This is a story about my uncle. We’ll call him Ralph for this story because that’s the name of his favorite turtle-ninja.

Ralph is rich. He’s also a borderline hoarder. He collects a lot of stuff — little tchotchkes and some kitschy seasonal furniture that he rotates through during the year. For example, for Halloween, he replaces the dining table with one carved like a jack-o-lantern.

Every so often, he gets too much stuff and needs to get rid of some of it. Instead of holding a yard sale, he likes to just put his stuff out in the yard with a “free” sign and advertise it on [Classifieds Website].

One time, Mom and I are visiting Ralph while he is doing one of his giveaways. I’m eating breakfast on the couch when I see a van pull up outside his house through the windows — a big van, like a moving van. Four burly guys get out of the van. At this point, I’m fully expecting them to start loading Uncle Ralph’s stuff into their van and just take it all themselves.

Instead, they open the van… and start unloading stuff in front of Uncle Ralph’s yard. It’s all junk: broken tables, extremely dirty stuffed animals, boxes full of broken tchotchkes, frayed clothing, books that smelled like the bad kind of mold, and a mattress that is so yellowed and damaged that it completely sags into itself in a small pile.

I fetch Ralph, but by the time he comes, they are done. They drive off, and one sticks out his hand and gives Ralph the finger as they leave.

This trash is utterly unlike the carefully cared-for things that Ralph usually puts out. Ralph is spitting mad. We call the police.

It takes the police a while to understand that a crime has happened. They don’t understand why Ralph minds having more stuff added to his pile of stuff.

Mom and I left Uncle Ralph’s house before we could learn how it ended, but I asked him about it later. He said that three of the culprits had been caught and that they’d been charged.

I work at a company where we write lesson material for safety courses, among other things. We then teach at companies that hired us. I get the copy and visuals from the teachers and companies, add it all together, proofread, do the layout, and add the illustrations.

I get a lot of questionably sourced materials, especially when used in commercially used and sold materials, but this time takes the cake.

Me: “Are you sure you want me to use those pictures?”

Colleague: “Of course. It’s fun.”

Me: “True, but I am 100% sure it is copyrighted.”

Colleague: “Nah, I took it off the Internet. If people didn’t want that to be used, they would not have put it on the Internet where everyone can take it. The Internet isn’t copyrighted; it’s public.”

I’m getting an instant headache, being a freelance illustrator myself on the side with work on the Internet.

Me: “Not how that works. I doubt our boss would be on board with this.”

[Colleague] tells me to mail our boss, then, and I tell her my worries about it.

Boss: “Just add the pictures. We’ve never gotten into trouble before. It’s not that big of a deal; everyone does it. No one will know, anyway, and it’s too expensive to have all pictures made specifically for us. We would not be able to make a profit. But I see your concern. Make sure you add ‘All text, photos, and illustrations are copyrighted by [Our Company]’ on every page so no one steals our work.”

I voiced my concern again and said that we best not use it and that we definitely could not claim copyright on a clearly copyrighted set of images. She told me to do it anyway. I did as told eventually, didn’t put my company ID label on the work as I did not want to be linked to it in case of trouble, and saved my boss’s email just in case.

The images in question: various pictures of Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck.

Related:
CopyWrong, Part 3
CopyWrong, Part 2
CopyWrong

One of the regional stores in our chain has been closed down as our company is opening a much larger outlet down the road. The closure has been signposted for months, and my team and I have taped off the area, locked all the doors, and shipped all the goods, and we are in the process of removing all of the fittings. We are working around the clock to literally strip the place bare within a very tight deadline.

Somewhere around 8:00 am, one of my crew points out a guy walking toward the closed front door with a massive “Closed” sign on it, staring intently at his mobile phone. As we watch, he walks straight through a thick piece of caution tape without even noticing it and straight into the closed door, slamming into it with huge force.

He immediately starts cussing us out, threatening us with violence, demanding to know why we are closed, threatening to sue, and claiming he has broken his nose (there is some blood) and his phone, etc.

I finally get a word in.

Me: “Sir, you walked past a barrier in our entranceway announcing we were closed, through thick tape, and into a closed door with a massive sign on it stating we were closed. We have never opened this early. This is totally down to your failure to pay attention and is none of our concern. Have a nice day. If you have any issues, feel free to call corporate, but we’re going back to work.”

He then tried to smash his way into the building to “teach me manners” and ended up getting arrested by the police.

 I work for one of many self-employable delivery apps that deliver food for various restaurants.

On this particular day, I have gotten assigned two orders that are relatively close to each other. I pick up the first order and get the second, too. The first order, of course, gets dropped off first. It takes me about ten minutes to get to the first address and drop off the order, but I can’t drop it off immediately since I have to hand it to the customer. This takes an additional five minutes since it takes them forever to answer the door. Once that has been completed, I am on the way to the next address.

I get to the next house to drop off this order, and this one also requests that I hand it directly to the customer. I knock on the door and a lady answers. She has this look on her face like I just kicked a puppy or something. She crosses her arms.

Lady: “Took you long enough! We saw you go all over the place except here to drop our food off. Care to explain?”

I am kind of shocked, but using my best customer service voice, I reply:

Me: “Sorry, ma’am. I was assigned two orders, and I was instructed to take the first order first since it was closer, I assume. If there is an issue, you can contact [Delivery App] support and they can try to work with you.”

She is not happy about this.

Lady: “I want my order remade, and I want it for free, or I’ll call the restaurant and have you fired!”

She has been very rude to this point and I really don’t want to help her further.

Me: “Ma’am, I don’t work for the restaurant. I am an independent contractor. I am so sorry, but there is nothing I can do.”

After that statement, she becomes irate. She starts to clap her hands.

Lady: “Okay. You wait right here. I got something for you.”

I decide it’s time to leave. Before I can completely get off the front porch, her husband comes out! He is at least six feet tall, and he starts to scream at me to hold it right there.

Now, for further context, I have trained in multiple martial arts and self-defense for years. I hear this man come out and yell, and I immediately turn to face him because you never want someone who is potentially aggressive to have your back. I am still backing up, but now I have turned to face him, only feet away.

He starts advancing toward me, screaming.

Man: “You are going get us our f****** refund or else!”

I reply with the same statement I told the lady, but in a softer tone to attempt to de-escalate this man. As I am in mid-sentence, he pushes me back hard. As soon as he pushes me, my instincts and training kick in. As I regain my footing (I didn’t get knocked down), I square my stance and put my hands up to my face in case he tries to swing at me. I start to yell back at the guy and order him not to get any closer or put his hands on me. (This is my warning.)

He then throws a wild punch which I slip back with a lean, and then I counter with a front kick to his stomach. This lands flush, confirmed by a notable “Oof” sound. He folds slightly, exposing his face, so I followed up with a one-two as trained. After eating a one-two, he falls to one knee. I move back slightly to disengage and tell him to stay down so I can leave. (Once again, you never just turn your back on an aggressor.)

He gets up, red in the face. He screams at me again.

Man: “F*** YOU! I’LL KILL YOU!”

And he attempts to charge me. He throws another wild punch and another. I eat one but slip and duck under the second to get around to his back. From here, I attempt to wrestle him down. He keeps trying to punch me and even elbows me once in the face before I am able to trip him and take him down. I do my best to pin him, but I’m not successful until he rolls toward me and I mount him. He is mad!

Man: “I will f****** kill you! Get the f*** off me!”

He tries to bench-press me off of him and almost gets up a couple of times. He is strong!

Me: “I’m not getting off of you until you calm down!”

Now, he starts to punch, scratch, and bite me. In response, I give a good couple of hammer fists to get him to cover up, and once he does, I get higher on his chest to pin his arms above his head. We remain there until the cops come.

Once they arrive, they order me off him and PUT ME IN CUFFS! I am put in a squad car until a cop comes to get my statement and asks me what happened.

Me: “They wanted a refund, and I couldn’t give it to them since I’m just a [Delivery App] driver.”

Cop: “The lady here called and said you threatened her and that you were assaulting her husband on their front lawn. Do you have any way to prove your side?”

Lucky for me, I have a dash cam in my car, and I left the windows down. The cam caught some of the action from the front door on video and the rest caught audio of the man demanding a refund and threatening me, me telling him to back off, some audio of the struggle, him telling me he was going to kill me, and even me telling him to calm down.

Apparently, a neighbor across the street had a doorbell camera, and it also captured the incident with video and some audio.

The cops then let me go. They got my information and told me that my story seemed straight. I pressed charges against the man and was told by the cops they would call me if they had more questions.

I also reported them to [Delivery App] and included a copy of the police case number from the record in my county. That should be sufficient to get them banned.

Related:
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 32
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 31
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 30
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 29
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 28

I am working the opening shift at [Pizza Chain] with two other people. It’s around 10:40 am, so we are putting everything in the oven so we can open at 11:00. Hearing a knock at the door, I look up from cutting a pizza and see a woman teetering in front of the door with two small children next to her. I notice her parked car taking up two spots before noticing we still have fifteen minutes before we opened. The assistant manager is a stickler for the rules, so he tells us to not let the person in until we open. I’m fine with that since we don’t have anything ready.

Cut to 11:00 when I go to unlock the door before taking the register. The lady and her two kids enter. The kids run to the table in the corner, while the lady stumbles to the counter. I can now smell the alcohol emanating from her, and I solve the mystery of the parking situation. She orders a couple of pizzas and breadsticks — nothing too fancy. I proceed to give her the food, and as I hand it to her, she blurts out that she wants to talk to the manager.

Knowing something is about to go down, I proceed to get him and return to the oven. Nothing is coming out, giving me plenty of time to listen to the conversation between them — not that it’s hard, as the woman immediately starts screaming at my manager.

Woman: “You didn’t open on time! You were supposed to open at 10:30!”

I guess she knows our schedule better than we employees.

Woman: “And my food took way too long to make!”

We serve Hot-n-Ready pizzas, so as soon as I got the money in the register, I turned around and grabbed the food.

The manager is trying to calm down the drunk woman, who is threatening to call the police now. He is halfway through a plea before being cut off by the woman, belting out what will become his future nickname:

Woman: “YOU OL’ [RACE] B*****D!”

She stormed out of the place, leaving the food with the kids still sitting at the table. She walked back in a few minutes later, now carrying a paintball gun she had grabbed from her van.

The other coworker and I had made our way to the back of the store to burst out in laughter. The manager was still standing at the register, in a combined state of confusion and anger. The fun was only beginning.

Upon seeing the paintball gun, the manager asked me to call the police. However, the police were already pulling up. Apparently, while the woman was grabbing her paintball gun, she actually did call the police. The officer made his way into the store and took a look around, noticing the drunk woman in the corner of the store with a paintball gun and two kids, the manager at the register slowly turning red, and two employees stifling laughter.

The officer tried to get both sides of the story. The manager calmed down and told him our side of it. However, the woman was arguing with us the entire time. By now, the officer could smell her new perfume, Eaux de Jack Daniels, and gave her a breathalyzer. Five minutes later, she was being carried out of the store in handcuffs.