I am standing in line at the gas station, and I overhear a woman yelling at the guy ringing her up.

Customer: “I’m an American, and I demand to be rung up by a non-Muslim!”

The guy took off his Kufi and tried his best to sound like an old-fashioned cowboy. The customer threw her things down and stormed off.

I have made it a point to give that gas station repeat business because that was one of the funniest things I’ve seen go down in a while.

I stop at my local membership warehouse store to get gasoline. The gas prices have been high lately, but this store usually has gas anywhere from twenty to thirty cents cheaper per gallon than most gas stations. As such, it’s always busy.

Unfortunately, the layout for the pumps at this store isn’t great. There is room for maybe five vehicles to line up behind the ones at the pumps. Beyond that, the vehicles start blocking one of the entrances to the parking lot for the store. Because of this, the store has enlisted employees to help guide the drivers to move their vehicles a bit closer and provide room for people just entering.

I’ve just pulled up to the pump, gotten out of my car, swiped my membership card, and am ready to tap my credit card for payment. At this point, I can see someone in the corner of my eye kind of hovering close by. Since I still need to type in my PIN for payment, I get wary of people standing too close to me when I pay. I turn to see one of the store’s employees looking at me expectantly. I think he must have a question or something important to tell me.

Me: “Yes?”

Employee: “Are you going to tap for payment?”

I’m thinking maybe there’s something wrong with the pump. I look back to the pump and don’t see a sign or any other indication that I couldn’t pay by tapping, so I look back at the employee.

Me: “I was going to. Why?”

Employee: “We’re encouraging everyone to tap to pay when possible.”

Me: “Okay?”

Employee: “You see, all the cars are lined up waiting, and if everyone taps to pay, it saves up to forty-five seconds on each transaction. It’s a much faster way to pay.”

Me: “Yeah, I know. I would have been done by now.”

I turned back to pay, blocking his view while I typed in my PIN. I didn’t bother to see if he was giving that spiel to anyone else, but he definitely wasted my time. Even if I was swiping, I could have gotten done faster.

My boyfriend and I stop at a gas station, and I go to get drinks while my boyfriend fixes his car’s windshield wiper; it randomly flew off. As I’m headed back to the car, a woman in the car next to us hollers at me.

Woman: “Hey, does he know his car is smoking?”

Sure enough, there’s a bit of white smoke coming off the front of the car. I let my boyfriend know, he shuts it off, and after a few minutes, we get out to look under the hood.

The same woman sees my pregnant belly.

Woman: “Oh, congrats! When are you due?”

Me: “On [date], and thanks!”

Woman: “You’re so lucky. I can’t have kids. When I got that shot, it made it so I can’t have kids. I’ve been bleeding for months now; they have to go in and burn my stomach lining to stop the bleeding.”

Me: “Uh. Sorry… that sucks.”

I’m trying to figure out how to politely end this conversation, but she’s just rambling and barely taking a breath between words.

Woman: “Yeah, they made me sign a waiver saying that it wasn’t the shot that caused it, but it was the shot. Now I’ll never have kids. Congrats to you, though! My friend had kids. I used to babysit them until they were all taken. Well, actually they weren’t all taken; the oldest three were taken and I wanted her baby. I would’ve babysat him twenty-four hours a day if she’d let me, but she took him to them and said she didn’t want him anymore. Now I don’t babysit anymore. I’ll babysit soon. I can’t wait to babysit again. You’re so lucky to have yours, though.”

Me: “Uh. Let me see what’s up with this car.”

I hop back in, and thankfully, we have the windows rolled up.

Me: *To my boyfriend* “Well, that was… just way too much information.”

Boyfriend: “Was that some family or a friend I haven’t met yet?”

Me: “Nope. Never seen her before in my life.”

I had a customer come into the gas station where I worked, yelling and cursing because he had bought a ninety-day pass for our car wash, and it was out of order for the second time in a week. He was berating me about getting his money back or getting the car wash open while I tried to explain that there was nothing I could do for him (because I couldn’t refund a previous day’s sales or fix the car wash myself). I was the only staff on hand at the time.

He was getting frustrated and proceeded to point to his car parked outside — a Mercedes SLS AMG — as he yelled:

Customer: “Do you see that car out there? That’s a $200,000 vehicle! I can have this place shut down!“

I guess I was more surprised than anything because I laughed right in his face.

Me: “Do you honestly believe that’s a reasonable course of action?”

He didn’t seem to know what to say to that and deflated pretty fast. It felt good to shut down someone who was being unreasonable and childish with just a calm and cool-headed reply.

I’m epileptic. I have both grand mal (falling to the ground convulsing) and petit mal (unresponsive stand and stare) seizures. The time comes for my first job and I have one requirement: I cannot be alone. If the seizure doesn’t kill me, collapsing and braining myself on a counter will. On Sunday nights, only one person works. Great, just don’t put me on for Sundays. Simple. Not to my boss who has four other employees. But [Coworker] watches football, so it has to be me.

I explain, for the thirtieth time, that I can’t be there alone. Tough, he says. I have to have my mom stop by every hour to make sure I’m okay on her one day off. On Monday, my boss calls me to the side.

Boss: “Just so you know, this isn’t because of your epilepsy.”

Great start.

Boss: “But I need someone for Sunday, and if you can’t work it because of your epilepsy, I’m letting you go.”

Me: “So, you are letting me go because my epilepsy makes it where I can’t be alone for my safety?”

Boss: “Yes. It’s not your epilepsy.”

Me: “You just… Never mind.”

Two days later:

Boss: “You need to come back; we are short-staffed.”

Me: “You fired me for having a medical condition. And you want me back? Still can’t work Sundays.”

Boss: “No Sundays.”

Guess who finally agreed as a favor to a coworker and was put on the schedule for Sunday alone? Guess who quit the next day?

I’m sorry my potentially deadly medical condition that you knew I had from the beginning is an inconvenience to you.