We have two cats, and they’re the sweetest cats ever. They don’t mind being picked up, they’re not scared of anyone, and they’re huge cuddle bugs. We got them by perfect coincidence too.

Here’s how we got Emmet:
It’s mother’s day. My sister and mom like going running together. This happens just as they walk in the door from a run.
Mom: we found a cat.
Me: what? Really?
(We had not really had any interaction with cats in our lives, so a cat was a very shocking concept to me)
Mom: yeah. We just saw him under a bush and went over to see if he was friendly but when we walked over he started meowing at us, and we realized it was obvious he was not an outdoor cat. He’s well fed, healthy, and in distress.
Me: where is he?
Mom:
Well we found him over by (street) and tried to carry him home,
But he was too fat, so we left him on the corner of (other street closer to our house) and we’ll have to drive over there and get him. Grab a bowl and water bottle.
(I grab a water bottle and a bowl and we get in the car. When we get to the street corner, he wasn’t where they had left him. We started to get worried until we found him under a bush very close by. We poured water into the bowl and he drank for five minutes straight. Then we put him in the car and drive home.)
Me: I can’t believe it’s a cat, I can’t believe you guys found a cat! He’s so cute! (Remember I did not grow up seeing cats often and it was years since I’ve pet one)
Sister: I know! I wish we could keep him.
Mom: I know, but his family is probably out there looking for him.
(We arrived at home, and then remembered our two rowdy dogs would not take this new friend well)
Me: how are we going to get her (at this point we thought he was a girl) past the dogs?
Mom: I think we just have to carry her to the guest room and lock the dogs out.
(My mom carried him into the guest room and we put some sand in a large cake Tin for a litter box and gave him some tuna and water. At this time my sister and I were in our knitting phase)
Sister and I : (gets on bed and begins knitting)
Emmet: (gets on bed, lays on yarn and knitting needles and begins purring)
Me: wow, she likes knitting! That’s funny! Maybe she belongs to an elderly person! (Yes, I know, stereotypical)
Me: I wonder what her name is. Let’s just try common cat names and see if she responds.
Me: stormy!
Sister: Grayson (he’s gray)
Me: maybe she has a human name. Let’s try some common human names. Emma!
Emmet: (looks At me)
Me: Emma! That has to be her name! Emma!
Emmet: (does not look at me any other times I say his “name”)
Me:
Well it has to be Emma anyway.
(We took “Emma” to the vet and realized that he was, in fact, a boy so we changed his name to Emmet. We put up signs everywhere and posted on the internet, and did everything we could to find his owner, but we just could not find them. We were going to give him to a shelter because we had a lot of pets already and my dad was not a big fan of cats, but we barely convinced him, luckily! Now he Loves him, or according to him, “tolerates him”. We still don’t know how someone could have lost such a precious kitty, but we still have him, and he was never claimed. And as if this story wasn’t long enough, I have another cat to tell about. Our dog had recently passed away, and when her birthday came around, we decided to go to a pet store to see if we could cuddle with some puppies in honor of her. Unfortunately there were no dog adoptions, so we looked at cats since there was a higher amount of cats than normal that day, due to a promotion. My sister immediately fell In love with one cat, and she sat in front of the cage for a good thirty minutes. We went home, although to was very hard to drag her away from the cage.)
(At home)
Sister:
I really want that cat.
Me: I know, but you know our parents are never gonna let us get another pet.
Sister: but we only have one cat and one dog! We had three large pets before!
Me: Yes, but we need to save the space for another dog! Zolie (our dog) is lonely! She’s not going to bond with a cat the way she would a dog!
Sister: why can’t we get a new dog and a new cat?
Me: I want to, too, but our parents will never let us. (Thinks for a minute) or will they? (Evil grin)
Me: let’s make a list of twenty reasons to get the cat.
(We spent the next half hour or so listing twenty reasons why we should get the cat, including cleaning up after it, etc. We gave it to our parents and they kind of just laughed at us and told us no. We had already planned to have dinner with our grandparents so we went there, where we told them about our scheme. They were on board since they love cats.)
Grandma: ah, I see you’re scheming.
Me: not exactly scheming, we just want the cat.
Mom: I’ll tell you what. We can go back to the pet store after dinner and if the cat is still there, we’ll consider adopting her.
Sister and I: yaaay! We’re gonna get a kitty! We’re gonna get a kitty!!
Dad: hold on, the cat’s probably not going to even be there.
Me: I know, I know. But I really hope she is!
Grandma:good luck!
(We went back to the pet store and immediately we ran back to the cats. We peered inside her cage and sure enough, she was still there! We celebrated, but our parents reminded us that we still might not be able to get her. But the moment we entered the greeting room, we knew we were going to get her. Her name was Renee, but we decided to change it to Anna, making Renee her middle name. Now whenever she does something bad, we use a baby voice and say “Anna Renee (our last name)! We do not (whatever she did)! And it’s so funny! But anyway we took her home and brought her upstairs to meet Emmet and because downstairs was dog territory and upstairs is for cats, and she almost immediately tried to squish between the railing of our upper story and almost fell about ten feet, but we caught her just in time, although at later times she fell and was fine. Emmet and Anna got along in no time, and next month we adopted a puppy called Joy so now we had two dogs and two cats. And 5 mice, a bird, many fish, and a hamster. Also our other dog’s name was Marie, I wanted to say her name since I said every one else’s names, it needs to be fair. Now all our pets live happily together and we ended up getting to two sweetest cats by perfect coincidence!)

They wanted me to feed their dog packaged cheese instead of kibble and on -i kid you not- on a silver platter

(I’ve been working in libraries nearly twenty years at this point, and grew up in this country. Despite that, I have a British accent. Most people, especially women, love it and it’s definitely different than the normal accent for this part of the state, and obviously not American, but not to the point where I can’t be understood, though I have been told all my life that I talk fast, especially by people native to this area. It’s true but that’s also a product of my accent. I’m also White, which demographically relative to the city in which I work, means I’m very much the minority to the point where patrons who don’t know me can ask for me by skin colour and staff knows immediately who they’re talking about. I’m staffing the front desk of the library where I’ve worked for 6 years when I’m approached by an older gentleman who forcefully flicks a sheet of paper across the desk.)
Elderly man: “You got anyone back there by the name of Charlotte? She said she’d help me any time I needed it if I came in and asked for her! You need to type up this letter of recommendation for my son. He’s incarcerated right now!”
Me: “No, sir, sorry. There’s nobody here by that name, I’m afraid. We can-”
EG: (Interrupting me) “WHAT? CAN YOU SPEAK PROPERLY? NOBODY CAN UNDERSTAND YOU! SPEAK ENGLISH!” Did you say she’s not here?! No young Black lady named Charlotte is in there?”
Me: (louder) “Again, sir, no. There’s nobody here named ‘Charlotte’!”
EG: “CAN YOU GET SOMEONE ELSE UP HERE WHO CAN SPEAK ENGLISH? SOMETHING’S WRONG WITH HOW YOU SPEAK!”
Me: “Mate, I can bloody well assure you, there’s nobody here that speaks English more “English” than I do. And I don’t have any sort of speech impediment, so there’s nothing wrong with how I speak. And again, no, there is nobody here named ‘Charlotte’; there never has been as far as I know. I’ve been here six years; never worked with a ‘Charlotte’.”
EG: LOOK, STOP SPEAKING AT ME AND GET ME SOMEONE UP HERE WHO SPEAKS ENGLISH! I CAN’T UNDERSTAND YOU! IF YOU EVER WANT TO GET A REAL JOB, YOU’RE GONNA HAVE TO LEARN TO SPEAK ENGLISH BETTER! STOP TRYING TO TALK IN WHATEVER LANGUAGE THAT IS! CAN YOU JUST GET SOMEONE UP HERE WHO CAN TRANSLATE WHATEVER YOU TRYING TO SAY TO ME?”
Me: (Smiling in a saccharine and obsequious manner) “I can think of no greater pleasure, sir, than to get someone who can get you the bloody help you rightfully need. One moment, sir…”
(I went in the back and managed to locate the first coworker I happened to see who happened to be African-American and just wished him luck after filling him in on the situation coming to a head at the desk and asking if he could try talking to the guy? He said the guy had no problems with him even after he told him library staff wasn’t available to type up the letter for the prison.)

My sister-in-law joins an MLM that touts itself as “chemical free” and uses terms like “toxins” to deceive everyday household cleaning supplies.

She’s trying to get me to buy stuff while she’s going on and on about how it’s such a safe alternatives…while she’s smoking cigarettes.

My mother in law does a similar thing awhile later. She’s ranting about aluminum and plastic food packaging and how it’s ‘killing us all!’ She then sincerely says she needs to go smoke a cigarette to calm her nerves.

I just don’t understand.

(I work as a receptionist in a busy optometrist’s office. Our office has a policy that if you’re over 15 minutes late to your appointment, which generally only lasts 30 minutes as is, you will need to reschedule. Except for the few doctors who make an exception. I’m sitting next to my coworker.)

Customer: *walks up to the counter with her guardian* I have an appointment.

Coworker: All right, what’s your name?

Customer: *gives her name*

Coworker: Okay, it looks like your appointment was at 10:20. It’s 10:39 right now, so I’ll need to check with the doctor to see if you’ll be seen or not because usually the cut off is 15 minutes.

Customer: No, my appointment was for 10:30. The card says 10:30.

Coworker: I’m sorry that there was that miscommunication, but it was for 10:20. *she excuses herself to go call back to the room the doctor was in.*

Customer: I can’t f***ing believe this. It was for 10:30. Where’s that card? *after a few moments looking through the bag and cursing, she finds the card* Oh it does say 10:20, s***.

Customer’s Guardian: I tried to get you moving earlier.

Coworker: *finally comes back from the back.* Okay, so unfortunately we’re going to need to reschedule your appointment.

Customer: I can’t f***ing believe this. What, you can’t be late to things anymore? F*** this, I’m not coming back here again. F*** this. *as she and her guardian storm off out of the office.*

Coworker: *after a few minutes bursts out laughing and looks to me and the other receptionist* Did you see that?

Me: See what?

Coworker: She just flipped us off, they’re sitting in their car out front.

(Flash forward to the next week)

Customer: *comes back in with her guardian* I have an appointment.

Coworker #2: What’s the name? *all of us three receptionists recognize the girl by face*

Customer: *gives her name*

Coworker #2: *starts to look up her name* Unfortunately, I’m not seeing an appointment for you.

Customer: What the f***? I used your website and made an appointment for today.

Coworker #2: Our website doesn’t actually work like that. It sends us and email and then gets sent to one of us to give you a call to set up an appointment.

Customer: F*** this! Doctors are stupid. *storms out*