What is one of the few things each and every person on this planet has in common? We all need to eat! And where do the vast majority of us get food? The supermarket. There are some truly bizarre people on this planet. Imagine what these people get up to in their friendly neighborhood supermarket?
These AskReddit users fill us in on some of their most exciting encounters.
#1. Witch
“There was an old lady snacking on frozen chicken legs while pushing her cart around. She had wild semi dreaded grey hair, layers of earth colored dresses, and a hunchback. That blew my ten year old mind. She really was a witch.”
#2. Jonesing For A Payout
“While working at Walmart, I watched a woman grab a jar of organic peanut butter, smash the glass bottle on the ground, and use the shards to cut her face. After slicing the [eff] out of her face, she ran up to my stunned ass and asked to see a manager. I walkie’ed somebody over and the manager rushed her into the office while asking me to call 911. Apparently she was an addict and jonesing hard. She figured the best thing to do was get hurt at Walmart so they would give her “a million dollars for pain and suffering”. Shockingly enough, Walmart didn’t pay out to the junkie that cut up her own face.”
#3. He Got Too Ballsy
“A homeless man was living in the corner of the garden center at Walmart. He set up camp behind the industrial shelves, stole a tent and was living there for a week. He was shoplifting all his supplies and food. He got ballsy and stole a George Foreman grill and was cooking a steak at 2am. FD was called for smoke in the building and found him behind the shelves. It was a pretty solid plan actually.”
#4. Some People Are NOT Meant To Be Parents
“There was a woman at Target yelling at her 5 year old son for crying and embarrassing her. I mean she was screaming things like, “YOU RUINED MY LIFE, YOU LITTLE SHIT” etc…luckily the manager told her to leave and called social services after she not-so-subtly threatened him.”
#5. The Weird Pickle
“A woman took off her underwear, hiked up her skirt, shat in a pickle barrel by the deli, then called the manager to complain about “the weird pickle”. Her hope was to sue the store but while she was out of view of employees, over a dozen customers saw it.”
#6. Turd Nugget
“I worked in a large supermarket a few years back and some guy came in, walked around the store, and every now and then dropped a nugget of turd by shaking his trousers. It happened 3 consecutive weeks before someone worked out who it was.”
#7. Hope They Helped, Buddy
“A fat guy hurried into the store who was beat red and sweating profusely. He rushed up to the counter with a few bottles of extra strength laxative. As soon as I finished scanning them he started chugging them. He paid cash and I handed him his receipt and change. He burped and pushed the receipt and now empty bottles towards me and calmly walked out of the store.”
#8. One Bite Is All You Need
“I’m a cashier and this guy walks up to my counter with a full roast chicken. I glance at him and continue checking out the person in front of me. When I look back, he’s gone. My manager comes sprinting up the aisle, picks up the chicken, shakes the container angrily and yells, “I KNEW IT, HE DID IT AGAIN.” I pull the container over and the guy had just taken a single bite out of the top of the chicken and left it. I have no idea how many times he’s done it but apparently enough for my manager to recognize him.”
#9. These Are Not Samples, Ma’am
“A really obese old lady at Walmart was just trying on deodorants and putting them back. I think she tried like 20 before she was satisfied to continue on without putting one in her cart.”
#10. Karma
“I worked in a small, local mini-market. There was an assistant manager there that none of us liked. He was incompetent, but really smarmy because his dad owned the company. One day, a known shoplifter comes in (a Roma Gypsy in her 60s), so he tracks her on the CCTV and sees her stash a bottle of expensive shampoo up her skirt. Delighted that he was going to catch her in the act and be a hero, he immediately went to confront her. Before he got to her she had obviously felt something was up and put the shampoo back. When he confronted her and said he knew she was hiding something, she whipped off her dress in one quick motion and stood there stark naked and challenged him to find the shampoo on her person. He looked simultaneously devastated and disgusted and told us afterwards that he could hear us all laughing in the security office from the shop floor!”
#11. Clean Up On Aisle 2
“My friend was pregnant with twins and was at Wegmans with our other friend. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to witness this. Her water broke in, of all places, the pickle aisle. She threw jars of pickles on the liquid to hide it, then left. She said she didn’t really know why she did that. She freaked out and didn’t want anyone to think she pissed herself, not thinking “I’m massively pregnant with twins and water breaking is an actual thing”.”
#12. Picky Eater
“I saw a dude standing in the queue, picking his nose and simultaneously touching all the candy bars before making his decision.”
#13. I Don’t Get Paid Enough To Care
“I was working in the floral dept. A large old woman in a motorized cart asked if I could honor her expired coupon. I told her I didn’t have a register in my department and pointed out customer service at the front of the store. Also, we didn’t even have the product the coupon was for. She purposely backed into a display of potted pants, but couldn’t knock them over to make her point, so she made a sharp turn and pushed over a few plants that were on the floor. She looked at me triumphantly with the expectation that my day would be ruined. RUINED. But alas, I shrugged my shoulders and continued with my corsage making. She rolled away dejected to go torture the people in customer service. I didn’t get paid enough to care and made sure to wait to clean it up to deny her the satisfaction of seeing me pick up her mess.”
#14. Kids These Days…
“This like 5 year old kid emptied a 4-pint bottle of milk all over the floor, and her mum just stood there and watched. Wtf lady?! Control your ridiculous child.”
#15. Crazy Chicken Man
“I was shopping at Trader Joe’s right before closing. There was almost nobody in the store, so I was zipping around in a hurry. I get to the egg rack and there is a tall man standing there blocking the whole thing with an open egg box just staring at it. Not checking for broken eggs like I do, but just staring at the box. So I try to work my way around him, he is muttering to himself, and I decide it would be better to give him some space and get eggs another time. Then, as I’m going down the next isle, I hear him starting to cluck and crow, soft at first but then it gets much louder and then BAM I see an egg hurled across the store and it splats on the wall above the meat rack. I’m thinking it’s time to bail at this point. Then I hear a call for manager on the intercom and bells dinging at the register so I pull back and watch the drama. Manager #1 comes up in a colorful Hawaiian shirt and instructs the nut bag to drop the eggs and please leave. He jumps back and starts yelling profanity and clucking, throws more eggs at the wall and goes for another carton of eggs. Manager #2, or maybe a checker, confronts him, and nervously says we called the cops, it’s time to go. So I get to the front checkout with a shopping cart half full and decide its not worth it and leave.”
#16. Just Buy The Man Some Ointment!
“Not me, but a former manager witnessed this. We have a rather large 24-hour grocery store in our city. She was there shopping after closing at work, after midnight. As she was shopping, a man with severe burns on his face and body (like needed emergency medical treatment) was walking around and begging people to buy him Neosporin.”
#17. That’s Not What You Said In Bed Last Night!
“I was ringing these two middle aged guys up on my line and I rang up a couple bananas and a giant thing of soda. The soda went crashing into the bananas and one of the guys said, “Woah, you’re crushing my bananas!” and the other guy yelled, in the most flamboyant voice I’ve ever heard, “That’s not what you said in bed last night, bitch!” and I couldn’t stop laughing for 10 minutes.”
#18. Someone Call Child Services
“Lady with two kids (maybe 4 and 7) comes into the store with the grandma. The 4-year old is sitting in the empty cart and the 7-year old is running up and down the aisles pushing her. Neither adult gives 2 shits at this point. The cart flips over and the lady drops a glass gallon jar of BBQ sauce she was holding, screams, and runs to the cart. She picks up the 4 year-old, cradles her, starts wailing and crying, just rocking her on the floor back and forth, all while sitting in the BBQ sauce. The grandma starts letting the 7-year old have it. He has his back to a 7+ foot tall display of Ritz crackers that I had built earlier that morning. Then the grandma calls him a bastard and shoves him into the display and the whole thing comes down on top of him. They pick up the 4-year old and just leave the store. I help uncover the 7-year old and he runs out the store after the mom. Totally [effed] up.”
#19. Big Chunk of Meat
“Our Tesco used to be open during the night and one night my partner and I were getting some midnight snacks, as you do. Walking past the meat aisle and this guy with no hair, about age 50, had a big chunk of meat (in it’s plastic sealing) and his hand down his trousers. I guess he couldn’t wait long enough to take it home.”
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