I do volunteer work in a food pantry, and it’s the day of the annual big lunch with the volunteers from the different food pantries of the department and the departmental headquarters.

During the preparation of the meal, there are, among others, our buyer, the person in charge of training courses, [Volunteer], and me.

Buyer: “What do you do?”

Me: “I prepare a meatless starter.”

Buyer: “Why? Are there vegetarian people here?”

Volunteer: “Yes, me.”

Buyer: “So, you are one of those people who break the windows of the butchers’ shops!”

We are shocked, but [Volunteer] and I are in our twenties and our buyer is in his sixties, and here, there is a “let’s respect our elders” mentality.

Volunteer: “No, I’m not one of the extremists.”

A little later, we are having lunch.

Buyer: “Ah, but the kick scooters, I don’t understand! It’s a means of transport for the bobos!”

The person in charge of the training courses is older than the buyer and is not a vegetarian.

Trainer: “So, it’s you who puts paint on the QR codes of the self-service electric kick scooters to prevent them from unlocking!

The media has been reporting these acts of vandalism.

Buyer: “Nonsense! Why do you say that?”

Trainer: “Since you thought that vegetarians were necessarily people who broke butchers’ windows, I thought that those who criticised the kick scooters were necessarily people who vandalised them.”

Our buyer stopped criticising vegetarians and people on scooters.

I volunteer as a Cub Scout leader for my son’s troop, a group of eight boys about nine years old — volunteer, as in Nobody Gets Paid For Doing This. We have a lot of fun meetings, trying to earn various badges, and the boys always have a good time.

At the end of one meeting, a father comes into my home to pick up his son, instead of the boy’s mother, who has always picked up her son in the past. 

I introduce myself to the father.

Father: *Angrily* “When are they going camping?! I thought scouting was all about camping!”

Me: “We would really like to do that. We were hoping to go camping this spring.”

Father: *Still angry* “They should have gone camping a dozen times by now! Why aren’t they going camping all the time?!”

Me: *Fake excited* “Oh, my goodness, are you volunteering to organize a camping trip?! The boys will be so excited! What date are you thinking, and where do you think we should go?”

He literally recoils, stepping back two paces. 

Father: “Well, uh, well…”

Me: “The other leaders and I all have jobs, and it takes time to plan the meetings and do the activities. It is so nice that you are willing to do this for the boys.”

Father: “[Son], come on. Your mom is waiting for us,”

And he practically ran out the door.

We did manage to have a couple of family camping trips with the troop. It was no surprise that this dad offered zero help with planning and did not attend.

I work at a major international coffee chain. I am doing this job only because I need it and living in Vancouver is expensive.

We’re at a regular all-staff meeting.

Management: “We have a new policy to save costs. From now on, when charities come in asking if we can donate food or coffee for their events, we are going to instead offer them volunteers.”

Me: *Over-enthusiastically* “So, we get to volunteer when people ask us for donations?”

Management: “Yeah! We’ll have signup sheets in here so staff can sign up to volunteer when they’re off shift.”

Me: *Still excited* “So, instead of donating food, we get to give them our free time and volunteer on behalf of [Major Company]!”

Management: “Yep. We’re glad you’re so enthusiastic about the changes.”

My coworker whispers to another barista, my friend.

Coworker: “I can’t tell if [My Name] is weirdly excited about her job or if she really hates it.”

Friend: “She definitely hates it. So much, she’s snapped.”

I’ve just returned home after three years of college, and I go back to the youth club I used to volunteer with. Things have changed a lot since I was here last, and since I used to be in charge of kitchen/sales, it’s only natural for me to step into that my first night back. Because we meet on Fridays, we sell, among other things, a large variety of candy.

It’s the end of the night and we’re packing up. I’m looking over the price list when the guy in charge of procurement — an old classmate and friend of mine — comes in. The real prices are in Norwegian Kroner, so the prices stated are just a rough estimate.

Friend: “You look puzzled, [My Name].”

Me: “What? Oh, no, I was just checking the price list.”

Friend: “Yeah, some of the prices are a little weird, I know.”

Me: “Yeah, why are we selling [candy bar #1] for $1.33? And [candy bar #2] for $1.56? Wouldn’t it be easier to keep it an even number? I mean, you’ve always complained about being left with so much small change at the end of the day.”

Friend: “I know, but I thought we should keep the prices close to the local stores’. I actually got the [candy bar #1]s on sale, two for a dollar.”

Me: “So, why not sell them for a dollar, then? And [candy bar #2] sells for over two dollars in some stores, so you could sell those for $1.90 or something to make up for the difference.”

Friend: “What?”

He seems really confused at this point, and I find myself actually talking slower.

Me: *Sighs* “If you paid one dollar for two bars, you essentially bought one bar for fifty cents, right? So, if you sell one bar for a dollar, you’ve made fifty cents. I can see why you’d want to try and price-match with the stores, and you could potentially make a few extra bucks a week, but if you’re offering the kids the same deal as the stores, what’s stopping them from buying in there instead of here?”

He didn’t have a good answer for that and seemed genuinely confused about the whole thing. He’s twenty-four and works at a grocery store, yet simple math still escapes him. He even suggested I use a calculator during sales, because counting is apparently difficult.

(I am working as a volunteer at an event; we only deal with entertaining or guiding the public. I need to use the bathroom and, on entering a cubicle, I find the toilet completely clogged. People have kept using it even though it was obviously blocked. I pull the door shut and lock the door using a coin. Afterward, I go in search of the attendant. I find her chatting to a male dressed in the same uniform at the entry to the bathrooms. They are not discussing work.)

Me: “Uh, excuse me, I just wanted to let you know that one of the toilets is blocked and that I…”

Attendant: “Go away, leave me alone. I don’t need to be told that every thirty seconds “

Me: “What the h***? I was just trying to tell you that I lo–“

Attendant: *cuts me off again* “I told you to get away from me. I don’t need to be told every thirty seconds.”

(The man is looking on, open-mouthed.)

Me: “As if it’s obvious that I can see that you’ve been told by anyone! I’m sorry I disturbed your conversation about what you are having for dinner.” *turns and starts walking off before turning around* “Oh, what I was trying to tell you was that I locked the door, and I was going to tell you which one, but now you can just find it for yourself.”

(This means that she has forty cubicles to check as the doors go all the way to the floor and up to the ceiling. About an hour later, one of my fellow volunteers comes in.)

Volunteer: “I’ve been asked by one of the toilet cleaners to let one of our volunteers know how sorry she is for being rude to her. How am I going to work out who that is?”

Me: “Yeah, that was me.”