I work for our local shire council, and we’re organising a career fair mainly for students in high school and university. We are a few weeks out, and the deadline for businesses who want to have a stall at the fair closed two weeks ago. We allowed a few late requests, but we have now reached capacity; there is physically no room for any more.

A “gentleman” from a religious charity that employs trainees phones asking for a stall. We let him know that, unfortunately, the deadline has passed and we are at capacity, but we’d be happy for his trainees to come along as attendees, and we can make sure to put him on the mailing list for next year.

He snaps back:

Gentleman: “No, that’s fine. I’ll just call the mayor!” 

Because, apparently, the mayor can turn back time to before the cut-off date or make the venue bigger just to fit him in! We have not heard from the mayor… yet.

I was working the desk at my small-town library when a man (here called Small-Town/Big Head) came in. I’d worked there for a few years and knew most of our patrons by name, but I’d never seen this man before.

Me: “Hi, can I help you?”

ST/BH: “Is [Library Director] here?”

Me: “No, she’s not in today. How can I help you?”

ST/BH: “Well, my name is [ST/BH], and I’m a member of the [Small Town] Council, so that makes me your boss. Can you tell [Library Director] that I came in?”

Me: *Very politely* “Nice to meet you, [ST/BH]. My name is [My Name]. I’m a resident of [Small Town], and I vote, so that might make me your boss. But I’ll be sure to tell [Library Director] that you stopped by.”

ST/BH: “Hmmph!”

He turned around and left.

A long time later, I was talking to our mayor and told him about this exchange. He said that the council members had absolutely no authority over the employees in any way.

A government department is asking us to design flyers and information posters for Christmas events that will take place in the town. It is currently September, so we have plenty of time to design what we need before the holiday season.

Client: “We liked what you put together for the part about the winter market, but the photos you used are from the market from last year.”

Me: *Waiting to hear what the issue is.* “Yes, we did. We used stock photos that were in the asset package you sent.”

Client: “Well, the winter market will look completely different for this year, so can you use this year’s?”

Me: “Is this year’s market built already?”

Client: “That usually happens around November.”

Me: “So you want us to wait until November to get these ready?”

Client: “No, we need them now.”

Me: “But it’s September.”

Client: “Yes.”

I say nothing, hoping (praying) that these pieces of information coalesce into the obvious realization that the client is asking me to perform time travel. This does not happen.

Me: “We can’t do that.”

Client: “Why not?”

Me: “Because the market isn’t built yet.”

Client: “Yes.”

Me: “No, that wasn’t a question. I am telling you, since the market isn’t built yet there can’t be photos of it.”

Client: “I don’t understand.”

Shocking.

Me: “You’re asking me to use photos of a market that hasn’t been built yet. That’s impossible.”

There is some shuffling on the other end of the line, and I hear another voice taking over.

Other Client: “Hi! Sorry about him, we… can’t explain him. Anyway, what you’ve provided is great! We’ll be in touch about any changes we’d like to make! Thanks and bye!” *Click.*

I never got a call from that other guy again. I hope he wasn’t given anything important to do…

I contract with the government and was working in one of their facilities. One day, I answered a phone call from a man giving a rambling diatribe about how we were terrible and destroying America. This was right after Snowden, so part of his diatribe accused me of spying on him and America, as well.

This was patently absurd. The organization I worked for definitely didn’t spy on US citizens; we only wasted their tax money due to a bloated and inefficient bureaucracy as the government should! I’m sorry to say I can’t properly recall his words to quote them, and I could never do the insanity of his rant justice.

The man had said he wished something would happen to all of us. It didn’t exactly feel like an intended threat, but I figured it should still be reported just in case. I went through the efforts of hunting down the details about what to do if you get a threatening call — because of course we have a procedure for that — and called the appropriate folks and explained the call I received.

Representative: “Oh, it’s him again. Yeah, we know all about him already, thanks.”

Me: “You do?”

Representative: “Yeah, he must have realized all our phone numbers start with the same digits. He’s been randomly swapping out the last three digits to call random people here all day; I think you’re the fifth today. He’s calling from his home phone number, so it was pretty easy to figure out who he is. Today’s his birthday, so I suppose this is the best thing he had to do on his birthday.”

Me: “That’s actually kind of sad.”

Representative: “Yeah, we’re pretty sure he is harmless, but I believe they’re sending someone to his house to talk to him anyway.”

I’d mostly forgotten the call later that day when I got a voicemail from someone wanting a status update on something I had worked on. I tried to redial the last called number to respond, but clearly, I did something wrong because I got the birthday boy instead, not that I realized that at first.

Me: “Hey, it’s [My Name]. You wanted to know about [work stuff]?”

Original Caller: “Sorry, who are you?”

Me: “It’s [My Name]. I was returning a call I just got…”

We both ended up confused for a minute, but then it must have clicked to the old man what had happened; he suddenly transformed from confused-sounding older guy to rambling insanity in an instant.

Me: “Oh, clearly I redialed the wrong number. Sorry to bother you. Happy birthday.”

Original Caller: “Wait. How did you—”

I hung up then.

I know I probably shouldn’t have reinforced his belief that we were spying on him like that, but I just couldn’t help it. I mean, really, if you think you’re calling an evil government bent on spying on you, why would you call using your real home number when that can be traced back to you with a Google search and, at most, paying five dollars to one of the tracking services anyone can use? If we WERE as evil as he thought we were, he really should have expected more than a cop knocking on his door telling him to cut out his nonsense.

I am a Hungarian transgender woman in transition. In 2020, the government decided that being transgender is a sin, it’s evil propaganda from the West, and it harms children. I am also a desk officer in the police, and only my superior officer knew that I had started to transition.

A man from the ministry came in to give us the new rules.

Ministry Man: “From this point onward, [Special Group] will give orders on what people are to be arrested for being or suspected of being [transphobic slur]s.”

Superior Officer: “Excuse me. Can you check the door again for me?”

[Ministry Man] peeked at the door, which said “Police” on it.

Ministry Man: “What about it?”

Superior Officer: “Oh, for a moment, I thought we had turned into the KGB.”

Ministry Man: “What?

Superior Officer: “Arresting people on suspicion of being transgender?”

Other Officer: “I don’t know… [Ministry Man] looks too much like a woman to me. Permission to initiate arrest?”

Ministry Man: *Instantly angry and shouting* “You must follow the rules!”

Me: “Can I see some of those rules?”

Superior Officer: “Yes, let us see those rules.”

We checked. It was a badly written paper trying to give full power to some office to call the cops everywhere they wanted, to install a hotline we must work with, and to generally put someone above the police in rank without the necessary training.

Superior Officer: “Come back when the rules make sense. We are not the KGB, and we have actual emergencies to worry about. Good day.”

I was very happy with this, and the whole department agreed that this was a powergrab.

Sadly, two years after that, I got fired by the top level for being an openly asexual woman, because it seems that was also corrupting children somehow. I moved abroad anyway.