I have curly strawberry blond/golden red hair. I recently cut it chin-length for the summer. Before that, it was past my shoulders. I don’t have much neck, so there really isn’t much of a difference between my shoulders and chin.

Friend: I like your new shoulder-length cut!

Neighbor: Why did you cut your hair? It was so pretty!

Aunt: It’s cute! Of course, you’re always cute.

Nana: I like the new layers and the shape. And since you thinned it out, it will be less hot for the summer!

Neighbor 2: I liked her hair before, but I understand why she cut it for the summer! It will be less hot for her!

Friend 2: You cut your hair! It’s so cute, sort of modern.

Dad: I’m glad you like your new hair. Personally, I prefer it shoulder-length, but it’s your hair. You do whatever you want with it.

This happened about a year ago. For context, I’m twenty-five, left handed, autistic, and am currently bagging for a coworker (a supervisor) who is a close friend of mine. I’ve also worked at this store for four years, so they are all well aware of my condition. I tend to like things just so and I like to make them as perfect as I can, so I’m aware I work slower than my peers. Not being able to do so gives me anxiety.

I’m bagging for a man around my age, who has been staring at me up and down. When I notice this, he instantly tries to make eye contact, so I quickly turn away and try to ignore it.

Customer: You know, you’d really go a lot faster if you’d use your right hand to bag my groceries. I swear, you’re the slowest I’ve ever seen here.

Me: No, I’d be slower. I’m left handed.

Customer: You just want to be different. Left handed people aren’t really a thing. Come on, hurry up! I haven’t got all day!

Coworker: Sir, please leave her alone. She’s doing her best.

Customer: But she’s *soooooooooo* slow!

Coworker: Do you want her to shove all your items in a bag in any way she can?

Customer: Is that any way to serve a customer? Quit defending the left-handed retard and get someone who can serve me better! I know what she is. She’s too slow to not be one. It’s all in her head. Sucks, too. You know, if you weren’t retarded, you’d be really hot.

Me: Oh, uh, thanks, I guess. Here. I finished bagging.

Customer: Finally! My food better not be crushed… oh…

He opened the bag to find everything organized and packed neatly. He’d only been waiting for an additional twenty or thirty seconds. I’m slow, but I can still keep up with the line.

Customer: Um, thanks… (my name). So, how about a date? I can put your mental illness aside.

Coworker: What? Just go. Now.

He sheepishly leaves. When he left, my coworker and I could not help but laugh.

For the past few months I’ve been involved in a Dungeons and Dragons campaign over a popular online RPG platform and voice chat. The DM and another player live in Scotland, two are in the USA near the East Coast, two are in Bristol, and I myself am in the West Midlands, so with the geographical constraints we have limited time to get together and play.

The current campaign is a homebrew based on 5th Edition, and is expected to last for about a year and a half at the current rate of play. We’ve quickly worked out some quirks to each character – my female alcoholic bisexual monk has fallen in love with the (female) NPC team leader who is also a mad scientist, our barbarian is a crazed dwarf who gets enraged at the slightest provocation, and our warlock, the only non-good team member, is a power-obsessed psychopath who wants to kill the rest of the party.

Not long ago, we were asked to locate a missing item by the team leader NPC, hidden at her former base in a cave. We turn up, fight through the usual group of enemies, and are targeted by two Water Weirds in the river that flows into the cave entrance. These are basically creatures made entirely of water, that can’t exist away from the river or lake that sustains them, and the best solution to dealing with them is to run away to dry ground.

After weakening them both, we happen to bring one to the point of around 1HP. The dwarf barbarian reaches his turn, and loudly announces, “I drink the water weird”. Cue laughter and confusion from the rest of the party on voice chat. The DM agrees, and asks him to roll a D20 to hit. It passes, and the dwarf proceeds to start sucking and slurping down the collapsed water creature, swallowing it whole.

Then, the DM announces that a Constitution Save is required. No-one is quite sure what this means, and the dwarf rolls. He winds up with… a natural 1. A critical fail. And so, he immediately proceeded to defecate and vomit repeatedly, passing the water weird’s flailing and deceased corpse through his body until he was completely cleared out. The dwarf then had to make his way back through the forest, covered in vomit and feces, until we reached civilisation once more.

A few sessions later, the same dwarf would be killed in battle and return as a zombie, unchanged except for a predilection for eating brains – rather unusual for a Chaotic Good character, but arguably one of the tamest parts of the campaign…

(I’m new, and being trained by a girl in her twenties, who has a bored face. As I arrive, I notice that in my hurry I had put different black shoes on.)

Me: *embarrassed* “Sorry, but I’ve put on 2 different shoes. Can I run to my house? It’s really close by.”

(She laughs and snickers, but agrees. I run and change them. Later, it’s near the end of the shift and I’m glad, since it is very slow and she’s not speaking. I notice that she has her face in the computer’s monitor, like an inch away, so I can’t see what she’s looking at. Then she moves slightly, and it’s porn! She’s watching PORN on the company’s computer! Lesbian porn to be more specific. I’m shocked but I don’t say anything. Later I find out that she’s left without notice, and that we have viruses. I’ve heard of porn addicts, but never thought there’d be one at my work and that they was usually guys.)

(My brother and I were in a car, with me at the wheel. It’s daytime. We go to a place where the roads are unmarked and strange, and my GPS tells me to turn left at the intersection. So I start to…but something seems off.)

Me: “Hmm? Which do I turn, into this lane, or that? Nothing is marked and there are no signs!”

Brother: *shouting at the tops of his lungs* “I DON’T KNOW EITHER, BUT HURRY UP AND MAKE A TURN! YOU CAN’T JUST STOP IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD!”

Me: “But I don’t want to turn into the wrong lane!”

Brother: “HURRY UP! SOMEONE’LL HIT US!”

(I quickly pick a lane and it wasn’t the right one, but luckily it wasn’t wrong. My brother quickly calms down and acts like nothing’s happened. I have anxiety and he knows this, and that was the last time I drove with him anywhere! I don’t know when people are going to figure out that shouting at someone will only make it worse.)