I work at a very busy bar and grill in my rural town. The staff is mostly women in their early twenties besides our bar manager and the cooks. It’s not uncommon for the servers to wear crop tops, shorts, low-cut shirts, etc. I am heavily tattooed; I have tattoos on both legs, one arm, my stomach, and my back.

I was serving my first table of the night, and a woman complimented the tattoos on my legs and the graphic tee I was wearing. After I thanked her, she then pinched my stomach, asking:

Woman: “What’s this shirt here? I love the pictures.”

Me: *In an awkward panic* “Ma’am, that’s me you’re grabbing. My stomach is also tattooed.”

This poor woman instantly turned red and kept apologizing. I couldn’t help but laugh. It was all so innocent and unexpected. But take this as a lesson folks: don’t touch your servers.

I work in a takeaway chicken store which is conveniently located right next to a pub/bar. One Wednesday night, this guy stumbles in, clearly drunk out of his mind.

Customer: “I want dinner!”

Me: “What it is exactly that you’re after?”

Customer: “Just some f****** chicken, vegetables, and gravy!”

I order him exactly that. He pays and sits down to wait with no problems. When it’s ready, he comes to the counter.

Me: “Would you like cutlery?”

Customer: “Yes.”

I pack his meal into a bag with cutlery, napkins, etc. He is just about to leave the store when he looks into the bag and totally loses it, screaming in a store full of customers.

Customer: “What the f*** is this, a plastic knife and fork?! I can’t eat with this; I need real ones for f***’s sake!”

Me: “Sorry, sir, we only have plastic.”

He took his meal out of the bag and launched it over the counter at me. Luckily, he was drunk, so his aim was terrible and he ended up hitting the wall.

As soon as this happened a guy sitting in the dining room grabbed him and pulled him out of the store, and he stumbled away.

My mom is paralyzed from the waist down, so my dad and I take her out grocery shopping every now and then. She has a motorized wheelchair, but it’s too bulky to take with us to the store, so we bring her non-motorized (push) wheelchair with us.

Dad pushes her around while I pull stuff off the shelves she wants us to get and put them in our cart. Dad has a voice that he’s used in the past to scare people. Just ask old potential boyfriends of mine.

While we’re doing this, another customer begins yelling.

Customer: “Hey, miss?”

She then starts whistling and pointedly clearing her throat. I put the last item in the cart and turn to the customer.

Me: “Can I help you?”

She thrusts a list at me and demands:

Customer: “Get me the stuff on my list.”

I look nothing like the employees; they wear blue from head to toe, basically, and I am wearing a yellow sundress with daisies on it.

Me: “No, I’m helping my mother now. I think there’s an employee at the front desk who can help you.”

She doesn’t like this and reaches out to grab my arm.

Customer: “You will help me now or I will get you fired.”

I shove her away, shouting “NO!” Then, I feel blood running down my arm where her nails have broken the skin on my bicep. Dad looks over and kind of freaks when he sees the blood.

Dad: “Leave my daughter alone!”

My dad’s voice is loud enough to get an employee to rush over.

Employee: “Is there a problem?”

Dad: “This woman just assaulted my daughter. Do you have a first aid kit or something to help her out? I’m going to call the cops while you get this.”

Upon hearing the word “cops”, the lady just sunk to the floor crying and trying to say it was just a misunderstanding. When the cops arrived, I had been bandaged up. The manager had come up, and upon listening to my and my dad’s story, as well as the employee describing the aftermath, the cops went to the back with the manager to check the video. Meanwhile, the lady was crying, saying, “I’ll lose my kids.” — no “sorry” or anything like that. The cops arrested her for assault on a minor and took her away crying.

At the trial later, the two things I most remember are that she was on probation and did indeed lose custody of her kids (I think the father got them), and she tried to say, “It was an honest mistake; I thought she was an employee.” Whereupon the judge said, “Even if she was an employee, what gives you the right to grab someone like this?” while showing her the pictures that were taken of my bloody arm.

She broke into more tears as the judge read her sentence, including the loss of her children due to violating her probation, plus some community service, I think.

Much later, as part of her effort to get her children back, she had to write me a letter of apology, which is still in my parent’s attic in a box.

I heard this story secondhand from a friend who is a biker and frequents a biker bar. I’m not a biker myself, but for the most part, they seem like your average decent folks that just like bikes. My friend is an accountant for crying out loud, the last job you would expect seeing him on a bike covered in leather. Unfortunately, there was one guy who occasionally showed up to the bar speaking big and boasting and generally appearing to be a biker just so he could feel tough.

There was another individual at the bar this day, an extremely tiny and unassuming man who was clearly not a biker. The tough guy apparently thought he would show off his toughness by demanding the tiny man give up his seat to the tough guy. The tiny man politely refused at first.

Tough Guy: “You want to fight me?”

Tiny Man: “Not at all. I’m a civilized adult; I don’t resort to violence to resolve disagreements.”

Tough Guy: “Because you know you would lose.”

Tiny Man: “I’m quite sure I would, considering I’m something of a pacifist who hates to hurt anyone. It’s hard to win a fight when you refuse to throw a punch.”

Tough Guy: “So, just move and…”

Tiny Man: “I’m sorry, but I’m not moving, We can’t have civilization if we give in to mere threats of violence. I’m afraid I’m staying where I am unless you force me. Of course, I have no doubt you could move me since I won’t fight back, if it would make you feel proud of yourself to push around someone that won’t resist.”

My Friend: “Stop being an [expletive] and leave him alone.”

The tough guy hesitated for a while, seemingly unsure of what to do once his bluff was called. But apparently afraid of backing down now, he moved to the seat and just tried to push his butt in to crowd the other guy out. The other guy refused to move and clung hard enough to the seat that finally the tough guy had to use some real muscle to actively shove the man off the seat and to the ground.

At that point, numerous people came to defend the man. My friend and most of the other bikers rushed over, and the bartender, who had been busy on the other side of the bar and likely hadn’t been fully aware of the earlier conversation, also ran to check what was happening.

Tiny Man: “No, please stop. I appreciate everyone’s help, but I don’t want any violence or uncivilized behavior. He can have the seat if it makes him happy.”

Bartender: “Did he shove you off the seat? I’ll kick him out of the—”

Tiny Man: “I appreciate it, but could I ask you to allow him to stay despite his immature behavior? I’ll be back after I use the restroom, and I’ll just take my Coke at a table, instead.”

None of the people at the bar knew how to respond to the man who was wronged basically asking them to not do anything. Eventually, they relented and left the tough guy in the seat, but pretty much everyone told him clearly how little they approved of his actions. Likewise, once the tiny man came back, a number of folks sat with him and tried to make up for what happened. I hear a few offered to buy him a drink, which he refused.

Then, a few minutes later, two police officers walked into the bar.

Tiny Man: “Hello. I assume you’re here about my call?”

Officer: “Yes, you said there was an assault?”

Tiny Man: “Yes, a minor one. That man over there physically shoved me out of my seat.”

When the police asked about witnesses, pretty much everyone at the bar jumped at the chance to back up the tiny man’s claims. Despite the tough guy’s claims that he hadn’t done anything, he eventually got escorted out of the bar.

Tiny Man: *To the tough guy as he was being escorted out* “I said I was civilized, but police are part of what keeps civilization working, after all.” *To the bartender* “I appreciate your allowing him to stay long enough for the police to arrive. If you want to ban him from your bar now, I won’t object. My ride has been waiting outside for a few minutes for the police to get here, so I’m headed out. Thank all of you for being so kind and understanding.”

My friend never saw either man return to the bar after that.

I’m a seventeen-year-old girl working for a chain craft store. I’m on my lunch break shopping as a normal customer, with no uniform or identification that says I work there. This man comes running up to me.

Man #1: “Do you work here?”

Me: “Yes, but technically not right now, since I’m on my lunch and not being paid.”

He proceeds to ignore my entire sentence. He grabs me by the arm. This man is probably in his early thirties, and as I stated before, I am seventeen and I’m a very small female. He begins to drag me to the register.

Man #1: “Your cashier needs help, and I’ve been waiting for my change for five minutes now!”

Me: “Please remove your hand from me before I drop these candles.”

To his benefit, he does. We make it up to the front, and there is a long line with one cashier working. I proceed to just page over the PA system for backup and go back to my lunch break.

The next thing I know, the man’s friend comes up to me and also grabs me by the arm to drag me to the registers.

Me: “What is with you and your friend and your need to put your hands on me?! Now please remove them before I get someone to escort you out!”

My manager then approaches me.

Manager: “Can you please hop on a register for just a couple of minutes? You’ll get an extra five for your lunch.”

Annoyed, I do what they ask and hop on a register. I start ringing up the guy who grabbed me. He has a $3,000 basket of sewing lights and Visa gift cards, and he pulls out a wad of cash. I take the cash from him, and it definitely doesn’t feel right, so I put it through our bill readers and mark the bills with the counterfeit marker. Both indicate that these are fake bills.

I hand back all the money he gave me.

Me: “This money is fake. You need to leave the store, and you are not welcome back. I will be informing my manager, and they will decide whether a police report needs to be filed.”

The guy fast-walked out the door. l told my manager everything and told them I’d be needing fifteen minutes more lunch time since the guy took up eighteen minutes of my time and wasted them. I didn’t get the extra lunch time.