I work as a lawyer for disabled people, protecting their welfare and SSDI (Social Security Disability Insurance) income.

Before a case, the prosecution approached me asking me to convince my client to drop their defense. The prosecution had plenty of videos of the defendant (or someone who looked exactly like the defendant) working in his yard and on his house.

I’m sure they thought their case looked rock solid… until we brought the defendant to court with his identical twin brother.

The prosecution tried to argue that it wasn’t the brother in the photos. As part of their argument, they showed a picture of the “defendant” working in his yard while a man who looked exactly like the defendant sat in a wheelchair in the defendant’s yard.

We won the case. My client continued to get the money he needed to live. And the South Dakota Department Of Human Services suffered no punishment for their error.

I’m doing a job interview for a pretty standard retail working position. There’s a collection of bulls*** questions that we’re required to ask and document the answer to as part of standardizing the hiring process.

I have an applicant in front of me.

Me: “What’s your greatest strength?”

Applicant: “I’m very fast at math. Ask me a math problem.”

Humoring her, I ask:

Me: “What’s seven plus fifteen?”

She responds almost instantly.

Applicant: “Three.”

Me: “That’s… not the answer.”

Applicant: “No, but it was fast, wasn’t it?”

I laughed. I hired her. A sense of humor is a useful skill working retail.

Me: *Answering the phone* “This is [Pharmacy]. How can I help you?”

Caller: “You gave me the wrong pills!”

Me: “I’m sorry to hear that, ma’am. Did the bag have your name on it?”

Caller: “It’s my name, but the wrong pills are in the bottle!”

Me: “It’s possible we refilled one of your other prescriptions on—”

Caller: “No! The wrong pills are in the bottle!”

Me: “All right, can I have the number on the bottle?”

Caller: “Oh, no, you don’t! I’m not giving that to you.”

Me: “All right, can I have your name, please?”

Caller: “No! I’m on to your tricks!”

Me: “Ma’am, I need to look up your file so I can figure out what the problem is.”

Caller: “No, you don’t! I know your sly ways. You’re just going to change my file so you can cover up your mistake!”

Me: “Ma’am, I don’t have that ability. I’d like to help give you the proper medication. Can you please tell me your name?”

Caller: “No! You’re going to change the names of the medications on my chart to hide your screwup!”

Me: “Well, ma’am, can you come back to the store so I can verify the wrong pills were given?”

Caller: “No! I’m holding onto this bottle! It’s evidence!”

Me: “Ma’am, I can’t change any ‘evidence,’ since you have a printed label on the bottle. Can you tell me the name of the medication?”

Caller: “No! Do you think I’m stupid? I’m not telling you anything!”

Me: *Sighs* “Okay, ma’am, if you won’t let me see your file or the pills, and you won’t bring it back, then what would you like me to do?”

Caller: “I want you to know that you’re a horrible pharmacy. And you are a terrible person!”

Me: “Excuse me? I’m trying to help—”

Caller: “No, you are an awful person! You don’t deserve to be in business, trying to poison me with the wrong pills!”

Me: “Well, can you describe them to me? Are they white? Oval?”

Caller: “I’m not telling! You are a bad person!”

Me: “Ma’am, I would really like to help you, if you could give me some informati—”

Caller: “No, you don’t! Shame on you for trying to kill me and then hiding the evidence!” *Click*

Related:
Well, Ain’t She Just A Pill, Part 2
Well, Ain’t She Just A Pill

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I’m an overnight worker in a big box store. One night, as I’m watching the front registers, a lady with a cart full of groceries walks up and asks to leave her groceries there while she uses the restrooms. This isn’t out of the ordinary, and I agreed to keep an eye on her things while she was away.

Five minutes go by. Then ten. Then twenty. I start to wonder if she left the store and forgot to grab her cart

A whole thirty minutes later, she walks back up with an unhappy look on her face.

Customer: “I want to talk to the manager.”

Overnight managers are notoriously busy. My store only has one manager, who has to sign for any trucks that show up and manage the stockers, cashiers, and maintenance workers, and he oftentimes also does stocking himself since we’re so short-staffed. I figure I should see if I can handle the problem to spare our poor manager the distraction.

Me: “What seems to be the issue? Maybe I can help out with it.”

Customer: “I was in the bathroom, taking a s***, and suddenly, the lights turned off on me! I couldn’t see! How was I supposed to wipe?!”

That is way more information than I wanted. I’m not sure how I kept a straight face.

Me: “Our lights are on a motion-sensitive automatic timer. They should have turned back on as soon as you moved.”

Customer: “That doesn’t matter! A customer should never have the lights turned off on them!”

Me: “I’m sorry this happened to you. The lights are on an automatic timer that turns off after fifteen minutes of no activity. There’s nothing we can do to change this.”

Customer: “Oh, I know it’s not your fault, but I want to complain to the manager! This should never happen to a customer!”

With the customer watching me, I had to radio for the manager to come to the front and deal with this crazy complaint. I wished that I had some way to warn him about what he was about to walk into.

I had to leave as soon as he showed up, so I never got to see how it resolved, but I can’t help but think that if I was sitting on the toilet for so long that the lights automatically turned off on me, I would’ve been too embarrassed to say anything.

I work in a small restaurant in South Dakota. The place is profitable — barely — but the building is old and in poor repair.

One day, the fire extinguisher falls out of its designated slot in the wall overnight. We find it on the floor in the morning. The manager grumbles and puts it back in place, only for it to immediately fall out again.

Inspection shows that the bits that are supposed to hold the extinguisher in place are bent and broken. Grumbling some more, the manager fetches some duct tape and tapes it back into place.

I attempt to point out that’s probably a bad idea and almost certainly is not compliant with local safety regulations, but the manager says it’s just temporary until he can get someone out to fix it.

As you can probably predict, no one ever comes out to fix it. Eventually, the tape wears out, and the extinguisher falls again. The manager replaces the tape.

Over the course of about five years, this happens three times. Finally, during a business rush, a waiter accidentally bumps the extinguisher, knocking it down, and it explodes.

White powder goes flying everywhere. It fills up the kitchen. It fills up the dining area. We’re all coughing and choking on the powder. One of the cooks steadies himself against the grill, burning the skin on his hand badly. I’m not entirely sure how he is able to hold on to the grill for such a long period of time while in so much pain, but he basically burns completely through the skin on the palm of his hand.

We have to shut down for the day to clean up, which becomes three days, which becomes a week. Then, the owners announce that they are closing for good.

All because of one idiot decision about a fire extinguisher.