Many years ago, I started working for a minor company, and pretty much everybody warned me that [Coworker #1] (among others) was a major moocher. “Don’t ever loan him money!”

After a month or so, I’d confirmed that, and I’d also learned that [Coworker #1] was a MAJOR pest.

The next time he hit me up for a loan “until payday”, I “reluctantly” let myself be convinced.

He should have known better.

I started reminding him of the loan several days before payday. On payday, of course, he didn’t have the money. By a week or so after payday, he flinched when he heard my voice, and he was actively avoiding me! It was marvelous!

A couple of months later, a female coworker that [Coworker #1] had a crush on came over to my machine, obviously irritated. [Coworker #2] seemed rather surprised that [Coworker #1] didn’t tag along all the way over there. I wasn’t surprised in the slightest!

She made some disparaging remark about him, so I asked if she wanted him to go away.

Coworker #2: “YES!”

Me: “No problem!”

I stepped around the corner.

Me: “Hey, [Coworker #1], about—”  

[Coworker #1] disappeared so fast, I swear there was a sonic boom!

[Coworker #2] was staring when I came back around the corner, laughing.

Coworker #2: “How did you do that?!”

Me: “Magic! Say the magic words, and the annoying little git disappears every time!”

I eventually explained things to [Coworker #2], and she thought it was hilarious.

And it turned out that there was someone else who had done the same thing I had. We were amazed that [Coworker #1] never paid either one of us off to make it stop.

This happened back in 2014 when I managed a small, locally-owned vape shop.

It’s been a long day, and my employee and I are cleaning up to close when the door opens. In walks this guy with a swagger the likes of which I will never forget. He’s clutching a brown paper bag and a small pair of pruning shears, holding these tight to his chest as if his life depends on their safety. As soon as he approaches the glass display cases, my employee and I both look at each other. We know that swagger: meth.

It’s hard to describe to someone who hasn’t been face-to-face with someone like this, but there’s this specific crab-walk they do when looking at things lower than torso height — dramatically bent knees, legs out to the sides, bouncing from side to side like a crustacean on a lethal dose of caffeine. [Guy] is looking through our product cases, crab-walking across them, pointing at random items, and repeating, “WAZZAT?! WAZZAT?! HOWMUCHIZZAT?! GIMMEDAT!”

I know better than to confront these people; they’re volatile and unpredictable. I keep my business face on and try to get through this ordeal as professionally as possible. He chooses a lanyard (for an old-style vape pen, clearly useless for him), and we go to the register. We’re watching this guy’s every little movement. My employee (relatively recently released from prison for, of all things, drug charges) is tense; he’s ready to fight.

And then, the reason for the visit was revealed. I know the hundred-dollar bill is a fake as soon as he pulls it out of the brown paper bag, but I play along and don’t immediately call him out. I do my normal big bill check, holding it up against the light to see a missing watermark and security strip. (We didn’t use counterfeit pens; that’s another story). Of course, it’s a fake.

Me: “Sorry, I can’t take this.” *Hands back the bill*

Guy: “WHY NOT?!”

Me: “It’s a fake.”

Guy: *Visibly enraged* “HOW DO YOU KNOW?!”

Me: “No security features; it’s fake.”

The guy points the pruning shears at me like a knife.

Guy: “YOU WANNA SHOW ME A REAL ONE?!“

And that’s when I drop the mask. I break; this is too absurd. I can’t help but laugh in the face of this clearly deranged person. What is he going to do? Trim me and enter me into his neighborhood’s prettiest lawn contest?

Me: *Snorting with laughter* “No?”

He waves the pruning shears around… threateningly? 

Guy: “WELL, YOU’RE A F****** LIAR, THEN!”

He stomped away like a petulant child, kicking over an innocent trash can on his way out the door. We never saw him again, but legends say he’s still trying to get change for that fake Benjamin.

I am a pharmacy tech at a fairly large retail chain on Long Island. While most of our customers are lovely, we have quite a few rather wealthy customers who are just… out of touch with how normal people work.

I had a person ask me over the phone to grab a whole laundry list (about forty items) of items from our front end. When I explained that I couldn’t do that but would ring him up at the pharmacy instead of the front end, since this time of night was never busy, he casually offered me $200 to do it. When I was quiet for a second, wondering if this was a prank, he upped the offer to $300!

I apologized and again told him that I couldn’t do that. (Corporate policy, apparently, says that we cannot sell front-end items out of the drive-thru, so it wasn’t just my own discomfort.) He sighed, said they would shop elsewhere, and thanked me for my time.

When he and his wife came to pick up their prescriptions, they were quite nice but insisted on trying to tip me $40 for ringing up their prescriptions. My pharmacist genuinely had to go up and tell them that we were not allowed to accept tips but we thanked them for visiting [Store], after my “thank you, but I can’t accept this” didn’t deter them!

All around, they’re very sweet people, but my goodness, it’s always a rollercoaster with them.

This happened during my second week as a pharmacy tech, and six months later, they still ask me (and all of my fellow techs) if we’re SURE we can’t accept anything.

I do taxes (mostly) for farmers. As such, I have to be fairly flexible about certain matters around payment. I don’t know exactly why so many of my clients are allergic to paying in cash, but many of my clients have engaged in significant barter transactions.

For example, one farmer I worked with paid a man to fix his irrigation system with a half-dozen chickens.

Another farmer paid someone to mow the lawn of his (personal) house every week with a basket full of fresh fruits and vegetables.

One farmer traded a prize-winning pig for some sort of hand-forged Japanese-style sword.

Probably the funniest is when they try to barter with me. I’m used to accepting a year’s supply of milk, eggs, or whatever in exchange for my services from several of my clients, but one year, a client offered me a whole live calf.

I had to turn it down. I don’t know how to raise a calf, and I know they eat more in feed than I can afford.

I strongly suspect that the farmer in question was planning on exchanging a year’s supply of animal feed for my services going forward.

A thirty-minute ambulance ride with three EMTs, one dose of steroids, and a nebulizer treatment (respiratory failure) resulted in a bill of over $1,500. Because I was on disability and only received about $800 a month, I just didn’t have it.

I called a couple of times to try to set up a payment plan, but no one ever called back, so it went to collections. I got the letter and saw that the collection agency had a specific phone line for setting up payments. 

Collector: “What kind of plan are you thinking of?”

Me: “I can pay about $100 a month.”

Collector: “Ma’am, are you aware of how much this bill is?”

Me: “Yes, I—”

Collector: “$100 a month will take you over a year to pay off.”

Me: “I know, but—”

Collector: “I’ll tell you what. We can set you up on four payments of—”

Me: “No. I can barely make this payment. I’m on disability. I only get $800 a month as it is.”

Collector: “Okay, so if you do $400 a month—”

I lost it.

Me: “Are you f****** kidding? Can you pay for everything in your life with $400 a month? I have to buy medications and food and—”

Collector: “Ma’am—”

Me: “I am offering $100 a month, and that is it.”

Collector: “I can’t approve that.”

Me: “Then find someone who can, or you won’t see a penny.”

Collector: “Hold on.”

I know it was rude. I know he was “just doing his job” and someone will undoubtedly say that I shouldn’t have taken the ambulance if I couldn’t afford it. Since the other option was dying, I took the ambulance.

After a few minutes, he returned to the line.

Collector: “I spoke with my supervisor. If you can make your first payment right now, we can approve $100 a month. But if you’re late once, the whole bill will be due. You will owe $100 by the fifteenth of every month.”

I get my payments on the tenth, so that worked.

Me: “Fine, thank you.”

It was a rough year, but with the help of my friends and family, I paid my debt in full.