I worked for a bookstore in an affluent part of the country, and we had our share of entitled customers who thought we should stay open for their benefit. Our closing announcements were made fifteen minutes to close, five minutes to close, and at closing, but we still got several folks per night who were conveniently deaf to those announcements.

One night, I was working a closing shift after two days of a nasty cold. My throat was still sore and my voice was raspy, and my manager had kept me in the back doing stuff that did not require me to speak much. At 9:45 pm, fifteen minutes before closing, he buzzed the back room.

Me: “Yes?”

Manager: “Hey, how’s the throat?”

Me: “Ready for a cup of hot tea. Why?”

Manager: “Would you like to do the closing announcements tonight? I’m out of patience with people.”

Me: “With pleasure.”

I switched over to the store speakers and deliberately lowered my voice down to the deepest, most gravelly register my throat could manage.

Me: “Good evening. Please be advised that the store will be closing in fifteen minutes. Please bring your items to the front for purchase.” *Beat* “NOW. Thank you.”

Five minutes later, the manager buzzed again, trying not to laugh.

Manager: “Please do that again for the last two announcements. People were running to the registers.”

I did so. When I emerged from the back room five minutes after we had officially closed, there was no one but the staff in the store, and the manager handed me a hot cup of tea from the cafe.

Many years ago, I used to own half a horse — the left side, if you’re curious. A friend who lived in the country owned the other half, as well as several other horses. The area around her place was wonderful for riding, particularly one old farm road with no vehicular traffic.

There was a problem, however, with a pack of six little yappy dogs. I’m not sure what breed they were; they were different color variants on the same style of dog, so probably pedigreed yappy-thing. They were owned by someone with more money than sense who had bought a place in the country. Yeah, that kind of person, and that kind of dog.

When we rode down the dirt lane past the house where the dogs lived, they’d come pouring off the porch, through the hedge around the property (about twenty yards from the house) and into the dirt road, where they’d harass our horses. My horse never threw me, but it was a close thing a few times because he was incredibly nervous about his feet, much more so than a typical horse. The dogs’ owner was never in evidence; they just threw their little house dogs out in the yard and ignored them.

One day, I wasn’t riding my horse; I was riding one of the other horses my friend owned. And this horse was a bit weird. I could tell you horse stories all day, like the fact that we saw him trying to imitate a Tennessee Walker’s running walk gait — and actually doing it for a couple of paces. (My horse was a Walker and was kept in the field next to him.) He’d take down fences and graze right outside, just to prove he could.

Well, the little dogs poured out through the hedge and started doing their thing. At that point, I’d had enough. I yelled, “Let’s get ’em!” and turned him toward the dogs. He put his head down and went for them. It was maybe twenty feet from the center of the dirt road where I was riding to the hedge. And those little yappy dogs put their little yappy tails between their legs and covered that distance at a speed I wouldn’t have expected, with me yelling, “Git on home!” the whole time, and my horse trying to grab one. The dogs ran back to their yard and hid under the porch.

After that, when the dogs came pouring out, I just had to yell, “Git on home!” and they’d flee, no matter what horse I was riding. I have no doubt that they continued to harass anyone else riding or walking down that road, though.

I went to university to do a degree in Computer Science before IT was considered a separate thing. All my good professors and lecturers dressed like they were ready to crawl around behind, under, and over the mainframes. All the bad ones wore stereotypical “professor” clothing.

In one lecture (with one of the good ones), there was a hardware fault somewhere in the internal network, and it was proving impossible to fix. The day’s topic got thrown out of the window — literally: he tore down the flip-pad sheet, screwed it into a ball, and tossed it through a convenient open window — and we all got down to troubleshooting.

Troubleshooting included crawling through the false ceiling crawlways, lifting the floor tiles reaching underneath, etc. It was fun — apart from the literal rat’s nest found in the “rat’s nest” of cables behind one of the mainframes.

It turned out to be the old cleaner-unplugs-something-important-to-plug-in-a-vacuum-cleaner moment, and nobody had spotted it; a good lesson in “check the simple stuff first, stupid”.

A customer comes in with his son.

Customer: “I need a baseball kit for my son.”

I show him the relevant section.

Me: “We have an extensive range here, sir.”

He stares at me expectantly.

Me: “Do you need further assistance?”

Customer: “Well, yes! I don’t know what he needs.”

Son: “Dad, I—”

Customer: “Not now, son. Adults are talking. Now, what will he need?.”

Me: “Well, he’ll need the gloves and recommended shoes, I would think. What hand does he pitch?”

Customer: “I don’t know.”

Son: “I pitch right, but Dad, I—”

Customer: “He pitches right.

I talk to the son directly, as he seems to want to say something.

Me: “And what size shoe are you?”

Customer: “Excuse me, I’m standing right here. Talk to the adult, please. Just measure him for the shoes.”

Me: “And if he needs the whole outfit, it’ll be easier to know his age.”

The father stares a little and then looks at his son, who looks like he’s given up.

Son: “Seven.”

Customer: “He’s seven.”

Son: “And he’s also playing softball, not baseball.”

Customer: “What? Why didn’t you say something?”

Son: “But Dad… adults were talking.” 

I liked the sass of that kid. I got him kitted out with the correct equipment, and Dad was sheepishly quiet for the rest of the transaction.

I once heard one side of a coworker’s phone conversation.

Coworker: “So, you’re going to bash my head in, huh?”

They read the customer’s full name from their screen.

Coworker: “That’s you, right? What’s my last name?” *Pauses* “You don’t know.”

Then they read off the customer’s address.

Coworker: “This is where you live, right? Where do I live?” *Pauses* “You don’t know? That’s a surprise. Here’s another. I don’t like being threatened, but I’m hoping you feel that way right now. Bye.”