(I’m a new legal assistant in a district attorney’s office, and have only recently moved to the state, so I haven’t had contact with many locals. The phone rings:)

Me: “District Attorney’s office. This is [My Name]. Can I help you?”

(I write down the caller ID’s phone number and displayed name.)

Defendant: “I need to speak to the district attorney.”

Me: “He’s not in right now. Can I take a message?”

Defendant: “Why the f*** would I want you to take a f****** message?! I want to speak to the f****** district attorney! I don’t want to leave another f****** message!” *lather, rinse, repeat in variations*

Me: *in every pause he makes* “Sir… Sir… Sir… Sir…”

(I hold the phone away from my ear, so the other legal assistant can hear, too, and look over at her.)

Coworker: “That’s [Defendant]. Just hang up. He’s the guy who lives in the abandoned hotel in [Tiny Town] and who the [Small Town] librarian had to kick out because he was trying to bathe in the library bathroom sink, and left the bathroom so filthy you wouldn’t believe it. And just wait until you see him in court!”

Me: “I’m afraid to ask what he’s done in court.”

Coworker: “He’ll take off his shoe and sock, and the bandages, and show the judge his amputated toes.”

Me: “You can’t make this s**t up.”

(THIS time, he claimed to have MRSA!)

(My boss is a lawyer who uses a computer with two monitors on a daily basis. One day, he calls me into his office to help him.)

Boss: “I’m having a problem with my computer. It won’t go away.”

Me: “What won’t go away?”

Boss: *points to car picture on the second monitor* “That! It won’t go away!”

Me: “Okay, you want a different picture for your wallpaper?”

Boss: “No, I want it to go away!”

Me: “Let’s start over. What do you actually want to see on that screen?”

Boss: “Google. That’s what’s usually there!”

Me: *opens Chrome*

Boss: “Hey, it’s back! How did you do that?”

Me: “…”

(When my husband was 18, he defaulted on a credit card in the amount of $500. Fifteen years later a company starts calling, trying to collect on that defaulted credit card in the amount of $12,000. They call him, me, my mom, my sister, his parents, his siblings, and his grandmother. Repeatedly, at all hours. They start telling him that if he doesn’t pay he will be brought up on federal charges and be a felon. They tell our family that he is a bad person who will go to jail for year. That if we don’t settle with them, they will push for the max penalty and he could go away for 10+ years. At first we think that this is a scam call. It’s scary how much information they have on us. When we look into them they turn out to be an actual debt collection agency. We both start taping the calls; so do my sister and two of my husband’s siblings. We all tell the company to leave us alone and stop calling. My husband and I tell them to either take us to court or leave us alone. After three months of this, we finally take them to court for harassment. This is one of the conversations that we have, to the best of my recollection.)

Their Lawyer: “You can’t use the recordings that your clients made. California requires all parties to be informed that they are being recorded.”

(Our lawyer presses play on one of the recordings:)

Employee From The Company: “This is [Employee] calling from [Company]; is this [My Name]?”

Me: “Yes.”

Employee From The Company: “Just so you know, this call is being recorded for legal purposes…”

(Our lawyer stops the recording:)

Our Lawyer: “Sure sounds like everyone was aware the call was being recorded.”

Their Lawyer: “But they weren’t actually recording the calls.”

Our Lawyer: “Well, maybe they should stop lying to people, and then they wouldn’t be here today.”

(They settled out of court, which was to pay our legal fees, “settle” our account so they couldn’t sell it to anyone else, a small amount of monetary compensation, and to never contact us or anyone in our family again.)

(I’m a secretary in a law firm, and our lawyers, for the most part, do value our work and contribution for the team effort. One in particular is always careful not to bother us with “simple” tasks, but sometimes he takes things too far.)

Lawyer: *to the room at large* “So, how busy is everyone today, on a scale of one to ten?”

Me: “An eight? Anyway, do you need assistance?”

Lawyer: “Oh, an eight… Well, then. No, it’s fine.” *he’s holding a stack of paper and fussing with it* “I needed something scanned.”

Me: “All right. Give it here, then.”

(I hold out my hands, but he hesitates.)

Lawyer: “No! You’re busy! A trained professional shouldn’t be asked to do simple things like this. I’ll do it myself.”

Me: *pause* “Sometimes you should really listen to yourself.”

Coworker: *who has been listening* “Now, give it here and get back to work; there’s a good lawyer.”

(I work for a disability law office and often reach out to hospitals and doctor offices about our clients’ medical records. One office has contacted us to say they have never seen one of our clients, and I request a certain letter be returned to place in their file. Two weeks later, I have to contact the office about the letter, which was never sent. The woman I speak to puts me on hold to search for her fax confirmation for the letter. At first, I pay little attention to the hold music, until the man starts singing a horrible rendition of “Lavender’s Blue.” By the time the song gets near the end, he is screeching the chorus, and I’m barely struggling to contain my laughter. The song ends, I think it’s over, until the song starts up again. By the third round, I’m laughing so hard, I’m struggling to stay quiet and not interrupt my coworkers. About midway through the song, the hold music is interrupted.)

Worker: “Okay, we did find the letter, and you’re right; it didn’t send through. We should be able to send it back through within the next ten minutes.”

Me: *still struggling not to laugh* “Thank you so much. I appreciate it.”

Worker: “Are you okay?”

Me: “Have you ever listened to your hold music?”

Worker: “No, but we’ve been asked who chose our hold music. Is it that bad?”

Me: *laughing hard now* “It’s the worst! But it gave me the best laugh, ever. Whoever this guy is, he’s almost squealing when he sings the chorus.”

Worker: *laughing with me* “Now I have to hear!”

(She had a coworker call through on another line via their cell phone, put it on speaker, and put the call on hold. Within a couple of minutes, we were all laughing at the worst hold song ever chosen.)