Karens always think they run the world—until karma comes along and humbles them right back down to Earth. Read on for some truly satisfying tales of the universe giving Karens a taste of their own medicine.
1. Shoe Swap
I went with my girlfriend to the store so she could buy a pair of boots. She had owned this style of boot for well over ten years and was a big fan. Unfortunately, they stopped making that particular type, and she was beside herself. I was being very supportive and comforting, but I also happened to see a pair of boots in the sale bin that happened to fit, so I bought them.
She was happy for me because I didn't own a pair of boots, but I felt that I was sort of rubbing salt in her wound. We had gone in to get her something she loved, and we left with her feeling crushed and me getting an unexpected sweet deal. A month later, I went to a different store to buy the same pair of sneakers I had been buying over and over again.
Unfortunately, I found out that the line had just been discontinued. However, something caught my girlfriend’s eye and she walked out in nice new sneakers.
2. His Luck Ran Out
I used to work at a check cashing/credit card cash withdrawal booth at a Native casino. One guy was really in his cups and, being a real jerk about how long it took me to get his cash, told me I needed to “hurry it up” or he would make sure I lost my job. I did hurry, and I hurried through the balance on five credit cards as he kept coming back because he was getting his butt handed to him at the tables.
I guess at some point during the night, Visa realized this person had blown through about 10k at a casino in a matter of hours, so they put holds on every one of his cards. This meant one thing only: The merchant must take the card from the customer. I ran and kept every single last card he had on him. He was not happy at all.
3. Good Samaritan
Today, I missed my bus to help an elderly woman with her groceries—only to have a friend pass me by and offer to give me a ride home.
4. Your Train Can Wait
I'm in the New York City subway. A guy elbows me out of the way to get into the turnstile, first yelling vaguely that he "has a train to catch". No way, really?. He goes through the turnstile, turns the corner, and there are a few uniformed officers set up near a folding table. The dude gets pulled to have his bag searched. I think he missed that train.
5. Don’t Speed Up
My stepdad is a driving instructor. One day, he was giving me a lesson and we were going over one of the possible test courses. While we were driving down a street in the suburbs, a guy was tailgating me. Every time I came to a stop sign, I did a full stop and he would throw his hands in the air and yell. It was starting to stress me out, but my stepdad said, "Don't worry about it, watch this”.
As we were going down the street he says, "Okay, now in about 50 feet, I want you to start slowing down a little bit, and right when you are in front of that school zone, pull over to the right”. So I did it, and right after I pulled over, the guy behind me took off like a rocket. And about five seconds later, a cop stepped out from behind a tree and waved him over for going double the speed limit in a school zone.
6. Emergency Repairs
Cars constantly park on either side of this particular road in town, essentially turning it into a single-track road. They were told over and over again not to do it as emergency vehicles can't fit through but seeing as there were no double yellow lines to denote it as a no-parking zone, the poor parking officer couldn't do much.
The fire department even took a stick with chalk rollers on it that was the width of a fire truck, ran it down the road, and put a notice on every car it marked, saying that if there was an emergency then their car would have blocked the road. Anyway, inevitably, there was a fire and the fire trucks needed to get through. Low and behold, they couldn't fit.
So after a BRIEF attempt at knocking on people's doors, they literally just drove straight down the road, scraping almost every single car and knocking all the side mirrors off. I'm pretty certain that emergency vehicles in the UK are not liable under insurance for cars they hit whilst on-call so they faced no repercussions for the mayhem.
I really hope all of those people paid more attention to their repair bills than they did the parking notices.
7. Checking Out
I sold computers and such for Circuit City back in the day. I was fairly new and the only one on shift at the time as someone called in sick. This is around the time the iPod nano came out, so everyone wanted to see them. I had been working with a group of people selling to each of them for over an hour. Then some guy comes up to me and asks why I have been ignoring his wife.
Apparently, these two had gone into the back corner of the store and stood there, not talking to anyone. They now wanted a high-end laptop but didn’t want me to get the commission because I “ignored” them. We didn’t make commission at the time, so I didn’t care in the slightest. I got the laptop out for a manager to ring up…and their check got declined. I did a happy dance.
8. Baseketball IRL
This idiot I knew in high school was trying to get a mentally handicapped kid to do stuff for a video in a very nasty cruel way behind the gym. Meanwhile, I’m sitting behind a car in the parking lot. Special kid is not dumb enough to play this game, so the idiot decides to get him to hold the camera for him instead.
People are heckling and calling out suggestions, nothing interesting happens, then someone comes out with a basketball, puts it on the concrete sidewalk, then hands idiot an aluminum baseball bat and mimes hitting the basketball, like splitting a log with an ax. Idiot winds up, brings it down, and I hear blaWHANK.
His head shoots back, blood everywhere. Honestly, from where I was I even thought he smashed his skull. Bat clatters like 20 feet behind him and he goes down backward. The bat bounced, nailed him in the eyebrow, split it open, and knocked him straight out. He was okay but had a scar and a wild black eye for a few weeks. But that's not even the best part.
The best part is that the whole time, the mentally handicapped kid he'd been trying to humiliate on camera is filming him and laughing so freaking hard that he's crying. You could tell he was so happy. Security didn’t believe no-one hit the idiot until he showed them the video. Yep, he was just that dumb, security found out.
9. Rated M
I worked at K-Mart in high school. It was a small store, so I worked in every department. You name it, I did it. I asked a woman and her son, who was about 12 or 13, if they needed help finding anything as I was out on the floor. The kid immediately complained that I was annoying him. I ignored it and went about my business. Right after that, I get called to checkouts.
As I was working there, the pair came by. The kid had gone all out back in the electronics area, with some EA sports titles and a Grand Theft Auto game. I was checking them out when the age prompt came up for the M-rated game. I decided to take a chance. I flipped the game over, and informed the mother, "This game has been rated M for the following reasons" and read the list off the back of the case. There is an awkward silence, then she angrily informed me that the son said it was only a little violent. He wasn't able to get anything that day.
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10. An Act Of Hubris
My first car wasn't the greatest vehicle, but I managed to scrape some money together to be able to afford it, and it was something I was proud of being able to have when I was young. I was out driving running errands in an affluent part of the city when I came to a red light, and these two dudes around my age in some expensive car pull up beside me.
They are kind of snickering to themselves, taking a few glances at me every now and then. Whatever, it's fine. Eventually, the driver rolls down his window and asks, "Hey, bro. Wanna put that thing to the test"? And starts revving his engine. Now me being a little annoyed, I start revving my engine because I knew they weren't expecting me to do that.
The two bros go, "Ohhhh", and start getting fired up. Green light comes, and we both slam on our accelerators, except I cap out at the speed limit. The two dummies speed off in a big display and head around the bend. But I had a plan. See, I already knew something about this particular stretch of road. There were usually officers set up with speed traps.
Lo and behold when I come around the bend, their car is pulled over to the side with a cop parked right behind them, lights flaring. They did not seem amused by my smile and wave as I passed by them.
11. He Made His Bed
I used to sell mattresses, which no one really wants to buy. No one’s jacked about buying them; they do it because they have to. I get it. Everyone that works there gets it. One Saturday, this cranky old dude comes in, and before anyone can greet him, he's complaining about literally everything.
We're trying to help him, but he shoos anyone who approaches him away. Of course, then he turns around to complain about no one helping him. Dude is old, like I said, and he can't get around well. We recommend he not lay down on an all-foam mattress if he won't let anyone help him up.
He says something rude and blows us off. He hobbles over to a foam mattress, one that is right next to a wall. This wall also has a TV display sticking about 8 inches out from the wall, and it constantly plays ads. The old man lays down on the bed and immediately hates it. He sits up, and he realizes it will be difficult for a man in his condition to get off the bed, but he won't ask for help.
Dude launches himself off the mattress and straight into the TV display. My manager loses it. The guy tries to bark at us, but everyone else is too busy trying not to laugh, so he gives up and cranky-walks out of the store.
12. Getting Trumped
This kid used to mess with me while we all waited for class to start in middle school. He'd grab at my stuff, particularly the trumpet I played for this class, make fun of me, all the usual idiocy. We were all bored, so it must've been to fill time. Anyway, this one day I decided I’d had enough of his antics. It was time to act.
So, I swung the case for my trumpet right at his head. I didn't think I hit him that hard, but I heard later he went into his class crying. They made us go into some kind of mediation thing but it was too late. I got my revenge, and he didn't want to live it down. So, we basically never talked to each other again. I was absolutely okay with that.
13. Free Ice
Three days ago, I went into a store to buy a bag of ice. I put the bag on the checkout counter and waited while the woman in front of me completed her purchase. This reminded her that she also needed a bag of ice. "Here...take this one," I said, and grabbed another bag. What she did next brought a tear to my eye.
"Is that all you're buying”? she asked me. "Yes”. She looked at me and said, "You're done....bye-bye," and before I could figure out what she meant, she turned to the clerk and said, "Put his ice on my bill”.
14. Burning Bridges
I work for a staffing agency as a recruiter. My co-worker was working with this guy who was pretty sharp. He was a programmer. His company was doing layoffs but he was told he wouldn’t be affected. My co-worker contacted him, chatted about the situation and he said he would be interested in looking around for other opportunities.
We just had a new client give us a position that fit his background. We lined up an interview pretty quickly, he interviewed and got the position! Great. It was even a little salary bump. Straight direct-hire, no contract stuff. He goes in, and works his first week. All is great, all smiles. Well, that next Monday comes and he isn’t there.
The company calls us asking where he is, so my co-worker calls him. He answers the phone and my co-worker asks, “Hey, is everything okay? You were a no-call no-show today over at XYZ company”. And the guy proceeds to tell us, “Yeah, I never actually quit my job. I just took a vacation for the week to see if I liked the place. It was okay but I’ll just stay here”.
My co-worker responds, “Man, is there anything I can do? This puts us in a tight spot, this is a brand-new customer of ours, can I do anything”? And the guy tells us “Quite frankly I don’t care what kind of position it puts you in nor do I care if they are a new customer. I’m staying, don’t call me again”. And he hangs up the phone. Well, it wasn't long before he came to have many regrets.
He got laid off the very next week.
15. Pitching A Fit
I used to work at a RadioShack in my area during college. It was never really busy on Sundays, so I was generally the only worker there. On this particular Sunday morning, I was incredibly tired from the night before, so I was kind of annoyed about having to come in on a day when no one was going to show up.
I got even more annoyed when I pulled into the parking lot and was instantly greeted by a man who proceeded to start yelling at me. I put on my sales associate smile and kindly asked what the problem was. "I've been waiting here for 30 minutes and you are late!" I wasn't late, I was actually 15 minutes early.
He then followed closely behind me to the door and was screaming at me the whole way. "I'm never coming back to this store" and stuff like that. When I finally got the door open, I let him know that I had to turn the alarm off and count the register before I could help him. This also made him angry...but at this point I didn't care.
I was nice enough to try and help him 15 minutes before we opened...least he could do was not be a jerk. Anyway, I finally get to help the guy out and he wants to know about batteries. Cool, easy. I proceed to show him our batteries and their prices. He goes off. He starts screaming and yelling about how everything was outrageous and the prices were terrible and apparently I had treated him like trash.
He started to pound his fist on the counter and started yelling again about how we didn't have any name-brand batteries (we did) and how RadioShack was communist by trying to push their batteries on their customers. I calmly told him that there was nothing I could do and asked if I could help him with anything else.
He stormed off, punched a battery display, and then came the karma. He proceeded to slam face-first into our door. Turns out that since he was yelling and screaming at me while I was unlocking the doors, I forgot to unlock the other one. He quickly looked around to see if I had seen him. I just waved and told him to have a great day. He spun out of the parking lot and I never saw him again.
16. Knot Today
In the UK, kids wear blazers and ties to school and a common teasing tactic that jerks used was to run up to kids and pull their ties so they get really tightly knotted. On the bus ride home, the bus was really full, and I was standing in front of one such harasser. He grabbed my tie JUST as the bus had to brake sharply.
He lost his footing and the only thing keeping him upright was the fact that he was holding onto my tie. Except he had grabbed the wrong bit, and it wasn't knotted. I simply untied it and he fell on his bum in front of everyone on the bus. That was the last time I was knotted, and it was absolutely glorious. What a victory.
17. Bad Boss
I worked selling shoes for two years on a weekend-only basis during school at a national chain. I was never offered a raise by the boss, never offered to open the store, never given any recognition. When I asked for some more responsibilities, I was told I was unimportant, as two new outside managers were coming in. One managed a section of PetSmart, and the other had no prior experience.
I put in my two weeks’ notice. Both people came in on my last day, so I showed them everything I learned and all the small quirks of the inventory that we had. Both quit within a week, and the store closed within four months.
18. First Class Dummy
We were boarding a transatlantic flight, coming home from the US to the UK. There were nine seats across the jet arranged as three sets of three. Me and my siblings are sat in the first three, then my parents have two of the middle set. Another family of five takes up the last four seats in that row and one in the row behind. The other dad was very loudly and rudely complaining.
He wanted the seat my dad was sitting in for his son (who sat in the row behind). It was clear to everyone that he had prioritized getting the front row and extended legroom over having his family sit together when he checked in and was now trying to intimidate the stewardess into giving him both. My dad tried to interrupt with the intention of offering to switch seats.
He had already decided he didn't want to be sitting next to this kind of person for eight hours. The guy obviously expected him to say something else so told my dad to mind his own business before he had a chance to speak. Stewardess asks everyone to stay calm and says she will be back in a minute. When she returns, she escorts my mum and dad into empty seats in first class.
Then comes back and says to the angry guy, "Problem solved, your son can now move". The stewardess has the biggest grin on her face and the guy was so confused. He got what he wanted but still felt like he had lost somehow, he just didn't understand how.
19. Drive On By
I work at Starbucks. One day as I was working the drive-thru, we were having longer than normal wait times as we were short-staffed. This one guy gets up to the window in a huff and starts yelling at me and complaining about his wait. I apologize and tell him his total.
He literally throws his credit card at me, and it bounces off the bottom of the window directly underneath his truck. We look at each other for a second, and then he sends his daughter out of his truck to look for it. I inform them it's right under their truck, so he moves his truck up a bit, gets out, picks it up, and hands it to me softly without making eye contact as he is squeezing himself between the tail end of his truck and the wall of the building.
He's pretty embarrassed as everyone behind him is watching. It was pretty satisfying.
20. Make Your Own Karma
When I was fresh out of high school and living with my buddy Brett, we wound up living month-to-month without a lease at a low-middle end apartment complex. The rent wasn't too bad, but me and Brett were 19 and had many more priorities other than rent and bills. So, we got a co-worker of Brett's to move in with us as well. We soon found out how bad an idea this was.
Long story short, the guy turned out to be a total idiot and a bit dangerous. After a couple of months of putting up with his garbage, we had a huge fight where he punched a hole in the wall and broke my computer. So, the next morning, as soon as the apartment complex office opened, me and my buddy Brett went down.
We signed a lease for the apartment, becoming the only two occupants. No more idiot friend, we just couldn’t deal. Then we called the authorities and had them kick the jerk out for trespassing. Authorities woke the jerk and his trashy girlfriend up out of a sound sleep to tell them they had to leave. I was so satisfied.
21. Change In Exchange For Life
I was in my tiny Dodge Neon at a red light and I gave a homeless person all of the change in my ashtray. The light turned green, and I made my left turn a few seconds later, I was hit head-on by a full-size truck. When they were loading my car on the tow truck, the driver asked, “How’s the driver”? and I simply said, “I’m fine”. His reaction left me stunned.
He was shocked at first, and then once he realized I wasn’t kidding, he said he’d been towing for 20 years and never seen anyone survive this extreme of an accident, let alone be standing there talking to him while loading up the car.
22. A Good Deed
I was in high school walking back from lunch when there was an older gentleman who had crutches in front of me, he couldn’t manage to get off the road since the curb was high and he obviously had leg injuries. All the school kids were walking past him so I did what I thought any decent person would do and went over to him and gave him a helping hand.
As I walked on, I got flagged down by a woman in a car who had watched the entire incident and she informed me she was the headteacher of a neighboring school and had been at a meeting at my school. She phoned up my school and explained the situation to my headteacher. As soon as I got back in for lunch I was brought in by my headteacher.
They thanked me for giving the school a good name and I got an extra hour for lunch and a certificate at the school award ceremony.
23. Read The Room
I was in line in the hardware store and the lady serving had a sign on the till that said that she was deaf. The beefcake behind me in the queue is trying to get the cashier’s attention, huffing and puffing and talking trash at her for being slow. The person she was serving had a cart full of items, by the way.
All of a sudden, he really loses his temper and screams at the cashier. His words sealed his fate. “What the heck’s wrong with you? Are you deaf?” I have never, ever seen so many people turn round in unison and give one person the stank eye. My mother, who I was with at the time, pipes up, pointing to the sign on the till.
She says: “What the heck’s wrong with you, can you not read?” The guy goes redder than I have ever seen anyone go and skulks out, avoiding eye contact with everyone. After that, he received a generous round of applause from everyone at the tills, including the other cashiers.
24. A Move-Worthy Mistake
One time in middle school, this guy who was relatively new at our school was making fun of a girl in our class who fell in the hallway in-between classes. Coincidentally, this was a girl I had a crush on. The guy was a little bit of a class clown, and was mocking her, making her look stupid and clumsy. This did not bode well for him.
Apparently, he misjudged his footing, and while attempting to jokingly ape the way she had fallen, actually fell for real, and landed squarely on his back in front of everybody. He broke his arm in the process. Passing him by in the hallway, I saw him just lying there, surrounded by adults and staring up at the ceiling, face completely expressionless. Pretty sure he moved after that. I would have too.
25. Victory Is Sweet
I was targeted for firing. It had nothing to do with my performance and everything to do with my manager, who took a disliking to me. I walked the line of perfection for about a month until I found another job. I handed in my two weeks’ notice. That was victory number one—but I had so much more in store for them.
I hired about a half-dozen of their employees and got them hired into my new company. That was victory number two. I'd like to think that victory number three was the 30 or 40 employees they lost in the following year, but I can’t claim direct responsibility for that. The thing is, when you have employees with high-demand skills like software engineering, you better treat them right.
26. Sometimes It’s Okay To Follow The Crowd
We were driving on a very icy road, in a four-wheel-drive car, after one of the first big snowstorms of the winter. We're going a little slow, which is about as fast as we feel we can push it, given the ice sheet over everything since the snow melted to slush and re-froze overnight. We've been driving in ice our whole lives.
We know what'll work and what is risky, and today’s conditions are bad. All other traffic is basically moving at our speed or even slower. A shiny new lifted red Dodge pickup pulls up behind us, tailgating and revving his engine. Basically, everything is screaming, "Big man in his big truck doesn't need to be held up by some tiny car that can't handle the snow"!
We hit a straight section and give him an easy chance to pass us. He takes it and quickly accelerates. BIG MISTAKE. About 400 feet beyond us, the road takes a moderate curve left. He tries to turn, but it's a solid sheet of ice and the truck just goes straight into a parked car and guardrail, right in front of a dozen or so witnesses.
We coast past at our slowed pace, making the turn without issue. His front end was pretty smashed up, maybe not totaled, but I'd be amazed if he could drive it to the shop.
27. You Won’t Get Away With This
Way back when I used to be in retail, I worked at an electronics retailer. We had some guys going around trying to lift DVDs. They were cutting the barcodes off to remove the sensors so they wouldn't go off on their way out. My manager notices and starts sending over floor reps to see how they are doing, if they need help, etc.
Finally, my manager goes over and just hands them a basket because they had nothing in their hands, so it was showing them we knew. Now they start wandering around, ditching the DVDs as they go. As soon as they drop one, an employee comes up and grabs it. Now they start freaking out. They dump the rest and just book it towards the door at full speed.
No one chased them because they ditched all the merchandise. As they exit, one of the dudes turns around and starts flipping everyone off. As he's doing this, he steps off the curb into the front driveway in the parking lot and promptly gets hit by a car. It was in the lot so it was only hard enough to knock him over, but he had to scramble to his feet and keep running.
28. Getting Lit Quick
I was walking down a busy street and a guy shoulder-barged me as he walked past. Unbeknownst to him, though, I had a lit smoke in my hand and it burnt him pretty badly on the way by. I was about 10 feet away when I heard him scream out, but there was too many people and I never saw him again. Oh well, serves him right.
29. Caught Red-Handed…By Karma
I go to New York City about once a year to visit family. While there, I always crave the "Grandma's Sicilian" pizza, and the best slice in the city is served near my cousin's place. Well, it's New York, and naturally the joint is crowded as ever. Across from the register, you can grab drinks, and paying for them basically comes down to the honor system, as well as your courage (the cashier can see you take a drink, but 90% of the time is occupied with a customer).
I had never really stolen before, but my cousin just nonchalantly took a drink and nobody said a word! I do love me some Peach Snapple, so I got greedy and took two of them. I paid for the food and we were on our way out. I was on a little adrenaline rush. Did I mention my craving for the pizza was so large that I got an entire pizza instead of just one or two slices? Yep, an entire pie for myself.
So, as we were walking back to the subway station, I tripped on the curb and fell. I landed on the pizza with my stomach, covering my clothes in sauce. Both Snapples shattered and the glass lodged itself in my knuckles, palms, and legs. The brand-new jeans I purchased the day before got ripped by the glass and stained by my blood. Despite cleaning the wounds properly, the ones on my hand became infected that night. Suffice it to say, I haven't stolen since.
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30. Above His Own Rules
I was in a class learning French, it was very early in the curriculum and our first test had a question that needed you to translate the word "singe" (monkey). A lot of us never learned this word at this point. I triple-checked all of our previous lesson material which even had a lesson on animal names and monkey was not among them.
Turns out, those who did know it only knew because they had watched an Eddie Izzard stand-up routine about learning French. So we brought this up and the teacher eventually gave us a point back if we missed it, but a smug student who grew up in Quebec said something to the effect of, "Even though it wasn't in the lessons, you can't just expect to be spoon-fed all of your vocabulary”.
He continued, “Knowing words outside of the lesson is part of 'global knowledge' and it's required for succeeding in this class". For the record, I agree with that philosophy—to become fluent you have to branch out and go outside the curriculum for more words. But this is the first month of class where you can't expect students to know that much outside of the lesson plan.
Fast forward to getting the grades for a later test and I catch him being a huge drama queen because he missed a point for not knowing the word "dehors" (outside) and sure enough he was arguing that he was never taught that word in class.
31. The Time Is Right
I was selling a woman a Nintendo 3DS for her son. I had given the son the box while I was ringing everything up because he was so happy to get his new toy. When it came time to talk about the accidental damage protection plan, she gave me an unreasonably hard time, making it sound like I accused her child of not being able to take care of his toys. The timing couldn’t have been more perfect.
The second she said that, the kid threw the box across the store into some shelves and knocked down a bunch of games. She bought the four-year plan.
32. Daughter Privilege
I worked at a coffee chain as my first job during high school. I worked a metric ton, and the customers loved me. The place was run by this super jerk of a General Manager who let her two daughters work there. One was a normal employee who got treated like an angel and always got the shifts she wanted, while the other was an incompetent shift leader who got the same treatment.
Well, one week this normal employee girl looks at her schedule then asks if she can trade two of her shifts with two of mine because she forgot about her mom's birthday. I said sure, no problem, because I was just trying to be nice. So, the next week when I get my schedule, I am only working one shift. I'm like, why the heck?
The General Manager only told me, "If you don't like the shifts I give you, then you won't get any". She didn't even care why I traded the shifts in the first place—for HER BIRTHDAY—so I immediately put my two weeks in. The last day I was supposed to work was a Saturday morning, which is always PACKED and if one person doesn't show up, it makes the whole morning awful.
Well, I forgot I had to work, and I was out super late that previous night. The next morning, I just kind of said "screw it" and just skipped work altogether. They called and texted me several times, begging to know where I was. I did not even begin to consider letting them know. It felt very, very good. I continue to chase that high.
33. Read The Fine Print
When I was a law student, I had a part-time job at a bar with a boss who was a jerk. When I went to sign the contract I, like the good little law student I was, read through it in its entirety. Of course, I was also on the clock, so I really took my time. I noticed that there was a clause (it was a standard form contract for this pub chain) about paying for damaged stock.
Basically, if we dropped a bottle of wine, then we'd have to pay for it. Being a male, I was always the one doing the stocking and regularly carried cases of wine up from the cellar. I knew one day I'd eventually break some stock, especially with the way the boss was. So, in the contracts (his copy and mine), I'd struck out the term about paying for damaged stock and signed and dated it before signing both copies of the contract.
He did not read the contracts before signing them, so he missed my changes. Eventually, the day came a few weeks later when he caused me to drop 16 bottles of wine. That was my moment to get revenge for the way he’d treated me. When he told me I'd have to pay for them, I told him I didn’t. He said it was in the contract. I asked him to prove it. He showed me a blank contract. I told him that was not in my contract.
He got my contract out and finally saw where I'd crossed out that term. I wish I had a picture of his expression. I did not show up for work the next day. I got all the satisfaction I needed from seeing his expression when reading my contract.
34. He Needed To Cool Off
I was at a big sports tournament after a game and it was raining a bit. An aggressive driver can’t be bothered with people rushing to their cars and almost runs over a kid. He then yells at people in his way and decides to weave around traffic to get out of the place quicker. There is a sawhorse blocking the exit he is not supposed to go out.
The rain is getting heavier. Everyone is watching this impatient person as he gets out of his car to move the sawhorse and bypass the traffic line and pedestrian traffic due to self-entitlement. When he gets out to move the sawhorse, he closes his car door and locks himself out of the car with the car running. Downpour ensues.
35. Sad Violin Sound
I was working at a music store. We do a lot of business in high-end band instruments (tubas, clarinets, etc). We only put them on sale for a couple weeks every year, and we're nearing the end of the sale when this story takes place. An older guy comes in to look at trumpets, and he's ogling the most expensive one we had on display, really standing there for a good few minutes.
My co-worker asks him if he wants any help, or if he's interested in trying it out, and the customer just starts talking trash about the expensive trumpet. "It's nice, but I'm really not that impressed. $3400? That's too much for that thing, yeah right”.
Right at that moment, we get a phone call asking us for that same model trumpet, and the customer is willing to pay for it in full over the phone to reserve it. Normally we would have three or four of these horns around but the sale was good and the very last one was getting trash-talked by this old guy.
So my other co-worker just strolls up behind the dude and plucks it off the wall. The old dude just goes ballistic, yelling, calling us all incompetent, etc. Turns out he really wanted it, but was pretending not to in order to try to get us to lower the price. There was nothing we could do for him, as the sale was only on stuff we had in stock. He eventually ordered one, costing him an extra few hundred bucks. We laughed about that one for a long time.
36. Not So Fast
A couple of years ago, a friend and I were going to a concert and the traffic was beyond snarled. There was only one entrance into the location and it was mucking up the traffic as you had to turn across a busy intersection. My friend thought that she could make it across, but someone coming from the other direction cut her off and made it so she was stopped in the intersection.
Cue some amazing jerk going from the light and screaming up to about an inch from the passenger side door. I really thought that he was going to hit us. He was screaming and flashing the finger and looked like he was going to get out of his car. Meanwhile, my friend is freaking out and trying to inch her way into the stadium parking lot.
Luckily, a uniformed officer had just wheeled up in time to see the jerk pull his stunt. He flashed his lights and angrily got out of his car and started yelling at the guy. As we finally got out of the intersection, he was writing him a ticket that included something to the effect of reckless driving, just for going about ten feet. It made the night for us.
37. Most Deserving Of A Tackle
It was the last day of school in the sixth grade and I had gotten an award for "most improved”. I was walking towards my bus while looking at the award, when all of a sudden, this guy who had bullied me the entire school year ran up to me, swiped the award, and ran off. I tried to chase after him, but he was much, much faster than me.
I chased him around to the front of the school, and just as we were passing the front doors, the teacher who gave me the award was walking out. He knew this kid bullied me and saw me chasing him, him holding my award, and the teacher bolted after this kid and then proceeded to tackle him to the pavement and restrain him.
And yes, he was allowed to do that, because we were in special ed, and the teachers had the right to exercise a certain level of force to restrain kids if they were being some sort of problem. I got my award back, and the kid got suspended at the start of the next school year.
38. The Perils Of Winter
I was driving back from spending Easter with my parents when it was heavily snowing and roads were covered with ice and snow mix. I hate driving in the snow anyway so that fueled my anxiety. I had to take an exit that was on the left side, which is usually for people who go fast or are passing others but I had to stay in that lane.
People were flying by me, going probably the intended speed—and that's when I saw it. This one car just driving by like their life depended on it. Later, I come upon a wreck that happened maybe a minute beforehand. Oh look, it was the speed demon who was on the side of the road with a car that is now sitting perpendicular to the road.
I am assuming said fast car was getting into a lane or had clipped the person in front of them to cause them to do that. I always want people to be cautious of driving in hazardous weather. Nothing is that important that you have to speed and not think about the other drivers. Unless it's an emergency, then call the right people!
39. Boy’s Night Out
A group of guys came into my restaurant. They were "celebrating" this rather rotund man's divorce. Needless to say, any pretty server in the building was about to have an uncomfortable visit. I kept an eye on their table, but I can't stand a stare too long before it becomes obvious I'm supervising them and not my staff.
I ran to the kitchen to check up on the cooks. I was gone maybe 15 seconds when a server comes to get me to cut the recent divorcé off because he just grabbed one of the girl's butts. Not cool, dude. I go out to the table to take them their checks and ask them to leave. I tell the table I had a complaint from one of the staff and said there would be no more drinks served to them, and that they needed to pay their tabs and leave.
Now, I'm not a small guy, but the six of them could easily cause more than a ruckus. Once their glazed eyes realize what's happening, the divorcé shouts, "Oh yeah, and what are you gonna do if we don't?" I couldn’t have planned the next moment better. He starts to stand up, but is a bit too husky for his gut to clear the lip of the table, and he spills two full pitchers and six almost empty glasses all over himself and his friends, as he then slips back into his chair with a thud.
I didn't have to say another word. His one friend threw down $100, apologized, and dragged his sticky, wet friend shamefully out the side door.
40. The Post Beckons
In elementary school, all the kids went to the bus stop together. As we walked, one of the second-graders ran into a lamp post. One of my classmates couldn’t stop laughing. We crossed the street and he was still laughing his butt off and didn’t look where he was going. You know what’s coming—he ran into a lamp post as well and instantly got laughed at.
41. No Tip, No Treats
I spent my last few dollars on a donut, instead of using it to tip the person who filled my gas. I then dropped my donut as I pulled out of the gas station.
42. A Small Price To Pay
I was at a red light, and, I have no reason why, but I gave a homeless person all of the change in my ashtray. The light turned green, and I made my left turn and a few seconds later I was hit head-on by a full-size truck. When they were loading my car on the tow truck, the guy asked me, “How’s the driver”? And I simply said, “I’m fine”.
He was shocked at first, and then once he realized I wasn’t kidding, he said he’d been towing for 20 years and never seen anyone survive this extreme of an accident, let alone be standing there talking to him while loading up the car.
43. From Sob Story To Most Wanted
I work in a cell phone/computer repair retail chain. We had this lady come in the other day, we'll call her Wanda. Now, we do buy phones and other small electronics, but ONLY if we're going to be able to sell them. We aren't going to buy your old iPhone 4, and we sure as heck aren’t giving you 600 bucks no matter how new your device is.
Wanda calls first, asking for quotes on three phones and a laptop. Two of the phones are older and kind of bad, after a quick Google. The laptop is an old Compaq, which should tell you why I refused it. Wanda came into the store an hour later. Apparently, our other location in the next town had quoted her 50 bucks for all three phones and 150 for the laptop. I knew this was a lie because the managers in that store are competent.
I tell her I can give her 30 for the nicest phone (her personal phone, which will become relevant soon), I can't take the two other ones, and I absolutely will not be taking the old Compaq that runs slow with a chunk broken out of the side. She starts whining about how I quoted her X amount of money and how she can't believe we can't give her more and we HAVE to take these items and blah blah blah.
Guys, it was 80 degrees in that store. Our AC had broken and we were hot, sweaty, and annoyed. And Wanda just would not shut up. I ended up giving her 50 for the darn phone, just to end the conversation. Seemingly satisfied, she left, saying she'd be going to the other store to sell her other two phones and the laptop.
About 30 minutes later, she was back AGAIN, this time hocking a sob story to my co-worker. He dealt with her the second time because I was close to screaming at her. She’s talking about needing money for her sick daughter. She whined at him too, until he finally bought the laptop for 10 bucks. Then, FINALLY, she was gone…but the story doesn’t end there.
Long story short, we checked the phone and laptop for resale quality. We find a text on the phone that said, "Give me back my laptop and all the things you took from me, or the authorities will be called”. We also looked up her name and found that she'd been wanted for theft back in 2010 in our district.
Officers were called, owner was called, and the laptop was given safely back to the original owner. Now this woman has a warrant out once more—all thanks to two grouchy, hot twenty-somethings who paid her $60 to get the heck out and never come back.
44. Make Like a Tree…
I was walking to the store with a friend when we were 13. We heard someone yelling at us and turned around to see some kid about 50 feet away. He was yelling and calling us every word you know at that age. As we started to walk over to confront him, he did a 180 to start running. Well, he spun around and ran face-first into a tree and hit it hard enough that he fell to the ground from the impact.
We couldn't stop laughing and hopefully, that was enough embarrassment for him to learn a lesson.
45. Don’t Mess With The IT Guy
I was hired as an "IT Guy" and did almost everything around the office. A client stole my boss’ new phone. I had, of course, set it up so that it could be tracked and all data removed remotely. However, the boss thought it was I who took the phone, even though I wasn't in the office that day. He didn't tell me for three days until someone explained why it couldn't have been me. I tried to wipe the data, only to find he had already called the provider and had the number barred from the network (no number to call, no GPS, no cell data means no access to wiping it).
We also had security cameras installed and he had tried to access the day’s file without closing the process that was writing it. So, the file was corrupt and could not be read.
He then fired me, as I had not performed my job role (which was never actually described).
He then realized no one knew the passwords, how to record video footage, or how to set up his new phone.
46. Safety In Waiting
I live in Colorado and see dangerous, aggressive mountain driving more than I would like. One day, there was a bunch of traffic coming down from the mountains on a two-lane road. Some guy in a brand-new BMW jumped the line of cars in the oncoming lane, apparently, he was thinking he was too good to wait in line.
As soon as he got to the blind corner, he saw an oncoming truck and swerved left, hitting the concrete barrier head-on. It triggered the crumple zone and the front third of his Beemer just crunched like a Coke can. Perfect justice: instant, severe, and he was the only person involved. He was uninjured, but his car was unquestionably totaled.
Pixabay
47. No Backup Plan
After purchasing a phone from me and being extremely rude and awful the whole time, this customer walked out of my store and instantly dropped their phone. It shattered and they were devastated. They then had the nerve to ask me to do them a favor and add the warranty they earlier said no to because it was a "waste of money". I had the pleasure of telling them it wasn't possible.
I got yelled and screamed at, they threw their phone at me, and security was called. Never saw them again after that, thank God.
48. Broken & Dumped
I was dating this awful girl for awhile, because you know, I was stupid. She had a temper and was always flying off the handle. One of those people who is never happy and complains about everything. We had a fight that morning about her irrational temper. Later that day, I called her to tell her I had to work late.
She freaked out and punched the wall as soon as our conversation ended. Turns out, though, she punched a part of the wall that was solid behind the drywall and shattered her hand. She was promptly dumped.
49. Watch Out For That Tree!
When I was at a local ski area about four years ago, a snowboarder cut me off at high speed and pretty much took out the little kid next to me. But when I went down a bit further, I saw karma had come for him.
He was out cold in the woods. Jerk hit a tree.
50. A Great Exchange
A few years back, me and my buddy were traveling around Germany and decided to go to Amsterdam. The trip there was an absolute nightmare. Long story short, we're on a bus at around 11 pm because the trains broke down. We also haven't had a chance to eat since early that morning. Everyone on the bus is obviously miserable.
While we're waiting to leave we hear some talking behind us, and it turns out it's some old German woman's birthday. Everyone is singing and wishing her happy birthday when she says something I don’t quite catch. So I ask the person behind me what she said, and they say that all she really wanted was some water. I happen to carry a water bottle with me religiously.
I hold it up, give it a shake, and say, "Wasser”. Then out of nowhere, a hand pops up and drops two sandwiches in our laps. We were eternally grateful to finally have something to eat.
51. Holding All The Strings
I work as a service advisor for a major car company. I had an extremely rude customer on the phone who needed her car in for service. I told her the only available appointment was a Monday morning at 7:30 am for a job I knew would only take 10 minutes. Justice served.
52. A Little Something
I was working in a supermarket when a panicked customer came up to me and said he'd accidentally left his cash in the ATM. They wondered if anyone handed it in. I was about to say no when another customer appeared behind him and said he'd been trying to catch up to him. He'd been queuing behind him at the ATM and saw what happened.
He’d got the money for him. It was £200, so a decent amount. The original customer was super grateful and offered him some of the money, but the man wouldn't take it under any circumstances. The good samaritan then bought a scratch card, scratched it, and found he'd won £5. It was some nice instant karma for a change.
53. My Name Is…
My friend is transgender and recently got a job delivering pizza. She's passable, but very out and would ask nicely for people to use her preferred name. She also wouldn't correct people if they used her old name. Her boss wouldn't have any of this and was in the process of getting her fired for "being overly aggressive about her name”.
She was going to fire my friend the next day but ended up getting fired herself after calling one of her other employees an inappropriate name in front of one of the customers. The new manager is really nice, according to my friend, and she's never been happier.
54. He Was Rubber, She Was Glue
A girl in school used to tease everyone and just be generally annoying. She was tossing this stress ball around and aimed it at this one kid’s head. Someone yelled, "Look out"! at him and so he looked up, saw the ball coming at him, and put up his hands in self-defense. It bounced off his arms and back at the girl and hit her right in the mouth.
It was a soft squishy stress ball so it didn't hurt her, but we all openly laughed at her and her surprised expression, so she sat down quietly from embarrassment. She still kept being annoying but she stopped throwing things at people's heads.
55. A Helping Hand
We weren't allowed to follow thieves once they were out of the store. So one day, the hot barista from the Starbucks next door was in chatting with me when I watched some jerk grab a coat off a rack. I motioned for her to follow me and we went to stand at the exit. The jerk catches on and high-tails it to the other exit.
I say to the barista, “Darn, we're not allowed to chase anyone outside the store”. She had the perfect response. Her eyes light up and she says, “But I can!" She proceeds to run down and tackle the guy. Oh, but there’s more. When he fell, his fingers twisted in the hanger and between that and the fall from being tackled, somehow four fingers on that hand got broken.
Only the middle finger was fine. So his sticky fingers got his hand messed up. Glorious.
56. Moving to the Dark Side
I was working 60-hour weeks, including being on-call 24/7 on weekends, for 12k/year. One night, I was at work alone until about 11:00 PM, and finally decided, "screw it". I locked up, threw my keys through the mail slot, wrote a resignation email, and turned my phone off. I woke up late the next morning to like 10 calls, texts, and emails from my (now-ex) boss begging me to come back.
So, I leisurely went back to pack up my stuff and give him a list of everything he still owed me. A couple of months later, after my remaining co-workers had full-on nervous breakdowns from sharing my workload and left the state for other jobs, he was down to one employee and had to move from his office in an awesome location to one of those sketchy office parks.
57. Paying It Forward
I was eating at a local sushi place when I noticed a $20 bill fall out of the pocket of a gentleman who was sitting near me. I picked the money up, tapped the guy on the shoulder, and gave it back to him. Another guy saw this happen and paid for both my lunch and my date's lunch, which totaled over $20.
58. An Entertaining View
When I was a broke college student, the high schoolers down the street sideswiped my car so bad my front door wouldn't open all the way and the mirror was gone. I confronted them but couldn't prove it. I couldn't afford to fix it. But karma had my back. The next week they come screeching out of the neighborhood while I'm studying next to the second-floor window.
They crash headlong into a tree and total their car. I had a comfortable view as all four of them got out. The driver was sobbing, shirtless on the pavement, until his mom came and cussed him out loud enough for the whole neighborhood to hear.
59. No Such Thing As A Free Drink
This customer was demanding his birthday drink. It wasn’t something we normally did, especially not to jerks. So I told him we couldn’t do that unfortunately in the nicest way possible. His girlfriend understood and offered to pay. This guy pushes his girlfriend and says no, I’m gonna get my free drink.
Me being me, I said nope, we can’t do that. He then storms out while calling his girlfriend stupid. He pushed her a bit while walking out the door. Only, it had just finished raining, and after he pushed her, the momentum made him slip and fall. Karma. I then gave her a free drink while her boyfriend stalked off.
60. A Hero Is Made
I was a lifeguard at a well-known chain of indoor waterpark hotels in the US, and a woman was letting her less-than-two-year-old daughter play in the shallow end all by herself while she sat in a chair and read a magazine. I walked up to her to let her know that it was not safe for a child that young to be by herself.
The mom started yelling at me, telling me that it was not my business how she parented and to leave her alone. At this point, everyone around her is staring. Then, as soon as she finishes her rant, her daughter loses her balance and falls face-first into the water, and is too young to know how to stand back up to get her face out of the water and breathe.
I run in, grab her daughter, and bring her back to her. Everyone around who was staring began to clap.
61. Nothing To Me
I dated a girl all through college, after four years, we were going to move in together and on that day, I was going to propose to her. Two days before that happened, I made a disturbing discovery. I found out she was cheating. We broke up, but neither could find another place, so we had to move in together. She continued to date the guy and we continued to live together in a very awkward situation.
Several months later, she began to flirt with me, and eventually called me into her room one night and asked me to stay with her. We had a physical affair behind the back of her boyfriend.
The payoff came when she asked me if we can get back together, saying she made a huge mistake and wanted to break up with her boyfriend to be with me.
I never enjoyed rejecting someone in my life as much as that. I took great pleasure in telling her she meant nothing to me. Then, I started dating her old roommate who I always had a thing for, which drove her even more nuts. Fast forward to today and I'm very successful, and happily married with two kids. She lives in a trailer park with her loser unemployed husband (she ended up marrying the guy after I rejected her).
62. A Balancing Act
One day, I saw a man struggling to balance about five boxes of shoes in one arm while he was talking on the phone with the other. I decided it was worth the risk of interrupting his phone conversation to offer to keep his shoes behind the counter while he kept shopping. I smiled and gestured that I could take them for him, to which he gave me a look of pure disdain.
I shrugged and moved on to help someone else who needed something from the stock room. When I brought it back out to her, she was helping the guy I'd spoken to because he'd dropped all the boxes on the floor. Shoes were everywhere and once we fixed them he scurried away without a glance at me.
63. Moving On Up
I was in line behind a “Karen”. The cashier was ringing up her stuff and then Karen was like “No, that’s not right. That’s wrong. That isn’t X, it’s Y”. So the cashier corrects it…and it ended up costing more than was originally rung up. “Oh, I should’ve kept my mouth shut, huh?” Best instant karma I’ve seen in real-time.
64. Ice for an Ice
Three days ago, I went into a store to buy a bag of ice. I put the bag on the checkout counter and waited while the woman in front of me completed her purchase. This reminded her that she also needed a bag of ice. "Here, take this one," I said, and grabbed another bag. "Is that all you're buying?" she asked me. "Yes". She looked at me and said, "You're done…bye-bye". Before I could figure out what she meant, she turned to the clerk and said, "Put his ice on my bill". Nice karma!
65. Keep On Waiting
I work in customer service, which involves doing cashier duties when covering someone’s break or when we’re super busy. One day, I was on the express register covering a break. I had a line of four people—one paying, three waiting. They all had maybe five items each. I had been doing this job long enough that I was pretty quick, especially with such short orders.
I watched this woman walk up from the floral department with a balloon bouquet, see my line, and apparently decide she was special and shouldn’t have to wait like everyone else, so she headed to the customer service desk. This is one of my biggest pet peeves because we can’t turn people away. The desk is for people who need things like returns or lottery, not for those who think they’re too good to wait a couple of extra minutes.
It also annoyed me because if we are legitimately getting backed up, it delays me from opening a full-size register to take some of the people who have already been waiting. I glanced over and saw my co-worker already in the process of helping a lady and smiled a little because the lady is a regular, and while not rude or anything, she always has to go over her receipt with a fine-tooth comb.
Any transaction involving her takes a bit of time, no matter what the details of it actually are. So, I checked through the people in my line at my usual pace. I noticed her glance over, obviously realizing she messed up. I checked out probably another two or three people before the lady ahead of her at the desk was even finished. A minor thing, really, in the grand scheme of things, but it was exactly, proportionally what she deserved, so it was pretty satisfying!
66. Problematic Attitude
I was waiting to put in at a boat ramp in Florida one day. It was a single ramp, the guy trying to take his boat out of the water was having a tough time backing his trailer down. His wife (I assume) and two kids were waiting on the dock. Some guy waiting to get out of the water starts screaming at him and heckling him. The first guy finally gets his trailer down the ramp.
Meanwhile, the angry guy had docked his boat and started walking up the dock towards the poor boating newbie, screaming and yelling. This dude punches the family guy and knocks him off the dock into the water. Then two burly dudes that nobody was really paying attention to walk up. They grab the angry guy as the family guy was falling in the water, then throw him onto the dock and cuff him after flashing their badges.
They were undercover watching the boat ramp. There was applause and cheering from the folks waiting to put in and take out.
67. Getting Sassed Back
I work near Baltimore, and I manage a plus-size women’s clothing store. We actually get a surprising amount of “non-traditional” customers. Guys who need a dress for a charity show, cross-dressers, genderfluid people, transgender women, and drag queens aren't unheard of. So a drag queen comes into the store to pick up some shoes they ordered online.
They must have been either coming from or going to a show because they were still in full makeup. I get their name, and during our conversation another customer walks in. I call out a greeting and say something like, "I'll be right with you”. I go to the back room, and it takes a minute to go through all the web orders.
I find the one I need and am on my way back to the counter when the new customer throws her arm out to stop me from passing. She then says, "I am a new customer and I've been here for 20 minutes and no one has spoken to me”. First of all, I greeted her when she came in, and second, she had only been in the store for five minutes at that point.
I resigned myself to groveling, but before I could say anything the drag queen stomps over, glares at the customer, and says, “Honey, she said hello to you". Complete with sassy finger snaps. The Queen then made a big show of thanking me for getting her package and gave me a big sparkly kiss on the cheek before she left. The other customer sheepishly paid for her Spanx and didn't make eye contact when I told her to have a good day.
68. Asking Too Much
At my last job, I had a new senior manager hired to run my division and our sister division. After working with him for six months, I had reached my breaking point. He would call at 5:01 to see if I was still there; he would email me at 1:00 a.m. (I had a company Blackberry) asking for amendments to his morning meeting’s presentations regarding my division.
He would ask my receptionist to take notes regarding the goings-on in my office, even though just three of us shared an office and he was down the hall. He was the worst boss I've ever worked for, but the job market was tight and this paid the bills. The final straw came, though, when I returned from a week off. He approached me and asked why I was quitting.
I hadn't submitted notice, nor notified anyone I was leaving. I told him I wasn't and that he'd be the first to know if I did. He called me a liar and walked away. I sent him an email that afternoon tendering my resignation with three weeks’ notice. In my exit interview, I told the HR team EVERYTHING, and I mean everything, about the junk he pulled. Four weeks later he was fired, along with my receptionist.
69. Not-So-Sweet Kisses
The washers and dryers in my apartment building are run through Bluetooth and an app you download on your phone. I figured out that if I put my phone on airplane mode while simultaneously pressing the start button on the machine, the washer would start but I wouldn’t get charged. I was so proud. I tried the same thing on the dryer and it worked—but then I learned my lesson. I went to get my clothes out of the dryer an hour later and everything was covered in melted Hershey’s Kisses.
70. In A Hurry To Get Nowhere
There was a dude tearing up the street, ducking off the road onto the shoulder to pass whenever someone wasn't going fast enough for him (which was everyone). The road had a generous speed limit but he was still going way over it. It was a residential area too. Then, about half a mile up the road, there was a cloud of smoke.
I get there and it's the speeder and his car is totaled with the engine as flat as a pancake. A bus had been taking a wide turn using both lanes and he obviously was going too fast to register and tried to race up the side as it turned.
71. Double Whammy
A guy comes into our store and is being a complete jerk. He’s not wanting to show ID to buy drinks even though he looked 20 at the oldest, and is constantly yelling and swearing. He also had parked in the handicap spot despite not having handicap tags or plates on his car. But he got what was coming to him.
One of my regular customers, who is a sheriff's deputy, was also in the store. He saw how the guy was acting. He saw where he was parked. He went out, got his ticket book, and wrote the guy a ticket. The guy realized he wasn't getting his drinks and went outside...to find he was getting ticketed. I could not stop laughing.
72. Ignored No More
I worked selling shoes for two years on a weekend-only basis during school at a nationally-recognized chain. Never offered a raise, never offered to open the store, never given any recognition. When I asked for some more responsibilities, I was told I was unimportant, as two new outside managers were coming in.
One of these guys managed a section of PetSmart, and the other had no prior experience whatsoever. I put in my two weeks notice. Both people came in on my last day, so I showed them everything I learned and all the small quirks of the inventory that we had there. Both quit within a week, and the store closed within four months.
73. Overheard The Compliments
I was watching my buddy stream on Twitch. He and I were just chatting and the conversation turned to one of our mutual friends. I went on a very brief bragging session about our mutual friend and how he’s such an awesome human. When I started watching the stream, I was the only viewer. Unbeknownst to me, our mutual friend also popped in, but was just lurking.
I found out he was there when he said something to the effect of “thanks for the compliments”. I was really embarrassed for just a moment, then said something like, “Well, now I’m embarrassed, but I meant every word”. We are all grown men approaching 40 years old. In this case, it was instant positive karma for my buddy and a good reminder for me to tell my friends and family how much they really mean to me.
74. Know Your Luck
It was very late at night. The streets were pretty empty, but I knew it would be my luck if I went past a red light, even if the streets seemed deserted, and a copper would show up and give me a ticket. All of a sudden I hit a light and another car rolled up next to me and started revving up like we were going to race. I had no intention of racing so I didn't care what this car was going to do.
It was a very expensive car and even if I wanted to race, it was not a race I would win anyway. So the light turns, and he burns rubber and just tears down the road. All of a sudden I see him from a distance swerve and go right into a light pole. I just continue on and pass him just laughing at the sight of him getting out of his car in disbelief and anger.
75. Playing The Short Game
I'm not sure if being a public defender counts as a retail or service worker, but considering that I provide defense to indigent clients facing deprivation of their rights and freedom, I'll consider it service nonetheless. I was representing a client who was a massive addict and had done some pretty bad things to her daughter.
She was charged with child endangerment and possession, and was facing three years behind bars—and that was on a plea deal. My client wasn’t happy with this deal and started freaking out at me when I told her that's the best offer I was going to get from the DA, and it was either accept that offer or go to trial.
I further pointed out the mountain of evidence against her, primarily the fact that her daughter was going to testify against her at trial. After she was done cursing me out, calling me a "public pretender" and every other derogatory name she could think of, she fired me and somehow managed to hire a private attorney for the low price of $8,000.
I still don't know how she managed to come up with that, but I have plenty of reliable guesses. The private attorney "guaranteed" her that he could win her case at trial, and that's exactly what she chose to do. Long story short, the private attorney clearly never even read this woman's file before trial. The trial lasted roughly three hours, the jury was literally out for only five minutes, and the judge sentenced her to 10 years. It was a good day.
76. Watching the World Burn
I was working for Krispy Kreme when it first came to my state. I was their primary "producer," meaning my eight-hour shift every night made about 80% of the product for the stores the next day, and it was usually just me who was making the product and sending it down the other end for a team to decorate and pack.
I was the one person who would take whatever shift they gave me, and always did the shift that had all the work, the "no time to chat" shift. The shift before me, without fail, screwed around and made my shift a nightmare. I called management out on it, saying it wasn't fair and. that if I left a shift without making yeast brews and such, I'd be sent packing.
The shift manager just laughed at me and tried to blame me for the yeast brews, which were meant to be running for four hours before my shift started, but I had to make myself straight away. I refused to take the guff. So she gave me a cruel punishment. She decided that what I really wanted was a week or two without shifts, effective the next night.
I went home, typed up my notice of resignation and addressed it to the full manager, saying I couldn't work for such an incompetent shift manager and that I need to work for a place that was willing to give me the commitment to shifts and pay that I was originally promised there. Less than two weeks later, I get a call".
Our production line has completely halted. You're the only one who knows how to fix it. Can't pay you cash, but can give you a few dozen of the product for it". I enjoyed those few dozen donuts very nicely. A couple of months later, I see they've gone into administration. All stores closed, and now only selling out of gas stations. I know I didn't directly have a part in that, but it felt good.
77. Guardian Angels
I have a happy good karma story that happened to me a few months ago on vacation in San Francisco. Late at night after a potluck and drinks, my friend drove me to a BART metro station near her house and gave me directions to take the train back to my hotel. I walked in, paid my fare, and went underground only to find out I'd just missed the last train.
Fortunately, my friend was awesome and gave me bus directions back, but there was another person who'd missed the same train, and he was in a far worse situation than mine. He was not sober and was carrying massive bags of groceries, trying to get back to Richmond, which was super far away. He also had no way to call an Uber.
Feeling bad, I offered to call him an Uber and told him he could pay me back what he could. He only had $3, but so be it, I didn’t turn him down. I didn’t know what a difference it would make. We chatted a while until his ride came. He went off on his merry, inebriated way, and I went to catch my bus. Except when I got on, I realized it was a MUNI bus, the other transit company, and so my BART fare wasn't transferable, and I'd have to pay again.
I realized I had no dollar bills left in my wallet. I spent it all on that useless fare. Panicking, I reached into my back pocket where I keep small change, knowing I didn't have enough for the $2.50 fare. And that's when I felt the $3 that guy gave me. It was such a beautiful feeling. I think we were mutual guardian angels that night.
78. Check Yourself
This rich kid pulled up next to me at a red light, at least I assume he was rich because he was driving one of the most recent Porsche models. He screams at me that he's going to run the red because, "The rules only apply to poor people like you"! I think his ego was blocking his rear-view mirror because I saw what he didn't.
There was an officer chilling behind us with an eyebrow raised at the guy. So I do my best to pretend I didn't see the cop and I said to the little brat, "You can't run that red! You're too much of a baby"! Kid runs the red, and I see the cop peel out from behind me into the lane the kid was in and pull him over.
79. Doggone It
Warehouse worker here. Customers have to show a card to shop, and even though we're not technically a grocery store, we don't allow pets. One dude tried to power walk past the employee at the entrance door holding a big pit bull puppy on a leash. We stopped him and told him he couldn’t bring his dog inside and he LOST IT.
He's saying how he’s our best customer and he's here five times a week and he owns stock. Whatever. He demanded to know why we don't allow dogs. We explained how it's a food safety issue, especially with an untrained puppy. At this point, our manager came over and just waved him through because he has no backbone. The results were hilarious. Not even five minutes later, this dog squats in the middle of the main aisle and pees, followed by a poop.
The man turned so red and dragged the dog towards the exit, abandoning his groceries. We stopped him and asked him nicely to please clean up after his pup. “That's the reason we don't allow them, sir."
80. Paying Time
I was working a job where I was doing 90 hours a week but only getting paid for 40-45. My boss blew up at me over the phone, so I quit right then and there, effective end of day. I finished up all of my work and he tried to sweet talk me into staying, but I held strong. Turns out he had to work 18 hours a day for the next two weeks trying to find a replacement.
81. Free Fruit
I liked going to the local fruit stand near my old job before work. It's a small family-owned and run place. A little kid was working the register and accidentally gave me back more than I gave them. I gave back the money and corrected the mistake, insisting it happens and to not worry about it, as I'm not telling anybody.
The kid must have told her family. About two weeks later, I didn't pay for fruit and that continued for the next month until I got another job. Karma works both ways!
82. A Slippery Slope
My husband was carrying our dog's freshly filled water bowl from the kitchen sink to the feeding mat. The dog ran right into him and the water spilled all over the floor. I laughed uncontrollably and called him silly. In the two minutes it took him to find the mop, I forgot the water was on the floor and slipped as I walked right through it to get to the dryer.
I fell hard onto the granite tile. I had a broken arm, had a mild concussion, and received eight stitches on the side of my head.
83. An Act Of God Indeed
This wasn't the customer, it was the manager. She was AWFUL. She was rude, intentionally picked out favorites and gave them presents in front of everyone (even when they didn't like her and tried to avoid it), messed up schedules on purpose for people she didn't like, the list goes on. She was the worst manager ever.
So there was a huge storm coming in, and people were really worried about it. Like the news telling people to stay home, other businesses closing, etc. It was up to her to either keep our store open or close it. Of course, she kept it open. Because schools closed, only half our scheduled employees showed up, and the rest called in—oh, plus she called her favorites and told them they didn't have to come in. But she got taught a cruel lesson that day.
As the five of us who showed up were standing there, watching out the front windows (there were ZERO customers) she starts yelling at us, threatening to write us all up. We are like, no one is here, all the work is done, we are watching the wind BEND TREES OVER and worried about if we are safe and will be able to get home.
Right about this time, we hear a SUPER LOUD crashing noise. CAHCHUNK - CAHCHUNK - CAHCHUNK - CAHCHUNK - WHAM! As the industrial air conditioner on top of the building got BLOWN OFF. Like it rolled along the roof, then went flying into the parking lot…Right onto her car. It was so perfect it was surreal.
Right in the center, it smashed her car flat. If she had been in it, she would have been a goner. It also only happened because she parked right up by the building, where we had SPECIFICALLY been told not to park. All our cars were out in the farthest corner of the lot. We later found out her car wasn't paid off, it was some stupidly expensive BMW or something, and her insurance didn't cover the damage because it was an "act of god".
84. Not Your Guy Anymore
I'm an IT consultant, and have a reputation of being really competent with Microsoft Exchange Server. A couple of years ago, I bid on but did not get a project. Multiple servers, multiple sites, and right up my alley. The firm that won the bid did so by pricing it extremely low, about 40% below my price, which was on the low end to begin with.
Totally unrealistic pricing, but they thought they could pull it off with their people. Their people were good generalists but did not have a handle on Exchange 2010. I told the customer—who I'd done work for before and who I'd had a good relationship with—that it was not going to end well for them. They took it as sour grapes on my part. I was so quickly proven right.
I had plenty of other things to do anyway, so I just moved on. Two weeks after they started the implementation phase of the job, the other consulting firm messed up big time. The entire email system stopped working. No mail coming in or out, no mail flowing between any of the Exchange servers, everything just still in the water.
I find this out when I get a call late one evening at my home from the other consulting company, begging me to pull them out of the fire. I told them "no thanks". An hour later, the owner of the other firm is at my front door trying to convince me to help them "for the sake of the customer". This is well after business hours. Then the conversation took a dark turn.
He ends up screaming at me and I slam the door, then call the authorities because I'm tired and afraid that I'll do something stupid if I continue to interact with the guy. Authorities come, he loses it, they detain him for disorderly conduct and I have his freaking car blocking mine in my driveway. I have it towed off, even though I had to pay for the privilege.
He spends the next 24 hours in the slammer. The customer called me the following day and I again declined to fix the mess. By this time, I'd decided I didn't want any of that junk on me, period. The customer then sues the other consulting firm, which promptly files for bankruptcy and closes its doors rather than dealing with it.
85. Big Burritos
I was walking into a gas station one night when a homeless guy asked me for some spare change because he wanted to buy a frozen burrito. I politely asked him what kind he wants and he said, "I’m trying to get the biggest one they've got”! I told him to wait right there, and I went inside and bought one of those huge burritos and handed it to him. The smile on his face was one of the brightest I'd seen in a while.
86. Honesty Is The Best Policy
My wife and I were getting some subs one day and as I’m checking out I saw that my bill was about half what it should be. I didn’t really think anything of it except that maybe there was some special going on. When we got out to our car, my wife looked at the receipt and noticed that we were only charged for one sub instead of two.
So I went back in and told the people the situation and they decided to only charge me half price for the sub and gave me a couple of free cookies.
87. You Got Told
I worked at a restaurant that was very popular for brunch, and Mother's Day was probably our busiest day of the year. I had a customer call the evening before and ask for a table for six. He was incredibly rude when I informed him that this would simply be impossible. He kept getting more and more worked up, asking to speak to my manager.
At first, I didn't want to pass the phone over. My manager, Mac, wasn't the nicest guy and we were in the middle of a busy dinner shift. But Mac came up behind me and demanded to know why I had been on the phone for so long. I was like “Screw it, this customer isn't going to listen to me anyways" and gave the phone to Mac.
Mac asked how he could help, and listened for about 15 seconds before telling this dude something like, "So you're tying up my hostess in the middle of dinner even though she's already told you nicely that we can't fit you and your goddarn family in the night before our busiest day of the year? Screw you buddy!" And he hung up the phone.
88. Kindness: The Ultimate Repellant
I was flying cross-country on a space-available ticket and ended up having a layover in Chicago. I was walking around trying to find a restaurant close to my hotel and I passed this dude on the street, begging for some money to buy something to eat. Now, I'm used to seeing people with a cardboard sign or whatnot, but actually approaching people was pretty new to me.
I thought to myself, "Man, this guy is probably just looking for booze money and I'm going to call his bluff". So, I walk up to him and say, "Tell you what: I won't give you any money, but I'm on my way to get a bite to eat and if you want, you can come along with me and I'll get you whatever you want". I did not expect his response.
I was feeling pretty cocky, and figured he would turn me down with some excuse. "Absolutely!" was what he said. So, he picks up his stuff and starts walking with me. We settle on some Ruby Tuesday or Applebee's-ish place. He says he can't decide between a big steak or ribs, and I wave him off with my hand and tell him I have no problem buying him both. But this is when things got truly weird.
As we eat, he pulls out the biggest knife I've ever seen in person. He puts it on the table and says to me, "I can't tell you how freaking hungry I was. Everybody was passing me on the street, some of them would glare or ignore me, some would talk smack. I told myself the next idiot who had something clever to say to me was getting cut".
I was freaking frozen. Conversation eventually moved on and we both finished our dinners, and I talked him into dessert. In the process, I told him I was extremely interested in his knife and was in the market for one, and I offered him 250 bucks for his. He was ecstatic and sold it to me. I just figured that dude really didn't need a knife on him like that.
I figured he could use the money more than the knife. I gave it to a uniformed officer and said I found it lying around on the street. Maybe someone’s life was saved that day, who knows. Life taught me a few lessons that night, though: Don't judge, because people aren't always who you think they are, and be nice.
89. He’s Gotta Go
I managed a steakhouse for a couple of years. During that time, we had an employee who was a know-it-all, who always talked back when asked to perform certain duties. After a while, I got sick of his nonsense and started writing him up whenever I could. Anyway, the manager at the time really liked this jerk for some reason, so I couldn't run him out as I had planned.
Well, one day, this employee showed up late to work (as usual) and decided he doesn't want to work after all. The manager decided to let him go home and covered his shift. He told him he had better show up for his shift in the morning since the girl who was working for him tonight only did it under the condition that he would work her morning shift.
That’s when opportunity reared its head. About an hour later, a tow truck driver showed up asking about the guy and if we could give him his home address. I told him I can't give employee personal information. Well, turns out the guy was a repo dude. He whipped out $200 and asked if that would make it easier for me. I quickly took the money and gave him the employee’s address.
Two hours later, the tow truck driver showed up with the employee’s truck. He then greased me with another $100 and thanked me. The employee didn't make it to work the next morning and was fired. Yep, the last laugh was mine.
90. Stuck In Her Ways
Back in high school, I worked for the street department of my city. We were putting a concrete patch on a street and had a lane blocked off. A lady in a huge hurry and a nice expensive car blew by me as I was holding the sign that says stop on one side and slow in the other. The “stop” was facing her. I tell her to stop. She swears and goes by.
Then she drives right into the wet concrete that goes right up to the bottom of her doors. She tries to get out of her car in her high heels and we just stand there and watch her swear at all of us to help her as she ruins her expensive shoes. She gets out barefoot and storms off. We had her car towed.
91. Babies Know Best
I currently work at a consignment shop. We have two stories of furniture, and it's only things people bring in for us to sell for some of the profit. A lady came in with her young son and looked around. We had two barstools and she came up to the desk and said, "I'd like to order two more of these bar stools".
I smiled and said, "We can't do that, those belong to someone and that's all they had to consign with us". She looks back and says "Well why the heck can't you order ones like this?! I'm sure you can find them online!” I clench my teeth and smile again, saying, "Ma'am we really can't do that. If you'd like to go online you are more than welcome to look for yourself, but I can't help you and I'm sorry”.
She huffed and started walking to the door, talking about getting me fired, making a horrible review of this place, everything in the book. I still laugh when I think of what happened next. She then got a nice big faceful of door. It's a push door and it was locked. She looks at me and screams "WHY IS THIS LOCKED?!" I have no idea. Then her son looks at her and says, "Mommy you were mean to that lady and I don't wanna go till you say sorry". Best kid ever.
92. You’ll Miss Me When I’m Gone
My first job out of high school was working for a rather famous and nation-wide guitar store chain. At first, I thought it would be fun, getting to be around guitars all day and talking music with fellow musicians. Turns out I was wrong. 10-hour shifts five to six days a week while listening to too-loud overhead music over and over again wasn't actually all that great.
But I stuck it out. I needed money and I have one of those "don't quit ever" attitudes. When I got hired, the store was in serious trouble. They had recently fired a huge chunk of the staff for skimming profits and selling substances out of the warehouse. Their numbers were really low, and corporate was breathing down their necks.
But, as it turns out, I have a penchant for selling stuff that I know about. I was the accessories guy and got really, really good at it. I was routinely rolling $30k or better a month out the door, and the most expensive thing I had in my department was only $500. I also had a file with several letters from happy customers saying how much help I had been.
Eventually, the store's numbers improved, especially my department. Suddenly, we were #1 for our district, and #3 on the West coast, behind Hollywood and San Francisco. However, NONE of that mattered to the General Manager or anyone from corporate. All they wanted was more from me. My numbers had to be better every month, or I'd get yelled at.
I was written up for having a low sales month one January because I went on vacation. I would get daily emails and phone calls from the district and regional managers, demanding to know why I hadn't hit $xxx in sales yet. My hours got bumped up to the point where my days consisted of sleeping, showering, eating, and working.
I had zero social life. My girlfriend at the time would go weeks without seeing me. Eventually, because of the stress, I developed an ulcer. So, I decided to quit. I threw myself into my last month, which just happened to be December, the month all retail workers hate. I worked extra hours, sold as much as I could, contacted old customers, you name it.
Blew everyone out of the water, rolling just shy of $80,000 in gear. My boss called me in to his office and said I was doing a good (not great, good) job, and to keep it up. I pointed to the sales numbers screen, pointed out how well I had been doing and how well-liked I was by the customers, and asked for a raise. His response chilled me to the bone.
He laughed and said no. That was it. So I handed him my resignation letter. Two weeks later, I was done and starting classes in college, something I'd had put off since work wouldn't allow me to cut hours for school. I came back to the store a couple of months later, as someone who had worked with me called and said they'd found a jacket of mine in the warehouse.
When I showed up, the General Manager wasn't there. I asked and finally found out the truth. Corporate HAD noticed me, and when my General Manager had failed to retain me, they'd fired him. Also, that department went from #1 to #9 in the district, out of 11 stores, when I left. The district managers were scrambling to recover. I laughed the laugh of the vindicated.
93. Her Spot
My cousin parked her car on the street near my house. My neighbor came out and yelled about how that was her spot. My cousin simply moved her car rather than argue. A few hours later, one of the children who live on our street rode a bike into my neighbor’s car in that exact spot.
94. Expensive Trash
I had an ongoing issue with people illegally dumping in my dumpster behind my business. For those unaware, it's far more expensive to have a dumpster at a commercial property than you might think. Mine's shared with two other neighboring businesses and emptied three times a week, and we pay a whopping $400 a month for the service.
So when it's suddenly full of garbage that's clearly not from us it's infuriating. I could never manage to catch the people who did it so I decided I'd install a camera. I was on the roof of my building running the wiring when, what do you know, some person is dumping a carpet and yard waste in my dumpster. I opted to not confront him right away.
I just call the non-emergency line and gave them a license plate number and description. The officer came by to verify the information with me, and as we were standing inside my shop talking, I notice the same guy just backed back up to my dumpster, again. He must've missed the copper’s car in front of my building (or just didn't care).
The officer made him empty ALL the garbage he dumped back into his truck, the dude had to climb in the dumpster and got absolutely covered in yard waste. As soon as it was all piled back in his truck (including the cab, since this was his second trip) the officer handed him a $500 dumping ticket. The look on the guy's face was priceless.
95. What He Does In The Shadows
I worked for an online banking help desk and this 18-year-old boy phoned up, saying he had seen a transaction for $7 to “allpay” and because he didn't recognize it, he decided the bank was robbing him of $7 and that I was in on it and I was a "thieving little jerk”. Then he gets his dad on the phone who stuck up for his idiot of a son, saying I was a pathetic idiot stealing off an 18-year-old boy, even though it was a debit card transaction and I simply worked in the department that helped people use online banking.
But anyway, I phoned our debit card services to see if they could give any more information, and boy could they. I then had the pleasure of relaying back to this little brat’s equally bratty father the following.
"Hi sir, thanks for holding. I've checked with our debit card services team and I now understand why your son would not have recognized the payee “allpay”. That's a deliberately vague term used for discretion when the customer has subscribed to online adult images. That's what it was for. Your son has been paying for online videos of that nature. Would you like to pop him back on the phone so I can tell him it's a payment for this, or will you pass on the information?"
The father just muttered that the issue did not require any further investigation, thanked me for looking into it, and hung up.
96. Get Mature, Kid
I worked at a Kmart in high school. It was a small store, so I worked everything: electronics, stocking, cashier—you name it, I did it. One day, I asked a woman and her son, who was about 12 or 13, if they needed help finding anything as I was out on the floor. For some reason, the kid immediately calls me out for annoying him. I ignore it and go about my business, but I think he's a little jerk.
Right after that, I get called to checkout. As I'm working there, here comes the pair. The kid has gone all out back in the electronics area, with some EA sports titles and a GTA game. I'm checking them out when the age prompt comes up for the M-rated game. I decide to take a chance and show the jerk a little karma.
I flip the game over and inform the mother that "This game has been rated M for the following reasons" and read the list off the back of the case. There is a long, awkward silence, and then she angrily informs me that the son said it was only a "little violent," and he must have lied to her. Kid wasn't able to get anything that day.
97. Going, Going, Gone
I was buying some drinks at a Circle K one day while visiting someone in Florida and some tourists cut us in line, all the while complaining loudly about everything (how expensive everything is, how crowded the beach is, it’s too hot, etc.). They were also really rude to the cashier and take forever arguing about the price of the hot dogs they were buying.
They left and as we walk out, we witnessed a seagull come and snatch the guy’s hot dog right out of his hand. His wife then shrieked and proceeded to drop hers out of surprise. I know it isn’t that big of a deal, but it was so hilarious watching that happening that I still remember it five years later.
98. Left With Nothing But Her Own Company
I once took a full flight home from Hawaii. I go to my assigned window seat and notice a grumpy woman is sitting in it. I politely tell her she is in my seat. She looks at her boarding pass and, sure enough, she is supposed to be sitting in the aisle seat across from me. She starts arguing that she MUST sit next to her husband and that she's not moving.
I decide it's not worth the hassle and take the seat she is supposed to be in. I don't even get a thank you or anything from her. Once we are in the air, the onboard entertainment of free movies and shows is available. And then the best thing imaginable happens. I look over and see her yelling at a flight attendant that her TV is broken and doesn't work.
The flight attendant apologizes and explains that the flight is full and there are no other seats to move her to. She had the pleasure of enjoying a five-hour flight with zero entertainment.
99. Feeling Blue
Some blue-haired lady came up to complain about a dessert she ordered at our restaurant, saying that there was a hair in it. She shows me, and what do you know, the hair was blue. I said, “Ma’am, no one who works here has blue hair”.
100. Two Lanes, One Winner
One day a few years ago, I was grabbing McDonald’s near work to eat something last second before my shift. It was one of those two-lane microphone deals. I blatantly finished ordering before the other lane, when he stomped on the gas to cut me off. I couldn’t help but laugh after what happened to him.
His car broke down right there, and I got to take my rightful turn in line.
101. Have A Care
I worked at a telecom in Canada. This lady comes in with a broken iPhone, demanding to get a new one for free. She went to incredible lengths to get her way. She called up our loyalty team in store and spent the next two hours screaming at them. Finally, they agree to a deal, and she is getting it for zero. She looks at me and goes, “I do not want a case, and AppleCare is a scam”.
Now, we work on commission, so this essentially meant I was getting nothing and ruining my numbers. She then keeps telling me to hurry up through the setup, since I was trying to get her out of the store with everything transferred over and set up. She grabs the phone and starts marching off, saying I was a terrible employee.
She gets three steps out of the store and drops the phone. Shattered screen, phone can’t even turn on now. She ran back in asking what I can do. I shrugged and went, “Sorry, but AppleCare sure would have helped, eh?”
102. Just Stop
My neighbor followed me down my driveway to yell at me for not coming to a complete stop at the stop sign. I apologized politely, even though I knew he was being petty as we live on the end of a quiet street. He then proceeded to yell and curse at me as he backed out of my driveway but as karma would have it, he backed into my tree.
He dented the whole side of his car and ripped his mirror off. He then proceeded to fly off down the road and didn’t break for the stop sign.
103. The Evil Twin
My mother's twin sister, AKA my aunt, is awful. She would gaslight, harass, and intimidate my cousin. Some highlights include burning her prom dress the day before prom to the point we had to go get an emergency replacement. She also threatened my cousin’s boyfriend with false charges—and then it got worse.
She tried to send her to one of those horrible wilderness camps. That was the only time her spineless father ever stood up for her. She also stole her scholarship money and took her car and sold it for money to go on vacation.
My cousin finally escaped by joining the Coast Guard and going to college online. My aunt ended up with cancer and she tried to convince my cousin to take care of her. My cousin’s reply was legendary. My cousin told her, “I'll help you pick out your grave and nursing home, nothing more”.
Today my aunt is pretty much a shell of her former self, physically and mentally. My cousin told the nursing home to never contact her until my aunt passes. She already filed a complaint against one of their nurses for overstepping that boundary because my aunt is a great manipulator and can play the weak old woman game.
My aunt constantly tries to call other family members to see if she can get sympathy or to live with them...No dice.
104. The Principle of the Thing
I worked as a database administrator for a community center one summer in university. Basically, I created a database for them to track who was donating to them and how much they were donating, as well a who was volunteering, and for how many hours. Very simple work and despite being the youngest person on staff, I got along well with my co-workers.
Well, except for my immediate boss, who was a total piece of work. The next spring, I was applying for jobs and e-mailed my old boss to ask for a letter of recommendation. Much to my surprise, she told me that she didn't write recommendation letters "out of principle". I was pretty ticked off about it because I was finding it very difficult to find a position.
Not being able to count on my most recent employer for a reference was a definite blemish on my resume. However, in spite of this, I managed to land a decent job. Lo and behold, I got to get revenge on day one of my new job. That day, my boss happened to email me about a problem at my old work with the database I had worked on.
She had moved some files around, rendering it impossible for her to access the database. She asked if I would come in. I had the perfect reply. I e-mailed her back and told her I already had a job and couldn't do it "out of principle". From the center's perspective, it effectively made my entire summer a waste of time. Hey, what can you do?
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