I go out for dinner with a few friends at a local sports bar-type restaurant. We’re all regulars at the restaurant, so we recognize most of the staff, but we’re also not THOSE customers who assume every staff member will recognize us.

We’re seated, and a server we don’t recognize comes by to introduce the specials and take our drink orders. Being a bunch of guys in our mid- to late twenties, we order a round of beers.

The server turns to my friend who has a baby face.

Server: “Sir, I’m afraid I can’t serve you.”

Baby-Face: “Why not?”

Server: *With a bit of a scoff* “You’re obviously too young for beer.”

Baby-Face: “I have my ID right here.”

He holds his driver’s license out, but the server doesn’t even glance at it.

Server: “How do I know it’s not fake?”

We immediately ask for a manager, but the server refuses to get someone, so we all turn to [Baby-Face], who stares at the server while taking his phone out of his pocket and making a call.

Baby-Face: *On the phone* “Hey, man. You mind coming out to table [number]?”

A few moments later, the restaurant manager appears. He looks EXACTLY like [Baby-Face]… because they are identical twins. The server realizes what’s happening and goes white.

Baby-Face: “Your new server refused to even look at my ID when I ordered a beer, and she basically accused me of using a fake ID when I tried to show it to her.”

Manager: “[Server]… head to my office. We’ll talk about the proper handling of ID for alcohol sales… again.”

The manager made an exaggerated show of checking [Baby-Face] — his identical twin brother’s — ID, to the delight of us and a few nearby tables who had witnessed the entire thing. He got another server to take care of our table for the night and headed back to the office.

We never saw our first server the rest of the night, and [Baby-Face] later confirmed that his brother — the restaurant manager — had decided to let her go after too many incidents over ID and alcohol sales.

I used to work at a clothing store, run by a woman who would buy vintage and high end items, repair them, and then sell them in the store. We didn’t have multiple sizes of things and the only bulk items we bought were little trinkets and soaps, sometimes jewelry.

One day, when the owner had gone out to get more supplies, a couple walk in. The wife was on the wrong foot the moment she opened her mouth. She seemed to think we were her slaves, that she was queen of the world, and everything had to be in her size.

Her husband would grunt and repeat what she said in a more nasally aggressive voice. It was the longest two hours of my life.

We had everything organized by size, and did not have extras in the back. After explaining that for what felt like the hundredth time, I was about to throw a purse at her head.

Wife: “This is not my size. Why don’t you have my size?”

Me: “Maybe look at a larger size rack?”

Wife: “No, no, no! I am a two. I have always been a two. I was a two when I had my kids. I am a two now!”

Husband: “No. She is a two. A two. A two!”

The owner came in while the happy couple was shopping and asked me what the problem was because I had “that look.” I explained the woman was being picky.

Eventually the wife stormed up again, with a pair of pants, demanding I read her the size.

Me: “That is a six.”

Wife: “I am a two not a six. Why do I fit into these?”

Owner: “Those are a six. If you fit into them, then you are not a two.”

The wife got silent, turned to her husband, and waved the pants around.

Husband: “Now, listen here, I don’t like the way you guys have been helping my wife. She asks questions and gets attitude. You should use your eyes and actually look at the tag and see if there is a problem. She wants to know the size, tell her the size.”

Owner: “Sure. I will take a closer look.”

She puts the pants on the counter, pops out her glass eye, and holds it close to the tag.

Owner: “Still a six.”

The couple sputtered, waved their hands around like blind birds, and storm out. They left a huge mess I had to help clean up, but only after I spent twenty minutes laughing about it with the owner and the other cashier. 

She was the best boss I ever had. I was sad when I had to move for college.

I used to work at a retail store in overnight stock. There was a day when I had to take a fifteen-minute break because I was tired and needed to sit down for a short time. A coworker, who wasn’t even a supervisor, walked away from what he was doing to gripe at me for sitting down when everyone else was working.

Me: “I get it, but I’m literally working on three hours of sleep right now, and I need a short break. I’ll get back to it when the break that I’ve clocked out for is over.”

He talked over me, raising his voice and berating me, again despite having no authority to do so, because I clearly didn’t care. I remembered that he wasn’t my boss, so I agreed with him, saying:

Me: “You’re right; I don’t care. Please leave me alone.”

He kept going. At that point, I was starting to get really annoyed; I was not even a few minutes into my break, and he would barely let me get a word in edgewise. Finally, I just exploded.

Me: “LEAVE ME ALONE AND WALK AWAY!”

He didn’t. So, I plugged my ears with my fingers and looked at the floor until he took a hint that I wasn’t listening to him anymore.

He finally went away. I finished my break and got back to work without further incident.

The next day, I was called into the office by a day-shift manager.

Manager: “I got a complaint from [Coworker] that you ‘yelled at him and ordered him around like you were his boss.'”

Me: “No, I did not do that. I just wanted to sit down for a moment on my break, and he took the initiative to bother me. Yes, I yelled at him, but he was the one to escalate the situation, not me.”

I got written up.

About a year into my last job with a military contractor, they put this guy in the night shift supervisor position, and it was almost immediately apparent that this guy couldn’t lead rats off a sinking ship. He would agree that the upper management were unreasonable a**holes — in private. But as soon as they were in front of him — usually wailing about some imaginary problem that they literally invented because they had nothing better to do — he would alternate between just sitting there saying nothing while we got berated and written up for fabricated reasons or being down on the floor doing everything short of kissing their a**es.

[Night Shift Supervisor] was also terrified of addressing any kind of issue between employees, so he always went down the “just figure it out” road. He was completely useless about it; he would claim to go address the problem and then do absolutely nothing. The few times that he did something, all it took was even slightly raising your voice to him and he would run away with his tail between his legs like a whipped dog.

The final straw came for me when [Night Shift Supervisor] approached me with the first shift supervisor. If we messed up something on our shift, we were expected to fix it. If the first shift messed something up… we were also expected to fix it because, for whatever reason, the day shift was never held responsible for anything at all. So, they approached me with a rocket tube; the first shift idiot who did my job had royally messed up the positioning of the lot number and ammunition number that got printed on every rocket body. They expected me to fix it because of course they did.

I was logging myself into the new production lot at that moment, which I think they waited for so they could sneak up on me with this nonsense. So, I listened, and then:

Me: *To [First Shift Supervisor]* “Day shift should fix their own screw-ups; we always get their mistakes to fix on top of doing our own jobs at night.”

This guy had the absolutely brass stones to tell me:

First Shift Supervisor: “You’re making that up! Your shift is never expected to clean up after day shift; that’s never the case! If you don’t agree with that, then maybe you’re in the wrong place.”

And right then, I noticed that [Night Shift Supervisor] was just… standing there listening to this fool tell me that something I had watched happen for almost five and a half years never happened. And he said nothing in my defense — not a g**d*** word.

I decided that the day shift fool was right; I was in the wrong place. So, I unclipped my badge — before I turned around so they couldn’t see it coming until it was too late — and then spun around, clipped it onto HIS shirt, and said:

Me: “Yeah, you’re right. I’m going to go find the right place.”

And I walked away. They were both literally stuttering as I left.

I was on break and checking my local state’s lottery website. One of the available lotteries would pay out $10,000 per month for the rest of my life. I figured the odds were ridiculously low, but I decided to play.

My boss wandered in and asked me what I was up to. I explained the winnings and my boss scoffed.

Boss: “Not worth it. Who can survive on only $10,000 a month, anyway?”

I stared at him until he shifted uncomfortably under my stare.

Boss: “What?”

Me: “[Boss], how much money do you think you’re paying ME?!”

My boss shut his mouth and fled from the break room. I just shook my head at how out of touch he was with reality. 

He avoided me for over a week.