We sell 3 day/2 night packages to Las Vegas/Grand Canyon at my work. This tour attracts the highest amount of crazies into our office out of all the tours we offer. For some reason insane people are attracted to the giant picture of Las Vegas hanging in view from the street. It has the same effect a red corvette has on babes. Only the babes are greasy and on drugs (the bad drugs) and I get to talk to them.
Insane people always end up asking about 25 questions about the tour. First they ask general questions about the tour: What is the duration of the package? Leading to more specific questions: Is the pool heated? Eventually leading to when they talk about themselves and how they think the tour would be really great. It’s like they want to convince me that they want to buy the tour. For anyone selling anything this is fantastic (commission) except your customer is insane and greasy. It’s almost worse if they actually bought the tour because you would feel bad for all the other people who would have to spend 4 and 1/2 hours in a 14 seat mini-bus with a smelly lunatic.
The last particular man who inquired about the tour wasn’t completely insane when he first walked into the office. Sure he was short and this is always a reason to be initially suspicious. I am fairly short (I use fairly because I still can not completely admit that I am short….at least not 100 percent short) and I am a reasonable person. He had black hair and was tan. At first I took him to be a regular customer. This was until he started asking too many questions. This was his red flag to my neo-fascist.
Now if I am busy, I pick up the phone and tell the person that I have to make an important phone call. I tell the person to call the number on the back of the brochure if he or she has anymore questions. I begin the dail a fake number and smile at the person. If it’s not busy or the person in question does not get hostile, I answer any questions and nod to stories (no matter how incredible) they may offer. This particular instance I was not busy and the man was amiable.
He smelled kind of drunk and he began to talk about how he was some manager of this or that and he was taking a two week vacation. He was going to buy 8 of his employees this package to reward them for working so hard while he was gone. I told him he was a pretty nice guy for doing that.
At about the 19th question he asked about player’s clubs. I said no you do not have to join any player’s clubs. Apparently this would have been a benefit of buying this package instead of a deterrent. He said he was part of the (some native american sounding) club. At first I took this to mean that he was part native american (It was Sunday and I was already braindead…ps I work Wednesday-Sunday). I was like cool I am talking to a native american (thus the dark hair and tan) but then he took out his wallet and began showing me all the different cards and the different player’s clubs they coincided with. I made the disturbing discovery that he kept a couple of condoms tucked away in one of his wallet’s side pockets. He left his wallet open on the counter for sooooo goddamnnnnnn long! like he wanted me to see the condoms. He wanted me to know that he not only had sex but safe sex. This was disgusting yet admirable.
He told me he had “racked up” a lot of points at Caesar’s Palace and he had earned a comp room. But decided he would save that for his anniversary coming up in March. He wanted to do something special for his wife. I was ready to call his bluff by this time. He was never really that interesting from the start of our meeting and I was tired of looking at those goddamnnnnn condoms! I picked up the phone. He had to know it would end like this.
