I forgot to add the best story about working at Eddie Bauer!!!

OK, I left out a story from my Workin' for the Man! post about Eddie Bauer. It is the best story I have from there. I can't believe that I forgot to include it! So here goes.

As I stated before, I was working at Eddie Bauer as a seasonal employee for Christmas time. One day, who is to walk into my store, but the sportscaster that was well known in town, and is now on the morning show for KVEW, Mr. Kevin Uretsky.

Now, I had always half way enjoyed his sports casting. For a local hack, he wasn't that bad. He always seemed a little smug to me on the air, but I figured that it wasn't as bad as I thought. I mean after all, he is a LOCAL sportscaster. How cool can one of the local news guys think they really are anyways?

I received my answer about 5 seconds after he walked into my store. This man must have thought that there was a crowd of paparazzi following him into the mall. He came in with his shades on, and acted as if we should be giving him free duds just for walking through the door. I am not quite sure, but there is a good chance that he had some 5x7 glossy photos of himself pre-signed to hand out to any lady, and I mean ANY LADY that happened to look in his direction.

I approached him with a smile, and said, "Hey, how are things going today? Is there anything I can help you find?" The reply I received came with the tone of a king speaking to a lowly servant. "Probably not. Unless you know how to read minds." Now, I have encountered rude customers before, but this was pure arrogance. I continued. "Well, I am not a mind reader, but if there is something in the store that you are looking for, I am quite sure that I can find it for you." He then replied with: "Fine, if you insist on bothering me, I am looking for a present for my Mother. She lives in Florida, and her birthday is in a couple weeks." Now as you know, E.B. carries a large selection of winter wear at wintertime. After all, they are an outdoor store. Trying to joke with him, I said, "Well, if she lives in Florida, I won't direct you over to the parkas, since they won't do her any good."

Like I said, from dealing with customers in the past, I expected some sort of response to what I said along the lines of, "He he, yes you are right, a winter coat wouldn't suffice would it?" Followed by, "What would you suggest?" But that is not what came out of his pie hole. He said to me, in a rather angry tone, "Of course she doesn't want or even NEED a WINTER COAT! Did you not hear what I SAID? She lives in Florida! Why do YOU people ALWAYS try to sell things to me that I DON'T NEED!?!"

Now at that point, I had two options:

#1, Excuse myself, and go find someone else that might be able to help this fat, double chinned, angry, can't hack the big time TV stations so he stays here, conceited, in love with himself, fat, worthless chunk of an old pork rind of a customer, such as my manager,

~OR~

#2. Punch the fat, double chinned, angry, can't hack the big time TV stations so he stays here, conceited, in love with himself, fat, worthless chunk of an old pork rind of a customer right in the head.

Of course, since I valued my job, I begrudgingly chose option number 1. I turned to walk away, when right at that moment my manager Carol, whose husband was the sportscaster over at KEPR (The nice personable one who I would talk sports with) came over to help Mr. Uretsky. As soon as she came up, he morphed into a different person. He put a big warm smile on his face. It looked EXACTLY like the one that was on the TV every night at 5, 6 and 11. They walked off, and Carol helped him find a nice gift.

It made me think of that part in the movie Back to the Future, when Lorraine's Dad back in 1955 said about Marty, "The kid is an idiot, his Parents are probably idiots too." I do not know Mr. Uretsky's dear Mommy, but she did raise the jerk.

So that is why ever since the Winter of 1996, whenever I go to any high school sporting event, and I see Mr. Uretsky, the fat, double chinned, angry, can't hack the big time TV stations so he stays here, conceited, in love with himself, fat, worthless chunk of an old pork rind of a human being, I stand up, cup my hands to my mouth, and yell, "KEVIN URETSKY SUCKS!!!!" Or something to that effect. On more than one occasion I am sure he heard me. And yes, I know that 12 years is a long time to hold a grudge, but someone has to try and knock the pompous ass down a few notches.

So there you have it. My Kevin Uretsky story. May he rue the day he ever crossed my path. Happy Wednesday everyone.