I received yet another scam call. I get them frequently, but it’s usually a speech-recognition system. This one was a real person with a thick accent from another country.

Scammer: “Our records show that you do have Medicare, parts A and B, right?”

Me: “Who told you I have Medicare?”

Scammer: “Your friend, Alex.”

Me: “My friend told you I have Medicare?”

Scammer: “Yes, that’s why we are calling you about your Medicare benefits, sir — to make sure you have what you need and help you get the right plan.”

Me: “Sounds like a scam to me.”

Scammer: “It’s not a scam, sir.”

Me: “Okay, prove to me it’s not a scam.”

Scammer: “Ask me any question. I’ll prove to you it’s not a scam.”

Me: “What’s the name of your company?”

Scammer: “US Senior Care.”

Me: “And do you have a website?”

Scammer: “Of course we do.”

Me: “What’s your website?”

Scammer: “US Senior Care.”

Me: “Dot com, dot org, dot net…?”

Scammer: “Dot com! Dot com.”

Me: “Okay, let’s try ‘usseniorcare dot com’… Nope, that domain is for sale.”

Scammer: “No, I mean it is US Senior Health Care.”

Me: “I’ll try that… ‘usseniorhealthcare dot com’… That domain is also for sale. Want to try again?”

Scammer: “It’s just Senior Health Care, sir. Are you not listening to me? Are you not understanding me?”

Me: “Oh, no ‘US’ in it, then? All right, I’ll type in ‘seniorhealthcare dot com’… That gave me an error message that the address cannot be found.”

Scammer: “F*** you! F*** you, man, you f****** motherf*****!”

Me: “I got the scammer to swear at me! I win!”

I have a story about Karmic justice for a coworker of mine, even though it was somewhat temporary. About seven years ago, [Coworker] was in her third year of college, using grants and student loans. She ended up having a complicated pregnancy and had to withdraw mid-semester. Since then, she has not gone back to college. Since she withdrew and did not complete her degree, she not only has to pay back the loans but the grants, as well.

[Coworker] says she wasn’t able to put her loans and grants into deferment because of this. She says she tries to pay back what she can when she can, but she is overdue to the tune of $10,000. But with a part-time retail job, it is slow going.

Last year, [Coworker] moved to a new house, and while she updated her address with our place of employment, for some reason, her W2s were sent to her old address. She was able to get a copy of her W2s, and she and her husband filed. They file jointly but with an “injured spouse.” This is not a physically injured spouse, but a financially injured spouse; basically, it means that the government can only take [Coworker]’s part of the tax return to pay for her student loans. It leaves her husband’s part of the tax return alone.

[Coworker]’s share of the tax return is usually about $1,000, and his share is about $4,000; he is a full-time worker. Well, a few weeks after they filed, they got a notice back from the IRS saying that her W2 had already been filed!

Yep, whoever now lived in [Coworker]’s old place got her W2 and decided to not only file it but file it jointly, hoping to steal my coworker’s tax return. Of course, they didn’t know about her loans, so they did not file with an “injured spouse.” As a result, not only did they not get a single dime, but the tax return went to pay my coworker’s over-due student loan to the tune of $6,000!

Now that’s poetic justice!

I wish I could have been there when the nasty fraudsters found out they weren’t getting back anything. What were they going to do? Admit they committed tax fraud to the IRS?

[Coworker] and I laughed ourselves silly before she admitted that, yes, she did get things sorted out properly in the end. As tempted as she was to let the fraudsters wallow in their own Karmic bed, she knew that not sorting it out on her end would get her in trouble, too. Still, the idea that tax fraudsters tried to steal and instead found themselves paying off someone else’s debt is a story that gives her the warm fuzzies.

And I’m sure the IRS has some pointed questions for the fraudsters, too!

I used to work at a now-defunct big box store. We had a new store manager come in that had been promoted from a store in another state. Our store was located in a lower income area with a large minority population. [New Manager] was of the same ethnicity and often bragged about how he preferred to hire young minority employees to give them an opportunity to work.

Within a few months, we noticed a huge increase in thefts by cashiers — their drawers were coming up $100 to $200 short — and it was always [New Manager]’s special hires. [New Manager] would make a big deal about firing them, often with them leaving in tears insisting they were innocent. He would express his disappointment, hire more young minority cashiers, and the same thing would happen.

It took way too long for someone to notice that their drawers only came up short on nights that [New Manager] closed the store. A hidden camera in the cash office ended up revealing him stealing money out of their cash bags. Corporate put the loss upwards of $25,000.

[New Manager] was fired, and less than a year later, they announced that the store would be closing due in part to “financial losses.”

But to me, the worst part was all of those poor cashiers — many of who were just teenagers — who were wrongly blamed for thefts of which they were completely innocent and the fact that everyone was so quick to believe it just because they were lower income and minorities.

I gotta say, even though we all lost our jobs, I really wasn’t sad to see that place close.

A long-time friend of mine who has also been a good client with thirty projects completed chats me up at a holiday get-together. 

Friend: “Have you ever heard of Milton Glaser?”

Me: “Of course; he’s a very famous designer.”

Friend: “I bought four of his books. Have you read them?”

Me: “Yes. I did a paper on him in school.”

Friend: “Reeeaaally? Huh, not sure why you went to school. After reading these, I realized I can do all your work myself. I should have saved myself a lot of cash over the years.”

Me: *Pauses* “That’s pretty insulting. What program are you using?”

Friend: “PowerPoint.”

Me: “Can I see these designs?

Friend: “Well, not right now; we’re at a party.”

Me: “Right. Just curious, how are you drawing in PowerPoint?”

Friend: “Drawing? I can’t draw. I take a picture with my phone of the things I like in the book, and then I put text over the picture in PowerPoint.”

Me: “You do know that is infringement, right?”

Friend: “It’s called ‘creating a design’.”

I work in retail. My shift lead, my manager, and I were working the closing shift together last week. I had just finished helping receive a shipment and was stocking the shelves, the lead was manning the service desk, and my manager was doing a walk-through of the store. We were the only three people in the store that night, and it’s a big store. None of us could see each other, and none of us except my boss had walkie-talkies. (That was a mistake!)

I finished what I was doing on the sales floor and came up to the front desk to talk to my shift lead. He grabbed me by the arm and said in a low voice:

Shift Lead: “Go find [Manager], now!“

It was out of the ordinary and super creepy.

Me: “What? Is she okay? What’s going on?”

Shift Lead: “Just go find [Manager], and be quiet about it. There’s a very sketchy-looking customer standing near the double doors with a cart full of merchandise, and I’m afraid he’s going to run out with it.”

I went to find my manager, and I had to pass the guy on the way. I put on my fake customer service voice.

Me: “How’s your night going? Are you finding everything okay?”

Customer: *Staring at me* “Yeah, I’m fine, thanks.”

Once I was out of eyesight, I ran to the back room and found my boss. I told her what was going on, and we walked together to the foyer.

Shift Lead: “The guy ran out the door, and he left the cart.”

I started to go out the first set of automatic doors with my phone in hand to see if I could get a picture of the guy, his car, or his license plates.

Manager: “Hey, don’t chase him.”

Me: “Yeah yeah, I know, I’ll be careful.”

My dumb a** started walking out the second set of automatic doors to the parking lot when my boss YELLED at me:

Manager: “DO NOT GO OUTSIDE!”

She never, ever yells, so it scared me. I turned around and came back inside, and my manager escorted me back into the store and away from the windows.

Manager: “That guy was sitting in his car with the lights off, staring at you. There was someone in the passenger seat, and they were staring at you, too!”

I had seen the car in the lot but didn’t think anyone was in it. I don’t know how she saw the guy in there, but I’m glad she did.

My manager ended up locking the doors, even though it was still thirty minutes to close. She then rang up the guy’s cart, and it was over $850 worth of booze. We went to her office and filled out a report.

Once everyone’s shifts had ended, we walked together to our cars; nobody really wanted to be alone in the parking lot that night.

I’ve seen shoplifters, and I’ve seen sketchy customers come in near closing, but this guy was really weird. He gave off a really creepy vibe and scared the s*** out of my boss and me, and neither of us scare easily.