(I’ve been receiving text messages from a Deaf-or-Hard-of-Hearing Support Agency for a Mr. [Name] for about a month. The agency is located on the other side of the country and is sending me messages regarding appointments I should remember and questions as to why I missed those appointments. I decide to call the phone number to explain what’s going on. Note: I am a 17-year-old girl with perfect hearing.)

Agency: “Hello, thank you for calling [Agency]. How can I help you?”

Me: “Hi, this is the owner of [phone number]. I’ve been getting text messages from your office for a few weeks now, and I wanted to let you know that I am not [Name], nor am I hard of hearing.”

Agency: *speaking noticeably louder* “Ah, that phone number! Mr. [Name], how are you? I see you’ve missed some of your appointments!”

Me: “I’m not Mr. [Name]. My name is [My Name] and I’m—”

Agency: “Then you must be Mr. [Name]’s carer! You know, he’s missed several of his appointments with us, recently—”

Me: “I’m not Mr. [Name]’s carer! In fact I live in Canberra. I’m on the other side of the country! This is my phone number. You’ve been sending your texts to the wrong number.”

Agency: “All right… I see here that we’ve been messaging Mr. [Name]’s phone, and his number is [my phone number]. Is that right?”

Me: *relieved* “Yes, that’s my number.”

Agency: “Great! We’ll text you before your next appointment. Please make sure your phone is on.”

Me: “What?!”

Agency: *hangs up*

(After about another month of ignoring their texts, they finally got the message.)

(I overhear this between an employee restocking shelves and a nearby customer who is taking a long time looking at different products. The customer has a child sitting in the cart who can’t be older than three or four.)

Employee: “Do you need help finding anything?”

Customer: “No, I’m fine, thanks; just looking here.”

(Customer takes an item from the shelf.)

Customer’s Child: “Mommy, does that have any high fructose corn syrup in it?”

Customer: “Let’s check, [Child].”

(They start reading through the ingredients together.)

Employee: “All right, then…”

(I am attempting to order food from a station offering pressed sandwiches, chicken patties, and veggie burgers.)

Me: “Hi, may I have a veggie burger, please?”

Worker: “Sure, which kind?”

Me: “Just the veggie burger, please.”

Worker: “Okay, would you like the chicken or the black bean?”

Me: “…”

(I’m at the food court and I need a power outlet. Five of the six places are occupied with people eating. The sixth contains a magazine, a drink cup, and an (obvious open) purse on top of the magazine. No one is nearby. I figure the owner has foolishly stepped away to get something from one of the eateries and will return promptly. Or, she’s wandered off and left her things lying around and will notice the total lack of purse and come running at any moment. I choose to eat lunch close to the ‘unoccupied’ table, figuring that when she returned to claim her items I could move to the table. 30 minutes pass, my lunch is finished, and no one has returned for the items or even looked at them twice. I carefully pick up the magazine (not touching the purse) and drink, and move them to a table about 4 feet away. I then plug in my computer and begin to work. 20 minutes later a woman comes storming up to me.)

Her: “DID YOU MOVE MY STUFF?!”

Me: “Yes. I waited about 30 minutes for someone to claim it, then moved it because I needed the outlet.”

Her: “WHO THE F*** SAID YOU COULD MOVE MY STUFF?!”

Me: “No one. Considering how long you left your things unattended, I’m surprised that no one took them.”

(I put my earbud back in and turn back to my computer. I am aware of her continued ranting, but as I’ve been pretty obvious about replacing the ear bud, I ignore her. Eventually she wanders off. 10 minutes later, an older man comes over. I remove the earbud. He’s being reasonably polite. I respond in kind.)

Him: “Did you move my employee’s items?”

Me: “Yes. They had been left unattended for at least 30 minutes before I moved them. I needed the outlet, so I moved them to the nearest table.”

Him: “You shouldn’t touch other people’s things.”

Me: “I actually sat at that table -” *pointing* “- for 30 minutes, waiting for someone to collect the abandoned items before I moved them. Your employee is lucky that someone didn’t come along and take her things.”

Him: “She says she was watching her stuff all the time.”

Me: “That seems unlikely, since no one was around for 30 minutes before I moved them, and she didn’t approach me until 20 minutes after I moved them.”

Him: “She also didn’t like how you spoke to her.”

Me: “I regret that.”

Him: *nonplussed* “She says you just moved her stuff and was rude.”

Me: *done with this conversation now* “She’s welcome to her version of what happened.”

(I put the earbud back in. A few minutes later, I glanced up and saw the woman ranting at her boss. With the earbuds in, I opted to ignore them. Kudos to the boss for going to bat for the employee. I rarely find a boss willing to stand up for an employee. Too bad this boss chose the wrong woman to stand up for.)

(Our phone has caller display and unwanted calls tend to come up as either ‘Unavailable’ or ‘Withheld’. On this occasion the display shows ‘Unavailable’ but I answer it anyway. There is a pause before the obvious chatter of a call centre came on. )

Me: “Hello, Asgard? Loki speaking.”

Caller: “Hello, I am from the Windows Service Centre and I am calling about your computer. How are you today?”

Me: “Okay.”

Caller: “You are getting errors on your computer; there are problems in the files which will cause it to crash at some point.”

Me: “Oh, okay.”

Caller: “Are you in front of your computer?”

Me: “No.”

Caller: “You need to go to your computer and turn it on, and tell me when it’s ready. I am holding the line.”

Me: “Okay.” *pretends to call to another person* “Thor? Where’s the computer?” *puts phone down for a minute or so before going back to the call* “It’s not here.”

Caller: “The computer is not there?”

Me: “No, it’s in Midgard.”

Caller: “What? It’s where?”

Me: “Midgard.”

Caller: “Where’s that? Is that another town?”

Me: “It’s a whole other land. This is Asgard.”

Caller: *confused* “…Do you have a laptop?”

Me: “We have no need for computers here. We’re gods; we don’t need a laptop. We use magic and godly powers.”

Caller: “…I’m calling about the Windows operating system.”

Me: “Yeah, we don’t use it here.”

Caller: *increasingly confused* “Okay, bye.”

Me: *cheerily* “Bye!”