My wife’s family is French, and we try to get over to visit them a couple of times a year. I love my in-laws, but they can be quite outgoing at times, and as a thirty-eight-year-old Autistic man, I find this a bit tiring.

For Christmas a couple of years ago, we were staying with my wife’s sister, her husband, and their son. My wife likes to keep me informed when we are about to meet people so I can prepare myself mentally and emotionally. I’m usually all right once I meet them; it’s just the thought of meeting new people for the first time that makes me anxious.

On this occasion, my wife told me that her sister’s husband’s brother would be visiting with his wife, and told me a little bit about them so I knew roughly what to expect.

When they arrive, I am in the bathroom, so I am unable to properly say hello. I hear them arrive and go through the typical French greeting of a kiss on each cheek. I finish in the bathroom and go to the room where my wife and I are sleeping to grab something, planning to head for the living room and say hello properly.

I turn to leave the room when I am met by a woman at the door, who I assume is the wife in the couple. The following brief conversation happens, in French:

In-Law: “You must be [My Name]!”

Me: “Yes.”

She tells me her name, but I can’t make it out because she speaks so fast.

In-Law: “Okay, hello.”

She shakes my hand instead of kissing my cheeks.

In-Law: “Was your poo good, then?”

Me: *Utterly mortified* “Uh… yes?”

She grins and walks off. I stay in the bedroom, trying not to cry. In my head, I am thinking, “What the actual h*** is wrong with this woman? WHO ACTUALLY ASKS THAT?!”

I decide not to leave the bedroom and instead lay on the bed, reading. Eventually, my wife comes to see what is wrong. The following conversation happens in English:

Wife: “Here you are, [My Name]!”

Me: “Hi.”

Wife: “Are you coming to say hello?”

Me: “Maybe.”

My wife notices something is wrong.

Wife: “Is everything all right?”

Me: “Yes.”

My wife eventually persuaded me to tell her what was wrong, and tearfully, I told her about my “encounter.” She was disgusted and horrified, and she apologised profusely. I told her that the only person I wanted an apology from was “the stupid b*** in the living room who thinks she’s a f****** comedian!” My wife told me I could stay in the bedroom until the visitors left, so I did. She asked me if I’d like her to tell her sister what happened, but I asked her not to because I was too embarrassed.

I haven’t seen this woman since the incident, but if I ever meet her again I’ll have to bite my tongue because I have a few choice words for her!

A year ago, the supermarket where I work moved to a bigger building right on the other side of the road. We had to empty the old one and dispatch everything to the other supermarkets of the chain before opening the new one.

Days prior, we put several huge signs on the entrance, the exit, and around the store, stating that we would be closed on a specific Sunday as we were emptying everything.

That day came, and it was obvious that the store was closed — closed doors, the signs, nothing on the shelves, no cashiers, a lot of pallets on the middle of the aisles.

Some customers showed up at the doors and we had to tell them to come another day. As we were working, a customer managed to force the first door of the airlock and around a dozen people started gathering in front of the second door.

A coworker finally noticed them, angrily and confusedly looking at us. It took us a moment to make them understand that we were closed.

From time to time, I still see some customers trying to get into the old building, checking if it’s open, and leaving disappointed, even though there is no way you can’t see the new building literally fifty meters away.

I’m a customer, waiting to have my prescription filled. One of my medicines is called UVdose.

Near me, another customer, an elderly lady, is asking for the same one.

Lady: “Oh, yes, I forgot! I need a box of overdose!”

Several years ago, when our twin sons were twelve, we set out on a “trip of a lifetime,” exploring Europe. The boys were eager to experience new things and were quite the adventurous travellers. We stayed at a gorgeous, ancient fortified farmhouse that was a lodge and a working farm. Other guests included a family from Belgium and three visitors from the States. One was a retired soldier who was shepherding another couple around some of the places he’d fallen for on his deployments.

I was the only one in the family who could speak French at the time, although my wife understood it but was too shy to try her skills. Our hostess was just the opposite; she could understand English but was too shy to speak it.

At breakfast the first morning, our hostess asked us if we wanted an omelette made from goose eggs. The Belgians eagerly accepted, and our boys’ eyes lit up as they saw the size of the eggs. We accepted her offer. The retired soldier also said yes and interpreted the question for his friends. The woman of the couple was very loud in her refusal. “I won’t put that s*** in my mouth! Why can’t these people eat normal?” She was served a regular fried egg.

Our meal was absolutely delicious and both the boys and my wife were very vocal with their pleasure in English.

The woman who had refused the omelette earlier then had a change of heart and asked her friend to ask for one for her, as well.

Our hostess said with a wink in our direction, “Tell her that I am all out of s*** for the day”.

My wife laughed, as did the retired soldier. It was left to me to break the news to the woman that there were no more eggs.

The soldier later thanked me. “Really, she’s been that way the whole trip; she wants to travel but wants everything to be like Philadelphia!”

When I am in high school, I get to go to France on a student ambassador program. One of the rules of this program is that, even though there might be multiple people to a room, everyone needs to have their own bed. Our first night there, we get our room assignments, and my two roommates and I head up to our room.

We get into the room and immediately find two of the beds: a regular queen in the bedroom and a sunseat-esque thing near one of the windows. My roommates snag the two visible beds and then we start searching the room for the other bed. We look in the closets in case it’s a murphy bed situation, tap the walls, again in case of a Murphy bed situation, and just look everywhere we can think of.

We have to call down to the front desk to get sheets for the second bed, so when the employee comes up with those, we ask him to show us where the third bed is because we are clearly dumb Americans.

He looks at me and [Roommate #2] and says, “There are only two of you.” We tell him that the other girl is in the bathroom. He looks at us like he doesn’t fully believe us — why in the heck would we lie about that?! — but tells us it is under the queen.

After he leaves, we go back and look at the queen bed; we initially dismissed it for having anything underneath because there wasn’t a ton of clearance. But I get down on my stomach and crawl around on the floor, tapping on the base, and there’s no bed; it’s definitely a solid base.

By this time, our leaders are doing room checks. They get to our room and I explain that I have no bed. One of the leaders goes down to see if there’s possibly a single room available while the other one comes and does a second glance over the room just to see if we have missed something. We haven’t, and the first leader comes back and lets us know that the hotel is full. 

It’s decided that I’ll room with one of the leaders for the night, so I get my stuff together and move up to her room. She tells me to shower if I want and then I get the sunseat bed. I get cleaned up and I’m all snuggled up in my bed, writing in this journal that the program requires us to keep — we get school credit for this trip — when one of the other leaders comes back and lets us know that they’ve found a bed.

So, I get all my stuff together and move again. Why they couldn’t let me sleep and then just move me in the morning, I’ll never know. This time, I’m in a room with my own bed and things are good and I get to go to sleep.

Before we leave, we have a picnic. There is a donation basket. Once stuff from the picnic has been covered, the leaders convert the leftover money to Franc and Euros give it out to those of us that have done something kind of above and beyond. So, because I moved around and was a good sport about all of it, I get a little extra money.

A few days later, I call home and talk with my mom about things, and I tell her what happened with the money. I find out after I get home that she almost gave my dad a heart attack telling him about it. Here’s what happened:

My mom tells my dad, “[My Name] found a way to make some extra money while on vacation.”

“Oh?”

“Yep! She’s sleeping around!”