With all the recent closures, the store I’m in is staying in operation with the only customer interactions being online orders, taken to customers’ cars at curbside. I take one customer her order and verify she’s the one I’m supposed to hand it off to.

Me: “All right! Here you go, have a good one and be safe!”

Customer: “No, thank you for staying busy like this!”

As she’s speaking, she’s pulled a can of disinfectant cleaner from seemingly nowhere and has started spraying her bag over. I’ve never seen someone be so careful about their order so it’s caught me a little off guard.

Me: “Well, I’m just glad we can still get a paycheck, you know?” 

Customer: “Oh, I get that!”

At this point, she notices I’m not leaving, which is purely to maintain polite conversation while seeing her off. She’s now opening the bag and spraying her purchased items directly.

Customer: “No offense, but you can’t be too careful!”

Me: “No, I mean, go for it!”

I have no idea what I was supposed to say, but apparently, that satisfied her and she happily finished spraying her purchase before hiding the can away and leaving.

I’m working in a local bookstore one weekend, and I answer the phone.

Me: “Thank you for calling [Bookstore]. How may I help you?”

Caller: “Do you guys buy books? I have textbooks I want to sell.”

Me: “We do buy used books for store credit, but unfortunately, we don’t buy textbooks.”

Caller: “Well, what other kinds of books are there?”

Me: “Um…” *Awkward pause* “Just… fiction, non-fiction…”

I am trying really hard to not laugh.

Caller: “Well, what about these books on psychology I have?”

Me: “Are they textbooks?”

Caller: “They’re written by an author.”

Me: “Yes, but are they textbooks?”

Caller: “They have an ISBN number.”

Me: “Yes… but did you buy them at a college bookstore for your class?”

Caller: “No. Oh! You buy just regular old books, huh?”

Me: *Pause* “Yes. Yes, we do.”

My fiance and I are discussing our upcoming wedding at a family event for my side of the family. One of my elderly relatives is VERY opinionated and thinks that her way is the only way. My husband has just told her that we have booked an all-inclusive resort in Jamaica for our honeymoon. My boss goes to this specific resort every year and he recommended it highly, so we booked it. 

Elderly Relative: “Why don’t you go to the Poconos? One of my neighbors went to the Poconos on their honeymoon and they loved it! You don’t have to fly there.”

It is worth noting that my family lives in central Delaware, a roughly three-hour drive from the Poconos. My husband is stationed at the nearby Air Force base. I am a truck driver for a food service company and the honeymoon resorts in the Poconos are on my route, so I drive there several times a week.

Me: “Why would we want to go to the Poconos? The weather is going to be the same as it is in Dover and I drive there several times a week for work. We are getting married in October and we want a real getaway.”

Elderly Relative: “But the resorts in the Poconos have the most delicious food! My friend says that they got to see a lingerie show there and they got to feed deer!”

Me: “First of all, the quality of the food that I deliver to the honeymoon resort restaurants is very low, the kitchens smell bad, and the places are extremely dated; they get very poor reviews online. In fact, one reviewer referred to one of the resorts as ‘welfare Sandals.’ Second of all, a lingerie show is not our idea of fun. We want to get on an airplane and escape our day-to-day lives.”

Elderly Relative: “What does Jamaica have that the Poconos doesn’t have?”

Me: “Umm, beaches, gourmet food, amazing spas, and world-class service?”

Elderly Relative: “But the Poconos are cheaper and they are closer!”

I look up the Poconos resorts on my travel app.

Me: “No, the Poconos are not cheaper! According to [Travel Site], they are actually more expensive than the deal we got on the trip to Jamaica. We are flying out of Baltimore Washington International and it is only a two-hour drive from here so I am actually driving less. The flight is only three hours.”

Elderly Relative: “You are going to have a really bad time in Jamaica and wish that you went to the Poconos!”

We had an AMAZING time in Jamaica! We spent every morning eating the best breakfast buffet that we have ever had, on a terrace overlooking the Caribbean. We got a massage at the resort spa, which was very nice. The restaurants were second to none and the grounds were absolutely gorgeous. Our room overlooked the Caribbean and was amazing. It actually rained VERY heavily in the Poconos during the week of our honeymoon. So much for the bad time that we were expected to have in Jamaica!

My elderly aunt is obsessed with her senior center, so much so that she feels the need to literally bully any senior who isn’t a member of a senior center to join one. She also happens to practically worship the ground that the director of her senior center walks on.

The following exchange happens when I bring my new fiancé to meet my family.

Aunt: *To me* “What senior center do [Fiancé]’s parents belong to?”

Me: “They aren’t a member of a senior center. They both have severe social anxiety and don’t like groups. They have enough trouble hosting [Fiancé] and me for dinner.”

Aunt: “What?! They aren’t a member of a senior center?! How do they live without a senior center? How do they get a nutritious meal every day?”

Me: “Uhh, they cook for themselves.”

Aunt: “But our director says that seniors shouldn’t have to worry about planning meals because they can eat breakfast and lunch at the senior center. How do they even go out to buy their groceries? The senior center bus takes us shopping every week.”

Me: “They go shopping by themselves.”

Aunt: “But our director says that it’s dangerous for seniors to go shopping by themselves! Don’t they want to go to [Restaurant]? Our director says that the only way that seniors can go to [Restaurant] is if they go on the senior center bus.”

Me: “That’s not true. Anyone can drive to [Restaurant] any time that they want to regardless of age.”

Aunt: “But our director says that seniors can’t do things for themselves and they need someone to help them. She says that all seniors should be legally required to join a senior center when they turn sixty-five. She says that we have the best senior center in the whole state!”

Me: “Did you not hear that [Fiancé]’s parents don’t like to socialize with other people? They have enough of a problem hosting [Fiancé] and me for dinner. They are definitely not going to socialize with people that they don’t know!”

Aunt: “I will talk to them at your wedding and make them join the senior center!”

My aunt followed through on this and ended up making my now father-in-law so angry that he had a meltdown at our wedding and stormed out of the reception. My aunt is STILL hung up on the fact that every senior should join a senior center despite my father-in-law’s reaction.

There’s a boy in my shop class who is very allergic to peanuts. For some unknown reason, there has been a large container of peanuts in our classroom since before I started at this school. Why it remains has been a consistent mystery, and every time we think it is gone one of us will find it in a cabinet somewhere.

During finals, our shop teacher gives us a free day. A lot of people are spending the class either playing games or studying for the finals of other classes, but our classmate with the allergy somehow slips out of the main classroom and into a side room. A minute or two after he leaves the room, another classmate looks up towards the door and rushes out. 

I, along with some other students, follow to see what’s going on. There’s a lot of yelling, and as I turn into the side room, I see a larger classmate holding our allergic classmate off the ground while a girl is trying to wrestle the jar of peanuts out of his hands.

Turns out that, for some unknown reason, our allergic classmate decided it’d be better for him to trigger an allergic reaction and go to the hospital than it would be for him to just study and take his English exam next period.