Customer: “I need the information off of my old phone.”
Me: *Looking around* “Okay, where is it?”
Customer: “At the bottom of a lake.”
Me: “…”
Customer: “Will that be a problem?”
Me: “Did you back it up in the cloud?”
Customer: “It’s in a lake, not a cloud! Keep up!”
I sniffed out the person who kept stealing my lunch at work by making it extra, extra spicy and noticing the culprit running to the kitchen for cold water.
After it came out what I had done, they reported me to Human Resources.
Human Resources: “Do you know why you’re here today?”
Me: “To discuss how I am going to be compensated for having a coworker stealing my lunch for months?”
Human Resources: “Uh… no. There has been a complaint made against you for deliberately poisoning a coworker.”
Me: “Either you’re not being serious, or you’re not aware of the facts. My accuser —or let’s just say her name, [Coworker], since we all know who it is — was stealing my homemade food for months, and she was only caught because I made my sandwich extra spicy one day and she couldn’t handle it. I should be reporting her to HR for theft.”
Human Resources: “So, are you admitting that you intentionally made your lunch extra spicy to bring harm to a coworker?”
Me: “I’ll admit that if you can admit what we all know: that [Coworker] is only able to make this ridiculous complaint in the first place because she slept with [Boss] on the company trip to Colorado and now she can get away with anything she wants.”
Human Resources: “Unsubstantiated office rumor is not why we’re here, and I’d advise you to not engage in such conversations as that is an HR violation.”
Me: “Just like how I decided I wanted to put some peppers into my sandwich one day is an HR violation?”
Human Resources: “The sandwich had sixteen habanero peppers.”
Me: “I like spicy.”
Human Resources: “Just… don’t do it again.”
Me: “So now HR is dictating to me what I am allowed to eat?”
Human Resources: “That’s not what we’re saying!”
Me: “You literally just told me not to put something I like in my sandwich.”
Human Resources: “No one can reasonably say that was a normal level of spice to put in one sandwich!”
Me: “So now you’re attacking my culture?”
Human Resources: “What culture?”
Me: “I come from a long line of Irish spicemasters who love spicy food.”
Human Resources: “There’s no such thing.”
Me: “So now you’re erasing my culture?”
Human Resources: “…”
Me: “…”
Human Resources: “Just… go back to work.”
Me: “Gladly.”
My coworker was not happy when she found out I didn’t even get a slap on the wrist. When I brought in a plain egg and mayo sandwich a few days later and announced to the office kitchen that I couldn’t handle spicy food, it didn’t make her much happier.
Our fast food place does kids’ meals that come with a toy. A father is getting a meal for himself and his son.
Customer: “And a kids’ meal for my son. Make sure the toy is for boys.”
Me: “Actually, the toys aren’t grouped like that. They’re all for all children.”
Customer: “So, like gender-neutral? Is this that woke s***?”
Me: “Uh… no, sir. It’s just toys.”
Customer: “Toys come for boys or for girls! If you’re selling that any-boy-can-be-a-girl s***, then we’re gonna have a problem!”
Me: “If you think Pokémon trading cards need to be assigned a gender identity, then I think you’re the one with a problem, sir.”
The customer’s kid finally looks up from playing his Nintendo; coincidentally, the game he’s playing is Pokémon.
Customer’s Son: “Dad, the Pikachu isn’t going to make me want to wear a dress. You have a hard enough time getting me to put on pants.”
The father grumbled but got his son his gender-neutral Pokémon children’s meal.
One time, I was flying out of Chicago, and at the security point, TSA confiscated my nail clippers. (Yes, clippers, not scissors.)
I got to the other side and into the shops. At the first pharmacist, I was able to replace the nail clippers. Next door? A shop selling products that included their small Swiss Army pocket knives, as the blades were under the 2.36-inch (6 cm) maximum!
I am an assistant manager at a pharmacy. We’re just a few blocks from a small retirement community, so we have quite a few senior citizen customers.
I have just finished a midnight shift and I am getting ready to leave when one of our elderly regulars wheels a cart full of merchandise to the front register. I have spoken to this particular customer many times, and she has always been very courteous, even going so far as to bring us baked goods around the holidays.
The cashier who’s working today is one of our best employees. He always goes out of his way to be nice to our customers, and he is mentioned by name on customer service surveys several times a week. He is Black, which is relevant to what’s about to happen.
Loss prevention has a very strict guideline that the register has to be manned at all times, so the cashiers are supposed to call another employee if a customer needs help finding something.
The cashier is about halfway through scanning this woman’s order.
Customer: “Do you have any more of the cases of water that are on sale?”
Cashier: “I’m not sure, but I can have someone check for you.”
He starts to call for someone on the intercom, but since I am right there, I say:
Me: “I’ll check for you!”
I head for the stockroom. As soon as I turn away from the register, I hear the customer speak in a very loud and angry voice.
Customer: “Why can’t you go look, you lazy f****** [N-word]?”
I freeze for a few seconds. I’ve heard plenty of racial slurs growing up in a rural area, but they’ve usually been whispered, and only after the speaker made sure the coast was clear. I’d never heard someone go full pre-Civil Rights Deep South before.
Then, I come back to life.
Me: “You need to leave.”
Customer: “What? No! I need my stuff!”
Me: “No. You have been asked to leave, so now you are trespassing. If you don’t leave immediately, I will call the police.”
She finally leaves, but not before she tells us that she is going to get both of us fired.
Sure enough, she calls the corporate office and complains. I have already emailed the district manager and the regional vice president in anticipation because I know she will leave out the racial slur from her complaint.
That leads to the most awkward conference call in history. The cashier, store manager, and I are on the call with [District Manager] and [Vice President]. [Vice President] says, in the most uncomfortable voice I have ever heard:
VP: “So, it’s, um… my understanding that she called you the, uh… the N-word?”
Cashier: “No, she called me a n***er.”
Talk about tension you could cut with a knife.
To their credit, corporate actually banned the woman from the store. That surprised me because brick-and-mortar retailers are so desperate for customers that they’ll tolerate all manner of despicable behavior to keep a customer from giving their business to a competitor.
I never had to enforce the ban because the customer never came back. In a way, that made her an even grosser excuse for a human being. If she came back and tried to shop like nothing had happened, then her outburst might have been attributed to a moment of senility, but the fact that she never came back tells me she knew what she said and how horrible it was.
