29 March 2010

Lemon Ricotta with a Dash of Bullshit

So, there I am, standing at the circulation desk, trying to do no less than three things at a time, when an older woman approaches me. What I am trying to do is find:
1. The title of some Triple Crown Novel that another woman swears is in existence, but I can't find anywhere or anything like it from another publisher.
2. Find essay writing books for this other lady [who was wonderfully patient with me because she saw I was busy]
3. Figure out when to meet with a top level admin because her secretary needs to know like ten minutes ago.
4. Trying to figure out extended dates for Census testing.

What does this woman want from me and why is it so urgent?

She needs a recipe involving lemon and ricotta.

Being the FUCKING AWESOME reference librarian I am, I just go to all recipes and plug in the ingredients, while still doing all of the above.

Me: So, what kind of recipe do you want?
Patron: Lemon and ricotta. Ricotta is a cheese (ok, gee, thanks for that information)
Me: Ok, those are ingredients, but there's like lemon ricotta cheesecake, cookies, muffins, pasta, quiche, lots of stuff
Patron: She just said lemon and ricotta [looks over at me, as if I'm supposed to know who 'she' is and what this pronoun likes to eat]
Me: Oh, I just don't see anything with lemon and ricotta, I mean, unless you were to zest the lemon and put it in the ricotta
Patron: No, no, no [really, really, honestly, I don't have time to argue with you over cheese], you're supposed to roll it out on a piece of foil and bake it [ok, this seems illogical to me, but I'm not a master chef, but sweetjeebusonapogostick, can you wait 5 minutes and then I can give you better service?]. That's what she wants. And only those two things.
Me: I don't really see any recipes that just have those two ingredients. There's a frosting that uses those two and some sugar.
Patron: No.
Me: If you can give me five minutes, I'll see what else I can find.
Patron: She just wants lemon and ricotta [Wait, what ingredients, can you repeat them another three fucking times for me?]
Me: If you'd like to go sit over at my desk, I'll be with you in just a few minutes [you fucking line-skipping impatient dingbat]
Patron: You're not Italian are you? Just gimme the ones for cookies.

This reminds me of the epic tale of Patti LaBelle's potato salad, which I will provide for you whenever I can find my email detailing the ridiculousness of that reference interaction.

1 comment:

  1. One of my pet peeves as a cashier was when people cut in the line. I can remember two separate incidents when patrons left the line only to come around to the front of the register and - while I was with another patron - started asking me questions or yelled at me. One claimed that I lied to him about an earlier transaction, the other started asking me about the batteries needed for the cheap cd player he was buying. Oh I'm sorry, I didn't realize that you were the only person in the store right now. Leave me alone and get back in line. People ... Remind me why I want to work with the public again?

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