A bunch of teens and a few people who were likely in their early twenties came into our small grocery store and stole all the mobility scooters. They jousted with them in the parking lot and in the store and absolutely trashed the back. This was in itself a pain to clean up since we have a Renaissance festival nearby this time of year which swamps us with customers, but what really sucked is what happened after we caught them all and kicked them out.

The exact moment I started to relax again, another employee came running up to the front to talk to the manager.

Coworker: “Those kids also trashed the men’s restroom!”

I didn’t think this would be too bad when I was immediately sent to clean it, but I took one step inside that door and vomited hard.

They had covered the entire restroom in SOY SAUCE, and no, I’m not joking. It was up the walls, in the toilet and urinal, and all over the floor, and that stuff smelled so bad

Then, when I had finished cleaning it all up, the same manager who told me to go back there berated me for taking so long even though I told them that I had no experience with legit cleaning supplies; I was kinda poor so rags and water were about the gist of it. That was the icing on the crap cake.

When I worked in retail, we had this lady who was incredibly annoying. She would be picking up meds for herself, her husband, or her daughter — who was eighteen and on [ADHD medication] — and she would always give us the biggest attitude when we asked for the full date of birth associated with the patient.

Customer: “It’s a HIPAA violation! What if someone hears it? I’m a lawyer, you know.”

Cool, except her daughter had the same name, month, and day of birth, and the same drug but different doses as another patient. We had to confirm the year so there wouldn’t be a mix-up, but she threw a fit every single time.

Sometimes the daughter would come in and pick up her or her mom’s or dad’s meds. [Daughter] was a sweetheart, which was surprising given how much of a monster her mom was. She was a no-fuss patient, gave us the information we needed, and was on her way.

One day, [Customer] and [Daughter] came in together. I asked for the daughter’s full date of birth, which in turn caused [Customer] to rampage into her “I’m a lawyer” speech. However, today, for some reason, her daughter snapped.

Daughter: “MOM, STOP TELLING EVERYONE YOU’RE A LAWYER! YOU HAVE A LIBERAL ARTS DEGREE! YOU CAN’T ARGUE YOUR WAY OUT OF A PAPER BAG! MY DATE OF BIRTH IS [FULL DATE OF BIRTH] AND I DON’T CARE WHO HEARS IT!”

My entire pharmacy team stopped what they were doing in stunned silence. [Daughter] stormed off, and [Customer] was basically speechless for the entire transaction. She snatched the drugs from me and walked out.

I still think about this four years later and it gives me so much joy.

We had a lady FLIP OUT because we run a summer camp in conjunction with the local YMCA.

Lady: “That’s a Christian organization! You can’t put up these signs in schools because of the separation of church and state! I will be contacting my lawyer!”

We never heard from a lawyer.

Client: “I can’t concentrate when you keep tapping like that!”

Me: “I’m typing. This is the sound of typing.”

Client: “No, THIS is the sound of typing.”

He starts gingerly finger-pecking the keys.

Client: “Notice the difference?”

Me: “All right, then. This is the sound of work actually getting done.”

Client: “It’s the sound of a jerk being a… jerk, if you ask me.”

I don’t work for him anymore.

It is during the early stages of the transition between analog house phones and digital models, so this is the first time a router has been installed at this caller’s mom’s house. She’d never needed a router before, so the process is a little more complicated than it is nowadays.

But the problem isn’t the router, it’s the caller.

While I try to navigate him through the process of initiating the basic setup, he gets angrier and angrier, yelling at me that I don’t know what to do while skipping most of the necessary steps, insisting on doing unnecessary things, or using his preferred software even if it doesn’t work. I don’t even get him to log into the router software to enter the needed data.

Finally, he rage-screams something about women taking men’s jobs and I hear the mobile clattering on a surface and him slamming a door.

The next thing I hear is rustling and a shy voice calling, “Hello?” It’s his mom, who begs me to get her phone online.

Her son has left his laptop up and running, so I lead this sixty-plus-year-old woman who has never touched a computer before through every little step — explaining to her how to use the mouse, explaining how to type, and explaining where to put the address of the router — and lead her step by step through the setup assistant, and we get her phone up and running.

The most time is spent on finding a sufficient browser since her son had insisted on one with which our router software doesn’t agree with. She needs a lot of descriptions and I have to explain literally everything on screen just using my tech dummies as reference, but she does that active listening trick where she repeats everything I say back to me before doing it and asks really good questions when she encounters something she doesn’t understand, so it goes slowly, but I never have to repeat myself and she does exactly as told.

To her son’s credit, he was well prepared and everything she needed was there — the passwords, the data, etc.

The whole call takes me far too long and my team leader is not happy, but the lady is so proud of herself, so it’s totally worth it! She even writes me some great feedback, mentioning my name! I find out about this when the company sends me a lovely letter with a copy of her letter attached.

I’ve helped countless people, but this sweet lady stood out. I’ll always remember that call.