Though there may be a lot of talk out there about the entitled Kens and Karens of the world—those people who ask to speak to a manager before we can even open our mouths at the cashier's counter—it can be hard to meet one in real life. Well, these customer service employees and other victims don't have that problem. They saw these types of terrible folks in the wild...and then they WENT wild.
1. At The Tipping Point
My mom was one of those difficult customers. She was always hunting down restaurant coupons, and that usually determined where we ate. My family wasn’t struggling financially. One day when I was about 15, she and I had lunch at a Tex-Mex place using a buy-one-get-one coupon. The total came to around $11. My mom left a $1 tip. But that choice came back around fast.
The server followed us out to the parking lot, handed the dollar back, and said, “You probably need this more than I do".
2. All Yolked Up
Once, when I was working at a wildly popular breakfast spot, this sweet-looking elderly couple came in. After I went over the specials for them, the woman ordered the duck hash, and the man ordered two plain poached eggs on toast. Everything seemed fine...until I brought out the food. The man suddenly got upset, and when I asked what was wrong, his answer instantly got under my skin.
Apparently, he was angry that I hadn’t brought him a tablespoon for his eggs. To be fair, he never asked for one, but according to him, everyone knows poached eggs are meant to be served with a tablespoon. I’d been waitressing for nearly ten years and had served plenty of poached eggs, yet I had never heard of that. Still, I apologized and told him I’d go get him a spoon.
I assumed that would settle it, but I was very wrong. He shouted, “No! My breakfast is ruined now"! Then he threw his plate of food at me and stormed out. His wife gave me an apologetic smile as she shuffled out after him. I had to work the next eight hours with egg yolk all over my uniform.
3. Clinging To The Vine
I worked at a vineyard where we occasionally got limos full of very trashed people. We didn’t let them in because we weren’t a bar and we didn’t serve visibly intoxicated guests. Sometimes the manager would step away from the entrance, and that was usually when people tried to slip inside. I had to approach one group and politely explain that they’d had too much to drink and needed to leave.
Well, it turned out she was the most impossible person in the bunch. Her response immediately made me tense up: “I’m not going anywhere". I explained that my staff would not serve her, so there was no point in staying. I told her that if she didn’t leave within five minutes, an officer would see her out. She didn’t believe me, so I called the local officer we keep on call right in front of her.
I said, “He’s on his way. I’d suggest leaving if you want to avoid making this more embarrassing". As I headed out the side door to get the limo’s plate number, she followed me into the back office. What she did next made me furious. She shoved me into a filing cabinet and said, “WE AREN’T LEAVING". Then her group came back, grabbed her, and they sped off in their limo.
The officer arrived a minute later, and I gave him the plate number so he could at least rattle them a bit. All that over a drink. It happens three to five times a year.
4. Border Brouhaha
My mother is one of those people who always has to argue, and she also happens to speak completely fluent Spanish. We were at the Mexico City airport flying to Juarez. We were bringing back a bunch of plates and other things my mom had bought there, all packed into one huge box. When we got to the check-in counter, the employee told her the box needed to be wrapped. My mother was deeply offended by that.
She yelled, “WELL, I’VE NEVER HAD TO DO THAT BEFORE! I BRING THINGS FROM MEXICO CITY ALL THE TIME, AND I’VE NEVER HAD TO DO THAT"! Her shouting drew plenty of confused looks. This very white woman was arguing in flawless Spanish, which was interesting enough on its own.
The employee repeated that she needed to get the box wrapped with tape, and that it would cost about 200 pesos, around $10. Instead of doing that, she stormed off and left a huge unidentified box sitting there unattended—which, of course, is exactly what airport announcements tell you never to do. My dad and I had already checked in and gotten through security while all this was happening.
My mom finally joined us at the gate in a huff, telling us all about this insult to her dignity. Just as she finished, things caught up with her. Five security officers walked over—with rifles at their sides—and asked her to confirm her name. When she did, they pulled her up and started leading her away. My dad, who’s an attorney, had a complete “this is bad” moment.
We ran after her. My dad stepped in with his lawyer skills, she didn’t get charged over the incident, and somehow we still made our flight. We even got the box of plates home. I still tease her every time we use them.
5. Tossed Out Of Target
Right after I graduated college, I worked as a manager at Starbucks. We made one woman’s iced tea incorrectly. It was a small mistake and would have taken maybe thirty seconds to fix. Instead, she reacted terribly. She threw the drink back across the counter, turned to her daughter, and said in the most smug, condescending voice, “See, this is why we finish high school".
As the manager, I refused to serve her after that. She thought she had the upper hand when she went to find the Target store manager. What she didn’t know was that the Starbucks I worked at was inside the Target where I had previously worked. Several other customers backed up my account, and she ended up being removed from the store completely.
6. She Was An Endless Stream Of Problems
When I was working at an ice stand, a woman came up to the window with her two kids. It was really busy, and the line was long. I took her daughter’s order, and then her son said he needed to use the bathroom. So she took him to the side of the building and let him go there, even though there was a tree just a few feet away...and we also had a bathroom that kids were allowed to use.
She took a while, and meanwhile the line kept wrapping around the building. So I helped the next customer while she was still off to the side with her son. Then she came back and stepped right in front of the woman I was helping, saying she was ready. I asked her to give me a minute since I was almost done with the customer she had just cut in front of. That’s when she got furious.
She started yelling about how unprofessional I was and how awful my customer service was. I explained that while she was off to the side with her son, I was trying to keep the line moving. She denied that her son had gone next to the building and said she wanted to speak to my manager.
I gave her his number and wrote down my name for her, which only made her angrier. She stayed to get her order—yelling the whole time while I made it—and then stormed off. The people behind her all apologized for how she acted and told me I was doing a good job.
7. Film Freak Out
Back in the mid-90s, my mom rented *Clerks* for the family from the video section inside the Kroger we used to shop at. She had no idea how crude the movie was. She was so offended by it that the next day she went back to the store looking for payback. She started yelling at the manager about how outrageous it was that they would carry such an offensive movie in a family rental section.
Then she demanded that they remove it from the shelves for good. And here’s the wild part: they actually did it. That store never carried *Clerks* again.
8. All Work No Play
I teach drama, and I once met the most intimidating parent I think I’ll ever come across. I was directing some kids in my school’s middle school division in a production of *Treasure Island*. One day, when we couldn’t use the theater, we held rehearsal at one of the girl’s houses. Her mother had invited us over.
At first, I was uneasy because something always seemed a little off about her. She was always in a huge hurry to get her daughter home after our regular rehearsals. Still, they had a very large house, and I didn’t want to pass up the space, so I agreed to rehearse there. When we arrived, the mom greeted us politely enough. But something felt wrong right away.
She said her daughter was in her room. I asked if she could come join us, but her mom kept insisting we start without her. I explained that her daughter had one of the biggest roles in the play, so it would be hard to rehearse without her. She just kept saying that her daughter had work to do and wasn’t available.
Finally, after about half an hour, the girl came out to join us, but her mother told us she could only stay for 15 minutes before she had to go back to working. The girl then turned to her mother and said, “I don’t have any work,” and her mother replied, “Yes, you do, sweetie,” in the most passive-aggressive tone I’d ever heard.
I tried to stay out of it, and we began rehearsing. Then I opened my laptop to show the kids a video of their performance. The mother happened to walk by at that moment, and she rushed over and slammed my laptop shut, shouting, “No media"! But she didn’t stop there. She picked up my laptop and carried it off somewhere else.
Since it was my computer, I followed her and asked for it back. She calmly explained that they were a “no media” family and that it was important her daughter not be exposed to that. Then she said her daughter should get back to work anyway, but I told her we only needed five more minutes. When I got back to the group, the girl said, “Isn’t my mom so annoying"?
I didn’t really know what to say. That’s when I learned the full story. The girl wasn’t allowed to watch TV, use a computer, or even listen to music on an iPod. She was expected to do schoolwork and read only books her parents had already approved. She was in sixth grade, so it wasn’t as if she had endless assignments.
Even so, her mother made her review her notes every single day and would often make her redo homework because it wasn’t long enough. Eventually I felt I had to say something, so I told the mom she was putting too much pressure on her daughter. Her response was to throw me out of the house.
9. Don’t Mind Me
When I was in college, one student came in and sat back in his chair with that classic “couldn’t care less” posture. Then another woman, probably in her mid-50s, came in and sat next to him. At first nobody thought much of it because it was college, and people of all ages took classes. But it got strange very quickly.
Usually attendance wasn’t taken, but it was the first day of a 101 class, so the professor wanted to confirm who was supposed to be there. The woman had a notebook out, but she wasn’t on the roster and wasn’t on the waitlist either. The professor asked if she had missed the waitlist announcement, and she replied, “No, don’t mind me".
The professor frowned and asked, “Why not? What are you doing here"? Her answer stunned everyone. She said, “Taking notes for my son. Like I said, don’t mind me". The professor just stared at her. Then he said, confused, “Ma’am, he is in college". She nodded and replied, “Yes, but note-taking is hard for him".
The professor asked, “Does he have an accommodation plan? If so, we have support for that". She said, “No. Like I said, don’t mind me". The professor answered, “I do mind. You have to pay to be in this class". She kept pushing, saying, “I’m not learning anything. Just taking notes". That clearly didn’t help her case. At that point, he pointed her toward the door.
He said, “No. You’re going to leave the classroom because your son isn’t 12 anymore and can take his own notes. You didn’t pay for this class, so you can’t be here. Goodbye". And she still had the nerve to say, “Well! I will complain to the head of your department". But the professor had the perfect response.
He told her, very clearly, “I am the head. Now leave".
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10. A Recipe For Disaster
I worked part-time as a busboy in high school. This one family used to come in—a man, his wife, and their two little kids. They looked like a totally ordinary family, but they were absolute table wreckers, and they always left a huge mess behind. There would be fries everywhere and food all over the floor. At one point I watched one of the kids drop the salt and pepper shakers into a glass of milk.
I was already frustrated, but when the dad called me over, I nearly lost my patience. He asked, “Hey, can junior get a new milk? He had a little accident". The kids screamed the whole time, and the parents never reacted. Every visit was an hour of total chaos. I had to clean up after them more than a dozen times before the hostess finally asked them not to come back. They threw a fit, but at least we never saw them again.
11. Enough, Mom
My mom was one of those people who made every restaurant outing miserable. Any time we went out to eat with her, it turned into a complete ordeal. She complained about everything—her fork was bent, her dish wasn’t as spicy as it had been before, the waitress didn’t speak to her first, her food was cold, or it had been too long since we’d seen our server even though we didn’t actually need anything.
The complaints never stopped. She would deliver every one of them to the server with this smug attitude and then add, “I used to be a waitress, and we never had these problems". She had worked part-time as a waitress at a pizza place in the early ’90s. I still can’t roll my eyes hard enough.
12. Master Of None
A coworker at my school had the most overbearing parent I’d seen in eight years in education. I honestly didn’t think people like this were real. This mom believed every school and grade level should vote for one child to be the “leader of their peers". She was convinced her son would one day become president of the United States, and she thought his early elementary public school experience should be built around that idea.
She wanted her son to be chosen to direct the rest of the grade, handing out responsibilities to the other kids. He had just turned five and had skipped kindergarten at her request, even though his assessment scores were still at a kindergarten level. She pushed his teacher to let him give monthly PowerPoint presentations on complicated topics like segregation and photosynthesis.
She would show up on those days to record presentations that were very obviously created by her. She also kept him after school three times a week to make sure his reading points didn’t just meet expectations but were ten times higher. Eventually, she pulled her children from the district to look for a private school where a second grader could be voted the “leader of all grades K–6” and practice leading the other students.
13. Mint Moocher
I’d been in the restaurant business for over 15 years, so I had seen plenty. Still, my favorite incident happened when I was managing a steakhouse. Our host at the time was a witty 20-year-old with a sharp sense of humor. As one customer was leaving, he grabbed at least 50 mints in his arms, and the host cheerfully said, “Enjoy the mints"!
The guy instantly lost it and started yelling. I heard the commotion from the front of the restaurant. When I walked over to see what was happening, I saw a man in business casual clothes standing there with an armful of mints, shouting at this kid. Meanwhile, my host was grinning and saying, “No, I’m not apologizing".
I calmly asked if I could help the man, even though I had no idea what had happened. He demanded that I make the host apologize. I asked him to settle down and let me speak to the host first. The host looked at me and said, “I told him, ‘Enjoy the mints’"! I turned back to the customer, and his expression was unbelievable.
His face was bright red, he was shaking with anger, and the mints were almost spilling out of his arms. I could barely keep a straight face. I was trying so hard not to laugh, and the only thing I could manage to say was, “Sir, please enjoy your mints". Naturally, he stormed out, called corporate, and then I had to explain the whole thing to my boss.
We got written up, and the guy and his wife ended up getting a free meal.
14. Paying The Price
I worked at a high-end store, so dealing with entitled customers was pretty normal. One Christmas, I had a customer who was being ridiculously rude to me and my coworker. I had already explained clearly that there was a line and he would need to wait his turn like everyone else. When he finally got to the register, he called my manager an idiot.
All of that happened just because my manager had to ring something up again. But karma showed up fast. Another customer behind him, who was about half his size, tapped him on the shoulder and said loudly, “Would you mind being quiet and letting these people do their jobs? You’re seriously irritating all of us".
I somehow managed to find a 50 percent off coupon for my new favorite person.
15. She Was Whining For No Reason
A woman and her husband came in, and before they even sat down, they told us she was extremely allergic to white wine. She said, “If you give me any white, I will have to be taken away in an ambulance". So I ran around double- and triple-checking recipes and making sure the kitchen was fully prepared so her meal would be safe when she ordered. Her husband chose the special.
I made a point of telling her not to eat any of his meal because it came with a beurre blanc sauce made with white wine, and I very much wanted her to survive dinner. I brought out their food, and the first thing she did completely stunned me—she took a huge forkful from her husband’s plate. I cried out in disbelief as she put it straight into her mouth.
While she was chewing, she said, “Oh, one bite won’t hurt". On top of that, she completely drained every server on the floor by pulling them into pointless, inappropriate conversations while they were trying to manage busy sections. She also cornered another guest in the narrow hallway by the bathrooms just to aggressively tell him he was being too loud.
16. Obey Your Commander
My friend and I were at a movie when a group of guys nearby started talking about how they had just finished basic training. Then they spent the whole film trashing it, making loud rude comments and ruining it for everyone else. My friend finally told them, “Keep it down". They flipped him off, but they quieted down. After the movie, we ended up right behind the same six or seven guys as everyone was leaving.
My friend said, “The way you were acting in there was really rude,” and the loudest one pulled out his ID and said, “Yeah, well, I’m a Marine, and I fight for your freedoms". My friend just smiled. He happened to be an officer, so he showed his own ID and said, “I’m a Marine officer, and wearing the uniform doesn’t give you permission to act like that".
Then he made them stand at attention right by the theater doors and apologize to every person walking out.
17. She Was A Mutton For Punishment
I used to wait tables at a country club. One time, a couple came in, and before I had even introduced myself, the woman was already upset that they had to wait five minutes while we reset their table. Right away, she started complaining that every time she ordered the filet mignon, it was terrible and cooked wrong. I suggested trying something else, but she refused and ordered it again anyway.
I let the kitchen know so they could make sure it came out perfectly and hopefully save everyone some trouble. When the steak was ready, it looked fine to me. I set the plate down, and I could tell from the smirk on her face that she had already decided she wasn’t happy. She picked up her butter knife and tapped the top of the steak three times with the flat side. At that point, I knew this was about to become a whole situation.
She hadn’t even cut into it or tasted it before saying, “This is disgusting". She sent it back and demanded a new one. So we brought out another steak. She ate half of that one and took the rest home. Before she left, she asked to speak to the manager. She complained at length, got her whole meal comped, plus a dessert, and left me an awful tip.
18. No One Could Hold A Candle To Her
I was visiting my aunt, and she needed to stop at Walgreens. She had a newspaper ad saying some candles were 50% off, so she picked out ten of them. At checkout, they rang up at full price, and she completely lost her temper. The difference was only a dollar each instead of fifty cents. The cashier and I both pointed out that she was holding an old newspaper.
The ad clearly said the sale had ended a week earlier. Then she switched gears and said, “Well, you could have told me more nicely,” and kept grumbling about it. I kept telling her we needed to go. Once I finally got her out to the car, I said I had forgotten to grab a pack of gum, went back inside, and apologized to the cashier.
19. I Broke It Down For Her
I used to work in the toy department at a retail store. The LeapFrog laptop had just come out, and they were really expensive. I was straightening shelves when I noticed a kid pounding on one of them. His mom was nowhere in sight. I walked over and asked him nicely, “Is that how you play with your toys at home"?
The kid gave me a sheepish “No” and put it back on the shelf. I was feeling pretty good about how I handled it—until his mother suddenly appeared. What she did next really caught me off guard. She snapped at me and said I had “NO RIGHT” to speak to her child that way. I looked her in the eye and answered calmly.
“Ma’am, your son was about to break a $150 toy. Our store has a you-break-it, you-buy-it policy. If you’d like me to hand it back to him so he can keep hitting it, I’d be happy to ring you up for the damage at my register". She gave me a nasty look, grabbed her son, and stormed off.
20. Fired Up On The Home Front
I was at a parent-teacher conference when a mother came in and said she was worried because her daughter was failing. I explained that I believed her daughter could still pass, but she would need to do more work at home. After all, she had completed almost none of her homework assignments. That turned out to be a huge mistake.
I then spent the rest of the meeting listening to the mother rant that I had no right to suggest how her daughter should spend time at home. She told me I should focus more on teaching her daughter during class than the rest of the students just because she was struggling. I politely explained that I couldn’t do that because it wouldn’t be fair to everyone else.
The mother then stood up in the hallway and shouted, “YOU ARE THE WORST TEACHER EVER! I’M GOING TO THE PRINCIPAL, AND YOU WILL BE FIRED". Spoiler: I wasn’t.
21. Fight Or Flight
I’m a pretty easygoing guy who travels for work, and I usually don’t let little things bother me. But a couple of years ago, I was on a flight that was already running 30 minutes late. I was thinking my connection would be tight and that I’d probably have to run, or at least speed-walk, what felt like a mile through the airport.
I was one of the last people to board, and I had to check my bag because the overhead bins were full. The four or five people behind me had to do the same. As I made my way down the aisle, a guy was asking people to rearrange their bags. He was trying to force his oversized bag into the overhead bin, but there just wasn’t space. So he called over a flight attendant.
She came up and said, “Sir, we’re out of room. You’ll need to check your bag". That set him off. He started yelling, “This airline is terrible. I’m a million-mile member. I want your name and employee number,” and kept going from there. At that point, I kind of hit my limit. I felt awful for the flight attendant.
She was only doing her job, and this guy had spent five minutes making a scene and holding everyone up. People were staring, cringing, and just hoping he’d stop so we could all move on. I finally yelled, “BE QUIET. JUST BE QUIET ALREADY"! I was shaking because I was so mad. And then I really let him have it.
I said, “Take your bag to the front, check it, and stop this nonsense. You are exactly what makes flying miserable. Your entitlement is unbelievable. If you’re really a million-mile flier, then you know the rules. You know how this works". He started sputtering and looking embarrassed, but he didn’t say another word. Then the best part happened.
Someone in the back of the plane started clapping. A second later, the whole plane joined in. I sat down while everyone applauded, and the guy had to take the long walk to the front of the plane. The flight attendant thanked me, and so did a bunch of other passengers. I didn’t plan to speak up, but I really can’t stand people who act like that.
The best part was that I got free drinks on that flight, the attendant gave me several drink vouchers for future trips, and another passenger handed me a free Wi-Fi pass he had won. It was extremely satisfying.
22. Things Got Pretty Heated
I once had a parent complain that we unfairly sent her child home after he had a 101-degree fever and threw up right in the middle of the cafeteria. She took it to a completely unreasonable level. She claimed that every single witness in the cafeteria was lying about the vomiting, and she also insisted the fever was only because her child had been wearing a sweater.
This parent wasn’t being called away from work to pick up her sick child. She was a stay-at-home mom. She was literally at home when the school nurse called her home phone.
23. She Had Me Tongue Tied
I worked at a fast-food restaurant, and my location was near some kind of convention in Ottawa, Canada. The city is pretty bilingual, but not everyone is. I definitely am not—I grew up on the prairies, where French was not a required subject. Anyway, during one of my shifts, a woman was trying to place an order, but she was speaking French.
I can usually catch the general meaning if I recognize a few words, but she was speaking pretty quickly, so I was struggling. After a couple of minutes of trying to answer her questions, I turned to a bilingual coworker and asked her to help me out, for the love of God. That’s when the woman responded in a way that made my face turn red.
In completely perfect English, and with as much attitude as possible, she said, “This is Canada. We speak French and English". I was stunned—not just by the comment, but because she had understood me the entire time and never tried to make things easier. I honestly couldn’t understand why someone would do that. All I could do was stare at her for a few seconds and walk away.
24. Missed Photo Op
Teacher here. I once had a parent complain that their child wasn’t in a group photo from a field trip. She suggested that I must not like her child and had purposely made him sit out of the picture. The real explanation was ridiculous. In reality, her child wasn’t even at school that day, but she insisted he had been there because he came home with a sticker from the place we visited.
Except no. The child got a sticker because I had gone out of my way to get one for him since he had missed the field trip. I even told her she could check my attendance book if she wanted proof that she hadn’t sent her preschooler to school that day.
25. A Chili Reception
I worked at Chili’s for about five years. I dealt with so many rude customers that I lost count, but one experience stood out as the worst by far. I was serving tables around graduation season, and a party of 25 called around 7 p.m. to say they’d be there in 30 minutes. We got a large table ready for them and expected them soon after.
Instead, they showed up about an hour and a half later than they said they would. By then, we had already broken up the big table and seated other smaller groups there. When they arrived, they were angry that their table wasn’t waiting for them. The sweet, soft-spoken hostess working that night calmly explained that we assumed they had decided to go somewhere else since they hadn’t shown up earlier. That’s when the customer causing the scene took over.
The woman speaking to the hostess immediately started going off, saying we should have known they were still coming. Then she loudly said Chili’s “was a terrible idea” and that we were all terrible at our jobs. The hostess was almost in tears, but she told them we would set up another table in a closed section and that I would take care of them.
These people came in all the time, were rude to everyone, never tipped, and constantly complained to get free food. When I handled large parties by myself, I usually started everyone with water because it takes time to get drink orders from that many people and bring everything out. I thought it was better for them to at least have water while they waited.
As soon as they got settled, several of them started complaining that they didn’t want water and that I was rude for not offering something else first. I calmly explained that I’d be bringing whatever they wanted and that the water was just there in the meantime. Apparently, that wasn’t enough for them.
They called me an idiot and said, “Get this mess out of my face,” talking about the water. Most of them ordered strawberry lemonade, so I made all the drinks and brought them out. Then the group started complaining that it tasted awful. They said it was nothing like how it tasted the last time they came in.
I explained that we made it the same way every time, but I’d be happy to make a fresh batch. I dumped what we had, made another batch of strawberry lemonade, and brought it back out. Again, they said it was awful. So I offered to get them something else if they didn’t like it.
They said, “We just want a server who isn’t an idiot and knows how to make strawberry lemonade". I got the manager, who explained that we prepared it the same way every time. They rolled their eyes and told the manager I was being rude. Then, once they started eating, they got even more disrespectful.
They deliberately poured drinks onto the floor, threw food at me, and insulted me right to my face. A couple of my other tables complained that the group was being way too loud, and they were right. I went over and politely asked if they could keep it down a little because they were disturbing other guests in the restaurant.
One kid shouted, “OH, YOU THINK I’M TOO LOUD"? Then they all got even louder. Some customers actually got up and left. That was the last straw. I raised my voice over them and told them they were no longer welcome in the restaurant. That finally got them quiet. One kid told me I couldn’t do that, like he was somehow in charge.
I said, “When you start driving away our paying customers, I absolutely can. Now get out". They still had the nerve to ask for boxes for food they hadn’t even touched because they were too busy causing a scene. I told them I didn’t care about the food and that they needed to leave. My manager and I stood by the door, smiling, while we watched them all head out.
One girl told me I had ruined her graduation party. I told her she had acted badly and brought it on herself. A few of them stayed behind to beg my manager to let them come back because it was their favorite place to eat. He told them they cost the restaurant money every time they came in and that they were not welcome back.
26. Diaper Duty
It really is the worst when this kind of behavior comes from inside your own family. We were at a crowded restaurant, and my mom tried to change my sister’s diaper right on the table. The waitress asked her to use the restroom instead, and my mom completely lost it. Then she had me change my sister’s diaper while she kept arguing with half the restaurant.
27. Never-Ending Nightmare
I was a server at Olive Garden for two years. It was a typical busy night during the “never-ending pasta bowl” season. One of my first tables that evening was a family of five—a mom, dad, two sons, and a little girl around two or three. They were all very overweight, and the daughter was wearing a dirty shirt and no pants, just a diaper.
When I checked on them, I noticed a really strong smell of poop hanging around the table. I came back with refills, and the smell was just as bad. As I walked around the table handing out drinks, I passed the high chair and saw the little girl with her hand in her diaper. What happened next nearly made me sick.
I watched her pull out the mess and toss it on the floor, right next to an even bigger pile that was already there and barely covered by a napkin. I couldn’t hide the look on my face. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but I turned to the parents and said, “Um, your daughter has a situation over here". The mother was not bothered.
She just said, “Yeah, I know, I threw that napkin over it,” and then kept eating her third refill of never-ending pasta. I was stunned. Not only were there two piles of poop on the floor, but the girl’s hands were clearly covered in it, and no one in the family seemed to care at all.
One of the brothers even asked me for another Dr. Pepper while I was still standing there in shock. I immediately told the manager on duty, and at first she didn’t believe me. I told her to go look for herself. She politely asked the mother to clean it up right away and even handed her disinfectant wipes. That’s when the mom completely exploded.
She said it wasn’t her job and claimed we were discriminating against her by asking. She demanded that everything be comped. She picked it up, but she didn’t wash her hands, didn’t clean up her daughter, and just kept eating. I thought that was the end of it and they’d pay and leave, but when I dropped off the check, the mom said, “Uh, it’s my son’s birthday. Don’t y’all sing and bring us dessert"?
28. I Swear She Was A Kook
As a teacher, I once had a parent come in to tell me their child had heard someone using swear words. The child was 16 years old. I thought it was a strange complaint, but if a student—or worse, a teacher—had sworn at him, that would obviously be a problem. So I asked the parent, “Was it a teacher or someone else at the school"?
They said no, so I asked, “Oh, was it another student then"? Again, they said no. Then I asked, “So it was someone else at school? Did it happen on school grounds"? They said it did not. I kept trying to figure it out. “During school hours"? Again, the parent said, “No". So I said, “Let me make sure I understand—you’re saying your child heard someone swearing outside school grounds, outside school hours, and that person had no connection to the school"?
They replied, “Yes, and I want to know what you’re going to do about it"!
29. His Words Hit The Spot
My dad was driving around with his terminally ill friend. They needed to stop at a pharmacy, and because my dad’s friend got short of breath easily, they were hoping to find a handicap spot. Unfortunately, none were open, so they had to park farther away. As they were walking toward the store, a short, muscular man came out of the pharmacy.
He walked over to his Ford F-150, which was parked in a handicap spot. He didn’t appear to need the space, and he didn’t have a placard. My dad’s friend was furious when he saw that. As the man was getting into his truck, he called out, “Excuse me—is your handicap physical or mental"? The man’s face went pale, and he quickly got in and drove off.
30. The Baconator
I used to work at Subway. There’s one legendary customer we still refer to as the “Crazy Bacon Lady” whenever this story comes up. She was an older woman who came in one day and asked how much a six-inch BLT cost. We told her it was $3.50 plus tax. She immediately started yelling, insisting it had been $2 when she came in the day before—even though she hadn’t.
It was actually the first time she had ever been in our store. And besides that, the BLT had never been $2 in the three years I’d worked there. She snapped out her order the whole way down the line, saying things like, “I am a good Christian woman. I don’t deserve to be treated this way. For $3.50, that bacon better be fresh! The service here is terrible! I’M NEVER COMING BACK, YOU HEAR ME"!
But the best part came when she reached my co-worker at the register. He told her the total with tax was $3.68. She said, “You people are workers of the devil"! Then she slapped down the exact change, grabbed her bag, and stormed out the door.
31. She Had Some Hang Up
A parent once called her daughter right in the middle of my class just to “check in". I took the student’s phone while she was still on the call and later spoke with the parent about how class time shouldn’t be interrupted just to say hi. Then I ended the call and kept the phone until the end of the period.
The student was completely embarrassed, and after that I never saw the phone again. My principal ended up shaking my hand, and the parent ignored every attempt I made to contact her about her daughter’s progress for the rest of the semester.
32. They Were In For A Rude Awakening
During my lunch break, I stopped at the grocery store. An older woman, who seemed to be dealing with some mental and emotional struggles, walked up to the checkout. When she picked up her salad, it popped open and spilled everywhere. She started crying, saying she couldn’t afford another one, and kept apologizing for the mess.
A store clerk and I went over to help. The clerk reassured her that this kind of thing happened all the time and that they wouldn’t charge her for it, but she was still really upset. She kept apologizing and crying. Then I noticed two middle-aged women nearby—perfect hair, expensive clothes, the whole image—snickering every time the older woman spoke.
I was shocked, but it got even worse. Before long, they were openly mocking her loud enough for all of us to hear. I walked over with my basket and quietly said, “Come on, knock it off". They immediately stopped laughing and turned red with anger. One of them snapped, “Excuse me? Who are you"?
I said calmly, “She’s clearly upset. She can hear you, and this is embarrassing for both you and her". That’s when they really blew up. “Who do you think you are? Don’t talk to me like that,” and so on. I answered, “I know you’re probably unhappy and taking it out on someone who doesn’t deserve it, but that doesn’t give you the right to be cruel to a stranger".
They were stunned, and honestly, it was something to see. Then they said, “We’re not paying for this,” and stormed out, leaving their groceries behind. The clerk started laughing, and the guy behind me said, “Oh, wow". Maybe I went a little too far, but I was genuinely stunned by how mean they were being.
33. Not In Your Wildest Dreams Lady
I’m a teacher, and I was helping organize a graduation dinner. One mother came in demanding that her daughter be allowed to perform music at the event. I explained that the graduating class had already chosen someone else. Then the truly ridiculous part came out. She got even more upset and clarified that she wasn’t even talking about her daughter who was graduating.
She meant her other daughter, who had graduated years earlier and was now trying to start a music career. I laughed, then professionally explained that it wasn’t going to happen. A few days later, she called the conference center and tried to insist that all the meals be made kosher, along with a bunch of other demands. She was definitely unforgettable.
34. Looking For Trouble
I waited tables for three years, and one time I had a group who seemed perfectly happy. I was doing everything right—quick service, polite attitude, the usual. Whenever I checked on them, they said everything was great and thanked me. But halfway through the meal, after I had stepped away, one customer went looking for the manager to complain.
Not only did she complain, she specifically targeted me. She actually asked the manager to fire me. Her reasons were minor falsehoods, and she backed them up by claiming she had worked in food service herself. If the more easygoing manager hadn’t been on shift that night, it could have gone badly for me.
Her meal was comped, and she left me no tip. It still bothers me when I think about it. It honestly felt like they had gone out that night with the goal of getting a server fired.
35. Her Behavior Needed To Go
I used to work at Walmart. When things were slow, cashiers would be sent onto the floor to straighten up and help in other departments. One day I was helping a friend in the children’s section when a woman came in with her two kids. One was still a baby, and the older daughter looked about four or five.
The mother browsed around while completely ignoring her daughter, who kept saying she needed to use the bathroom. She wasn’t whining, just repeating, “Mom, I have to go". The mother kept brushing her off and telling her to hold it. Finally, the little girl shouted, “Mom! I! Have! To! GO"! which woke the baby.
The baby started crying, and the mother finally responded by yelling at her daughter for being a nuisance. My friend and I exchanged looks like, “What is wrong with this woman"? but there wasn’t much we could do. Then she yelled, “Will you be quiet? I wish you had never been born".
I was stunned. I couldn’t believe anyone would say that to a child. My friend dropped what she was doing and said, “What did you just say"? The woman started to tell us to mind our own business, but my friend cut her off and launched into one of the fiercest speeches I’ve ever heard.
She told the woman it was obvious the little girl needed the bathroom, since that was all she’d been saying for the last five minutes. She ended by telling her to take her daughter to the restroom immediately and act like a parent. I wanted to applaud. The woman left without another word.
Apparently she complained to management on the way out, because my friend was called into the office soon after. She said she stood by what she did and would do it again. The manager told her he understood, gave her a warning, and said, “Good job".
36. I Slammed Back
One day, I watched a woman slam her car door into the vehicle parked next to hers over and over because, according to her, “they parked too close". I lost my patience right then. The woman doing the damage was actually parked over the line, while the other car was centered perfectly in its space. I wrote down her license plate number, went into the store, found the owner of the other car, and told them what happened.
37. The Shrill Of Defeat
I worked at a local computer shop less than half a mile from the school in the middle of my city. Every now and then, we’d get a call from the school’s tech support person with a fairly advanced question, or just something he didn’t know. Over time, the school got to know us well enough that either my boss or I—the only two employees—would occasionally be called in to fill in for their tech person.
The school board knew us, the administration knew us, and I even became close friends with the only janitor at this high school of more than a thousand students. One day, while I was covering for their tech person, I got a call from an angry mother about her child. At first I was curious, but then the principal came in and motioned for me to hang up immediately.
Still, I kept listening. Apparently, her child had scored a 79 on a test, and she wanted him to be allowed to retake it. Even though this school was pretty relaxed about most things, this was a state exam, and I knew that because I had gone there myself. My explanation did nothing to calm her down. She started yelling in the highest pitch imaginable, and I just sat there in disbelief.
My phone volume was turned almost all the way down, and the principal could still hear her from about eight feet away. He leaned against the wall, and by that point we were just waiting for her to stop. Suddenly she did, and I could hear her struggling to catch her breath on the other end.
After about a ten-second pause, I asked, “Would you like fries with that"? She let out another angry shout, followed by one last ear-piercing screech, and then hung up. The principal and I laughed harder than we ever had before.
He said, “Thank goodness you don’t work here, or I’d have to fire you". All that over a 79.
38. O Holy Nightmare
I had to deal with the ultimate stage mom. One mother threatened to pull her daughter out of the school if she wasn’t given the lead role in the Christmas concert to sing “O Holy Night". The girl had made it completely clear to me, the faculty, and her classmates that she knew she wasn’t the right fit for the part, and she didn’t even want it.
This was entirely her mother’s doing, because she was determined that her daughter would be “the star” of the school no matter what.
39. Stand Up And Deliver
I was at a 7-Eleven buying something when a woman in business clothes cut into my transaction. She angrily told the cashier that her coffee wasn’t hot. He apologized and said he could brew a fresh pot right away. She replied, “No, I’m far too busy to wait for that"! The clerk then offered her a refund, and she said, “No, I don’t want a refund! I’m busy, and I want a hot cup of coffee RIGHT NOW"!
I felt awful for the clerk, who, judging by his accent, probably hadn’t been in the country long and seemed stunned by how rude she was. I finally snapped. I said, “Listen, what exactly do you expect him to do? The only way he could give you what you want would be to get a time machine and brew the coffee before you arrived".
She just stood there trembling. I couldn’t tell if she was angry or embarrassed, but after what felt like forever, she rushed out of the store and drove off. Everyone in line started clapping. The clerk looked surprised by my reaction too, but he told me, “It’s nice to know some people will stand up for strangers in this country".
40. Crying Over Fried Rice
I was a waitress at a gas station restaurant, and one night a trucker got upset because his rice pilaf wasn’t made with plain white rice. He took it to a completely unnecessary level—yelling at me, my coworker, and the cook, and causing a huge scene in a packed dining room. He targeted my coworker the most because she refused to put up with his childish behavior. He had ordered two bowls of rice, and he was upset about both.
The whole thing could have been solved easily by bringing him a different side dish. But it seemed like he mostly wanted an excuse to complain to the cook about “serving food that does not look good” while we were trying to handle other customers. I ignored him for the rest of the night and let him sulk and glare. We gave him a discount, and he still left me a tip. Even so, I was embarrassed to be serving a grown man acting that way.
41. A Smile Was Worth A Thousand Words
I’m a teacher, and I usually gave homework that was mostly just practice because I didn’t want to overwhelm my students. One time, I gave one of my stronger students a more challenging assignment to see how he’d handle it. I attached a sticky note with a smiley face that said, “Michael may need a little help on this one". The dad came in the next day, and I was stunned by how strongly he reacted.
He slammed the note down on the principal’s desk. He was upset because he thought the smiley face was me being sarcastic and suggesting that he never helped his son with homework. The principal was politely baffled, and the man’s wife came in later, rolling her eyes and apologizing for him. My principal gave me a chance to explain, and eventually he calmed down.
Still, a sarcastic smiley face?
42. Her Entitlement Got Knocked Out Of The Park
I worked as a nanny and often took the baby to the park, where we did the usual “meet people and play” routine. There was a mom I saw there a lot, and our kids would often play together. One morning, we were all at the park, and when I looked up, I realized I was alone with two toddlers and her older preschool-aged child.
I called out for her and searched around for 15 minutes before calling the authorities. Twenty minutes later, she still hadn’t come back, but the authorities and a social worker had arrived. They took my statement and then left with the unattended children. As I was walking down the street, about a block away from the park, the mom came running up to me and pointed back toward it.
She demanded to know where her kids were. I told her what had happened, and we ended up arguing. I could hardly believe what she was saying. She was angry that I hadn’t just stayed at the park with her kids while she ran to the store, because I was a nanny. Apparently, she thought I should be able to take care of extra children, even though they weren’t my responsibility.
I told her—as calmly as I could with the baby there—exactly how irresponsible and dangerous her choice had been. I also made it very clear how reckless and unfair her behavior was. There was some kind of court hearing afterward, where she claimed I had been babysitting her kids. But when she couldn’t even give the judge my name or contact information, it was obvious that wasn’t true.
I never found out what happened with her or the kids after that.
43. The Proof Was In The Puddin’
I was an assistant school counselor at a high school. We had an angry parent call several times, accusing us of somehow turning her son gay. There was just one problem: meanwhile, her son was dating his way through a large part of the school’s female population. The calls stopped suddenly after he got a classmate pregnant.
44. Trouble Was Brewing
I worked at a very busy restaurant, where weekends were absolutely hectic, with more than 250 dinner guests. We’d stay packed right up until closing. Every server had their own section. One of the sections was bigger than the others and usually had two servers assigned to it instead of one. One Saturday night, though, we were short-staffed.
My manager decided to put me in the large section by myself, since the others couldn’t manage it. It had happened before and usually wasn’t a huge issue. There were two round tables in that section, one seating six and the other seating four. Both had families at them. As the night went on and the restaurant got busier, my section got harder to keep up with.
Because of that, my service slowed down a little, and the tables had to wait longer for their food. I apologized and explained the situation to everyone. They all understood and told me not to worry about it—except for the father at one of the round tables. He’d already had quite a bit to drink and was clearly buzzed. Every time I walked by, he seemed to get more irritated.
At one point, his table was waiting for dessert, and then he did something that completely shocked me. He stood up and poured his full glass of pilsner all over me while I was serving food to the family at the next table. For a second, I had no idea what had even happened, so I didn’t know how to react. Luckily, one of the bartenders saw the whole thing.
They rushed over immediately to throw him out—almost instantly. The only good thing that came out of it was that all my other tables felt so bad for me that no one complained about the wait times anymore.
45. Toilet Trouble
Within the first few days of the school year, it became clear that one student had no idea how to use the toilet without help. This was a class of five- and six-year-olds. My friend contacted the student’s parents. Eventually, it came out that the child had only recently stopped using Pull-Ups, and the parents hadn’t actually taught her how to use the toilet because they didn’t want to put “pressure” on her.
They said they thought she would let them know whenever she felt ready to learn. They even suggested that a female staff member should always be available to help their child in the bathroom and clean her up whenever she had an accident. The level of entitlement and laziness was hard to believe.
He told the parents that if their child was not toilet trained, she would no longer be allowed to attend the school. The child learned to use the toilet without help within a week.
46. Do I Have To Paint A Picture? Your Kid’s Rude!
Some kid was in a restaurant where my mom and I were trying to have a quiet lunch. This kid started to throw crayons at my mom, literally from the next table. The kid's mom was too busy talking on her phone to care. I tried glaring, but she couldn't care less. In the end, I walked up to her to confront her, and she actually gave me the "one-minute finger".
That was it. I picked up all the crayons that were on the floor, on the table, and from in front of the kid, dumped them on her lap, and sat back down. I think she was so shocked, she just left. The manager of the restaurant gave us a free meal. Apparently, that particular woman was known for just letting her kid run wild.
47. I Tried To Put Her In Line
It was a Friday at around 6 pm, and I was in line at a supermarket. The lines were longer than normal. This entitled late-40s soccer mom was in front of me, tapping her foot and getting all sorts of agitated. We got up to the register and the woman started going off about how slow the line was and how ridiculous the wait had been.
The girl checking items through was young and obviously couldn’t say anything, so I stepped up to the plate. I said, "Lady, you need to CALM DOWN. You aren't the only one inconvenienced by long lines. Being nasty to this poor girl isn't going to make your groceries slide through any faster". Her jaw dropped as if everyone in her life just sat around, taking her verbal garbage wherever she went.
She shut up and continued through, glaring at me as she left. I sat back, looking satisfied with an “I don’t care” look. The female clerk smiled and said she couldn't have ever done that. A week later, I saw the clerk again, and she told me that the woman came back in, talked to her manager, and she got in trouble for not telling me that I was out of line for calling her out!
48. She Made A Mountain Out Of A Molehill
My mother had a dreadful moment once. She paid me a visit shortly after I moved to Switzerland. We went shopping for groceries together. Everything in Switzerland was at least twice as expensive. My mother proceeded to brutally embarrass me. She let the entire shop know how overpriced each and every item I put in the cart was while also insisting that we needed to buy bottled water because she couldn't drink the tap water.
Meanwhile, she would drink tap water at home, and Switzerland had better quality water. So from everything she complained about, the $12 for four bottles of non-sparkly water was somehow completely fine. I never went shopping with her ever again after that.
49. Told Off In A Tiny Space
I was on vacation with my parents. My dad had planned for us to have this amazing dinner at a fancy restaurant. The restaurant was literally on the first floor of a small or medium-sized house. Seeing as the place was so tiny, all the customers had to keep their voices down so as not to disturb everyone else. We sat down for dinner and were immediately overwhelmed by a man talking loudly at the table next to us.
Not only was he basically yelling, but he was saying very inappropriate and prejudiced comments. He obviously had too much to drink, but everyone at his table looked too scared to say anything to him. My family and I tried to have our dinner and ignore him, but it was becoming very difficult. My poor dad, who had planned this great dinner, looked so crestfallen.
Whenever someone upsets a family member of mine, I snap. And that's exactly what happened. I turned around and said very clearly and loudly, "Could you please keep your voice down. I can hardly hear anything besides your voice". The guy was speechless, probably because I was an 18-year-old girl telling him nicely to shut up in front of an entire restaurant.
50. This Parent Spelled Trouble
My mom was a teaching assistant for a while when I was a kid. A student’s mom was irate because her son failed his spelling test. He got a zero, and the mom insisted that was impossible. She said that she had made flashcards, and they studied for an hour. The parent claimed that the real reason my mom failed her son was that she must be prejudiced.
The parent got so mad that she came down to the school to file a complaint against my mom, and almost every word was misspelled. She slammed his test on the desk, demanding that his answers were correct. But this actually led to a tragic revelation. Turns out that the mom was spelling at a level that could not pass a third-grade spelling test.
She was teaching her incorrect spelling to her son when he came home with a paper of the words to learn.
51. Read The Room—We’re Busy!
A 40-something-year-old, heavy-set woman was seated at my table. The first thing I noticed was that she was alone and had a really thick novel with her. I approached her in a timely manner and asked her what she would like to drink. The first thing she told me was that she was waiting for one more person, but she went ahead and ordered her cocktail anyway.
I let her know the bar was kind of backed up, so it may be a little longer than usual for her drink. Her drink came out, and I brought it to her. The other person still hadn't arrived. She then asked me why her drink took so long. I apologized and said the bar was backed up with drink orders. I walked away to check up on my other tables.
About two minutes later, I came back to her table and asked her if everything was OK. But something just seemed off. She complained about the drink and wanted to order something else from the bar. She told me what she wanted and then said, "Please don't let it take as long as the last time". I calmly told her again that the bar was unusually busy.
Still, I would get it to her as quickly as possible. The other person still hadn't arrived. I brought the drink out, and she got tired of waiting for the other person and placed her food order. Everything came out in a timely manner and correctly, so there was nothing to complain about. She then asked for the check, and I brought it to her.
She paid with a credit card and left. I looked at the credit card slip. She left $0.00 for a tip. So, I looked around the table for cash but couldn't find any. However, I did notice that she accidentally left her novel. I came up with an ingenious revenge. I went to a secluded area of the kitchen with the novel in hand and proceeded to tear out the final chapter of the book.
I then walked to the host stand with a smile on my face as she was coming back to reclaim the novel. I handed it to her and told her to have a nice evening.
52. She Was Off The Rails
My parents went with me to the UK when I started boarding school, and my mom reserved our seats on the train. A girl was sitting at our table. We told her, “Hey, those are reserved”, and she apologized and moved across to sit with her family. But my mother wouldn't let it go. She pulled out our tickets and started screaming at this family about how we reserved the seats.
My dad and I told her to sit down and shut up. It took some arguing because she then turned on us next. She started screaming at us during dinner—in the hotel restaurant with other people around—for not having her back. I was eager for them to leave when I moved into my dorm.
53. A Waste Of Space
I had a student who was a waste of a seat. He was lazy, manipulative, and arrogant. His mom was a single mom, and based on our first contact, it was pretty clear she was going to be a nightmare. By the end of the first nine weeks, I already had a folder in my email just for emails from her. Despite being a helicopter parent, her son never improved.
She would give me the standard, "We are going to study for the test on Tuesday over the weekend". Then, he would come in on Tuesday unaware that there was going to be a test and then fail it. Naturally, he failed the first nine weeks, and his mom went berserk. For the next six weeks, not a day went by that I didn't receive an email or phone call from her.
Finally, right before Thanksgiving, I had her come in for a meeting. I showed her my failures log. I kept a record of the day-to-day behavior of students who had chronic issues. I showed her what her son had been doing. She refused to believe it—just outright refused. After that, she transferred him out of my class and into another with the same results.
He had four English teachers during his first ninth-grade year.
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54. Sweet Dreams Are Made Of Cheese
I had a guest who ordered a cheese plate to go along with their vino. The cheese plate was pretty big with lots of different kinds of cheese on it, some rather expensive. So I set them down in front of her, and she asked me what they were. It was written on the menu card, but she seemed to want to hear it. However, I could only recall the names of some.
She rolled her eyes at my lacking knowledge and proceeded to ask if I at least knew where the cheeses came from and how they were made before insulting me for not knowing. But that's not all—she then complained to the restaurant manager about my "not knowing what I serve". I even went to the kitchen and asked the already furious cook, but he didn't know himself either.
55. Dollar Dilemma
My dad was a bit of a Ken, but luckily, he never got too loud or obnoxious. He would just really, really pedantic. He once called Walmart and went into this whole thing about the strawberries being one dollar more expensive than what was advertised. I couldn't believe that he would go so far over a single dollar.
56. They Got Served A Cup Of Courtesy
Years ago, I was at a Panera Bread around the holidays. It was full-on shopping season, and the place was close to some shopping malls, so it was extremely busy. This older couple ordered coffee, and the lady behind the counter gave them a to-go cup, saying, "I'm sorry, we ran out of clean mugs, and the dishwasher is running now, but I didn't want to make you wait".
She was very polite, but the lady got mad and started screaming about bad service. She actually yelled, "I need a FOR-HERE cup, not a to-go cup"! The poor girl behind the counter kept apologizing and saying they would be done in a minute, but the woman just kept complaining. Meanwhile, another employee came up to take my order. I saw my chance to get extra petty then.
I ordered my drink and said as loud as I could, "And a to-go cup is FINE with me. Unlike some people, I understand the drink will taste the same"! The old lady freaked about how rude I was while I waited for my drink. The manager came out and gave me a free loaf of their holiday bread "for being so patient". The old people left, still angry.
57. Crowdsourcing
My mom had a phase like this for a few years. She literally told me, "You know, if I'm mean to people, they do things for me," as if she had a revelation. So, she yelled at a cashier once because she didn't read the signs that were plastered everywhere. The cashier had to call his manager to cancel her transaction. Then she said she deserved free booze from all the hassle he caused her.
She was actually looking around, trying to get the crowd to join her in her single person riot. I decided to step up and put her in her place. I told her—very loudly in front of everyone—that she needed to shut up because she was acting like a child. I said that no civilized adult would be acting with such a low IQ and as barbaric as she was acting. You can't cause a problem and then get mad about it.
58. Pasta Prima Donna
I worked at an Italian family restaurant that was locally owned and basically a staple of the area. My very first day on the floor without a trainer was on Mother's Day. A lady ordered gnocchi, and I wrote down her order. I got over to the computer and couldn’t find gnocchi anywhere, and for a good reason. It turned out we didn’t serve gnocchi.
I went back over to the table to let the lady know we didn’t sell that here. Her reaction was something else—she started screaming at me that I ruined her Mother’s Day, and the entire day was ruined because I didn't know we didn’t serve gnocchi. I could understand her being a little irritated at me. I really should have known that, but she should have looked at the menu.
59. She Had A Long List Of Problems
It was Christmas, and I had a customer who wouldn't accept that her three-minute-long order, which took a sheet and a half of paper, wouldn't arrive before the drinks and appetizers. Not more than 10 minutes went by, and anytime I came near that table, she grabbed my apron, demanded to speak to a manager, or called me incompetent. Her poor family was quite embarrassed.
Things spiraled even further when her food arrived. She started pointing out all the things wrong with it. As I pulled out the page and half ticket this woman ordered for a surf and turf, I explained everything on her plate. She lost her mind and screamed at me to get the manager again while pounding on the table, then hitting her plate off the table. Her husband had to restrain her and drag her out of the restaurant kicking and screaming.
Getty Images
60. The Daily Grind
I had a sixth-grade student whose stepmother emailed me on a daily basis. He was a good kid, had an A in my class, and didn’t have any behavior problems. Even so, I had over 90 emails from her. They were usually completely unnecessary. I just wanted to ask her, "DO YOU EVER TALK TO YOUR SON"?! He could clearly answer 95% of her questions!
Yet, she would still send me emails asking things like, "What was the situation that caused my son to be marked tardy to your class"? And, "There is an assignment in the grade bookmarked with a 0/0. It's titled Extra Credit Bonus Points. Please advise on how this will affect his grade". She would also incessantly check his grades. It was crazy.
61. Priority Seating Is Just That
I was taking a packed train on my way to work. There was a group of college-aged people standing in the middle of the train, close to an old lady holding three or four bags of stuff. At one stop, a person who was sitting down in the elderly seating section got up. One of the obnoxious college girls sat down and continued to gab with her friends. I was not going to let that fly.
I looked at her and said, "Nope, get up". She gave me this look like, "How dare you talk like that to me", and didn't respond. I told her she should give her seat to the elderly woman, but she still did nothing. So, I loudly said that she was selfish and should be ashamed of herself. She then got up, and the old lady sat down and gave me an appreciative smile.
62. My Mom Got Schooled
My mom went and harassed my elementary school so much over small things and caused such a big fuss that they didn't let my niece—who they knew was my mom's granddaughter—come back. They just didn't wanna deal with her anymore, to the point of booting her out of the school. Luckily, my sister and I had already left and were in middle school.
Those poor teachers didn't get paid enough to deal with her.
63. Negative Nelly
I had a parent complain to me about her child who was doing really well. Her grades were over 90%, and she showed consistent effort in her classwork and homework. When I told the parent that her daughter put a lot of thought and effort into her work, her mom’s reaction left me stunned. She asked, “She sucks up to you”?
I told her, “No, she wants to do well and be successful. That being said, we'd like to improve her grammar a bit”. Then her mom went bananas. She said, “I knew it. She's stupid. She doesn't do anything. She will fail”. I reassured her that wasn’t the case and told her that her daughter just needed a little more rigor in that department.
The mom responded, “She's such a disappointment”. Every once in a while, I would get a complaint from her whining to me about her child. I couldn’t believe it. Her kid was a joy. I would always take care to affirm her efforts whenever possible and assure her that she was doing great. It may not offset the negativity her mother imposed on her, but the other teachers and I tried to make sure she didn’t doubt her ability to do well.
64. One Degree Of Separation
A customer at my store was being rude to me recently, so I gave her attitude back. This did not make her too happy. She aggressively said to me: “I’d watch out if I were you. I know your manager". Without even stopping to think about it, I replied: “I know him too. So what"? She was completely dumbfounded and didn’t say another word after that.
65. Say Yes To The Dress, But No To Her
When I was wedding dress shopping, I invited my mom only because I knew she would be hurt if I didn’t. Ten years later, my friends still recalled how rude and obnoxious she was to the poor staff. My parents weren’t giving me a penny for the wedding, so it wasn’t like she was the one paying for the dress and had a say in anything.
Every time a staff member asked me a question, she kept talking over me and giving them wrong information. She was also just horribly negative about everything—the sizes that the store had, the dress details, the alterations, etc. She did all this in a loud fashion in front of the staff and the few other people in the shop. She even tried telling them not to bring dresses I had specifically arranged to try on ahead of time.
My aunt started distracting her as much as possible because it was so uncomfortable while my friends tried to lighten the mood. When I found my dress and went to order it at the cash register, the employee asked if I wanted to open a store credit card. My mom quickly piped up and said, “YES, she does”. I did, but it was not her choice to make, and I hadn’t discussed it with her, so she had no reason to think I wanted to do it.
I finally snapped at her and later apologized to the staff.
66. Request Denied!
There was a moment when my mom turned into this type of person. She wanted me to film her while she said something to a cashier at McDonald’s. I told her I wouldn’t do it, and she got mad at me. She apologized soon after, but her request honestly got me mad. People who work in retail or food industries don’t get paid enough to deal with an irate person who is yelling at them for accidentally making a mistake.
They certainly don’t get paid enough to be filmed and be embarrassed online.
67. Sue-Happy Hooligans
I taught in Korea. We were having a spelling test, and two kids would not stop talking. Seeing as we had no additional desks, I sent them to separate corners to finish the test on the floor. Immediately after the test was finished, they returned to their seats as normal. A couple of hours later, my boss told me one of the parents was upset and wanted to come in to talk to me about what happened.
I waited around for an hour after work, but the parents didn’t show. So my boss told me I could go home. Two hours later—at 10 PM on a Friday night—I was out to dinner with a friend when I got a text from my supervisor. I was shocked. It said the child’s parents were suing me and to call him immediately. At 10:30 PM, my boss picked me up, drove me to the parent’s house, and without even being allowed to explain myself, made me apologize.
The parents still decided they were going to sue me. Then, things took another twist. I learned the following week that another student was also trying to sue me over the incident, but they weren’t even involved in it. It was the best friend of the kid who was suing me. His parents decided to try and sue me because their kid was "upset" that his friend had been punished.
Luckily nothing ever came to fruition. The Department of Education watched the CCTV footage of my class. They also observed me teaching another class and determined I had done nothing wrong. My favorite part of the ordeal was that the parents of the kid who initially tried to sue were both teachers!
68. She Made Her Point
The very first class assignment was to have my policies signed and returned to me. It was worth four points. My approach was that late homework lost 20% each day it was late. A kid turned her sheet in late, so I put it in as one point off. I got an email the next day from the mom complaining that one point off was 25%, not 20%.
Technically she was right, but each grading period usually had over 2,000 total points. The kid apologized for their mom being crazy. I told them not to worry about it.
69. A Hair-Raising Tale
Way back in the day, when I worked in the food service industry, we once had a customer who got a salad and, when she was just about finished eating it, she intentionally placed one of her hairs in the bowl in order to try and get it refunded. Instead, she got the complimentary “I’m sorry” free bakery item to make up for it. This happened several times, and eventually, it got to the point where she was doing this every single day.
Finally, the store manager sat down at her table and told her this was her last day eating in the cafe, and that they would refuse her refund today and refuse her service in the future. She started to say something about the customer always being right—but he already had a brutal reply ready for her. He just put up a hand to cut her off. He said “You cause us to lose money every day. You’re absolutely not our customer. You are a liability, and you are no longer welcome here".
Unfortunately, this confrontation took embarrassingly long to get to. I worked in training support and the issue came to light during an associate-level customer service class. They had been rolling with it for at least a few weeks, hoping she would just stop at some point on her own. I’m not sure if the managers all knew what was going on, but I called them after class and it was taken care of between the two of them by the end of that week.
70. Putting Two And Two Together
I work at a local bar. One night, a bunch of intoxicated people were making a huge mess, wasting our time, and harassing other tables. Finally, I went up to them and informed them that there was an issue. Me: “The manager has decided that all of you need to leave. We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone and your behavior warrants it".
The loudest guy at the table: “Screw you. If you kick us out, we're never gonna come back to this place". Me: “That's exactly the point. Please leave".
71. It Was A Targeted Move
I was at Target. There was a shopping cart in the middle of a parking space. I was alone, so I got out of my car and moved it into the corral directly across from the spot I was about to enter. Then came an inconsiderate loser—she pulled around my car and parked in my spot, the one I had just moved the shopping cart out of.
I went up to the window and told them they were welcome for my moving the cart. They started sputtering and lying about not having seen me. So I put thumbtacks behind the wheels of her car and left.
72. There Was No Bending The Rules
As a teacher, I had a parent come during back-to-school night and yell at me because we had classroom rules that her son was upset about, and she didn't think they were necessary. They were simple rules like raising your hand to speak and keeping your hands to yourself. She pulled her kid out of the school the very next day when I refused to cave to her demand.
Then, I had the principal tell me that I needed to stop telling the kids to be quiet in the hallway because they were too young to understand. This was first grade.
73. Patience Wasn’t My Strongest Suit
I went to see the Wolverine movie in a very large theater. About halfway up the rows of seats, it had an aisle that cut across horizontally from one side of the theater to the other. Some idiot father was there with a toddler, and he let the kid run back and forth across the aisle, squealing the whole time. I put up with it for about 30 minutes.
Then, I finally had enough. I went down to the father and said, "Do you realize the entire movie theater can hear your child and that it's ruining the movie for the rest of us? Please make him be quiet". The father stared at me in complete shock, as if the concept had never crossed his mind. He immediately left with his kid. Several people around me said “thank you” as I sat back down.
74. An Arresting Development
My uncle was a teacher for 25 years at a fairly prestigious school. He had taught several grades and was teaching a sixth-grade class. There was a boy in the class who was very—for lack of a better word—stupid. This wasn’t uncommon in schools, but this kid was simply thicker than brick and couldn't seem to grasp anything that was being taught to him.
My uncle had been teaching a chapter in history and was assigning homework for the day when the boy stood up and started yelling about how stupid history was and that my uncle was dumb for attempting to teach it to them. Needless to say, the boy was sent to the office for verbally harassing a teacher. While the boy was in the office, he began crying and started to fabricate a story about how my uncle had called him an idiot in the classroom.
He said that he retorted by saying, "No, I'm not like that", or something to that effect. He then began requesting to speak to his parents. The headmaster obliged and let him call his parents and, at the same time, summoned my uncle to the office to discuss what was going on. Five minutes later—as my uncle had just finished explaining what had happened—both the boy’s parents burst into the office. What they did next was so bizarre, it’s unforgettable.
The father, who was chief of the local law enforcement agency, attempted to arrest my uncle with his wife—who worked closely with the mayor—basically spewing in my uncle’s face as she yelled at him. All the while, their boy was sitting there smiling and laughing as my uncle was taken from the room by the chief. It was all pretty absurd. With an entire room of witnesses—the other students—the actual story came to light fairly quickly.
However, instead of apologizing and trying to save face, the father began telling a tale of how my uncle had resisted arrest, reacted forcefully, and "struck" him as he was attempting to gain control over him in the office. Both the parents approached the headmistress after the fact and offered her an ultimatum to agree with what they were saying, or they would make her life a living nightmare.
All that, instead of simply admitting they were wrong. The father lost his job, and the wife was severely demoted to desk clerk after everyone found out she tried to use her position as leverage in the situation.
75. His Attitude Didn’t Cut The Mustard
My dad hated mustard. I remember one time he got mad at a lady at McDonald’s because there were pickles, onions, and mustard—all the toppings that he didn’t like—on his burger. He started yelling and asking for them to remake his meal. He then proceeded to tell them to be careful with taking orders and getting them correct because some people have mustard allergies, like him.
He didn’t have a mustard allergy. Then, from the front seat, I mouthed “Sorry” to the lady, and we drove away with his new plain burger.
76. Is The Cup Half Empty, Or Half Full?
I was once a witness to a silent owning that I still get giddy just thinking of. A buddy of mine was serving a table and the kid at the table was around eight or maybe ten years old. He gives her an adult glass for her apple juice. The dad pipes up and says he doesn’t want her to have all that sugar, so he needed to take it away and come back with a kid-sized one.
My friend replied that the glasses are all the same size, the adult size just looks bigger because they have thick bottoms. The dad responds that “the adult glass is clearly bigger and LIKE I SAID I don’t want her to have all that sugar". My buddy decides to have fun. He gives a super deliberate exaggerated nod, says nothing, and marches to our little service alley behind the bar.
That’s when he put his plan into motion. A few moments later, he re-emerges with a kids’ cup, sets it down beside the glass, picks up the glass, and pours the adult glass into the new one, lifting it progressively higher and higher until the last drop drips down into the glass, perfectly fitting into the kid-sized cup. He then darts the heck off to the kitchen without even looking at the guy, like he didn’t even exist. I exploded with laughter.
77. What A Beautiful Sight
Over the course of six months, through countless phone calls to different union offices and the department of labor, I eventually got my boss fired for changing people's time-keeping information to pilfer overtime from them. During those months I was treated like dirt by this guy, but I never actually did anything wrong so I couldn't be punished.
At one point, management—against contract rules—denied my time off request to be at my best friend’s wedding and my boss brought me into his office and threatened to fire me. At this point, I had called the northeast district business associate on him, and I will never forget the look on my boss’s face when he realized I knew he couldn't do anything to me.
78. It Was The Same Old Story
Almost every year as an English teacher, no matter what book or theme I go with, I have at least one nutjob parent who thinks it is inappropriate for some reason or another. I had just finished teaching a unit on the Holocaust. I was not one to coddle students, so we went to the museum, saw a lot of documentaries, and read books and accounts that didn't really hide or sugar-coat anything.
I was proud of how they handled it. Next, I started a unit on The Hunger Games. Parents tended to be afraid of any contemporary literature, so I sent home a note explaining the book and my justifications for teaching it over Christmas break. I asked the parents to contact me immediately if there were any issues. I didn’t hear anything back, so in February, I started the unit.
A week or so into it, I had a parent come and say that he thought the book was too violent for his sons, both of who were in my classes. I said, "Ok, well, we just learned about the Holocaust, which was much more violent". Then he said, "Well, that's OK because it really happened". The funny thing was that I saw one of his sons with the sequels during independent reading time later in the year.
79. She Couldn’t Take The High Road
When I was a teenager, my mom picked up my two best friends and me from the mall. While driving us home, someone cut her off when she was trying to change lanes. She went into total road rage and started screaming at the other car. Words were coming out of her mouth that would make a sailor blush. She swerved the station wagon so hard it banged into the yellow concrete dividers.
The tires scraped the sides and almost went over them. None of us said a word on the way to my house. We didn't know whether to laugh or be scared, so we kept silent. The next day my dad was about to get in the car to go somewhere, and he noticed the tires on the one side were yellow. He asked, “Hey, who painted the tires yellow”? I didn't want to squeal on my mom, so I said, “Boy, that's weird. Heck if I know”.
80. She Got A Doggone Sweet Surprise
I used to clean a local gymnastics facility on the weekends. The owner would rent out the place for birthday parties, and one of the coaches was always present for them. One weekend, I saw a car pull up about an hour before the party was to start. I was finishing cleaning the lobby, and we had no power as our lights were being replaced.
This woman came in and headed upstairs. About ten seconds later, she came STORMING down the stairs, got in my face, and started yelling, "WHY is there no power?! I'm supposed to set up for this party. HOW am I supposed to do that WHEN I CAN'T SEE WHAT I'M DOING"?! I was a little stunned and told her that, per the owner's policy, she couldn’t be in the building until the coach arrived.
Her face went purple. She yelled, "HOW DARE YOU TELL ME WHAT I CAN AND CAN NOT DO! THE OWNER SAID I COULD BE HERE WHENEVER I WANTED. I WON'T TAKE THIS GARBAGE FROM SOME STUPID KID"! I said, "Fine, but your power won't be on for another 45 minutes. You might as well go wait in your car until the coach gets here".
She stomped off, tried to slam the door, and proceeded to try and call the owner. When the coach finally arrived, I told her what had happened and how she acted towards me. I also left a note for the owner and called her to inform her. I left the gym and went home for the night. The following day, I went in to get paid. The owner pulled me aside and told me I did everything right in that situation. Then I found out the whole story.
I found out that not only was that lady completely nasty to the coach as well, but that she didn't pay for the party, and she stayed a full hour longer than what was rented. Then, I got the best news possible. When the parents were all inside, her dog had gotten into the cake that was in her car and ate about half of it. Her reaction was deranged.
She then said, "Oh, we can still use it. We'll just cut around the parts the dog ate". 40 minutes later, she came running back into the gym, grabbed a bunch of paper towels, and returned to her car. Within the time that she brought the cake inside to the time she went back out, her dog had pooped and puked EVERYWHERE in her car—on the seats, floors, armrests, even the dashboard. This car was COVERED in poo and vomit.
81. In The Heat Of The Night
At the store where I work, we have sweet biscuits with icing on top. Every weekend, this lady comes in and wants them fresh, with extra icing. But every time, something is apparently wrong with them. Her main complaint is them being “too cold,” which is usually probably due to the extra icing being added on top of it. We have told this to her repeatedly.
Well, this last time she came in, we gave her the biscuit, fresh out the oven, loaded it down with icing, and she still says it’s cold. The manager tells her the only way to get it any hotter would be to melt the icing in the microwave, which we refuse to do. The lady has a conniption, demanding to know why. My manager, God love her, says “Because sugar is hotter than the seven sons of the underworld when it’s heated up like that, and no matter how much you deserve it, I’ll be darned if I give you an excuse to have a lawsuit against us".
82. I Went Crazy Over A Hot Cake Craving
I had a bad moment a few years ago. My poor boyfriend and my stepdaughter had to deal with my anger during the ordeal. We were going camping for the long weekend, and we got up early to head out. My boyfriend asked if I wanted to grab breakfast before we hit the road. I said, “No, I will be OK until we get to a town an hour away, and I will get hotcakes from McDonald’s".
We rushed to get to McDonald’s in the town because it was 10:45 AM and breakfast was done at 11. I had a one-track mind, and all I was craving were their hot cakes. That was all I wanted to eat. When I got inside the restaurant, there were ten people ahead of me. So, I asked an employee if they were still serving breakfast. I got a yes from them, so all was good.
I would get my pancakes. I was three people away from the cashier, and the breakfast sign flipped to the regular menu. They announced breakfast was OVER! I just lost it! I freaked out and yelled—at no one in particular—for wasting my time in line and stormed out. I went outside, flipped out on my boyfriend, and pouted in complete anger for the next hour and a half in the vehicle.
It was NOT A PROUD moment, and I was completely embarrassed. I was still mad when we got to our destination and angrily cooked lunch after we unpacked our trailer. I am pretty sure my stepdaughter would have cried from embarrassment if she had come in with me inside the restaurant.
83. Driven Out
My dad once got banned from the Ford dealership, which was the only place where his car insurance covered the three-year late oil change that he needed. Why? Well, for the dumbest reason imaginable. They had a vending machine that sold Arizona tea for $1.25 while the can said 99¢. He didn't even buy it or want to. He was just screaming at the front desk people because there was a discrepancy.
The vending machine wasn't owned by Ford, and they were most certainly not in control of the prices. I have no idea what he hoped to gain out of that ordeal.
84. Mega Burger Mayhem
My mom was totally one of those ladies. One day, we were at a fast-food restaurant, and I asked for my mega burger without bacon. I'm not allergic or anything like that; I just don't like it on burgers. My mom turned into a monster. She actually asked for the fryer to be heavily sanitized, and when they said no, she stormed into the back and tore the place apart.
85. Well-Done
I was a server at Applebee’s. One Friday night, just after the happy hour had started, I had one table come in—a father and daughter. Things took a bad turn real quick. I got their drinks, brought them to the table, and began to take their orders. The father ordered our Southwest steak salad—which only comes medium rare and is clearly stated on the menu—and the daughter ordered the same thing.
The daughter, however, asked if she could get the steak medium-well. I informed her that it was the restaurant's policy that it only came medium-rare but that I would talk to my manager to see if I could make it happen. She said, "No, that's alright. I'm good with medium-rare". Her father then told her to shut up and began to ream me on how all of our food is pre-cooked.
He said that it's ridiculous that we couldn't further cook the steak on that salad. I took it like a champ, apologized, and told him that I would speak with a manager right away and make sure we got the steak done medium-well. I left and talked to the manager, who gave me the "okay" to get that steak cooked medium-well.
When I came back to the table to deliver the good news, I couldn't believe my eyes. The father was now face-to-face with a gentleman—a regular—from the table I was serving directly behind them. They looked like they were going to come to blows. I ran over and tried to diffuse the situation, as it was not something we wanted happening right in the middle of the busy restaurant.
Apparently, the gentleman who was a regular overheard how the father was speaking to his daughter and told him he needed to treat the two of us better and with more respect. The father then got upset at this statement, fired something back at him, and the two stood up to exchange words and undoubtedly fists. The situation escalated quickly.
I tried to offer to move their tables and let them know that we couldn't have them acting this way in the restaurant. Nothing worked. I ran to grab my manager. When we returned, the two were brawling on the floor. We broke them up, had to kick them both out, and I then had to finish the last three hours of my closing shift feeling rattled and out of it.
86. Lunchtime Loser
I was seven months pregnant and working at McDonald’s. Some customers would ask for orders to be brought to their table, which was fine. Some people are slightly disabled or have big orders and would rather watch their kids than wait for their food. I was carrying a big tray of food. That, along with my belly, meant I couldn't see my feet.
There was a small stool in the middle of the floor that I didn't see. I tripped and fell and partially landed on my belly. As I slowly got up in shock, my colleagues ran to make sure I was okay. However, the customer had a more disturbing reaction—she stood over me and berated me for dropping her lunch and insisted I personally pay for a replacement.
87. Garlic Lovers Surprise
Every so often, this woman and her sister would come into the pizza place I worked at. They always started off the phone call with how much they loved our food, how fantastic the service was, etc., then would say that we also never put enough garlic on the crust. There were five minutes of buildup just to tell us she wanted extra garlic.
I told her we would make sure to put extra garlic on the crust. They came in, got their food, and left. Five minutes later, they were back. She started grilling me on how there was almost no garlic on the pizza. I took a look at it, and there was considerably more garlic than average on that cheese disc. Not only did she get a free pizza, but she kept the one she complained about!
This happened a few more times, each time with more and more garlic. She got about three free pizzas total. I remembered the name that came up whenever they ordered, so a month later, when they called, and I saw her name come up, I prepared myself. I took their order, went through the garlic spiel, and ended the call. My manager and I were both fed up with her by that time.
The garlic bottle needed to be refilled, but it still had enough garlic for about six pizzas. My manager said, "Hey, watch this", and his next move made me gasp. He dumped the garlic on the entire pizza, not just the crust. It was an apocalypse of garlic. Lakes were forming on the pizza's cheese, and the crust was stained a bright, sickening yellow-orange.
It soaked through the box and stained the table underneath it. It was truly an unhealthy amount of garlic for anyone. Had I seen it without context, I would likely advise not eating it. The woman showed up, opened up the box, and seemed satisfied. She paid for her order and left. I was dumbfounded. I was seriously concerned about her well-being. She hasn't been back since.
88. Old McDonald Had A Farm
My brother was a waiter and was working with a really difficult woman. She ordered the salmon and asked when it got to her table if it was “farm-raised". She got mad at him because he didn’t mention that the salmon was farm-raised when she was ordering, even though it clearly states that it is farm-raised on the menu. She ordered the chicken to replace the salmon, and my brother said “I have to warn you, it’s farm-raised”.
89. Just A Coke And A Smile
A man came in alone. He looked to be in his late 50s or early 60s, and he gave me a bad impression from the get-go. He snapped at me to get my attention, and before I could speak, he said, "Coke. With a lemon wedge". We were a tiny little cafe without the funding for a machine or the attention for a sponsorship, so we didn't serve soda.
I told him that, and he said, "I don't think you heard me. I want a Coke with a lemon wedge". I was pretty confused because I made it pretty clear we didn't have Coke. It turned out he wanted me to walk next door, buy him a Coke, and then bring it in and serve it to him. I told him as politely as I could that this was absolutely not happening.
I was hoping that would be the end of it. His reaction made my jaw drop. He picked up the porcelain tea cups we put at each place setting and threw them on the ground, shattering them and cutting open my ankle just a bit. The whole cafe went very quiet. I just kind of stood there looking at the mess of broken china all over the place.
These were beautiful, rare cups that were impossible to replace, and I just didn't know what to do as an 18-year-old facing up against an aggressive older man. Fortunately, just a few seconds after the cups hit the floor, a man got up from his table across the cafe and walked over. He then reached into his back pocket and showed the man his badge.
He was an off-duty officer. The guy did not get his Coke with a lemon wedge or any food, but he did get taken into custody and administered a ticket for making threats and breaking public property. He didn’t let up, yelling, "I JUST WANTED A COKE! IF THIS LITTLE GIRL KNEW ANYTHING ABOUT SERVICE, I WOULDN'T HAVE HAD TO SET HER STRAIGHT".
90. Thinking Inside The Box
For context, I’m a female in my twenties working at a fine dining restaurant. This older guy kept giving me trouble all night. Doing stuff like ordering crudités and then calling it rabbit food and sending it back. At the end of the meal, he says: “Where do I put this comment card"? Me: “See that black box over there? Right in there"!
Guy, thinking he’s being incredibly witty and funny, when he’s actually being a total doofus: “Did you just ask me to stuff your box"?! Me: “Nope, mine isn’t black, sir. Bye! I need to actually help people now". His friends started cracking up and his face turned bright red. I don’t understand people who make inappropriate comments like that in public.
It made the entire meal uncomfortable for the rest of the evening, and his friends were clearly not impressed by the way he was treating me.
91. Putting Your Foot In Your Mouth
My mom had a rule about no shoes in the house under any circumstances—but one day, it came back to bite her. My brother's friend had prosthetic legs, so he always had shoes on. He came over one day and my mom got really mad and confronted him, yelling: “Why do you think you're so special that you don’t have to take your shoes off in our house when everyone else does"?
He responded by lifting up his jeans and showing his Air Jordans resting in a pair of fake legs and said, "I'm sorry, ma'am. If I take them off, I'll have to take my legs off, too". My mom offered a half-hearted apology and went upstairs. She never commented on it again.
92. Life Is A Box Of Chocolates
This conversation ended with a customer throwing a large bag of Lay’s Sour Cream and Onion potato chips at my head. It was a woman who came into the store looking to buy a box of chocolates. But there was one huge problem. She didn’t have any money. So this customer proposed that she take the chocolates now and come back later to pay when she had money.
“Do you expect me to go all the way home and bring back the money"? she asked. I said, “Yes, because other than that it’s called shoplifting and we will call security". “But I need these,” she pleaded. I just said no. That’s when the chips started flying.
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93. No Connection
A very grumpy high-society woman came to the store saying her brand new 3,000-dollar Microsoft surface bought by her husband was defective because she could not get internet when she was on the move. I quickly realized she was talking about Wi-Fi, so I tried explaining to her how Wi-Fi actually works. Boy, was that a mistake!
I told her that she could not use her Wi-Fi outside her house, but that she could share her smartphone internet connection. She would have none of it. She said I was lying to her and making fun of her. She even asked to speak to my manager, who then proceeded to tell her the exact same thing, almost to the word. She left screaming.
94. Sounds Wrong
My uncle is a deputy sheriff, and one time, he was at an airport speaking to my aunt over the phone in Spanish. Once he was done with his call, some nearby woman who overheard him went up to him and started demanding to see his green card. Huge mistake. My uncle decided to mess with her and said he didn't know what a green card was.
He told her he had never even heard of it. She became more upset and kept demanding to see it. He messed with her more and then eventually went, "Well, I don't have a green card, but I have this," then brought out his wallet and showed her his badge. She immediately walked away while my uncle just kept laughing at her.
95. Harpy 0, Punisher 1
I work at a hospital as an ER nurse, which means when I start at 7 am, by 9 am all the patience I possess is gone, and by the end of my 12.5 hour shift I’m pretty much just done with people in general. So after a rather grueling shift, I stopped by the grocery store for dinner. I’m tired, and feeling super lazy at this point so even though I’m only grabbing a couple of things I use a regular cart—coz, you know, I can lean on it.
I do my shopping, pay for my goods and head out to my truck. Just to inform, no khakis were involved here. Store employees wear dark brown slacks, white collared shirts and ties. I was wearing an Incredibles scrub top—yes the animated movie, no you can’t judge me—and bright blue scrub pants. After loading my groceries, I, of course, return my wheeled crutch (ahem, shopping cart) to the corral.
I get back to my truck when a harpy with a resting witch face that would make Lois from Malcolm in the Middle proud screams across the lot. She yells, “Boy! I’m done you can take my cart now"! I’m like, “Huh"? I know I look young but, really? Boy? She continues, “Come over here and take my cart"! I say, “Yeah I don’t work here, sorry".
She replies, “Just do your freaking job and take my cart"! I shoot back, “That’s gonna be a hard no from me, sorry". I start (again) back towards my truck. The harpy, at this point, decides to thrust her cart towards me. It rolls (as carts with wheels are wont to do) and to me, it’s like a train wreck. I want to look away but I can’t. I’m mesmerized by the free range movement of this cart as it runs right into a Jaguar...a nice clean one...with dealer plaques still on where the license plates should be.
A woman who totally looks like a Karen (you know the type) is just getting out of it. She obviously starts screaming and hollering, as only a woman that type can. Harpy is trying to blame me for not running out to catch the cart. I’m trying very hard not to start laughing. I finally get back to my truck as Harpy is screaming at me to stop, because this is my fault because I should have collected her cart in the first place.
The last thing I heard before closing my door and driving off was the woman screaming at Harpy about how, “He’s wearing scrubs! How could any idiot think he works here"? I think this was the first time I’ve ever rooted for someone like that.
96. Every Office Needs An Otis
A while back I was working in an office that allowed dogs. It was an open floor plan and since customers never came into the office, we kept the dog food and water bowls right by the front door, just because it was the most convenient space and no one else would see them but us who worked there. Of the six of us who worked in the main office area, I was the only one who didn’t have a dog and I always felt horribly left out.
To make matters worse, across the way was a doggie daycare. One day, a very frantic woman came in and she had an absolutely massive Basset Hound with her. Usually, the only people who came into the office were associates who had appointments with someone working there, but it was rare they brought their dogs. She ran up to me and said, “Do you work here"?
I said, “Yes, how can I help you"? And she said, “I wasn’t sure if you took walk ins but I read online I could just drop him off? I tried to call but no answer". I didn’t know what she was talking about at that point and I said, “Come again? Who did you call exactly"? Thinking if I could just saddle her off to whoever she came to see, I wouldn’t have to decipher her problem.
She said, “Well it doesn’t matter now. Look, something urgent has come up and I really need to leave him here. Here’s his food he likes and I’ll be back in a few hours and—" At this point I wasn’t thinking of the doggie daycare. I thought maybe she was a friend of someone here. I said, “Well alright, can I get your name please"? And she said her name and then asked if I needed her to sign anything.
I was so confused at this point I just said, “Why would I need you to sign something"? And she left almost immediately. So I took Otis (the dog) to the back and showed him to my coworkers and no one knew the woman or dog. I was worried she wouldn’t come back, but at the same time, my wish for an office dog had been granted! And Otis was supremely chill.
All he did all day was lie around and drool onto his own ears. I just freshened him up every now and then, took him out every couple hours, and he was happy as a clam on a big cushy dog bed we thankfully had an extra of. He just loved attention from anywhere he could get it. At the end of the day the woman, thank God, came back. She said, “Thanks, you’re a lifesaver. How was he"?
I said, “He was a champ". And was about to say “But why is he here” when she said, “That’s a relief. Most kennels say he gets anxious around other dogs. I heard you operated at a much higher capacity, I was thrilled to see you had so few clients in the room at one time. So, how much do I owe"? It honestly took me this long to realize what had happened.
She thought we were the dog daycare. Now, I probably should’ve corrected her. But I loved my day with the office dog and I did want to get paid for supervising this strange dog all day. I just threw out the number that sounded fair and appropriate “That’ll be $20". I said. She replied “Reaalllly"?! In this very high tone, and I couldn’t tell if I’d overshot or undershot.
But she paid me and left. My coworkers were laughing hysterically when they realized what had happened and we thought it would just be a good story for the future. Wrong. The next week...she came back! She said we were so much more affordable and less overcrowded than her other place, and that she was happy to use us. I was glad for the company so just took him.
I didn’t think there was any way she couldn’t have at least some idea we weren’t a dog daycare. The whole ordeal was so strange I just figured, “don’t question a good thing". I was much younger and dumber then. Not long after, Otis started getting dropped off two, sometimes even three or four days a week. I was in heaven. He was such a love. And he made fast friends with the delivery guys and visitors.
One day, we took our office Christmas card photo and Otis was over that day, so we included him. In a Santa hat. It was pretty great. But it turns out Otis’ owner was friends with one of our clients who I guess happened to have the card out on her table or was kind enough to display it alongside her other holiday cards. Because one day, Otis’ owner came in holding the card and walked up to me and said, “I can’t even believe I’m asking this but... is that my dog in this photo? This isn’t a dog daycare at all. This is just an office, isn’t it". I froze in my tracks.
She said it with a note of surprise, as though she was looking around and putting it all together for the first time. No coincidence that this was the first time she wasn’t in some crazy rush either. She was like, “Then who are all these other dogs"?! And I explained. I was terrified she was going to demand her money back, or worse, take some sort of action against us for misrepresenting ourselves as a dog care business, or complain to corporate.
Instead, she basically said, “Why didn’t you ever say anything"! And I explained we just really liked having Otis around. She stopped for a minute and seemed to be thinking and said, “Is that right"? And I said yes and told the story of how I was the only one in the office without a dog so loved the company. She seemed a little flummoxed or hesitant, understandably, because the whole thing was so weird.
She turned to my coworker and asked if I was telling the whole truth. I don’t know why she thought my coworker, also a stranger to her, was any more trustworthy than me, but hey. Strange times. Coworker backed me up. So she said, “Well, I wish you’d said something sooner. Could’ve saved me a lot of embarrassment with my friend back there. Alright, I have to get going. See you at 4:00". And she left Otis!
I couldn’t believe it! I said, “So he can stay"?! And she replied, “Where else could I find someone to watch him one on one all day for $20"? And off she went. Otis stayed my office dog until his family moved away, luckily right around the same time I took a new job.
97. She Took Matters Into Her Own Hands
I worked at a popular restaurant. During dinner service, we usually had 30-40 minute long wait times. People were told about this by the hosts. There was this lady who got fed up with the wait after 10 minutes. She stormed into the restaurant, stood next to a table of four people, and literally asked them, "Are you guys done? We've been waiting for a long time now and would like to have the table if you guys are just chatting".
98. No Time For A Dip
I went to a hotel one night for dinner. The hotel had a pool that was clearly only for hotel guests, as was indicated by the dozens of signs surrounding the area. Did this stop my mother? Absolutely not. My mother told my little brother and me that we were allowed to use the pool and even had us wear our bathing suits under our clothing so we could easily get changed after dinner. However, they had employees monitoring its use.
After we jumped into the water, security calmly walked over and asked to see our hotel room keys. Since we weren't staying there and didn't have room keys, we were politely asked to leave. My mother refused and insisted we were within our rights because we ate dinner there. A screaming match ensued, and there were hundreds of people staring at us.
Finally, the head of security had to kick us off the property before the authorities were called.
99. Staying Hydrated
Table of 10, Sunday brunch, fancy restaurant, I'm hungover. A crowd swarms in at the opening and my whole section is filled at once. I'm efficient and cool. I'm used to this. I get to the big table and preface that water is being brought as we speak. I then begin taking everyone's drink orders. As I'm taking orders around the table, one woman blurts out that she wants water.
She then starts screaming not to forget the water, interrupting her friends and family as they make their meal requests. I acknowledge her each time until after the fourth time. That’s when I lost it. I told her: 'If you ask for water again, I'll make sure everyone here gets water but you". She sinks back in her chair looking dumbfounded. I go put in the order, then head to the bar.
100. Thanks For Playing
Last week, it was a glorious night. A party of six comes in…headed by a woman with the classic choppy blonde bob. This lady wants two four-seater high-tops pushed together. Our host says she can’t do it because the restaurant was too busy. She looks her up and down and says, “Let me speak to the manager". She’s calm, just insistent, and it’s obvious she’s played this card before.
So I roll up. “How can I help"? “Can we push those two tables together"? Nope, I say. “You can have that table that’s for six in the corner, you can have that booth for six after we clean it, or you can have that table for six outside after they get up—in about 10 minutes". All the while, I’m pointing to each table like I’m showing them emergency exits on an airplane.
“You can’t push those tables togeth—” “No, we will not be moving the tables. You can have....." and I point out the tables again. “You know what I think? begins turning to her friend You know what I think"? both of them together “We go somewhere else"? But I had the absolutely perfect response to this. At this point, I clap my hands together.
Then I say, “Thank you and have a great night,” and immediately turn around and walk away. The best part? She stares at the back of my head for a solid two seconds before she shuffled out. I didn’t realize this until I watched the video of the exchange.
