The first time I bought a brand-new car, I brought my parents with me — mostly because I was hoping I’d potentially be able to walk off the lot with the new one but didn’t think I’d be able to trade in my old one. Plus, I wanted their opinions on a couple of options I was considering. Before we went to the dealership, I called my credit union and went through them for the car loan (because they got me a much better deal than the dealership and so that I’d have a better idea of my budget). I already knew what model I wanted but was mostly waffling on color and some of the extras.

The entire time, I did almost all of the talking, although my dad did add things a couple of times when he was giving opinions on the options. But again, I was doing the talking. This was for my car. For me. Going to my house. Paid for with my money/loan. We got things decided on which car I wanted, and the salesman brought us inside so we could go over the paperwork.

Salesman: *Glancing at my dad* “Okay, we’re going to need her to fill out this paperwork here, and we’ll go talk with our finance guys and see what kind of deal we can work.”

My dad just kind of gave the salesman a look.

Dad: “It’s her car; talk to her.”

Me: “And we don’t need to talk to the finance guy. I’ve already got approval from [Credit Union] for [amount]. You can call them at [number] on this card.” *Puts the information on his desk* “Please don’t run my credit, because I’ve already run it through them and know that I’m approved to get this car. Can we just get the paperwork figured out?”

[Salesman] again glanced at my dad, although to his (minute) credit, he seemed to catch himself and then looked at me.

Salesman: “Okay, so we’ll still need to check with the finance guys on this.”

Me: “Why? I’m already approved for [amount about $3,000 more than the price of the car], so you know that it’s covered. We don’t need to run credit or talk to them, unless you were going to take my old car as a trade?”

[Salesman] did go back and talk to finance. I had to remind him again not to bother checking my credit because I wasn’t financing through them and was already approved. He came back and told me they could do $500 immediately on trade-in and I took it. (That was probably a little less than its value, but I was just happy to get rid of it.)

We finally got the paperwork filled out, and [Salesman] said that he’d take care of the loan side and I would get a notice and be able to pick up the car on Wednesday. (This happened on Sunday.)

Wednesday came around and I hadn’t heard from him, so I called him.

Salesman: “Thank you for calling [Dealership]; this is [Salesman].”

Me: “Hi, [Salesman], this is [My Name]. I came in on Sunday and worked with you about the Crosstrek?”

Salesman: “Hi! How can I help?”

Me: “Well, it’s Wednesday, and I haven’t received anything that said I could come to get my car.”

Salesman: “Oh, yeah, about that. Because you’re not financing through us, you’ll need to send in [specific documents] from your credit union.”

Me: “But you said you were going to reach out to them for that. You have all the information.”

Salesman: “I’m sorry, you’ll need to call them.”

We ended the call. I called my credit union and got all the paperwork sent over to the dealership. It took me about twenty minutes, and half of that was spent on hold just because they were busy. I did finally get my car, and I love it. I probably won’t go back to that dealership any time soon, though.

Our house has an alarm system. My dog — a lab mix a little on the bigger side — sleeps inside. One morning, I get up to feed him and let him out. He’s very excited (as is normal because, you know, he’s a dog) and as I’m half-asleep trying to turn off the alarm, he leans against me and knocks me off-balance. As I am in the process of keying in the code, my finger misses the key I am aiming for and instead hits the fire alarm.

Even though I cancel it fairly quickly, it still sends the alert to the alarm company. They try to call my dad, but between the fact that he is up making sure the house is safe and not on fire and the fact that his phone is on silent, he misses the call. So, of course, they dispatch firefighters because they’re doing their job.

I answer the door when they arrive because I am closest.

Me: “Um, hi?”

Firefighter: “Hello. [Alarm Company] alerted us to a possible fire at this house.”

Me: “Oh, um…”

I’m completely embarrassed even though it was an accident. To be fair, I am a teenage girl with messed-up hair and wearing old pajamas, and these are cute firefighters.

Me: “Yeah, that was me. I was trying to turn off the alarm to let him—” *indicates the dog, who is excitedly trying to make friends with the firefighters* “—out, and he bumped me, and I fell against the button.”

By this point, my dad has come down the stairs, having just finished calling back the alarm company.

Dad: “I missed the alarm company’s call to cancel the alert. We’re sorry for any issues this caused.”

Firefighter: “It’s no worry. We understand that things happen, but we do need to check the alarm really fast.”

Dad: “Please do.”

I managed to get the dog away from all his new friends and send him to the backyard while they tested the alarm. After that, I made sure to be steadier on my feet or occupy the dog with one of his toys before trying to turn the alarm off.

I ordered delivery from a restaurant because I’m lazy. The delivery driver saw me smoking on my front porch. I put out my cigarette and went inside because [global health crisis] was still a thing. The driver was supposed to put my food outside the door and continue on. 

He actually put it on the doorstep, took a picture, took the food back, and left. 

I went outside to get the food, and there was nothing. I checked the app, and it showed as delivered; it even showed a picture of the food on my porch.

I called the guy through the app.

Driver: “I put the food outside your door. But I did see a girl on the front porch who went inside right before I came up.”

He actually tried to blame ME for stealing my own freaking food! I was so mad!

I went through the app’s help section to get the order and the tip refunded, and I ordered again. I’m still so mad!

I used to work at a toy store where customers could come in, put stuffing in an animal, put clothes on it, and name it.

A couple of years before this story, the company started offering a birthday promotion where parents could bring their young children in, and however old the child was turning would be the price of their animal, e.g., six years old = $6.

Close to the holidays, pre-health crisis, I answered the phone on a busy Saturday. The woman on the other end told me she was pregnant and due very soon, and she wanted to know if she could bring her children in for their birthdays before she wouldn’t be able to. Corporate was very generous with the policy, so I let her know she could, and she said they would be in later.

A few hours after, we had a lull in the crowds. In came a very pregnant woman, her husband, and three rambunctious boys, all under the age of six. I recognized her as the woman I had spoken to and welcomed them in. She told me that her three boys, turning six, four, and three, all had their birthdays within the next two weeks and she was due during that time. Since I had the time — and as a manager, rarely had the opportunity to help with stuffing — I grabbed the animals for her kids and began helping.

I don’t remember the entire stuffing process, but after we had stuffed them and put the hearts in, the boys wanted to pick their clothes while I stitched. I asked for a high-five from each of them. The six-year-old gave me one, and so did the four-year-old. And here comes the reason for this story.

With his two older brothers running away with their dad and their mom sitting down, the three-year-old must have felt like now was his opportunity to get away with something wild. My hand was held up for a high-five from him. In what felt like slow motion, he grabbed my wrist in his hand, pulled it to his face, and LICKED the palm of my hand from wrist to fingertip.

Before I could even react, he ran to his brothers and dad. I looked to see if his mom had seen what happened. She was horrified.

Mom: “Did he just lick you?!”

Working with kids — and customers — I laughed it off and assured her it was fine. Using my slobbery hand as little as possible, I closed up the animals and then ran to scrub my entire arm clean.

Honestly, I would rather this happen than have them cough or sneeze directly in my face. It just happened so fast; I couldn’t help but laugh.

When I was in college, my roommate and I decided to drive over to his parents’ house for a few hours. On the way, the state was working on bridges and overpasses in an area. They funneled all traffic into a single-lane (instead of two) cattle chute each way and kept it that way for some distance, rather than deal with multiple merges.

We were in the middle of that, chugging along at the posted speed limit with my roommate driving, and a cream Cadillac whipped up behind us, tailgating ferociously. We got off that bridge, and the Caddy dove out through the barrier barrels, scattering them all over, flipped us off as he passed, and swerved back in, scattering more barrels.

Roommate: *Muttering* “Why is there never a cop—”

Then, he suddenly jerked up, looking in the mirror. We dropped out the end of the cattle chute, we pulled to the right, and four or five cops whipped past on our left.

A few miles down the road, there was the cream Caddie again, surrounded by cops and cop cars, with the driver out performing a field sobriety check.

Apparently, he failed, because when we came through on our way back several hours later, the cops were gone, but the Cadillac was still there.