It is Christmas Day, and our little diner is open for breakfast only. The staff and I are very much looking forward to closing at 11:00 am to go be with our families.

A woman bustles in at around 10:30 am with her four children.

Customer: “Thank God, you’re open! Everywhere else is closed!”

Me: “Well, that’s Christmas Day for you!”

Customer: “Yes, yes, it’s ridiculous. It’s very inconvenient! My kids will tell you what they want. I’ll be outside making a call.”

Me: “Sure thing, ma’am. Please note that we close at 11:00 today, so you might want to order your food now, too.”

Customer: “Whatever. Just coffee for me. Kids, tell her what you want, but no desserts!”

The kids are polite and have bought coloring books and the like, so they’re no problem at all in their booth while their mother is outside on the phone. We close at 11:00 and she is still out there on the phone! At 11:15 am, we have cleaned up the rest of the place and I go outside.

Me: *Politely* “Ma’am, we’re now closed. You’ll need to settle your bill and collect your children.”

She actually holds her hand up to me as I talk, as my request is obviously not as important as whatever she is talking about. I’m about to repeat my request more sternly, but then I overhear a snippet of her conversation.

Customer: “No, you don’t understand! I was supposed to come in yesterday, but my d*** ex dropped off the kids! He was supposed to have them for Christmas, but his mom had to go and get sick or some stupid s*** like that.”

Me: “Ma’am, I—”

Customer: *Glaring at me* “I am trying to get my eyebrow appointment rescheduled to today! Do you know how hard it is to get your eyebrows done on Christmas Day?!”

Me: “I’m sure, ma’am, but the fact remains that we are now closed. You need to settle your bill and collect your children.”

Customer: “God! Five more minutes!”

Me: “Ma’am, in five minutes, I will serve all your children extra-sugary desserts, enough to make them extra energetic for the rest of the day.”

Customer: *Glaring giving way to shock* “Ugh! Fine!”

She finally paid and corralled her kids out of the diner. She came back the next day when our hours were back to normal. Her eyebrows were the same.

Every company’s internal systems are going to have their unique quirks, weird hiccups, and unnecessary workarounds. It’s always an effort, no matter where you work, to figure out which things can be fixed, which things can be dealt with, and which things you just have to say, “Don’t do it.” For us, the “don’t do it” involves modifying partially-fulfilled items; it tricks the system into retroactively changing what was already fulfilled, which screws up reports, invoices, and stock counts. Instead, we have to “cancel” remaining items and re-add them as a new line. It’s not difficult if done ahead of time but leaves way too much open if being expected to do it mid-process, and we’ve spent years fine-tuning the steps we need to take.

We’re explaining some facets of it to a couple of new employees when someone from the purchasing group walking by decides to interject. She’s got a reputation for a wonderful combo of sticking her nose into things, assuming answers despite only half-hearing, and generally being a know-it-all.

Purchasing Employee: “Well, the reason we’re doing that is that some people weren’t doing their jobs.”

Me: “Nnnno. I mean, technically, yes, but that’s because we were having to do all these extra steps that shouldn’t be necessary if the system was set up right.”

Purchasing Employee: “The system is fine. It’s people who weren’t reading the notes and weren’t doing what they were supposed to. I’ve never seen a company where we had to add new lines to change old lines because people wouldn’t do it right.”

Me: “My point is that if our system was set up like every other system I’ve ever used, this would be an automatic process or something more smartly worked with. It’s like a five-step process on our end to edit a partial line and have it recognized correctly versus a two-step process to pull to a new line.”

Purchasing Employee: “Well, people need to just do things right! When I started here, we used to do things this way all the time, but because some individuals weren’t paying attention and weren’t doing things correctly, that was causing constant issues.”

Me: “I get it. Don’t forget: I was one of those people. I’ve been here longer than you. I was one of the ones that helped us get where we are, so mistakes don’t happen. I was pointing out that we wouldn’t have to do these things if this single aspect of our system was up to the industry standard and we didn’t have to do things literally backward to make it work.”

Purchasing Employee: “Hey, I’d love to have everything automated for me, too, and I’m not saying I never make mistakes, but if people could just follow the steps, we’d be able to do it.”

At this point, I realize she’s not ACTUALLY listening to the person involved and just thinking she knows everything about everything. I eventually just hold up a hand and “Okay, whatever” her until she gets the hint and leaves.

I turn back to our new hire with a smile once she’s out of earshot.

Me: “And that’s why we don’t involve [Purchasing Employee] in conversations.”

New Hire: “Yo… Was she even listening to you, or what?”

Supervisor: “I think ‘or what’ sums her up in general. Thanks for keeping it polite, at least!”

Me: “Mmmmmmhm! I’m gonna go get a coffee and scream into the void for a bit.”

I came in for a quick three-hour shift for the dinner rush on Christmas Eve. Things were pretty slow but we had several timed orders for 4:00, 4:15, 4:30, 5:00, etc.

I took a couple of normal deliveries, and people were being a little generous, having a good time.

I grabbed a normal bag, a 4:15 timed order that was several large pies with a $91 cash pay, and a 4:30 timed order that was another cash order of two full sheets, and I rushed out the door on my trip.

The ticket didn’t say the 4:15 order was at a church; I only noticed that when I put the address into my GPS.

I got there on time, and they asked me to wait as they were finishing singing a song. The place had a full congregation and a live band with a singer… and I thought I was just waiting for whoever had the cash to pay to come out after the song was over. And, I gotta admit, I was getting a little ticked I was made to wait when it would make the next delivery a few minutes late.

But they asked me to go inside and take the bag up to the stage! As I was unloading, the preacher started thanking me and all food service personnel for working on Christmas Eve in front of the entire congregation. This felt all very strange, to say the least, because here I was in the spotlight in front of everyone.

But he asked if he could say a quick sermon. He said that the spirit of Christmas was about giving, announced they were giving me a $500 tip, and handed over an envelope!

Totally shocked and embarrassed, I managed to say thank you and that I appreciated it, hopefully, loud enough that most could hear, and with my head swimming, I followed a lady to the door.

I completed my other delivery and got back to the shop still dumbfounded. I asked the manager how many people were employed there, and he said twelve. I told him what had happened and asked that he split the $500 with everyone.

At close, they wanted me to take $100 of the $500, and we all were still super surprised about what had happened.

Merry Christmas, indeed.

In my childhood, my family would visit my grandparents to celebrate Christmas each year. One Christmas, when my sister and I were somewhere around the ages of seven and five, my parents discovered late on Christmas Eve that they had forgotten everything they had meant to put in our stockings at home, which was hours away. 

As all the shops were closed for Christmas, my parents and grandparents had no choice but to scour my grandparents’ house for anything that they could possibly put in a Christmas stocking. The results of this foraging mainly turned up nothing but several pens and legal pads, along with other odds and ends I can’t remember. My parents went to bed feeling awful, certain they had forever ruined Santa and the magic of Christmas for their children.

On Christmas morning, my sister and I eagerly peeked into our stockings, and our eyes grew wide. We ran back to our parents, squealing.

Us: “Did you see what Santa brought us? He gave us real grown-up pens and pads! Mommy, Daddy, look at the notepad! This is the best. Christmas. Ever!“

We cherished those legal pads for the rest of the day, and for months afterward until the paper ran out.

Years later, I finally learned the truth of the story and how bewildered my parents were that no toy had ever enchanted their children like a couple of old legal pads. My mom was certain we were overcompensating for disappointment, but I still remembered that day as the best Christmas ever!

When I was around second grade, my church put on a Christmas play involving every child in Sunday school, telling the story of Jesus’s birth. I was cast as one of the three wise men, and our role was to stand in front of the mics, look up at the ceiling, and comment on the Star of Bethlehem. In order to prevent us from looking in three different directions, we were told beforehand to look in the direction of the ceiling fan. Unfortunately, I had no idea where the fan was in the nave, especially in the darkened room.

Wise Man #1: “Wow, look at that star!”

Wise Man #2: “That star is shining so bright!”

Me: “What could that star mean?” *Pauses* “Where is that stupid star?”

My mom told me afterward that all the adults around her thought it was adorable, which totally made up for the other kids telling me their parents were recording the play and I blew their big moment.