So I went to a Honda dealership in Oakland last night because I had an hour and I wanted to test drive my future car before I bought it. I told the guy when he ran up to me that I wasn't buying anything today, I just wanted to test drive a car. He was surprised that I knew everything about the kind of car I wanted, but seemed alright with letting me chauffer him around.

Naturally he couldn't leave it at that, though. When it was past time for me to leave, he wanted me to stay and buy the fricking car. And I'm too ... well, I wouldn't say I was nice, but I was too polite to tell him to get out of my face and let me go. So I sat and waited while he went and "got a brochure and his business card." What he was really doing was recruiting his manager to come over and try his hand at getting me to buy something right then. And they tried hard. Like, really hard. Until I wasn't polite anymore. And I don't like it when I'm pushed to non-politeness.

Salespeople, let me tell you a secret. Some of us don't like the hard sell. We don't respond well to it. And while you may think all you've done is lost a sale that day when I leave, in reality you've lost my business forever, as well a that of any of my friends. When it comes to spending more money than I made until I was 25, if it's a good experience, I'll tell everyone I know. Same thing if it's a bad experience. And more than 24 hours later, I still can't think about yesterday's encounter and feel anything but guilt (because I didn't stay and buy), anger (because they made me late for my next appointment) and resentment (because I was apologizing to them for not buying!!!).