In Which We Remind the Customer that No One Lives in a Vacuum.

Tales from the Cutting Counter: Yesterday, a 60-something woman came into the store. Her cell phone rang almost immediately, and she spent the next half an hour browsing the aisles and chatting in a very loud, clear voice. It quickly became evident that her conversation was personal and rather gossipy. As she segued from subject to subject, everyone around her became privy to financial information, opinions about the parenting habits of neighbors, snarky comments about acquaintances and so forth. The chatter was so annoying that my floor manager actually came up to me and asked if I was listening to it; I replied that it would be impossible NOT to listen. Eventually, she made her way to the cutting counter, where I waited hoping that she'd hang up. She told the person on the other end of her call that she'd call back in 10 minutes and closed her phone. She put a bolt of black fabric on the counter, asked for a yard of it, and as I was preparing to cut it she said, "My daughter just moved and she was telling me her troubles." I looked her dead in the eye and said with as little expression as possible, "We know." A yard of ponte knit: $12.99. Leaving somebody speechless: priceless.