I make appointments for tenants who have technical issues in their house — any kind of issue. If it’s something that falls under our responsibility, I make an appointment for you.

Tenant: “The banister of my stairs is loose. I need someone to fix it.”

Me: “Of course. Let me look into this.”

I quickly get everything ready for an appointment with our carpenter. On the schedule, I see a few options that might be too far away if the tenant is dependent on the banister for safety. She does sound old, and the date of birth does scream “old”, as well, so I may need to call a different department to get an earlier date. But since I know which questions they will ask, I decide to ask those first.

Me: “May I ask how long this banister has been loose?”

Tenant: “For about three months now.”

Me: “Oh… May I ask why you didn’t call back then?”

Tenant: “It didn’t bother me, but you see, we started redecorating and we pulled off the wallpaper. It would be nice if it could be fixed tomorrow since we plan on finishing the wall the day after tomorrow.”

In the background, I hear:

Voice: “They’d better be coming tomorrow! I can’t finish if they aren’t here tomorrow!”

I don’t really like “back-seat callers”, but I try not to let it get to me. However, I really do not like people demanding an appointment the next day (or even the same day) when they’ve had the opportunity to call for three months. How do people always say it? Bad planning on your side does not mean urgency on my side?

Me: “I understand that you want to continue on your wall, but I’m afraid we don’t have any openings tomorrow. I do have one two weeks from now.”

Tenant: “What?! That long?! You can’t be serious!”

Me: “I’m afraid that really is the first option we have.”

Tenant: “But… but… what if I fall?!”

Me: “Well, you did say you’ve had this situation for three months already. How did you handle things in that time?”

Tenant: “But my wall! You can’t expect me to look at that awful wall for two weeks, now, can you?”

Me: “I understand this is an inconvenience for you, but—”

Tenant: “You can say that again!”

The voice in the background speaks up again.

Voice: “I’m not going to wait two weeks! I want them to come tomorrow!”

Tenant: “You need to come tomorrow!”

Me: “I have no one available tomorrow, but—”

Tenant: “You have to!”

Me: “I’m sorry, but I can’t help this. You said this banister has been loose for three months now. You could have called anywhere in those three months. The fact that you planned a wall redecoration now and did not take the banister into account does not mean that it’s an emergency. A lot of people made appointments earlier and have been waiting; I can’t cancel them so I can have a spot for you.”

Tenant: “But… I…”

Voice: “What?! But…”

Me: “I can offer this date for our carpenter, or you can look for someone yourselves at your own cost. Shall I put you in for this slot? And does the gentleman next to you have any other questions?”

The man in the background is suddenly very silent.

Tenant: “No… No, thank you. Please put us in for that slot.”

Me: “I will, and it’s already taken care of. Can I write down your phone number in case someone else’s appointment gets cancelled and our carpenter is in the neighborhood?”

Tenant: “Yes, please, thank you.”

The rest of the conversation was uneventful. The conversation didn’t come up in a review, either. But I really wished the “Bad planning…” line could be translated into Dutch without sounding like garbled Dutch.

We live in a 1930s residential area in terraced houses that don’t have their own driveways or garages. Not many people owned cars back then, so parking space wasn’t a priority in planning. As a result, everyone must park on the narrow street, and parking spots are tight and scarce. You just park your car in the first available spot you can find.

Everyone is fine with this situation. No one claims a parking spot, and we all have a quiet agreement that you park your car so someone else can either park in front of or behind it. There’s no hogging of two parking spots because of bad parking.

One day, we all find a leaflet in our mailbox announcing the arrival of [New Neighbor].

Leaflet: “I’m [New Neighbor], the new owner of house number twelve. The parking spots in front of my house must be kept vacant on [date] so the movers won’t have any difficulties parking their van. Failure to do so will result in cars being towed. The sidewalk in front of my house and the three houses on either side will be off-limits so the movers won’t be hindered by people walking by.”

Unsurprisingly, this announcement is not received well. Apart from the fact that [New Neighbor]’s entitlement is so high that she thinks that she can tow cars that are legally parked, she also can’t deny her neighbors the right to use the sidewalk.

On the day that the movers arrive with their van, all parking spots in front of the house are occupied and some neighbors have installed themselves on the pavement with chairs and tables. They are drinking tea and coffee and having a nice neighborhood party. The movers address the neighbors.

Movers: “Would you like to move your cars so we can park here?”

Neighbor #1: “None of these cars belong to us, so we can’t help you.”

Neighbor #2: “If you damage any of those cars, though, things will get ugly.”

[New Neighbor] appears at this stage and starts screaming.

New Neighbor: “I’m going to have all these cars towed! I’ll let the police clear the sidewalk!”

Of course, everyone started making fun of her.

[New Neighbor] grabbed her phone and started calling towing services, just to find out that no one would tow cars just because she said so. The next number she called was the emergency number. They told her that abuse of the number could cost her 6700 Euros, as we could hear since [New Neighbor] was literally screaming the conversation and repeating the answers she got.

[New Neighbor] was losing it at that point, but it got worse when one of the movers drew her attention and pointed to the front door of her new house. The front door was boarded up, and it would take a few hours to make the house accessible again.

After an hour of discussion, phone calls, swearing, and throwing tantrums, [New Neighbor] realized that she wouldn’t have a happy life on our street. The movers drove off without unloading one single bit of furniture, and [New Neighbor] left after giving threats of lawsuits and “I’ll be back” statements.

The next day, a realtor put a new “For Sale” sign up, and the house was later sold to a lovely couple who knew how to treat neighbors.

We later found out that [New Neighbor] had quite a history of making herself an “unwanted element” with her neighbors.

She never came back.

My husband has a sensitive stomach, so I keep a sort of mental note of which products are safe for him and which give him entire nights of stomach cramps.

This conversation happens after I, after testing positive for a certain contagious illness, have come back from isolating at a family member’s house while they were on holiday.

Me: “I just did some groceries. I got some more cheese.”

Husband: “Man, I mostly lived on cheese this last week — so many cheese sandwiches and pasta with cheese. It was the easiest and fastest way to get some food in me after a long day, especially with you gone.”

Me: “I did see that. I’m surprised you got cheese from [Supermarket], though. I’ve been avoiding that like the plague for years, because you got cramps from it the last time we tried it.”

Husband: “…”

Me: “What?”

Husband: *In a small voice* “That would explain so much about this week.”

I am the kind of guy who can’t stand linguistic errors, including anglicisms in my mother tongue. Most of the time, I restrain myself and say nothing, but sometimes, I do say something. For the sake of this anecdote, understand that in Dutch, there is the word “moraal” (morals) and “moreel” (morale), which people get confused due to reading and watching too much in English. I have translated the error to English.

Coworker: “Well, I’m trying to go for something positive, guys, because I noticed our morals are threatening to go to an all-time low.”

Me: “I think you mean our morale.”

Coworker: *Playfully annoyed* “Oh, yeah, whatever. I was never that good in grammar.”

Me: “That’s very clear. Because this isn’t grammar.”

During some time of unemployment, I apply for a job at a new restaurant they plan to build in a nearby city. I haven’t worked in a restaurant for several years, but I know I can do it if I want to, and I need a job.

After some time, I receive an invitation by email for a general meeting of applicants. At the meeting, a presentation is given about the plans for the new restaurant. It sounds quite cool. There is also a round where you introduce yourself to the group, which seems promising. After that, they take individual interviews. During the interview, I get the usual questions about what days and hours I can work. I go into it with an open mind and am prepared to work a lot for them.

Later, I receive a rejection by email anyway. I’m not terribly disappointed — just a little bit. Hoping to learn from the experience, I ask them if they could explain their motives for rejecting me.

Their answer?

Hiring Manager: “As we said in our previous email, it’s based on your experience and traveling distance.”

Right. But you knew all of that already from my resume, so what was the point of inviting me for the job interview, anyway?