I had autistic burnout a few years back and have struggled to find work since. I’m attending a course on job hunting, made mandatory by the social service (UWV for the Dutch folk). The trainer is the type of “dudebro” who treats us all — a class of adults over thirty — like teenagers and has an attitude of “I’m here to be your friend, not your superior” in the worst possible way.

For example, during this exchange, we are made to watch a video called “How To Make Your r Resumé Lit!” I wish I were joking. It’s presented by an adolescent who is literally rapping his presentation — something that makes the three immigrants in our group, whose understanding of Dutch is still minimal, very confused to say the least. 

I’m doodling random circles on a piece of paper to keep me grounded — mostly to distract myself from completely losing my s*** — when the trainer comes up to me and glances at the paper.

Trainer: “You know, that is so creative! You’re really artsy, aren’t you? So talented!”

Me: “I’m literally just doodling.”

Trainer: “Oh, come on! Don’t underestimate your ability to make art! Hey, can you do me a favour? Can I keep this?”

He’s reaching out for the paper already, so I snatch it away.

Me: “No.”

Trainer: “No, seriously. I really want this art piece. I’ll even pay you for it!” *Winks*

Me: “No.”

Trainer: *Now full-on pouting* “Please? As a gift from you to me?” 

Me: “Again, no. Also, try all you like to pretend to be my ‘bestie’, but that doesn’t work with me. You can quit the act.”

[Trainer] suddenly becomes very serious and very convinced that he has some sort of point, and he starts leaning over the table to hover over me.

Trainer: “Hmm. You realise what this is really about, do you?”

Me: “You clearly don’t. Leave me alone.” 

He gave me the side-eye at every class after that but refrained from talking to me directly since.

I’m working in a restaurant. It’s late, the kitchen has just been cleaned, the waitresses are bussing the tables, and there are five minutes before I shut down takeout. The phone rings.

I answer the phone right away.

Customer: “When do you close?”

Me: “It’s 9:11 now, and we need to have everyone out by 10:00 pm.”

Customer: “Well, great. I’m just going to walk over now. I’ll order takeout when I get there.”

Me: “Takeout ends at 9:15. I can quickly take your order now and put it in, and we will have it ready when you get here.”

Customer: “Okay. I’m going to order something I’ve had before. It was a veggie burger.”

Me: “Great. Was it our avocado Imp—”

The customer gets very angry; I can hear it in her voice.

Customer: “No! It was just a veggie burger.”

Me: “Okay, can I put you on hold for a moment? I believe our only veggie burger at the moment is the avocado Impossible. But I can double-check for you.”

Customer: “Seems impossible right now. Yes, do that.”

She already sounds smug. I can’t quite explain it, but I know she is going to be difficult.

She is on hold for about thirty seconds. I am right: the only vegetarian burger is the Impossible one, but we can substitute a veggie or Impossible burger in place of a regular beef patty.

Me: “Thank you for holding. If you would not like the avocado Impossible burger, we can sub in a veggie burger or an Impossible burger in place of any beef patty.”

Customer: “Well, that’s what I want. And I want it on multigrain bread like I had it before. They put it on two slices of bread on each side, and they didn’t charge me anything extra for it.”

I pause for a moment. I’m honestly not quite sure what to say; it sounds like a lie and I am basically alone.

Customer: *Very bluntly* “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Me: “Yes, I do. They used four pieces of bread?”

I think I can do that, even if my manager tells me I should charge extra for more bread next shift. Then I’ll know for next time.

Customer: “Yes. Now, what do they usually have on these?”

Me: “I’m not sure; I don’t know exactly what you want.”

She still has yet to clarify what burger she’s modifying.

Customer: “Well, vegetables! What vegetables do they put on a burger?! Like lettuce? Tomato?”

She’s talking to me like I’m five.

Me: “It’s different for every burger, but yes, we do have lettuce and tomato, and we can add that to any burger.”

Customer: “I want that; I want lettuce and tomato. No onion. I want that sauce you guys have, too. Also, I don’t want iceberg lettuce. I’m healthy. I only eat romaine or… What’s that other stuff you guys have?”

I glance at the clock. It’s 9:14. I’m off in fifteen minutes and I am not supposed to ring in anything past 9:15.

Me: *As nicely as I can* “I’m sorry, miss, do you have access to the Internet? It’s getting quite late. If you’re able to check out our menu online, you can see what we have.”

Customer: *Snapping* “I don’t have a computer next to me! Honestly, I don’t see what’s so difficult about this! You said you close at 10:00!”

Me: *Calmly* “Yes, but travel and takeout close at 9:15. If you would like, you can come tomorrow.”

Customer: “What am I gonna do, eat a burger at 7:00 am?! Is there anyone else I can speak to? There has to be someone. This is ridiculous!”

Me: “No, I am the only person working takeout tonight.”

And I need to clean up by myself; that’s gonna take a while.

Customer: “Then I want to speak with your manager!”

Me: “My managers have gone home. You can phone them tomorrow, though.”

Customer: “GOOD! I WILL!” *Hangs up*

Respectfully, don’t order things that don’t exist 5 minutes before closing. Please just look at our menu first. I don’t mind subbing a veggie patty for a beef patty, and I don’t mind subbing in bread for a bun. We can add lettuce and tomato to whatever burger you want; modifications are fine! Making up a completely new item is not — especially not five minutes before closing and fifteen minutes before I am supposed to be going home.

I work for a big grocery store. There is a [Retail Chain] about a five-minute drive from us.

One day, [Retail Chain] shopping carts start showing up in our corrals. It’s only one or two a week, but corporate instructs us to remove them from customer access wherever found, and they quickly start taking up a lot of space in our storage.

About once every month or two, the store manager sends an employee with a van to return the carts to [Retail Chain]. It’s the neighborly thing to do.

Unfortunately, after about a year of this, corporate starts squawking about lost manpower hours and mileage reimbursement and orders us to stop returning carts.

So, the store manager calls [Retail Chain] to explain and asks that they start sending an employee here to pick up the carts.

Instead of being reasonable, the [Retail Chain] manager accuses my manager of deliberately stealing his carts and threatens legal action.

A [Retail Chain] employee never arrives to recover the carts, and after consulting with legal, my manager orders the destruction of [Retail Chain] carts. Now, instead of returning them to [Retail Chain], we’re throwing them in our dumpsters to be carted to the dump. We pay by weight, so this actually costs more than returning them.

My manager calls [Retail Chain] one more time, against the advice of legal, to advise them that we’ve begun the destruction of the carts but that they still have a couple of days in which they can come by to get the carts. He just gets more inane accusations in response.

We do eventually resolve the mystery, though.

One day, I see a young man returning a [Retail Chain] cart to our cart return. I radio the manager on duty and approach the young man.

Me: “Hello. May I ask what you’re doing?”

Customer: “I am returning the cart to the corral.”

He gestures with both hands at the cart and corral when he says those words.

Me: “Why are you returning it to us when we were not [Retail Chain] and the cart is [Retail Chain]’s?”

Customer: “[Retail Chain] doesn’t have any corrals. Carts go in corrals.”

Me: “You should return the carts to the [Retail Chain] building if they don’t have any corrals.”

Customer: “Carts belong in corrals. Carts go to the corrals. Carts need to go to corrals. Carts do not go to the store. You do not take carts to the store.”

When I suggest that [Retail Chain] carts should go back to a [Retail Chain], and not a [Our Store], he becomes agitated and wails:

Customer: “But [Retail Chain] doesn’t have a corral!”

Around this time, my manager arrives and tells me to take a hike.

Manager: “I’ll take it from here.”

I don’t know what exactly my manager said to that man. Perhaps all he did was suggest a different store to return the [Retail Chain] carts to. Perhaps he suggested that the kid shop with us rather than with our competitor.

Whatever the duty manager said, it worked: the carts stopped appearing after that.

I did ask around, just because I wanted a fuller picture of what had just happened, and I found out that that specific [Retail Chain] HAD gotten rid of all of their outdoor cart corrals around the same time that the carts started appearing at ours.

We used to have a separate line for walk-ins and one for online orders. Since we are in lockdown at the moment, we have switched to 100% online orders and we only allow people in who have an order number.

A customer walks in and comes right up to the counter. She’s also not wearing a mask — a legal requirement at this time.

Customer: “I have an online order to pick up, number 311.”

Me: “Ma’am, please put on your mask. The line for order pick-ups starts outside and we will call you in when it is ready. It looks like your order will be ready in nine minutes.”

Customer: *Not moving, not putting on a mask* “No, I made an online order. Online. I don’t wait.”

Me: “Everyone has made an online order, ma’am. We don’t do walk-ins at the moment, so we only have the one line. Please put on your mask and enter the line.”

The customer looks at the line, then at me, and then at all the staff.

Customer: “This is discrimination! This is discrimination and I will not have it!”

Me: “Ma’am?”

Customer: “Making the white lady wait for her order while all the Black people get served first! I see how it is!”

I notice the line of three people inside the store happens to be made up of all Black people, entirely a coincidence.

Me: “Ma’am, that’s just the way the line is. Everyone is waiting their turn, so if you could—”

Customer: “No! This is discrimination and this is disgusting! The news said this would start to happen!”

She storms out, and we hope she just joined the line and will have a rant on social media or something. We are very wrong.

She later storms back into the store, still with no mask but with a couple of police officers!

Customer: “That’s them, officers! You need to arrest them for hate crimes!”

The officers look at us and seem to be intelligent enough to surmise the situation. They talk to us, get our explanation, and then finally turn back to the fuming customer.

Officer: “Ma’am, it seems that all you were told to do was wait in line. These workers here even offered the security footage to confirm their version of events, and usually when that kind of evidence is offered, it’s because it’s going to help them. Can you explain, once again, why you feel you have been the victim of a hate crime here?”

Customer: “They asked me to get in line!”

Officer: “And?”

Customer: “I never have to get in line!” 

Officer: “And?”

Customer: “Well… I am feeling discriminated against!”

Officer: “That’s it?”

Customer: “Well… I was the only white customer!”

Officer: “Okay, well, ma’am, what you experienced wasn’t a hate crime or discrimination. I believe it’s called ‘waiting your d*** turn’. You’re lucky I don’t fine you for wasting police time. My partner and I are going to leave now, and you’re going to apologize to these nice workers and buy your sandwich in peace.”

The customer mumbles an apology but leaves without picking up her sandwich.

Officer: *To me* “I’ve seen hate crimes. That woman just didn’t get her way for the first time in her privileged little life and didn’t like it one bit. Call us if she comes back and wants to make a scene.”

Me: “Thank you, officers!”

Luckily for us, she didn’t come back. I got to eat her discrimination sandwich.

Related:
You’ve Lived A Privileged Life If You Think THIS Is Discrimination, Part 3
You’ve Lived A Privileged Life If You Think THIS Is Discrimination, Part 2
You’ve Lived A Privileged Life If You Think THIS Is Discrimination

Some people are so entitled that their worldview collapses when they’re not getting their way for the first time ever. You can see it happening again in these 10 Shocking Stories About The Most Entitled Customers Ever!

I’m a dishwasher at a nursing home. Today, they are serving loaded mashed potatoes and chicken cordon bleu. I pop out to the dining room to grab some dirty dishes off the table and a resident storms up to me, or rather angrily wheels up to me, clutching the to-go box that we give to residents that eat in their rooms.

Resident: “Do you work in the kitchen?!”

I worked retail for many years prior to this, so I put on my “customer service persona.”

Me: “Yes, ma’am. How may I help you?”

Resident: “There were pieces of black plastic in my potatoes! I gave them to the guy to bring to the cook, but then there’s this stuff in my chicken!”

Me: “Ma’am, that’s just ham.”

Resident: “Well, still, there’s black plastic in my food! I don’t want it!

The resident shoves her box at me.

Me: “I’ll go ahead and throw this away for you. Can I get you something else to eat?”

Resident: “A grilled cheese sandwich!”

Me: “All right, a grilled cheese sandwich.”

Resident: “With pickles!”

Me: “That’s a grilled cheese sandwich with pickles. I’ll let the cook know.”

When I went and talked to the cook about it, she told me those “pieces of black plastic” were bacon.