Those who are devoted listeners to one of my two current podcasts, The Daily Zig, know that prior to my recent travels to North Carolina, I was determined to set aside a little time to buy a suit. Who has time to buy a suit? No one. But when you are Down South, time stretches a little easier — much like the waistband of some of these new, low-cost fabrics made from polymers seemingly manufactured outside of our measly four dimensions.

I needed a new suit because my old one is simply too big. This is a good problem to have, by and large, because it means my refusals of that second piece of pie and occasional trips on the treadmill have had some effect. But dragging my ass on this has led to two unfortunate recent events in which I was in constant fear of reenacting a Roscoe Arbuckle short.

I didn’t care too much at last year’s New York Film Critics Circle gala. Would it be so bad if I flashed some skin in front of a Safdie brother? No, it would probably secure a walk-on in a new project. (Something that may be happening anyway, if you believe the hype.) But the other time I was constantly adjusting my drawers was at a funeral, and that was significantly less appropriate.

Anyhow, the JCPenney in Burlington, N.C. is as fine of a place as any to secure a modestly-priced but not heinous suit as well as some other garments. Indeed, there were no shortage of markdowns and sales that brought my grand total to a reasonable sum. Unfortunately, when I returned to New Jersey and moved to put my new purchases in the closet, I noticed that one of the elements still had its theft-prevention tag on it. The one that, should you try to remove it yourself, it will explode blue dye all over you and also shoot plastic shards into your eye and send you to the emergency room.

Annoying, but no big deal, right? Just go to the closest JCPenney (and, luckily, there is one a very short drive away) with my receipt and they’ll pop it off. No worries!

Well, what happens when you just can't find your paper receipt? That’s okay, you have an email one, right? Well, what happens when you can’t find your email receipt? Well, just go to the JCPenney and talk to someone like a person and this ought to take care of itself, you are probably thinking. AND OH YOU WOULD BE SO WRONG!!!!

Yesterday evening at the mall, once I found a station with living people at the cash registers, I calmly explained that I purchased a jacket in North Carolina, the dummkopf there didn’t remove its affixed sartorial landmine, and even though I don’t have a paper receipt, here is proof on my AMEX app proving I recently threw down a significant chunk of change at JCPenney in a different state.

She looked at me like I had just flown in from the Kuiper Belt.

Luckily, her supervisor was right there and she at least understood what was going on. She understood, but she still told me to take a hike.

“I didn't steal this.”

“I believe you, but I can’t remove that without a receipt.”

“Here is an AMEX statement that says JCPenney.”

“That’s not enough.”

This back-and-forth went on for some time. She told me to call AMEX and to call the store in North Carolina and maybe they would have a solution. I needed an itemized receipt with a SKU on it. (Hold on to that thought for a minute.)

A call to AMEX merely kept me on hold for 20 minutes and led nowhere, and my wife, having pity on me, called the nice people in North Carolina and was told, in no uncertain terms, that their system absolutely could confirm the sale.

What the bozo in New Jersey never asked was if the jacket still had the tags on it. It did. I didn’t know to tell her that. But if they scan the tag (which has the SKU?), then scanned my AMEX, and plugged in the store number in N.C., all would be fine. “We can do this,” the N.C. manager said, concerning interstate negotiations.

I returned to JCPenney today, waited on the line, spoke to someone who did not understand a word I was saying and who then called her manager. It was the same meanie from the day before. My tags were scanned, my AMEX was scanned, the N.C. store number was entered. No dice. They tried it again. Same thing.

I was then told to go upstairs and talk to the person at the cashier near the optical center.

Wait this is where it gets good.

I go to the optical center and find the cashier. It says “register close.” I bellow “hello?” a few times and even “anyone work here?” I heard the opening theme from 28 Days Later in my head.

I wander around and see a line for people with returns. Actually I see two lines, both rather chaotic, but there is only one deeply frazzled employee working. I get on the shorter of the two lines and make my way up, cracking passive aggressive remarks with the people on the other line about which is the true line. I loudly say “this fine worker will adjudicate, and we will trust her decision,” figuring it couldn’t hurt to kiss her ass a little in advance.

I make my way to the front. I explain everything. She understands. She wants to help. She seems nice! She scans my card, scans the tag, plugs in the store number. Nothing. She tries it at least three more times. She pokes her screen. There are now at least 10 people behind me. She pokes and pokes some more. I say “I can’t be the first person in the world to misplace a paper ticket?” She chuckles. I say “I swear I didn’t steal, you can’t just pop this off?” She cannot. There are protocols. She could get in trouble. I understand. I say “I suppose it is theoretically possible that I just walked over to menswear, took a jacket, then came to you with a crazy story about buying this elsewhere. It would be a novel way to steal. But I throw myself at the mercy of Mr. John Christopher Penney himself, and humbly swear that I did not do that, and that everything I’ve told you is true.”

This was a gamble, but luckily, luckily, it made her smile. She was on my side on this.

“I have to call my supervisor,” she said. I asked “um, is that [REDACTED] downstairs?” It was. I made an “uh-oh, here comes sunshine!”

This made her full-on laugh, as it did some of the people behind me, who, by all rights, should have wanted me dead so they could quickly exchange whatever junk their idiot nephew bought them for Christmas that was two sizes too small.

The manager came up and they spoke in hushed tones, both eyeing me from behind a stack of Frozen-branded coloring books. It was determined that I should call the JCPenney in North Carolina, and maybe they could find something on their end.

I stepped aside to let others to do their business and made the call. To my surprise I actually got a manager on the phone in under 10 minutes, I explained the situation, then I handed to the phone to my cashier. She also explained the situation, and once again poked at her screen. Numbers were read back and forth. I suppose the woman in North Carolina poked at her screen, too. Everyone was poking.

No one had any proof that I actually bought the jacket which I very much wanted to throw in the garbage at this point. But they did find a total, un-itemized charge in N.C. It was determined if the number on my phone, from AMEX, was the same as what they were seeing down there, this would be enough to allow the removal of the thingamajig.

Is this procedure? No, I can’t imagine that it is. Felt made-up to me, but that’s how the nitty gritty of life really is. Still, in order to get the precise amount from AMEX I needed my phone back. I got the email up, but by this point my cashier had deserted me to help another customer. Naturally, that transaction had its own complications, so I was sitting there vamping with the woman in N.C. who quite likely had her own job obligations to get to. I felt bad. Wasn’t this all my fault for not having the paper receipt? No, it was the fault of the person who left the tag on, I thought to myself, then realized, NO IT WAS MY FAULT FOR NOT SHOPPING ON AMAZON LIKE A NORMAL PERSON!

In time, it was determined that amount on my phone matched what was on the other store’s computer. At least I assume the person in North Carolina saw that. I don’t know what she saw. She could have just been saying “yes, yes” to end this whole rigamarole.

“She says I should take it off,” my cashier said to that horrible monster manager who wanted SO MUCH for me to walk home in defeat. “Okay, do it,” she said in failure. I had won.

The tag was removed in three seconds and I shouted “we did it!” My cashier seemed genuinely happy. I didn’t look at her boss. I hope to never see her again. I likely will not, as I sure as shit don’t plan on shopping at JCPenney in the future.

The best part was that, as I left, the cashier said “weird how our alarms didn’t go off when you came in with that.” Weird indeed.