This happens on Mother’s Day years and years ago. I have two large tables; one holds fifteen and the other holds twelve.

The twelve-top is seated. I take their drink order and go in the back to get it. They decide they like the fifteen-top table in my section better, get up, and move there. A hostess comes up with the fifteen-top that was meant to sit at that table. She’s confused and comes to find me. I approach the table.

Me: “I’m sorry but we’re going to need your party to move back to your original table. This is set for fifteen people and you have twelve.”

Customer #1: “Yeah, we were way too squished there. We like this better.”

I point to the party of fifteen waiting.

Me: “This table is set for them. They have fifteen. You will need to move back.”

A woman from the fifteen-top approaches.

Customer #2: “This is our table. We have fifteen! You heard her; move back to your table.”

Customer #1: “No. It’s Mother’s Day and I want my mother to have the best table.”

Customer #2: “Oh, and my mother doesn’t deserve to have a nice table?”

They start to argue loudly. The manager shows up and tells the twelve-top they need to move. They refuse and start to call him names, like children.

Customer #1: “You need to shut the f*** up and do as you’re told!”

The manager gives her a look like, “Oh, really?”

Manager: “That’s it. You need to leave.”

The table erupts as they start yelling, but nobody gets up. The manager takes me aside.

Manager: “Do not serve them. Let them sit. If they don’t leave, we’ll call the police.”

The fifteen-top finds another home. The hostess sits the empty twelve-top with another group, so I put my energy into them. [Customer #1] waves at me as I pass by but I don’t stop.

Customer #1: “God d*** it, she’s ignoring us!”

The manager goes by again.

Manager: “You have five minutes to leave or I’m calling the police.”

The fight between them was ugly and everyone was watching. [Customer #1] and another man with her got in the manager’s face, but he kept his cool. Finally, they gave up and exited the restaurant.

As they left, I couldn’t help but notice the little old woman with them, probably [Customer #1]’s mother. She was all dressed up with her hair done up, and she was probably starving. She hadn’t spoken a word during the chaos, and her entire day was ruined because of her daughter’s selfish actions. I just don’t understand people sometimes.

I’m a bartender at a little hole-in-the-wall watering hole with a very regular and very loyal customer base. I have a night off, so I meet up with a friend at another bar for a few drinks and some food. After supper, we decide to walk to the bar where I work to cap off the evening.

We get there and there is a good energy going on. The music is a bit louder than usual, and there are maybe ten patrons in the bar.

We have one customer who is extremely wealthy, and it’s nothing for him to spend $200 to $400 per night multiple times a week buying everyone rounds. As such, he’s treated like royalty around there.

I’m sitting there having a really good time, enjoying a beer, and I decide that I want to add a song to the jukebox. I grab a $5 bill and walk over, only to notice sixty-three credits showing on the screen. No big deal, I think. I’ll just put my $5 in, request a few songs, and leave the sixty-three credits untouched.

But noooo.

Our wealthy regular sees me perusing the jukebox and comes up and physically pushes me away from it. I ask him what the f*** he thinks he’s doing. He says those are his credits, and no one is allowed to touch the jukebox until he’s used them up. I point out that I have my own $5 and no intention of using any of his credits.

Nope, not good enough. No one is allowed to touch it until he’s done with them.

I know it’s not worth arguing, so I step back, and he starts requesting songs until he has used up every single credit. Each song costs two to five credits, so he puts in a lot of songs. Each song gives you the option to pay an extra two credits to have your song played next, but I notice he isn’t using it.

This particular brand of jukebox has an accompanying phone app. I didn’t have it downloaded prior to this night. But I do now.

I calmly sit down at my table with my friend and put my plan in motion. I download the app and purchase $10 worth of credits. I request two songs and pay the extra two credits to fast track them. I sit there in quiet anticipation, and I can see that the regular is starting to get into a groove with the music he’d requested — Vietnam rock.

His heart gloriously sinks when Bom Bom Bom by Sam and The Womp comes on. No big deal, guys, his song must be next. Nope, it’s Wannabe by The Spice Girls.

He sits down, dejected. I quickly purchase another $20 in credits and request Baby by Justin Bieber, Livin’ La Vida Loca by Ricky Martin, Axel F by Crazy Frog, and Foil by Weird Al Yankovic.

And I fast track every one of them.

Partway through Foil, I notice the regular sulking in his chair… so I purchase another $20 in credits and proceed to request Never Going To Give You Up by Rick Astley, Who Let The Dogs Out (Barking Mad Remix) by the Baha Men, Numa Numa by O-Zone, Pas Parle Americano by Yolanda Be Cool, and Star Wars Cantina March by John Williams.

They’re starting to realize something is up, so the regular and a few staff who were on last night convene at the jukebox to try to figure it out. At this point, the Cantina March is playing. They turn the jukebox off and then back on again. “Doop doop doop doop…” They turn it off and then back on. “Doop doop doop doop…” Each time, it picks up where it left off. I can’t hold my laughter.

One of my coworkers catches on and comes over with her phone in her hand with the app open. She shoves it in my face with a “How f****** dare you…” Yadda, yadda, yadda.

I quietly get up, down my last mouthful of beer, put my jacket on, and walk out without a word. I walk down the street to a greasy spoon that our staff and customers are regulars at due to proximity. I sit down, order a beer and a burger, and proceed to log back into the app.

I purchase another $10 worth of credits and fast track All I Want For Christmas by Mariah Carey and Mickey by Tony Basil as one last “bite me” to the regular.

I can only imagine the fallout I’m going to face Monday afternoon when I show up to work, but whatever. My $40 are no less valid than his, and no one customer gets to commandeer the tunes for the entire night and physically block anyone else from touching it.

Our plant manager was paid production bonuses, and in his infinite wisdom (greed), he told his superiors that we could get out more production than two plants our size could get out reasonably. With the aging equipment that he refused to replace or repair, we were getting seriously behind and now needed to run twenty-four-seven just to stay as behind as we already were.

Our handbooks stated quite clearly that Sunday work was strictly voluntary and was to be “requested” by the supervisor by Thursday at lunch. Attendance on Sundays was abysmal at best since many of us had families and other important things in our life.

[Plant Manager] decided this wouldn’t do and called a plant-wide meeting on one particular Thursday right before lunch.

Plant Manager: “It has come to my attention that many of you are abusing the Sunday voluntary workday status, so I am changing this effective immediately.”

He didn’t have that authority.

Plant Manager: “So, if any of you choose not to come in on Sunday, don’t bother coming back on Monday! Understand?!”

Me: “Are you serious?”

Plant Manager: “YES!”

Me: *With a crap-eating grin* “Okay.”

Three others and I got together and decided to give him what he wanted. We didn’t come in on Sunday or Monday. By Monday morning, around 7:00 am, my phone was blowing up with texts and missed calls. Finally, I answered.

Plant Manager: “Where the h*** are you?!”

Me: *Politely* “Enjoying my day off. Thanks again”

Plant Manager: *Yelling* “What do you mean, ‘day off’? You are supposed to be here!”

Me: “No, you told us that if we didn’t come to work on Sunday not to come in on Monday, and frankly, I thought it was very nice of you to give an extra day off like that.”

Realizing he was trapped, [Plant Manager] changed his tone slightly.

Plant Manager: “Well, that’s not what I meant and you know it. Now get in here as soon as you can.”

Me: *Nicely* “Nope, you can’t back out now. Next time say what you mean. Have a nice day, see you tomorrow.”

Then, I hung up and turned off my phone. After a few other incidents like this, the company finally fired [Plant Manager] and now has a much better plant manager. It’s a great place to work now.

I work in Accounts Receivable and Human Resources at [Hotel]. Our hotel is very unique for a few reasons: it’s the nicest hotel in the immediate area; the immediate area is somewhat infamous locally for how rough certain neighborhoods are; we have our own convention center; while we are employed by a major hotel management company, I believe that they are now the largest hospitality management group in the US; and the property itself is actually owned by the city that it is in.

It’s another day at work. I’m in my office, being amazing as always, and happily getting all of the little accounts balanced and invoices sent. The phone rings. I give my opening spiel.

Caller: “Um, hi. My name is [Caller]. I have a charge on my account from your hotel last night but I’m not there. I’ve never even been to your state. I live in [State].”

Me: “That’s odd. Could you or someone with a tablet in your home possibly have made an accidental reservation here? You may have been charged when the room was held but did not check in.”

Caller: “No, we don’t have a tablet. I don’t have any reservation apps on my phone, and my children can’t open it anyway.”

I get the type of card and last four digits of her card, confirm the charge date, and get the exact amount charged. Rather than run it through our processor, I take a shot in the dark with our point-of-sale system while she’s still on the phone. It has this nifty little feature where you can search using the type of card and last four digits. It doesn’t always work so great, but when it does, it is awesome. And lo and behold, it decides to work when I try it.

Me: “Huh, that’s odd. I’m showing a matching card on a reservation that was authorized for that amount yesterday and they are still in house.”

I’m taken aback here and forget that I shouldn’t tell her names. Honestly, I am more talking to myself, trying to figure out what exactly was going on.

Me: “Hm… Mr. [Man].”

Caller: “I don’t know a Mr. [Man]. Our last name is [Caller’s Last Name]. Should I dispute this charge with my bank?”

Me: “Ms. [Caller], if you could wait, I would like to try to figure out what’s going on on our end first. Can I get your phone number and call you back within two hours?”

Caller: “Oh, yes. That’s fine.”

I turn to the Director of Finances. He has roughly 457 years of experience, so he is my go-to for odd situations and can give a pretty good explanation when things go awry. He agrees with me that there is no way that this could be a processing error from the bank. We pull up the reservation and can see in the transaction history that the guest actually swiped the card, meaning that we didn’t manually enter it and we didn’t make a mistake by typing the wrong number (which we don’t normally do, but stuff happens).

I then call the room, apologize profusely, tell him that the computer malfunctioned during their check-in and deleted the card on file and that we need to have him re-swipe his card as soon as he can. This is a strategy to get a close look at the card. The guy comes back, and he does physically have the card and it has his name on it, but something about the card is odd. Mr. [Man] accepts our apologies for bothering him and goes back to his room.

Now, here’s where it starts getting so fun that I still smile. I hate thieves. I mean, really. I hate seeing innocent people like Ms. [Caller] get hurt, stress out, have to go through filing a chargeback, and wait on their own money that they need, and the business then getting hit with a fee while also adjusting revenue. I’ve worked in so many places where the managers didn’t care and let people get away with so much shady stuff that it drove me crazy. I do not tolerate it anymore whatsoever. So, as I’m at the front, I see the general manager. He had seen the exchange at the front desk and asks me what it was about. I tell him what happened.

Me: “I’m pretty sure that Mr. [Man] somehow stole Ms. [Caller]’s information and made a fake card.”

Because we are city-owned, we get a lot of cool events, like the one we have in house at this very moment: the Sheriff’s Convention. The city manager is actually right by the general manager as I give him the breakdown of what is going on. The city manager calls over a sheriff he is on a first-name basis with, who ends up asking me all kinds of questions. They go off, confer with one another, run the guy’s name, and get whatever paperwork they need.

They then search the room. As it turns out, Mr. [Man] has made a bad name for himself and has been using aliases that were linked to him. When they search his room, they find several fake IDs, a lot of fake cards in his name, a credit card machine, and a lot of blank cards. He and his lady get to be part of an impromptu training for the convention and even get to ride in pretty cars that have pretty, pretty lights.

My favorite part about all of this is that when they checked in, the parking lot was FULL of cop cars. I still do not understand what made them think that paying for their room with a stolen card was a great idea. Or, you know, bringing in all of their equipment, stolen cards, and fake IDs.

I got to call back [Caller] back pretty quickly, and I had a great story for her.

I’m working an early dinner shift at a fancy, fine dining setting. A four-top reservation comes in — two older married couples in their fifties. They get a table by a window, watching the beautiful sunset. The place is still empty, the piano is just starting up, and it’s a calm, lovely scene.

While they’re being seated, [Husband #1] is intent on the wine list and wants to order before I’ve left the table after my first greeting. He picks out a decent $80 cabernet for the table and I signal to my back waiter to switch out glassware while I head down into the cellar for the bottle. I come up and go through the pouring and tasting and then serve each guest.

As soon as I put the bottle down, the man takes it and empties it among the four glasses, so each of them has a red wine glass that is super full, and everyone at the table is clearly not amused. I watch as [Husband #1] chugs his glass in a desperate series of gulps. His wife is saying his name quietly while the other couple just sits awkwardly with their fifty-gallon wine glasses, trying to sip them without spilling.

I come back to see if they are ready to order. Everyone is, but [Husband #1] wants to start with another bottle. I sort of agree, noting everyone’s glass is full but his. Everyone orders food and he mentions the second bottle.

Me: “Would you like to wait for it to be served with the food, or should I bring it straight away?”

Wife #1: *Suddenly blurting* “[Husband #1], you’re an alcoholic.”

The man immediately gets red in the face and doubles down on the order.

Husband #1: “We’ll take the second bottle now.”

Then, the other woman looks up at me.

Wife #2: “He drove us here. If you serve him, he will be putting our lives at risk.”

Husband #2: *Flatly* “Our lives are in your hands.”

[Husband #1] is about to blow a gasket, his face is purple, and he’s sputtering. I just pick up the wine list and channel my best blackjack dealer.

Me: “I apologize, but I am not serving any more alcohol at this table.”

[Husband #1] slammed his butter knife into the table, making a ruckus, but his wife kind of calmed him down.

They ate three courses, totally silent the entire time. They didn’t say a word to each other or anyone. The tension was unbelievable. In the end, they let [Husband #1] pay, and he tipped me zero on $400.

But hey, I saved their lives.