I worked as a float teller for about a year before I got married and moved. It was the best job I’ve ever had; I loved what I did and had a great boss and wonderful coworkers. As a float, I went to any of the sixteen branches of this credit union on any given day if they had a call-off or if someone was out on leave/vacation, etc., so I was rarely at the same branch for more than a few days and didn’t really get to know our members. On this particular day, I was working at a branch where the tellers there had been at this same branch for 6+ years. They knew almost everyone who came in, and therefore didn’t feel the need to do the proper verification steps that the credit union had in place. Which is fine is some cases, but NOT in others (somehow, they got away with it).

Anyway, I ended up working the teller line and drive-through by myself for about an hour, which wasn’t a big deal because this branch was usually pretty slow (one of the other girls was gone for lunch, the other was opening an account or a loan, I don’t remember which). As the one teller was leaving, a woman pulled up at the drive-through, and the loan teller goes, “Oooo, just a warning, she’s really nasty. She’s a shared branching member, but don’t ask for her SSN or her address. We know her; just do what she wants.”

In my mind, I’m thinking, “Challenge accepted!” (in case you don’t know what shared branching is, it’s a co-op of a bunch of credit unions…if your credit union is in said co-op, you can do your banking at any other credit union in the co-op, as long as you’re willing to hand over your ID and verify some personal info. Note: this is NOT an option for the tellers. We have to ask these questions and physically record the ID number.

It’s a co-op rule, and if we’re found to be in contempt of these rules, we could face huge fines and/or be kicked out of the co-op.) I also hate when exceptions are made to the rule unless there’s a really credible reason (a customer being nasty is not one, IMO) and figured the worst she could do was yell at me. So I start talking to this lady, and at first, she seems pleasant. She gave me her ID, but politely refused to verify her address or the last four of her SSN. I didn’t have a headset, just a microphone, so I thought that if I went outside to get this information, she might be more willing, since there was no risk of anyone else hearing her (even though the lobby was empty).

I go outside, and she thanks me for doing so, but still doesn’t write down everything I need. I go back inside, not really sure what to do, especially since the manager was in an off-site meeting, and there was no one else available (they would’ve just told me to go ahead with it anyway). I’m not comfortable with finishing the transaction and tell her as politely as I can that I’m very sorry, but if she’s not willing to provide me with the information I need, I will not be able to help her. And she goes ballistic. She insists that I can and will do what she wants, and why isn’t what she gave me good enough? As she’s ranting and raving, three more people come in, and the first one comes right up to my window and won’t leave, despite me telling him that I’m currently assisting drive-through.

The woman sees him standing there and gets even more furious because she’s sure he can see her information. At this point, I have a line waiting, and decide to just do what she wants. As I’m processing her transaction, I put her ID in a drawer beside me, assuring her that the guy in front of me can’t see anything at all, but that doesn’t appease her. She’s shouting at me so loudly that everyone in the lobby can hear her, even though I had temporarily turned the mic off. I finally finish up her transaction, really shaken up inside, but staying as cool and collected as I can, and send her cash back out. I try to carry on with the rest of the customers, but she’s still yelling, this time because she can’t find her ID, which she’d sent in to me.

I look around and finally find it in the drawer where I’d put it (I’d forgotten to send it out with all that was going on…which was my fault entirely and I take full responsibility), and send it out, apologizing profusely and cheerily telling her to have a good day. As I’m finishing up the next person, she comes storming in, shouting that she wants to talk to my manager.

I tell her that he’s not here, but that I can get one of the head tellers for her when she’s done with her appointment. At this moment, the door to the loan office opens and a customer comes out to get something from his car. This lady goes right in to the office in the middle of the loan application, yelling at the other teller to call her manager, and that she’s going to report me.

The other teller comes out with big eyes and goes, “What happened?” I tell her what’s going on, and she tries to call the manager, but can’t reach him. In a rage, the lady refuses to wait and storms back out (all of my other customers were offering their sympathies to me at this point, since they could hear everything and knew that this lady was just a psycho).

Later, this lady comes back when the teller who’d been on lunch was working and asks if she can speak with her privately, to which the teller agrees. Five minutes later, the woman leaves, and the other teller comes out laughing. The crazy woman had asked her (in all seriousness) if she thought that I had stolen her identity. Thankfully, I had a flawless reputation at this institution and was well-liked (for whatever reason); even though it was a ridiculous notion (for any teller at this institution, not just me), she told her that I would never do such a thing and that I was a good employee.

I had to write up the incident for HR, but never got in trouble. Evidently, this was not the first time this woman had gone off like that (no surprise there), and they were considering kicking her out of the co-op. No one blamed me, and I was praised for keeping my cool in a stressful situation. Eventually, someone audited the receipts for this branch and discovered what they’d been doing, and they did get in trouble, for which I felt slightly bad. But all of us in the float teller pool had been frustrated with how they did things there for a long time, so I was also relieved that something was finally being done about it. And very thankful that management had my back, because I know that’s kind of an anomaly in the workplace, sadly.

After having allowed my hair to grow to long I eventually got around to shaving it all off, as I usually do. The night after I had my regular scheduled video chat with my 6 year old god daughter.

goddaughter: “[my name] Your hair is gone”
Me: “Yes I don’t like having to comb my hair, so once it gets long enough that I’d have to comb it I just shave it all off!”
goddaughter: “I liked your hair! you should have kept it”
me: “Oh I’m sorry you don’t like it”
goddaughter: “next time you want to cut your hair you need to ask me first”
me: “Oh, so you get to decide when I cut my hair now?”
goddaughter: “yeah, If I like it you shouldn’t cut it.

At the end of the week I traveled to my goddaughter for a short visit slash weekend long babysitting session. During the visit she ended up rubbing my head, enjoying the feeling of freshly shaved short hair.

goddaughter: “your hair feels nice”
me: “Oh, so now you like me shaving my hair?”
goddaughter: “yeah I like playing with it”
me: “so am I allowed to shave my hair again in the future now”
goddaughter: “okay”

I guess I’ve been saved from having to beg my 6 year old’s permission every time I want to shave my hair.

There was this bloke who used to work at our company, whose job it was to maintain the software that we used to print our reports. These were reports for our customers. We gathered their data and summarised it in whatever ways, then we printed it out for our customers.

Anyway, this bloke was a grumpy old guy, who never stopped for small talk and got irritated if anyone interrupted what he was doing to answer a question, and basically had no people skills at all. When he had fixed our problems he just basically sent an email (with no greeting) saying “Fixed” or whatever, and it would be up to us to re-run the reports or whatever and get on with the day.

When it was lunchtime there was a van that came around about midday and brought sandwiches which they would bring into the downstairs kitchen, and the various departments would be telephoned, and the person getting the call would call out “Sandwiches!” which was the signal for us to drop what we were doing and make our way downstairs to where we could then buy a sandwich for our lunch, then go back upstairs to carry on what we were doing. We all waited for the “Sandwiches!” call, as it was the highlight of the day.

Anyway, he had been with us nearly a year, and it was time to go to the annual christmas party, which we all had to go to, it was held in a hotel in the evening in one of the weeks running up to christmas. We used to all assemble in the bar, and we were supposed to talk to each other and mix around and talk to people we didn’t normally meet. Anyway, this bloke stood to one side and didn’t seem to be very interested in going up to people and talking to them.

What happened then was that the managing director (M.D.) of the company would at some stage come into the bar area, and make a short speech, which would culminate in him announcing that the tables in the restaurant were open and that we could then go to our assigned tables and eat our christmas dinner. So anyway, what happened was that when the M.D. came into the bar to do this, he had just opened his mouth to start speaking, when the bloke I was talking about called out “Sandwiches!” in a loud voice, and everybody stampeded into the restaurant without the M.D. having been able to make his speech.

Anyway, no sooner had this bloke sat down at the table when a group of managers came up to him and made him get up and go off with them. Nobody ever saw him again, and it turned out he had been kicked out of the party and then fired from the company.

Good riddance too, everybody thought.

(I work in a anime store and we have kids come in all the time and parents buy them merchandise for animes that are not age appropriate for kids but parents do not know, they think since its animated it must be for kids)

*mom comes into store*
Me: hey. How can I help you.
Mom: my son texted me a list and I need to find a poster for this anime.
Me: ok ,tell me whats on the list and I’ll see if we have it.
Mom: he wants a poster from this anime called “hentai “.

( hentai is animated Japanese porn)

Me: ma’am,  who are you shopping for?

Mom:my teenage son why?

Me : I hate to tell you this, but your son is watching animated Japanese porn. That is what hentai is.

Mom :* looking at me like a deer in headlights* are you serious?

Me: yes, we see lots of kids actually with hentai merch and have to explain to the parents what it is.

Mom: well thank you so much for telling me this information,  I’m gonna head home now and have a talk with my son.

(Something tells me that kid is not going to be watching anime for a long time)

My Spanish teacher is reading a novel aloud to the class. Some of the scenes in the book take place in a classroom, so once in a while an academic topic will be mentioned in passing, like a commonly studied person or a historical event.

Teacher: “Amur—I don’t know how to pronounce this—Amurgo Vespi?”

Me and guy next to me: “Amerigo Vespucci?”

Teacher: “Yes, that!”

This isn’t the first time she’s struggled to pronounce an unusual name, but it is the first time she’s struggled to pronounce one that is distinctly from a Romantic language.