I work as a night auditor at a hotel. One night, a guest calls down from their room, complaining that the smoke alarm is going off in the room next to them. I go up to investigate and can hear the smoke alarm all the way down the hall. When I get there, I knock on the door.

The guest opens the door, revealing that the entire room is filled with smoke. I ask what’s going on and the guest casually responds, “I’m cooking,” apparently not noticing or caring that her cooking has completely burned and she is sitting in the middle of a huge cloud of smoke. From the glimpse of the charcoal that I see on the stove, it looks like one of the things she was cooking was ravioli.

How one manages to burn ravioli, I don’t know.

After silencing the smoke alarm, I tell the guest that we are going to have to move her to a new room. She asks — again, completely nonchalantly — “Why? Is there something wrong with this one?” In the most un-sarcastic voice I can muster, I respond that yes, the fact that the room is filled with smoke counts as “something wrong.”

I don’t know whether she is “out of it” somehow or just playing dumb in order to avoid getting in trouble, but either way it is pretty disturbing that she was willing to sit around breathing in smoke.

The best part, though, is what my manager tells me when he comes in to help deal with the situation. The room where this incident happened is the exact same room where, a few months ago, a guest hung their clothes on one of the sprinkler heads, causing it to break and setting off the sprinklers in half the hotel.

I suggest to my manager that we get rid of that room and turn it into a closet. He laughs and agrees.

My mom and I are at the mall. The first place we stop is the food court, and we head over to a sub shop. My mom always gets the same sandwich. Everything is going smoothly until the following exchange.

Employee: “Cheese on your sandwich?”

Mom: “Yes, please.”

Employee: “What kind?”

Mom: “Shredded.”

Employee: “Cheddar or mozzarella?”

Mom: “Shredded.”

Employee: “Cheddar or mozzarella?”

Mom: “Shredded.”

Employee: *a little louder* “Cheddar or mozzarella?”

Mom: “Shredded.”

Me: “Mom, she knows you want shredded cheese. She wants to know what kind. Do you want cheddar or mozzarella?”

Mom: “Shredded.”

Employee: “Cheddar or mozzarella?”

Mom: “Uh, mozzarella.”

Me: “Then why didn’t you just tell her that?”

I am shopping at a mall in Pennsylvania and I sit down at the fountain in the middle. I get up to strap my shoes on properly and find someone has already sat down where I was.

Me: “Excuse me, I was already sitting there.”

Customer: “Well, I’m sitting here now.”

Me: “I’m sorry if you thought I was going, but I was still using that place.”

Customer: “You’re not sitting here now, so I suggest you get your skinny little a** out of here.”

Me: “Don’t call me that.”

The guard comes up and hears me argue.

Guard: “What’s going on here?”

Customer: “This boy told me to piss off and did the finger.”

Me: “I didn’t! I promise that I didn’t do that. You can check the cameras; I didn’t do that!”

Guard: “What happened?”

Me: “I got up to strap my shoe. I was less than six inches from the fountain edge but he just sat down. And he wouldn’t let me get up.”

The customer tuts and shakes his head.

Customer: “When will you kids learn that lying gets you nowhere? Just look at him; he’s obviously a yob. Besides, he’s scruffy.”

I am sweaty because I had to run across the store from one side to the other, hence my rest.

Me: “But you did! I didn’t do anything.”

Customer: “It’s wrong to lie. I just don’t know where the young people get their ideas from.”

I plead with the guard but he grabs my arm and starts taking me away when he suddenly stops and picks something up from the ground. It is a bag of weed.

Guard: *To the customer* “Care to explain where you got this from? I obviously saw you trying to put it in the boy’s pocket, so whatever you say will be taken against you as evidence. Shall we?”

The customer was arrested on false accusations and drug charges. It turned out he had also gotten a child in trouble with her parents some years earlier because he planted stolen items in her house.

I am in the technology center of my college to use multiple displays for my research project. I get up to get lunch and I notice a friend of mine at a station a table over from me.

Me: “Hey, [Friend].”

Friend: “Hey, [My Name].”

Me: “What are you up to?”

Friend: “Trying to get my computer to turn on.”

Me: “Would you like some help?”

Friend: “Would you? Thanks.”

I walk over.

Friend: “I’m a bit hopeless with technology.”

I notice that he hasn’t gotten his laptop out to hook up to the USB-C dock.

Me: “You need your laptop.”

Friend: “I don’t have my laptop.”

Me: “Well, these aren’t computers; they’re just monitors, keyboards, and mice that you hook your laptop up to through that dock.”

Friend: “Well, that explains why I couldn’t get it to turn on!”

I’m in high school and just got hired at a music/movie store. On my first shift, I am wearing the uniform but only doing training. This includes watching videos on one of the small machines customers can use to listen to music. I’m wearing headphones and focusing on the video when a customer approaches me. 

The woman asks for help finding something in the store. I haven’t even gotten to that part of my training yet so I tell her I’m new and in training, and I can’t help her. I go back to my video thinking she’ll find someone else. That’s where I am wrong. 

She does find someone else, but not to help. She immediately seeks out the store manager and complains about me. They come back to find me together and the woman continues yelling about me to my manager in front of me. She goes on about my horrible customer service and how I am just standing there doing nothing, not helping anyone. 

My manager tells the woman she’ll deal with me later, helps her find her CDs, and checks her out. My manager does talk to me later in the back, but it’s to say that I should’ve helped the woman from the beginning.

That’s how I got yelled at and written up on my first day of work… for not knowing something I wasn’t yet taught.