(I work for a sizable company as tech support.)

Me: “Thank you for calling [Product] support. This is [Name] speaking. May I ask who I’m speaking with?”

(The woman on the line has a rattly, elderly voice.)

Caller: “What’s a [Product]? I don’t have a [Product]; I have a computer. I need help with my computer.”

Me: “Yes, m—”

(The customer refuses to let me get a word in. I try, but every first syllable I’m talked over. I am honestly impressed how little this elderly woman needs to breathe.)

Caller: “So, I have a new [Operating System #1] computer and I don’t understand; my [Operating System #2] worked just fine. But I don’t understand; it says there’s networks. I didn’t make any networks. I don’t know what a network is. What is [Someone’s Network]? Who is that? I certainly don’t know. I think people are on my network.”

Me: “Ma’am—”

Caller: “That’s not right! What are they doing to my network? All my computer has is pictures of my grandchildren and my ducks. I don’t want people to have pictures of my grandchildren.”

Me: “Yes, ma’am. I unders—”

Caller: “You don’t know what kind of creeper could be looking at them. I have lots of grandchildren. But my husband died in 1991. I think that’s ten years ago. No, that’s fourteen. My husband died fourteen years ago.”

Me: “I’m sorry to hea—”

Caller: “He’s the one that got me my ducks. My whole yard is full of ducks. I don’t think he wanted me to have this many ducks, but my grandchildren love them.”

Me: “Ma’am, I—”

(The customer continues to go on endlessly about her ducks, grandchildren, dead husband, and occasionally about the “hacker network,” for the next ten minutes before I finally get enough words in:)

Me: “Ma’am, unfortunately, you’re in the gaming department. What I can do is transfer you to [Company] central—”

Caller: “But I don’t have games; I have a comput—”

Me: “Yes, ma’am, I understand that. Let me bring you to the computer people.”

Caller: “Oh, bless your heart. Thank you.”

(I put the customer on hold, dial the appropriate department, punch in the commands, and patch her in.)

Agent: “Hello, thank you for calling [Company] support. Who am I speaking with?”

Me: “I’m sorry.”

Agent: “Huh?”

Caller: “Oh, thank you. I need someone to help me get rid of these networks. I only have two browsers. One is a folder for drivers and the other is—”

Me: *hangs up very quickly* “HEY, [BOSS], CAN I GET MY BREAK NOW?”

(This happens at least once every day, without fail.)

Customer: *walking up to me, confused* “What theater is my movie in?”

Me: “Can I see your ticket?”

(The customer hands me their ticket, which has the theater number printed in large, bold text that takes up more than a third of the ticket.)

Me: “That’d be theater number four. For future reference, it’s right here on the ticket.”

Customer: *annoyed* “Well, how should I know that?!”

Me: “Because it’s right there on the ticket?”

Customer: *sighs* “Whatever.”

(There is a brief, awkward pause.)

Me: “Is there something else I can help you with?”

Customer: “Where is theater number four?”

(I point to the theater, which is clearly marked with large numbers on either side of the doors and a large sign with the name of the movie playing.)

Me: “It’s right there, sir. The one marked ‘Theater #4.'”

Customer: *suddenly angry* “HOW WAS I SUPPOSED TO KNOW THAT?!”

(One of these days, I swear, I’m going to respond with what I’m really thinking: “Because, unlike you, I ACTUALLY USE my basic powers of observation like a responsible adult. Do I need to hold your hand and walk you to your seat as well?”)

(My story involves a party game called “Bag of Nouns.” Everyone puts five nouns on five strips of paper and all the papers go into a bag. Teams are optional. The game has three rounds: the first round, you say whatever you can to get your group to guess the noun you drew from the bag and get through as many nouns as you can in a minute. At the end of each turn, all the strips of paper go back into the bag, so very quickly certain nouns become familiar through repetition. The second round is same idea, except you get ONE WORD to describe what’s on the paper, so you’d better hope the nouns you draw on your turn are familiar ones, or that someone in your group will figure out one of their nouns that hasn’t been drawn yet. If you screw up and say, “um,” then you’ve used your one word for that noun, and you’d better hope your team can guess from nothing. The third round is charades. We are on the second round, and a friend’s guest gets to go first.)

Friend: *to guest in question* “Okay, second round. You get just one word per noun that you draw. You can say that word over and over, but you cannot say any other words, not even ‘uh’ or ‘um.'”

Guest: “Okay.” *draws from bag, looks at it* “Right, so, this is a thing where—”

Friend: “—no. One word.” *everyone agrees to give her another shot, since she clearly missed something* “Okay, so if the noun you drew was, say, ‘car,’ you could say, ‘drive,’ or maybe, ‘traffic,’ but nothing else. If the noun you drew came up a lot in the previous round, try to pick a word from those turns to describe it that your team would recognize. Okay?”

Guest: “Yeah, got it.”

Friend: “Great. Draw again.”

Guest: *draws, looks* “Um, so, these are given when—”

Friend: “—no. Stop. Okay. So, for example, the one you drew that time was ‘Finals.’ You could say, ‘test,’ or, ‘college,’ and when that word came up in the first round, ‘stress’ was focused on a lot, so you could use ‘stress’ or something. But no other words. No sentences. No descriptions. One word for the noun you drew, and then your team has to guess based on that one word.”

Guest: *pauses* “Sure.” *draws again, looks at paper* “This is something that—”

Friend: “—yeah, okay, your turn’s over. Next person!”

(She never seemed to really understand the rule, but she also never seemed to understand that she was missing anything.)

(It’s almost Halloween, and that means we get some crazy questions at our town hall. Most residents call our office for tax collections and treasury and treat it as if we are a general receptionist to field calls. These are the questions we usually get for the Halloween season.)

Customer #1: “When is Halloween?”

Employee: “The 31st.”

Customer #1: “Right, but is it, [day] or [day]?”

(Another fun conversation sample…)

Customer #2: “What time is trick-or-treating?”

Employee: “There isn’t a set time.”

Customer #2: “Well, how am I supposed to know when to go out?”

(And a few more…)

Customer #3: “Are the fireworks going to be at night or during the day?”

Customer #4: “Where can I go to get a trick-or-treating permit?”

Customer #5: “I am taking my kids to go trick-or-treating. Can I get a solicitor’s permit?”

Customer #6: “How much does trick-or-treating cost?”

(My math teacher is known to be a drama queen, and she really doesn’t like me. One day, before math class, my finger gets slammed in a door. As I am quite scared of my math teacher and don’t want to be counted as tardy to her class, I decide to go to her room, and ask for permission to go to the school office and get a bandage. As I get to the room, my finger starts to turn a greenish-purple color. When I go to ask to get a bandage, this happens:)

Teacher: *shows up to the classroom late, after her lunch break* “Okay, everyone, let’s hurry and get this lesson started since we’ve already missed five minutes of class time.”

(I raise my hand.)

Teacher: “Not now. Wait until we start the lesson, and then you can ask.”

(At this point, most of the other kids in my class have noticed, and are now urging me to just leave and go to the nurse. My teacher hears us talking and asks what all the commotion is about. I show her my finger.)

Me: “I got my finger slammed in a door. Can I go to the nurse?”

Teacher: *screams* “Yes! Go, go anywhere. Go to the cafeteria, go to the auditorium; just get out of here. I don’t want to see it.”

(I rushed out of the classroom, almost crying from the pain in my finger. Unfortunately, I ended up having this teacher again in a later year, and she was just as bad.)