Recently, one of my coworkers found out that I don’t drive; I don’t even have a license despite being more than a decade over the legal age. He’s taken to nagging me about getting my license, usually thinking up scenarios where he believes I’d need to be able to drive. I’ve had solutions to each. He still tries, though.

Coworker: “I was watching a video the other day about how to survive nuclear war. It said to ‘drive as far away from the city as possible’. How’d you do that?”

Me: *Shrug* “I have friends.”

Coworker: “And you’re sure that in that emergency they’d think to pick you up?”

Me: *Shrug again* “I mean, you’re possibly massively overestimating my will to live.”

Coworker: *Laughs* “Okay! You’ve got me there.”

Years ago, I was working in a development lab for a large tech company. It was pretty casual, and there was no dress code until an old-school manager took exception to a couple of us showing up in tie-dye apparel.

A coworker was sent home to change clothes, and I was lectured about professionalism and appearance.

Manager: “And it would be nice to see you show up in a real shirt sometime — you know, with buttons and a collar.”

So, I bought several of the ugliest, loudest, brightest tropical-print shirts I could find — yes, with buttons and collars — and those became my standard work attire forever after.

The grumpy manager actually said:

Manager: “Okay, I give up.”

I’m currently job hunting in Brazil, and I get lucky and am able to score an interview in a lab. I arrange with the professor in charge to interview on a certain day, but she warns me that things might have to change as her father is going to have surgery. I say that of course that is not a problem and I hope I will see her soon.

The day before my interview, I get an email from the professor saying that her father “faleceu”, which I understand to mean that there have been some complications and she needs to be there to take care of him, so she needs to reschedule the interview. I send an email back saying it’s not a problem and wishing the best of luck to her father.

Later at lunch, I mention this to my boyfriend, and he asks to check the email. He is a native Portuguese speaker, while I am still learning but at a decent level. He then turns to me with a look of complete horror.

Boyfriend: “[My Name], her father didn’t worsen. He died! Please tell me you didn’t wish for him to get better!”

Me: “Not exactly. I did wish him the best of luck, though.”

Cue frantic scrambling by both of us to draft an email begging for forgiveness and asking if I could start again. Luckily, it was clear from the CV I had submitted that Portuguese wasn’t my first language

I got the first interview, and I don’t think I did too badly as I got a call back for the job. Lesson learned, though: always double-check unfamiliar words before replying to emails.

Coworker #1: “Three hundred, jeez.”

Coworker #2: “Only fifty-five. That’s not too bad.”

Me: “What are you guys doing?”

Coworker #3: “We’re looking up how much our prescriptions cost per month without insurance. Some of this is scary. My aunt is diabetic, and she has to pay nearly five hundred for her medication, even with insurance.”

Me: “Now I have to know what mine would cost…Two hundred and fifty-eight dollars is my most expensive one.”

Coworker #2: “[Another Coworker] is in the lead. His meds are eight hundred without insurance.”

Various exclamations of shock and dismay are heard, and then I have a thought.

Me: “I wonder what my wife’s would be… HOLY S***!”

Coworker #3: “Your wife has a lot of health issues, right? I’m almost afraid to ask.”

Me: “Two thousand, six hundred, and eighty-nine dollars. For one of her meds.”

There is a brief, stunned silence.

Coworker #1: “Yeah, she wins.”

Me: “I don’t want to play this game anymore…”

We often get to read about people hating their work. I love mine, mostly. I work as a research assistant, so basically, I help people smarter than me (neuroscientists) to create more knowledge. I recruit participants, set up their appointments, run the tests, report bugs, and so on.

No one has ever been nasty as such. It’s just that I recruit from the available student population, most of whom are advanced in the path of becoming clinical psychologists.

One insisted that he cannot follow instructions because he’s got a doctor’s note saying he cannot concentrate, and it gets him extra time in exams. Okay, this is a concentration task, and you knew that, so why did you sign up?

Another tells me she cannot see without her glasses, and I’m discriminating by asking her to not wear them. Normally, we’re super-sensitive and a safer space, but it said in the ad that there would be electrodes near the eyes, and those do not permit glasses. Why did you sign up?

My favorite insisted that I should give her ten times the normal compensation because she has ESP (extra-sensory powers). Girl, if you do, you do not want my little test; you’ll be published in Nature magazine.

Another aggressively demanded that I explain to him what exactly constitutes human consciousness. If I knew, I would not be working as an electrode washer.

With yet another recruit, I started getting really weird data, so I went to check. The participant had stopped performing the task entirely and was messing with his phone — which messes up all the sensitive equipment — on the grounds that he “did not want to and I couldn’t make him”. Indeed I couldn’t, which is why it says on the contract, “Participation is fully voluntary; you may leave at any time.” No need to mess up my lab!

One of my colleagues had a hungover subject throw up on the equipment. (Again, you’re not there by force.)

Otherwise, there’s been nothing egregious, and I’m sure customers are way worse. But these people are your future degree-having clinical psychologists. If your therapist says you’re insane, get a second opinion. It may be them.