My mom is a high school librarian. Sometimes parents would come into the school to visit her, but one day towards the end of the school year, a lady who just so happens to be one of our neighbors comes to her, looking extremely ticked off.

Mom: Can I help you with anything?

Lady: Yes. The school is making my son take credit recovery for math class. I want you to tell them that math is stupid and he won’t need it in the real world.

My mom is left speechless. She does nothing about it. A couple of days later, the lady’s boyfriend comes in with her in tow. Note that the Special Ed teacher is also in the library at the moment.

Lady’s Boyfriend: (to my mom) Now I want you to tell the school her son doesn’t need credit recovery because math isn’t important.

Special Ed Teacher: What kind of job do you have?

Lady’s Boyfriend: I’m a wood Carver.

Special Ed Teacher: Don’t you need math to make accurate measurements?

The lady and her boyfriend shoot the teacher and my mom a glare before running out of the school.

(My family is having dinner at the table, which is roast duck. There is me (early 20s) my dad, my step mum, and two brothers (17 and 15). Suddenly my youngest brother starts laughing hysterically and we stop and look at him)

17 year old brother: (after a long pause) What?

(It takes some time for my youngest brother to compose himself enough to reply)

Youngest Brother: Ducks go quack!

(Naturally, we like to bring it up whenever he’s claiming how smart he is)

(This takes place in the early 1990s. It’s Friday night and my parents and their friends are playing cards. During a span of ten minutes, the telephone rings several times-all from the same man dialing the wrong number.)

Caller: “Let me speak to Linda.”

Mom: “I’m sorry, you have the wrong number. There’s no Linda here.”

(The man doesn’t apologize, but rudely hangs up. Mom goes back to playing cards and a couple minutes later, the phone rings again.)

Caller: “Put Linda on the phone!”

Mom: “You still have the wrong number! There is no one here by that name.”

(He hangs up again and mom returns to her game. He calls two more times, each time being ruder about his demand to talk to Linda. My mom has limited patience for stupid people AND is also known for being a joker. After being interrupted again, she’s had enough.)

Caller: “I wanna talk to Linda!”

Mom: “Look, Linda is in the back room with Joe! She’ll call you back when she’s done!”

(The man never called back again!)

I was in the back aisle of a supermarket, the aisle had a column dividing it into 2 uneven sections. My cart was blocking the smaller section while I was selecting cold meats from the chiller. The wider section was the end of an aisle and was blocked by a couple of women who were selecting items from there, they just happened to be wearing Hijab. They were distracted, talking to each other about the products while their cart and pram took up space. Another woman pushing a cart headed straight to them them, not giving them time to react , she starts rudely yelling at them.

Rude Woman “WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, BLOCKING THE WAY SO I CAN’T GET PAST. IT’S DISGUSTING THAT YOU THINK YOU CAN TAKE UP ALL THE ROOM. *the poor women are shocked and are trying to move out of her way but she’s not given them much room.

Rude Woman *turns to me “You see how rude they are blocking the way?”

Me “You could have just said ‘Excuse Me’, Rude Woman *turns to another lady who has just come around the corner “You see how they blocked the whole way”

Lady “Like the other lady said you could have just said “Excuse me”.

*By this time the ladies have moved out of the way and the customer stomped off, obviously disgusted that we hadn’t joined in on her discriminative rant. I was also blocking the way but she only picked on those who showed their devotion to their religion.

(A middle-aged husband and wife walk into my office lobby accompanying an older gentleman in a motorized wheelchair. They all look slightly confused.)

ME: “Hello, how may I help you?”

HUSBAND: “I’m not sure we’re in the right place. We’re looking for – um, show her the card.”

(The gentleman in the wheelchair hands me a business card for a non-profit that assists the disabled)

ME: “Oh, they used to be in the building behind us, but they’ve moved. They’re not far away, though. Let me look up their exact address. I’ll be right back.”

(I go to my desk, look up the company, and print off a map and directions to their new location about a mile away.)

ME: “Here you go!”

HUSBAND: “And your name is Angel?”

ME: “Oh, no, I’m (name).”

HUSBAND: “No, you must be an angel because you printed this out for us. Thank you so much.”

(All three of them thanked me profusely and left looking very happy. Not all days at work are a grind.)