I have been an IT tech for fifteen years. I absolutely love it when people ask for a man.

I have an older man calling from the Bronx — I am Canadian. He is being a total a**, calling me “little lady” and such. He asks if he can speak to a man, and I tell him none are available. I then ask him if he wants me to lower my voice and strap one on to help him. He laughs for about ten minutes and is happy to let me help him after that.

(It’s around the year 2000. My mother has brought one of our computers in to have some issues checked out, as they’re bad enough to interfere with the computer’s functionality.)

Tech: “Okay, I took a look, and it seems you’ve got a couple viruses that need to be taken care of.”

Mom: “Viruses?”

Tech: “Yeah. You need to be careful what sort of websites you visit; some may download things to your computer without you noticing.”

Mom: “Uh-huh… That’s an interesting problem for a computer that’s never been connected to the Internet.”

(We did get the computer fixed, somewhere else.)

(The battery to my computer has died. To save gas, I walk to my local computer repair to see if they can order one, so I don’t have to drive to a battery supply store miles away. This was a mistake.)

Me: “Hi, I’m hoping you can order a battery for me. I know I need a battery for a [Model].”

Clerk: “Are you sure you want that, sweetheart?”

Me: “Yes. I took a picture of the back of my laptop so I know that is the model I need, and I know the issue is with the battery because I tested it.”

Clerk: *disbelieving* “Ooookayyyy.” *types on computer* “It’ll be four hundred dollars to order it and install.”

Me: “I know how to install a battery, and I know for a fact that the highest the price should be is about a hundred fifty, and the lowest I saw was around seventy dollars. Even then, installation shouldn’t cost as much as the battery itself; you just take out two screws and click it in.”

Clerk: “Look, sweetie: that’s the price. Take it or leave it.”

Me: “I guess I’m leaving it, then.”

(I start leaving when a woman comes in. I ask what the issue is with the laptop she’s carrying because I don’t want her to have the same issues I did with the condescending clerk.)

Woman: “I was told I need to reinstall the operating system because I shut it down during an update.”

Me: “They just tried to rip me off here for a new battery. I know [Tech Team] at [Popular Electronics Store] will do that for about a hundred dollars. Go there if they try to overcharge you here.”

Woman: “Thank you!”

(After that I left. I hope that store got its act together, but I doubt it.)

I work at a computer repair shop. We also fix cracked phone, tablet, and even e-reader screens.

This woman comes in with a e-reader that has a cracked screen. I take it out of the case to get the model number off the back, and I notice it’s got some crusty, nasty food stuck on the corner. The whole corner is covered in who knows what. I am disgusted, but little do I know, this is about to go to a whole other level of disgusting.

As soon as I get the model number and set the e-reader down to type it in to our computer, the lady picks up the e-reader, says, “Oh, I must have spilled something or other on it,” and licks it off! She then hands me back the e-reader, covered in food and her spit.

I nearly throw up right there!

(A lady comes in with an external hard drive.)

Customer: “I backed up some pictures to this, but deleted them to make room. I need to get those pictures.”

Me: “Okay, well, let’s see if we can recover them. Do you know what folder the pictures would have been in?”

Customer: “What folder would I have put them in?”

Me: “Um… Often people make a folder called ‘Pictures,’ but they could have been anywhere.”

Customer: “Well, can you just give me step-by-step instructions on where and how to find them, and then I can look?”

Me: “Well, no. I don’t know where they are. That is what I am trying to figure out.”

Customer: “Well, my son put them on there and then deleted them to make room.”

Me: “Do you know when he deleted them? That would really help.”

Customer: “I don’t remember. When would he have deleted them?”

Me: “I really couldn’t say.”

(The conversation just kept going in circles, so I eventually looked at every recoverable file before I found what I was looking for.)