I work in Human Resources and I’m meeting with a lawyer who is defending our company from an unwarranted sexual harassment claim made by a former employee after she was fired. As I am explaining to him that the company culture here would strongly discourage that sort of activity, my two — male — coworkers walk by, talking to one another super casually.

Coworker #1: “Aw, man, my hands still smell like girl. All day, that smell never really comes off.”

Coworker #2: “I know, [Female Coworker #1] is always the worst. [Female Coworker #2] isn’t too bad, but the smell when it’s [Female Coworker #1] just lingers and lingers.”

The lawyer gives me an “oh, really” eyebrow, like I suddenly lost all credibility about our corporate culture.  

I call my coworkers to come back and, while trying very hard not sound stressed about the answer, I ask them:

Me: “I just overheard the last bit of that. Why do your hands smell like girl, and what does it have to do with [Female Coworker #1]?”

Coworker #1: “Oh, it must have been her turn to buy the soap for that washroom. It just smells like fruit and girl, and the smell stays for hours. The soap [Female Coworker #2] buys smells like girl, but you can’t even smell it after twenty minutes or so.”

They wandered off looking really puzzled about why my visitor was laughing so hard, but all I could think was, “Thank God!”

I am waiting by the printer having just refilled it with paper. My manager is at his desk not far from me.

Manager: “Don’t you hate those tan lines?” 

I turn and see him looking at me. 

Me: “What tan lines?” 

Manager: “Your bikini line.”

Me: “How the h*** are you even able to see that far up?”

Manager: “When you bent over to refill the paper tray.”

Me: “…”

Manager: “What? If you don’t want men looking, you should crouch more like a lady or stop wearing skirts!”

I was extremely uncomfortable and ran to the HR manager. She was quite furious about it and demanded he be suspended until an investigation took place. Senior management, though, just sent him on equal opportunity training; the HR manager resigned in protest.

It seemed to work on my manager, though, as now he refuses to lift his eyes up from his desk. I can’t stand to be in the same room as him, though, so I have requested to move departments. If I’m denied, I will be resigning also.

I’m a woman doing my weekly grocery shop, wearing a T-shirt with a character from a popular webcomic. A man steps in front of me — ignoring the social distancing guidelines of two metres — and starts talking to me.

Man: “Hi there! I like your shirt.”

I move away from him.

Me: “Thank you.”

Man: “Would you like to get coffee or something sometime?”

Me: “No, thank you.”

Man: “Why not?”

Me: “I’m engaged.”

Man: “Oh, really?”

Me: “Yes.”

Man: “I don’t see a ring.”

Me: “As it happens, my fiancee asked me to marry her about two months ago. We planned to visit my parents to tell them in person and collect my deceased grandmother’s engagement ring from their safety deposit box for me to wear. Obviously, that’s not possible right now.”

Man: “You could have just said you’re a lesbian instead of wasting my time.”

Me: “And you could have just accepted ‘no, thank you’ right off the bat, but here we are.”

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I am a female in my early twenties, on my own, doing some grocery shopping on a cold January morning. As I am waiting for checkout, I see a middle-aged man a few checkouts down from me, carrying a colorful bundle of foam pool noodles.

I’ll admit I am pretty blatantly staring because, A, what does he need pool noodles in January for? And B, [Retail Chain] sells pool noodles in January? 

I watch him walk away, and then I pay for my groceries and go to return my cart.

To my shock, Pool Noodle Man walks right up to me from the exit doors. I had thought him long gone. 

Pool Noodle Man: “Are you Italian? You look Italian.”

I look down at my pasty-white skin and back up with my pale blue eyes.

Me: “Noooooo.”

Pool Noodle Man: “Oh, but you looked Italian. Are you married?”

Me: *Shook* “I don’t believe that’s any of your business.”

He then turned and high-tailed it out of there, fast. It wasn’t until later that I realized he probably took my staring as a sign of interest. Maybe he didn’t think there was anything odd about pool noodles in January?

I still don’t know why he thought “Are you Italian?” was a complimentary or appropriate pick-up line to use on a woman twenty-odd years younger than him.

I work at a call center for a cellular network. We are open 24/7 so everyone gets night shifts. 

A lot of callers are just drunkards, calling and talking dirty with female executives. At first, we are instructed to simply disconnect the call, but the number of calls doesn’t go down. Now, we have started logging in “caller used abusive language” and “flagging” the interaction. 

The QA on shift hears the call and if they find it abusive — which it always is — they will block the number. 

The customer will call next morning saying he isn’t able to make calls and the executive tells him that his number is blocked because of his behaviour. 

In order to unblock his number, he has to submit a written apology at his nearest cellular retail store. 

Within a month, these calls dropped.

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