The grocery store I’m shopping at today has mostly self-checkout lanes. The single cashier-aided lane is currently unmanned.

I go to one of the self-checkout kiosks and start scanning my groceries. From the kiosk next to me, I hear:

Customer: *Beep* “F***.” *Beep* “F***.” *Beep* “F***.”

I look over and see a middle-aged woman in a fuzzy tweed-looking black and white jacket with thin white and black stripes repeatedly scanning an item. It beeps, and a popup on the screen says, “Invalid barcode.” She says, “F***”, dismisses the error message, and tries again. Over and over.

I figure what’s most likely going on is the self-checkout kiosk has, for whatever reason, decided that her jacket is a barcode and is attempting to scan it. I don’t say anything; it’s none of my business. And I could be wrong; I’d rather be silent than speak up and look like a moron.

A store employee wanders over to the woman.

She explains to the store employee that the scanner isn’t working, and then scans her box and says, “F***,” to demonstrate. The employee scans the box. It works perfectly. The employee starts to wander away.

She grabs another item from her cart.

Customer: *Beep* “F***.”

The employee takes the item. It scans perfectly. The employee starts to walk away again. She takes another item from her cart. No bueno. She calls the employee back and makes him redo every item that doesn’t scan.

Customer: *Beep* “F***. Here.” *Beep* “F***. Here.” *Beep* “F***. Here.”

This looked like it could go on for a while, but I ran out of items to scan, so I paid and walked away. As I walked out, I glanced into her cart.

It was pretty full.

I am clinically diagnosed with ADHD, but I hate taking my Adderall, so I often substitute ungodly amounts of caffeine for my pills.

I’m ordering coffee for my fellow workers on my shift in my office: one smoothie for the receptionist, one green tea latte for a coworker, one dirty chai for another coworker, and a monstrosity with twelve espresso shots for me.

It’s a busy day. The line to the door stretches out the door. I ordered ahead online, though.

The foyer is tightly packed, but I wait patiently for the office’s caffeine load. Shortly, as often happens when I’m feeling crowded and overheated, I start having to pee.

I leave and go to the bathroom. When I return, I see my drinks in another woman’s hands. She has two kids with her. I walk over to her.

Me: “Ma’am, I think you might have grabbed the wrong drinks. See, that’s my name on the side.”

Woman: “I don’t care.”

Me: “But… my name’s on them.”

Woman: “You didn’t want them as much as I wanted them, or else you would have taken them before I got to them.”

Me: “I was in the bathroom!”

Woman: “Thus, you didn’t want them.”

Me: “But those are my drinks.”

Woman: “They’re mine now.” *To one of her kids* “Here, have a mocha.”

And she hands my omega-caffeine drink to one of her kids.

Me: “But that drink—”

Woman: “I don’t care! I have three kids. One of them is waiting in the car for me! It’s ninety degrees outside! I can’t wait in a long line like this!”

The little kid starts chugging my drink. The baristas are too busy to take notice of all this. The line is still really quite long.

Me: “Well, maybe you should have thought about that before you went to get a coffee!”

Woman: “How dare you?! You don’t know what it’s like parenting three children! I deserve these drinks more than a childless b**** like you!”

Kid: “Mommy…”

Woman: “Shh! Can’t you see I’m talking with this lady?”

Kid: “Mommy, this mocha tastes funny.”

The woman rounds on me.

Woman: “What did you put in your drink?! Are you trying to poison my child?!”

The kid passes it to her other kid, and the other kid starts drinking my mocha.

Kid: “See? Tastes funny.”

Other Kid: “Well, I like it.”

Me: “Look. I have ADHD and—”

Woman: “I don’t give a s*** if you’re the Queen of England. What are you trying to poison my child with?!”

Me: “I wasn’t trying to—”

Woman: “Shut up when I’m talking to you, r****d.”

At this point, I am too frustrated, and I do something very stupid. I start screaming as loud as I can, and I grab the green tea latte, which is very staining, and throw it onto the other woman.

While she stands there dripping and shocked, I grab the other two drinks from the platter and throw them in the direction of the waste bin, one after the other. I don’t know if they actually go in or if I miss. Then, I turn and flee into the bathroom, locking the door behind me.

I start shaking and crying. I am a moron. Images of being arrested for assault start dancing through my head.

Someone starts pounding on the door of the bathroom. It’s the woman with the kids, and she is shouting incoherently and slamming at the door. The door frame starts splintering a little with the force of the slams.

I hear a scuffling outside and the slamming stops. There is more shouting and yelling. I am too scared to go out. Things quiet down.

Eventually, there is a more polite knock at the door.

Voice: “Ma’am, could you please come out of the restroom and provide your side of the story?”

I open the door a crack. It is the police. The lobby has been cleared, and the woman who stole the office coffee order is sitting against a wall in cuffs. Her two kids are nowhere to be seen.

Me: “Uh… first off, she said she had a third child in the car. It’s ninety degrees outside. Can you check the car for her child?”

Police: “Yes, we’ve handled it.”

Me: “Okay, well…”

I repeated the story. They wound up charging me with misdemeanor assault. The woman was banned from that coffee shop, and the officers told me that the woman would be charged with child endangerment, assault (she’d apparently attacked employees who’d tried to get her to stop slamming on the bathroom door), damage to property, assaulting an officer, resisting arrest, and theft.

I got a free replacement for the office’s coffee.

When I explained why I was late getting back to work, my coworkers were very understanding and let me take the rest of the day off.

I later wound up vacating the charges by pleading guilty, but it won’t show up on my record if I don’t get into trouble again for two years. (I don’t really understand how it works. I’m not a lawyer. This is just how it was explained to me.)

I don’t know what happened to the woman after that.

I work for a chain grocery store. I recently got my appendix out, but I’ve been cleared to return to work for light duty.

I’m walking between duty stations when I see a customer who’s clearly reading a blog on his phone. He’s leaning against the cart, nose in the phone, scrolling with one hand. He’s near the end of the aisle.

To get where I need to go, I need to go either around the back of the aisle or across the front of the aisle in front of him. I wait a little bit, staring at him, to see if he’s going to move. He doesn’t seem like he’s going to move.

I’m achy, and I don’t want to walk around to the back to cross the aisle, so I start to cross in front of him.

Bad decision! He starts moving forward again, abruptly, as I cross in front of him. He catches me right in the side with the cart and knocks me over. His phone goes flying out of his hand, and he also falls over behind the cart.

I scramble across the ground and grab his phone. I notice it’s showing NAR.

He’s apologizing profusely to me as I lever myself up and hand his phone back to him. I feel really bad inside, but I tell him it’s okay so that he’ll stop following me around apologizing, and I go to the back to talk to my manager. My manager authorizes me to leave.

I first visit an urgent care clinic but am soon sent by ambulance to an emergency room

I turn out to be bleeding internally because the cart got me in just the wrong way to tear open something related to the appendectomy. The hospital is able to fix it, and Workman’s Comp will pay for it, since it’s an accident that happened at work.

Ultimately, I think I’m going to be okay, but I’m off work again while I recover from this.

Anyway, NAR readers: please don’t NAR and shop.

I’m a tax accountant. It’s off-season work, so I’m not following a strictly professional dress code: I’m wearing a T-shirt from a local gym that I use.

Client: “Hey, I know that gym. Is that your other job when you’re not doing taxes?”

Me: “I’m flattered that you think I’m fit enough to be a personal trainer, but no.”

Client: “This is a little awkward, but I was actually thinking cleaning staff.”

Me: “Ouch.”

I work in a very share-and-share-alike-style office. We often bring in treats to share with the office, such as pies, muffins, cupcakes, etc. I’ve brought my fair share of things to share with the office, as well!

But… I really like cheesecake. And I find, during my break, a huge fourteen-inch cheesecake that’s on clearance for only $8. I buy it and put it in the work fridge, intending to take it home and share it with my family, who also like cheesecake.

The next thing I know, all of my coworkers are walking around with slices of cheesecake. I realize I forgot to put something that says, “Not for sharing,” on the cheesecake! I rush to the breakroom… and find that only one slice is left.

With a sigh, I eat it before anyone else can get to it.

Later, I hear someone asking around about it.

Coworker: “Who brought in the cheesecake?”

Me: “That was me.”

They handed me a thank-you card from most of the office for the cheesecake.

So… I’m frustrated, but simultaneously, it’s a somewhat warm, fuzzy feeling. I’m conflicted.