@ChiLibrarian: wow, that’s bad. I get the odd sexist comment (being a guy) and the extreme political views, but have never heard something that racist. My absolute favorite retort for that sort of thing (especially in the workplace) is “whoa, whoa, save that kind of talk for the klan rally” – that usually shuts them up. But, well, I wouldn’t say that to a patron though. I love the idea of listening to the patron’s TV through the phone to see what’s on – and yes, I’ve gotten that same “what am I watching?” question too.

My favorite was the sweet, but nearly deaf, lady in her 90s that used to call and ask, “Who’s that on my TV right now?” Usually we could hear the show in the background and as she didn’t have cable, figure it out pretty readily.

My least favorite character was the rather horrible racist who’d call for movie listings, but didn’t want us to read him any of the listings with non-Caucasian stars. I didn’t know what he was talking about the first time I helped him. I naively thought he didn’t want movies shot in black and white. Unfortunately, he explained what “no Black movies” meant. Ugh.