I am like a magnet for "crazy" this afternoon.

[Chan790]

Let me tell you about my day. About 30 minutes after I got to work a woman comes in and asks for me by name...so I say "Can I help you?" and she responds "I have a message for you."

I say "Okay"

She says "____ I have been sent with a message for you from the Lord. Are you ready to receive it?"

Mind you, I have a line of customers out the door and I'm being told that God wants to speak to me. She's over-dressed for the weather for one thing. She seems like she might be pretty under all the Tammy-Faye layers of make-up. Both of her hands are in her coat pockets. She's tweaking (behaviorwise...fidgeting, not making eye contact, rolling her shoulders) but appears and smells clean.

Thus, thinking she might be concealing almost anything in all those clothes, I say "Not really." and prepare to step back in case I have to either defend myself, run/duck, or if need be beat her senseless. At this point, she grabs me by the upper-arm and proceeds to tell me that I have been given a journey by the Lord that I have given up on but that I am still on Jesus' heart. And he wants me to know that...AND HE WANTS ME TO KNOW THAT. (She's yelling...and she still has me by the bicep.) So I make eye-contact, nod, and give enthusiastic but vague affirmative answers because I feel that she's potentially-dangerous. She finally says her piece and leaves.

So I start heading to the back of the store to write up an incident report, confer with my shift manager and call the police because I'm somewhat creeped out that she knew my name and because I want the police to keep an eye out for this woman...when this other woman comes over and starts yelling at me and saying she wants my name. I refuse to give it to her so she asked a coworker who for some reason...gave it to her! "I'm deeply offended, I know your CEO and I'm gonna call him." "Okay" says I. "I'm serious, I'm going to get you fired." At this point, I just stop talking. I say nothing. She continues to make threats and be disruptively-belligerent. I walk away. She locks herself in my bathroom. I call the police but by the time I come out of the office, she has left.

So...I'm now home alone. Kinda shell-shocked because I'm freaked out that this woman I've never seen before knew my name and because I was accosted twice in the span of 5 minutes by people who clearly feel strongly about me whom I've never met before; I've never been one who felt comfortable with law enforcement, but now I'm the complaining witness of two criminal reports.

:shrug: Really. I'm at a loss for words.

[zanne]

1. Wow.

Be sure to lock your doors, OK?

I was a salesclerk in a department store once and a woman came up to me, poured some water from a bottle and sprayed it in my face. She said "You have just been baptized in the name of the Lord". I said "Gee...thanks" and walked away.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. Whoa! You have every right to feel the way you do. And that second person had better

not have any influence on your employment. If something does change (you are fired or poorly treated) I hope you will try to put together a case for being discriminated against on religious grounds. (I'm assuming, here, that this is what wild woman number two was all worked up over.. that you called the cops on someone harassing you with her own religious views.) :hug:

[ForrestGump]

3. Dude...you wrote an incident report on the Virgin Mary. And Mary Magdalene.

I WANT YOU TO KNOW THAT! I WANT YOU TO KNOW THAT!!!!



On the other hand, perhaps you have turned into a crazy magnet. I've had some pretty far-out unsolicited weirdness attacks working on the Las Vegas Strip and thereabouts (I think my favorite may still be a very mannered gentleman who had just talked with the Man In The Moon, and he was certainly less manic than the others) but you kind of expect that in a place like this, and none of the really mindnumbingly odd examples ever used my real name.

I really can't imagine where these two could have come from, or even what riled the second one up so much. Do you wear nametags at your job and, if so, did the first woman ask for you by just your first name or by your surname, as well. Big difference because, as irrational as it is, I can see someone thus afflicted coming in to your workplace on other occasions and receiving repeated messages from Jesus that you were not yet beyond redemption and that it was her mission to tell you so. Jesus can, after all, be a harsh taskmaster.

[Chan790]

7. Well...

I don't know where they came from, but I do know what riled the second one up. She told me...loudly. She felt infringed upon that I would let people minister in the store. She doesn't want to hear ministry, she just wants to drink her coffee and do the Sunday Times crossword puzzle. And that's ruined for her forever. And she's going to ruin my life. and on and on and on.

The whole thing is absurd because according to the cop, the second woman actually could face more severe charges...publicly threatening violence in the workplace or in a private-space for public usage (i.e. a store or any other public venue) is considered "making terroristic threats" while grabbing my arm is just a misdemeanor assault.

She used only my first name...if she had used my last name, I'd seriously be sleeping in a motel tonight. Thankfully we don't wear name-tags and though we are expected to be gushingly-friendly and forthcoming with the customers...we're allowed to use whatever name we want. I use a nickname of my middle name (While this is the name I answer to outside work and the one she used...it's not a legal name so it's not on my mailbox or in the phone book or on almost-anything.) and an obviously-fake last name. (Usually something like Trouble or Danger or Courageous.)

[texanwitch]

4. I had a crazy person attack me on the bus because I said I wasn't interested in Jesus Christ.

This person tried to hit me.

The Army trained me well in self defense.

The crazy types are out there.

[elleng]

5. Full moon last night.

Lots of stuff like that yesterday, where I am.

Relax, breathe.

[rug]

6. Do you work in an all-night pharmacy?

[Chan790]

8. Nope...

coffee shop. A certain very-large chain.

[NJmaverick]

9. That is one heck of a story

Sounds like you have a rather interesting job

[Chan790]

10. Hardly...

I work for a retailer. Usually run of the mill and quiet job.