During the worldwide health crisis, my city set up one of the largest emergency homeless shelters in the country. Over the eighteen months that it operated, the services offered expanded from basic shelter, hygiene, and meals to include navigation services to help our clients connect with service providers and employment and housing programs.

As a member of this navigation team, all my teammates and I were required to test for the infamous contagious illness every week. If we tested positive, we were not permitted to work for at least two weeks. This story happened a few months before we shut down.

On the day after our mandatory testing, [Coworker #1] came in coughing and complaining about being tired because she couldn’t get any sleep. Our manager told her that, since she was having symptoms, she could go home and rest. She refused.

Shortly after we opened the doors to the office, I heard this exchange between her and another coworker. [Coworker #1] had her mask down to her chin, and [Coworker #2]’s nose was sticking out of their mask.

Coworker #1: “It’s all bulls***, anyway. I took one of those at-home tests a few days ago, and it gave me a false positive. There’s no way I have the [slang for illness].”

Coworker #2: “Right, those tests are so inaccurate, always giving false results. I don’t know why anyone is still testing.”

Coworker #1: “Because they get a whole bunch of money from every test. I bet they get more from positives, too — which is f***ed because, of course, then the people they’re lying about have to miss work.”

Coworker #3: “Wait… Did you say you tested positive?”

Coworker #1: “It was a false positive! It was probably because my son sneezed on it while I was waiting for the results. He had it last week.”

Coworker #3: “Wait, your son had it?! And he’s not quarantined?!”

[Coworker #1] coughed directly into her hand.

Coworker #1: “Relax, he’s not even sick. It’s not like you can get it from someone who’s not even sick.”

At this point, [Coworker #3] joined me in the far back of the office, where we wiped down and sanitized everything and kept carefully away from everyone else for the rest of the day.

The next morning our manager — who missed that exchange due to never being in the office when we were actually open — told [Coworker #1] that she had tested positive and needed to stay home.

[Coworker #3] and I worked in the shelter as a whole for over a year, and in the navigation office for almost six months. Neither of us ever tested positive, despite almost certainly being exposed almost every day.

In the store where I work, for returns, you either have to have your receipt or the item you’re returning with the price tag still on it and your driver’s license.

One day, a man comes in with a shirt to return. The man appears to be homeless; his clothes are unkempt and disheveled and he just looks very scruffy and gruff. The shirt he hands me still has the tag on it, but it is wet… and it doesn’t feel like water.

I can tell he’s in a rough spot, and even though the company would not normally accept an item that’s not resellable, I decide to go ahead and return it to try to show some compassion and kindness.

Me: “Since you don’t have a receipt, can I see your driver’s license?”

Man: *Snapping* “I don’t have a driver’s license! You can just return it anyway.”

Me: *Politely* “I can’t return it without a receipt or driver’s license. I physically cannot do the return process without either.”

Man: “Just return it for store credit!”

Me: “I’m sorry, but without a driver’s license, there’s nothing I can do.”

I still feel bad for him, though, and want to offer a solution.

Me: “Look, just have a friend come in and return it for you with their driver’s license. They can give you the store credit for it. I just can’t return it without a license.”

He promptly turns to the customer next to him and orders:

Man: “Give me your driver’s license!”

Naturally, the customer is baffled. The man starts yelling at her to give him her license and, obviously, she says no. Then, he turns to me and starts calling me names. Eventually, seeing that he’s getting nowhere, he leaves.

I tried so hard to be polite, and I am very shaken by his demands of not only me but the customer at the register next to him, but there are more customers in line, so I don’t even have time to process what the heck just happened.

Fortunately, my next customer witnessed everything and says something along the lines of:

Next Customer: “You handled that like a saint!”

I once was in discussion with a finance-related company that expected me to shake down customers in bad areas and do nightly cash deposits at a bank where others had recently been mugged. Their “safe” was a paper box in the office.

They changed how much I would be paid by saying I was expected to work ten to twenty hours overtime/salary wage suddenly.

Management made a point to tell me they offered free chips and sodas, and a moment later, they called an employee greedy and fat for enjoying said snacks.

I could go on.

When I decided not to take the job, I called the manager only to find out that he had gone on vacation — no supporting incoming staff — and the chick above him about lost her mind on me when I told her it wasn’t going to happen.

I’m so glad I bailed.

I’m watching a half-marathon in a small town. It’s cosy, and people keep their distance without the need for barricades. Police aren’t needed for traffic control, and cars can drive on the same road as the marathon at the same time and nothing ever happens. It’s been going like this for over twenty years now. 

Suddenly, a woman in her car drives up to one of the barricades there to give direction to the runners. She immediately drives onto the curb and is stopped by an older man, who directs the runners in the right direction. 

Woman: “I need to go over there!”

Older Man: “Excuse me, miss, but there are runners running in that street.”

Woman: “But I live there. I need to be there!”

Older Man: “I can move the barricade for you. One moment.”

Woman: “Yes, yes!”

The barricade has barely moved and the woman hits the gas. 

Older Man: “Mind the runners!”

Woman: “Yes, yes!” *Waves out of the window*

She was not going slow at all, and she almost hit the curb on the other side while evading the barricade that was being opened for her on that side. I think her waiting time was about three minutes?

I live in a trailer park that has a horseshoe-styled driveway. Due to three of us parents having children younger than ten and the fact that the driveway is extremely icy in the winter, the bus comes up the driveway to pick up all the children.

I got to be one of the luckier ones that has an indoor porch, so as a result, last year, my daughter would wait on the porch when it rained or snowed and I’d get wet by waiting for the bus so she wouldn’t. The bus driver last year didn’t mind waiting a minute for her to run down the driveway and onto the bus, as she was usually seen walking toward me. However, this one…

Me: “[Daughter]! The bus is coming!”

Daughter: “Coming, Mama!”

My daughter got as far as the front of the car, clearly seen by the driver… and the driver drove right by us. Shocked, I took her by the hand, and we rushed to the trailer next door where she was able to board the bus.

Daughter: “I was on the porch! You saw me!”

Driver: “You should have been at the end of your driveway. I don’t care if you were by the vehicle. I’m not waiting.”

Me: “Really? She was waiting on the porch so she wouldn’t get cold and wet!”

Driver: “Not my problem.”

Me: “Would you make your children wait in this downpour?”

Driver: *Pauses* “No.”

Me: “Then why the h*** should mine?! She will be waiting under a roof during rain and snow! I will not let her get cold and wet just because you think you’re in a d*** race!”

During this, another parent had rushed her children toward the bus as it had been done to her, as well. Their trailer was off the horseshoe part of the drive and further in the back, and her children were even younger.

Parent: “Man, if you weren’t giving her grief, we would have missed the bus.”

Me: “You can wait two seconds for my child to walk from the porch to the end of the drive. Don’t ignore her again! I will report you!”

She turned away from me angrily as the other two children boarded the bus. When the doors shut, she looked like she was about to take off angrily.

Me: “YOU HIT THAT GAS AND SEND THEM KIDS FLYING, I’LL HAVE YOUR A**!”

She slowly pulled away, clearly angry at being called out. I turned to the other parent, who was laughing.

Parent: “She does it to us, too. She’ll see my youngest running fast as he possibly can and then take off.”

Me: “I get the feeling she’s not gonna last the entire year. I wish the other driver was back.”

I normally don’t confront, but when it comes to my child, apparently, I have a disappearing backbone.