I’m in a pissing contest with the cashier at our building’s cafeteria. How sad is this? I’m a professional 44-year-old woman and I’m setting up for a battle with a 75-year-old cafeteria cashier that wears her stockings rolled down to her ankles and black orthopedic shoes.

Regardless of her age or the scariness of those shoes, though, I vow that I will win this fight. I’m going to crush her spirit and her ability to get away with charging me 15¢ for a teaspoon of peanut butter.

Every morning, I go over to the cafeteria and get a medium coffee ($1.74) and a small container of plain oatmeal ($0.89). I usually always have correct change, but if I don’t have the $2.63 exactly, I leave the pennies in the little penny jar, or take a couple of pennies…y’know how it goes. No big deal, right? I don’t carry my purse or my wallet. I carry what money I need because I need my hands to carry back the oatmeal and the coffee and be able to open doors. (Remember that I’m clumsy and tend to drop things?)

The oatmeal is regular cooked oatmeal with nothing extra added in. But! there are little bowls with nuts and raisins and dried cranberries sitting around. There are also bowls of cream cheese for bagels or butter for toast. There used to be a bowl of peanut butter and those little plastic rectangles of jelly sitting out, too.

I like to get some protein in the morning, so I always add about a teaspoon of peanut butter to my oatmeal. By the time I would get back to my desk, the peanut butter would be all melty and yummy and I would stir it through with some Splenda and a few raisins, and oh mah gawd y’all, it was as close to heaven as freakin’ plain oatmeal could come.

(Yes, I would have much rather had one of those chocolate chocolate-chip muffins or scrambled eggs with cheese and a side of bacon, but to fit into my Execuhot wardrobe, y’know, I have to think about some of the crap I put in my mouth.)

Anyway, one day I walked over and lo and behold, they had changed the bowl of peanut butter to a bowl of these little containers of peanut butter. Okay? Okay. Not a problem. It was probably about the same amount of p.b. that I added every day anyway. So I grab a container and walk on up to Cashier Ratched.

I plop my $2.63 into her hand, just like I’ve done every day for the past six months - and just as she says “$2.78″.

“Excuse me?” I say. “Did y’all raise the price of coffee?”

“No.”

“Oatmeal?”

“No.”

“Well then why is it $2.78? It’s always $2.63.”

I am truly dumbfounded. There is a growing line of bagel-bearing, spandex-clad women behind me. Cashier Ratched points at my little container of peanut butter.

“Fifteen cents for peanut butter.”

“But you’ve never charged me for peanut butter before, I’ve always added it directly to the oatmeal from the bowl that was out there.”

“We have to charge for peanut butter.”

I am not happy, but who am I to argue? Besides, she’s wearing a hair net and I have visions of her coming up behind me while I’m getting my plastic spoon and napkins with a butcher knife.

“Okay, I’ll have to go get the difference. I’ll be right back.”

And so I go back to my desk, grab the 15¢ and carry it back to her. Now I start carrying $2.78 to the cafeteria every morning.

A few days later, I decide, on a whim, (well, that and the fact that the oatmeal looked like soup, and I cannot abide watery oatmeal) to get a couple of pieces of toast and fruit instead. I grab a container of peanut butter for my toast (no margarine for this girl) and head over to Cashier Ratched.

I watch her ring up: $2.28 for the fruit (salad bar by the ounce, yikes!), $0.75 for the toast.

“That’ll be $3.03.”

“You didn’t charge me for the peanut butter.”

“The peanut butter is free with toast.”

Are y’all following this logic? Peanut butter is free with bread, but not if you take it to put in your oatmeal. I’m learning all about fuckin’ cafeteria-lady logic. But, I decide to not rock the boat. Just learn the rules and move along now, eh?

Until the next time I go in and get the fruit and toast and - Yes! You got it.

“Excuse me, you charged me for the peanut butter. You said it was free with toast.”

“Oh no I wouldn’t have done that. We have to charge for peanut butter.”

“But you didn’t charge me the last time.”

“Oh yes, I would have. We have to charge for peanut butter.”

And the line of fried egg/hash brown/sausage sandwich plus a diet Pepsi wielding ladies behind me is getting longer.

I pay my peanut butter surcharge and vow that I will get to the bottom of this.

Last week, I saw the cafeteria manager counting tea bags while I was spooning my oatmeal into its styrofoam bowl. I walk over, holding my oatmeal and my coffee and my little container of peanut butter.

“Excuse me? Can you tell me if I’ll be charged for this peanut butter?”

“Well, normally peanut butter is complimentary, but are you just getting the peanut butter? No toast?”

“No, I put the peanut butter in my oatmeal. The thing is, sometimes your cashier charges me for it, and sometimes she doesn’t. It’s not that big of a deal, only 15&#162 but I usually come in with correct change and I get tired of her changing her mind on whether to charge me or not.”

“Well, it’s complimentary for something that you usually have with peanut butter, like toast, but most people don’t put peanut butter in oatmeal.”

Ahhhhh, the fucked-up cafeteria-lady logic presents itself again! I agree that it makes sense, and I pay my money and take my oatmeal. And we go on happily for the next couple of days, because I get toast and don’t have to pay for my peanut butter because, y’know, I’ve figured out the logic. Go me! Am a genius.

Then, last Thursday, I get toast. And she charges me.

—- Awright bitch. It’s ON. It’s so ON. —-