Me: I have a secret.

Brother: *looks excited* Oh?

Me: Yeah. A secret garden.

Brother: *confused look*

Me: *guestures to the bookshelf*. It’s a book, The Secret Garden.

Brother: *dissapointed look* Oh. I thought it was something interesting.

So there’s an older guy and girl staying at the hotel. They’re supposed to come down to square up their bill for the night so we can check them out and recheck them in under weekly rates. The girl is a bit on the bigger side and looks to be younger than me, about 17-18 and the way she acts around the guy strikes me as a daughter/father relationship. The older guy looks to be 35-40.

Girl: (on her way out for a smoke – again) How’s your night going?

Me: Good good, yours?

Girl: Not too bad.

Me: Is he going to come down soon? We need to square up for tonight?

Girl: Who my hus-

Me: -ur dad – oh I mean your …. husband.

Girl: *doesn’t notice my suprise* yeah we’re waiting on our cheque to clear at midnight. He’ll be back down then.

Me: Okay

Girl: It’s too bad you guys don’t have pet-friendly kitchenettes. Eating out is expensive. We’re living off of [well known sandwich restaurant] right now.

Me: *nodding sympathetically* yeah that can’t be too healthy

Girl: Especially since I’m pregnant

Me: *shocked* You’re pregnant!?!

Girl: Can’t you tell? I’m six months pregnant.

She steps back and tries to show off her belly. I had assumed she was just on the heavier side and ‘gifted’ up top but she does in deed have a small baby bump.

Me: wow … congratulations.

For once, I was way off. Not only is she not his daughter, she’s his wife and 6 months pregnant.

(I am a very petite girl, and one of the smallest in my karate school. I’m usually paired up with opponents who are larger than me because my instructor has informed everyone to be careful with a partner who isn’t your size in our classroom setting, not in a street fight. We have an annual tournament, and I’ve been paired up with people much larger than me who are considerably taller.)

Partner: How are you even in the adult class? You look like a 5 year old!

Me: I’m actually [my age]. Please, give it all you’ve got!

Partner: No way! There’s no way I’d beat up a tiny girl like you!

Me: Trust me, I’ll be fine.

Partner: No, you won’t. I’m too good for you. How are we even paired up?! I bet you can’t even fight!

(Within 30 seconds, I’d knocked him onto the ground and won the match. I ended up winning the entire tournament!)

Instructor: (announcing the winners’ names) And, in 1st place, proving that size makes no difference, [my name]!

(She clearly looked at my opponent who teased me about my size!)

Crowd watching the tournament: GIRL POWER!

Our point of sale software is a DOS interface which is heavily manual — some national discounts data goes in, but a lot of the items in store require manually entered prices or barcodes. We keep our monitors angled away from the customers because otherwise they complain about the wrong prices or descriptions which pop up during the transaction and it takes at least twice as long to process anything.

I am just starting to ring up a deaf couple, and I turn the monitor because I don’t have sufficient sign language to talk them through what I’m doing without a visual aid. The previous customer turns back from exiting the store and stares at me.

Me: “Did you need something else?”

Customer: “You turned around the monitor at the start for them but you wouldn’t show it to me until you’d finished putting everything in. Why?”

Me: “These customers are deaf and I can’t explain what I’m doing unless–”

Customer: “No, I want a REASON.”

Me: “As I explained when you asked before, we enter the prices manually and–”

Customer: “BUT IT’S NOT FAIR!”

Me: “I’m actually not supposed to turn the monitor for anyone. I make the exception for customers who can’t understand spoken English so–”

Customer: *interrupts with a furious, wordless scream which continues for an impressive length of time while the entire store stares, then RUNS full speed out of the store*

(We are watching the opening scene of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang one afternoon. Note that the school is very conservative.)

Teacher: *moves to the other side of the room and starts dancing, then stops* I forgot we weren’t allowed to dance here. *goes back to her desk sheepishly*