At my job, we've had our share of rather interesting characters come and go, and the mentally unstable tend to be some of the cream of the interestingness crop. Lately, we've had an overweight, aged, balding black man come in who a customer called schizophrenic. I don't know much about psychology, but what I do know is, he was talking–no, arguing with himself.

Apparently, he can be quite polite though, because when he entered the store, the first thing he did was bow to everyone. Prior to that, he wished the customers sitting outside a merry Christmas (unfortunately about a month too late). He also did some kind of very animated chanting, with all the appropriate gestures, flailing of the arms, and so forth. He followed that up with a little impromptu panhandling, garnered himself a dollar, which he used to buy an espresso shot.

By the time he started screaming incoherently, customers became quite uncomfortable, and apparently someone had called the police at some point. They arrived just as he began chatting it up with an unsuspecting female customer. A friendly hello from the cop, a few questions about how he was doing (to which he responded by clutching his head migraine-style and saying "bad memories!") and eventually he was off, quite cooperatively.

Oh, but that's not the end. Not half an hour later, he was back, freshly dressed in some kind of fisherman getup, and sporting a book on Christian theology, a star shaped Washington Mutual paperweight, and a blank Christmas card. Most of it, he offered to one of my coworkers. He then sat to read through this Christian theology book. Except, he wasn't really reading it, so much as scribbling notes in it. And tearing out pages.

Eventually, it was time to close, and I politely told him it was time to go. He left, and left behind all of his junk, including the book he'd been scribbling in. Most of it was literally scribbles, but I could make out a few words here and there. Apparently, he was concerned that God owed women pussies and babies Christmas. He was more blunt in the bathroom: On a roll of toilet paper, he had written "Fuck God" in large upper-case letters. Apparently, he doesn't have as good a relationship with God as the Christian theology book had previously suggested.

I had to chaperone one of the girls home because (what luck) this guy just happens to live in her apartment complex. When I left, he was asking somebody for a vacuum cleaner. At midnight.

technorati tags: customers, humor, schizophrenia, work

Filed under: humor, work on February 3rd, 2006