(I’m a hostess at a family Mexican restaurant. The woman I’m dire= cting to the table is Latina. I’m 22 and white.)

I was seating this woman at a table for four (although she was the first of= her party to arrive) and after I put the menus down, she requested a booth= , so I picked them back up to move her to the new table. But I noticed that= in the process of originally putting down the menus, I’d knocked the = salt over. I panicked to myself, feeling embarrassed that I’d have to = do the one superstitious thing I do in front of someone else, but I did it = anyway. I threw some of the salt behind my shoulder quickly before directin= g her to the new table, hoping no one had seen me, but then she shouted, &q= uot;YOU DO THAT TOO?!” I laughed sheepishly and told her that it was t= he only superstitious thing I did. I told her that my aunt used to do it a = lot when I was younger and I just picked it up naturally; now I can’t = not do it. She laughed and said that her husband had told her it was a &quo= t;Puerto Rican thing” and that she’d argued he was wrong and now = she had proof (since she saw a young white girl do it). She asked me where = I was from and I said Florida and then she asked me my name. I told her and= she shook my hand and smiled. We chatted shortly after then I went back to= work.

It was just so neat and touched my heart a bit. Humans are so odd. We conne= cted over such a small and strange thing.

I’m a manager at a pretzel bakery. It was a busy Saturday afternoon when a customer comes up and asks for a jumbo pretzel and cheese sauce. No problem. I get th jumbo pretzel for the customer and and then if they would like to add a drink. The customer declines th drink and I proceed to ask if they want cheddar or nacho cheese. The customer just says yes. The customer proceeds to pay for the purchase and I start bagging the food when I ask again if they want cheddar or nacho. The customer looks at me and says cheese. At this point I explain that the business has two flavors of cheese. Nacho which is spicy and a cheddar that is more mild. The customers looks at me amd says she just wants cheese. I again repeat the options and starts huffing under her breath and says whatever give me whatever. I ended up giving her cheddar because she would not tell me what she wanted.

I and my GF are at a hibachi restaurant. Usually when I eat out I don’= t order any beverages, but when I go to this place I splurge on a hot sake.= It is delivered in a sake bottle and glass, with enough to fill about 3 1/= 2 glasses. At the end of our meal, after drinking 3 glasses, I reach for th= e bottle and discover the waitress had already taken it away, along with my= final portion. Since this is an expense I rarely indulge in, we decide to = say something to the waitress. I’m hoping to get a small discount for = the small amount I was not able to enjoy, but instead she brings me a whole= new bottle. At that point I was a bit embarrassed, as I felt that was more= than I deserved, but since it was already poured I accepted it. I poured m= yself a new glass, and noticed a black speck flow in. I check the glass and= exclaim in surprise that it is a fruit fly! I fish it out, and since she i= s holding out her hand I place it on her finger. Upon seeing it she apologi= zes profusely, and I tell her not to worry about it. My GF and I get a good= laugh about it, I finish my sake, and on the way out the waitress apologiz= es again for the fly, which I assured her I was not upset about as it was n= ot her fault.

I ended up tipping 35%, enough extra to cover the bonus drink they didn&#03= 9;t need to serve me, so hopefully there’s no hard feelings.

My friend and I — both women — decide to have a day out shopping while her husband takes their daughter for the day. It’s our first venture out without her daughter, so we decide to go to a locally-owned restaurant. It’s a small area, and I work in a very busy convenience store. At least half the town knows me, including the owner of the restaurant, which is why we decide to try it out.

We’re sat by the hostess and given menus. It’s not a busy section, but it’s not empty, either. The waiter comes out to take our drink orders, and he looks upset by something. I don’t think anything of it and go back to looking at the menu.

Neither of us notices at first because we’re chatting and trying to decide what to get, but after a while, I begin to realize he hasn’t come back to take our orders. He’s not even come back to give us our drinks. We look around and see people who we know were seated after us already eating. We really don’t understand, and I’m pretty confused by it.

I go to find our waiter or a hostess, but instead, I see the owner coming in. He recognizes me at once.

Owner: “Oh, hey there! You’re the [Convenience Store] girl! How are you enjoying it? I told you it’s good, didn’t I?”

Me: “Uh… I wouldn’t know. Did something happen to our waiter? Did he get sick or something?”

Owner: “What do you mean?”

Me: “We haven’t even gotten our drinks yet. We’ve sat for like… ten minutes? Fifteen? He took our orders, looked mad at something, and then hasn’t been back. There are people around us already eating who were sat after us.”

Owner: “What? I’ll go see what’s wrong.”

I go back to the table, where our drinks still haven’t appeared. She’s getting angry and I’m still wondering what’s going on. Shortly after, the owner shows up to take our orders, bring us our drinks, and bring the bill. He’s also the one to take the payment.

Me: “So, what happened? Did he get sick or something?”

Owner: “Don’t worry about it; we’ve got it taken care of. You both have a nice night, and I hope this didn’t ruin your date!”

That’s when we realized that the waiter was refusing to wait on us because he thought my friend and I were lesbians on a date. At least I got a good laugh out of it after. I still haven’t gone back, though.

My boss does not get along with his brother, but he calls all the time, sometimes drunk, sometimes in jail, and sometimes he’s just had a broken heart from his latest girl. My boss and his brother have had their worst fight yet; I won’t go into details, but it involved their mother, who died from breast cancer, and their father, who is in a wheelchair.

My boss has been acting passive-aggressive all day, being rude to customers, messing up orders, yelling at a coworker, and being moody. The phone rings and I pick it up.

Me: “Hello?”

Boss’s Brother: “Hey, it’s me. Can you get [Boss] on the line? I really need to talk to him.”

Me: “Hey, [Boss], your brother’s on the line.”

Boss: “I don’t want to talk to him.”

Me: “He said it’s urgent.”

No, he actually didn’t.

Boss: “What am I, his keeper?”

Me: “Do you know who you sound like right now?”

A customer, an old woman, speaks up.

Old Woman: “He sounds like Cain!”

She bops my boss on the head with her tiny fist.

Old Woman: “Bad man!”

She takes her coffee and leaves. And then, a middle-aged man comes up and talks to my boss.

Man: “Take it from me. Your brother isn’t going to last forever. Don’t abandon him. Talk to him.”

My boss sighs and takes the phone from me.

Boss: “Hello?” *Pauses* “When?” *Pauses* “This morning?” *Pauses* “Okay, I’ll be there soon.” *To me* “Can you hold the fort until closing time? My brother was in an accident and he was badly hurt.”

He left and came back the next day to inform us that his brother had been in a car accident and had several broken ribs, a broken leg, and a broken elbow. He could have lost his life. To this day, whenever the brother calls, my boss always answers.