I once managed a convenience store (Cumberland Farms). I had the responsibility to keep the store staffed, stocked and profitable. Staffing was the big issue. I was responsible for keeping the store open. If someone couldn’t work, I had to fill the spot. As a result, for a while I was working between 90 and 100 hours a week. I’d work my shift, and because I was short staffed, worked the other daily shifts too. There were weeks I worked every hour the store was open. Eventually I was able to hire enough people to run the store. I hired this one guy to work nights and weekends. I spent over a week training him. When I was confident he could go it alone, I assigned him his first solo weekend. I gave him Sunday morning. This ended up being my first weekend day off in a couple months, and I was elated. Sunday morning rolled around and I got a call. The new guy was stuck on the Cape. His van had broken down the day before and he wasn’t going to be able to get it fixed until Monday. He was going to be unable to work. That meant there was no one to open the store. As a result, because I was the manager, I had to go do it. I lived close enough that I walked to the store. So I got dressed and headed over to open up. Now this guy literally lived around the corner from the store. Total distance from the store to his door couldn’t have been two hundred feet. As I was crossing the street to get to my store, I glanced down the side street where he lived, and there it was. The van that was supposed to be broken down on the Cape was parked out front of the house. The van was noticeable for several reasons. It was red, had a custom paint job, big fat tires, chrome bumpers and a huge motor just pouring out from under the hood. Did I mention this big red gaudy van was parked on the road in front of his house not 200 feet from the store? I opened the store and started making calls to get a replacement for my employee that was stuck down on the Cape. . At a reasonable hour of the morning, I called his house and got what I was told was his mother. I asked for my employee. I was told he was sleeping. I asked about the Cape, I was told he hadn’t gone to the Cape and he had been home all weekend. I asked how the van was running; I was told it was running fine. Wednesday when he came to the store to get his check (he wasn’t working Monday or Tuesday), I fired him. He was angry and wanted to know why. I asked about his breakdown. He regaled me with a very long story about going to the Cape and getting stuck in Sandwich. I then had to explain to him that I walk to work and as I was crossing his street, I could see his van parked in front of his house. He then launched into a story about having it towed. I then had to explain to him that I had spoken to his mother. He was mad, he attacked me. He abandoned his attacked after I brandished a length of steel pipe. I asked for his key to the store. He refused to give it to me. He threatened to return after I locked up and “rob the store blind”. I had to inform him that the locks had already been changed. He threatened to return and vandalize the store. He’d reap his revenge if he had to break every window to do it. I just looked at him. At this point I told him to go ahead, it wasn’t MY store. I also mentioned that, I knew where he lived; it was around the corner about 200 feet away. His brilliant response was that, I wouldn’t be able to prove it was him. I just had to shake my head. He took his check and left the store, never to be seen again.
So, let’s think about the logic of this. A guy that lives 200 feet from the store and drives a bright red custom van and leaves it parked on the street tried to get away with saying said van is broken down on the Cape. When he’s caught in the lie he assaults me and threatens to return to vandalize and “rob the store blind”. And when he is told that I’ll just call the cops on him because after all I know it’s him and where he lives, his response is that I won’t be able to prove it was him.
Did I forget to mention there were three customers and a new weekend trainee in the store at the time this was going on?
Sometimes you just have to scratch you head and wonder.
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