Imagine your pain if you walked into your local supermarket intending to buy cheese, and walked out 20 minutes later with a large bag of cubed butternut squash.
That’s what happened to one luckless shopper in North Carolina on Saturday when he discovered he’d unwittingly purchased the pumpkin-like vegetable on a previous visit to the store.
Fellow shopper James Dator was among those who witnessed the fallout of the man’s fateful transaction some time later and decided to live tweet the subsequent exchange with staff, who bemusedly attempted to rectify the error with little success.
A very confused man is attempting to return his open diced butternut squash because he thought it was a giant box of cubed cheese.
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
Rather than accept his mistake as an unfortunate, or even amusing gaffe, the gent decided the best way out of his embarrassment would be through argument – stating the bag wasn’t clearly labelled.
I can't believe this. They're saying he can't because it's open. He's saying it wasn't clearly labeled.
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
Unfortunately for him, the facts didn’t necessarily stack up in his favour.
There's a GIANT label that says butternut squash
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
But, being an understanding kind of place, the shop workers thought they’d found an agreeable solution.
They've agreed to refund his money. Now he's demanding they honor 2 pounds of cubed cheese for $2.97 as if it was priced like squash
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
Which, nonetheless, didn’t quite fit.
"Sir we don't have 2 pound bags of cubed cheese"
"I have guests waiting!"
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
The man just really wanted that cheese.
He wants them to give him two pounds of block cheese and have the deli counter slice it into cubes for him
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
In a moment of misguided inspiration, another member of staff who overheard the ensuing stand-off thought the best solution could only be to give the man what he wanted, and scuttled off to replace the item…
Oh god an employee trying to be helpful half heard the conversation and retrieved a whole butternut squash and it's a lot worse now
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
And dutifully returned clutching a whole butternut squash.
"I DON'T WANT RABBIT FOOD I JUST NEED SOME GOTDANG CHEESE!!!"
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
In a way, though, the employee’s quick thinking really did have the desired effect.
He's leaving without the cheese and took the squash with him.
— James Dator (@James_Dator) July 22, 2017
Either admitting defeat, or simply realising he’d already spent too much time away from his dinner guests, the man left – and took the squash with him.
If anything at all is to be learned from the strange encounter, other than the fact that two pounds of butternut squash is definitely not two pounds of cheese, it may be that people in customer service have the patience of saints.
I've been in retail management for nearly 12 years, this story gave me an intense physical reaction, similar to having a near miss in a car.
— US v. Shark Fins 🌹 (@taddsche) July 24, 2017
Thank you, grocery store workers: you attempt to address our pain, even when it is so clearly self-inflicted.