Seriously do not do the following:

Ways to annoy the ever-loving life out of your local MegaCineplex Theater (soulless division):
1. Get up to the box office and/or concession stand and start bitching about how expensive things are. Yes, I know they are expensive. I do not set the prices: I take your money, give you change, print tickets, and scoop popcorn out of large bins. Sorry, bucky: My $6.50/hr doesn't include listening to you bitch.

2. Stand in a long line at the concession stand and then start figuring out what you want. See all those people behind you? They might know what they want already. Get moving.

3. Try to convince me to give you a discount you're not entitled to, free soda, popcorn, or candy, or anything like that. Look: I'm a bad employee, I guess. I'll sell you a 12-and-under ticket if you look 14, even if it's a PG-13 movie. But a) see item 1 on this list, and b) I really have no reason to like you, and being a cheapskate kind of makes me *dislike* you. Plus, I need a paycheck, and you're really not worth getting fired over.

4. Speak very, very quietly, so I can't hear you.

5. Change your mind about six times about what you want at the concession stand. Make up your mind already!

6. Order about seventeen million things, including six chicken tender combos and nineteen hot-dogs, and do it chaotically, so that every five items or so I think you're done. Also, you've made me go to the one working Icee machine nine times.

7. Order an Icee. Especially a cherry Icee. They, due to some hellish chemical property of artificial, carbonated, frozen cherry flavoring, tend to rise, and therefore, overflow up out of the dome lid, and make a hellish mess which is, quite simply, a huge pain for all involved.

8. Be loud and annoying. Anywhere in my vicinity - even when I'm not working, come to think of it.

9. Make a cute comment about how bored/tired/etc. I look. It's not cute nor funny. Shut up, please.

10. Use my name. Yes, I'm wearing a nifty little name tag. No, this does not mean we're best buddies, nor does it mean we're even on a first name basis. I find it sort of creepy, actually, especially when you're a too-nice looking older man.

Tomorrow: Why the Patriot Act kind of sucks, part one of many.