Today Freddy and I stopped at the local Goodwill store to check for canning jars. I buy a lot of mine there. Today I got lucky and got a whole box of quart jars and a few smaller ones. I was in the kitchenware section and two young men wearing Goodwill vests were talking and sort of straightening up a few items. Mostly they were just talking. I noticed one reach over and pick up a bottle off of the shelf and spit in it. Then he put it back between two glass items and kept moving some things around and talking to the other guy. He was chewing tobacco and spitting in a Pepsi bottle. The nasty thing didn't have a cap on it either. Then some little kids came by and were looking at things there on the shelf. The young man did not even try to move the bottle he had been spitting in. When I got to the front there were several people there so I didn't say anything about what I had seen. I had to go back to the book section to get Freddy and when we got back to the check out counter there was just the one lady there to check us out so I told her what I had seen. She got upset and said she needed to tell the manager. I said I don't want to get him fired or anything and she said those two guys don't work here. They are doing community service hours. The manager came and she told him the story and he took off to the back to look for the guy. He was pretty upset too. I feel sort of bad for the young man, but it was so nasty and he was certainly old enough to know better. So, what would you have done? I am just wondering if you would have said something or do you think I should have just let it go?
You did the right thing. Spit carries all kinds of nasty surprises and you wouldn't want anyone getting seriously ill from it.
I absolutely would have done what you did. When I'm in a store shopping, I expect a certain amount of professionalism from the store employees (even ones there for community service). The store has a reputation to uphold, and you are doing them a huge favor by letting them know.
eww! You did the right thing. Can you imagine what would happen if somehow the glass breaks and some poor person has to clean that up? My dh dips, and I have thrown glasses away because I will never use that glass again. And he's not even a total stranger! Gross!!
Absolutely the right thing. That is completely wrong whether they were employees or there for service hours. Yuck, the visual with that story is nasty.
I'm making this unanimous again! YEP! You were right in complaining. And I'm guessing you weren't the first one to do so!
I used to be the manager of a VOA thrift store, and we often had people there doing community service - and you definitely did the right thing. I thank you for the manager!
You did the right thing!!! (Two thumbs up!) Community service is taken too lightly these days. While I am all for churches, thrift stores, etc... allowing these people to serve their time in these facilities, they have also become easy outs because the work is usually easy. Community service, in my opinion, should be restricted to hard, sweat-it-out work; that is in the outdoors be it cold or hot. Community service should be memorable to say the least. It should be back breaking, sweat making, pain staking work for an offense commited. The person who spit in the jar obviously isn't taking his service seriously or the reason he is doing service in the first place. He isn't remorseful! So I say good for you! I also hope that the person who signs his slip removed him from the store and if legal, didn't give him credit for that hour he spit in the jar.
Patty, you said it all. I was talking to a city employee yesterday. The house beside me is empty, overgrown with weeds, windows broken and dead animals inside. I asked the city employee, what about having the community service workers come and clean it up. He said, "We can't let them use the equipment, they break it on purpose and it costs too much to replace it." So much for hard labor, they can pick up trash, keep them out of the stores away from people they could harm. Just my 2 cents!!! Way to go Beth!!!
Thanks everyone. I guess the reason I mentioned this at all was because I felt a little like a tattletale, but seeing him just made me sick and sort of mad.
Sometimes being a "tattletale" is the right thing to do now questions asked... this is one of those times
