Reply #1: Wait. I don't understand the part about being attacked by a shark in an Italian restaurant.

[Warren DeMontague]

Was that metaphorical?

...Anyway, seems like you have worked out your own conclusion, here: i.e., they've lost your business. Still, such is life. A lot of retail establishments simply don't take ANY checks, at all, ever. It's simply too risky to let someone hand over a piece of paper they say is worth whatever-it-is. Fact of the matter is, there are a lot of rip off artists out there. It's not personal, it's not about YOU, but someone at the store's management level or higher has decided the risk of losing the business of check-writers ('risky' ones or all of them) is worth the made up revenue losses they won't be incurring with bounced or bad checks.

The value of a credit card to a retail establishment isn't that it means YOU are a great guy with a Visa, it means that YOU can be the biggest fuckknuckle in the world, once that approval goes through, the credit card company is on the hook for the money, not them. They don't have to hassle with banks, collection agencies, calling the bogus phone # someone wrote on the check, etc. etc.

This is reality, and if you're not going to carry a credit card or a reasonable alternative, maybe you should use paypal or some such other means to buy stuff online. Because this is just the way things are.