One of my sisters and I are in our twenties and the other one is in her teens. The three of us were at the grocery store a few weeks ago when this happened. We were wandering around discussing stuff when I stopped to look at the stuff on the shelves, so my sisters stopped, as well. I was not paying attention to anything, as usual, but I trusted my sisters to warm me if I was blocking someone or something. 

They saw this woman coming in our general direction with her cart, so one of my sisters moved away and my other sister pushed me closer to the shelves and came closer to me to provide space for the cart. This woman kept coming at me and my sister, and when she was close enough said, “Excuse me,” in a rude tone. I said sorry, sort of a reflex response, and my sister tries to pull me away to make more space for her. 

She kept coming at us and kept saying, “Excuse me,” loudly and still in her rude tone. I kept saying sorry and my sister started trying to push me into the shelves to give her space. It got to the point that this woman’s cart was going to run me over, so my sisters and I looked at her. At this point, I don’t know what we would have done if she was a major b****, as we all hate confrontation. 

Turns out it was one of our neighbours who we know fairly well. She looked at us, said sorry, and laughed. Then, she explained that she’d done it to other neighbours as a “politeness” test or something, and told us that we’d all passed. She then told us that she did it to another neighbour, who we all know to be a nice old lady, and she apparently lost it and was cursing up a storm until she realized it was our neighbour. 

My sisters and I laughed it up with the neighbour and walked away, all feeling very confused. Up to this point, I don’t know how I should feel about her “test.”

(Our store has to look out for people overloading their trolleys with high-value items. It’s known as a “trolley-push,” as they attempt to just go straight to the exit — without paying — with the trolley full of items, hoping that security won’t stop them. I have worked every Tuesday night for four years, and have gotten to know our regular customers. I can tell something is up, as the security guard appears to be following someone and a member of management is watching the security cameras. I wander over to the member of management to see if they need help.)

Me: “Hey, are you following someone?”

Management: “Yeah, he’s got a trolley full of stuff. We reckon he’s hiding some high-value stuff in there and will attempt to walk out the doors.”

Me: “Oh, well, I doubt he’ll walk out the doors since he’s [High-Ranking Manager] from [Our Supermarket Warehouse nearby].”

Management: “Um… What?”

Me: “Yeah, he’s got a big family, so every Tuesday he comes and does a massive food shop. He’s a really nice guy.”

Management: “Oh… Right… You can go back to the customer service desk now.”

(It turns out they thought the guy was really dodgy and wasted about half an hour following him. He told me a few weeks later that he could tell they were watching him, which he found wildly amusing, since he was technically senior to them in the company. He still comes in most Tuesdays to shop and say hello!)

(I work in a supermarket bakery. When I was hired I was told about a creep who would call every so often. He doesn’t have a distinctive voice and always waits long enough that they will mostly forget — and are often busy enough anyway with multiple calls daily that they aren’t on guard when they grab the phone — and he will start off innocuously asking about custom cakes, before asking about explicit designs using graphic terms, getting all breathy and excited. They will immediately hang up on him, of course, and are very grossed out, and I often tell them if he ever calls again to just give the phone to me. Months pass by without incident until one day one of my younger coworkers answers the phone and gets a weird, uncomfortable expression on her face. While she is in her mid-20s, she has a very “baby” sounding voice.)

Coworker: “Um… just a moment.” *covering the phone and turning to me* “It’s that pervert… Did you seriously want to…?”

Me: *snatching the phone from her* “Hello, sir! I’ll be happy to help with your order, right after you explain to me, for the recording, why you’re making graphic sexual comments to my underage coworker here.”

(I heard an audible, shocked gasp and the line immediately went dead. I was, of course, full of it; we didn’t have the ability to record calls on that line even if I wanted to, and she definitely wasn’t underage, not that that should have mattered. But while we merely got a good laugh out of scaring him finally, apparently, that was more than sufficient to scare him off for good. It’s been over two years since I worked there, and the women who are still there happily inform me when I come by to shop that they still haven’t heard from him. If only all of life’s annoyances were so easily solved.)

(I work for a little over a year at a grocery store, and then I move from Ohio to Florida. I visit Ohio a year later, and I swing by the place to chat with my friends. I used to run the self-checkouts almost exclusively. One of my ex-coworkers, who’s running the self-checkouts area, walks over to me and asks if I’m on break. I laugh and shake my head and keep talking. He takes off the handheld device and starts handing it to me.)

Ex-Coworker: “If you’re not on break, you can take over.”

Me: “I don’t work here anymore. Haven’t for almost a year now.”

(The dude was so surprised.)

(I’ve just opened a new package of white American cheese made by a company whose initials are LOL. I set a large plastic bag on the counter and write on it the date, the product code, and “LOL White” as a scowling old man walks up and sees what I’m doing. For reference, he’s white and so am I.)

Old Man: “What the h*** do you think you’re doing?!”

Me: “Huh?”

Old Man: “Laughing at the white man?!”

Me: “What are you talking about?”

(He slams his palm down on the bag I’m writing on.)

Old Man: “Right there! ‘Laughing out loud at the white man!’ F****** millennial [racial slur]-loving libtard feminist SJW socialist traitor!”

(I groan. Oh, joy, another one of those.)

Me: “That’s not what that means.”

Old Man: “Shut up! I know what all those stupid things your generation write on your liberal chat rooms mean! You millennials almost ruined this d*** country trying to destroy the white man! Well, you ain’t gettin’ away with it ever again now that Trump is in charge! Trump’s gonna send you all to Hell where you belong!”

(I grab the block of cheese and slam it on the counter right in the man’s face. Over the course of about three seconds, the look on his face goes from, “What the hell is he doing?” to, “Uh-oh, is that what I think it is?” to, “Oh, God, I’m an idiot,” to “NO, I CAN’T be the idiot!” to, “ENEMY! DESTROY! DESTROY!”. He slams both hands down on the counter and leans over it to scream in my face.)

Old Man: “TRUMP 2020! TRUMP 2020!”

(He turned around and stomped out of the store muttering about “f*****’ [racial slur]-lovers.”)