(The store I work at has had immense issues with corporate, and we are waiting on them, and have been, for over a month for many things. We can’t physically sell the things people order online before we get them. My normal manager is out this week and in her place is a spineless assistant manager. I’m nineteen and am only working for the summer, yet I am practically in charge because of the incompetence.)

Customer: “I’ve been waiting two weeks for my shirts; where are they?!”

Me: “I’m so sorry about that, ma’am. Do you possibly have your order number so I can look that up?”

Customer: *rudely* “No, you should have it in the system.”

Me: “Okay, ma’am, can I have your name, please?”

(The customer glares at me LIKE I SOMEHOW SHOULD BE ABLE TO GUESS HER NAME and writes it down for me. I take it back to the manager, we search her up, and the system says her stuff shipped on Monday. I go back out.)

Me: “So, our system says it shipped on Friday, so hopefully you should see those in about a week.”

Customer: “Can I get a shipping number?”

Me: “Absolutely!”

(I go back again. The manager says that she doesn’t have one, so maybe we “shipped” it after the mail came on Friday, and the mail guy didn’t come again until today.)

Me: “So, my manager says that even though our system says it shipped on Friday, it is possible that it didn’t actually leave until today, which is why she can’t find a tracking number. If you want—“

Customer: “I knew it! I knew you weren’t telling me the truth! Get me someone who will actually tell the truth!”

(My manager comes out next to me and literally repeats everything I just said, while I’m standing next to her.)

Customer: “I could tell the way she—“ *flips hand at me* “—was looking at me that she was lying, that she wasn’t telling the truth. Thank you for telling me the truth.”

(She left and the manager went into the back again, yelling a quick “sorry” to me. I don’t know what planet she had to be on to think that a nineteen-year-old would be hiding and lying about her shirts.)

(I work in a call center taking calls for both customers and the other people who help them. I’m still fairly new; I’ve only been here three weeks, and just barely learned all of this. Today, I was having a great day up until this happened.)

Me: “Thank you for calling [Service]. My name is [My Name]. How can I help you today?”

Customer: *want to clarify this is not actually a customer of the service, but one of the people who help the customers* “Hi. I would like to see if there is any way to get the hours that I missed when I was accidentally kicked off my shift.”

Me: “I would definitely be happy to look into that for you. It will only take a moment, if you wouldn’t mind waiting.”

(I reach out to someone else to see if there is anything I can do, but I am advised to have the “customer” email in.)

Me: “Thank you for being patient with me! Unfortunately, there is nothing that I will be able to do on my end. What you can do, though, is email in to [email address], and someone in that department should be able to help you further.”

Customer: “That’s BS. I was told to call, and you say you can’t help me. It’s probably your fault that this happened! It’s not fair! How is it fair that you get to work fine, while I was wrongfully booted and won’t get paid?!”

Me: “I am sorry, and I really wish I could—“

Customer: “I DON’T CARE WHAT YOU SAY! GET ME TO SOMEONE WHO CAN!”

Me: “Sir, I’m sorry, but there is nothing we, on the phones, can—“

Customer: “Stop BS-ing me! I want a supervisor, and I want them now!”

Me: “Okay, I can get you one, if you wouldn’t mind ho—“

Customer: “You’ve got to be f****** kidding me! I shouldn’t have to wait! GET ME SOMEONE NOW!”

Me: “Sir, I will get you someone; however, I will need to place you on ho—“

(The customer gets extremely upset and starts screaming at me, and crying that the whole situation is my fault and that it’s not fair. All this is while I am trying to flag someone down to talk to him.)

Customer: “You know what? F*** this! I quit. Get me off of your employee list!”

(Again, this is something the phone service cannot do, so I direct him to email in again. The customer gets more upset, to the point that I can actually hear in his voice that he is getting visibly red.)

Customer: “F*** you! F*** the email service! And most of all, f*** this company! I’m going to make sure no one uses it again! I will tell everyone I know, go back to the people I helped, and tell everyone that this is BS!”

Me: “I am very sorry, sir. I really do wish there was something that I could do on my end.”

Customer: “Take your apology and shove it up your a**!” *hangs up*

(I take a quick breather before doing my notes. A coworker who sees I am struggling flags someone down and my supervisor asks to listen to the call with me. We listen to the call. Having to relive it, I start crying. My supervisor turns to me slowly.)

Supervisor: “Listen. There was nothing you could do. It was not your fault that he got like that; you directed him to where he needed to go, and that was that. But I have a question for you.”

Me: “Question?”

Supervisor: “So, in a few weeks — you know, when this blows over and you can laugh about it — I would love to use this in a training class for new agents so they can see just how they can handle these types of situations.”

Me: “Go for it.”

I’m driving, with my husband in the passenger seat. We pull into the local grocery store parking lot that is always crowded. Every space is taken in the first aisle we drive down. As we pull around to go down the next aisle, we find the path blocked by an SUV. There is no traffic coming either way and at first, we don’t know why it’s just sitting there, until I notice the passenger side door is open and a foot is hanging out. Considering that we’re right in front of the store, I naturally assume that the passenger is being dropped off so that the driver can find a spot to park without the passenger — probably elderly because we live in a county with a large retirement community — having to walk too far.

At first, we sit there and wait, but the passenger never steps out, never even opens his door all the way. Eventually, I check to make sure there is no oncoming traffic and start going around the SUV. Next thing I know, it starts honking and, as far as I can see, there’s no reason for it, since they’re blocking and we’re just trying to get down the aisle. And then I have to put on the brakes because a car has started to back out of a space that’s right in the front. I think nothing of it; I don’t even consider taking the spot since we don’t need one that close to the entrance, but that was before I noticed the SUV pulling in uncomfortably close to my car and I finally put two-and-two together.

Blocking the roadway, the passenger taking his time to get out, or at the very least the honking was all because they thought we were trying to take the spot, when we couldn’t even see the car that was getting ready to leave. So, of course, I take the spot. A d**k move on my part, I’m sure, but if you’re going to be that rude and inconsiderate to other drivers, you’ll get the same in return.

(My roommate and I are in separate rooms while talking. We’re both in our late twenties or early thirties, but we have a running joke that we’re going deaf because of frequent exchanges like these.)

Roommate: “Only eleven days until spring break!”

Me: *with my head in the refrigerator, looking for a snack* “I’m so ready. Why can’t it be next week?!”

Roommate: *pause* “Did you just say, ‘Why do you hate me?’”

Me: *standing up and looking through the door at him* “No. I said, ‘Why can’t it be next week?'”

Roommate: “Oh.” *another pause* “I just had my urine checked last year, and it was fine.”

Me: *staring at him, trying to figure out what that has to do with anything, then it clicks and I start cracking up*

Roommate: “What?!”

Me: “I thought you said you had your urine checked instead of your hearing!” *still dying of laughter*

Roommate: “Oh, my God.” *shouts to his boyfriend, who is an American Sign Language interpreter* “Hey, babe! We’re gonna need your interpreting services a lot sooner than we originally thought!”

(This takes place when I am fourteen years old. My father has full custody of me, and for good reason. I’m visiting my mother, and she and her boyfriend take me to the mall with them. I’m a huge lover of animals and always want to stop in at the local pet shop that has puppies and various other critters up for adoption. All the animals, except for puppies, are kept in unlocked cages so that customers can handle the animals, so long as they’re 18 or older. I can’t wait until I am old enough. I stand by as my mother lifts a ferret out of its cage, and I start petting it along with her.)

Mom: “Oh! You’re so cute! I wish I could take you home.”

Mom’s Boyfriend: *laughs* “Do it. Just stick it in your purse.”

(It’s obvious that he’s joking, but my mother does a quick look around and really does shove the ferret into the large purse she’s carrying!)

Me: *completely shocked, but keeping my voice down* “Mom!”

Mom: “Come on; it’s time to leave.” *starts heading for the exit*

Me: “You can’t!”

Mom: “Shh! Let’s go.”

(I glance at the employees, but they’re all busy. I’m about ready to shout and cause a scene, until a conversation I had with my father just a few weeks ago pops into my head and I can practically hear him shouting, “We don’t turn in family!” At the time, he was referring to some issues with my cousin stealing from us, because he is not a fan of involving the police. As I am now, I’d make sure my mother was caught for this, but at fourteen, I don’t. I storm off ahead of her and make sure she knows I am angry about it. A huge fight ensues, during which I hear some great gems from her.)

Mom: “Do you want me to turn it back in and get caught? Do you want me to get arrested? If that happens, I’ll never get your sister back.”

(My half-sister — not my father’s daughter, just to clarify, as people have asked why he didn’t have custody — was taken by CPS just a couple months ago.)

Me: “If you want to get her back, how about not breaking the law?! This is why they took her from you in the first place!”

Mom: “You’re judging me the same way your aunt judges you!”

Me: “My aunt judges me because I dress like a goth, not by what I do!”

Mom: “Well… Because of the way you dress, she thinks you do bad things!”

(I stopped arguing with her, because I figured that if a fourteen-year-old could see the major hole in that defense, there was no point in explaining it to an adult. My mother continued on with her own tirade, though, during which she took the cell phone from me when I tried to call my father to explain why I needed to come home early and announced that this must be the end of our relationship. Sadly, it wasn’t. I put up with her for several more years before I finally cut her out of my life for about a decade. Now that I’m thirty and better able to handle her, we’re speaking again on a superficial basis, mostly to help myself to move on from some unresolved issues and anger I’ve had towards her. And by the way, I’m pretty sure she’s the reason why that pet shop now has locks on all their cages.)