T and I are horrible at returning videos, and our late fees are legendary. We scoff at people who complain about paying 12$ in fees. To us, this is standard. Moreover, a couple of weeks ago, T rented movies at the Mont-Royal/St-Denis Blockbuster. Thinking I’d do a good deed, I returned them. To our usual Blockbuster, the one on Ontario. They called us, and we fixed the whole thing. But got a late fee.

So, a couple of weeks ago I went to Texas. Expecting to be horrendously bored, I rented seven DVDs to bring with me. I returned them almost on time. But a couple of days later, I noticed one of the DVDs was still in my machine. I’d returned an empty box. Blockbuster obviously hadn’t noticed either, because they hadn’t called to warn that the movie was late.

That evening I went to return the orphan DVD. There were about fifteen people waiting in line, and the clerk was stressed. She was assisted by a trainee, who seemed to be hindering her more than anything else. Her experienced colleague hadn’t shown up. Anyway, my turn came, I explained the whole thing and she looked through the “DVD boxes without DVDs” drawer (I’m obviously not the only dimwit on the Plateau). She rudely asserted that I hadn’t returned the box. I named off all the other movies I had returned with it, and told her I hadn’t been called about a late video. I asked her to check my account.

However, my account looked like a Christmas tree. Things were flashing all over the screen. I could read

“Customer returned DVD to wrong branch”
“Customer has late fee”
“Customer has late fee”
“Customer has late fee”
“Customer has late fee”
“Customer has late fee”
“Customer has late fee”
“Customer has late fee”
“Customer has late fee”
Etc.

Didn’t make me look too good. I told the clerk it wasn’t worth arguing, it was just a Blockbuster DVD box she was missing anyway. While all this is happening, the trainee is trying to create a new membership, and at every step of the process, he asks the now-very-stressed main clerk how to proceed. She’s struggling to unlock a DVD box and refusing to believe me, only half listening. Finally she just starts serving someone else. I go check to see if the box hasn’t simply been returned to the shelf. It hasn’t.

The issue still not resolved, not too sure what to do, I stand next to the counter, waiting for her to finish serving her current customer. She finally notices me, and says “What are you still doing here?!!”. I ask her what she wants me to do about the missing box. “I’ll deal with it, just… go!!”.

I’m not sure that qualifies as getting kicked out of a video store, but it made me feel like a rebel anyway.