I’m at a gas station that has impressive quality coffee. I walk in and notice the worker brewing some fresh coffee. She tells me that it’ll be a few minutes and I say I’ll wait. During this time, a woman comes in and almost shoves me aside, despite there being plenty of room, but I’m too tired to care.

Me: “I know coffee is brewing, so it’ll be a few, but at least we get fresh coffee.”

Customer: “You mean to f****** tell me that every d*** urn is brewing?”

Me: “Looks like it. But fresh coffee!”

Customer: “Every d*** urn is f****** empty?!”

Me: “Um. I’d rather wait a few and have fresh coffee than have stuff that’s been sitting for hours.”

Customer: “WELL, THAT DOESN’T F****** MATTER NOW!”

A worker steps in and lets her get some coffee while it’s brewing. I wait for mine to finish and go up to the counter. She pays and tries arguing with the worker, so they open another register. I use a coupon and get my coffee free.

Customer: “WHY THE F*** DOES SHE GET HER COFFEE FREE?!”

Worker: “She used a coupon.”

Customer: “I WANT MY—”

Her friend comes and drags her away. The friend comes back and pays before marching out to yell at the woman. I think that’s the end of it until I’m at work the next day. I’m still tired so I don’t fully register that it’s the same lady from yesterday.

Customer: “I want your f****** manager.”

Me: “Oh. Um… May I ask what for?”

Customer: “You f****** know.”

I get my manager and clean my area. When I’m done, I ask my manager what happened. He tells me.

Customer: “That girl was rude!”

Manager: “What’d she do?!”

Customer: “She backtalked me at [Gas Station]!”

Manager: “Uh… was she in uniform?”

Customer: “No, but she’s rude and needs to be fired!”

Manager: “I can’t punish her for being rude off the clock and out of uniform. Did she say she worked here?”

Customer: “No!”

Manager: “Let me get this straight. You came in here, saw her, and got angry over something she did off the clock, and you want to fire her?”

Customer: “Yes!”

Manager: “Well, judging by just us talking, you’re lucky she didn’t f****** slap you for being so rude. Get out of the store.”

The woman sputtered and stormed out. She tried speeding off but hit forward instead of reverse and went right into a light pole. Karma!

It was the far back yesteryear of 2009 and Lonely Island had recently released their smash hit I’m On A Boat. For those unfamiliar with the song, the innocent title does nothing to convey that the lyrics are absolutely riddled with F-bombs.

Apparently, this fact also completely escaped the organizers of my senior prom, as when the song was inevitably requested — because what teen can resist randomness, T-Pain, and swear words? — the uncensored version started blaring through the speakers.

Supervisors rushed to the DJ booth and scrambled to switch over to the version that’s as much bleeps as English, but it was too late. The damage had been done, as 500 teenagers belted out “F***”s at the top of their lungs and nothing was going to stop them until the song had been sung.

Not sure what fallout there was for whoever approved the song list, but requests were pre-screened for the rest of the night instead of playing nearly immediately.

I am in the hospital for an emergency appendectomy. While I am there waiting for surgery, I overhear a conversation with a man being extremely loud and a nurse trying to tend to him.

Nurse: “Sir, I need to ask you to calm down so we can treat your injuries.”

Man: “No! I bet you gonna try and sew me up so you can pass it off to my insurance! I ain’t falling for that s***!”

Nurse: “Sir, I’m gonna ask you to please calm down so we can stop the bleeding and at least bandage you up!”

Man: “NO! YOU’RE JUST TRYING TO STEAL MONEY FROM ME! I’M NOT FALLING FOR YOUR S***! SEND ME ANOTHER NURSE OR SOMETHING!”

Nurse: “Listen! I don’t have to deal with your attitude, but it’s my duty as a nurse to tend to injuries. Now either you can calm down and let me at least bandage you up and give you pain relievers and send you on your way, I can have security escort you out while we clean the mess you made, or I can send you to [Nearest Hospital, in another city] if you want to be rowdy as you are. What’s it gonna be?!”

I don’t hear anything for ten minutes, or I pass out from the painkillers, but I overhear the nurse and another nurse speaking after a while.

Nurse #1: “I can’t believe he was that stubborn over a ‘paper’ cut on his arm.”

I’m guessing that is a code term for minor cuts and whatnot.

Nurse #2: “Paper cut? That did not look like a paper cut!”

Nurse #1: “Trust me; when you’ve had to file paperwork as much as I have in my time, you realize the difference between a ‘stab wound’ and a nasty paper cut.”

I have been thankful ever since for how kind the nurses were while I was in the hospital, after seeing what they put up with daily.

I work between several departments in a grocery store that has a savings card. If a customer has forgotten their card, they can stop by the service desk to receive a single-use slip with their number on it. On this particular occasion, I’m scheduled as a cashier.

Customer: “I’ve lost my card, but I have this slip until they send me a replacement.”

Me: “That’s fine, ma’am; it won’t take a second.”

I look at the slip. There’s no signature from an office clerk, it’s not dated, and the store’s stamp isn’t on the back. According to the rules, I’m supposed to call and verify that the customer did, in fact, just get her number today. I can see that she isn’t about to pay with a check so I decide to let it slide and just punch the number up, and then I begin to shred the slip.

Customer: “What in the h*** are you doing? That’s my card!”

Me: “I’m sorry for the confusion, ma’am, but this slip can only be used once.”

I begin reading from the pieces.

Me: “’This is a one-time use slip. This slip is intended as a temporary substitute for the customer’s [Store] card. This slip will be disposed of by the cashier after it is used. This slip is only valid on the date written on the slip.’”

Customer: “I don’t give a f*** what it says; that’s my f****** card number!”

Me: “Ma’am, I’m sorry, but it’s corporate policy that these slips are used only once and then destroyed.”

Customer: “But I lost my card!”

Me: “Ma’am, if you lost your card, we can actually replace it for you at the service desk. The whole process takes less than a minute; you’ll have a new card and your perks will all transfer over to the new card in less than a day.”

Customer: “But that card won’t have my number. They’re sending me a new card with my number on it and it hasn’t arrived yet. The regional manager of my usual store gave me that to use until my card arrived.”

Me: “Ma’am, I can understand why you’re upset—” *no, not really* “—but I am bound by our corporate policies, as is the regional manager.”

The customer is clearly inconsolable and begins screaming curses in every direction, cursing at me, passing customers, and anyone else in earshot. It’s obvious to me that the office clerks should be able to hear her but are cowering behind the tinted glass, so I decide to be as painfully pleasant as possible.

I speak pleasantly, but only loud enough for someone nearby to hear clearly.

Me: “Ma’am, again, I’m sorry for the inconvenience this may have caused you, but you are actually in luck. As chance would have it, my personal supervisor, the office manager, the store manager, the regional manager, and the district manager are actually all in the building right now and I could actually page all of them up here right now. You could explain your side of the story to them all at once and we could have this resolved immediately. Shall I press a button and have them paged?”

Customer: “F*** no! I’m going back to talk to my regional manager from the store I normally shop at and I’m going to have your f****** b**** a** reported!”

Me: “If that’s what you want, ma’am, I can actually give you the corporate number to file a complaint directly with our complaint department.”

I’ve finished with her order, bagged it, continued with a constant smile and a stream of lilted “please” and “thank you” while she continues to scream curses. I know the managers must have heard but they are still too busy hiding.

I am now loud enough for everyone to hear me clearly.

Me: “Thank you for shopping with us today, ma’am. And again, I’m sorry that we weren’t able to help with everything. But please, do have a wonderful day!”

Customer: “Oh, GO F*** YOURSELF!”

She storms out with everyone staring at her, perhaps now aware that everyone else has been avoiding her until this point in a clear ten-foot circle.

Coworker: “I am so glad she went through your line and not mine.”

Me: “Yeah, most people won’t mess with a 6’2″, 240-pound guy, but occasionally, I do get a challenger.”

I related the story to my manager later and she seemed completely unfazed by the whole event. I shrugged it off, having told my half of the story and warned her of the possibility of an incoming complaint, and went on break. As far as I know, the woman never actually filed the complaint or the complaint wasn’t given any serious consideration.

I was twenty-one when I had my first job in America. I’m Arabic, and my boss was Asian-American. I hadn’t seen The Office at the time, but I noted the absurdity of my boss and now I’d definitely compare him to Michael Scott.

He would get free potato chips from a guy in a company truck and would stuff his cheeks in the middle of telling me what to do. He always offered some.

He fired a coworker for screaming some racist stuff at me by just… yanking her out the door.

He called another coworker a cub or a baby lion because she was tiny with wild unruly hair, and he would do a mini-roar whenever she was about to report for her shift or when I mentioned her name.

Sometimes, he ran around the place with a wig on his head imitating me.

He occasionally brought his daughter to work and gave her piggyback rides in the office, and he would ask me to take videos.

He would talk to black people in a “black” way. He would say, “Wassup, shorty?” to the ladies and ask people, “What’s poppin’?” He called the guys Tyrone and would say, “Shieeeeeet,” in his most convincing “black” voice. It was actually pretty accurate.

He would ask me to teach him random Arabic words so he could yell them sporadically in the middle of the day. He always got the accent right.

He had an open-door policy and would do shots in his office.

He started a small chicken farm in the back of the building and would give out whole chickens to the staff. He had a coworker and me try to slaughter one on one occasion. I couldn’t do it and nicked it just a little bit and shrieked, spraying all three of us with blood.

He eventually received a visit from some people from the city who came to tell him he couldn’t keep chickens in back. He was rounding the main floor with a small basket of freshly laid eggs just as they were asking for him.

He did the chicken farm again the next summer, this time with a small garden growing squash, cucumber, corn, etc. to disguise the chicken coop, and he happily gave out vegetables along with chicken. He was extremely proud of taking home a tray of his own eggs to his children and ate two fresh eggs every morning.

He brought a wok to work to deep fry sausages in. Sometimes, he made lunch in the back. The entire floor would smell like food and he would round us all — three of us — to his office to eat.

He would regularly fall asleep under his desk. The snoring was so loud you could hear it in the front. Once, a client asked what that noise was. I said it was the plumbing. He usually woke up after his naps looking puffy but acting as if nothing had happened, and he would always immediately go next door for a Cherry Coke.

He would constantly eat hard candy to stay awake during the day.

He ate too many edibles at a party I hosted once and passed out.

He told me to hire someone, but when he saw the girl, he did a comical thing with his face, eyebrows raised and eyes big — think Ken Jeong — because she was having trouble fitting into her chair. She was a bigger girl. He took away chairs the next day because they “encouraged us not to concentrate on the client.” The girl was a no-call-no-show the following week.

He had a love-hate relationship with a groundhog not long into his farming venture. He never caught the guy.

He once threw a cricket at me from the very opposite end of the office floor. He and another coworker kept such straight faces as I finally convinced myself the cricket flung itself at me. I watched the cameras at the end of the day only to see them do it. I’m still traumatized.

He had a hard time growing a beard and would ask me what I thought of the progress of his “soup taster.”

He fell into a poison ivy bush once and didn’t know right away. He ran around screaming until we sat him in his office, semi-undressed, and put medicine on his wounds. He was so miserable for days; it was hard to watch.

He dove headfirst into the wall when asleep once and needed to go to the doctor and get three stitches on his busted lip. He came to work that morning with a huge lip and kept having to explain himself all day. We kept joking that his wife was beating him up. He still insisted on snacking as usual. At one point, he sipped ketchup with a straw.

He has an office to this day full of the weirdest collection of things: a few feathers from favorite chickens of his that he has since consumed, all named and dated, a rabbit paw someone gave him, a goat’s hoof, a framed quote I told him that was told to me by a very high homeless person… I don’t remember the rest. It’s just an odd place to go into.

He was the nicest boss I’ve ever had — well-meaning, if a little racially insensitive, all while being fascinated by other people’s cultures. He would buy different cuisines for us to try each week. He gave bonuses because he knew the job didn’t pay much, so that was always a nice surprise. He paid my former coworker when she had to stay home all through her husband’s bout with the recent health crisis.

He loves llamas, alpacas, and baby goats, and when I showed him how to use Reddit, he would almost always send me an alpaca photo. I still get a photo now and then.

Three years after I left the job, he still sends me photos of his illegal farm and recently asked me to post his cucumbers on Reddit.