My mom worked for a big retail company. At the time, you could get a few cents off per gallon of gas if you paid with a store gift card.

One year, just before Mother’s Day, my brother went into the store to buy a gift card for gas and stopped to talk to my mom. She very blatantly steered him toward a flower display and said how nice it would be to get a bouquet for Mother’s Day.

Brother: “Mom, will you buy my gas?”

Mom: *Jokingly* “You have a job; buy your own d*** gas!”

My brother laughed and went on his way to purchase his gift card and fill up his car. 

On Mother’s Day, Mom opened her card from him to find a [Store] gift card for $10 on which he had written, “Happy Mother’s Day. Buy your own d*** flowers.”

I took a call from a woman wanting to schedule a neuter for her Italian Greyhound. We had a long, rational discussion about anesthesia, pricing, pre- and post-op considerations, etc. I’d entered her and her dog’s information, scheduled the appointment, advised her regarding fasting, and was about to hang up when she just had one more question.

Woman: “Just out of curiosity, do you remove the testicles completely, or is it that new thing I’ve heard about where you just deflate them?”

I managed to answer the question and hang up before I burst out laughing, but I couldn’t get the picture out of my head of our doctor poking the dog’s scrotum with a needle and the dog flying around the room like a balloon.

I work as a janitor in a shopping mall. It’s a decent enough job, and every now and again, people passing by really make my day — though most often it tends to be kids. One of my favourite moments was when I was using a floor scrubber machine, one of those big ones you sit on. A kid, probably five or so, walked up to me with a deadly serious expression on their face and proceeded to drop the best icebreaker ever.

Kid: *Pointing at the floor scrubber* “Could you get away from the cops with that?”

Me: *Stifling laughter* “No, not quite. It doesn’t move very fast.”

Kid: *Nodding, still looking very serious* “Uh-huh. So, don’t get caught if you do something bad, then.”

Me: “I’ll just try to not break the law at work.”

Kid: *Flashing me a smile* “Good. Okay, bye now!”

And off they went, running to their mom. Made my day.

I am attending one of the largest furry conventions. When I first arrive and am still in the process of getting everyone signed in and organized, I overhear a woman in the lobby loudly complaining.

Guest: “I don’t approve of there being a furry convention at the same place I am staying! Whoever arranged my stay should have checked with me for something like this! I tell you, I’ll have someone’s head for this when we get back!”

Me: “Oh, here. How about mine?”

I then promptly took the head off of my fursuit and offered it to the woman.

She was less than amused by this generous offer and stormed off.

My husband and I are playing checkers. He has only ever played one or two games of it before, while I played quite a bit when I was younger, but I haven’t for many years. As with most games, he is a far better strategist than I am.

I have five pieces left, none kings. He has two kings, and he also has the four pieces on the end row of his board, which he has stubbornly refused to move for the entire game. There is only one more move I can make, and then I will have no more possible moves and will have to forfeit. Suddenly, I have a ridiculous idea.

I king one of my own pieces.

Me: “This guy declares a coup and seizes control!”

Now that my piece is a “king,” it is able to move backward, and I capture one of my husband’s kings.

Husband: “Hang on. I’m really intrigued and want to see how this pans out, but can we at least agree that I officially won?”

I readily agree, since I blatantly lost anyway.

Husband: “Okay, then. My remaining king is… rather startled by this new development.”

He moves his remaining king backward, away from mine. I follow. We repeat this for a few turns until I protest that I’m just going to end up chasing him until we’re both tired of it.

Husband: “Not if one of us does something stupid.”

Me: “Fine. This other piece announces that the new leader is ineffective and declares his own coup.”  

I king another piece and am able to take his remaining king. This leaves him only the four end pieces. He tries to protest that with two leaders, my army would collapse, but he had two kings before, didn’t he?

Husband: “All right, then, these guys decide to form a tetrarchy.”

He kings all of his remaining pieces.

Me: “Fine. My kings deputize everyone else, and they’ll sort out the oncoming Civil War later.”

I king all of my remaining pieces. I now have five kings to his four. He jumps over one of my kings, which should have been safe, since it was on the edge of the board.

Husband: “This guy goes off to explore and conquer new lands!”

Plainly, I am not going to win the contest of imagination, either. I pull the board out and say that if he’s going to find NEW lands, I’ll just steal THIS land!

Husband: “Ah, but all the pieces fell onto the table. And my guys have already colonized it, so all of your guys got captured.”

He arranged all of his pieces in a circle with mine in the middle. I made one doomed attempt at a “jailbreak,” but I had to admit I’d been beaten yet again.

But I ended up almost collapsing over the table from how hard I was laughing, and my husband was laughing really hard, too, so I think we both get to count it as a win.