Monday, March 29, 2010

Testing, Testing! A Book Return Story

So a customer comes in and brings back the McGraw Hill GRE 2010 practice tests.

The bookseller calls me out.

Bookseller (who has not taken the GRE--this will be important later): Daniel, could you handle this?

Daniel: OK. (to myself: Wah!)

Customer: The book is defective. I've written in it, but I'd still like to return it.

Daniel: Um, if it's defective, the publisher will probably take it back. What's wrong?

Customer: Well, here's the analogies section. See? The problem is that some of the analogies don't have a comparison item.

Daniel: It's been many years since I've had to take any of these tests. I have no idea why some have comparison items and some don't. I guess I'll take it back. Do you want a different book?

Customer: No, I'll just get my money back.

And I want to stop here and mention that very little of the book was written in, and the book had actually been bought at our store by this customer. Maybe the perception was that all our GRE books were similarly damaged.

He left.

The second shift comes in. I ask another of my booksellers, who is studying for the GRE.

Daniel: Hey, have you ever seen something like this? The book is defective.

Bookseller who has taken the GRE: Oh, those are antonyms.

Daniel: Crap. I wonder if they explain this.

Bookseller WHTTG: Yes, on page 6.

Daniel: I don't think that guy is going to pass, no matter how many books he buys.

1 comment:

Sharon said...

Your first bookseller took the LSAT.