(Mendocino County, California, is where all the hippies moved after the Summer of Love, and it is a very laid-back place. I am sitting in a restaurant and hear the woman in the next booth talking on her cell phone:)
Woman: “Okay, so I’ll see you there in an hour. Is that standard time or Mendocino time? Mendocino time? Okay, an hour and twenty minutes.”
(I, and two friends, go to visit a friend in the hospital. We know his room number, but it doesn’t correlate to the floor he is on, so we head back down to reception to find that out. When we get there, there are people ahead of us. One of them rips into the receptionist (who is in a security guard uniform) because they hadn’t been speaking English. At least half the population of Orange County speaks Spanish, if not natively, very fluently, like most of southern California. I offer my opinion:)
Me: “I think the basic problem here is that you’re an a**-hole.”
Man: “You think I’m an a**-hole because I think they should speak English?”
Me: “Yes. That’s why I think you’re an a**-hole.”
(He tries to offer up every racist justification in the book, and in reply to each one, I say:)
Me: “And you’re an a**-hole.”
(After about 30 seconds of being reminded just what part of the human anatomy he was, he got disgusted and left. I didn’t notice it at the time, but apparently the receptionist/security guard spent the entire time trying desperately not to laugh, and nearly succeeding. I sincerely hope she went home and told her family the story over dinner — in Spanish.)
(I have just recently started working as a customer service rep, and I get some very funny calls about the furniture we sell. I answer this call as normal and am answered with this:)
Customer: “Hi, you’re going to think I’m a total idiot, but I pulled that lever on the chair I bought, and now it’s too tall and I can’t figure out how to lower it!”
(I’m working with the nephrologist at our clinic when I read an exchange between her and a lab tech in our EMR system.)
Lab Tech: “Patient was given a jug for collecting the 24-hour urine test but was unable to fit the total volume in the jug, so she put the rest in a peanut butter jar. Please re-order test as this is an unacceptable container and will have to be re-done. We will give her two jugs.”
Nephrologist: “Test re-ordered. Hopefully no more peanut butter jars this time…”
(The 24-hour urine test comes with patient instructions that say in big bold letters not to use any container but the jugs provided, and to get another jug if needed.)
(The store I work in is being re-modeled and the closest bathrooms are downstairs.)
Customer: “Where is the bathroom?”
Me: “Downstairs. The elevators are just over there.”
Customer: “Is it far? My son really has to go.”
Me: “It’ll take you two minutes to get there.”
Customer: “I don’t think he’ll make it.”
(She walks away at this point with her son. I turn to my coworkers to figure out who is going to clean the jean wall, empty the dressing rooms, and straighten the tables. I do the jeans.)
Coworker: “OH, MY GOD! I JUST TOUCHED PEE PEE!”
(She really says, ”pee pee,” as it is the kids department. The woman has let her son pee on the clothes in the dressing room. I put trash bags on my hands and grab the trash can.)
Me: “I’ll pick it up. They could have peed on the cheap clothes. He peed on the Dockers.”
(That’s when I picked up the top pair and found the poo poo.)
