(I work in the kitchen of a café, which is affiliated with the nightclub next door, and there are various doors and hallways that connect cafe, kitchen, and club. The bosses of the café and club are married. As you can imagine, despite them officially being separate businesses, pretty much everything is connected in some way. When I start my morning shift at 6 am, most of the bartenders are still there or getting ready to leave.)

Bartenders: *coming into the kitchen* “Oh, man, it’s so unfair. We’ve been working all night and now you come in here and bake croissants and make everything smell delicious.”

Me: “Well, I just finished this batch. You can have them if you want. There’s also cheese and ham if you want to grill it.”

Bartenders: “Really?! We were just joking…”

(The croissants are ridiculously cheap and the café staff eats for free anyway, so I figure my boss won’t mind.)

Me: “Yeah, go ahead. I’ll just make some new ones for the cafe.”

Bartenders: “This is the best!” *everyone’s happily assembling cheese croissants* “You know, the girl who worked here before would scream at us if we even tried to walk through the kitchen, let alone ask for any food! She said we were all just drunken a**holes trying to steal from [Café Boss].”

Me: “Well, I hope I won’t get in trouble with [Café Boss]. If so I’ll just pay for the croissants this once.”

Bartenders: “Nah, if she gets angry, just send her to us and we’ll explain. [Nightclub Boss] has been thinking of getting us some breakfast now and then, anyway.”

(My boss didn’t mind when I asked her about it, as long as I wrote down what the people from the club ate, for accounting. Now most of the bartenders jokingly call me ‘kitchen mama‘ for feeding them in the morning, and I’ve never had to pay for a drink at the club! Goes to show what being nice can do.)

(I have been asked to help out at a 21st birthday party at work. It’s my first time on table service, working with another staff member. I keep taking orders and drinks out while she mainly chats to the barman. At the end of the night the birthday girl’s father approaches me.)

Father: “Excuse me. Can you come over here so we can order more drinks?”

Me: “Sure!”

Father: *looking around to see where my coworker is* “Here, take this.” *pushes

a folded up $50 note into my hand* “Put it in your pocket and don’t tell the other waitress how much I gave you. You did most of the work while she did as little as she could and flirted with the barman all night.”

(Later, my coworker approaches me.)

Coworker: “Did you get a tip? I got $20. Don’t worry if he didn’t give you as much. It was your first night, after all. You did okay…”

(My coworker and I are on a break.)

Me: “I am missing my cousin’s engagement party tonight.”

Coworker: “Why didn’t you put in for the night off?”

Me: “Mum forgot to give me the invite until it was too late.”

Coworker:  “You should have just called in sick. I do it all the time when I have a party to go to.”

(Two days later, I am working with a different coworker.)

Me:  “I thought I was working with [Coworker] tonight?”

Coworker #2: “Didn’t you hear?”

Me:  “About what?”

Coworker #2: “She called in sick last night so she could go to [Boyfriend]’s work party.”

Me: “Um, doesn’t [Boyfriend] work for our security department?”

Coworker #2: “Yes, the party was here as well and with all the bosses in attendance, the idiot was fired on the spot and escorted off the premises.”

(I am female, and at a party. I work with a computer program that requires a key, or dongle, to operate. It looks something like a USB thumb drive, and at this moment I am wearing it around my neck.)

Friend: “Is that a USB stick?”

(I explain to them that it is a dongle, and not a USB drive.)

Me: “You’re like the ninth person to ask me that. I swear I am going to have sex with the first person to get it right.”

(Just then, my girlfriend arrives.)

Girlfriend: “Are you wearing your dongle?”

(I do a victory fist-pump and our friends crack up. It takes a while to explain to my girlfriend what had happened!)

(It’s kicking out time at the nightclub. A desperate young man  has been making passes at me all night. He comes out with his one final, killer, guaranteed-to-work, chat-up line.)

Desperate Young Man: “Can I come home with you? It won’t take very long.”

(I try to give him a reply, but I laugh too hard.)