My dad worked in pest control. He only had partial custody of me. One day, when I was around ten and he had a custody day with me, he brought me with him to a restaurant.

It was already fairly late at night. We ate together, he got me a sweet treat from the dessert menu, and then… we waited. The rest of the guests gradually cleared out.

Me: “Hey, Dad, aren’t we keeping these poor servers here late?”

Dad: “No. It’s fine.”

They started vacuuming around us and shutting off lights. Dad got me another round of soda and helped me with my homework, but I was too stressed out by the fact that we weren’t leaving. I didn’t understand.

Finally, the servers left, and the manager approached my dad and handed him the keys.

Dad: *To the manager* “Remember not to come in tomorrow. It won’t be safe until the day after.”

It was a work site. Dad had been contracted to spray it for rats and roaches. According to Dad, they had a severe problem and were paying him for advanced mitigation. He had me help him get his gear out of the truck and put it in the correct locations. 

He gave me a hundred dollar bill for helping him, but he never did understand why I was upset that we’d eaten at a place that had such a bad problem.

I work in pest control, and I was sent to service a customer’s house. The wife there had a reputation for being very rude. When I pulled up in the driveway, I heard her yelling at one of the lawn workers, and she called him a racial slur. She stormed back into the house, locked the door, and wouldn’t answer it.

My manager called her and convinced her to answer the door. She interrupted me while I tried to introduce myself, and she asked me a lot of questions. It was about half an hour before she let me in.

This was the start of her berating me and talking down to me every month. Our office would call her before I got there, but she would always make me wait outside for twenty to thirty minutes, making me late for my next appointment.

Eventually, we stopped scheduling appointments after hers.

I never applied any pesticide; I always sprayed with just water. This was my subtle revenge.

Subterranean termites are a problem in our region. One way that pest control companies will combat termites is by installing plastic feeding stations into the ground all around a home or building. The stations are leased. The pest control company owns the stations and will often remove them if a homeowner discontinues service, sells their property, etc.

A home that our company serviced went up for sale and was vacant for several months. Instead of removing the stations, my boss decided to leave them just in case the new owners wanted coverage. (This way, it would be cheaper because there would be no installation fee.)

Eventually, the house sold, and my boss spoke with one of the new owners. The man didn’t give him an answer right away and just said that he’d call us back. Two weeks passed and my boss reached out to him again, but no answer. My boss sent me to speak with them in person and if they didn’t answer, weren’t home, or didn’t want the stations, I was instructed to dig them all up.

I knew this was not going to go well, and I expressed my concerns about doing this, but my boss insisted that I go and that this was “perfectly legal; we own those stations!”

The wife was home but didn’t answer the door until I proceeded to remove the first station. She rightfully asked:

Wife: “What are you doing?”

I introduced myself and explained why I was there.

Wife: “Oh, no. Let me call my husband before you do that!”

She called, but he didn’t answer at first, so she made me wait. During that time, she started crying and complaining about being in this new house.

Wife: “I’m not used to this! I’ve never lived in a house this big and in a neighborhood like this! I mean, I just don’t know what to do!”

All I could think of was how bad this looked to the neighbors, so I told her that I had been there too long and needed to leave for my next appointment (which was true). This made her more upset. I started walking back to my truck just as her husband called. On the way, she kept getting in front of me, begging me not to leave. Her husband was furious, and I heard him yell at her over the phone.

Husband: “YOU TELL HIM TO LEAVE RIGHT NOW! GET OFF MY PROPERTY! I’M CALLING THE COPS!”

I made it back into my truck, but I didn’t drive off because the lady postured as if she was going to get in front of it. Then, she grabbed onto my side view mirror and kept telling me to lower my window. I called my boss and told him what was happening, and he kept trying to convince me to go back and remove the stations.

Boss: “I have friends who are cops, if they want to go that route. We own those stations, and I gave them ample time to decide on what to do.”

I lowered the window and put my boss on speakerphone.

Boss: “What is she doing?”

Me: “She’s just really upset and won’t let me do anything. I can’t get the stations but she won’t let me leave, either.”

I got tired of being in the middle of the wife, the husband, and the boss, and I finally told them:

Me: “I’m sorry, I’m leaving.”

My boss sent me back about a week or two later, and basically, the same thing happened, but that time I did not stay as long. Believe it or not, he tried to send me a third time, but I refused to go.

It’s tough being a termite technician during the summer. You work harder than the pest control techs, and you do follow-up work on their accounts for unpleasant jobs like checking rat traps and removing dead animals.

Boss: “[My Name], I know it’s late, but I need you to go to this customer’s house and check the rat traps in his attic.”

In my mind: “I was supposed to be off hours ago and it’s 1,000 degrees. I am so tired…”

I get to the house, and the owner is there and already has the attic ladder pulled down for me. He’s a nice guy; we talk for a minute and I feel better about being there. When I get into the attic, I notice that it is large and has flooring; it’s not that bad at all. I check the traps and they’re all set and nothing is caught. I come down and talk with the owner again and get to call it a day.

A couple of days later, the boss calls me into his office and tells me to shut the door.

Boss: “Remember that house I sent you to to check the traps in the attic? Did you take that gentleman’s hat?”

I laugh at first. Then, “Oh, wait. He’s serious?!”

Me: “What? No, I didn’t take any hat. The guy was standing there the whole time.”

Boss: “Well, he says that the hat was on a workbench by the attic ladder and now he can’t find it. He thinks you took it.”

Me: “[Boss], I swear that I have no idea what he’s talking about.”

I notice that people at the office start treating me differently. This bothers me for weeks.

A month passes, and one day while I am turning in some paperwork at our office, a secretary says loudly:

Secretary: “Here’s [My Name]. I think you owe him an apology, [Boss]. And you need to tell that man to call him and apologize, too!”

The man had called a few days before to tell my boss that he’d found his hat; it was in the trunk of his car and he’d forgotten that he had put it there. He did not apologize for the accusation, and for some reason, my boss didn’t tell me the man had called. Had the secretary not said anything, I never would’ve known. And [Boss] never apologized, either.

I’m designing a website for a client. The client initially expressed that he wanted to use burgundy.

Client: “This isn’t right. You know the color blood red?”

Me: “Yeah, I think I know what you’re talking about.”

Client: “Yeah, I love blood red. I want the logo to look like that. Do you know what it would look like if you took a paintbrush, dipped it in blood, and smeared it downward? How the blood would be darkest in the center, and there would be splatters of blood and lighter shades of blood around it?”

Me: “You want a gradient?”

Client: “No, I want it to look like the blood of all our victims.”

Me: “I’m sorry, what?”

Client: “You know, from all the bugs we’ve terminated.”

Me: “Oh.”