(My mom can be weird sometimes. This happens when I am ten or so. My sister and I find a feral kitten and beg our parents to let us keep her. My dad says yes and my mom says no. I promise to clean up after her. In the end, we get to take her home. We get her litter, a box, and food. The next day, I get up to clean the litter box as I promised.)

Mom: *watching me take out the poops* “Disgusting!”

Me: “I guess?”

Mom: “Poops are disgusting! You’ll catch a germ!” *walks away*

(From then on, every day whenever I clean the litter box, my mom watches me and shouts, “Disgusting!” and looks at me like I am insane.)

Me: “Mom, didn’t you clean our poop when we were babies?”

Mom: “That’s different!”

(I have just gotten off of work and need to stop by the grocery store for a few things. During my work shift, a coworker finds a marker we use to check for counterfeit money and draws all over me with it. I am very pale so it is easily visible.)

Small Child: “Mommy, look at that lady! She’s got stuff on her face!”

Parent: “It’s rude to point, sweetie.”

Small Child: “But look! She looks like she’s got the chickenpox!”

(The lady finally looks up to see the marker all over my face and screams.)

Parent: “You should be ashamed of yourself! How dare you come out in public, let alone to work in such a horrid condition? You probably just infected this entire store, you filthy heathen!”

(The lady picks up her child and runs screaming from the store. After a long day of dealing with people just as crazy, I merely go back to shopping. However, an employee approaches me, having heard the commotion.)

Employee: “I’m sorry, is everything okay over here?”

Me: “Yeah, some crazy lady thought I was diseased and took off.”

Employee: “If you don’t mind my asking… what’s all over your face?”

Me: “Do you guys have those counterfeit markers here?”

Employee: “Yes…”

Me: “My coworker got bored.”

Employee: “Oh! Right… Yeah, that would do it. Have a great day!”

(Our thermostat is not controlled in our store. A computer system in a different state is where the controls are located to prevent employees from messing with it. The only thing we can turn on and off are the ceiling fans. One day it is ridiculously cold both outside and inside the store.)

Angry Customer: “This is ridiculous! You must not want to be here this morning if you’re turning on the cold air when it’s forty degrees outside!”

Me: “I know it’s pretty cold out there, but unfortunately, we can’t do anything about the air inside right now. My manager already made a call in to get the heat turned on, but it could take several hours for it to get switched over since the controls are in a different state.”

Angry Customer: “That’s bulls***! I install air conditioning and you can’t install the system controls in a different state. You’re just a stupid little nobody so you make things up so you won’t get yelled at.”

Me: “If you’d like to file a complaint, sir, my manager is on the register to my left.”

(My manager goes over the same thing with the angry customer but he only gets more pissed off.)

Angry Customer: “You all must be stupid, then! I can’t believe they made someone as incompetent as you a manager if you don’t know how to work a f****** thermostat! I’ll just come back there and fix it myself!”

Manager: “Sir, if you attempt to get behind this counter I will have to call the police on you, and I’d like to remind you that they are just across the street so it won’t take long for them to get here. I’m sorry about the cold, but there is nothing more I can do at this time, and you do have a nice, thick jacket on that should be keeping you very warm.”

Angry Customer: “How dare you threaten me?! I want the number for your corporate office!”

(My manager writes a number down on a piece of paper and hands it to the angry man, who stands right in front of her and dials. That’s when I hear our store phone ringing.)

Manager: *to me* “Sorry, let me go back to the office and answer that.”

(She walks back to the office and from where I am standing, I can hear both sides of the conversation as the angry man yells at my manager and she proceeds to tell him the same thing we already told him twice. After a few minutes he hangs up and grumbles.)

Angry Customer: “I can’t believe this s***! That is the stupidest thing I ever heard!”

Manager: “Sorry, sir, I had a customer on the line. Did corporate resolve your issue?”

(The angry customer leaves, cursing under his breath.)

Me: “That… Did that just happen?”

Manager: “That was awesome! I knew he would fall for it!”

Me: “Are you allowed to do that?”

Manager: “Are you kidding? Corporate doesn’t have time to deal with grouchy guys screaming at them because of something that can’t be immediately fixed.”

(Just then, our cold air shut off and the heater kicked in.)

This happened as my fiance and I were getting ready to move into our own place. 

His mother and grandmother were going through their old plates and other household items to show them to us to see if we’d be interested in taking anything with us. (No, not really, they had very different tastes than I do). 

One of the household items they unearthed was a set of depression-era candle holders. One pair was crystal, and the other was coin glass. They put them off to the side to put away later, and eventually, my fiance and I left. 

Later, they called him to accuse me of stealing a single holder from each pair. When they went to look, they were each missing one. 

As per my fiance’s suggestion, they checked the others they had left and realized that they had swapped them when putting them away. According to my husband, they never apologized for accusing me. 

And he wonders why I don’t get along with his mother.

(When my boyfriend goes to a party for one of his old college friends, another college friend tells him that her cat is pregnant and almost due to give birth. My boyfriend and I have been thinking about getting a kitten for some time now, so my boyfriend thinks this is the perfect opportunity to get one. He immediately expresses interest in adopting a kitten once they are born, and the college friend agrees to let us have one and keep us posted. Three weeks later…)

Boyfriend: “I haven’t heard from [Friend] yet about that pregnant cat. Let me text her.”

(He gets a text back saying that the cat gave birth two weeks ago.)

Me: “I thought she would keep us posted?”

Boyfriend: “Maybe she forgot. Let me make an appointment, so we can choose which kitten we want before we can take it home.” 

(Kittens need to stay with their mother for at least eight weeks.)

Boyfriend: “All right, I made an appointment to go see the kittens in two weeks. She couldn’t make time earlier than that.”

Me: “Sounds reasonable. I’m so excited!”

(It’s five days before the appointment and we get a text from that friend.)

Friend: “I hope you don’t mind, but I gave every kitten away except one. Is that a problem?”

Us: “What?! Of course, that is a problem! We wanted to choose our own kitten! We wanted a calico cat and now all you have left is a grey-white!” 

(There were four calico kittens and one grey-white.)

Friend: “Oh, I didn’t know you wanted to choose.”

Us: “Why else do you think we made that appointment?! We made that specifically so that we could choose our own kitten!”

Friend: “So, do you still want that kitten?”

Us: “Actually, no. We are not going to be treated like this. You failed to inform us in the first place that the kittens had been born, you scheduled an appointment with us quite late because you couldn’t sooner, and now you’re taking away our choice?! What do you think they are? Stuffed animals? We were really looking forward to a kitten, but we are now going to search for another litter of kittens. Thanks for nothing!”

(We never heard from her again about this matter. [Friend], please take into consideration that with real animals, there are real human emotions attached to the choosing process. I really hope you won’t disappoint future cat adopters if your cat is pregnant again.)