I’m having dinner with my wife and three kids (twin boys, age eleven, one girl, age nine).

Son #1: “We were talking to [Friend] today, and his allowance is twice ours!”

Son #2: “Yeah, we need a bigger allowance!”

Wife: “Well, there’s only one of him, and there’s two of you, so…” *Shrugs.*

Son #1: “It’s not our fault you made two of us!”

Wife: “The only way your allowance is going to match [Friend]’s is if there’s only one of you. We can do a fight to the death after dinner.”

Me: “Choose your weapons and head to the backyard after dessert.”

The boys moan a bit but settle down. But then…

Daughter: “If they’re both mortally wounded in the fight, can I have all three allowances?”

Customer: “I want a Coke with diet ice.”

Me: “A Diet Coke with ice?”

Customer: “No, a regular Coke, but diet ice.”

Me: “The ice is as diet as it gets. It’s just regular water.”

Customer: “Your menu screen I was looking at said that diet ice was an option!”

Me: “Do you mean light ice?”

Customer: “Whatever you call it! I want the diet ice!”

Me: “Soooo… regular Coke and light ice?”

Customer: “Yeah!”

My manager, who has overheard, tells me:

Manager: “Put that in as regular ice. She doesn’t actually want less ice cubes, she just wants them to be ‘diet’.”

Me: “But—”

Manager: “—I know, I know, but customers are stupid. She’s already got it into her head that diet ice is now a thing, and Jesus himself could come down from Heaven and tell her that diet ice is not a thing, and she’d still be all “I want it!” I guarantee you that if you put in the order as less ice, she’s gonna come back and complain that we didn’t give her enough ‘diet ice’ cubes.”

Being new here and only seventeen, I put in the order as regular ice, and when the customer collects it at the next window, she finds nothing wrong with her order.

Me: “Are we allowed to do that?”

Manager: “For food? No. For water, meh. Not like she can be allergic. I’m so tired of them that I don’t argue and just give them ice and tell them to enjoy. I swear some of them take a sip right in front of me and say ‘mmm, tastes so much healthier’ before driving away.”

Related:
H2-D’oh!, Part 15
H2-D’oh!, Part 14
H2-D’oh!, Part 13
H2-D’oh!, Part 12
H2-D’oh!, Part 11

A woman tried on some shoes from the sale rack. They fit her, and she was happy. I ring them through at the counter, and she says:

Customer: “Oh, actually, can you get me a duplicate pair? I don’t want to wear the shoes everyone else has been wearing.”

Me: “These ones out are the only ones we have, because they’re the sale shoes.”

Customer: *Angry.* “Well, go check the back anyways!”

So I did. There was none. No s***.

Instead of telling her and missing out on a sale, I just wrapped up the ones she tried on and gave them to her. She tried them on and immediately went:

Customer: “Yep, I can tell these are new. They feel stiffer and look cleaner! See? wasn’t that hard, was it? I knew you’d have some in the back.”

Back in the 1990s, I recall some tradesmen (tradies, as we call them) were doing some work on my street, about three houses down. One of them has partially parked in front of my driveway, so I can’t pull out (I have tall hedges on both sides).

Me: *Approaching the group of tradies.* “Excuse me, gents, but whoever of you drives that car there, could they move it somewhere else? It’s blocking my drive, and I can’t get out.”

Tradie: “That’s me, mate, but that’s the only place I could park on the street that’s free.”

Me: “Well, I know that’s annoying, but—”

Tradie: *Starts up a power tool to drown me out.*

Me: *Shouting.* “—I gotta get to work, so—”

Tradie: “Can’t hear ya, mate!”

Me: “Maybe if you turned off the power tool, you would.”

Tradie: *Laughing with his mates.* “Like this c*** knows what a power tool is!”

I sigh and walk back to my driveway, past my car, and into my garage. I walk back out with a fuelled-up chainsaw, start it up, and start walking to the part of his car that’s blocking me in. The tradies have all turned to look my way thanks to the sound of my very loud chainsaw. The owner of the vehicle starts running over.

Me: “Power tools like this?!”

Tradie: “Jesus f****** Christ mate! I’m moving it! I’m moving it!”

They didn’t park within three houses of me the rest of the time they were working there.

This is a story from the 1990s, when I was working as a Councilor in Training (CIT) for a summer camp. I was sixteen, and this was my first time working with kids whom I didn’t babysit.

We had a problem kid, whom I’ll call Maddie. Maddie was one of those kids who thought the rules didn’t apply to her and had a very bad habit of jumping on people’s backs from behind and saying “Surprise!” in a very excited tone. I was only one of two CITs for a camp of thirty-odd junior kids, and it was my first year, so I was struggling to establish boundaries.

The first time Maddie jumped on my back, I said:

Me: “Hey! That’s dangerous! If you jump me by surprise, I could fall and hurt you!”

Maddie would just laugh and run off.

About a week after camp started, we were at the beach for the 4th of July fireworks. I’m nervously hanging out with my kids, because it’s dark and the beach is crowded. Suddenly, Maddie jumped on my back, and I made a split-second call. I knew how to stage-fall from theater, and I figured that the girl could handle me falling on her onto sand as opposed to a wooden floor. 

So, I collapsed backwards bonelessly, landing on her. She screamed. I immediately got up, checked to make sure she was fine (she was), and then I explained:

Me: “Jumping on people is not okay.”

She never did it again.