So this bad Jewish stereotype walks into my store, an empty plastic pitcher in one hand and a small child (probably grandchild) being toted in the other. He looks at the soda machine, all its Pepsi branding sprayed lavishly across. “How much are your sodas?”
“2 dollars,” replies the clerk. (They’re now 2.49.)
“2 dah—2 dollars? Sheeminy!” The guy has the excess cartilage on the nose that comes with old age. I heard cartilage doesn’t stop growing, ever, but why does it seem to be worse in men? And honestly, I’m not deliberately trying to be stereotypical about Jews, but this guy really has a huge, honking nose. Almost as big as my Italian nose. “Everybody wants more than what it’s worth,” the bad Jewish stereotype remarks. “Where’s the owner so I can ring his neck?”
He goes on to order a 2-liter Pepsi, and even before he’s paid, even before he’s looked right at me and asked, “Do you work here?” apparently not noticing the company logo monogrammed to my shirt, he pops the soda top and pours it into his pitcher.
For the record, one of the reasons why he’s such a bad stereotype of the Chosen People is because of the way he talks. It’s not something that can be easily transcribed, but just to write in the vernacular for a bit, the word “here” is more like “heah” and “worth” and “work” are more like “woith” and “woik”—not quite in that Lawrence Tierney style, but close.
After he’s asked Stupid Question of the Day (the one about me working here), he pours out a Vegas-style shower of nickels and asks me to count it out. I fudge it and give the store an extra ten cents. The man and his grandkid leave the store with a storm cloud chasing them.
I’m sorry if I’ve offended any Jews out there, but remember, he was the one behaving so stereotypically.
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