I am third in the queue at a local supermarket. At the counter, there is a lovely, polite, elderly lady with the telltale jerking movements of Parkinson’s. Her voice is a little slurred, soft, and monotonous.

Lady: “I’m sorry I’m so slow. Can I just get these?”

She puts through five items, mostly lunch stuff.

Cashier: “No worries, not a problem at all! Would you like a bag?”

The next customer cuts in.

Man: “Well, I’m f****** worried! You shouldn’t be allowed out in public like that.”

He gets up in the old lady’s face.

Cashier: “Stop that immediately!”

Man: “Listen, b****, I shouldn’t have to wait in line because some old f***** can’t handle her highs!”

Meanwhile, the old lady is calmly putting her stuff in her bag… except for a can of soda which she holds in her hand.

Cashier: “Excuse me. That is my mother, and she has Parkinson’s Disease; it is a neurological degenerative condition that causes those movements.”

The manager can be seen approaching but is still a few moments away.

Man: “Like f*** she is! She’s just high!”

The lady opens the now very well-shaken can of soda and proceeds to drop it at the man’s feet, causing it to spurt upward in a jet of foam and thoroughly soak him.

Lady: “Oh, I’m terribly sorry! I have Parkinson’s disease. There was a spasm in my hand and I let go of it. I’m soooooo sorry!”

The other customer shouts for a bit and then gets thrown out by the manager.

The elderly lady then waits at the end of the checkout to speak to her daughter after she finishes serving me, and that’s when I notice her mischievous grin.

Me: “You totally meant to do that, didn’t you?” *Smirks*

Lady: “H*** yeah, I did!” *Smiles sweetly* “I may have Parkinson’s, but I can still deal with an a**hole or two!”

This story is part of our Best Of July 2021 roundup!

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It’s a very busy lunch rush and I am taking a customer’s order over the drive-thru headset when he asks for a type of burger that has several different variations. He seems confused, so I explain the differences to him.

Customer: “Hold on. It’s not for me; it’s for someone else. Let me call them and check.”

This isn’t unusual, and it’s better than the customer calling later and accusing us of giving them the wrong burger. He spends so long on the phone, however, that I end up moving from order taker to cashier, handling the customers at the window instead, and another crew person finishes taking the order for me.

Finally, the customer gets to the pass-out window and hands me his card, and I notice he has his phone to his ear. We are required to read back the order at the window to confirm it is correct; however, as soon as I start speaking, the customer holds up his finger, shushes me, and rolls up his window. This means I am unable to confirm the order, give him his drinks, see if he wants a drink carrier, or ask if he needs additional condiments.

Aside from being rude, this slows us down, because we would be getting all this stuff ready while his order was being bagged. I run his card, but because his window is up, I’m not able to hand it back so I set it in front of my register with his receipt. His order comes up not too long after that and I start trying to flag him down and get him to roll his window down, so we can get his order to him.

He looks at me, makes eye contact, and then looks away. I’ve got other orders coming up and I’m pretty annoyed with this guy at this point. I hold up his bag and start waiving energetically. I’m seconds from leaning over and knocking on his window. Finally, he puts his phone down.

Customer: “Sorry about that. I was on an important phone call.”

If it was that important, he could have pulled around in front instead of holding up the drive-thru and wasting time on the lunch breaks of the people behind him. I give him his card back and try to get him his drinks and food handed out as quickly as possible to get the line moving again. At this point, we have all the food and drinks up for the next six cars. That’s all we can fit from the speaker to the window; we can’t take another order until this guy moves.

I hand the customer his bag of food.

Customer: “I just need to check and make sure you got this right.”

My manager, the other cashier, and I just stared in disbelief for a few seconds as this guy, who had already held up the drive-thru for nearly ten minutes, proceeded to pull out each and every sandwich and open and check them all, before I closed the window, walked away to get cookies, and started adding them to all the other car’s bags as a preemptive apology for the wait this guy had caused. 

Apparently, he was satisfied, because he FINALLY drove away. The cars directly behind him were pretty understanding. They could see me trying to give him food for a while and see him sitting there after getting it, but I did have to explain to the cars behind that they were held up because someone decided the drive-thru window was the place to take an “important” phone call.

I’m a security guard in my office with the door closed. As is standard for this sort of job, there are windows all around, so anyone can see in and I can see out. I’ve just had a new employee show up and she is currently waiting in the hallway outside of my office for her supervisor to show up and show her around. We’re both wearing masks, as is required here due to the ongoing health crisis.

Well, I end up sneezing and I sneeze LOUD. I do cover it in my arm and all that, and I go to clean up with sanitizer out of habit. The next thing I know, the new employee has burst through the door into my office and started shrieking at me about how I’m going to give her “the rona”. I’m pretty dumbfounded by this and just sit there and stare at her while she’s basically throwing a tantrum, yelling things like how dare I put her at risk (by sneezing in a closed room well away from her whilst wearing a mask) and how she’s going to get me fired for endangering people. 

Karma happens then, as her supervisor finally shows up shortly after and apparently watches for a bit. Once she has seen enough, the supervisor approaches.

Supervisor: “Excuse me. Are you [Employee]?”

Employee: “Yeah!”

Supervisor: “And today’s your first day?”

Employee: “Uh-huh!”

Supervisor: “Wrong. I’m going to go file the termination paperwork in a little bit. Right now I’m seeing that you’re off the property immediately!”

And just like that, she was marched off the grounds. I’m glad that we didn’t have to deal with that particular bit of crazy for long. I can’t imagine how bad things would have been if she had exploded at someone like that on the factory floor.

Our comic shop is located in a busy section of downtown. During the weekends, people will try and park in our small lot to go to other stores or just walk around. We have a sign stating that we will tow off non-customer cars. I am working on a busy Saturday when I see a man park and begin walking in the opposite direction of the store. I walk out and flag him down before he gets far.

Me: “SIR! You can’t park here if you’re not a customer! You’ll have to either move to another lot or use the city parking garage down the street.”

Older Man: “Miss, I am not going to be long. I’ll be back in a few hours. I’m sure your store will survive my car being there.”

We have a tournament starting soon and our lot WILL fill up very quickly.

Me: “We actually need that spot. We have a tournament starting soon and—”

Older Man: “That’s nice. I really don’t care.”

He walks off. I go back into the store fuming.

Me: “Hey, [Owner], that guy is going to be taking that spot up for hours. What do you want to do?”

Owner: “You know the number. Call the tow truck.”

I smile evilly and call the towing company. They arrive in half an hour and tow off the vehicle. We have their business card for when this happens. The tournament starts soon after his vehicle is removed and is in full swing a few hours later when we see the old man come back, looking around where his car used to be. He comes stomping inside, face red.

Older Man: “You! You f****** b****! Where is my car?!”

Me: “Towed, about three hours ago. Here’s the card for the company.”

I handed over the card for the towing company, and he simply took it with one shaking hand and walked out. Right as he got outside, he let out this roar of rage, grabbed the plastic trash can we keep out front, and threw it at the window. Since the window is plexiglass, the can just bounced off the window and rolled back to the man’s feet. The entire store was quiet for a moment, and then someone started to giggle. Soon, we were all laughing, fake roaring, and pointing at how stupid he looked. He flipped us off and stormed off, never to be seen again.

This story is part of our Best Of July 2021 roundup!

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I’m working a night audit shift at a hotel on a Friday night. The first part of the night goes surprisingly well, which is uncommon given that Friday nights at the hotel front desk are rather busy and can, at times, be hectic. But hey, I’m not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, so on my night goes. I sit on my a**, do crosswords on my tablet, and generally enjoy peace and quiet. Three-thirty am rolls around and I decide I’ve wasted enough time waiting for the last arrivals and begin my audit, and not but thirty minutes later, in comes a guest.

She strolls up to the front desk with a clear sassy attitude.

Guest: “Yeah, uh, the girl who was here earlier said she’d give me a refund for [some issue]. The computers were frozen then, and she told me to come back in a couple of hours.”

Immediately, alarm bells ring in my head. One, I wasn’t told about this. Two, no notes were left about this. Three, she left at 11:00 pm and it is now just about four in the morning. That is not “a couple of hours.” Four, you come in here and the first words out of your mouth are demanding money? You’d best have a pistol tucked somewhere, honey, and a desire for a prison sentence, because there is no way I’m giving you money, at 4:00 am, without any sort of notice from second shift, just on your word, unless you’ve got me at gunpoint.

Me: “I’m sorry, but I wasn’t told about this earlier. I’m afraid I can’t help you; you’ll have to come back at a later time.”

Guest: “What, can’t you call her?”

I make a show of looking at my watch.

Me: “Ma’am, it is four in the morning.”

Guest: “And?”

Me: “Aaaand I’m not going to wake up my coworker at 4:00 am when she has to be back here at 7:00 am to relieve me.”

Guest: *In a very disbelieving tone* “So, who do you call when you have a problem?”

I already know where she’s going with this.

Me: “Ma’am, I have only called my manager when I also had to call the police.”

And apparently, that puts ideas into this woman’s head, because right then and there she says the most entertaining thing she can.

Guest: “Mmm, well, then, you’d best be gettin’ to calling him, because the police are gonna be down here. AND the news.”

Me: “Well, you can go right ahead, then.”

I’m thinking, “Oh, this is gonna be good.”

There is such an explosion of utter amusement inside me that words do not do it justice. They simply don’t. First off, what the f*** does she expect the police to do? I’d love to hear what her explanation to them is. “Uh, yes, officer, this man refused to give me money when I demanded it. No, I was not trying to rob the place. Yes, this is what I called the police for.”

Secondly, what did she think “the news” was going to do about this? I have no idea. “We’re bringing you a story from [Town], as a woman has apparently been refused money from the till when she demanded it firmly. We now go live to the scene.”

This is clearly quite newsworthy, but this is a major city. They’ve got more important things to report on, like flies banging, or the weather on Mars this week, or, you know, actual news, but that’s not nearly as entertaining!

At any rate, I am not about to stand around and piss away yet more time while she prattles away on the phone, so I grab my reports, plop myself at the computer, and resume doing my audit. There is no way I am going to get it done if the police actually show up, which I doubt they will, but regardless, I have no desire to be behind, either way. You would think my dismissive attitude and focus on my work would immediately deflate the ego of any normal human being, but no, not this woman.

This woman begins telling someone (who I suspect is actually nobody and she’s just rattling off random chatter to scare me for reasons that will shortly become apparent) that she needs the local numbers for the news and the police, etc. I’m not really listening because, again, I’ve got things to do, and I don’t care if she claims to call the President, the Pope, and my mother all in a conference call.

Three minutes pass.

Guest: “What’s your name?”

I have been standing in front of her with my name-tag on for a solid five minutes now.

Me: “[My Name].”

Guest: “And what’s your manager’s name?”

Me: “[Manager]. His card is right over there. You’re free to try calling him, but I’m not gonna be the one to wake him up at 4:00 am over this.”

Guest: “Oh, I intend to.”

Here’s what makes me suspect this woman was full of s*** when calling her “friend” and asking for the local news and police: she DOES try calling my boss, and from where I am sitting, I can clearly hear the voicemail message when he, predictably, does not pick up. You know, because it is FOUR IN THE G**D*** MORNING. When she was talking to her friend, I heard no such chatter, leading me to believe she is even more full of s*** than I previously thought.

It is at this point that she realizes that her posturing and threatening are going to do her no good and calling my boss will be fruitless. She takes on a less asinine demeanor, at which point I become less dismissive myself.

Guest: “What time does your manager get in?”

Me: “He’s covering tomorrow night’s shift, so no later than 11:00 pm tomorrow, unfortunately. Actually, let me see when [Aforementioned Coworker] gets back in.”

I double-check, even though I already know she’s relieving me.

Me: “She’ll be back here in the morning. You could always just wait a few hours and get this sorted with her then. But I really just can’t be giving out money from the drawer just on your say-so when she didn’t tell me anything about this and didn’t leave me any notes.”

Guest: “I see. I’ll be back in the morning, then.”

And she turned and strolled on out the front door with all the attitude she’d had coming in.