(While walking down an aisle in a supermarket, I come upon a bedraggled-looking mom who is trying — but failing — to quiet her four-year-old in the middle of a loud and teary, “BUT I WANT IT!” tantrum. I impulsively decide to lend the mother an assist. As I pass by, I bend down so that the kid and I are face-to face, and with my most sincere-and-saddened voice and expression, I solemnly confide to her:)

Me: “You know, when I cry, my parents never buy me what I want.”

(The girl’s eyes immediately shoot wide open and she goes dead silent in mid-scream. I’m not sure if it is due to finding out that she is not, in fact, invisible, or just the idea of a sixty-year-old man crying because his parents won’t buy him something. As I continue down the aisle, I am concerned at first that the mother might not approve of my intervention, but I am reassured when a few seconds later, I hear the mother announcing to her daughter:)

Mother: “YUH SEE?“

(I’m a man, doing some grocery shopping on a weekday. It’s in the middle of July, and I have a day off. Another customer, pushing a baby stroller, approaches my cart and looks in.)

Customer: “Sure that will fit on your benefits?”

Me: “Excuse me? Why would you assume I’m on benefits?”

Customer: “Well, else you’d be at work, duh.”

(Apparently it’s very strange to take days off during summer.)

(As part of a family vacation, I get my dad a ticket to a program where he gets to fire a flintlock musket. He arrives at the site, fills out the paperwork, and chats with the other two gentlemen who are there for the program. Soon the instructor arrives.)

Instructor: “So, three today? Great. Before we go over safety, I just want to remind you that flintlock muskets are not very accurate. You’ll be aiming for a paper target, but even hitting the cardboard around the target is pretty good with these guns! So, let’s review range safety…”

(Safety reviewed, guns loaded, and all three shooters take their shots… and hit their targets. Again, and again, and again. The instructor is astounded. The final count, out of 12 shots, is 10 hits on the paper target for one man, 12 for the other, and 11 for my dad.)

Instructor: “Wow. Just wow. This never happens.”

Man #2: “Did I mention I was a Marine?”

Man #1: “I went to Vietnam.”

Dad: “I haven’t served, and I thank you both for it, but I do shoot at my local range twice a month.”

Instructor: “Oh, that explains everything! You’re all ringers!”

(They had a laugh and parted on good terms, and Dad has been showing off his perforated target to all his friends ever since!)

I’m a guy, and a female friend of mine has invited me to join her and a few of her friends to go to a bar they like. They are all rather attractive women, but as I’m already in a relationship, the idea of being romantically interested in any of them doesn’t even cross my mind.

At one point in the evening we are outside on the bar’s patio area, save for one friend who is still inside. I am in need of a new drink and ask if I can get anyone else one, since I’m heading to the bar, anyway. After getting people’s orders, I head inside and see the other friend standing by a table talking to a guy that I assume she knows. She’s on my way to the bar, so I stop and ask her if I can get her a drink, since I am in the mindset of buying the next round. She politely declines, but then the guy she was talking to says something to me. The music is very loud and I can’t make out what he said. I ask him to repeat himself, but I still can’t make it out. However, from the cadence it sounds like he is making a joke, so I smile at him and chuckle and continue on to the bar to get drinks before I forget what people have asked me to get.

Later, after our group leaves the bar, the friend who was talking to the guy says she is astounded by what I did. I don’t know what she means and ask her to explain. The guy she was talking to was just a random guy who was trying to hit on her. When I came up and asked if I could get her a drink, he thought I was trying to hit on her, too, so he was threatening to fight me for having gotten in his way.

So, from his perspective, he threatened to beat me up, and I looked at him, smiled, laughed, and walked away. He was so intimidated by that that he ended up leaving her alone for the rest of the evening.

I am in no way a “tough guy” and, in fact, tend to avoid conflict to a fault. But this particular time, I managed to accidentally “out-tough” a random guy at the bar.

(I’m a customer, flying out on a Tuesday morning. I’ve driven to the airport, parked in a long-term lot, and am now standing in line for the security checkpoint. I’m idly people-watching when I notice a woman wearing these really long sandals basically made out of lots of straps. It strikes me as pretty impractical footwear for traveling, so I give her a closer look… only to recognize her horizontally-striped shirt and bleached blonde hair from someone who sped past me very aggressively on the highway before I arrived. She’s also wearing large sunglasses inside the airport, so I call her Shades. She finishes checking a bag at the counter and walks over to join the security queue, roughly a dozen people behind me, only to pull out her phone and begin speaking very loudly:)

Shades: “OH, NO, MOM, THIS IS AWFUL. IT’S A CATASTROPHE! MY PLANE IS GOING TO LEAVE SOON WITHOUT ME, AND THERE ARE LIKE EIGHT HUNDRED PEOPLE IN LINE IN FRONT OF ME!”

(A quick count suggests roughly forty people in the line. This is not a bad security queue. I begin exchanging amused and disbelieving glances with the people nearby.)

Shades: “MOM, THEY’RE GOING TO LEAVE WITHOUT ME! I CAN’T MAKE IT IN TIME WITH ALL THESE PEOPLE IN FRONT OF ME! THIS IS SO TERRIBLE! WHY ARE ALL THESE PEOPLE HERE?! THIS AIRPORT IS AWFUL; IT’S NOTHING LIKE NEW YORK!”

(She’s now getting looks from all over the line, but doesn’t notice or doesn’t care.)

Shades: “I’M GOING TO MISS MY FLIGHT, AND IT’LL COST ME AN EXTRA 100 DOLLARS, AND I’LL BE STUCK HERE IN THIS STUPID CITY!”

(I can’t help but laugh. She shuts up for a little while, and then gets back on her phone.)

Shades: *still shouting* “HI THERE, [OTHER RELATIVE]. IT’S AWFUL; I’M GOING TO MISS MY FLIGHT! IT BOARDS SOON AND THERE ARE LIKE FORTY PEOPLE IN FRONT OF ME IN THE SECURITY LINE. I CALLED MOM, BUT SHE WOULDN’T GIVE ME ANY SYMPATHY. SHE SAYS CHARLOTTE IS A NICE CITY AND DOESN’T CARE THAT I’LL BE STUCK HERE!”

(Don’t worry, Shades; we care. We’re all hoping you’ll hurry home; it’s just your mother who doesn’t want you back.)