Wednesday, January 31, 2007

An interesting observation

I was getting gas tonight at a BP station just over the Missouri line* when something unexpected happened to me. An attendant, probably about 19-20 years old, was emptying the trash cans. As I was filling up, he asked me if I needed any help with anything. I told him that I was fine. He told me that if I needed help with anything, to let him know. He then started talking about the weather (which is terrible, by the way) and was generally very pleasant.

It was creepy.

As I was leaving, I got to thinking about how odd the guy's behavior seemed. But as I thought about it some more, I realized that what was really odd was that the guy's friendliness made him stand out so much, even to the point of being weird.

Have we really sunk so low that friendliness is considered weird? Have we become so accustomed to poor customer service, that good service is creepy? Sadly enough, I think this is the case.

*I filled up for $1.83 the other day. Gotta love cheap Missouri gas.

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