I’m in the outdoor section of the hardware store, showing a couple some of our stone tiles. I gesture to where the rows of the particular tiles they want start and stop.

Husband: *Angry.* “Where the h*** are you sourcing the stone?! I thought you said it was all made from the same stuff?!”

Me: “It is, sir.”

Husband: “Then why is that stuff so much darker?!”

Me: “Because, sir, that end of the row is shaded by the big tree.”

Husband: “…oh.” *Sheepish laugh.* “Haha, brain fart.”

Wife: “That wasn’t a brain fart, honey. Your brain just s*** its pants.”

I worked in a specialty shoe store. I was fitting an elderly man with shoes; his wife was sitting next to him. He looked at me and said:

Elderly Man: “I love seeing a woman working on her knees.”

Me: “Yes, it’s the perfect height for punching a man in a specific area.”

Elderly Man: *Shocked.* “Hey, I was just kidding!”

Elderly Woman: *Laughing her a** off.* “Ha! I told you one of these days that mouth of yours was going to get you into trouble!”

Elderly Man: “But I was just kidding!”

Elderly Woman: “I told you times have changed, honey. One of these days someone is gonna punch you in the nuts, and when it happens I’m going to laugh even harder than I am right now.”

She turns to me.

Elderly Woman: “Where are the store’s cameras? I’ll stand between them and you so that you get a clean shot.”

Me: “You’ve… put thought into this.”

Elderly Woman: “You have no idea how many times I have heard that “joke”.”

Me: “Ma’am, I am a woman working in a shoe store. I guarantee I have heard it more times than you have. That is why I have rehearsed responses to it.”

She laughs, but a little sadder this time. Her husband has tossed the shoes I was fitting away and has stormed out of the store barefoot.

Elderly Woman: *Sigh.* “This is gonna be another day of sulking, just like when I told him he couldn’t make the ‘milk’ joke with the waitresses at the diner anymore…”

I’m straightening bedding in the bed department when a couple walks into the aisle holding a duvet cover.

Girlfriend: “I think it’s time to get a new duvet.”

Boyfriend: “Uh… why?”

Girlfriend: “I like this one. Ours is old. We should replace it.”

Boyfriend: “But you only moved in last month. I got that duvet.”

Girlfriend: “Yeah, but you’ve had it for a while.”

Boyfriend: “It’s fine. We don’t need to spend money on another one.”

Girlfriend: “It has holes in it.”

Boyfriend: “It still works.”

Girlfriend: “Why do you always do this? I’m asking for one thing.”

Boyfriend: “Because you always want to buy things we don’t need.”

The tension rises fast.

Girlfriend: “It’s a duvet, not a car. Why are you acting like this?”

Boyfriend: “Because I’m tired of you deciding everything. You don’t listen.”

Girlfriend: “I don’t listen? You shut down every time I bring up anything about our place.”

Boyfriend: “Maybe because I’m not sure I even want to keep doing this.”

A long silence. She sets the duvet back on the shelf.

Girlfriend: “Then that’s it. I’m done.”

She walks toward the exit. He hesitates, then follows her out without another word.

My coworker steps out from the next aisle, watching them leave.

Coworker: “I don’t think they were ready for a new duvet.”

I’m enjoying a park bench on a sunny day. A woman I don’t know is sharing the bench with me, eating a bag of chips.

A guy comes jogging past the bench and stops in front of the woman, jogging on the spot.

Jogger: *Breathless.* “You’re doing great! So healthy!”

Woman: *Thrusting an oversized pile of chips in her mouth.* “Thanks, I’ve been training for this bag all week!”

The jogger rolls his eyes and continues on his way.

Me: “Wow, that was rude.”

Woman: “That was. That was also my husband. He’s just p***ed he signed up for a company half-marathon and I decided not to join him. So here I am… cheering him on.” *Munches on another chip.*

Me: “Ah… that explains it a bit better.”

Woman: *Gets out a box of donuts from her bag.* “Want to have one of these with me in about ten minutes? That’s how long he’s averaging per lap…”

CONTENT WARNING: Sexual content.

I was in a bar one night for a friend’s birthday, and our conversation was interrupted by a woman who was screaming because she was breaking up with her boyfriend.

Girlfriend: “You’re broke and useless! And… and… and every time we f***ed I f***ing faked it!”

Boyfriend: *Deadpan and calm.* “What makes you think I was f***ing you for your benefit?”

She then poured his beer all over him and stormed out. 

We were back at that bar the next weekend (two friends’ birthdays one week apart), and the couple was there again, eating each other’s faces, so I guess they worked it out?