Of Blacktop and Chalk

The unexpected events always keep me amused. In my business, one cannot predict who will walk through the door or what crazy ideas they'll tote along with them.
  Yesterday morning started off mildly until a large African-American man came in acting all shifty while inquiring into pricing. His eyes kept darting back and forth and he seemed to have trouble keeping his train of thought. I politely answered his questions and finally determined what sort of thing he was after. He ordered some basic lettering for his parking lot sealing business' trucks. He tried dickering the price with me but with the short time frame I was given, I felt that there was no room to move. We also decided that he would install the graphics himself to save some cash. He gave me a small down payment then rushed out. I didn't think all that much about it at the time, but as I was preparing the graphics I just had a funny feeling that something wasn't quite right about the whole transaction, but I followed through with my end of the deal. Fast forward to this afternoon when he called to see if I could stay to receive him after-hours. I begrudgingly agreed to wait 30 minutes more. Thankfully he arrived as advertised, along with his two man crew. That's when the fun began.
They blast in the door and promptly knock over several finished signs that were awaiting pick-up. The man I was dealing with was on his phone having a heated, vocally pronounced coversation that went something like this..."NO YOUR FOOD AIN'T INCLUDED! I DONT GIVE A F**** WEATHER YOU EAT OR NOT! GO OUT AND KILL A G/D TURKEY FOR ALL I CARE! I'm not sure what to think at this point. His men are just wandering around my shop while he paces back and forth. Now it's about 5:40 and I'm feeling waves of pissed-offness and amusement roll over me. He finally hands the phone off and deals with me. I hand him the lettering and he says, "The truck's out there- go put it on- you told me you would put it on- remember? I replied, "Mmmm, no. In fact we discussed it and you wanted to save cash". "Oh no!"he blurted, "for this price- you puttin' this on there!" So of course, I snatched them back from him and grabbed my cleaning supplies and followed them into the parking lot. I tear off a couple of paper towels and move towards the truck. Just then he jumps in front of me and says, "You don't need to clean nothin'- just stick it on". I thought that was odd until I smelled the faint odour of wet paint. I shouted, "IS THAT WET PAINT?". He replied, "Don't worry about it- just stick it". It appeared that he had just painted his truck before he came to visit me---with a ROLLER! So I thought, what the hell. I pulled the release liner off and quickly eyeballed the placement and...ppplllaaattt! Right into the wet paint. "There you go" I said as I wiped the red paint from my knuckles. Then it was time to be paid. "Where's the bill?" he shouted. As I handed it off to him, he demanded to his associate to give him some money. The man reached into his pocket and produced a $100 bill. He plucked it from the sad man and hands it over to me. So I say, "That's not quite enough". He replies, "Make it enough- I ain't got no more!". They then all turn face and piled into the truck and tore out of the driveway. I was left stunned, bewildered and a bit thankful that I actually got $140 of the $160 he owed. Chalk that one up to a hellava good story to tell.