A customer looks at the Thanksgiving Sale signs spread liberally around the store, then marches over to my spot at the customer service desk.

Customer: “Why are there Thanksgiving signs up?”

Me: “Because we’re running our annual Thanksgiving sale, ma’am. It runs until the 9th.”

Note: The 9th of October.

Customer: “That’s wrong! Thanksgiving isn’t until November 23rd! You have your signs up WAY too early!”

Me: “You’re thinking of Thanksgiving in the US, ma’am. This is Canada. We have ours in October.”

Customer: “You can’t DO that! It’s… that’s… It’s UNAMERICAN!”

Me: “Exactly, ma’am.”

Related:
Blame Canada! Part 16
Blame Canada! Part 15
Blame Canada! Part 14
Blame Canada! Part 13
Blame Canada! Part 12

I used to work as a computer tech many moons ago. One day, a woman brings me her desktop computer for what she calls “warranty work”.

The computer has clearly been pried open. The metal case is bent, components are missing or shoved back in crooked, and it looks like someone has gone at it with a screwdriver and pure confidence. 

I take one look at it.

Me: “Ma’am, this computer has been opened, and the internal components have been removed and reinstalled improperly. You’ve basically destroyed it. We won’t be able to repair or replace this under warranty.”

Customer: “What do you mean it’s not covered? I bought the warranty! It stopped working, so you have to fix it. That’s literally what a warranty is for! This is a scam!”

I wait for a pause and then ask her something.

Me: “If your car broke down, would you pull over to the side of the road, grab a wrench, and start removing parts from under the hood?”

Customer: *Zero hesitation.* “No, that would be stupid.”

I just silently look at her and wait for her to catch up.

Customer: *Eyes widening.* “Well, this is different! I wouldn’t open the car because that’s complicated!”

Me: “There’s a billion nanometer-sized transistors in here that would disagree with you, but never mind. Would you like to proceed with repair work outside of warranty?”

Customer: “I would like you to take your stupid warranty… and shove it up your a**!” *Storms off.*

Me: *Getting in one final line.* “Judging by this case, you already did that to your computer!”

I’m at a baseball game watching my MLB (Major League Baseball) team. We are playing a particular team from New York that is known worldwide. Too often, their fans come to our city and act like jerks. There is a New York fan behind us who has been extremely loud and annoying the entire game. Every few seconds, he’s making comments about how much Canada sucks or how amazing his team is.

Thankfully, his buddies seem aware that he’s being an idiot and frequently tell him to quiet down. During this game, my team is ahead 2-0 in the third inning when we give up a couple of hits, and the opposing team now has runners at first and second with only one out. Now the annoying fan starts to get boastful!

Fan: “Yeah…. my boy, [Player #1] is going to hit a triple and shut you f****** Canadians right up! You guys suuuuuck!”

Fan #1: “Dude, shut up!”

Fan #2: “Come on, man, this s*** is getting old!”

Fan: “Ready, here it comes…”

[Player #1] then weakly grounds out to first base. Immediately, the guy behind us starts griping.

Fan: “What the h***? He was clearly safe, this is bull-s***!”

Fan #3: “Dude, he was clearly out! Just relax!”

Next up, he starts making comments about our pitcher, who, so far, is pitching a blinder!

Fan: “[Pitcher] f******* suuuuucks! That’s why you’re pitching in Canada, a**hole!”

Fan #1: “He has five strikeouts already!”

Fan: “Holy s***, [Player #2] is gonna light him up! Here we go…”

[Pitcher] strikes him out to end the inning, the guy behind immediately rises up and starts yelling!

Fan: “WHAT THE H***! THAT WAS WAY OUTSIDE! THIS GAME IS RIGGED!”

Fan #2: “Sit down!”

As the game goes on, New York falls further behind, and this guy gets more and more agitated and is running out of insults! Then one of our veteran players steps up.

Fan: “This guy’s old as time, he f****** sucks; you should just retire a**hole!”

He then hits a home run to put us even further in front!

Fan: “THIS TEAM STILL F****** SUCKS!”

He was very quiet for the rest of the game. When I next got up to go to the bathroom, I saw he’d left, but his buddies were still there! The rest of the game was pleasant!

It was near Christmas, and the parking lot for the outdoor mall was very busy. The main draw was a grocery store. Space was very limited.

At that time, being a grade B lunatic, I drove a 1992 Miata with a supercharger. In Canada. In winter. I felt very fortunate to have found a space almost immediately, which I turned left directly into with absolutely no difficulty (since a Miata is more manoeuvrable than a gnat, and approximately the same size).

I got out of the car when I heard shouting. I looked over to see a furious man yelling at me from the cab of the massive black truck I had been following, which was sitting just behind a three-way stop, signalling left. To this day, I couldn’t tell you a single word that he said, but I am not exaggerating when I say that nobody in my life has ever been that visibly angry at me before or since, save for a couple who were responsible for my birth.

It took me about fifteen seconds to figure out that he had been signalling left, not to indicate that he was turning at the stop, but because he was trying to reverse into the space. He seemed to have decided that I had deliberately “stolen” his space out of pure greed (even though I couldn’t possibly have known that was what he was trying to do).

As I recall, he had actually gotten out of the truck, but this was quite some time ago, so that detail has become hazy. Certainly, there is a non-zero chance that this situation would have ended in violence had I not done so. In any case, I made the tactical decision that the path of least resistance was to just get back in the car and find another space.

To this day, I wonder if they were more angry that they lost the space, or at the “girls’ car” they lost it to.

CONTENT WARNING: Vomit

We got a new worker at the grocery store where I work. He was freshly sixteen, and during a break on his first day, he admitted his dad was pressuring him to get a job – ANY job – as soon as possible.

New Guy: “Like, I’m not gonna say no to having cash of my own instead of an allowance, but my dad is one of those macho a**holes who thinks a “real man” shouldn’t be scared or disgusted or disturbed by anything. The fact that I freak out when I discover a spider in my room the size of my palm apparently means I “need to get a job and grow up”.”

Coworker: “Well, then you picked the right place. A couple years working in retail, and I guarantee nothing will ever freak you out again.”

New Guy: “Come on, you make it sound like working in the trenches. A retail job can’t be that bad?”

Coworker: “You wanna bet? A couple years ago, we had some j***a** come in demanding a refund because he bought shrimp from us, ate it raw, and got sick.”

New Guy: “Huh? How does anyone expect to get a refund if they don’t bring the product back?”

Coworker: “Oh, he brought them back.”

I watched the new guy’s face slowly morph from confusion, to realization, to abject horror.

New Guy: *Into his hands.* “Oh my go- OH MY GOD!”

Coworker: “Yeah. I feel like the fact that it was still recognizable as shrimp suggests he was already sick when—”

New Guy: “OH MY GOD!” *Runs to the bathroom.*

I was kind of impressed when the new guy decided to stick around after a first-day warning like that.

I was even more impressed when, on his second day, he revealed he had managed to tell the same story to his dad, who had “reacted pretty much the way I did” and promptly gotten off his son’s back about becoming a “real man”.