Whatever. . .

Exerpts from an actual conversation last night at work.
customer: "Coffee!"
notice the lack of verbs there
me: "Sure, do you want the large one?" (notice the suck uppiness trying to make a few extra bucks for the company).
customer: "Is that the small one?" (yes, that was asked in all seriousness)
me: "Um, no. That is the large one."
customer: "No, I don't want that size,"
At this point an uncomfortable silence befell us. I tried to ponder where in the world someone would go that they would be sold the cheapest thing. Does anyone go out to the movies and the girl says "You can save a quarter if you get the small one instead of the giant heaping tub of popcorn." Not to my knowledge. I then realized that a few moments had gone by and the customer still hadn't told me what size he wanted. Finally I asked "What size would you like?"
"Regular." And this is where we run into problems. If I gave a small I'd here "that's it?" or if I gave a medium I'd here "that's too much."
"We have medium or small then," I replied holding up the medium and small cups, hoping to be helpful.
"I don't care, whichever," was the reply.
Okay, so you're getting the medium then I thought to myself.

Guess what, that was the wrong choice.

Obviously "I don't care, whatever" translates into small.

All this over one cup of coffee. Is it really hard to walk up to a counter and say "May I have a small coffee please?" How much time would that have saved both us? Not to mention aggravation on both our parts. I guess that would have just been too darn easy.