(This happened to my sister at a previous waitressing job. She had a regular customer who was an older gentleman and seemed to be always slightly inebriated.)
Customer: I like you… You’re… You’re good with words, y’know that? You have a gift.
(A few weeks later:)
Customer: I heard you’re quitting your job… I have something for you…
(Customer comes back the next day and leaves for her an impressively heavy 2-volume set of the Oxford English Dictionary that she had to bring a rolling suitcase to transport home)
(I am about five years old, my brother around eight. It is a weekend. We have woken up before our parents and want to be up before they do. We also want pancakes. We’ve been sticking our heads out our door and calling down the hall to ask them if they’re going to get up. I can’t remember the first part of the conversation went, but I remember this part clearly.)
Brother: “Could you make us pancakes?”
Dad: “Maybe later.”
Me: “Do you mind if I make pancakes?”
Dad: “No.”
(I turn away from the door and start to pout.)
Brother: “What are you sad about?”
Me: “He said no!”
Brother: “But that means yes!”
(He then explains how “do you mind” and “no” mean “I don’t mind.”)
Me: “But… I don’t know how to make pancakes!”
(Somehow I had conveniently forgotten that fact when I asked if I could make them myself. To the best of my memory, that morning ended with me on a stool beside my mom trying to make “the biggest pancake ever” and asking her to make the batter fill the entire pan.)
(I answer the phone at home.)
Me: “Hello?”
Caller: “Hello, am I calling the Lee family?”
Me: “Yep, speaking.”
Caller: “Very well. My name is [Caller], calling on behalf of the Chinese-Canadian Association. Do you have a moment to participate in a survey?”
Me: “I’ve got time, but I don’t think you’d be interested in what I have to say.”
Caller: “I don’t follow, sir.”
Me: “Unfortunately, we aren’t Chinese, so I don’t think I can adequately field any of your inquiries.”
Caller: “I’m sorry, but I am calling the Lee family, correct?”
Me: “Correct.”
Caller: “And you aren’t Chinese?”
Me: “Also correct.”
Caller: “But how can that be?”
(Apparently, he had never heard of Korean people named Lee. Or even white people named Lee!)
(When my brother is sixteen he is just starting to fill out, but still looks gangly and breakable. However, having been into sports since he was three and having two older siblings who are rough on him, he’s a lot tougher than he looks. He’s playing soccer, and one of the guys on the other team is being an absolute terror but is good enough to hide his cheating from the referees. This frustrates everyone on my brother’s team, as well as the refs since they can’t kick him out if they can’t catch him. Eventually, my brother’s coach decides to place my brother opposite him. To the surprise of absolutely no one — we are all very involved in the soccer community, and all of the refs and a majority of the players and coaches in our age range know us, at least by reputation, if not personally — the first time that kid tries this with my brother, he is laid out flat. My brother doesn’t bother to hide what he is doing and is given a yellow card. The opposing coach pulls his player. Standing near the team benches, my mom is in a good position to hear the player and the coach talking about it. For context, a yellow card is a warning and a red card is an ejection from the game. Two yellows automatically add up to a red.)
Player: “I’m fine, Coach! I can still play!”
Coach: “You’re not going back out this game.”
Player: “C’mon, he’s already got a yellow. I’ll be fine.”
Coach: *exasperated* “Exactly! He’s already got a yellow! On the next hit, he’s leaving the field, anyway. He has no more reason to hold back! If I put you back on that field, you’re leaving it on a stretcher!”
(Exactly right, Coach. Exactly right. The player sat out the rest of the game and my brother carried the record of his yellow with pride. The player was a lot less vicious after that, now that the idea for how to be rid of him for good was planted. My brother was far from the only one willing to sit out two games if it came to it.)
(I decide to drop some bottles off for the refund on my way to work. At this particular supermarket, you turn the bottles in at the customer service desk. If no one is there, you are supposed to leave the bottles in a tray on the counter and apply at a till for your refund. I do so, pick up a drink, and go up to a till.)
Me: “Just this pop, and I brought in eighteen small bottles.”
(The cashier rings me up, but she’s frowning in the direction of the Customer Service desk, where one of her coworkers is helping a man with his bottles.)
Cashier: “Did you leave your bottles on top the counter?”
Me: “Yes, they’re all diet Coke bottles.”
Cashier: “Hey, [Coworker]! Those bottles aren’t all his.”
(Apparently, the guy was going to cheerfully stand there while she paid him for my returns as well as his and not say a word. I guess you can’t blame a guy for trying.)
