I’m going through airport security to get home. I have a water bottle on me, but I know it can’t have water, so I just leave the ice and plan to get more before the flight. As I show my ID and boarding pass, I decide to confirm it’s all right.

Me: “Hey, is it okay if I bring this through? It’s just ice.”

I shake the bottle a bit so she can hear it. She looks tired and responds like I’m an idiot.

TSA Agent: “That’s fine. Ice isn’t water.”

I am outside the visitors’ center at a national park with a glorious view of the mountains. I am pointing some features out in the distance to a group of visitors.

Me: “So, if you look just up there, above the tree line—”

Guest: “Why did they stop planting trees at the tree line?”

Me: “Oh, uh… Well, the tree line is simply an altitude at which there is a lack of nutrients in the soil or it’s too cold for trees to grow. It’s why the tallest mountains are either totally bare or only covered in grasses and small shrubs.”

Guest: “Oh! That’s amazing! I need to write that down so I can tell this to my family!”

When [Friend] told me this story, I just HAD to get her permission to share it. She gave it, so here we go. Fair warning: I fear the number of IQ points that may be lost in reading this.

[Friend] started dating [Idiot] about two years before this incident. Things seemed to be going all right between them. She told me he was a bit of a derp and sometimes incredibly oblivious to some things. He couldn’t pick up subtle cues, and even suggestions flew over his head with about a mile of airspace between his skull and the suggestion. She originally chalked it up to him being on the autism spectrum, as she has a few other friends who have similar problems picking up cues. So, she just switched her behavior from “talking to neurotypical” to “talking to neurodivergent”, and the bumps smoothed out for a while.

All was well and good.

Then, the talk of taking the relationship seriously came up — marriage, becoming a family, etc.

And that’s when the relationship began to die.

[Idiot] announced that he wanted to DNA test [Friend]’s kids to make sure they were his — the kids who were five and three when [Friend] and [Idiot] started dating.

[Friend] said she had to come to a full stop in the conversation for several seconds while her brain rebooted.

Friend: “They’re not your kids. You know they’re not. My ex-husband and I had them together before I ever met you.”

Idiot: “Yeah, and now that we’re getting married, they’ll become mine. I just want to DNA test them to be sure of it.”

Friend: “Let me see if I understand this. Do you… Do you actually think my children’s DNA will… change… to become biologically yours?”

Idiot: “Obviously. I just want the confirmation on paper, is all.”

There was a long conversation about how DNA didn’t work that way, with his rebuttal that adopting them would make them BECOME his. Then, there had to be a conversation about how becoming his children would only happen on paper, and in the legal system. She had to explain that, no, the children would NOT magically transform into his own biological children once the paperwork was filled out. He kept insisting that EVERYBODY said the kids became theirs once adoption happened. She explained the concept of “adopted children are loved just as much as if they were biological”, and that was what that meant. He insisted that everything pointed to kids BECOMING “theirs.”

[Friend]’s mom eventually had to become involved to back [Friend] up. His DAD had to become involved to back [Friend] up. A few books had to get involved to back [Friend] up.

[Idiot] was furious! He couldn’t understand why people would EVER adopt a kid if the kid didn’t “become” the actual, biological child of the people who took them in. He went on about how stupid and selfish it was for kids to retain the DNA of the sperm or egg donor! How could any kid who wanted to be adopted REFUSE to change one little thing so they could have parents?! “DNA doesn’t work that way” is a bulls*** excuse!

He ranted and raved, and right in front of his own parents, he told her that if her kids weren’t going to become his kids, then the marriage wasn’t going to happen.

He told her that he would give them all a week to change their minds and agree to be his biological kids. He said that WHEN they stopped being selfish, and WHEN the DNA test proved it, he would take the kids in.

Friend: *To me* “And that’s how the relationship ended.”

Me: “Uhhhh, wait. Hang on. Was he just looking for an excuse to break it off? Did he just get cold feet, or want to date around some more, or…?”

Friend: “Nope. He really is just that stupid. His mom called me on the sly and very gently suggested that I just break it off with [Idiot], because no matter how much she and his dad talk to him, he’s adamant about it. He’s even saying that he will never date a woman with kids from here on out unless they agree to change their DNA to become his if the relationship becomes serious.”

So, [Friend] is single again, having dodged a tactical nuke.

For the record, the father of [Friend]’s kids is still fully in the kids’ lives, has full parental rights, and has 50/50 custody, so adoption wasn’t even on the table. It just didn’t come up in the conversation due to the stupidity of the DNA topic taking over [Friend]’s brain space.

I work in transportation logistics. We make sure that freight is delivered on time. We have a customer that is… difficult… to say the least. They are the type of company that wants to complain about anything. If we deliver every load we have for them, they want to complain about how we can’t deliver the freight that is still on a freight barge in the middle of the Ocean and are “refusing to deliver their freight”. If we miss a load, they want to complain about how we can’t do anything right.

They decide to go overboard one day and send me to a breaking point. Something that needs to be known about this customer: they will only allow us to deliver ten loads a day. Period. End of story.

We just received sixty loads we have to deliver to them. Okay, this is easy; ten loads a day means it will take six days to deliver all the freight. Ten times six equals sixty. Well… at least I thought this was easy.

The customer has a literal fit when we tell them this. They tell us that we are “refusing to deliver their freight in a timely manner”. They demand a call with us.

Customer: *Screaming at the top of their lungs* “This is unacceptable! How can you even tell us it will take six days to deliver all our freight?!”

Me: “I am not sure I am following. You will only allow us to deliver ten loads a day. We have sixty loads. That will take us six days to deliver.”

Customer: “Unacceptable! How can you be so stupid?! Six days. Can you even do math?!”

Me: *Slightly agitated but still professional* “Apparently not? Please advise what you mean and how we are not making the delivery timely. Again, we can only deliver ten loads a day to you. Has this changed?”

Customer: “No, it hasn’t! You can only deliver ten loads a day. I mean…” *Frustrated sigh* “Six days. I cannot believe how f****** stupid you are. I demand a call with the president of the company!”

Me: “Absolutely. Let me get with him and we can go from there.”

I call the president and tell him what is going on. The president is shocked and annoyed by what I’m telling him. But, as the customer (who does a lot of business with us) is upset, he agrees to a call at 2:30 that afternoon.

We have the call. The customer is still irate and screaming that we are being too slow and that they cannot believe it will take six days to deliver sixty loads. My president and I do everything we can to try to explain to them that ten times six equals sixty, but the customer refuses to accept it. We ask them five different ways if we can deliver more loads a day. This is always met with a resounding “No!” The customer is also not supporting any counter-offers for how we can deliver more quickly in their eyes. They are simply appalled that… ten times six equals sixty?

We spend TWO HOURS on this conference call, and nothing is resolved. Frankly, we are at an impasse in any negotiations. My customer simply refuses to accept that ten times six equals sixty. We end the call with the fact that we will deliver the loads, ten a day, and that is the best we can do based on the parameters the customer has set. I leave the office that day frustrated and upset.

The very next day, the customer sends us an email. When I read it, I literally start beating my head on the desk.

Email: “After the call yesterday, we still do not understand your incompetence. However, we must ask: if we allow you to deliver twelve loads a day, will that shorten the timeframe for you to deliver all the freight?”

UUUUUUGH

Related:
Math Is Your Friend, Part 11
Math Is Your Friend, Part 10
Math Is Your Friend, Part 9
Math Is Your Friend, Part 8
Math Is Your Friend, Part 7

I’m doing a job interview for a pretty standard retail working position. There’s a collection of bulls*** questions that we’re required to ask and document the answer to as part of standardizing the hiring process.

I have an applicant in front of me.

Me: “What’s your greatest strength?”

Applicant: “I’m very fast at math. Ask me a math problem.”

Humoring her, I ask:

Me: “What’s seven plus fifteen?”

She responds almost instantly.

Applicant: “Three.”

Me: “That’s… not the answer.”

Applicant: “No, but it was fast, wasn’t it?”

I laughed. I hired her. A sense of humor is a useful skill working retail.