I work as a personal care provider for individuals with mental disabilities. Unfortunately, I have a severe anxiety disorder which can make the constant noise of the job difficult, as all food for four people has to be blended in an industrial blender in a tiny, echoey kitchen, and one of the individuals moans constantly. One day, I need a quick break, and as I walk out the door:

Me: *Jokingly* “I need some weed.” 

Oddly enough, I feel funny as I say it. I have my hand on the door as I turn around to say I was joking, only to shrug and go back out to my car; surely, my coworker will take it as a joke. Still, I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve just sealed my fate as the last day on the job. 

While I do live in a state where recreational marijuana is legal, it’s illegal to smoke pot on the job, especially THIS type of job. Really, all I do is walk to my car — parked two feet from the front windows — grab an energy drink from my front seat, and walk right back inside to get some ice. Total time out of sight: maybe thirty seconds if I dawdled.

My coworker decides that I couldn’t have been joking. I have my hair dyed bright red and I admittedly do smoke when I’m safely at home, so clearly, I am a heathen. (Really, I think she is pissed that I am being unwillingly groomed for the soon-to-be-empty manager’s job.)

So, two days later, on my day off, I get called on my cell.

Boss: “Effective immediately, you are under investigation for consuming drugs illicitly on the property. You will not be receiving any type of compensation or allowed to work again until the charges are cleared. The investigation may take two to four weeks to conclude.”

Mind you, this call comes two days before Christmas, and I am the sole employee scheduled to work twelve-hour day shifts on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day. Not only am I losing my double-time pay for covering the holidays, but they are losing the one person who doesn’t already have plans on those shifts. 

After receiving that phone call, I sit there for a minute and decide that that job isn’t worth the additional stress — I’ve been doing the manager’s work for her for a third of the pay for six months at this point — and I am done. So, I type a short letter of resignation, drive to work on my day off, and slam it down on my boss’s desk. I tell all of the managers present:

Me: “If you are going to throw me through the wringer based on a single comment and not a shred of evidence, I’m not coming back.”

After that day, I took a week off for the holidays and then started applying to job after job in my tiny town. Nothing came my way, so eventually, I turned to an employment website. When that came up blank, I decided to try building a writing portfolio on a couple of freelancing sites, as I’d always wanted to be a published novelist.

One year later, I’m now published in “Forbes” as a financial analyst for several major investing and consulting firms. I work from home, choose my own hours, and get paid top-dollar — despite my lack of a college degree — for doing what I’ve always loved.

All because I made a dumb, offhand comment to my coworker on her first day on the job.

I work at a very large factory. At my particular spot in the factory, we work in a two-hour rotation for twelve hours a day on most spots on the line, save three. These three are super easy spots where you stay there all day and are therefore coveted.

Today is my first time at this specific spot since I started three weeks ago. I sign into the station and sit down on the provided stool. A coworker whom I have never met, running late, comes up, signs me out of the spot, signs herself into it, and sits down on the other stool.

Me: “Hey, that’s my spot. You are over there.”

Coworker: *Loudly* “Nope, it’s my spot! I just worked eight days in a row. I need to be here!”

And she turns her back to me and starts talking just as loudly to another workmate.

Me: “No, it is my spot. I was assigned to it.”

Coworker: “Well, I’m taking it!”

I’m a very shy and non-confrontational gal, so I shut up for a second, completely taken aback by this obnoxious behavior. A minute later, I decide to compromise with her. 

Me: “Okay, well, you take it for this quarter, but it’s mine after that. Or maybe we can do every other one?”

She only looks at me with a glare, which I return. 

During that day, she bullied a guy into buying her a soda, forced another girl to let her have another easy spot and made that girl take the hardest on the line, and was loudly belligerent to anyone coming near her.

It turns out she was able to give others negative marks on their work when she was assigned to that spot, which not everyone gets. Those who kissed her behind were not given marks. Those who did not, like me, were given mark after mark.

After too many complaints against her, she was demoted. She now refuses to look at me and requests others to sit in my spot if we have to work together. I happily comply.

My native language is Portuguese, but I do speak English fairly well. My mom, however, can only speak Portuguese. Both of us go on a trip to London and, of course, I am always the only one doing all the talk for both of us.

We bought some “special cards” that grant us “free” entrance to a great variety of tourist attractions; it’s not exactly free, as we paid quite the sum for these cards, but it’s still cheaper than paying for every single attraction we visit.

We’re visiting an attraction that is very popular, so there is quite a queue. There is a Londoner lady in front of me. After a while, the lady steps out of the queue to look at some maps along our way. It isn’t like “one look to the side and then back to the queue.” No, she starts reading the freaking map while the queue advances. So, I take that as my cue to advance, too.

A few minutes later, when she finally notices that the queue has gone on without her, she locates my mother and me and proceeds to yell at us about how we cut her place in the queue.

Lady: “There’s a queue here! A line!”

Me: “Well, you stepped aside, so we just went on ahead.”

My mother asks me, in Portuguese, what is happening, and I tell her. The lady notices that we are not English speakers.

Lady: “Oh, you’re Spanish. There. Is. A. Queue. Line. Here.”

She pauses between every single word, despite the fact that I’ve been speaking English to her.

Me: “I know that! But you stepped aside, so…”

Then, suddenly…

Attraction Worker: “All the visitors holding the [special card], please come this way to the preferential queue!”

I prompt my mom to get her card, and the lady, seeing we both have the [special card], can’t help but say:

Lady: “You’re being called that way.”

Me: “Yes, I know. Excuse me, I’m going in first!”

I’m the manager of a local video game store. I’ve run it with no real problem for years and recently decided to expand to a couple of major card games. A few months after I do so, I have a guy come in to trade in a handful of singles. I’m a female in my late twenties, though I’ve been told I look younger.

Customer: “I wanna see what these are worth.”

Me: “Sure, I’ll check out what they’re worth on the computer.”

I check their values. Unfortunately, while the cards are neat, they’re not worth more than a few dollars total. I bring them back over to the counter.

Me: “So, it looks like I can give you [low amount] for these.”

Customer: “No, one of those alone is worth [higher amount].”

Me: “I went through and got the values for all of them. This one here is worth the most at [amount].”

Customer: “I want your boss to check, not some eye candy cashier.”

One of my regulars, who’s nearby on a demo machine, overhears. He’s very obviously trying not to laugh.

Me: “You want the manager?”

Customer: “Yeah! You obviously did something wrong!”

Me: “Sure.”

I go into the back, where my boyfriend is working on some inventory. He technically doesn’t work for me, but he pitches in sometimes when it’s busy. I tell him someone wants to speak to a manager after I helped them. My boyfriend rolls his eyes and comes out to the counter.

Boyfriend: “Is there an issue here?”

Customer: “Yeah, your s***ty cashier lowballed me on my cards. I know they’re worth more!”

Boyfriend: “Are these the cards?”

Customer: “Yeah!”

My boyfriend takes them and checks them, again, on the computer. He comes back and sets them on the counter.

Boyfriend: “They’re worth [low amount] total. What did she tell you?”

Customer: “There’s no way you guys are gonna give me a s*** offer like that. I wanna talk to the owner! Call him!”

The regular now just bursts out laughing. The card guy turns to look at him.

Customer: “What’s so d*** funny?!”

Regular: “You dumb f***! She is the owner!”

The card guy looks at me.

Customer: “No way. She’s too young and too d*** stupid to run a place like this!”

Boyfriend: “Yeah, you know what? I don’t think we need these cards.” 

Customer: “What?!”

Me: “Yeah, I’m gonna take back my offer. You could always try eBay.”

He looks like he’s about to yell at us, but then he picks up his cards and leaves. My boyfriend shakes his head and heads back into the back room.

Regular: “D***, I love this place.”

Related:
Call Of Duty: Misogynist Warfare, Part 6
Call Of Duty: Misogynist Warfare, Part 5
Call Of Duty: Misogynist Warfare, Part 4
Call Of Duty: Misogynist Warfare, Part 3
Call Of Duty: Misogynist Warfare, Part 2

I work in a bank with a lot of elderly customers that come in regularly. Most are fine, but I cannot stand this one lady. She is always rude, impatient, and demanding. State law recently changed about how trust titles checks have to go into trust titles accounts.  

Me: “Hello, how are you today Mrs. [Customer]?”

Customer: “Ugh, terrible! Ever since you closed your stupid drive-thru—” Two years ago! “—I’ve had to walk all the way inside this stupid, stupid bank. No other bank does that! Now, make this deposit for me.”

Me: “Okay… Oh, it looks like two of your checks are made out to a trust.”

Customer: “And?”

Me: “This isn’t a problem at all, but I will have to change up the transaction a little bit because of a new state law. I have to deposit these two checks into your trust account, but I can transfer the same amount of money from your trust into the account you want so there won’t be a difference—”

The customer replies loud enough for the whole bank to hear.

Customer: “What?! That is ridiculous! I’ve been making the same deposits for twenty years! My lawyer said I could do it like this!”

Me: “Unfortunately, this is how we have to do it with the new law.”

Customer: “Are you calling my lawyer a liar?!”

Me: “No, of course not. But bank policy and state law say that I cannot deposit these checks straight into this account.”

Customer: “You’re not a lawyer! You can’t tell me what I can and can’t do!”

Me: “Everything will still be the same. I just have to process the transaction a little differently.”

Customer: “You know, you’re just trying to make me mad. The actual bank doesn’t care what is deposited as long as they get my money. You stupid tellers are the ones that look at everybody’s checks and try to make their lives more difficult by telling the bank to make more policies. Fine! Do it your own stupid way!”

Oh, yes! I just love making new policies so I can be called stupid in front of the whole bank repeatedly and process more difficult transactions!