I worked at an extremely busy car dealership as a receptionist, so naturally I had customers asking me questions I couldn’t answer. This takes place on an insanely busy Saturday. Also this is before the era of smart phones, and I don’t have a computer on my desk.

Me: Good afternoon, thank you for calling (dealership) where may I direct your call?

Customer: Yes, is this (different dealership)?

Me: No ma’am I’m sorry you called (dealership). Is there anything else I can help you with?

Customer: Do you know the number for (different dealership)? Can you give it to me?

Me: No ma’am I’m sorry I don’t know the number there.

Customer: (This woman pulled a Jekyll and Hyde move on me. She went from a very nice, polite and soft spoken older woman to a banshee.) (Screaming into the phone.) Why aren’t you doing your f#@+ing job? You have absolutely no G-damned customer service skills at all! (She continues berating me for another minute or so)

Me: Ma’am if you continue to scream I’m gonna hang up.

Customer: (She says this in the most condescending, shrewd tone) Well how do you expect me to get their number then?

Me: (Ive had it with this lady and replied back in a sort of cocky and condescending tone right back to her) Well ma’am you can try looking it up in the phone book or calling 4-1-1 (number for information) might help. (I hung up on her before she even had a chance to say anything else)

My mother in law asked me to drive her car to the auto-shop, because it needed to be repaired. It is a rather small car and really a piece of …. This particular car seems to hate me with all his mechanical heart, as it failed me more than once. I should have known before, what was in for me. On that particular day, it was late in the afternoon and the roads were very busy with people getting home. I was standing in the middle of the lane, waiting to turn left, when the car died. Utterly and completely died. Busy lanes left and right of me and a queue of cars behind me. I got out of the car to push it to a parking space to my left. I am male and not weak, but this small car really put up a fight. While the drivers behind started honking, I managed to use a gap in the traffic to push the car to the pavement on my left, but for the love of god, I was not able to get the car over the curbstone. I pushed forth with all my strenght, the car rolled back onto the street. Everytime I feared to not only cause a major traffic jam, but also a crash with another car. I have to confess, that I got desparate, because I had no idea what to do. This went on for some time, when I suddenly felt the traffic behind me standing still. Right where I stood before, was now a huge truck from Poland. The driver had steered his truck over two lanes and just blocked the whole traffic. Calmly he got out of the cabin strolled over to me, helped me push the car on the pavement and without uttering a word went back to his truck. When the traffic lights went green, he simply drove off.
This is not the most thrilling story on earth, but while nobody else even thought about helping, a foreign truck driver, who clearly had to reach a destination in time, took his time to help a complete stranger.
Dzięki, Kolego! Thank you, man.

This happens when my mom is in the sixth grade.
There was a bully that would punch my mom is the chest every day as he would walk past her on the way to his seat. My mom was too shy/embarrassed to tell the teacher or her parents, so one day she decided to tak matters into her own hands.
She gets to class early, and sharpens all of her pencils as sharp as she could. When he walks by her and hits her, she takes her pencils and starts stabbing him repeatedly.
Bully, crying: Mr. (Teacher)! (Mom) stabbed me with her pencils! I’m bleeding!
Teacher: What did you do to (Mom)?
Bully: I hit her.
Teacher: Quit crying and go sit down.
Things sure have changed since the early 70’s.

(I’m in language arts class and we have a substitute teacher.)

Substitute: “Okay class, I understand you’ve written a personal statement. You’re going to stand in a circle and each share a sentence from your narrative.”

(My personal statement was, as you might guess, personal. I wasn’t expecting to have to read any of it aloud.)

Me: “Excuse me, [Substitute]? Mine is quite personal and I’m not comfortable sharing.”

Substitute: “Do you think that’s fair? Everyone else is going to open up and be vulnerable here. It’s not right to not do the same.”

(She continues in this manner for a while, piling on the guilt as much as possible until I feel like refusing would be downright cruel. She also threatens to tell my regular teacher and put my name on a misbehavior list, along with two others who also refused.)

Me: “…Okay, I’ll share.”

(I gained nothing but anxiety and shame from being forced to participate. The whole thing made me feel like a bad person over even thinking of refusing. To be clear, the extent to which she tried to persuade me was emotional manipulation and I regret caving in.

A few months later, I’m in a science class and she’s the substitute. A few people are talking or playing games instead of working.)

Substitute: “Do you think that’s the right thing to do?”

Student: “Huh?”

Substitute “Don’t you think it’s wrong to not listen to a teacher or do your work?”

(She continued this for a while and repeated with every student goofing off. From what I overheard, she lost every argument because teens like to dig in their heels – I was the exception. Apparently that teacher enjoys using emotional manipulation to attempt to get students to behave, and it usually fails, resulting in everyone feeling bad.)

I used to work in a construction office where we’d shut down the entire week from Christmas to New Years. It was pretty common for other companies to do the same thing, or for people to take off during that week to spend extra time with their families. I do change my voicemail and email settings during that time to alert people that I’m out until (date).

I have a work cell phone that I can use to check emails and calls, but I kept it put away over Christmas. A few days later I receive a call and stupidly decide to answer.

Me – “This is (my name).”
Client – *angrily* “Yes, I have been TRYING to get a hold of you for the past few days!”

You’ve GOT to be kidding me…

Me – *overly nice* “Yes, I’m on vacation right now and haven’t been checking messages over the holiday. What can I do for you?”

I don’t remember now what exactly he wanted but it was a super simple question that I was able to answer off the top of my head. Nothing urgent or that couldn’t have waiting until the office opened back up. But thanks for being a jerk?