I was really good at math as a kid. We’re talking traded my stupid third-grade crosswords and word searches for my sister’s sixth-grade math homework kind of good… at least until Mom found out and made me stop. I wasn’t in trouble; she just explained that I was doing Sis a disservice by denying her the chance to understand math concepts she would need and be tested on. Busy work exchanges were still cool, though.

Then, I took Algebra 1 from a retired sailor who couldn’t teach to save his soul. And I had knee surgery on September 15th, the day the class learned what y=mx+b meant. When I returned from surgery the following week, I was still high as a kite on pain meds until some time in October. And the teacher flat-out refused to help me catch up. When I asked him to explain that formula, he’d just parrot, “It’s the slope-intercept form of a line!” without ever telling me what that meant.

At one point the following spring, during a conference with my parents, he had the gall to say that I was “too stupid to learn math” and “the stupidest kid in the whole school.”

Dad nearly rage-flipped the table, but Mom put her hand on his knee and then punctured the teacher’s ego.

Mom: “Every student must have aced the math section of their standardized tests, then! I demand to see proof of that.”

He was caught off-guard, with a dazed “Huh?” expression. Then, Mom pulled my test results (just back that week) out of her folio and practically purred:

Mom: “[My Name] only missed one question, so if they’re the stupidest kid in the school, then everyone else must have aced the test, right? Oh, they didn’t? Well, then, perhaps the problem is not a stupid pupil. Hmm…”

We left the teacher gaping like a fish and the school counselor laughing at him. 

That night, my dad went through my entire algebra textbook with me, right from chapter one. He started to gloss over that same equation with the same recursive answer the teacher gave until I stopped him.

Me: “What. Is. Y? What is X? What is M? And what the heck is B?”

Dad: “You don’t know that?”

Me: “NO!”

Dad: “Oh! Well, that explains everything!”

And he proceeded to actually break it down for me. It took less than two minutes, including drawing multiple graphs to illustrate how the formula works. Two freaking minutes would have saved me an entire school year of frustration.

After that, we zoomed through the entire text in about 4 hours. The next day, I took my final. I aced it.

But my love for math was gone. The teacher in question “retired” at the end of that year.

When masks were still mandated where I work, someone came in without one.

Me: “You need to put a mask on, please.”

Customer: “God will protect me!”

Me: “That’s great, but if you want to be in here, you need to wear a mask whether God will protect you or not.”

Customer: “God is so good! Only those who aren’t saved get [very contagious illness]!”

Me: “If you won’t wear a mask, you need to leave.”

Customer: “You’re going to Hell for wearing a mask!”

Me: “Oh, I’m going to Hell. Just not for wearing a mask.”

And I guided her out of the store.

I worked in a fast food restaurant, and one of my coworkers did an exceptionally fantastic job with any task he was assigned to, whether it was as a cashier or working in food prep. It came to no surprise to any of us when he was promoted to a shift manager position.

Our actual surprise was that he somehow confused the word “manager” with “Gestapo.” He constantly stood next to working people and was either snapping his fingers or clapping his hands: “LET’S GO! LET’S GO! MOVE IT!” Mess up an order? He’d go grab the poor prep worker from the kitchen and then say, right in front of the customer:

Manager: “Is this what you call customer service? How long have you been working here? Apologize to him right now!” *To the customer* “Sir, we’ll get you another order made, and I’m writing him up for this right now! This is inexcusable!”

He would constantly give blatantly obvious instructions to crew workers on how to do their jobs, even though many of them were “veterans” who had been there ten or more years and could recite protocols while in a coma. Write-ups started streaming in from him over petty issues like clocking in two minutes late from break or forgetting to give a customer their receipt, which infuriated many of us since a lot of us had been there for years without a single blemish on our records.

One day, I called in to let my work know I would be fifteen or thirty minutes late because my car was not starting and I was taking a bus instead (I don’t trust Uber), and I was unlucky enough to have him pick up the phone.

Manager: “Why didn’t you prepare to leave earlier? It’s your responsibility to make sure you get here on time! I’m starting to consider having a talk with [General Manager] about whether you should even be here! You need to take your job more seriously!”

I arrived at work on time after pestering my roommate for a ride, and as expected, [Manager] was there driving everyone like sled dogs. As I was listening to a customer give her order, he walked past me, snapped his finger repeatedly, and snarled, “Pick it up!” as though I was supposed to control how fast the customer was deciding. Then, as I was putting her order together, he barked:

Manager: “Napkins! Ketchup packet! Come on. You know the drill already!”

I locked my register, grabbed his hand, shook it, and walked to the back.

Manager: “Where do you think you are going?”

Me: “Unemployment office.”

Manager: “No, stay right there— HEY! [Coworker], that’s too much lettuce! This is the third time—”

Coworker: “Goodbye, sir.”

They walked to the back with me.

We both left just as we said we would, and as word got around, three more employees walked out that same shift. When I returned to the restaurant the following day to turn in my uniform, the general manager met up with me and took me to the office. There, he put me on the phone with the franchise owner, who apologized to me and reassured me that this situation would be handled immediately.

Surprisingly enough, that shift manager wasn’t fired, but please believe me when I tell you that it felt GREAT to come in to work the next day to see him dressing in a common crew uniform, looking completely humiliated. He quit after three weeks of being relegated to all the mundane tasks such as deep cleaning machines and handling delivery all by himself with no help.

I’m at a large retail store, driving through the parking lot looking for a space. I see an empty spot ahead and start to turn into it, only to be greeted by another car honking its horn, sitting in the space across from it. The guy inside is waving his hands furiously and gesturing at me, while the woman in the passenger seat attempts to cover her face.

I finish parking, get out, and gesture to the other driver with upturned palms and a “What’s wrong?” expression. I’m actually concerned the guy might be in some sort of trouble or need help, but I’m not expecting what happens.

He shuts his car off and thrusts his door open, actually hitting the SUV beside him, and screams before even getting out of the car:

Other Driver: “You a**hole! You did that on purpose!”

During this tirade, his (presumably) girlfriend also exits the vehicle and now has the look of someone who wishes they could physically become invisible.

I listen to his rant about my deliberate and personal attack against him which I perpetrated by parking my car and preventing him from pulling through spaces, to wit, he would now have to reverse out of his parking space… which is just an unforgivable inconvenience.

I let him get the whole rant out, nearly a full two minutes of it. He makes a h*** of a scene, and by the end of it… I am laughing. Not on the inside — I am laughing in his face. He doesn’t like being laughed at, apparently, and steps back, shutting his door so he can approach me. He has his hands up at shoulder height at this point, looking like he might take a swing at me.

Me: “Let me get this straight. You got out here yelling at me because you don’t know how to drive a car and that’s somehow my fault. Is that right?”

Now that he was closer, I could smell alcohol on his breath. He stomped away like a little kid pitching a fit, went back to his car — which the girl was no longer in, but instead standing beside with her door closed — got in, and slammed the door. He motioned to the girl to get in as he started the engine, but she shook her head no.

He put it in reverse and slammed backward out of the parking space… and into the big 4×4 pickup behind him to his right. The tow hitch obliterated his back bumper and didn’t let it go. He was in a full rage again at this point and droves away, leaving behind the accident, his (presumably) girlfriend, and, to the credit of universal karma, his bumper with the license plate.

This entire exchange lasted a bit less than five minutes, but it’s five minutes I’ll treasure.

I’m an artist at a convention. To pass time and to attract customers, I do some live drawing while my partner handles customer contact if someone is interested or has questions.

Customer #1: “Wait… you drew this?”

Me: “Sure did!”

Customer #1: “But… you are fat.”

I am speechless.

Customer #1: “These are all normal people.”

Me: “Eh… yes. They are my characters.”

Customer #1: “But you are fat! Why do you draw skinny people? You should only draw what you know. This is false advertisement.”

At that moment, another customer walks by.

Customer #2: “Oh, wow! This is so pretty!”

Me: “Thank you!”

Customer #1: “Oh, don’t bother. She’s misrepresenting herself.” *Turns to me* “You’ll meet yourself one day and you’ll see I’m right. You should only draw what you know! You are stealing work from other people!”

Thankfully, the customer (or actually, non-customer) walks on.

Customer #2: “Does that mean I can’t draw gay furry art?”

Her comment made me burst out laughing. I needed a moment to compose myself, but [Customer #2] (and fellow artist) and I had a lovely conversation afterward.