This has been my day for dealing with dipsh*ts. It’s been like an eight-hour version of the “stupid customer” montage from Clerks. People who are pissing me off today:

• People with no creativity or imagination, like the woman who spent twenty minutes repeatedly asking me about every minute detail of our store sample, because she wanted her cross-stitch to look EXACTLY the same. Eventually I ended up on a chair trying to count the holes per inch on a piece of linen in a framed design ten feet up on the wall.
• People who expect me to mind-read, like the woman who came in and asked for “tapestries that are French” for her friend, when what she really wanted was “cross-stitch kits” that are “pale in colour.” I only figured that out after tearing my hair out and showing her every French canvas we have in the shop.
• People who don’t know what the hell they’re doing, like the woman who bought a Zhivago pattern book and bunch of wool on the weekend but can’t get any of the patterns to work, despite the fact that “they’re very simple” and “she’s a really good knitter,” yet somehow after a few rows she’s always missing stitches. So obviously Zhivago is some kind of magic wool where perfectly knit stitches just DISAPPEAR.

And then there were the usual assortment of idiots asking for things we obviously don’t sell – velcro, a pin for a pocket watch, quilling supplies – and country mice visiting the big city who freak out when they see our prices. It’s been a loooong day.