(For a few months, I spend two days a week working in a large museum. I work in one of the offices in a staff-only area so I don’t get to see much of the museum during the day, and wear business clothes. As a result, I only know for sure where one exhibit is. I explore during lunch. On my first day:)

Visitor: “Hi, excuse me, do you work here?”

(I look down at my staff pass.)

Me: “Uh, yeah.”

Visitor: “Great. Could you tell me where the Assyrian exhibit is?”

Me: “Um … I … don’t actually know. I think it’s down there but I’ve only just started working here. Oh, but that guy over there will know.”

(The next day:)

Visitor: “Can you tell me where the dinosaur exhibit is?”

Me: “I don’t know, sorry, but that guy will.”

(Later, I ask my boss about that one. He tells me the dinosaur exhibit is in an entirely different museum. After a couple of weeks, I take my pass off when i go to explore so that people will stop asking me for directions. But as I come out of one of the staff-only doors…)

Visitor: “Oh, hi! Could you give me directions to the Japanese exhibit?”

Me: “It’s on the fifth floor… somewhere…”

Visitor: “Sorry, I thought you worked here because you came out of that door.”

Me: “I do work here… Sorry.”

(Even when nobody sees me leaving through a door, people still guess I work there and ask directions, to which I never seem to be able to help. Fast forward to my penultimate day working in the museum.)

Visitor: “Hi, excuse me, do you… Oh, no, sorry, I thought you worked here.”

Me: “I, uh, do.”

Visitor: “So could you tell me where the Germany exhibit is?”

Me: “I… yes. I can. Go right, then go up the stairs on your left and it’s the hall to the right of the first landing.”

Visitor: “Great, thanks!”

(Why couldn’t this intimate knowledge have come to me earlier than my penultimate day?)

(I’m standing in line at the 9/11 memorial in New York, waiting to go in for the 2 pm viewing. As you can imagine, it’s very crowded. Each ticket is booked for a specific time to prevent overcrowding and to keep numbers at safe levels. It’s currently 1:30 pm; I’ve gotten in line early as I expected there would be a lot of people – which there is. There is an employee standing near the entrance to the lines directing people where they should stand. All of a sudden a woman pushes in front of me…)

Woman: *shouting* “I HAVE A 1 pm TICKET! YOU HAVE TO LET ME IN NOW!”

Employee: “I apologize, but you will need to go to the back of the line. You will still be able to get in with that ticket but I cannot allow you to push in front of the other patrons.”

Woman: “No. I should be let in first. I bought an earlier ticket then they did.”

Employee: *sigh* “Can I have a look at your ticket, please?”

Woman: *triumphantly thrusting a piece of paper in his face* “Here!”

Employee: *looking at piece of paper a little bigger than a credit card with ‘reference’ and numbers scrawled after it* “Ma’am, this isn’t a ticket… I can’t let you into the museum with this. You will need to go to the ticket window so they can print it for you, the line is just over there to your left.”

Woman: *now irate* “WHAT? You expect me to stand in a line? Look up my reference number and let me in NOW!”

Employee: “I have no facilities to do that with. The only people that can help you with that are in the ticket office. You need to—”

Woman: *now screaming* “NO! I SHOULDN’T HAVE TO STAND IN LINES! THAT’S WHY I BOOKED AN EARLY TICKET AND CAME LATE! I’M SMARTER THAN THEM!” *gesturing to other people in line*

(A HUGE security guard appears, and speaks to the employee:)

Security Guard: “Is there anything wrong here? I can escort her off the premises if you need.”

Woman: *sizing up security guard* “Oh… the ticket line is over here, you say?”

(I work in a museum bookstore where we sell a lot of expensive, hardcover art books. A customer brings up an unwrapped exhibition catalog and shows me his receipt and the damage to the top edge of the pages.)

Customer: “Can I exchange this for another?”

(I look at the damage. It’s not bad, but when a customer pays eighty dollars for a book they want it to be perfect.)

Me: “Certainly. There are others right here.”

(I pick one up from the stack and glance at the edges before I hand it to him. They’re perfect.)

Customer: “Thanks. I’d just like to check the new one before I leave the store.”

Me: “Let me unwrap that for you—”

(I hold my hand out to take the new book back and do it for him, but it’s too late. The gentleman has very helpfully whipped out his credit card and used the edge to slit the shrink wrap like a paper knife. He did so very vigorously. So vigorously that the credit card tore into and through the page edges, damaging the pages in a different spot from, but identical to, the way the pages on the original book were damaged.)

Me: “That wasn’t like that when I handed it to you. Did you open the first one that way?”

Customer: *sheepish look spreads over his face*

Me: “Would you like to keep the first book you damaged or the second one?”

Customer: “The… second one.”

(I hand it to him, and he slinks off. For all I know he went to another shop to exchange the second book for another new one…but I bet he didn’t tear into it with his credit card like that again.)

(I go on a romantic trip to the museum with my boyfriend. We’re wandering around the creatures they have on display, when suddenly:)

Boyfriend: “Babe, what even are these? I’ve never heard of.. ‘Bar-nah-clays’?”

Me: “Honey, those are barnacles…”

Boyfriend: “Oh.”

(I am 12. I am at a technology museum with my family. I love to do the stupidest things to my brothers. This particular day, my littlest brother is wearing a green hoodie and black sweats. After wandering around for about half an hour, I see my second-to-youngest brother standing next to a cool exhibit for a SCUBA simulator where you lie on your stomach and steer this handle to move the diver. I spy my littlest brother in his green hoodie using it.)

Me: “SHARK’S GONNA EAT YOU!”

(I then bite him in the butt. As hard as I could. It wasn’t my brother…)