every two or so minutes.
"These people need'ta stop sendin' me ass-shots."
Distraction!
The woman continues, explaining how it's part of this "Moe Coe Dot Com", some dating site she's a part of, and people send her pictures of their backsides directly to her phone - and how annoying it was. Despite all the warnings that were going off in the back of my mind, she continued, and I listened.
"Jus' the otha day at work, some guy sends me a message 'bout how he would like'ta climb up on my back. I tell 'em no, of course, I'mma married woman, but he's all like 'I won't tell if you won't tell ;)'.
Queen laughed politely with a hint of laughing at something more, and I laughed along with everyone else, but it was a hollow laugh. The woman spends over $400 at once and leaves after I fumble a bit showing her where the power cord goes, and as she leaves Queen has to hold in even more laughter. I laughed too, of course, but I couldn't help but wonder why.
Yes, I found myself thankful for grabbing Queen when I did. There are certain types of people I'm just not ready to handle yet.
From what I was able to gather as Queen talked with the woman, she was looking for an Xbox360 to buy from us, though she didn't have a clue about much of anything she was talking about; we spent a good ten minutes explaining the difference between controllers, wires, hard drives, games, save files, et cetera.
And then the woman browsed through our games. She picked up Sonic the Hedgehog - "This the one where you curl up 'nto a ball, rollin' 'round an' shit." - and she later bought it with the system, along with a few sports and racing games.
I watched Queen ring her up, helping a few customers here and there as the woman talked and checked her phone, which periodically went off every two or so minutes.
"These people need'ta stop sendin' me ass-shots."
Distraction!
The woman continues, explaining how it's part of this "Moe Coe Dot Com", some dating site she's a part of, and people send her pictures of their backsides directly to her phone - and how annoying it was. Despite all the warnings that were going off in the back of my mind, she continued, and I listened.
"Jus' the otha day at work, some guy sends me a message 'bout how he would like'ta climb up on my back. I tell 'em no, of course, I'mma married woman, but he's all like 'I won't tell if you won't tell ;)'.
Queen laughed politely with a hint of laughing at something more, and I laughed along with everyone else, but it was a hollow laugh. The woman spends over $400 at once and leaves after I fumble a bit showing her where the power cord goes, and as she leaves Queen has to hold in even more laughter. I laughed too, of course, but I couldn't help but wonder why.
Yes, I found myself thankful for grabbing Queen when I did. There are certain types of people I'm just not ready to handle yet.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Practice Post
Today's first customer was a slightly obese kid, somewhere between ten and twelve years old. The poor fellow looked like he had no idea where he was going as he stumbled along, bobbing his head. Queen had stepped out for a minute, leaving me alone to watch the store. Eventually the kid wandered up to the counter and stared up at me with inquisitive eyes.
"Do you guys have any older games?" he asks me, to which I ask what system he means.
"Pee-es-too."
I blink before explaining he just wandered through the PS2 games. Yet he pressed on, saying we didn't have it. The game he was looking for.
"What game are you looking for?" I ask politely, in my friendliest tone.
"Dukes of Hazzard."
In the end, he was right; we didn't have any Dukes of Hazzard, and the kid left defeated.
. . .
Not an hour passes while I'm at work before all hell breaks loose as a tall man with long hair carrying a duffel bag walks in. He unzips the duffel bag in a cocky manner, revealing 40+ PS2 games and two memory cards he wants to trade in. I help Queen out a bit with checking the game discs before wandering off to distract myself with inventory work. I didn't have the pleasure of talking to him too much; he didn't seem the type to take pleasure in conversation to begin with.
Cleaning up after the massive pile of games he dropped off with us took most of the evening.
. . .
In our deadest hour comes two men roughly in their twenties. One sported the perfect policeman mustache, the other the perfect peach fuzz; both wore hoodies too big for them. I watched out of the corner of my eye as they wormed their way around the store, picking up games, laughing at the "silly" ones, and leaving a mess of things in their wake. I wasn't too far behind, reorganizing everything as they passed; there wasn't too much to do.
They made their way to the Gamecube games as I continued to fix the mess that was the Xbox 360 section, making their opinion of our wares as public as the store we run.
"Hey, look, they got Zelda!"
"Nah, man, you don't want to play that one, that's the cartoony one, that's stupid."
I sighed to myself. I am only an opinion, after all.
In the end, after they took their sweet time making a beautiful disarray, the gentlemen picked up NBA Ballers: Chosen One (XB360) and Half-Life 2 (Xbox).
I blinked.
"Do you guys have any older games?" he asks me, to which I ask what system he means.
"Pee-es-too."
I blink before explaining he just wandered through the PS2 games. Yet he pressed on, saying we didn't have it. The game he was looking for.
"What game are you looking for?" I ask politely, in my friendliest tone.
"Dukes of Hazzard."
In the end, he was right; we didn't have any Dukes of Hazzard, and the kid left defeated.
. . .
Not an hour passes while I'm at work before all hell breaks loose as a tall man with long hair carrying a duffel bag walks in. He unzips the duffel bag in a cocky manner, revealing 40+ PS2 games and two memory cards he wants to trade in. I help Queen out a bit with checking the game discs before wandering off to distract myself with inventory work. I didn't have the pleasure of talking to him too much; he didn't seem the type to take pleasure in conversation to begin with.
Cleaning up after the massive pile of games he dropped off with us took most of the evening.
. . .
In our deadest hour comes two men roughly in their twenties. One sported the perfect policeman mustache, the other the perfect peach fuzz; both wore hoodies too big for them. I watched out of the corner of my eye as they wormed their way around the store, picking up games, laughing at the "silly" ones, and leaving a mess of things in their wake. I wasn't too far behind, reorganizing everything as they passed; there wasn't too much to do.
They made their way to the Gamecube games as I continued to fix the mess that was the Xbox 360 section, making their opinion of our wares as public as the store we run.
"Hey, look, they got Zelda!"
"Nah, man, you don't want to play that one, that's the cartoony one, that's stupid."
I sighed to myself. I am only an opinion, after all.
In the end, after they took their sweet time making a beautiful disarray, the gentlemen picked up NBA Ballers: Chosen One (XB360) and Half-Life 2 (Xbox).
I blinked.
Monday, March 22, 2010
Foreword
I made this blog a few months ago and couldn't really figure out what to do with it. At this point in time, I'll use it to document some of my more interesting experiences - working video game retail as a seasoned single-player gamer in a southern game store.
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