(My husband and I work at the same hotel; I am housekeeping and he’s at the front desk. A fellow housekeeper quit, so even though I’m part-time, I’m working six days a week while my husband has his normal full-time hours.

I am assisting with planning my sister’s baby shower which is the day after my son’s birthday. Exactly a week before my son’s birthday, my father has a heart attack which, thankfully, he survives. I am giving this information so one can understand how crazy things are.

We decide to do a last-minute party on my son’s birthday two days away since it’s my husband’s day off before I go to work. When we confirm this, I literally run to the bakery for a cake. When I get there, it is busy; I manage to place a late order for the party.)

Baker: “Writing?”

Me: “Happy Birthday, [Son].”

Baker: “Colours?”

Me: “He likes blue… and green… and red… It doesn’t really matter; he likes all colours.”

Baker: “Would you like flowers or balloons or something?”

Me: “Yeah, that would be great.”

Baker: “Which one?”

Me: “I’m sorry, umm, actually, would it be possible for a dinosaur?” 

Baker: “Sure, you can bring in a picture and we can put it on the cake, but it’s much more expensive.”

Me: “No, it doesn’t need to be fancy. I was thinking like a doodle of one instead of balloons. My son is turning three; he will recognize it even if it’s not pretty.”

(The baker looks at me a little confused and I ask to borrow her pen and paper and draw a head long neck and body.)

Baker: “Oh, now I understand. Well, everyone would know that’s a dinosaur, and that should be easier than flowers.”

Me: “And my boy is obsessed with dinosaurs, so he’ll be so happy.”

Baker: “Okay, it will be ready at [time] on [birthday].”

Me: “Okay, great, thank you for being difficult.”

(I turn to walk away and I realized what I said.)

Me: “Oh, my God! I meant to say, ‘Thank you, and sorry for being difficult.’!”

(Thankfully, the baker thought it was the funniest thing she had ever heard and was laughing… as was literally everyone who heard me.)

(I am working at a retail portrait studio. I have a mother bringing her daughter in for modeling headshots. I explain to her ahead of her appointment that we do not do any editing or retouching, only cropping. She agrees that she can purchase the digital images to have them edited herself if she would like. As we start the session, the daughter, who is around eight or nine, is in the camera room with me and her mother is standing in the doorway glued to her phone.)

Me: “All right, sweetheart, let me see your model smile!”

(The daughter sticks out her tongue at me.)

Me: *laughs* “Cute, silly one for mommy. Let’s do a nice one now, big smile!”

(The daughter puts on an angry pout face. I try everything I can think of to get her to laugh or smile. She’ll pretend to agree to cooperate but will pull a mean face the second I go to take the picture, thinking it’s funny. I can’t even catch her laughing about it as she covers her face with her hands. Finally, after trying several times to signal her mom to ask for help, I put down my camera and go over to her.)

Me: “Mrs. [Mom], I seem to be having a hard time getting your daughter to smile. Would you mind giving me a hand?”

Mom: “She knows what she’s doing.”

Me: “Every time I go to take the picture she pulls a silly face. We’re not getting good headshot photos.”

Mom: “Have you ever modeled before? She knows what she’s been doing; she’s been modeling since she was five. Just take the picture.”

(I do my best. We end up with a small handful that I think might be okay, and a couple dozen silly or mean faces that I keep in the album to show the customer how her daughter was behaving. I begin to show her the album.)

Mom: “Very funny. I get that you’re trying to prove a point, but I just want the nice ones.”

Me: “Well, these few here were the best overall headshots where she didn’t pull a face.”

Mom: “No! You’re not listening. I don’t want to see these garbage ones where you photoshopped her to look stupid so you could prove your point. I want the nice original ones that she took.”

Me: “These are all the originals. Like I explained to you on the phone, we don’t do editing or retouching. We don’t have Photoshop. These are the actual faces your daughter was making.”

Mom: “She would never!”

(Her daughter smirks from across the room where she’s playing on her mom’s cell phone.)

Me: “I didn’t edit them. These are all the original images.”

Mom: “You are full of bulls***! If you don’t give me the originals where you didn’t make my daughter look like a f****** [slur for people with disabilities], I will sue you for defamation of character!”

Me: *shocked* “Ma’am, I can’t control the faces your daughter makes. I tried to get her to cooperate and I asked for your help. I didn’t edit these; she was making those faces.”

Mom: “MY DAUGHTER DOESN’T MAKE [SLUR] FACES!”

(I know that a coworker around the corner has a special needs child and I don’t want her to hear this woman’s abuse.)

Me: “Ma’am, I need to ask you to lower your voice and watch your language or I’m going to have to ask you to leave the store.”

Mom: “I’M NOT F****** GOING ANYWHERE UNTIL YOU GIVE ME MY DAUGHTER’S ORIGINAL BEAUTIFUL PHOTOS, YOU STUPID C***!”

(I immediately called security and she ended up being escorted out while calling me every name in the book and insisting that she was going to sue me for making her daughter ugly. She called every customer service number she could find, no matter how loosely they were affiliated with us. It took weeks to sort out the numerous complaints she made, but thankfully, she never came back. Good riddance.)

(I answer a call from a customer wanting to bring in his car for repair.)

Caller: “Hi. I’d like to bring in my car for service; it’s got a lot of problems. When is your first available appointment?”

Me: “I can do something tomorrow or Thursday this week if you’d like.”

Caller: “Do you know what might be wrong with it?”

Me: *pause* “No, sir, without looking at your car I can’t tell you what’s wrong with it.”

Caller: “Oh, okay.” *hangs up*

(I am in line at a local poultry place with a guy in front of me ordering.)

Cashier: “That will be $8.48, please.”

(The guy gives the cashier a credit card. The cashier looks at it.)

Cashier: “May I see your ID, please?”

(The guy hesitantly hands over his ID.)

Cashier: “Sir, is your name Mohammed [Last Name], or Jeff [Other Last Name]?”

(The cashier gave the credit card to the manager and not back to the customer.)

(I work in a large professional music store in Vancouver and we serve all types.)

Me: “Hey, what can I get you?”

Customer: “I’m the guitar player for Melissa Etheridge. I need some guitar strings.”

Me: “Oh, okay. Cool.”

(I notice his tour tag around his neck that he apparently needed to wear outside the concert venue for our enjoyment.)

Me: “What kind of strings do you need?”

Customer: “Guitar strings, bud.”

Me: “Okay, what kind of guitar strings?”

Customer: “Six-string.”

Me: “Acoustic or electric?”

Customer: “What do you mean?”

Me: *puzzled* “Do you need strings for an electric guitar or an acoustic guitar?”

Customer: “Electric.”

Me: “What brand and gauge of string do you want?”

Customer: “Yuppers. Electric.”

Me: “Do you want Ernie Ball? D’Addario’s?” 

Customer: “I don’t know. Whatever.”

Me: “Do you use a particular brand?”

Customer: “’Lectrics, usually.”

Me: “Okay… What gauge?”

Customer: “What?”

Me: “What gauge do you use? Lights, Extra Lights, Medium…”

Customer: “Dude, they’re not cigs, they’re strings.”

Me: “I know that but they come in different gauges, depending on what you like. I use lights, for example.”

Customer: *cocky* “Oh, so you’re a player? Ever play in concert? Like in front of a ton of screaming fans?”

Me: “I’ve played some cool gigs, but nothing like Melissa Etheridge. Maybe a thousand people at most.”

Customer: *laughs condescendingly* “Dude, that’s pretty bad. Small-time.”

Me: *annoyed* “Well, at least I know what gauge I use. That’s gotta be worth something. How is it that you play with Melissa Etheridge but you don’t know what strings or gauge you use? Are you sure you play with her?”

Customer: “What?”

Me: “Let’s go over to the guitar area and maybe you can show me some licks.” 

Customer: “Dude, I don’t have time for that. It’s not guitar lesson time.”

Me: “Surely you’ve got two minutes to whip off some licks? Here, just wait and I’ll get a guitar.”

Customer: “Dude, I gotta go here. I gotta get back.”

(He starts leaving the store.)

Me: “What about the strings?”

Customer: *out the door* “No time!”

(Turns out he was most likely just a roadie as he certainly wasn’t the guitar tech, who would have known about such things.)