I’m a nineteen-year-old girl, and I work as a cashier at a small pizza place just up the street from my house. One day, I’m using the restroom during my break when I hear knocking on the door. Our restroom is a single-occupant unisex restroom.

Me: “I’m in here!”

The knocking continues.

Me: “Occupied!”

The knocking gets louder.

Me: “I said I’m in here!”

Voice: “Open up!”

Me: “Give me a moment!”

The knocking suddenly gets very loud and the door handle starts jiggling. I’m done using the restroom at this point, so I get up, flush, and wash my hands. When I open up the door, I see the manager, who is easily in his fifties, standing there.

Manager: “Why didn’t you open the door?”

Me: “I was using the bathroom!”

Manager: “Doesn’t matter. You need to open the door whenever I knock!”

He wrote me up for insubordination. I quit the next day and found a new job at a different restaurant in the next town over a few days later. The pay wasn’t as great, and I had to have my mom or my older brother drive me there since I don’t have my driver’s license and it’s too far to walk to, but at least the staff and management there knew how to respect other people’s privacy!

I work in a computer lab of a small library in NLR, AR. Every once in a while we get a unstable patron that comes in. A patron came in earlier and was causing a slight commotion over scrap paper, when he suddenly left. He came back moments later and I had this conversation with him:

Patron: So you got curly hair, and a blue dress on? okay I got cha’.
Me: Ummmm……
Patron: Federal law says you gotta give me paper!
Me: Sir, I’m sure that there is no such Federal Law, but I can give some scrap paper just not a full sheet.
Patron: You know now that Trump is president things will get better.
Me: Okay.
Patron: Trump is gonna take all the jobs away from woman and put them back in their place!
Me: Sir?
Patron: Y’all *points to me and a co-worker* better get your a** back in the kitchen.
Me: Sir, I find what your saying highly offensive I’m gonna ask that you leave the library now.
Patron: I’m just letting you know that you wont have a job for long. Get your a** in the kitchen B*%$#.

Eventually I have to call the cops because he won’t leave, and for offensive language.

I am working in the copy center when an older lady approaches me, asking if I can help her with business cards. We keep regular customers’ files in the computer, so I look up her folder and pull up the business card file. Keep in mind that this is the ONLY business card file in her folder.

Me: “Is this the business card you were looking to print?”

Customer: “Yes, but it’s supposed to have [Name] on it. These don’t.”

Me: “I can change it to put that person’s name on it.”

Customer: “No! These aren’t the right ones. It’s supposed to have [Name] on it.”

Me: “Okay. Let me show you the files in your folder. Maybe I didn’t see it.”

I show her the files in her folder, knowing this was the ONLY business card file. Midway through me showing her, she changes her attitude completely and becomes extremely rude.

Customer: “Never mind! I’m just going to wait until [Other Employee] gets back. She’ll find it! You don’t know what you are doing!”

She then shops around the store for a few more minutes with her husband. I am the only person watching the front of the store, so I have to ring up her purchase, as well. Even though she has already made me mad, I stay calm and treat her like I would treat any other customer.

Me: “You total will be [total], ma’am.”

Customer: “Don’t speak to me in that tone. You need a serious attitude adjustment, missy! Where is your manager?!”

She then runs over to my manager and speaks to him about how unhappy she is.

Customer: “That little girl is nasty! She has the worst attitude I’ve ever seen. I will never work with her again! She needs to learn how to respect her elders! She should be fired! What a snotty little girl! FIRE HER NOW!”

My manager loves me and knows what a nice person I am, so I did not get fired. Since this incident, the old lady has come in the store a few times and each time, she looks surprised to see me and gives me death stares. I laugh every time!

We have a crafting business and sell a lot of fan-type things at comic cons. Today, we had a woman we had never met before walk up to the booth.
Customer: “Hi, but you know who I am, I’m [name neither my mom or myself have ever heard of].”
Cue our blank looks.
Customer: “You know, the Charm Lady!”
[Repeat of our blank looks]
Mom, smiling: “Oh yeah!” [like she knows what this person is talking about.]
I’m tired enough that I don’t pick up on the *pretend we know who she is* clues, so I still sit there looking blank. My husband is in the back Googling her.
She wandered off, disappointed that we had no idea who she was. My husband never could find anything about her online. At least she was friendly.

(I HATE my job and am only going in order to continue to be able to pay my bills. I’m looking for something else that pays similarly, as I’m actually making above minimum. It’s a sunny afternoon moving into early evening, and there are three of us in the store: me, a coworker who smokes, and the unbalanced kitchen manager, who is technically higher ranked than us but also not our boss. My coworker has just stepped out for a smoke and I have just finished a task that required the step ladder, which is typically kept in the far back corner of the kitchen. As I am moving to the kitchen to put the ladder away, I see the front door open out of the corner of my eye. I call out to the kitchen manager that I’ll be right back to properly put the ladder up and whip around to the registers, a good six feet away on a slightly raised platform. The intrusion was my coworker and as I’m moving back to the kitchen to finish with the step ladder, it comes sailing at me from the kitchen door. I leap back and it clatters harmlessly to the floor, but I am badly shaken.)

Me: “What the f***, [Kitchen Manager]?! I said I’d take care of it.”

(I am so shaken, I actually don’t remember if he responded, or how. He leaves for the night soon after. A few days later, the store’s general manager arrives at my apartment to give me a lift into work, as he insists on scheduling me before the buses start for the day.)

General Manager: “So, [My Name], I heard there was an incident with [Kitchen Manager] the other night.”

(I’m unsure where he’s going with this, and I’m already uncomfortable with him because he’s my boss and I have some fear issues with authority figures and this guy has already proven to be unreliable.)

Me: *cautiously* “Yeah.”

General Manager: “Well, how could you have handled that better?”

(I am stunned enough that I respond in a manner much unlike my normal self with management.)

Me: “Besides call the police because that was attempted assault?!”

(At this point, my general manager started spluttering, shocked that I had reached that very logical conclusion. He began to try to placate me, telling me that it wasn’t [Kitchen Manager]’s fault, that he hadn’t been taking his medication for a while. I let him know that that wasn’t an excuse and then, fortunately, we were at our store and I ended the conversation by walking away to clock in. In the end, the kitchen manager was let go, but unfortunately, that was well after I quit for a job that paid about $1 less per hour.)

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