In the late 1990s to early 2000s, I was a tech at a small computer store. A woman brought in her malfunctioning computer and paid a rush charge to have it looked at right away. While I was checking her machine in, she was going on and on about being an attorney and needing the computer fixed quickly to be able to serve her clients. I handed her our standard disclaimer about data loss, etc., and asked her to sign.

Before I could finish explaining what it was, she grabbed my pen, signed the form without looking at it, and walked off.

I made note of her name in case I ever needed an attorney, so I could remember not to use her.

Our lobby is going to be closing soon, so my manager sends me out to vacuum the floor. There are a number of customers seated, eating, so my vacuuming will be limited to the places where no one is seated. The vacuum is old and practically worthless in terms of cleaning, but my manager insists that there isn’t money available for a new one.

As I get started, I feel gas building, and I end up farting. It’s a long one, too. The sound is covered by the noisy vacuum, so I keep going.

As I vacuum my way past a customer, I can hear them utter a yelp of horror over the noise. They are staring at my vacuum with expressions of absolute horror and disgust.

One of them says to me, “The motor is burning out.”

I don’t confess, mostly because I’m too embarrassed. I just nod with a straight face and keep going, dragging the smell behind me. Five minutes later, the smell has permeated the entire lobby. In those five minutes, everyone has complained to the manager about the smell of the “vacuum,” and everyone clears out. It’s still fifteen minutes until we close our lobby, but no customers have remained to tough it out.

The manager comes out from behind the counter and stops dead when he meets the wall of scent. He gives my vacuum the same look of horror and disgust, gestures for me to stop vacuuming, and sends me to do other duties.

A few days later, a brand new vacuum is mysteriously afforded, and the old one is disposed of.

I’ve never confessed.

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My parents were visiting from out of state, so we were picking up some snacks and supplies for their hotel room. My dad uses a CPAP that requires purified water, and we didn’t realize until we were waiting in line that we’d forgotten it. It was just before the holidays, and the store was packed, so I jogged back and grabbed a bottle while my parents were waiting to be rung up.

When I returned, another couple had pushed their heavily-loaded cart up and were starting to unload, and my parents’ order was almost done. As it would take a little finagling to get past the other couple and their cart, and as I’m a six-foot-tall woman, I just leaned over their order on the belt and placed the bottle of water at the end of my parents’ items, saying cheerfully, “‘Scuze me! Yoink!”

I then carefully moved around their cart and rejoined my parents, and only then realize the couple was staring at me, agog. I started wondering what was going on when the man looked from my mother to me and said, “Oh! You’re with them!“

I blinked and then started laughing. “Oh, my God, yes. I was grabbing something for them… I’m sorry, did you think I just tried to cut in line by saying, ‘Yoink’? Holy cow, that would make me the biggest jerk ever. I’m so sorry!”

He started laughing, as well. “I was actually kind of impressed that a lady apparently had brass balls bigger than mine!” The cashier looked infinitely relieved that an incident was avoided, and the gentleman and I laughed about my “epic rudeness” for the rest of the sale.

I work at a local ice cream shop. During the summer, it is insanely popular. Every day there is a line that goes out the door. It is a weekend, and we are trying to move people along. The policy is to keep the line moving down so others have a chance to see the selection of ice cream.

A customer asks me for a double scoop of moose tracks and I get it for her. As I hand it to her, she refuses to take it, saying it is too much. I explain to her that I can’t put it back and this is what she ordered, but she denies the ice cream.

As this is going on, there is another worker explaining to customers they have to keep moving the line down. This customer loses it and starts yelling at my coworker, saying she is being rude and pushy even though she was only following the policy.

The manager has just started his shift, and talks to the customer, but she yells at him and storms out. I have to throw away the ice cream — which is worth ten dollars — and everyone is upset and confused. A few minutes after the incident, her husband comes in and apologizes for her behavior.

And then, a few moments later, I learn that that nightmarish woman is our state representative.

My mom has been a teacher for all my life, and often teaches me things before my school does, especially when I was younger. I’m relatively advanced for my age, which means that I have been reading since three. This occurred when I was four, and my mom worked as a first-grade teacher in the same school I attended.

For some reason, my school thought teaching four-year-olds Spanish was absolutely necessary, so we got a new Spanish teacher in the middle of the year when the first one quit. She came into the classroom and started putting up posters while we played. Being by the teacher’s desk, I spotted a paper that seemed interesting, mainly because it had the word “snack” on it. Bored, I started to read the paper, which I did out loud.

At first, the teacher didn’t notice anything. Then, when she heard me, her eyes got huge and she rushed to the class phone. Dialing my mom’s classroom, she yelled into the phone, “Mrs. [Our Last Name], your child can read!”

My mom simply replied, “I know. I taught her how.”

That teacher avoided my mom and me for the rest of the year.