Years ago when I worked as a museum educator, I was running a drop-in gallery program. A small girl around five years old confidently approached me and leaned on my table like she was about to smoothly order a drink at a bar. 

Little Girl: “I like this museum, and I would like to work here.”

I was about to play along and ask her if she knew a lot about history when a woman, presumably her mom, appeared behind her

Woman: “No, honey! You can’t work at the museum! Remember…?”

And this little girl sighed, eye-rolled, and said:

Little Girl: “I know, I know! Child labor laws!”

I sensed that they’d had that discussion before. I think that kid is going places!

In the late 1990s (before cell phones were widely used), my sixth-grade class went on a field trip to a couple of local museums. Our school was very small, and our class only had around twenty students, so instead of taking a bus, a few parents volunteered to drive everyone.

We spent a couple of hours at the first museum and then loaded up and travelled about twenty minutes to the second museum, which was showing an IMAX film related to our recent studies.

As my group was walking into the building, we saw one of the parent drivers jogging back to his minivan as fast as his chubby legs would allow. As he ran, he yelled back across the parking lot:

Parent: “WE LEFT MRS. [TEACHER]!”

Yes, we had managed to get every child and parent transported successfully, but we left our teacher in the parking garage at the first museum. Since we were in several vehicles, no one had noticed until we all arrived at the second location and someone realized she was missing. (Again, no cellphones to call for help.)

She did finally make it to the museum in time to head back to school with the rest of the group!

Early in my career as a graphic designer, I was hired by a museum to do a poster for their upcoming exhibition. I came up with two versions. One had a black background with a white headline, and the other one was the inverse: a white background with the type in black.

Client: “I like how the white text stands out from the dark background in this version, but the white background in the other version is so much friendlier. Couldn’t you combine that background with that text?”

The moment those words had left his mouth, he seemed to realize that white type on a white background wouldn’t be an ideal solution.

I work in a museum with a large and famous dinosaur exhibit. I see a father walking around it with his son who can’t be much older than eight or nine years old.

This boy is wearing a T-Rex cap and an Iguanodon T-shirt and is even sporting a “Jurassic Park” belt buckle. He is carrying a pocket guidebook about dinosaurs. He is, without a doubt, a dino kid.

They approach a part of the exhibit where we have a representation of what a dinosaur nest may have looked like, along with an animatronic of an egg hatching.

Dad: “How did they know they laid eggs?”

Kid: “Because they’ve found fossilized eggs, Dad.”

Dad: “Actually, that can’t be true; only bones get turned into fossils, and—”

Kid: “Are you seriously dino-splaining to me?”

It took a lot of effort to remain professional and not burst out laughing!

I am a relatively new employee at a large natural history museum. I give tours to visiting schools. One thing I learned a long time ago is that the kids are usually all great; it’s the parents that you have to watch out for.

During my induction, I am shown a whiteboard in the staff common area. It has a list of odd quotes and descriptions of weird people. I am told that this is a monthly list of all the memorable guest encounters in the museum, with a poll taken at the end of the month about who had the best (or worst) encounter, with a fun little prize. It’s a great way to keep morale high when the guests are at their worst.

I am explaining plate tectonics to a class as they assemble around our giant model of the Earth — a spinning globe showing all the major fault lines.

Parent: “If the Earth is a globe, then how come all the rivers don’t just flow to the bottom?!”

Me: “First of all, there is no if; the Earth is a globe. Secondly, what do you mean by ‘the bottom’? The bottom of what?”

Parent: “Like, the bottom! If the Earth is a ball, then it has a top and bottom, right?”

Me: “We have poles to indicate the axis the Earth spins on, but that’s the only way we’d define an arbitrary top or bottom of the Earth. And the gravity on the surface is what keeps rivers flowing how they do.”

Parent: “Huh… sounds like something an indoctrinated ‘glober’ would say. River flow can be explained so much easier if you account for a flat earth.”

Me: “That’s absolutely not true in even the slightest. Please don’t make such comments around the children, sir, in case they mistake what you’re saying as fact and not nonsense.”

Parent: “You can’t say that to me! I’m a customer!”

Me: “You are a guest, in a place of science and fact. Ask questions about the facts to learn, but do not question the facts themselves. Now, may I continue my tour, or will you keep interrupting?”

The parent remained blissfully silent and sullen for the rest of the tour. 

At the end of the day, I went over to the whiteboard and wrote down “flat-earther” as my craziest encounter. The sad part? I didn’t even win that month.