(I’m on bike patrol when I hear on the radio that a man suffered a heart attack while driving and crashed his truck in the middle of a busy bridge in our city. I pedal over to offer any assistance for traffic control, and see that there are two ambulances already arrived and the paramedics are actively performing CPR on the driver in the middle of the road. The regular patrol officers are diverting traffic carefully but slowly past the scene, so I pedal back to the beginning of the bridge to signal drivers to slow down as they approach.)

Man: *in his car, rolling down window* “Hey! What the f*** is the hold up here?!”

Me: “There was a crash on the bridge up ahead.”

Man: “Well, they should really do something about the f****** traffic!”

Me: “Sir, I think they’re doing the best they can, but like I said, there was a CRASH on the bridge. I think they’re a bit preoccupied at this moment.”

Man: “Well, they need to do something about this f****** traffic! I have places to be and s*** to do! This is f****** bull-s***!”

Me: “SIR, there are paramedics up there right now, doing CPR on someone as we speak! You’re just going to have to be patient.”

Man: “I don’t see why I should be inconvenienced because of this! You people need to do your jobs and move the f****** traffic!”

Me: “EXCUSE ME, SIR! There is someone up there, RIGHT NOW, actively DYING in the middle of the road. So just SIMMER DOWN and shut up, because your problems are just not that important right now!”

Man: “Well, they’re important to me!”

(He rolled up his window with a scowl and continued honking, making impatient gestures, and easing as obnoxiously close to the car in front of him as possible the entire time it took him to get past the scene of the crash.)

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(I work at a fast food restaurant chain that was involved in a scandal involving their pinto beans back in 2011, when they revealed they weren’t vegan. Since 2013, though, they’ve been completely vegan. So, that’s three years that our beans have been vegan. The pinto beans are in front of the black beans (which have always been vegan), so while we try our best to avoid it, sometimes a few beans or the juice from the pinto beans will fall into the black beans. Nine times out of  ten, no one, even the vegans who ask us to change our gloves to serve them, care. But this one customer…)

Girl: “Do you have fresh black beans? I can’t have the ones behind the pinto beans.”

Me: “Uh, sure, I think they just put some in the back.” *I glance back, and there are beans, but they’re nowhere near needing to be changed* “Do you have an allergy?”

Girl: *pause* “Yeah.”

Me: *gets her fresh beans, passes her order down the line, goes about my day without thinking about it, though she does give me the stink eye*

(A few weeks pass without any incident, until she comes back and does the same thing, asking for fresh beans. This time, we don’t have any readily available, so we have to hold up the line waiting for the grill to make her fresh beans. She takes this opportunity to give me “suggestions” on something I have no control over.)

Girl: “You really should keep the black beans behind the pinto beans so people who can’t have pinto beans can still have the black beans.”

Me: “Um, well, we’ve never had anyone else say they were allergic to the pinto beans, so I suppose there’s an equal likelihood that this could happen the other way around for someone allergic to the black beans…”

(I serve her new beans as I try to piece together her logic for saying this. We get people with common allergies like gluten all the time, but never someone allergic to pinto beans.)

Girl: “Well, I’m not allergic, but I’m vegan, so I can’t have the pinto beans.”

Me: *pause* “Our pinto beans are completely vegan.”

Girl: “No, I know they aren’t. I know you guys use meat in your pinto beans.”

(By this point, I’m totally taken aback by this girl. Not only did she lie about having an allergy, which is something our restaurant takes extremely seriously, she’s now claiming we’re lying about what’s in our beans, or we just don’t know. She continues down the line, and gets to cash, asking for a manager. She gives him the same spiel she gave me about putting our pinto beans behind our black beans.)

Manager: “That’s set by corporate. There’s really nothing we can do about that, but our pinto beans are vegan.”

(The girl continues to insist that they aren’t, so I chime in again.)

Me: “We can show you the recipe cards if you want, so you can see exactly what’s in them.”

Girl: “Fine.”

(My manager goes off to get the recipe cards, which takes a while, and the girl goes to sit and eat her meal. He comes back, and I point out where she’s sitting. I watch the exchange, and she brushes him off in less than a minute.)

Me: “What happened?”

Manager: “She insisted she didn’t want to see them.”

Me: “What? So not only does she not believe us when we say they’re vegan, she’s going to go on insisting they have meat and keep demanding fresh beans?”

(My manager shrugged, I rolled my eyes, continuing to be baffled by the contradictory stupidity of humanity, and continued to serve customers. She stayed away for more time than I’d seen her away before, but when she came back, she ordered black beans with no noticeable commotion. Maybe she just didn’t want to be proved wrong.)

(The phone rings. When I answer, I recognize a lady I’d helped the day before.)

Customer: “When I bought my light yesterday, the lady didn’t sell me any bulbs to go with it.”

Me: “Yes, ma’am. You didn’t want them because you said you already had some at home.”

Customer: “Well, I don’t. I don’t know why you’d have that impression. Anyway, I’m in another lighting store now, and they say they don’t have that bulb.”

Me: “Really? That’s just a bulb with a candelabra base. It’s extremely common and dozens of different bulbs would fit. I’m surprised that any lighting store wouldn’t have it! Perhaps if you phrase it differently they might recognize it. Some people describe it as a ‘small base’ or an ‘E12′ base.”

Customer: “Look, they DON’T HAVE IT.”

Me: “Okay, that’s no problem. We carry them all the time. I’m looking at some right now if you’d like to come back in.”

Customer: “I’m in [Town 20 minutes away]. I’m NOT coming all the way back.”

Me: “Well, like I said, it’s a very common bulb. You should be able to find them at dollar stores, grocery stores, hardware stores… anywhere that sells bulbs, really.”

Customer: “I’m not driving all over town just because your employees didn’t give me any bulbs!”

Me: “All right, ma’am, what would you like me to do for you?”

Customer: “I want you to mail them to me.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but we can’t do that. Among other reasons, the postage would cost far more than the bulbs themselves.”

Customer: “Well, then, somebody needs to deliver them to my house.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but we can’t spare any employees for that.”

Customer: “This is horrible customer service! I’m never shopping there again!”

Me: “I’m sorry to hear that, ma’am. Did you have any other questions?”

Customer: “No!” *hangs up*

(Twenty minutes later, she showed up at our store, but not to buy the bulbs. She returned the fixture.)

(I’m working an armorer’s booth at a sci-fi convention. Company policy is we can’t even sell the polypropylene — rubber substitute — training blades to anyone under 18. Two guys walk up an hour after the show opens, clearly buddies; one is about 15, the other has a young face but a full beard. They ask about training knives for about 10 minutes, and then pick out the ones they want.)

Me: *to the bearded one* “Sorry, I have to ask. How old are you?”

Bearded Guy: “17. Why?”

Me: “I bet you’re going to regret being so honest, but I can’t sell these to anyone under 18. If one of your parents is here and comes to buy them for you, no problem, but you can’t buy them without an adult guardian present.”

(They wheedle and whine for a while and finally give up. Five hours and hundreds of customers later, two guys come up to the booth. One looks to be baby-faced and is wearing big sunglasses. The other looks young, but has a full beard. Something in my brain clicks that, sans sunglasses, I’ve seen this combo before… They pick out the knives they want without a word, and start to hand me money.)

Me: *to the bearded one* “Sorry, I have to ask, how old are you?”

Bearded Guy: “18.”

Me: “Funny. I could swear you were 17 this morning…”

Bearded Guy: “No, I’ve never been here before!”

Me: *to his friend* “And at a convention where every second booth is selling cosplay masks, you try to disguise yourself with sunglasses?”

(They grumble and swear at me for a minute, trying to convince me I’m imagining things.)

Me: *to the bearded one* “Let’s make this simple. Do you have a driver’s license or health card with a birth date?”

(They gave up and walked off.)

(Every year, we close the hotel for our annual holiday for 4-5 weeks mid-November to mid-December. This is widely published everywhere. We have a promotion with a well-known tour operator who issues vouchers for a menu for two. We get very little money for these vouchers, but it is good publicity and people have to book in advance for a date that suits both parties.)

Caller: “I have a voucher from [Tour Company], and I would like to book a table for [date].”

Me: “Sorry, that date is during our annual holiday. The hotel is closed at that time.”

Caller: “But I so wanted to come and eat at your restaurant.”

Me: “Sorry, we are closed at that time of year; can I offer you a booking for another date?”

Caller:“No, I want that date. Why is that not possible?”

Me: “The hotel is dark and cold, there are no supplies, the cold storage and everything is switched off, and the staff is on holiday.”

Caller: “Well, can’t you come back from holiday and open the restaurant for me?”

Me: “Sorry, but it is just logistically not possible.”

Caller:“That is lousy customer service. I demand you open your restaurant for me on that date I want.”

Me: “You expect me to fly back from Turkey on day eight of my two-week sightseeing tour, to reopen the hotel especially so you can have dinner with your voucher?”

Caller: “Yes! Now, that was not so hard, was it?”