I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.
July 23rd, 2011 (I believe this is my very first post) - I am wearing gloves and using tongs. I assume you have some intelligence because you are dressed and somehow made it here, lucky me. If you try to grab one more handful with those filthy paws i will slap you. that is a promise.
August 14th, 2011 - Hip checking your wife out of the way to get to the last piece of salmon is almost a guarantee that you won't be seeing any sweet lovin' for a while... so enjoy your nibble, dummy.
August 27, 2011 - Please don't try to convince me that the amazing grass fed beef that I am sampling is bad for you when you are slurping off of a gallon sized bucket of sweet tea and your kid has a ring pop shoved in their mouth. And, no, I will not debate you on this subject. Just walk away. Now.
December 12, 2012 - This was the exchange between me and a customer tonight -
I see this woman walking around the store in an obvious daze, so I ask if I can help her find something. She asks where the bread is. Now, in my head I'm saying, "You mean that huge wall, easily 15 feet long by six feet high, right behind you?". Instead I smile and ask which bread she is looking for. She immediately gets snarky. "Bread.. you know the stuff that normal people make sandwiches out of? You work here, you're probably one of those vegan weirdos.." (oh, and she pronounced it VAY-gn) Always with a smile (Miss Lexie paints hers on in the morning), I sweetly retort "Yes, ma'am. I work here. I am not a vegan nor a weirdo, and I know where the bread is." I then walked away, leaving her completely befuddled. Score.
Can't make this stuff up, folks.
January 2nd, 2013 - It was tough picking just one, the holidays were filled with an outpouring of stupidity. However, it's sometimes the small moments that stick in your head more. I was working on the HUGE chalkboard calendar in the store lobby yesterday, up on a step ladder for a couple of hours. I felt a poke on my butt, and thinking it was Keith, I turned around with a smile to see a little boy of about 6 standing there. He croaks "where are the little carts?" in a pretty rude manner. I looked up to the woman standing behind him, and she angrily responds "Well?" I smile, shrug and say pleasantly "I guess they're all being used." The little darling pokes me in the leg again and yells "Find one!" I laughed and turned my back on them, nearly biting a hole in my lip in the process. This demon spawn will probably end up in Club Fed in twenty years for embezzlement, since he's so entitled to whatever his black heart desires...
January 4th, 2013 - To the mother of the little boy, about four years old, who had his hands down the front of his sweatpants for quite a few moments, NO he many not reach in to the basket for a cracker.
January 16th, 2013 -
Miss Lexie's Sample Etiquette: Fashion Edition
I get to see a whole lot of people doing what I do, and I've made some observations that I would like to share
1. Jeggings are stupid on just about everyone - especially the 30 something man I witnessed last night. Not an emo boy wearing his girlfriend's clothes, a grown man. shudder.
2. Super high heels are cute, unless you can't walk in them on a polished cement floor. Face planting is not cute in case you were wondering.
3. Honey, your lip liner should be the same color as your lipstick, or didn't you get the memo twenty years ago? Probably not from the look of that hair....
4. For the love of god, dress your age. Or at least your size. Just because Walmart makes it in your size doesn't mean the rest of us want to see you in it (or falling out of it.)
5. If you're going to go through the pain and expense of all that facial plastic surgery, shouldn't you do something original? There are at least a dozen women walking around with the same damned duck lips!
6. If you are going to go through that pain and expense to recapture your youth, do something about your hands too. A 40 something face is pretty useless with the Crypt Keeper's hands.
7. One final thought - UNDERGARMENTS. Know how to use them, and find someone to help you purchase the correct size. Please. Think of the children.
That is all.
February 4th, 2013 - It amazes me how many people wander into the store with recipes in hand, full of ingredients they are clueless about. I'm not talking about "how do I cook quinoa?" clueless, more like "what is quinoa?" clueless. They don't even know what category an ingredient falls under. Is it an herb? A bean? I even had one customer ask me if it was a kind of exotic meat. Sigh. Google, people. Learn to use it. Embrace it. It is your friend.
February 8th, 2013 - Miss Lexie's Sample Etiquette: Update to the Fashion Edition
Two things I have noticed in the last week that made me shake my head. First, snow boots with four inch high heels are just dumb. Period. The only purpose they serve is to make you look like a moron.
Second, the colder it gets the more fragrance people wear. I swear I've been working in a funky cloud the last week. If you're wearing enough that the people around you can taste it long after you've left the area, you need to rethink your dosage.
February 16th, 2013 - It was a tough day, dear readers. So many faux pas that it might take an hour to list them all. Here are the highlights:
* Letting your little ones be self sufficient is a part of growing up. Letting them select their own sample from my demo table is fine, as long as they don't put their boogie covered fingers in all of the cups, and as long as you don't get pissed when I ask you to please select for them so I don't have to waste an entire tray because they have now sneezed all over everything.
* I think all humans are beautiful, no matter what size; I'm no Tiny Tina and never will be. However, if you are the size of a Volkswagen, please don't ask me what dessert in the case has the least amount of calories. (She was offended when I suggested she visit the produce department instead.) This has happened twice in the last year.
* It bears repeating - this is NOT A BUFFET! It is NOT my job to feed you lunch or dinner, it is a single bite.
* Do not reprimand your little brats by telling them that "this lady is going to call the police on you if you don't behave". I didn't make them this way, you did. Maybe I should call the cops on you for child neglect.
* Hovering over the pan does not make things cook faster. Trust me. In fact, it may make them cook slower.
Perhaps there will be more later, my dears. Miss Lexie needs a bourbon.
February 24th, 2013 - Please, for the love of all that is good in the world, if you have a specific issue regarding food, come right out with it. Don't ask "What is in this?" if all you need to know is if it has gluten or corn or nuclear waste. Cut to the chase, as Miss Lexie is getting old and doesn't want to spend her remaining years trying to drag information out of dim witted sample whores.
(thanks to my dear friend Noah for the inspiration, and the lovely customers at Earth Fare for the material. It never ceases to amaze Miss Lexie how dumb people can be.)
March 7th, 2013 - (right after my promotion. New store, new customers, new stories!)
When I am in my new little corner of the world, surrounded by hundreds of the world's finest cheeses and dry cured salame, please do not ask if I have a vegan cheese that tastes like gorgonzola dolce. When soy beans grow teeny little udders, maybe. But for now, you don't eat dairy because of a personal choice (I asked, it wasn't a lactose issue, it is a moral issue), so embrace that and adapt. Miss Lexie, on the other hand, will be eating the gorgonzola dolce this weekend on a bone in rib eye. I must not have any morals. I am completely okay with that.
March 7th, 2013 (later in the day, Miss Lexie was a bit tired and maybe a tad ornery)
Children are like pets. If you can't handle them, please don't have them. If you can't handle one, don't have a dozen. As a special note to the family sitting behind me, with the little darling that won't stop trying to climb over the back of the booth and kicking it right where my back is, it is readily apparent to me why some species eat their young. How sad we are not one of them.
March 8th, 2013 - If you're going to drive your SUV 45 miles to save $1 on fresh mozzarella, perhaps you need to rethink your priorities. Especially if that's the only reason you drove 45 miles.
March 15th, 2013 - A coupon for a free 7 oz. lump of cheddar with a $5 purchase should not require samples. It is barely enough for a sandwich, maybe two if there is meat involved. If you don't know what cheddar tastes like, perhaps you should be in Walmart looking at American cheese?
Miss Lexie's Sample Etiquette, Part Deux:
There is a table piled with pieces of cheddar, and a big neon green sign that states quite simply "COUPON ITEM". If one more person walks over, picks up a piece of the cheese, looks at the sign and then yells across my department "Hey, is this the cheese with the coupon?", I may be calling y'all for bail money.
An update from Miss Lexie: someone tried to return the free cheese. I repeat, someone tried to return the free cheese because they didn't like it. I have no words....
March 25th, 2013 - A couple came in to my department this morning. I asked if they were looking for anything in particular. He just grunts "samples". I smiled and replied, "I'm sorry, but with the snow this morning I'm a little behind. Is there something you would like to try?" (To be honest, I wasn't going to waste product on an empty store, so I didn't put anything out.) He grunts again, "Cheese, obviously. Duh." Not a peep from the lady until now. She walks over to him, cracks him in the back of the head with her hand and says "This is why I leave you home." She apologizes to me, snatches him by the arm and drags him out of the store. I'm still giggling.
April 11th, 2013 - I understand the necessity to sometimes feed young children while grocery shopping, especially at a later time in the day. What I don't understand is a grown ass man having to walk around eating a bag of chips and getting his greasy, salty, icky fingers all over my beer bottles, cheese case and goddess only knows what else. Oh, and I reiterate a complaint of last summer - even if you're male, PLEASE for the love of all that is right with the world, get a pedicure before you start wearing flip flops. Please. I threw up a little in my mouth at the sight of you waddling around with your snackies and ugly bare feet. You almost caused Miss Lexie to forget herself and utter a profanity. Shame on you.
April 15th, 2013 - A man wanders around my department, then settles in beside the olive bar. He doesn't just sample, he easily eats a half pound, throwing the pits in a basket of cracker boxes when he thought no one was looking. He then approaches me and asks where the cheese samples are. I looked him in the eye and sweetly replied, "Bless your heart, you're not full yet?" He wasn't amused. I can't stop giggling.
April 25th, 2013 - Please, oh please, allow your children to run through my department unfettered with the confines of respect or self control. Let them pick up the carefully stacked cheese and press it to their booger cake faces. Encourage them to move all of the signs in my cheese case to express their creativity. And, please, don't forget to give me the death stare as I follow them around putting everything right. Without that icy look, my day can never be complete.
May 2nd, 2013 - Miss Lexie here, with a little advice for the buying public - if you are going to swear at me in a language other than English, don't look surprised when I respond in kind. I may wear a name tag for a living, but I am not uneducated. Plus, after working in kitchens for decades, I can cuss in quite a few languages. (I am really fortunate that the manager on duty doesn't speak Italian, though. I would have been soooooooo fired for what I called this guy to his face. hehehe)
May 11th, 2013 - A woman with seven children comes in to the department yesterday evening. She's got three in the shopping cart that must be under 4 years old, and four running around rampant that are under 10. The littlest one has a toy gun which he/she is chewing on. These little darlings are climbing on everything they can reach, including stacks of beer and cheese. One tries to get into my cheese case. Another is deftly rearranging all of my displays, putting stuff where ever she feels it should be. The mother, who is ignoring all of the havoc, comes to me and says "I need a cheese to cook with that is cheap." I ask for clarification without trying to sound too aggravated at the destruction her brood is wreaking on my world. She huffs and says "I don't know, something to feed these brats to shut them up." I hand her a big block of muenster, give her a quickie recipe for mac n' cheese, and silently hope that she gets out of earshot before I yell "Well, you made them, chickie. Maybe you should have taken up knitting instead?"
May 18th, 2013 - Please, dear readers, save your cheese labels for future reference. Coming to me and demanding a "white cheese cut into a square" that "sort of tasted like mozzarella but not really" that was "maybe goat milk, wait no, sheep. Well, maybe it was cow, I don't remember", that you bought at another store three years ago really doesn't give me much to go on. Furthermore, please don't get huffy and exclaim, "Well, you're the expert, don't you know?" (He left with a mild yellow cheddar. Sigh.)
May 24th, 2013 -(Memorial Day - holidays bring the best out in people, don't you think?) Miss Lexie's Sample Etiquette, the holiday edition:
People, please, for the love of all that is still good in the world, learn to be flexible. Cussing out the meat cutter because he "has wrecked your whole effing day" and various other indelicacies because he was out of a coupon item is not realistic or the least bit nice. Its not his fault that the store ran out. Its the three hundred people that got here before you did. Get here earlier next time and leave Steven alone..... or Miss Lexie might forget she's a lady. Trust me, its not a pretty sight.