I worked at Blockbuster one summer. We rarely did things like that, but to consider it from the worker's perspective: one has to checkout customers, which is probably a less arduous task now that one is not constantly arguing over late fees, scan in movies, sort movies for shelving, keep your area clean (at least you're supposed to), and answer the phone, and perhaps another task or two. The juggling multi-tasking can be a bitch.
Nevertheless, a few times the BBV people have been real bastards.
Going the other way, so can customers. I had a knife flashed to intimidate me once. (I was too shocked and enraged to do anything before she, (yes, she) walked out the door. The next time her husband came in, who had also vaguely threatened me, I stuck my chin out at him from across the store and mouthed shit. That really pissed him off.)
The last video store I used with any frequency, they would never enforce the late fees. This was a good thing, because they didn't have cards, but just asked for your phone number, and so my roommates inevitably used my accounts, and since everyone in the world is irresponsible about turning in movies (except me!), I was constantly told that I had late fees even though the last time I personally had taken out a movie was six months prior to that and I had returned it on time. Now I just don't rent movies.
I once rented from a small indie type video store. When I say once, I mean only one time -- I rented the first season of Twin Peaks (which was lovely). I was told, when I checked the videos out, that they would be due in two days, but that since I would not likely watch the entire first season of Twin Peaks in two days, I could turn them in a few weeks later, and pay a nominal late fee. I consented.
Two weeks later, I return. The clerk is angry at me, for the videos are late. I tell him that I will pay the late fee. He says it is too late for that -- much too late -- and that my membership has been revoked. I say: that's too bad, because I was likely to rent more movies, turn them in late, and pay more late fees. The clerk called the manager, and returned to show me a post-it note. The note said: "Jag-Off."
I could not get angry at that.
I think ogged's Blockbuster has a good, Calvinist approach to customer service. The woman on hold will deserve her service more in ten minutes than she would have if she'd just gotten an answer then and there.
All shifts in verb tense are intentional and serve important narrative purpose.
In your comment, text, or generally?
In my comment. In general, shifts in verb tense are BAD.
The switch to the "historical present" at the beginning of the second paragraph really "heightens" the "urgency" of the passage, and the cunning switch back to the past at the end both models the action—as the clerk went away from you, towards the manager, so he recedes from us, into the distant past—and the emotional state of the protagonist: all the urgency is lost in the impasse of managerial intervention. Further, it fosters the detachment we need to understand the bemused reception of the post-it.
Well done, text.
text, would it be a security breach to say where this was? I was not aware that the term "jag-off" was in use outside da 'Burgh.
hmmm, other Pittsburghers seem to feel the same. But there is a vote for Chicago, as well as "mostly midwest," "Northern," (though Dude, you look like a Jagoff in nem pantz en at. is echt Pittsburghese), and "Italian or North Eastern Americans." Note that in Pittsburgh the term can be used in a family newspaper.
I've heard "jagoff" and I've never been to Pittsburgh.
the etymology is interesting. The incident occurred in Chicago -- a tiny place on Clark street; I couldn't tell you where it was, exactly. Since I've been in Chicago, I've thought of jag-off as a Chicago term, though I'm sure I heard it somewhere before I got here.
I imagine it comes from someone with an Eastern European accent saying "jack-off."
OK, this is a job for my Chicago-born linguist friend who studies Pittsburghese (sometimes).
Speaking as a Chicago-raised (or close enough) lad I heard jagoff exclusively until at least college. I didn't even get the connection to ejaculation until then.
Guys who jagged off were jagoffs meaning, I suppose, every one of us.
One would think jagoff would be the product, much like runoff.
i am the (chicago native) linguist friend. i am afraid i'm of minimal use. however, i do have two points.
first, i will not give pittsburgh cred for owning 'jagoff'. many pittsburghers also claim unique ownership of 'pop' and 'needs done'. but these are not unique to pittsburgh. (they do own monophthongized /aw/ as in 'dahntahn', at least on this continent.)
second, i think jagoff is bad, but certainly not as bad as 'jack off'. here is my evidence. when i was a wee one, somebody's initials were JAG and so i called him 'jag' and my mom said i couldn't use that word, because it was bad. however, i agree with tripp: it does not mean the same thing as 'jerk off'. it's more like 'jackass'.
perhaps it does not have the same strength of negativity of "jack-off" or "jerk-off," but it arises from the same source of meaning, no? It does not just mean "jackass" but instead evokes the image of masturbation.
I always presumed that 'jagoff' was the middle-American translation of 'wanker', with the clear implication of the preference of masturbatory activity to the actual.
so a wanker is someone who prefers wanking himself to getting wanked? I always thought it was someone who wanks, for whatever particular reason. But I am not well versed in Brit slang.