People Share The Consequences Of These Crazy Revenge Stories
21. Douche Sergeant's Boot: A Painful Military Motor Pool Misadventure
“While in the military, I worked in the motor pool. We had a new staff sergeant come in, but we already had a motor sergeant and platoon sergeant, and he was the lowest-ranking of the three, so he was relegated to a lower-level task in the platoon.
He was a raging jerk, and most of the enlisted men hated him.
I helped a buddy move to a new barracks one night after work and twisted my ankle coming down the stairs. It hurt, but I didn’t think much of it. We had some drinks afterward, and everything was fine.
The morning, though, was a whole nother can of worms. I woke and couldn’t put pressure on my ankle. When I looked down, it was swollen like a cantaloupe. No problem, I dressed in my uniform and carried my boot to formation. Jerk Sergeant saw me coming.
He asked why I wasn’t in uniform, motioning to the boot. I informed him of the situation and told him that I had to go to sick call. He said that it didn’t matter; I had to be in uniform for formation. I showed him the ankle, but he’s a jerk, so that meant little.
He told me to put it on or he’d have me written up for disobeying. So I put that boot on. I had to put my toes in, then grab the top of the boot and slam the foot on the ground several times to get it in.
It’s been a while, but I vaguely remember there being a few tears. Only vaguely, though, and only a few if you believe that.
When I got to the hospital, the doctor (colonel, full bird) proceeded to let me know how stupid putting the boot on was, in no uncertain terms. His language was colorful, to say the least. Then he asked why I could be so stupid, and I informed him that I was threatened with Article 15 (for a minor offense, an Article 15 is given instead of a full judicial hearing, but can still demote you or punish you in other ways) if I did not comply.
He asked who ordered me to do this, so I told him. I won’t say gleefully, but it was with much glee.
In a flash, he was on the phone. That colorful language was now directed at someone else. It was a sight to behold.
But this is not the malicious compliance.
So, I was given a profile (a doctor’s note specifying what you can and can’t do because of medical issues) that said that I must wear an air cast, use crutches, and that I could not do physical training or stand for more than 10 minutes at a time.
Returning from the hospital after lunch, I stopped at the barracks and grabbed a running shoe for that foot and returned to the motor pool. The jerk saw me coming. Again. Man, was he out to get me. He met me at the gate and asked for my profile, which I gave him.
He then told me that the profile did not specify that I could wear running shoes. I informed him that it did state that I had to wear the air cast and that it would not fit in the boot. He didn’t want to hear it.
But then I told him he was welcome to call the Colonel to clarify. He declined, but stated that I could not wear that shoe. Hmmmmm. I can certainly do that.
I took the shoe off and hobbled to the smoking area just outside the motor pool and sat there for 3 hours.
My squad leader, Sergeant Ski, came looking for me eventually, mainly because others had complained that I was sitting in the smoking area for 3 hours. He asked what happened, and I told him. He then asked why I didn’t come into the motor pool.
“Sorry, Sergeant, regulations prevent me from entering the motor pool without footwear.
Since I cannot wear this shoe because my profile doesn’t specify, and I can’t wear the boot over the air cast, it looks like I’m on a 6-8 week smoke break.”
Sergeant Ski was very unhappy and told me that I should have informed him of the situation (back before cell phones), and I replied that that would have required me to enter the motor pool without the proper footwear.
I cannot do it. Sorry. He told me to put the shoe on and head inside; he’d deal with it.
The platoon sergeant tore him a new one. Again. A 3-hour break and the jerk gets his reprimand. Good deal for me.”
20. Nail Gun Mayhem: A Warehouse Pallet Fiasco
“This happened while working for a small business.
The boss in question is actually a great dude, but like all bosses, he’s under a ton of stress and has his “moments”. This particular piece of compliance revolves around a nail gun in use in the warehouse (Don’t worry, no idiots were harmed in the writing of this story).
So every afternoon we have pretty large shipments getting sent out. Everything sold for the day would be popped onto pallets and shipped off to customers. Now, pallets are surprisingly expensive, and if not sized properly, cost a fortune extra in freight. So we eventually started making our own in order to fit the size of the products being shipped using the previously mentioned nail gun to put them together.
All was going well until the delivery guy told us that, and I quote “Those freaking pallets of yours are crap and keep falling apart, stop using the freaking nail gun and put them together properly.”
We looked into it, and he was 100% right. The nails from the nail gun were super small, thin, and couldn’t grip for crap.
The warehouse manager could actually pull the pallets with his hands. So yeah, not good. It was reported to the admin folks upstairs, and the show went on.
From that point on, we started using normal nails instead. Yeah, it took longer, but we were still saving money and the delivery folks were happy as clams.
Now for the turn. One Friday, late in the afternoon, the boss comes down and lets us know the sales team has just landed a big one.
Boss: We need some pallets, lads. I want this to be shipped this afternoon. Grab the nail gun and throw some together ASAP.
Me: No problem, I’ll get on it now.
Boss goes back upstairs, and I start belting pallets together using normal nails. Five minutes later, the boss comes back down, and he is fuming.
Boss: OC, I can see you on the cameras. What the heck are you doing?
Me: Hammering the pallets up, boss, as you said.
Boss: I SAID to use the darn nail gun.
Me: Well, I would, but when we used it last time…
Boss: NO BUTS. We bought that nail gun, now you better darn use it! In fact, I’ll show you how!
Boss man takes the nail gun and slaps together a pallet in 20 seconds flat. (Normally takes about 3-4 minutes by hammer.)
Boss: There, see, now do it the right way or go home.
Me: Yes, boss.
And so begins our compliance. I pick up the nail gun and smash out 5 (fragile) pallets in the space of about 3 minutes—exactly the same way the boss man did, which I’m okay with (it’s a ton easier).
All while my coworkers giggled with glee. Come shipping time, I realize just why they were all giggling. All the other forklift users are out for the rest of the afternoon with local deliveries, sickness, and general excuses. The only person with a fork license who was going to have to load the truck was… you guessed it.
Boss man.
So boss man picks up the first pallet and is about to load it onto the truck when the pallet is hit by a stray breeze and falls apart on the forks.
Delivery Guy: THE HECK DID I TELL YOU ABOUT THOSE PALLETS?
ARE YOU IDIOTS USING THAT NAIL GUN AGAIN?
The boss stammers, saying we needed them sent this afternoon and the nail gun should have done the job.
Delivery Guy: I don’t darn care. I cannot take any of the pallets you’ve built with that nail gun.
If they fall apart in our possession and damage something or someone, it’s a darn nightmare. Do them again and I’ll pick them up tomorrow.
And with that parting gift, in his own act of compliance, the delivery driver keeps to his word, closes the truck, and drives off without our shipment.
The boss sits in silence, contemplating the thousands of dollars in product which has now experienced a nice big shipping delay (Did I mention this was Friday?).
Boss: OC?
Me: Yeah, boss?
Boss: Retire the nail gun… and sorry about earlier.
Me: Don’t worry about it.
Want a hand getting all of these back inside?
Boss: Yep, and if you’ve got some time before closing, I would appreciate some fresh pallets as well.
Me: On it. I’ll have them knocked up in a bit.
And the nail gun was never heard from again.
Don’t you all enjoy a happy ending?”
19. NYC Subway Stand-Off: Cane User Challenges Handicapped Seat Misuse
“This happened just under 2 years ago while I was living in NYC. I was/am on the younger side of what the public expects to see for a cane user, and other than having the cane I don’t look disabled. Also, just because I know it’s going to be asked, I have the cane because of hyper-mobility issues that have basically led to my joints not functioning as they should.
Essentially, it helps keep me from falling randomly or over-straining my already taxed muscles.
Also, those of you who have ridden on NYC subways might know this already, but every NYC subway car has seats that are designated as ‘handicapped’. These seats are to be vacated and given to anyone disabled, elderly, pregnant, injured, etc. You can definitely sit there if you aren’t handicapped in some way, but it’s a fine if you don’t give up your seat when someone who needs it comes along.
There’s actually nothing other than manners forcing you to give up your seat in the rest of the train. That said, even in NYC most people tend to automatically offer up a seat when they see a cane.
NYC subways are especially brutal on my condition if I have to stand.
The constant, unpredictable need to shift my weight leaves my muscles in agony after even a short ride. I always tried to board by the handicapped seats, that way I at least wasn’t putting someone out in the regular ones. A lot of folks will pretend not to see you, but eventually they realize you caught them staring and they offer up the seat.
One day I got on the A train at Columbus Circle heading north after a long day of work. The train was pretty crowded and every seat was full. A guy sitting in one of the handicapped seats saw me and jumped up. The young lady standing in front of him hadn’t seen me and sat down (this happened sometimes, women assuming they were being given the seat by a chivalrous man but most women would see me and realize what had happened).
The lady saw me just as the man gives her a “what the heck” look. I hadn’t planned on saying anything because… I mean, invisible disabilities are a thing and I tend to freeze with confrontation anyway. But I must have had a puzzled look or something because the lady goes “Someone ELSE can give you a seat”.
I look around. Every other handicapped seat is occupied by someone who obviously needs it (elderly, pregnant, etc). So I just say “Well…. They’re all people who are supposed to be sitting in these seats. It’s a fine if you sit here and aren’t handicapped while someone who is doesn’t have a seat.” I was still tired and a bit startled to be pulled into a confrontation.
Lady: “Well then it’s a fine for all of them!” She points to the regular seats.
Me: “No… just the ones with those signs.” I point to the sign directly above her head declaring the seats as handicapped.
Lady: “Well you can stand for ONE stop!”
Now…. I could have probably gotten a regular seat from someone nicer than this woman. But the subway had already started moving at this point and I needed to hold on. That, and… well… I’m stubborn and petty. So I stand in the crowded car, right in front of her, my cane an inch from her kneecap for the express trip from 59th to 125th.
Those of you who have experienced the joy of an express NYC subway train ride, you know they are not gentle. They speed along, bouncing, swaying, and jostling without a care in the world. I am in agony in no time flat, but I’m not the only one.
Every jerk of the subway car sends my cane hard into this lady’s kneecap. I don’t have to intentionally do anything more than stand there. Actually, I’m trying to stay as immobile as possible, but this particular operator is driving like he’s late for his own wedding.
She tries to shift, but I really am all up in her business (grab bar is right above her, after all).
We get to 125th and she tries to stand, but I don’t move. She did want me to “stand” after all. She eventually shoves past me up out of her seat (I’m fine because the car is too crowded for me to fall or anything) but doesn’t make it out of the car in time.
By that time I’ve gratefully taken the seat she vacated so she has to stand until we get to 145th. At that point she got off, I assume to get on and go the other direction, and I never saw her again.”
18. Stingy Administrator’s Flooring Fiasco: When Cutting Corners Costs Big
“Years ago, I used to work as a medical biller for a surgery center. The administrator who ran the place knew that I worked in construction with my father during my off time, doing remodeling and building houses.
As such, she commissioned us to do some work for her at her personal home. It was small projects, really: installing a new garbage disposal, installing a new mailbox, installing a projector in the ceiling. Easy stuff.
Now, before I get into the main part of this story, I must tell you that she was very stingy with money.
We had an autoclave that needed servicing at work, and she refused to pay for the worker’s travel time of 2 hours for a 30-minute job. She refused to pay a lot of the medical equipment bills until she was threatened with collection notices or refusal to send any future items. She even told us not to waste patient bands from no-shows, and instead place another patient’s sticker over the old ones (which could be a HIPAA violation, but she didn’t care).
This is important to know.
One day, she came to me and asked if we could take a look at her flooring in her exercise room. She had said the water heater had busted and, as a result from sitting too long, her flooring was swollen from being waterlogged. So my dad and I went over there to assess the situation, and determined that we could do the job for a total of $400 plus material. We weren’t out to strike it rich, but really to help the community by providing quality service at a low rate.
She was happy with the price and told us she would pick out the new wood she wanted laid down. We told her that she would need about 100 slats for the repair we were going to do, as well as new plywood for the base.
She seemed okay with that.
She went to Los Angeles one weekend and came back with material that she wanted to use for the flooring. Only, she had about 30 of the requested 100 to do the job properly. On top of that, she did not think that she needed to get a new sheet of plywood.
We informed her that the old plywood was moldy, swollen, and would only cause problems down the road. She eventually agreed to purchase the plywood replacement, but she was not going to purchase more wooden slats. Instead, she demanded that we use most of what was already there (yes, the swollen pieces), but to tear up the slats in the little alcove that was not hit with water damage and place the damaged ones there.
We did everything we could to convince her this was a bad idea. We told her that wood doesn’t magically shrink when it dries out. We told her that joining the swollen pieces with non-swollen pieces would be near impossible. We told her that the moisture would invite more trouble down the road and provide for an uneven floor setting.
She was having none of it. She knew better and did not want to spend more than she already had.
So… we went to work. We tore up the old pieces, saved the best ones, and started laying down the new pieces first. Then we tore up the pieces in the alcove and matched them with the new pieces, too.
Per her instructions, we placed the least damaged slats in the alcove, doing everything we could to make it look presentable. Lo and behold, though, it was all uneven. It raised in spots. It had gaps in spots. It didn’t fit quite right. But that’s what she wanted done, and that’s what she was going to get.
Despite our best efforts, we were absolutely shocked when she said that the flooring looked horrible, despite us telling her that it would look horrible with the damaged slats. Okay, no, we really weren’t shocked at all. She demanded that we tear up the floor again and fix it the right way.
We told her “Sure, but you’ll have to pay us another $400, plus get the other slats that we requested.” She got livid, said we were horrible people, and refused to continue on.
The next day, I quit the job after she came in and bad-mouthed my dad in front of my coworkers.
But I heard from my coworkers that she had to hire someone else to do the job, and it cost her $1200 for the labor alone, plus another $400 in wooden slats. All because she was so certain she knew better than the guys who have been doing the work for years.”
17. Escaping Toxicity: How I Refused A Two-for-One Job, Survived Bullying, And Found A Healthier Work Life
“So last year, I’d been working for ‘big uk telco’ as a senior technical reporter for 16 years. All was well. I was highly qualified (my job dealt with local government, so I had clearance, etc.), I enjoyed it, and my company had supported me when I had to take 3 months off 2 years ago due to a serious health condition.
But then I got a new boss. We’ll call her Helen.
Helen was actually part of our wider team, a fellow reporter who was ‘promoted’ (actually she was best friends with the senior manager, so…). The power went straight to her head, and she started reprimanding people for random things (like ‘disrespect’ for questioning a process change which would double the time it took to do it, etc.).
She wanted to make her stamp on the job despite it all working fine until then.
Unable to deal with Helen, my colleague Jim handed his notice in. Jim is a technical architect, a role I did some years ago before taking a sideways move into reporting.
His customer is huge, and it takes him forever to do his job, especially with all of Helen’s ‘improvements’.
Before he leaves, I get called into an ‘informal chat’ that turns out to be Helen informing me that they’re not backfilling Jim; they’re making a cost-saving move (for which she will get a bonus).
Instead, my role was to be (ta-da!) a technical reporting architect for BOTH customers.
“But….that’s two jobs,” I point out, “which parts of each are you proposing I drop to even make this remotely possible?!”
“We’re not dropping anything. It’s perfectly do-able.”
“But… despite whether you think it is, I don’t agree. I see Jim struggle every day. It’s why he’s leaving. I don’t want to do two jobs; I have my health to think about.”
“Oh please. You’re not so special.” She is literally scoffing at me now.
I must point out here that my serious health condition was PTSD and a nervous breakdown after having a baby, watching my dad have a stroke, my mum being in a coma following a massive heart attack, and a friend taking his own life.
She then goes on to say she doesn’t believe in mental health and that I should prepare to have my handover from Jim.
So I ask her to check with HR whether what she’s doing is legal, as it’s a change of role with no new contract. This REALLY annoys her off. The meeting ends.
A week later, she hauls me into a ‘stress review meeting’ which, when I arrive, is a reprimand.
In order to try and be as maliciously compliant as SHE could, she’d written down all ELEVEN things I’m supposed to have done wrong (the idea being I’d end up being written up and, should I betray her again, fired).
Some of my crimes were:
– Being miserable (Yes, I got in trouble for being sad).
– Refusing to take on Jim’s role and being ‘awkward’ due to my ‘so-called health problems’.
– She faked a customer complaint (it turns out I wasn’t the only one she did this to).
– Not attending a meeting she ran weekly (I went back through my mail to find the email she’d sent me stating that my attendance wasn’t required as I used a different system due to my customer).
She said I was skating on thin ice, and if I wasn’t willing to pick up the extra work, then why come back at all after Christmas? (This was late December).
Okay then!
The day after New Year’s Day, I called in sick—she was right, I had no intention whatsoever of doing two jobs.
I had sixteen lovely weeks off with my family, at full pay, whilst I prepared all my evidence (easy enough since she was foolish enough to email it to me) to take the company to court for bullying (her manager/best friend would not reprimand her).
It never got to court. The entire department was made redundant due to mismanagement, and on top of my redundancy package I was paid for the remainder of the year plus all my holidays. I got a better-paid job the day after I handed my laptop in.
My new boss is absolutely lovely, and my new company treats me with respect. And I can see boats and ducks from my office window.
She did not lose her job. Her friend promoted her to another department where she’s universally hated and back to her old tricks (even going so far as to ring ex-employees’ new managers to tell them they made a mistake hiring them, literally just to be a mean jerk).
But hey, karma will get her in the end.”
16. Closet Chaos: A Temp’s Malicious Compliance Unleashes A Shipping Disaster
“I will try to make this short, but so much happened in a short amount of time.
I had recently started working for a brown and yellow box shipping facility. I ended up in a unique position as a front-end clerk. This was a temp job, but if I did well, I would be hired on as full-time. I met two ladies (let’s call them Wanda and Cindy) who ran the front and began to learn as much as I could for two weeks before Cindy (the one who ran everything in the front) went on Christmas vacation.
I was her replacement. I did terribly at first, but after a week of being literally fed to the wolves, I began to catch on better. Wanda did what she could for me, but was in a way counterproductive at times because we did not get along and she knew about as much as I did.
Just to give you an idea of the workload, a typical day’s work for my job is to separate all in-house packages from customer packages and to separate all customer packages from one another. Most packages are car parts or tractor parts. All extremely heavy stuff.
I am a 25-year-old, 5’9″, 175-lb woman at the time. That took time and effort. Among my duties is to fix broken packages (rebox and relabel or just tape it until there is no brown left), handle losses (there were way too many of these—people on the belt do not care if a package is marked fragile or handle with care), and ship off lost packages to another brown and yellow box facility.
Sometimes, if they were behind on the belt, they would even throw me up there for an hour or two even if I, too, was far behind on my work. It was by far the most chaotic and disorganized place I’d ever worked, and the lack of communication was a big issue for this place.
Now back to the in-house packages. These always get put on a cart and hauled over to the customer service’s door. I knock. I speak with the people inside and have them sign my tablet.
Well, days pass and cart after cart after cart, I’m running out of carts (everyone is), and none of these packages have been touched. I speak with the manager of the morning shift about it, and she said that it was my job to put these packages away.
So yet another job to take on.
“Okay. I was told, since I was new, to only focus on the front counter duties and not the extra duties that had been tacked on to Cindy over the past 20 years. I’m not sure what to do with all this stuff.”
She shows me a closet and enters a passcode—one I was not supposed to know. I would need to get her every time something needs to go inside this closet. “Just sign for the packages yourself and put them in here as soon as you get them.
We need the carts when you’re done.”
This is where malicious compliance begins. I nod, feeling a bit ticked off at yet another thing to do, and begin filling the closet with all those boxes, trying to maintain some order, but it was hard to do with such little space and time.
If it was in-house, it went straight to this room and it got full quickly. By the end of the week, I had to start leaving a cart in front of the closet because there was no room left inside. Eventually, they took my cart and left the boxes on the floor, which I got yelled at for as a safety violation.
So I threw the boxes up over the piles in the closet just to get them out of the way.
Later in the weeks to come, there was a BIG problem. The gas cards for their drivers were missing! It was literally the week of Christmas and everyone was losing their minds.
The drivers were nearly two hours late already. I overheard the managers flipping their crap, saying this was the worst thing to possibly happen and that it was the first time in 30 years it had happened.
So… hey, guess where those gas cards ended up being?
In that stupid closet because everyone was too busy to check the loads I dropped off and was just telling someone new to put them somewhere. Like I would even know what was important.
Needless to say, they didn’t hire me back, and I was glad to leave.”
15. Poking The Hornet's Nest: A Cook's Malicious Compliance With A Smug FOH Manager
“I work in a kitchen at a high-volume, low-quality establishment. Before summer (busiest time of year), we have a mandatory cook’s meeting. The newish owner (owner’s daughter) and the front-of-house manager are running this meeting. Now I’ve worked there for a long, long time—long enough to know these meetings are all talk and nothing changes.
Well, the FOH manager finally gets to bring something up in the meeting.
FOH: I don’t care how busy it is in the kitchen; when we ask you guys how long an item will take, you need to give us a time for when it will be ready.
I don’t care if it’s a fake time; I need to know how long.
Now the amount of smug this guy produced was enough to gag a swamp cow (moose).
Me: That’s fine and all, but can you guys not seat the restaurant all at once?
There are 3 hosts, 20 servers, 7 bartenders, and 5 expos versus at most 6 cooks, and this place can easily seat 250 people or more.
Owner: That’s enough cooks, but we will try to stagger the seating this summer.
Now you may be asking me, “It sounds like you dislike this place; why work there?” Well, since it’s such a crappy place to work, it has a high turnover for cooks.
I won’t even learn a new cook’s name until they’ve been there for a week. But since I’ve been there for a long time and I’m reliable, I’m sort of a manager. I get paid well, and if anything goes wrong, it’s my fault, but I have zero power—I’m not the chef.
The owner does the job of the chef—she orders and handles scheduling and never works on the line. There’s no real chef.
Anyhow, it’s time to get on to the malicious compliance. So, 4th of July weekend is here and it’s hot as heck.
The clock/thermometer is reading 118 degrees Fahrenheit and is 8 feet away from the heat. Within 5 minutes of lighting my grill, my balls created enough sweat to waterboard Osama Bin Laden. Not only that, but we had a cook call out for lunch.
Within 15 minutes of opening, we were screwed. They seated the whole restaurant.
And I know that the FOH manager gets some sick satisfaction from freaking us like that.
It didn’t take long for some to ask the dreaded question: How long on that burger? Now we have a computer system like BK and McDiks, so it’s really easy crap for our ordering system.
All times are programmed to get everything out at the same time. So I freaking hate breaking my freaking rhythm when I have freaking 60 items to cook at my station because we had a cook call out and a normal 3-man station is being managed by two people.
I peek through the window and see it’s the FOH manager asking the question. Now he usually helps host, but when the expos get screwed, he has to go help the expo.
FOH Manager: How long on that burger?
Me: I’m busy right now.
FOH Manager: That’s not a time, is it?
Believe it or not, I was relatively calm because I was taught to keep my head down when it gets busy and pump food out as fast as possible. Getting angry only slows you down. But this mother screw was trying to start crap with me, and I’m a petty man.
I would cut my nose off to spite my face.
Me: 10567 seconds on that burger.
Oooo, the amount of rage he had in his eyes could have burned through a cow. He didn’t say crap. Knowing he was defeated, he went to go seat more people.
Well, at a certain point, if the cooks keep up, they can fill the windows with food ready to go. This screws the expos and forces the FOH manager to come back in. I have sandbagged burgers so I could get a clear board. Now I could watch the expos sell the wrong food.
And oh boy, it was fun.
FOH Manager: Can I get a mediocre burger on the fly?
Me: Here you go.
Seconds after being asked, now the rush is dying down and the expos have caught up, but I was yet to let it go.
Me: How many open menus are there right now?
FOH Manager: Why are you asking that? That’s none of your business.
Me: Uhhhh, what? It’s my job.
He left yet again, knowing what he said was just plain stupid, and everyone thought less of him.
I know a lot of setup for a mediocre ending, but you know what, I don’t know, bb. By the way, Emkay, in the one in a billion shot you see this, I love your voice.”
14. Mmmmmbop At Dawn: How I Took Down The Assistant In A Canoe Rental Rebellion
“I worked one summer at a canoe rental company located in a large provincial park. The place employed about 60 people aged 16 to 23 on average, with a few managers who were older.
One of the rules at the place was that the only acceptable music that could be played on the speaker system was from a specific list of approved albums from a book filled with CDs.
One of my jobs was to open up the shop in the morning.
This meant that I started about 15 minutes before everyone else. My usual routine was to unlock everything, arrange the tills, move a few canoes designated for the first rentals of the morning, and then, at exactly 07:00, press play on the CD player. I would then get my morning coffee, eat breakfast, and watch the world go by for 15 minutes before returning to work.
Usually, the person who started at 07:00 in the ‘shack’ was responsible for selecting and starting the music. However, as I was really efficient, I would finish my morning duties, press play, and be long gone from the vicinity before anyone realized which song I had chosen.
For the first few days, I chose nice, classic, upbeat music to get everyone going—The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, maybe some CCR, etc. I really enjoyed sipping my coffee and watching all the kids start work, bobbing their heads to the music as they flipped canoes and cleaned tables, etc.
The assistant manager was one of those “my way or the highway” types. If you got on his bad side, he would give you the worst jobs, belittle you in public, and essentially just be a jerk. We shall call him Assistant Jerk.
One afternoon, one of the younger women working at the shack put on a CD (from the book) by Hanson called Mmmmmbop.
Everyone in the area who could hear the speakers started bobbing their heads to the music and singing along to the chorus. All in all, everyone seemed to be enjoying the song—everyone except Assistant Jerk.
Right when the chorus dropped, he came running out of the office and started to yell very loudly at the woman working at the ‘shack’.
I won’t quote him verbatim, but essentially he told her, “Screw you, you silly fool; if you or anyone plays this song again, you will be fired.” He made her take off her uniform and leave work for the day.
I overheard parts of this exchange and approached Assistant Jerk, asking why he reacted the way he did and noting that the CD she chose was in the approved binder—so what was the issue?
You can’t fire or threaten someone’s job if they are following the rules. His response was something along the lines of “the song would make the company look bad and shouldn’t be played.” He refused to apologize to the woman when I told him he was out of line, and his response was to threaten my job as well.
The next morning at 07:00—and every morning I worked thereafter—guess what song I chose to play at full volume! Remember, by the time the chorus dropped, I’m long gone from the shack. So whoever was unfortunately closest to the radio at that moment would get yelled at and threatened, etc.
I had made several extra copies of the CD, so every day Assistant Jerk would throw out the Hanson CD, and the next day it would be played again.
I made a point to speak with anyone who got yelled at afterward. I explained their legal rights to them and noted that I had witnessed how out of line Assistant Jerk had been.
No one got fired or officially disciplined, despite Assistant Jerk’s attempts.
This continued for about a month until the owner arrived early one day and observed the whole process, especially how Assistant Jerk talked to the staff. The album was on the approved list, so it was a completely acceptable choice.
Assistant Jerk was demoted and was not rehired the next year. Of course, I played that song daily for the rest of the season whenever, when (now just called Jerk) was also working.
It gives me a little skip in my step when I hear that song and picture his scowling face storming across a dock, with the sun rising over the horizon and birds chirping in the background.
Beautiful!”
13. Tales Of Literal Compliance: Misunderstood Instructions And Unintended Chaos
“Looking back on a fairly long life, I realize my borderline autism (not understood by anyone along the way) led me into numerous situations where I “took things literally” – one of the keys to malicious, oblivious, or generally humorous compliance.
I figured a few examples fit here nicely, even though I was really attempting to comply.
The earliest I can remember with any really bizarre results was likely during the last part of elementary school. Outsider. Tortured. Also a number of years of intense martial arts.
A bully fellow – I can visualize him, but do not recall his name – poked at me as usual, but had found that I did the martial arts. “Go ahead, knock me down, go on.” After a substantial amount of this, and encouragement from others (several days’ worth), he finally poked at me with his arm, trying to push me.
Giving me his arm was not a good idea. Quite without malice, or really any thought other than a reaction to a move by an opponent, I took his arm, carried him over my now outstretched leg, flipped him over onto the asphalt. Now I was used to opponents who were quick, wily, prepared, strong, and who knew how to land.
I was likely more energetic than this fellow expected, and narrowly escaped suspension. I wonder now whether he actually bounced. I was kind of mystified at the time as to why Admin was concerned – he had requested the service.
My working life was punctuated with a few nice instances.
I very likely missed a great many!
Don’t ask questions. That was a command, not just to me. Don’t ask questions, just do what is requested. We have it all handled. I came back to university from a trip overseas with this demand still firmly in my mind, and without the knowledge that it had been rescinded because of some issues.
Management was gone, there were tickets for a trip to a sponsor/client organization, details of the trip. All except what it was for. So I went. It turned out I was teaching a course! Amazing. Fortunately I was able to use the organization’s own materials, to draw geologic sections accurately from memory, and to make up a course on the spot.
However, it was very clear that I was taken by surprise. It wasn’t unusual for me to be asked to simply sit in on meetings, for example. I really got grilled on why I didn’t call someone. And I was glared at for pointing out that I wasn’t the one making the rules.
Another whole class of compliance appearing malicious is my tendency to keep doing what I’ve been asked to do. My favorite experience: I moved to another building. I was assigned a secretary to do all word processing, instead of using our professional staff, over my strong objections.
I did so. Thousands of dollars of wasted time. Moved back to the main building as a unit, and took over a formerly leased-out floor. For a couple of months, we still used the secretary, and we both hated it. A guy comes in, “We know you like using [secretary] .
. .” Me: “I hate using [secretary], we’re losing time and money doing that.” Guy: “Why are you using her?” Me: “I was told I had to use her.” Guy: “Who told you that?” Me: “You did.” Predictable denial and whining.
I was told to follow the expense form absolutely—no exceptions.
I didn’t realize that the expense form just summarized whatever was in our government contracts. I always made out on per diem, usually on lodging. Then I took a red-eye flight back from California and went directly to work. The way the form read, I had to ask for payment for a hotel (expensive) that I didn’t use.
This apparently caused some excitement, which I didn’t find out about until I left the company. Someone asked me at the time, and I told her I had to do that because the top manager said I had to, and that’s the way the form read.
It was as if nobody had ever read these things.
Management ignores a report of critical issues that might jeopardize a contract? Then call the hotline. Nobody told me that nobody calls the hotline! A 5-man audit team shook up a multi-story office building! Pretty cool.
On and on. And I still fill out forms exactly as requested, listen carefully, and do what people are actually asking. I take things “literally.” Ask stupid questions, get stupid answers.
All this time, I had the feeling that something was wrong with each incident, but logical analysis said, “Go ahead,” so I did.
Generally, the people who got upset deserved it. And I’ve gradually gained enough awareness to actually engage maliciously with my inherent skills.”
12. When My Miswritten Fit Note Silenced My Boss
“I work at a petrol station and have a pretty bad foot condition that makes walking or standing painful after long periods of time. I also have back, knee, and other joint problems which make unloading heavy deliveries on my own much slower and harder.
My boss, while well-meaning, is a bit of a jerk so he doesn’t really understand the limitations of my conditions.
I have repeatedly told him what I can and cannot do and have handed him medical notes from my GP (for the back problem) and from the chief geneticist in charge of the project concerning my foot problem (it’s a very rare genetic foot condition), which he very briefly scans and says, thanks, I’ll add them to your file.
He is pretty upset with me because I did not tell him about all these conditions when I signed up (legally, I do not have to unless I need some concessions made or there are parts of the job I simply cannot do).
At that time, it was the Christmas period, so I had to work extra shifts to cover for the other employees.
This included nine-hour shifts (with no breaks) on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day. When I arrived at work, I was limping pretty hard, so he asked, “What’s wrong with your foot?” I gave him a blank look and simply said I hurt it.
Two months later, I met with my GP to discuss my health and the DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) regarding disability. My boss refuses to purchase a chair for me at work, and the DWP (through other schemes) will only pay for a chair once I have a fit note (one with a specific time frame rather than just a generic medical note).
So I went to my GP and asked for a fit note citing my back problems and foot condition. She was very helpful and wrote me a one-month fit note, and she asked me to return if needed to have it updated or extended.
I should mention that my GP didn’t write the fit note properly.
It was supposed to be a “Can work but needs some special modifications (also known as a chair to sit on),” but the GP ended up writing an “Unfit for work” note, meaning that I should not work at all for a month. Since I am able to work, albeit painfully, I did not want to claim to be completely unfit, so I did not want to use my fit note until I had it amended the following week.
Then came the compliance. My boss added plenty of (completely unnecessary) tasks to my task list while also telling me that I have to work a nine-hour shift without breaks (or a chair) on Tuesdays, simply because he has something scheduled and cannot do it himself.
(We have lost two full-time employees because they had enough and quit.) There is nothing I can say to get out of it. I told him that I should not be working a nine-hour shift at all, especially not on delivery day without any support and without him shelling out a measly £20 for a chair.
He refused to acknowledge my condition. (He also told me that the painkillers I take en masse every day are bad for me and that I should just meditate the pain away.) He said if I want anything to be done, I need to get a fit note.
The next day, I decided to ask him once more if I could just have some help opening the Tuesday shift or if someone could pop in for a short period in the middle so that I could take a break. Any help at all would have been greatly appreciated. He again said, “Nope, no can do.
Bring in a fit note and we can discuss what happens next.” I handed him my fit note. He honestly did not expect me to have brought one in. He also did not really understand what it meant, so I simply explained to him that the note stated that for the next three weeks I was unfit for work, should be removed from the rota as medical leave, and was entitled to full sick pay (we don’t have sick pay, but if we did, he would have to pay it to me).
Watching his face change from confusion to sudden realization was brilliant. I do feel a little guilty, as my boss isn’t a bad person; he just doesn’t understand my medical problems and other related issues.”
11. Band Practice Rebellion: Outsmarting Unjust Teachers With Malicious Compliance
“When I was in Year 9 (8th grade for the Americans reading), I was in a band with two of my friends, Luke and Joe. We were practicing after school to learn some new songs (I think it was either Foo Fighters or Sleeping with Sirens).
We found out earlier that the drama room that we tended to go to was being used for the drama students’ exam practice and the music room had piano lessons going on, so we asked our music teacher and the headteacher if we could use another room, to which they responded yes, that we could use one of the cafes that we had.
The school day ended and the three of us walked to the music room to get our equipment to set up. We had a full drum set and a huge amp that had two cables (one to power it and the other for the guitar; Luke had his own cable but we didn’t use it.) The amp alone took all three of us to carry it.
We started playing until we saw a teacher walk in. She asked us if we could play more quietly as she was marking work upstairs. We agreed and turned the amp down enough so that we could still hear it over the drums but not loud enough to make too much noise.
When it comes to the music, we need to hear each other. I need to hear both Luke and Joe so that I know where I am in the song, Luke needs to hear the drums so that he can keep time, and Joe needs to hear us to know when to pick up the tempo or slow it down.
Minutes later, another teacher came down into the room. (T is teacher, K is music teacher, Me is me.)
T: You three need to leave right now!
Me: What, why?
T: You are being too noisy and you don’t have permission to use this room.
Me: *Looking confused* We already turned down the amp and were playing the drums more quietly, and we do have permission from Mr. Gates and our teacher to use this room.
T: I don’t care, all three of you leave now!
My friends were about to pack when I spoke up and told them to leave the stuff where it was.
Me: You always tell us to stay behind instead of playing video games, but here we are being productive and you’re telling us to go home. A bit hypocritical, don’t you think?
She looked at me as if I had insulted her family.
T: Give your planner! (We were given books to write down notes, assignments and for teachers to mark detentions.)
Me: No, why?
T: Because you need to give it to me. I’m giving you a detention.
Me: No, I haven’t done anything wrong.
All I did was contradict what you have been telling us.
T: Give me your planner now or I’ll get your teacher.
Me: Do it, we’ll wait here!
The teacher left and then returned with our music teacher.
K: Give me your planner.
Me: No, you and Mr. Gates gave us permission to use this room and we aren’t doing any harm.
K: You’re not listening to a teacher, and you’re refusing to give us your planner.
T: You should have listened to me when I told you to leave.
Me: I said before that you’re always telling us to stay behind and now you’re telling us to go home. That’s stupid and we have the right to practice here. So screw off and let us do what we do.
K: Don’t you dare talk back!
Just give me your planner or leave!
It then hit me and I had a small, sinister smile.
Me: Okay, you want us to leave. We’ll leave. Luke, pack up your guitar. Joe, grab your drumsticks.
They do as told, and all three of us leave.
K: Where are you going?!
Me: We’re going home.
K: What about all of that?!
She points to the equipment that is still sitting where we left it.
Me: You said either give me your planner or leave. You never told us to tidy up.
I flipped off the two teachers, and the three of us went home, leaving them to carry the drum set and the amp back upstairs to the music room.
My friends thank me, and I got a call home demanding that I apologise to the two teachers.
I did, but I didn’t know that my feud with my music teacher wasn’t over yet.”
10. Broken Toe, Robot Vacuum, And The Absurdity Of No Work-From-Home Rules
“I work in IT, always have.
A couple of years ago, I switched from massive corporate drone work to a much smaller scale (literally a mom-and-pop shop, but with like 30 people in it) firm where things are much more hands-on and interesting. My background is automation and integration, so I can do almost anything remotely, and the physical-only tasks, like running a cable, can typically wait.
So, we had a new partner join the company, and he also came from a large corporate background. I could call him NP for New Partner, but making up abbreviations for people’s names in a story is silly and confusing, so I will call him Jim.
Because that is his name.
I like Jim. He has some East Coast mentalities that don’t work so well out here in the desert, and his background is finance instead of technology (and it’s a tech firm), so there is some minor friction, but he is a genuinely likeable guy.
One day, Jim decides that working from home while sick is a no-go and that if you can’t make it into work, you can’t do any work. I get where he’s coming from; it makes it harder to bill out accurately if you do not have direct confirmation of work being done, but I also think we should trust everyone we work with until they prove unworthy of that trust. Come to think of it, maybe that is why he decided on this policy in the first place?
Anyhow, I have one of those little robot vacuum cleaners so that I do not have to sweep my house every day to keep up with the dogs. These things are great, but what they really excel at is getting tangled up on cords. I have this little home office that is full of robot-strangling cords, and I put a 25-pound barbell in its doorway to keep the robot out.
And I promptly walked into it at full stride with bare feet. I broke that toe next to the big toe on my right foot. Oh, lordy, was it painful… and it went full technicolor to boot. The swelling was such that I could not fit my foot in a shoe.
So, I put in a request to work from home for a couple of days…. Which Jim rejects, saying that I need to take the time as sick days and not work at all, which completely makes all the sense in the world because it’s not like I use a computer all day… oh wait.
Naturally, I have zero cares to give because my foot hurts like a mother, and I shut down the laptop and proceed to do precisely nothing all day long. A couple of hours into my forced day off, I get a call from the office manager, who I also like.
She needs help with some minor nonsense that Jim came up with, which I could do in a matter of a few minutes.
But I can’t. Because Jim said no work while you are sick. I explain this to her. I tell her that my fingers work just fine, and the only reason I am not actually there is because I cannot fit my foot into a shoe and probably couldn’t drive anyhow even if I could.
She agrees that this is absurd, but Jim really needs this thing done.
Well, sorry… I will be in a couple of days from now when I can fit my foot in a shoe and I can deal with Jim’s thing then. I get a couple more calls from her over the day; she knows the rule is stupid, and she’s making a record of all the things that I could totally do despite my location but couldn’t because of a silly rule.
She likes to work from home too.
Monday rolls around, and I can fit my foot in a hiking boot, so I do that and head for the office with a significant limp. Upon my arrival, I expect Jim to demand a doctor’s note, which I have both obtained along with photographs, but which I was also on the fence about presenting to him because I am not some foolish teenager, and this is not high school PE class.
But instead, the rule was changed. Now, work from home is on a per-approval basis, just like it was before. If only I did not have four days of work to catch up on in the space of one, I would have called it a solid win.”
9. How I Broke My Dad’s New Shovel While Shoveling Icy Driveways
“This story happened a few years ago, when I was still in middle school. I haven’t really thought about it in a while, so I’m sorry if the details are a bit off.
My dad had just bought a really nice snow shovel (it was heavier and made of metal, and it shoveled much nicer than our cheap plastic ones).
My dad isn’t one to be abusive, but he can be unreasonable at times. He’s a great man, and I love him very much.
It was snowing one day, and my dad asked me to shovel the driveway. I thought nothing of it, since we were expecting company. We have two entrances to our driveway (shaped like an “h”), and we normally only used one of them (since it led directly into the garage) while the other one was usually used by guests when we had company over.
Since we only use one of the driveways, I only felt obligated to shovel the one we use the most over the past few days (as it had been snowing for a while now). My dad asked me to shovel both sides of the driveway because his friend was coming over to watch a football game (I believe this was around 2015 when the Broncos were doing really well), which would be difficult since the day before had been relatively sunny, partially melting the unshoveled snow on the driveway and turning it into freaking ICE.
I tell him this, and he pretty much ignores me and tells me to do the best I can.
So I do the best that I can. I’m out there for approximately half an hour scraping the ice off the driveway with the shovel, to little or no avail.
I go inside to tell him that I tried and that I was cold, but he took one look at it and told me to do a better job. I reluctantly comply, as I figured that he wanted the driveway looking as nice as it could for when his friend comes over.
I’m out there for another twenty minutes scraping the ice again with the shovel. The ice was so thick that it probably would’ve required a freaking chisel to remove.
I go inside to tell him that the driveway is iced and that I can’t do any more since my fingers are practically frozen at this point.
He yells at me once more to do a better job and to “use your muscles,” and this is where the malicious compliance comes into play. I’m really upset at him now, and I try to pry the ice off the driveway using the shovel as a lever, all while on the verge of tears.
Normally, I would be careful not to break the shovel, but I was upset at this point, and he did tell me to “use my muscles.” I do this for another half hour, and by the end the shovel is an unsightly mangle of metal.
My mom calls me inside (since I’ve been shoveling for a while now), and my dad reluctantly says I may finish.
A few days later, when it snows again, my dad calls me downstairs to yell at me for breaking the shovel. The conversation went something like this:
Dad – “JAXON!”
Me – “Yeah?”
Dad – “You think it’s funny to break a brand new shovel?”
Me – “Dad, I tried telling you that it was iced—”
Dad (cutting me off) – “Look, I asked you to shovel the driveway, and you BREAK MY SHOVEL?!! You can break your own shovels when you get your own job, but I’m gonna need $50 to pay for this one.”
He ended up buying a new shovel. Yeah. I know it’s nowhere near as intense as some of the other stories and I guess I’m technically the bad guy here, but it’s my story and I just wanted to share it.”
8. Truck Driver’s Road Rage: Reckless Driver, Loud Air Horn, And A Mother’s Outburst
“So I drive an 18 wheeler. Not only that, but I own my truck and my business.
One day while coming into Laredo, Texas, I was in the turning lane for my exit and this car whipped out in front of me. Not really having enough room to stop, I tuned onto the shoulder, threw on the air horn (which is extremely loud when you’re next to the truck), and stopped right beside the guy.
He proceeds to get out of his car with his phone and starts taking pictures of my truck and plate. By this time the light had turned green, so I gave him a few short horn honks to basically tell him to get going. He then beats on my door, so I rolled my window down, and he starts screaming about his ears hurting and how I’m damaging his ability to hear.
He then demands that I give him my boss’s number and my Driver’s License Number so he can call it in and report me and “Have my job for this.” And he proceeded to move his car to the shoulder and backed so close to my bumper that I couldn’t get around him.
I kind of smirked at him and told him he didn’t want to speak to my boss because he is a short-tempered man and that he wouldn’t like what my boss would have to say about this issue, but he insisted that he speak to my boss.
I also told him that if he wanted to call me in, all he’d need were the numbers on the side of my truck since it’s assigned to me (considering I only own one truck, you can imagine what I would assign my truck number to be).
I gave him my cell phone number and watched as he laughed while speaking each number as he dialed. I saw his number pop up on my phone mounted to the windshield (he couldn’t see it from his angle) and tried to hold in my laughter.
I let it ring for a minute, and he was getting impatient, the whole time traffic was going around us. I finally picked up the phone and answered it. “Insert Company Name Here Transport. How can I help you?” His face turned bright red.
He proceeded to yell at me some more and told me that it wasn’t over because now he has my number (Yeah, dude, so do about 100,000 other people.
So what?).
A week later, I got a phone call from a number I didn’t have saved in my phone. I had forgotten about the incident but thought it might be a broker or a customer. I answered the phone and this lady chirped up.
It turned out it was his mother, and she wanted monetary compensation for her son’s troubles.
I asked if she knew what had even happened, and she told me some story about how his bumper was damaged by my truck and that he was scared to talk to me because my driving an 18 wheeler was intimidating to him.
Being a smart owner, I have a camera in my truck, and I dump all my truck’s footage onto my hard drive, so I asked her if she could receive videos over email. She said sure, but wasn’t sure what I was about to send her.
I spent a minute or two looking through the hard drive on my laptop, found the video of the incident, and sent it to her. While still on the phone, I could hear the audio playing as she watched it. Her tone changed in an instant, and I heard her put the phone down, and all heck broke loose in that house.
There was Spanish screaming, things being thrown, and Lord knows what else going on. It reminded me of that movie “A Christmas Story” when Ralphie’s mom calls that lady about the curse word and hears the apocalypse on the phone. Yeah, it was kind of like that, but in Spanish.
She then comes back to me and very kindly asks for two things. One, she asks that I forget she called and act as if this never happened because she was embarrassed to no end. And two, if I could delete the video of her son’s idiocy.
I told her that number one was fine; I could do that. But as far as number two, I would not delete the footage, as the only way anyone other than me or her would see it is if it were needed for a court case.
She bid me good day and hung up the phone.”
7. Sweet Revenge: How My Sabotaged Bridge Exposed A Lazy Partner
“My story starts a few weeks ago on January 11, 2019, on a Friday. My engineering and design teacher, Jaime, had assigned a project for the semester and paired me with another person whom I had never met. Mrs. Jaime gave us an entire class period to simply meet our partner and gain some insight into the problem assigned (ours was making a simple tension bridge with specific constraints), and also to divide and designate which parts of the project would be completed by each person so that it could be graded individually.
The first time I met my partner, whom we will call Todd, he seemed like a somewhat stand-up guy and was very nice. We talked about video games, which was a common interest between both of us. He seemed to have no limits when it came to gaming; however, unlike me, I always put school before games.
Flash forward to a week before the due date. I had been working on my part of the project (we both had sections we needed to complete, such as calculations and other components) and had almost finished my half. At this point, I was curious to see what Todd had completed, as we also had an in-class presentation on what we did and how we completed it.
So I called Todd to check on his progress, and the conversation went like this.
Me: Hey Todd, I am just calling to check on how much you have completed on the project so that we both can finish it by tomorrow and prepare for the presentation.
Todd: I have done a little bit, but I have just been busy recently with family issues and my brother’s hospitalization (I knew he was lying about visiting his brother because I knew he had been online on Steam and Discord pretty much 24/7).
Me: I know it is hard with family issues, but I NEED you to do your half of the project so that we can both get a good grade on the presentation portion.
Todd: Yeah, yeah, I get it, but could you do my half so that I can spend more time at the hospital with my brother? I can handle the presentation part, but can you build the bridge?
Me: (I was quite mad that he would use his brother as an excuse to avoid the project and exploit my desire to please people) Fine, but just to help you out, I will write the presentation so you can be by your brother’s side as long as possible.
Being as angry as I was, I had to think of a way to sabotage his part of the project because of how lazy he was and because I wanted him to pay. I decided to make the supports on his side of the bridge extremely thin (I sliced the wood into fourths and only used one quarter).
Also, I had prepared an entirely nonsense report and speech for him that made him sound foolish when he read it aloud, using nonsense sources with names to make him inadvertently utter expletives.
Flash forward to the 25th, I had brought the project and had given Todd his part of the presentation.
I raised my hand when Jaime asked who wanted to go first. Todd had clearly not reviewed his speech at all before presenting, and as soon as we reached the front of the room, we began the presentation. I read my half first, which was the introduction and some information about the project, leading into Todd’s half.
A quarter of the way through, I could tell that both the teacher and some of my peers had noticed how many times Todd had inadvertently uttered expletives without realizing it. The others had not noticed, perhaps because they were tired with this being the first period of the day.
After completing the speech, everyone, including Todd, realized that his speech was extremely foolish, partly due to his inadvertent expletives. “Now I will test the bridge,” I said as I rolled a small but weighted boxcar across the bridge, starting from my side. Immediately upon reaching Todd’s half, the bridge completely collapsed. Todd stood there, awestruck by how foolish he looked. I was on the verge of breaking into laughter.
Todd received a C- on his half of the project, while I received a B+ because of the presentation.
It felt amazing to deliver a little bit of justice.”
6. Malicious Compliance: How I Outsmarted My Negligent English Teacher
“I live in a Spanish-speaking country that tries to teach English in school, making it mandatory from the seventh to the twelfth grade in government schools, and in almost every college, you have to pass a test of basic English to get your degree.
However, I attended a private school until I was 11. The first three years (when I was three to six years old) I actually had the same number of hours in English class as any normal class, so when I was in seventh grade in public school, I was pretty advanced on the subject.
Especially because the six mandatory years of English classes only teach you “I am, you are, he is…” and basic verbs over and over again.
Three years later, I attended my first English class at a new school (I think the USA equivalent would be a junior in high school), and I didn’t like my teacher.
She was a woman who knew she wouldn’t be fired because of collective contracts and didn’t care about students learning. She would give us an hour to answer ten questions without teaching anything about it first and scold us when the answers were wrong. So, I would answer them in ten minutes, spend ten minutes helping my friends, and the other forty minutes chatting with them.
She hated that. She’d tell me I was distracting them or acting dishonestly by giving them the answers. I would actually explain the subject, let them answer, and correct what was wrong while telling them why. You know, my teacher’s job, basically.
I started skipping class and just going when I knew there was a test. One day, when I was planning to skip class, it was pouring rain, and I ended up going to class to avoid getting wet.
Same thing: I finished the questions in ten minutes, and when I was explaining them to my friends, she scolded me and made me change places to the far end of the room, completely alone. I was not happy but complied. An hour later, she started asking us the answers, and when she asked me, I told her I didn’t know the answer.
She got mad. I told her that I didn’t know and wasn’t around anyone to consult, so I didn’t know the answer. She approached me and looked at my book. Sure enough, the answer was there. She started yelling at me and finally told me that if I didn’t like her class, I didn’t have to be there.
So, I packed my bag and left the classroom. I waited outside for my friends. About fifteen minutes later, she opened the door and said, loud enough to be heard by my peers in the room, that if I wanted to come back, I would have to apologize, stop fooling around, and sit alone at the end of the classroom.
If I didn’t do that, she would fail me and I wouldn’t be able to take her class again.
I told her “No, thanks” while smiling and waving. I still remember her face. She was lost for words and finally closed the door in my face.
I was a stupid fifteen-year-old and made an effort to annoy her for the next ten months. I would go to her classroom and sit at her desk until she arrived, then I would leave the room while politely smiling and saying “Hello and goodbye” to her.
She failed me in her two classes (we had two semesters with her, so two grades). I just took an extraordinary exam for each one (I don’t know if this exists elsewhere, but here you can take a test of the entire syllabus and if you pass, that’s your grade for the class.
Those tests are created and graded by the coordinator, so no teacher is directly involved.) I got a ten on both (I guess in the USA it would be an A? I still don’t understand the difference between an A and an A+, but basically a perfect score).
Next year, I had another teacher who actually cared about teaching and quickly understood that I was a bit advanced, so he would ask me to help him answer my friends’ questions, grade tests, and give me different assignments so I wouldn’t get bored. One day, I was chatting with him in the hallway when the teacher who had failed me approached us.
She greeted my actual teacher, turned to me, and asked if I was ready to apologize and retake her class so I could pass.
I smiled while my good teacher told her that I had achieved a perfect score on my tests and that I was helping him with his class.
I still rejoice at that.”
5. Kilt Guy’s Epic Last Day: A Midsummer Middle Finger To Six Flags Management
“So I used to work as a games attendant at Six Flags in Jackson, New Jersey. Unlike most establishments, I had no ill will towards most of my peers and supervisors, but lots of bottled-up contempt for the higher-ups. They had so many rules and regulations that were tedious and only there because they felt it was necessary.
One of the big ones they harped on people for was the grooming and uniform guidelines.
Now, like the proper employee I was, I hit the grind and did as I was told like a loyal subordinate. I have a fairly deep well of patience, and I was only there for the summer, so why fuss about it.
Flash forward several months into working when a flash flood ripped through the county, drowning half the park. I had not prepared for the wet weather and suffered the consequences as every inch of me was soaked, which wasn’t a problem except I was only halfway through a 12-hour shift and a stiff breeze kicked up for the whole rest of the day.
If there was ever a top five for how close I got to being hypothermic, that would have to be up there.
Now if you mesh all that together with pay just over minimum wage for three years of service, an almost hyperthermic shift, and a lousy paycheck every week, you have the perfect combination for a disgruntled employee.
So naturally, I thought of different ways to make my last day at work memorable, but what to do? They have rules for everything, and even breaking them, even minimally, precludes you from clocking in or results in being suspended, fined, fired, or arrested. Then it hit me: the perfect middle finger to the higher-ups for my last day.
So I took that ancestry.com swab and figured out more or less everything my parents had told me about my genealogy (I know this sounds off-topic; just bear with me). On my mom’s side was lots of Viking and German, and on my dad’s side was British, Hungarian, and Irish.
Now, being the prideful jerk that I am, I naturally had to buy some of the cultural garb my ancestors would have worn because I figured I had to represent. Which is where this comes full circle. I decided to don my kilt, knee-high wool socks, and my flashes on my last day of work.
Now, bear in mind, at this point it’s the middle of August in an amusement park. Anyone who has been to an amusement park in ball sweltering heat will tell you it gets a bit steamy, especially when you’re in a wool kilt and knee-high wool socks.
But like I said, I’m a prideful jerk, and after sneaking my kilt in my bag through security, I put it on and had at it.
I had also managed to mock up a good enough Irish accent (being, I’m an American anyway) over the summer, and in full regalia I went from the beginning of my shift at 4:30 until the park closed around 11.
And just to put some icing on this cake, several patrols were in my area that day, and I made absolutely sure to stand out in the open and be noticed. The best part was that I was only breaking trivial rules—nothing worth a fine or an arrest—and the only leverage they had against me was thrown out the window, since it was my last day anyway.
Checkmate.
But here’s the best part: even though my username is definitely not my actual name, most games employees at Six Flags have undoubtedly heard about this. Like a wholesome, properly done joke, it continues to pay dividends. The higher-ups were so furious with the stunt I pulled that afterwards they tightened the clothing guidelines even further.
For example, excluding the adornment of “fun socks.” When I went back with a friend of mine, everyone made a comment on it, and even employees I had never met before referred to me as kilt guy.”
4. Cybersecurity Coup: How A 23-Year-Old IT Head Took Down A Boss And Coworker To Save The Dealership
“First off, I’m on mobile, so sorry. Before I start, let it be known I am using my phone to type this up.
Anyways, I am the head of IT for a large line of dealerships in west TN. These dealerships deal with the government a lot—mainly selling cars and stuff to police and emergency services. Because of this, our cybersecurity measures have to be as tight as a barrel and locked down, which I usually do very, very well.
I also have a coworker who we will call Cranky. She is in her early sixties, has smoked most of her life, and has a thick trailer park accent. Her skin looks like yellow paper, and she drinks nonstop. Her job is to run the cashier desk because her husband is the GM of the main dealership.
It was last Tuesday when I noticed an error from Cranky’s computer. Now, her computer handles all of the credit cards, and if it gets a bug, it gets first priority. So I ran a scan on her computer and, lo and behold, she has a bug that’s funneling data out like a hole in a bucket.
I went to talk to her and let her know I needed to fix her computer.
Here is the convo
Cranky: grumble
Me: Hey Cranky, I’m going to need to fix your computer. You have a bug.
Cranky: What?! No! You don’t have the authorization to touch my computer!
Me: I’m the head of IT. I can do what I need to when needed.
Cranky: No, you freaking can’t. I’ll talk to my husband.
At this point, she yelled for a bit about my age (23 years old) and about how millennials lie. Then she got up to get the GM/husband.
GM: Don’t touch her computer; we will have a professional look at it. (Meaning his son, NOT A PROFESSIONAL)
Me: That’s a really bad idea. We already have to let people know what’s happened because it’s a breach in our security. If we get audited, it would be even worse.
(Here’s where I got mad.)
GM: Listen, you’re a kid and this is the adult world. Just do what I say.
Me: (Silent rage building, nods.)
GM: Besides, we barely use you and we don’t really need an IT department. We have operated for 30 years without one!
Me: Can you write down specifically what you want me to do so that I know exactly what my duties are from now on?
At this point, the GM and Cranky both did so and signed the lists.
Cranky: I hope you learn something from this!
Me: I sure did!
After this, I went home and decided that maybe we needed an audit. So I called some of the agencies we work with and hinted that they might want to audit us.
Fun starts here.
I walked in the next day and found out not 1, not 2, but 4 of the agencies sent someone to audit our records and systems. We failed spectacularly!
And the reason was that we had a bug on the main payment computer. I got called into the CEO/owner’s office.
Owner: What the heck happened to our system?
Me: A bug got in it.
Owner: How?
Me: Well, it’s mainly because C—
Cranky (interrupting): It’s because he looks at explicit material!
Me: Nope, it’s because Cranky and GM told me not to fix their computers and changed my duties.
Cranky: Pfft, that’s a flat-out lie!
GM got called in at this point, and the CEO asked him if this was all true.
GM: No, it is not.
We never—
Me (interrupting): Here are the papers they both signed telling me specifically what to do, and here is the ticket for her computer that she had me close.
I slide the paper across the desk to the CEO.
CEO: Thank you. Go on and do your work and fix the system.
The two of you stay behind.
Later that day, I walked by her cubicle and she was packing her stuff into a box. The GM was also packing his stuff, and they were both apparently blackballed from working in the dealership areas. We also lost two multimillion-dollar contracts.
The best part was that when I walked out to my car, she was sitting on the front step crying, and she saw me and said
Cranky: Can you give me a few bucks since you screwed me over?
So I took out a dollar from my wallet, and in big bold letters I wrote, “I hope you learn something from this.” Then I handed her the dollar and went on my merry way.”
3. Kitchen Fire, Family Fiasco, And A Lawsuit That Changed Insurance Law Forever
“The year was 1987/88 and I was a college senior. My brother is three years younger than I am and was a sophomore in high school. My parents had just finished remodeling our home, especially the kitchen and bedrooms, and had taken a trip to Florida.
My brother decided to have his partner over for dinner and decided to cook her french fries. Now, the new stove was some sort of 80’s ceramic cook-top. I cannot remember the brand name, but I do remember that you could not tell if the stove was on or off except for an orange light.
These kinds of stovetops only heat the pan; there is no gas or electric burner. You literally cannot tell if the stove is on other than by putting your hand on it. It has a ridiculously stupid design and probably is not made anymore (it wasn’t induction).
So my idiot brother pours oil in the pan to make the FF’s and either forgets to turn the stove off or doesn’t see the orange light that it is still on. He goes into the other room to be intimate. (There is great family debate about this to this day.)
Did you know that hot oil does not evaporate? It just keeps getting hotter. Well, the oil eventually explodes all over the brand-new cabinets and immediately sets the kitchen on fire. Bro has just enough time to grab the dog, partner, and call the fire department before running out of the house.
The fire department is amazing and knocks the fire down after only burning out the brand-new kitchen and dining room. There was significant structural and smoke damage, but the house was still intact.
Oh, this is all happening while my folks are on a plane back from Florida.
I won’t get into what happened to Bro, but suffice it to say that he had to hide in the woods for a few days.
Now, this is where it gets good. My crazy father has a giant filing system, all paper, where he has the giant metal racks in the basement with every freaking thing ever purchased in an accordion file on the metal shelving in some sort of ridiculous filing system that only he can use.
EVERY. FREAKING. RECEIPT. Since 1963. The Vogons would be proud.
So once the dust settles, my father calls the insurance company to file a claim. As we all know, insurance companies tend to be large, greedy, bureaucratic crap shows with zero interest in helping people. The insurance company starts asking for receipts.
All of them. Father goes into his filing system from heck and begins producing every single receipt the insurance company asks for. Now, understand that the house is unlivable at this point. The smoke damage was pretty severe, and they were stalling. Finally, they come back with an offer that is ridiculously low.
Now, my father is not a calm person and hates insurance companies and lawyers more than anything. As a very successful businessman, he has had his share of lawsuits and takes particular joy in suing crooked lawyers and insurance companies. So he goes nuts when they make this lowball offer and immediately files suit against them for violating the homeowner’s policy.
In the meantime, he has to find suitable living arrangements for his family, deal with agents, get contractor estimates, etc.
I asked my father why he didn’t just take the money and begin rebuilding. He says, “These jerks do this to people all the time and people have to take the money in order to rebuild, but I’m going to fight them.” So he begins painstakingly researching the policy with his broker.
Fast forward a few months, and I’m home for the summer and working on rebuilding the house. The entire family is working on the house when there is a knock on the door. My brother answers. The guy says, “Are you X?” My brother says, “Yes.” “Consider yourself served.” The look on my brother’s face was priceless and we were hysterical. He didn’t understand, and my father says, “I am suing you.”
My father sued my brother for negligence. The same insurance company provided us with the contents policy as well as homeowners insurance. See where this is going? The insurance company would have had to represent my brother under the homeowners policy. The insurance company called the next week and settled the case in full.
The next year, insurance law in my state was permanently changed to prevent that from ever happening again!
Edit: I just searched the local newspaper archives and the fire took place on 4/22/87. This would have made me a junior in college and my brother a senior in high school.
Follow up to original post: So I just spoke to my Pop. Here are a few more details of the story. For those saying the story is not true because a policy is a policy and it’s all spelled out, the fact that he had every receipt is important because after he produced all of them, the insurance company literally said, “We are not paying you the final 20k of the claim, sue us.” They knew it would cost him about that much to file suit.
So he wasn’t having any of that crap. If you think about it, an insurance company screwing policy holders like that would save them a ton of money, and most people would simply settle.
Back in 1987, you absolutely could sue a family member for negligence under the same insurance company that had multiple policies on your home.
The insurance law, rule, policy—whatever loophole he found—was changed forever in my state after that suit.
They didn’t settle the next week; his lawyer got a call the next day!
I did ask if he had a copy of the suit. There was a long pause as if he was mentally finding a triplicate form.
“I don’t think so,” he said. I would have him ask the law firm he used, but he ended up suing them ten years later on a different matter… lol… and yes, he won…”
2. Night Shift Pasta Sauce Mayhem: Battling Slackers, Spit, And A 10-Foot Skid
“This happened last Tuesday/Wednesday. I work 8–6 overnights at a large grocery store chain; from around 11–5 it is only me in the store. Tuesday I come in for my shift and my manager informs me that someone from another franchise will be coming to pick up a skid/pallet of Pasta Sauce, that they have run out of, and we have way too much of.
No problem.
Around 3 AM the bell to the receiving door rings and I let in a younger guy, late teens/early 20s. He is on his Bluetooth talking to someone on the phone and eating a giant freezie, taking a bite every so often, and then spitting on the ground?
What the heck? Anyway, here is the problem. We have both a power jack and a few pump jacks in the store, but our power jack was out for maintenance, which is really crappy. Pump jacks work fine, but for skids that are massively heavy—like those of water, pasta sauce, etc.—you really can’t push or pull them around.
If another person pushes with you, you can get some momentum and it becomes a lot easier once you get going. This skid of pasta sauce is basically an immovable object. I signal to the guy and say “Hey can you give this a push so I can get rolling and pull it on the truck?”
“Not my job, bro.” I told him it was nearly impossible for me to move this without a power jack or assistance. He told me, in so many words, that it had to go on the truck because they needed the product at their store this morning.
I proceeded for the next 25 minutes to creep this skid inch by inch toward the truck with all the strength I had, while he stood there watching and talking on the phone. I got it up the ramp, barely onto the trailer, and dropped it.
“That’s gotta go to the back of the trailer, yo.”
For those that do not know, a skid of product that isn’t pushed to the back of a box trailer will tip over 99% of the time, regardless of how careful the driver is. I told him it was on the truck and my job was done.
I figured he’d relent and help me move it to a safer spot in the trailer. Instead, he stood there for a few minutes and then proceeded to yell at me, call me a jerk and tell me he’d better not catch me outside of the store.
Before storming out the door, he spat some of his freezie my way, hitting my pant leg.
At around 6 AM the phone rings. I pick up and recognize the voice on the other end. I started working with this company at 15 (I am 29 now). It was the guy who trained me when I first started, got me into a full-time position from part-time, and basically showed me everything I know about work.
Needless to say, we are very close. He had since moved up to be a franchisee at a different location—the location where the skid of pasta sauce was going.
“Hey Bluesnowmanz, did you put that sauce on the truck like that? It tipped and nearly all of it is damaged. Did you know that was for me?” I apologized and said I didn’t know it was going to his store.
I then explained how our power jack was unavailable, that I asked his guy for help and was refused, and that I got called a jerk, spat at, etc. He said, “Hang on,” and set the phone down. I could hear him call the guy over and absolutely lay into him, just yelling—I couldn’t make out too many words.
The guy gets back on the phone and says that tomorrow night he needs to send the truck again (to actually get sauce this time) and to let the driver put the skid on the truck himself. Gotcha.
The guy shows up the following night around the same time, looking like a scolded dog.
He grabs a pump jack and heads towards the skid of sauce. I left the area and went back to what I had been doing. I returned about 40 minutes later to see the guy drenched in sweat, out of breath, and with the skid moved about a whopping 10 feet from where it was originally parked. He looked like he was going to cry or had already started crying.
At this point I relented and started to push from the other side. We had it on the trailer and secured it in about 30 seconds.
The guy was so out of breath he could barely get out “Thanks man,” before he exited the back door.”
1. Chronicles Of A Cadet: How I Out-Drilled A Faulty Command At A Major Event
“I used to be in my country’s youth cadets force when I was a kid. I was on a particular squadron in my hometown that was one of the few in our wing (a collection of around 20-30 squadrons) that had a qualified drill instructor who was a sergeant.
He was super proud of that and was a total drill nerd. This dude and I got on really well, and I also loved drill. I knew the drill document like the back of my hand. I even knew it better than him. We used to quiz each other on it, and I’d catch him out far more often than he’d catch me.
I was the cadet sergeant in charge of drill on our squadron. Because of us, our squadron’s drill team was the best in the wing, and we always won the inter-wing competitions.
We had a pretty big public event coming up in which the high ranking officials from the cadet organisation, the actual military force we represented, and also a member of my country’s royal family were present.
It was a pretty big deal, and we obviously had a ton of practice runs making sure our drill demonstration was on point. It was a wing event, so there was a huge team from the wing involved. My sqn DI was in charge of it, and he was super stoked about it.
We went through a ton of practice sessions with him, and he set me as the right marker for the final salute because he knew I’d keep the perfect pace, timings, and spacing for everyone else. This meant I was on the front left corner of the flight when we faced the front.
It came to our last practice, and it was a full run. The banner teams and the band were there too. All of the senior wing staff were present, including the Wing DI (Warrant Officer jerk). This guy was a total jerk. He treated everyone like crap and loved to throw his authority around.
As we were about to march off and go into a wheel around for the final salute, the warrant officer jerk marched next to our DI. I knew he was going to take over, and I knew how angry my DI would have been, so I was about to ruin his fun.
WOD took over and called for a left turn. Now it was clearly stated in our drill document that, should a new flight commander wish to take command of the flight, they must announce that they are doing so with a specific preface to the preceding order.
WOD did not. He just called a left turn and everyone complied except me. He did not notice at first because the flight was quite long and he must not have seen me. Next, he called the marching order and everyone complied except me. Being the right marker, my entire file got stuck behind me, still facing the front at attention.
They literally collided with each other because they were expecting to be moving off.
WOD lost his temper. He screamed for the flight to halt. He marched over to me with the wing commander, my sqn commander, and my sqn DI. Then he fully yelled in my face (bear in mind I’m like 16 at this point and I’m a bit of a wise guy) for a few minutes before asking if I was deaf and why I did not move like everyone else.
“As per MILDOC123 Section 69, I must only follow the commands of the established flight commander, Sir! No order has been called to take over, Sir!” I yelled back. I saw the smug look on my Sqn DI’s face, and I was fighting one off myself.
WOD turned as red as a cherry and didn’t say a word. He reset the sequence, took command of the flight properly, and we went through it all fine after that.
After that, I was approached by my Sqn commander and my Sqn DI, who both laughed and told me that although I was right and they all had a good laugh, I probably shouldn’t do that on the day.
I agreed. Fortunately, he didn’t take over from my Sqn DI on the day, and he was super happy about that!”
