Sure. And maybe I'm a Chinese jet-pilot.

With surprising regularity, patrons will ask me to hold onto merchandise for them because for whatever reason they are unable to make the purchase at that particular moment. Quite often, I will agree to their request and set the desired items aside until their return. It is the polite thing to do and conveys a desire for their business. For the most part, it also doesn't pose any great hardship or inconvenience, just a touch more clutter around the work area.

What dismays me is how often the patrons do not return for the merchandise they took such pains to have me set aside for them. It is almost a bedrock foundation of retail sales that customers are fucking liars. It doesn't matter what flavor of retail one is into, I've done more than just the adult store gig, most customers that ask you to perform some favor for them will hang you out to dry without a second thought.

Perhaps they change their mind at some point between leaving the store and coming back. Perhaps they get distracted and forget they have items waiting for them. Perhaps it just gives them a cheap giggle to put together a shopping cart to abandon. Regardless of why they fail to return, functionally, they're bald-faced, pox-tongued liars.

Thus, no matter how sincere and adamant they appear to be, I invest no faith in their avowal of return.

Unfortunately, this seems to bleed into every customer interaction. Until demonstrated otherwise, every patron automatically defaults my mind to a stance of them prevaricating. A person that will lie to me about one thing will lie to me about another.

Pretty bleak outlook. Too bad it's proven out on almost a daily basis.

It does make me wonder, just how often the average person makes and breaks stated or implied promises offhandedly. "I'll call you." "The check is in the mail." Gee do you think that lines like that take on such a universal infamy because they're rare? Fuck no. They're socially acceptable fictions that have to be honored on the slight chance that they're telling the truth. Much like a store holding aside some items for someone to come back for. So I wonder how many variations are there being passed around. I wonder how much interaction is built upon deliberately false information. I wonder whether a habit of easily made, easily broken promises might have something to do with what seems to be a steady decline of personal integrity and responsibility.

And people wonder why they're required to provide collateral more and more.

*Title from "Army of Darkness" Ash.