Here's a fun one for ya'll. Today at work, as with everyday at work, our security guy managed to arrest some shoplifters. Now I have to say that this store is really unlike anything I've ever seen for the amount of theft that goes on in it, as well as the Management team taking it personally! At least once every two days we have a grab and run... ocassionally two or three in a given day. When the alert call goes out over the PA system everyone in drops everything and goes racing out the front doors in the mostly vain attempt to catch the bastard that just ran out of the store with a DVD player or a boxed DVD set. Unfortunately by the time the alarms at the door go off and we realize that this person isn't just another innocent shopper it's inevitably to late. They're gone sprinting across the parking lot. Now the fact that the sprinter has a good lead and is usually as fast as the wind doesn't seem to deter many of the males in the store from chasing after them. Most of the time it's a virtual stampede of Assocaites pouring through the door on their way out trying to catch someone. Now a few times the criminals have figured out just how stupid we really are and have worked in two's. So while their buddy is racing like the wind with a herd of furious Zellers Managers and Supervisors behind them the other one calmly collects all that they had on their list and sashays out the front doors. Of course the alarms go off but everyone able is already chasing his buddy! Score 2 points theives, 0 for Zellers. Actually one time at his old store the Manager got so furious he jumped into his truck, drove through a rose bed, over a sidewalk or two and chased some unfortunate fellow for blocks until he finally just about died from a coronary. I do believe the Manager got a stern talking to from the Police over that one. Seems he really hasn't learned though.

Anyway back to my story about the events of today. Two East Indian ladies, an old one and her daughter, came into the store and proceeded to clean out our clearance racks. Now this really isn't a big deal because it's all clearance but their total bill would have been well over $175, which tells you how much shit they managed to get into their bags at $5 a shirt. So anyway perhaps because the old one was REALLY old they didn't manage to get away fast enough and we caught them. Well it turns out they just "Forgot to pay!" So anyway being the good people we are we called the police anyway. Then because they both decided that they suddenly couldn't speak english anymore we simply got one of our people to come in and translate. This is the funny part. It turns out that our translater decided that it was time to give these two a lecture about how fortunate they were to be in this great country and that they were giving all brown people a bad name! She went on for about 45 mins until the police came. Considering the fact that they were stealing all of the clothes to take with them to India in a few days it'll be interesting to see how well things go for them at the border. Hopefully they'll never get back in!

Because I'm in the mood to tell stories tonight I'll give one last one about one of our Supervisors and her experience while testifying in court against a shoplifter she had caught. The shoplifter, not being the most intelligent person, went up to the Judge and pointed directly at the Supervisor and said "She was the one... she took me up the stairs to the office and beat the shit out of me!" Well this is entirely laughable if you just look at the Supervisor... she's mayube 5'3 and likely weighs about 130lbs. That's not the best part of the story though. The Judge looks at our Supervisor and asks is this true? To which she reply's well... we don't have a second floor in our store!