People Enlighten Us With Their 'Kind Of Petty' Story Of Revenge
20. Don't Be Mean To Someone Who Has The Power To Take Your Job Away
“About a year ago, our company’s junior partner hired a woman to be the new office manager when our faithful matron retired after 32 years with us. Apparently, the new recruit had wonderful letters of reference that proclaimed her as a gift from God Almighty himself to the business world.
Indeed, so lucky were we to land her as our newfound guiding light.
This all took place on a Monday morning during a week when I was off. As I walked into the main office the following Monday, I heard an unfamiliar and angry female voice yelling at somebody about being totally useless and incompetent.
Looking about, I saw this rather tall, slim, 40ish woman with short, brunette hair whom I didn’t recognize. She was in a rage and yelling at our purchaser, Louise.
She looked up, saw me, and went from enraged to ballistic in less than a second.
“What the heck do you think you’re doing walking in here at a quarter past seven?” she shrieked.
“Walking in here at a quarter past seven; next stupid question…?” I snapped back.
“We start at 7 AM exactly, not a quarter past!”
“I start when I get here and stay a lot longer than the others. Comprender, Señora?”
Before she could reply, I continued. “Actually, I’ll ask the next question: Who are you, and what makes you think you can come in here and lose your mind on Louise, lady?”
WELL, you’d think I’d been seeing her daughter.
The woman came completely unglued on me. Nearly hysterical, she screamed that she was the office manager, don’t call her “Lady,” and I was fired. Further, she didn’t put up with “this kinda nonsense” from anyone.
Turning to Louise I asked, “Is this nut job always like this?”
“All day every day to anybody and everybody, it seems,” Louise grumbled.
Angered now, I leveled a cold glare at Whacko Woman asking (through clenched teeth), “You’re that Darlene woman that Mike hired last week?”
“Yes I am, darn it! And just who are you, JERK?” she demanded.
“I’m the lead product designer and senior partner here, Darlene; you know, the “jerk” who signs your paychecks.
In fact, I’m about to sign your first and last paycheck right now.”
The silence was deafening.
Darlene suddenly became very subdued and began to explain (on the fly) why I should give her another chance, but I just glared at her to silence as I’d already made up my mind on the matter.
I waved her over to my desk, checked the spelling of her full name, and wrote her up a check for exactly one week’s pay.
I then told the now-shaking woman that she had exactly ten (count ‘em, 10) minutes to collect her things and get off the property.
I also added that if she ever set foot on the property again, I’d have her arrested for criminal trespassing.
As a final dig, I turned to Louise and asked, “Would you please see to it that Miss Psycho-witch packs up and leaves within 10?”
With her biggest smile, Louise nodded saying, “It will be my pleasure.”
And she did just that, too.”
19. Don't Call Me Fat, I'll Make A Scene
“Just for some context, I am 5’9. I weighed maybe 140lbs at the time which is well within normal limits. My body was “average” not fat. It would be a stretch to even call me chubby, to be honest. My partner at the time was 5’11 and a bit on the thin side.
My partner (let’s call him Tom) and I were in our early 20s. I think I was 21 and he was 22 at the time. His mother (TM) was visiting him from out of town. He called me to ask if I’d like to have lunch with him and his mother.
I told him that I’d love to meet her but I was at a shopping center (think of a strip mall) and I had already paid for parking so I didn’t want to leave until I finished my shopping.
I don’t remember what my shopping was, perhaps a specific item at a specific store for a birthday present, but I do remember I could only get it at a store in that location and parking was $20.
It’s important to understand there is a drivable paved city road that circles the center of the shopping station with several exits leading to the parking garage. Cars can sort of “window shop” the establishment and then the road ends with a traffic light to help merge back onto city traveling roads.
So, anyway, Tom said he understood and he’d swing by to pick me up, and then he’d drop me back after lunch.
Another important note is that, for whatever reason, the back door behind the passenger’s seat in Tom’s car at the time wouldn’t open. I had an ongoing “shotgun” war with friends when he would drive because the losers would have to climb in through the window.
Tom pulls up to the station, I wave and climb into his car.
This isn’t an embellishment, to the best of my memory, this is how the conversation went.
Me: (stepping in and sliding into the seat behind his mother) “probably wishing you had stacked your purchases behind the passenger seat, huh babe?”
My partner: (laughing) “I’m sorry sweetie.
Mom, this is my partner, OP’s name.”
Me: “It’s a pleasure to meet you Mrs so & so, you’ll have to forgive my less-than-graceful entrance. This door doesn’t open so we have to use the window when Tom isn’t expecting guests and has the other back seat otherwise occupied.”
TM: (to Tom) “You didn’t tell me she was fatter than you.”
Tom: (unappreciative voice) “Mother!”
Me: (looking at Tom with wide eyes) “I don’t think ‘fat’ is a fair adjective.
I’m not as thin as Tom, no, but I’m certainly not fat.”
TM: (turns in her seat, makes a dramatic show of casting her gaze over my body) “I think my adjective is perfectly adequate.”
I was more than a little shocked but I’ve never been someone to stay in an unsociable or hostile environment simply because it’s expected of me.
Luckily, the traffic light that allows vehicles to exit had just turned red. Even MORE, fortunately, there was a long line of moviegoers waiting on the same side of the car as myself and TM.
Me: (to Tom) “Well this was lovely but I’m out.”
Tom: (looking embarrassed but understanding) “I’ll call you later babe.”
Me: (to TM) “Enjoy your salad, Mrs so & so.”
I roll down the window and start to climb out and I.
Just. Can’t. Help. Myself. I lay my belly across and start flailing my arms, waving frantically to the moviegoers.
Me: “Help!!! Omg, help!!! I’m so fat I got stuck climbing out of this car window!”
It’s obvious I’m not stuck but a few guys in line are chuckling.
Me: “Please! Does anyone have any butter? We may need to grease my sides so all my flubber can slip out. I neeeeeeeed butter and a plunger.”
One of the guys in the movie line asks, “What’s the plunger for?”
Me: “So you can stick it to my fat face and help pull me from this clown car!”
Tom is laughing and watching the spectacle, and TM is sitting with her arms crossed and her face is fire-engine red.
Unfortunately, the light turned green so I easily and swiftly slid the rest of myself out of the car and waved goodbye, smiling like an idiot.”
18. Shouldn't Have Been A Jerk... Or Left Your Car's Sunroof Open
“While in the military, I had this kid fresh out of boot camp who thought he really knew EVERYTHING. He was smarter than all his superiors, and also, the quintessential only child. Mommy and Daddy were rich, he was spoiled and had more in his trust fund than he stood to make his first 20 years in the US Coast Guard.
He was also a blue falcon and kissed up to the brass constantly.
He belonged to the Yards & Docks unit at the base where I was stationed, and I worked for the Assistant Engineering Officer in the Yard proper. Basically, my boss outranked his. My people worked for me, and my orders, in theory, always superseded those of his enlisted Chain of Command.
It still didn’t stop him from causing problems for my subordinates. To get at me, he would get my guys in trouble for stupid, petty stuff, which resulted in harsher punishment than generally fit the infraction.
One day, I had had enough of this punk’s nonsense.
I came up with a perfect plan. Mommy and Daddy had bought this poopbird a brand spanking new Beemer coupe, with a sunroof. He always left it in the lot by the Docks building, with the sunroof open if there was no rain.
Our yard had a large shipping and receiving area, as we sent out large and small stuff all up and down the East Coast and Great Lakes.
One thing the storekeepers could get was packing peanuts. In BULK. IN A LARGER TOTE THAT REQUIRED A FORKLIFT TO MOVE.
I waited ’til a Friday afternoon right before weekend liberty and made my move.
When he came out, all spiffed up for a night of chasing tail on the main drag, I had emptied packing peanuts ’til they almost came out the sunroof.
His windows were tinted, and he didn’t see them when he opened the door.
That look and the whiny baby reaction were FREAKING PRICELESS.
A passing officer saw the debacle and promptly had the Petty Officer of the Watch (a real hard Chief Petty Officer Boatswain’s Mate) order poopbird to “clean that darn mess up before it blows all over the compound.” He tried to explain that it wasn’t his doing, and Chief looked at him and said, “Your car? Your freaking problem!”
He then spent the rest of the afternoon scrambling to clean up the mess, looking for a shop vac, anything to get it done.
But I had locked up the tool room (and shop vacs) and hit the gate before he came to me begging for help. He was out there all night and part of the next day picking up little, green foam peanuts from one corner to the next.
I hated that little brat, and I never got busted. A lot of people knew who did it. I think even the CO did. That kid never gave me grief again after that. Always addressed me by rank and proper title after that. He got kicked out a year later for using substances.”
17. Drink This, And You'll Never Steal From Us Again
They had to learn their lesson the hard way.
“This is a regular revenge story that took place many years ago involving me and my best friend, Heather. That’s her real name because she’s cool, and she doesn’t care.
I gotta set the scene and give some backstory.
We’re extremely close. Our families are close, too. Heather has known me since my first literal breath. Our mothers were best friends in high school, and Heather was only two years old when I was born. So, of course, when I got bigger, we had playdates.
Those play dates graduated to a countless number of sleepovers and taking family vacations together.
Anyway, to the story – It was springtime in Minnesota. Snow was on the ground. I spent my spring break week at Heather’s house every year, and for this year, in particular, her break was actually scheduled the following week after mine.
And if I remember correctly, her parents allowed her to take two weeks off of school because spring break was kind of our “friendship tradition.”
…and you don’t screw with tradition, boys. My parents usually went on vacation without me, anyway. And Heather’s parents worked full time, but things were pretty laid back at her place, so we could do whatever we wanted without parent supervision.
The only “adult” in the house during this time was her older brother. If we needed something or had a problem, we had to go to him. But, HE was the problem…
Being as young as we were, any money that we had was scraped up couch change, or it was given to us by our parents.
My mom would send me with spending money for the week, and I would blow it on movies and candy within the first day. If we wanted snacks or pop for the remaining time I was spending there, Heather and I had to walk about 2 miles (there, AND back) to the gas station.
Heather lived in the country – Everyone knew everyone, so we were able to take shortcuts through backyards, in an attempt to avoid the massive amount of wind, snow, and slush on the roads.
When we’d get back from our long walk, we would put our pop in the fridge, go downstairs and relax.
We call soda “pop” here, by the way. But this is where our frustrations began.
Our snacks and pop repeatedly went missing from the fridge shortly after our return. Shortly as in almost immediately. Since her brother, Jim, was the only other person in the house, we knew it was him or one of his friends.
We came back from the store one day and actually caught Jim in the act, so we confronted him. We explained to him how annoying it was for him to constantly take our drinks without asking. We even offered to pick up some for him, but this wasn’t good enough.
He laughed in our faces. He didn’t care. He’d say things like, “What are you going to do about it?” as he guzzled down our drinks literally right in front of us.
Oh, Jim, you gluttonous butt, you really shouldn’t have said that…
You kind of get the idea where this is going, right? Maybe you don’t.
Here’s the revenge.
We walked to the gas station the very next morning with a plan to mess with Jim, but if it was going to be executed properly, we had to take our time and do it right.
We bought a big bottle of grape Shasta.
The reason why we picked Grape is because it was a lot darker in color than all of the other flavors, and we knew Shasta was Jim’s favorite and that he would not be able to resist stealing it from us. So, we got back to Heather’s, we cracked that sucker open, and we both took a big swig.
Only half of the bottle was left to maintain its fizzy-ness, so we proceeded to add the following ingredients: one raw egg without the yolk; a pinch of salt, pepper, sugar, brown sugar, flour, and other various seasonings; our spit; Coca-Cola; a couple of squirts of mustard and ketchup; and pretty much whatever we could find in her kitchen.
The end result was disgusting. We took special care to make sure that the bottle didn’t appear to be too full. We twisted that cap as hard as we could, so it seemed like a fresh pop when opened, shook it up nice and good, put it back in the fridge, sat at the table, and waited.
Not even ten minutes after our mission was complete, Jim walks in the door, goes straight to the fridge, grabs the Shasta, and takes a fat gulp without a second thought.
But I TELL YOU WHAT MATE, he sure thought twice after that!
All I can remember is Jim doing a large spit-take, gagging, and throwing up all over the kitchen floor. He proclaimed, “WHAT THE?” and we just sat there. We were overjoyed at the sight of our success, and he never stole from us again.”
16. Try To Force Me Into Pitching In More For Your New, Expensive Furniture? Not Happening
“I lived with my uncle 10 years ago, and I just wanted to move out and show myself that I could do it. My girl at the time had a best friend that also wanted to move out and live with her man. We decided to go for a coffee and go over a budget plan and see if we could manage ourselves.
We all hung out whenever we had the chance. 2 months go by, and we decided to start looking at apartments. We finally found one that met our budget. I paid my share of the rent and damage deposit.
It would just be me, my girl’s best friend, and her man splitting the bills; my girl wasn’t ready to move yet.
My uncle gave me advice that has stuck with me to this day, if you move in with a couple, it will always be 2 against one, and it isn’t pretty.
After we moved in (it’s been 3 weeks at this point), we decided we wanted new furniture, cutlery, etc., etc.
Me being the busy guy I was, decided to just let them pick it out, and I’ll pay my share as long as it’s reasonable and within the budget we worked out previously. They were happy to accept my portion, and they went out to IKEA and bought what we “needed.”
Anyway, they gave me the bill on a contract paper and insisted I had to sign/pay but with no receipt attached.
I said I would gladly pay if I could simply see the proof of purchase. They asked me to trust them. I asked how much my portion was, and they said I had to pay an additional $3,500 on top of the portion I gave them already and refused to let me see this bill.
I had to leave for work, so I said I would talk to them when I got home after my shift.
The dude was cool with that, but the girl huffed and puffed.
I ended up working a full 12-hour shift on a Monday, and it was an hour and a half commute to get home. I get to the apartment, and the locks wouldn’t open to my key.
And nobody was home, or so I thought. I called my landlord, and he came to our apartment with me standing outside the door patiently waiting. His master key wouldn’t work on the locks either. Then someone inside the apartment said if we didn’t leave, she’d call the cops.
Man, what a gong show that turned into. My landlord was angry because he had witnessed us all sign the lease, and we all seemed to get along. She refused to talk to him and me.
After a half-hour of the 2 roommates arguing with the landlord and me through the door, the cops were finally called by her only because I refused to pay for their furniture purchase that I haven’t even seen yet.
10 minutes go by, and the cops showed up.
The landlord gave the cops full permission to use any force to let me into my living space. They finally opened the door, and the cops told me to stay in my room unless needed and that I should move out promptly. The landlord offered me a one-bedroom after the dust settled with the roommates, and I won’t breach my lease with him.
The roommates were livid. The cops told them to grow up and to stay in their rooms until they can talk like adults again. I did as I was told and just went to bed.
The next morning, I went to the living room to check out the new furniture that I had supposedly bought, none of it was from IKEA.
I’m talking about the Brick quality brand name kind of furniture. All white leather with marble top side tables. Stuff I would have never agreed to buy. I let them keep the portion I had given them previously, but I wouldn’t pay a penny more.
It was far beyond the budget plan, and let’s face it, I would never get to take any of these when I moved out.
Things were still sour after that. I’d come home with all my food thrown in the garbage, they broke all my coffee cups, and took the shower curtains into their room with all the towels including the toilet paper.
All these things I paid for even before the furniture incident. They had left their toothbrushes in the bathroom, though… man, I tell you after a long 10-12 hour shift of working…
Anyway, a week goes by, and the happy couple had broken up, and the guy desperately tried to make amends with me because all these things he had purchased were on his credit card.
I told him I was sorry, but I was financially tight from replacing anything they had broken of mine and the new apartment I was moving into at the end of the week.”
15. My Pet Tortoise Gave A Bratty Kid Something To Cry About
“A bit of background: My grandmother has this friend whom she loves so very much and even sees her as her own daughter.
My grandma is great; she’s done so much for me, basically raised me when my mom left (a story for another time), and has always been there for me and for anyone really.
If you are in need, you know you can count on her, but she is also very strict and sets clear boundaries regarding behavior, etc. (For example, I can go out at night with friends and get intoxicated, just make sure to get home to sleep, even if it’s at the butt crack of dawn, and no staying over at anyone’s place.)
Now, regarding this friend, whom we shall call Karen, because why not.
For a reason neither I nor anyone else who knows about this can begin to fathom, Grams has a massive weak spot for Karen.
Karen can do no wrong. She has my aunt buy Karen’s groceries each month (Karen does pay for them though) because she cannot drive, despite having a man with a car, and every time Karen comes over, we are expected to cater to her every need and drive her home because God forbids Karen calls a cab, even though she lives across town and a lot of other nonsense like this.
Karen also has three goblins who are the loudest, brattiest, most obnoxious girls I have ever known. They have broken so many vases and little decorations we have in our living room, broken into my room (all the rooms in the house, to be honest), and made a mess, and Karen only laughs and dismisses it, and so does my grams as those spawns are never in the wrong.
Geez, I’m getting annoyed just by typing this, but I digress.
This story centers around the eldest of the spawns and my pet tortoise…
Something else I need to point out: my tortoise is half-demon, summoned straight from the deepest pits of darkness to come and wreak havoc on earth, and before being called here, I’m fairly certain he must have been Satan’s lap dog.
Yes, he is THAT bad. Believe it or not, he is a huge jerk to everyone but my grandfather, whom he happens to have bonded with and loves so very much; it’s adorable. But to any other person, especially someone he doesn’t know, he’d get very nasty very fast.
He’s been with us for the last 7 years but was already fully grown when he reached us, so we believe he’s around 10 years old if not older, and as such, he’s larger than your regular pet store turtle and is also heavier.
Well, on this fateful day, Karen and her spawns came over to visit, and as usual, I locked myself in my room to prevent a massacre as I know I’ve got no patience for those little jerks.
I heard them race up the stairs over to greet my grams, who they also call Grandma, rolling my eyes and play in the terrace, which happens to also be Devil Tortoise’s lair. I tuned out their loud laughter and yelling and focused on whatever else I was doing at the moment until I heard a dry thud and one of the spawn’s wails.
I immediately ran up to the terrace fearing the worst for my turtle. I couldn’t care less about those goblins, and the moment I got there (the terrace is up three flights of stairs), I saw my cousin, who also hates Karen and her little brats, laughing her butt off.
I stepped over and saw my turtle on his shell, trying furiously to flip back onto his belly and spawn holding her finger as it had a small drop of blood in it, and there was also something else staining her shirt.
What happened was that Karen went over to my grandmother’s room to talk and left her three spawns playing on the terrace on their own, and DT (short for Devil’s Tortoise) came out of his hiding spot, most likely curious due to their loud noises, and the moment spawn caught sight of him, she went over and picked him up.
Big mistake. Anyone who has tortoises or turtles as pets will know that they do not appreciate being picked up. It gets them anxious, and in the best of cases, they will immediately hide in their shells or, in the case of DT, get into fight mode.
The moment spawn lifted DT, he went straight for her finger and simultaneously unleashed his bowels on her… And as silent and fairly tidy as turtles can be, their pee and poo do stink. I’m sure the bite didn’t actually hurt, but it was more the surprise and disgust at the sudden attack of DT that caused spawn to freak out and drop him flat on his shell.
Karen and grams also came running when they heard the commotion, and I was almost expecting her to scold me, as I didn’t do anything to help spawn, and instead was busy checking DT to see if he had not gotten hurt from the fall.
But miraculously this time, all Grams did was direct Karen and spawn to the laundry room to get her cleaned up and state, “You do not mess with DT; you only appreciate him from afar.”
Nothing much happened afterward, and since then, all three spawns never try to get close to him when playing on the terrace.
I did go over later that day to treat him to a slice of his favorite fruit, mango, for being such a good boy and exacting small revenge on those darn kids whom I loathe so fervently. And yeah, DT is an absolute jerk, even to me sometimes, but I love him to his last scale and wouldn’t trade him for any other pet in the world!”
14. Standing Up To A Bossy Work Colleague
Someone had to do it.
“I had a work colleague who was brought in by management on a large-scale project and was effectively given the green light to do whatever she wanted. This chick got intoxicated from the small bit of authority she had and made people’s lives a misery.
She absolutely hated my boss and was trying every trick in the book to make his life a misery. My job would take too long to explain, but I was effectively a go-to guy for quite a few aspects in the office, so I knew I was safe.
but she was trying to get him to quit or get me to leave his team.
What she didn’t know was my partner had moved home to Oz, and I had kept it a secret that I was going to follow after a few months. Life was ticking by, but this freaking she-beast pig dog was driving me up the wall.
My hours were being increased, the workload was phenomenal.
I asked her to get someone else in for me to train as I needed time off from time to time and always refused in the most passively aggressive way imaginable. Anyway, the date had been set and projects were coming to a head which would have seen my workload increase to new levels (I was pulling 14-hour days already).
I went up to my head boss and informed him of my decision and the reasons.
He offered to get me a visa for my partner and her old job back if I stayed (helped my ego as I was wondering was I bad at what I did as I was getting so much heat from this woman).
I refused, saying I’d need to leave in a month and needed two weeks off. He wished me well and understood my reasons. All my references were sorted everything was wrapped up.
The beauty of this was my other managers who were involved in the project hated this witch as well, so I told them of my plan.
They were all happy to play along and play dumb.
A big meeting was taking place later that day, and off she goes delegating like a champ to everyone bossing them all pushing people’s buttons. Then it came to my turn: I made a point of asking her if was there any scope to get someone in to help as I’m slammed as it is.
The usual dull tone response of go screw yourself, basically. Ok, no problem.
She starts to outline everything that’s going on and all the stuff I’ll have to do. The expectations were crazy, and her last sentence was, “So, you’ll have to do all that.”
No, I don’t think I will.
Her face twisted, and she snarled at me. “What do you mean you won’t do it?” “Like I said. I don’t want to do it, so I won’t. In fact, I quit. I’m moving to Australia in four weeks, and I’m taking a two-week holiday before I go.
So, screw you.”
Her face dropped. She was lost for words. She was scrambling saying, “I’d have to train someone.” I took out a copy of my contract and said my responsibilities were clearly defined, and I would honor those ones. As she hadn’t updated my contract and responsibilities, I wasn’t obliged to help her.
I also showed her the copy of the e-mail I had just sent to HR showing her responses to my objections about the hours I was working and her refusal to train anyone else.
My bosses at the table were losing their minds trying not to laugh in her face.
Walked out with one manager getting up to pat my back. Possibly told her to get screwed once or twice more, and this is what she had coming for her. All of her projects got screwed over, so other managers were able to crucify her.
She also got hauled up for the overworking and refusing help. And the best part is when the head honcho heard, he came down to actually say well played on telling her to get screwed (he had no idea what had been going on) and she walked by and heard him saying it to me.
The whole office knew what I did, and everyone was delighted someone screwed her over. I went back to visit at Christmas, and people still came up and said how happy they were I did it.”
13. Arrive Minutes Before Closing To Get Tons Of Groceries? We'll Waste Your Time
Just because a store is still open for a few minutes doesn’t mean you can simply sneak your way in and perform a regular shopping trip.
“I work in an East Coast supermarket chain as a front-end cashier.
Our store stops accepting new customers at 8:45 and closes at 9:00.
After this, we have to break down the aisles and clean, so we all leave around ten. If this schedule is disturbed, we all go home much later. Onto the revenge…
It was a Thursday night, and our store was running at a decent pace up until about 8:30, where only a few customers remained.
At 8:56, a customer walks up (C) with two carts of groceries, overflowing onto the floor as she dragged them along behind her. She’s a regular and does this same thing every time she comes in, even the managers complain about her.
We’ve always talked about ‘teaching her a lesson’ and such because she is just so nasty as well.
She walks up to me and says, ‘You’d better look a little more lively than that, I don’t want to be here all night!’ She began to haphazardly toss all her groceries across the belt, in no order whatsoever. I looked over at my bagger, and she looked like someone just killed her puppy, but I had an idea!
Her groceries needed to be sorted and carefully placed in carriages to avoid anything at all from being crushed, right? Just to give an estimation, a normal transaction runs about 3 minutes.
We made hers last about 15. We sorted everything into sections by item type, and then by subcategory. After each section, I stopped and waited for my bagger to finish, and would carefully review the last section to check for any double scanned items or incorrect prices.
After about two sections she began tapping her foot and sighing frequently…
(C) ‘Would you just hurry up?!’
(Me) ‘I’m just doing my best to make sure your order is correct!’ (retail smile)
(C) ‘Let me talk to your manager, smartie pants.’
I call over the manager and continue to carefully and precisely ring the order.
(C) ‘Look what he’s doing! This is OUTRAGEOUS I mean it’s 9:10 and I have places I need to BE. Do you know who I am?? etc. etc.’
(Manager) ‘He’s just doing his job, and very well I might add. You should come in earlier next time.
Have a good evening, ma’am.’
(C) -Sounds you would expect from a rabid dog-
I can see she’s paying with a check, so while she is chewing out the poor manager, I quickly remove the strip of ink from the printer and finish her order.
(Me) ‘Ok, the total comes to $407.67.
How would you like to pay?’
(C) ‘Check. And you’re lucky I’m paying at all.’
(Me) ‘I’m so sorry you feel that way!’
I take her check and place it in the printer. Oh no! It doesn’t work!
(Me) ‘Looks like we’re going to have to take you to another register, ma’am! Our check printer is actu…’
(C) ‘I’LL JUST PAY CASH!!’
(Me) ‘Okay, so sorry!’ (retail smile)
I slowly count her change (might’ve lost count a couple of times) and wish her a ‘night as wonderful as she is!’ We all stayed late that night, but no one complained even once.”
Another User Comments:
“When I was 17, I worked as a cashier at a fairly large grocery chain.
There was one regular that would come in any time from 7 pm until almost 11 pm when we closed. She was this miserable, middle-aged ex-teacher that was supposedly recovering from an injury.
She would make us bag everything in a paper bag placed in a plastic bag, and the rule was that we should be able to pick it up with our pinky.
She always came in alone and, wasn’t married, and didn’t have any kids, and I would catch her lifting 3-pack gallon jugs of water into the cart.
After her items were bagged, she would make one of the cart guys load her bags into her car.
I always wanted to ask her how she was able to carry the water jugs inside the house but bit my tongue. She eventually earned the name “Helpless” and was hated by everyone that worked there.
One night, I got fed up with her. It was ten minutes till closing, and she comes into my line with a huge cart of stuff.
So I take my time ringing everything up, and when I went to bag, I started putting just one item in each double-wrapped bag and weighing it with my pinky. She bought a candy bar? It got its own bag. Even a small bag of chips got its own bag.
I made sure to be overly dramatic and tell her that her single items were too heavy to bag according to her rule. To prove my point, I tried lifting it with my pinky and pretended that I was unable to lift it.
The whole process took a half-hour, and by the end, she was so angry. She even put the groceries in the car herself. After that night, I never saw her in my line again. Justice served.” I-am-not-spartan
12. Let Your Kids Act Out In The Grocery Store? I'll Leave Them A Little Something
Enjoy this little scent!
“Every Sunday I hit up my neighborhood grocery store for my weekly meal prep. I don’t like shopping so I make a list beforehand. I get there at 7:00 am and know where everything is, so I’m usually in and out of there in 15 minutes.
However, this particular Sunday I was busy in the morning and ended up at the store later than I prefer at 9:00 am.
After grabbing my cart I get stuck behind a group of slow walkers who are heading straight for the first aisle on my list.
Okay, change of plans, head to aisle 2 on my list. After grabbing my stuff there, I enter the other side of aisle 1 to get my things before heading to aisle 3. Of course, there is a woman with her 2 children standing right in front of what I need while she looks at the opposite side of the aisle.
I politely ask if I can grab a couple of things behind her. She makes a face and begrudgingly moves over.
I passed by the butter four times before I could get in the cooler because some woman was mining for gold or something. My body went on autopilot as the next thing I know I have a full cart and am standing behind two people at the checkout.
A family gets in line behind me and I’m not sure who I want to punch more:
The three children screaming and running around my legs, but not quite hitting me.
The silent father with dead eyes.
The mother, barely audible above the screams, telling her children, ‘You are not behaving very well right now,’ then immediately turning around and letting the kids continue.
Not wanting to cause a scene (and forever have to drive across town for groceries) I stewed. I’m now next in line when I feel a hand on my hip/butt. I turn to see a woman twice my age holding a bottle of booze. ‘Hey.
Lemme get ahead of you. I only have one thing I need to get out of here before my partner notices I left.’ My two modes at that moment are ‘catatonic’ and ‘murderous rage,’ so I take the high road and just let the lady go.
I’m staring daggers into the side of her head as she wills her last hopes into the card reader that the sub-$5 purchase is approved.
A guardian angel must have taken mercy on me as my first glimmer of hope came in the form of the cashier handing her a receipt and she exits.
Finally, the only thing standing between me and my now very much-needed booze is upon me.
I enter my loyalty number on the pin pad (gotta get them points) and put my card in the chip reader. The family behind me is standing much too close as I’m ready to enter my PIN.
Side note: I know I am grumpier than most, so I try to let the things that don’t physically harm me go.
However, one of my biggest pet peeves is people looming over my shoulder as I am entering my PIN. As I’m shifting my body to turn my back to the family, I feel it: last night’s dinner has descended, and it was packed with cheese, ground beef, and taco seasoning.
My guardian angel was still with me.
I stealthily enter my PIN and grab my card with the family still on my heels. Then, I released. Silent but deadly does not do this abomination justice. It was as if Satan himself was singing Careless Whisper. Pausing for just a moment to make sure the area of effect was centered at the family until the first stink particle hit my nose signaling my exit before it made me gag.
The heat leaving my pants with each step was symbolic of rising from the depths of darkness. With only a few yards before I was outside, I turned to see the children holding their noses with one hand and flapping the other and the once oblivious parents frantically looking around to find the source of the chemical attack.
I walked into the morning sun with a new lease on life and went home to a celebratory drink. Hopefully, the cashier can forgive me.”
Another User Comments:
“Ha! I did that waiting in line while some jerk kept bumping my heels with her cart. After I crop-dusted her. I almost lost it when the guy behind her waved his hand in front of his face and moaned, “Dang, who blew grit?”” filmcup
11. You Can Finish The Rest Of The Shift By Yourself
They wrongfully accused them of being a thief, so they left mid-shift.
“I once found myself in a situation where I was forced to take a job at Blockbuster Video. I had previously come from working in an independent store with lots of freedom, working with my closest friends, that eventually went out of business (go figure).
Anywho, my need for funds outstripped my pride, so I succumbed to the corporate machine that was Blockbuster video. Every day I put on that uniform, it stripped away a new layer of my soul. Regardless, I’m an amiable fella that tends to get along with everybody, so the new folks I worked with became fast friends – save for management.
The managers there were the stereotypical management archetypes we all love to hate from every film we’ve ever seen. So, while being amicable, I just couldn’t really get along with these two people – the Assistant Manager in particular. That being said, I always did my job and did it well – I just didn’t let those two push me around.
In hindsight, I was likely out of line sometimes, but there’s no fixing that today.
It’s probably worth noting at this point that before taking the job at Blockbuster, I had also sent out my resume to an agency in the video game industry that I was woefully underqualified for.
I somehow got an interview there, but nothing ever came of it.
Fast forward a few months, I’m working the mid-day shift at work on a Tuesday afternoon. This was at the height of the time where, if a new release wasn’t in, you could get a rain check to get it for free the next time around.
A couple had come in to rent a film that I thought was completely rented out when in actuality it wasn’t out yet (it was the “coming soon” boxes that were out on the shelves). I apologized to the couple and scanned the appropriate barcode to credit them for the film on their next visit.
The whole while the Assistant Manager is watching this unfold.
When the couple leaves, she explains the error that I had made and tells me that she is going to have to write me up for theft against the company. I’ve obviously a bit upset by this as I’ve never stolen anything in my life.
I explained that I didn’t see it as theft, but she won’t hear any of it and proceeds to write me up on a pink slip. Once she’s done she says I’ll have to sign the slip as an admission that I was aware that what I had done was wrong.
Needless to say, I refused to do it.
There was no way I was going to label myself as a thief when I had made a simple mistake in which my manager could have intervened and stopped.
As we’re arguing over the slip the phone in the store rings. The Assistant Manager picks up the phone and tells me it’s for me.
The voice on the other end is unfamiliar to me but rings some bells in the back of my mind. It turns out, it’s the man I had interviewed with months before for the job I was woefully underqualified for.
He explains that he had called my house (I was still living at home at the time), and my parents told him I was working.
When he heard I was working at Blockbuster, he decided I shouldn’t have to endure that for one more second (he was the best boss ever), so he asked for the local number there (he lived in Philly – I was in Canada) and called the store immediately to tell me I had the job if I wanted it.
Obviously, I said yes.
I hang up the phone with a grin on my face. The Assistant Manager says that if I don’t sign the slip right away, she’ll be forced to send me home without pay pending likely being fired. I say that I have a better idea and take my stupid Blockbuster shirt off there on the spot and tell her that she can kindly go screw herself, leaving her there to work the rest of the shift by herself with her stupid pink slip dangling in her hand.
I went in a couple of years later to rent a movie. She was serving me at the counter. The only thing I said to her was, “So, still working at Blockbuster, eh?”
I know that was a jerk-ish thing to say, but it was personally cathartic for me.”
10. Cut In Line? I'll Buy Your Candy
“It’s lunchtime and I’m purchasing a sandwich and drink from a local supermarket.
While I’m waiting in line, this woman is shrieking at her phone to who I can only presume is her partner. She’s visibly angering most people in the general vicinity with her swearing and general attitude.
As it’s coming up to my turn to check out, she’s decided she’s fed up with waiting and puts her big bag of M&M’s in front of my lunch on the conveyor belt and says, ‘I need to go first.’
Without so much as a moment to think and without making eye contact I pick them up and move them behind my items, saying nothing.
RED ALERT: DIVERT ALL POWER TO WITCH DRIVE
Woman: ‘What are you doing?’
Me: ‘I was here first, wait your turn.’
Woman: ‘Screw you, I am on my lunch break and I have a very important job blah blah blah…’ (I can’t remember the whole rant)
Me: ‘It’s lunchtime, everyone is on lunch, you have to wait.’
Woman: ‘Screw you! I asked nicely!’ (lolwut.)
At this point, the woman throws her M&M’s in front of my lunch still ranting and it’s now my turn to check out, enter Awesome Check-out Girl.
So after seeing the bag of M&M’s land on the conveyor, I decide, whatever and I accept the woman’s gracious offering and buy the M&M’s for myself, leaving her M&M-less.
Of course, the battle was not yet over, more screaming was coming my way.
Woman: ‘What are you doing, those are mine!’
Me: ‘Nope, I’m paying for them now, if you want M&M’s you’ll have to go get some and wait in line.’
Woman: ‘You’re a thief! You stole my M&M’s!’
Me: ‘No I just bought the M&M’s you rudely threw onto my pile of stuff.’
Woman: ‘I’m not getting anymore, give me my M&M’s back.
You’re a thief!’
Awesome Check-out Girl: ‘Ma’am, I suggest you go and get a new pack and wait in line, there are people waiting. The gentleman hasn’t stolen anything, he paid for the M&M’s.’
Woman: ‘Call the freaking manager, get this piece of trash kicked out for stealing.’
Me: ‘Mind if I step out anyway? I have a very important job and I’m on lunch?’
Woman: ‘Where are you goi-‘
Awesome Check-out Girl: ‘Sure, here’s your receipt.’
Me: ‘Thanks.’
To wrap up, the M&M’s were delicious, and I shared them with my co-workers.
Don’t know if the woman went back to get some, but I highly recommend them.”
9. Giving The Client The PowerPoint She Wanted
All they had to do was listen as part of the revenge.
“As a designer, I try to educate my clients on design and why something has to be done a certain way.
My agency is not cheap, so we make it quite clear that they are paying for our experience and knowledge, not some Photoshop monkey.
Most of the time, my clients are appreciative and enjoy extra guidance and professional advice.
Occasionally, we get “fun” jobs.
The sales pitch went well enough. The business owner, Bob, seemed like a decent guy and happy to trust our professional expertise. However, shortly after signing the deal, he brought on a new manager, Karen, who was put in charge of marketing, including the new website we were just contracted to do.
It quickly became clear that Karen thought of herself as a multi-disciplinary genius and despises us because she thinks she can do better than a professional design agency. Karen loves sending over incomprehensible design instructions and feedback in the form of design mock-ups she creates in Powerpoint.
They’re as ugly as the devil’s butthole after a strong curry, but we try our best to translate the abominations she birthed into good-looking professional design proposals that best reflect the intent of her ideas.
Karen did not like it one bit. Karen was rude, and uncooperative, and removed Bob from the email threads when we tried to reach out to him to get his opinion.
When we sent over a design, she would complain about how it wasn’t what she wanted and scream over the phone while our team patiently explained why we couldn’t design exactly as she wanted. Mainly: It would be ugly as heck, and nobody would want to do business with them with a website like that.
The last time Karen complained about how we were “stupid morons” for not doing what she wanted, we got her on the phone with Bob. She was screaming incomprehensibly, and nobody got a word in. Finally, Bob took her side and said, “Karen is extremely experienced and knows what she’s doing.
I want your team to FOLLOW EVERY INSTRUCTION, EXACTLY AS SHE ASKS.”
No problem.
Once again, Karen sent over a ridiculous 70mb Powerpoint. If we followed it exactly, it would look like a website from the 90s with the worst UX ever.
We went through every little pixel of her PowerPoint, asking her “So, do you want us to copy this… EXACTLY?” To which she would reply with a smug YES.
So, we documented her instructions down to the letter to cover our butts. Once again, we asked Bob: “Are you SURE?”
Reply: “Yes, please hurry up and make those changes exactly as she asked.”
Okie dokie.
We copied every ugly font choice, every terrible gradient, and every hideous element into the design.
We even went the extra mile to export the ugly lopsided shapes she drew as PNG graphics, so it would all be “exactly” as she wanted. Then we sent the design over: “Here is the design. We have done everything exactly as instructed!”
Karen once again replied, taking Bob out of the loop, “PERFECT! Now, it wasn’t so hard to do things EXACTLY ASK I ASKED, was it?”
We waited.
Bob exploded, demanding a meeting the very next day to explain why we were delivering such shoddy work.
We go to the meeting, and Karen starts demanding that we propose a completely new design.
We presented all past designs, the document in which Karen confirmed that she wanted all the changes, the countless emails in which we painstakingly explained to her why her ideas suck, and finally, the last email in which she praised us.
“You see, Bob, after our last call with you, we had followed Karen’s instructions TO THE LETTER, EXACTLY AS SHE HAD ASKED. She seemed very happy with it. I am confused, why the quick change of heart?”
I then pull out the contract and calmly point out the portion which stated the number of design proposals we would create.
Karen had used up all of it. I had reminded her that she was limited to X number of proposals, but she clearly didn’t remember any of it because she didn’t bother reading our emails and would keep talking or yelling over us when she spoke on the phone.
I looked Bob in the eye and told him he could either pay extra for each additional new proposal Karen wants or choose from the existing designs done. They ask for some time to discuss privately. We break for coffee.
“Well, Karen is extremely experienced in this field.
We will go with the last design since it is exactly as she wanted.”
Even my intern couldn’t hold back his surprise. As we drive back to the office, he asks, “Is Karen sleeping with Bob or something?”
I shrug. It’s his business, and we’re getting paid anyway, and he clearly doesn’t appreciate our design expertise after all.
The less time we spend arguing with them, the more time we could use to focus on my appreciative, good clients.
We make Bob and Karen sign off on the design and finish up the project quickly. Karen still tries to be difficult, but we stick to the contracted terms, and she couldn’t do anything.
2 months after the project ended, I get a call from Bob.
He began with some small talk about innocuous project-related business, but I realized it wasn’t the purpose of his call. Karen had been fired after making more serious mistakes causing major losses to his company. He sounded contrite but did not offer any real apology. “That’s terrible, Bob. I’m so shocked. I thought Karen was extremely experienced and knew what she was doing.””
8. My Parents Tried To Ruin My Hobby, So I Hurt Their Reputation Instead
“I (21F) live at home with my family, and because of that, my parent’s home address would also be my shipping address.
My main hobby is collecting anime figures. As the hobby suggests, I spend a portion of my spare time seeking out, negotiating, buying, selling, cleaning, and properly displaying figures that I have collected over the years.
I take great care to budget properly, and to be frank, I feel the hobby helped me develop a lot of facets in my life that I otherwise wouldn’t have bothered with.
My parents, however, do not like this hobby. While they are completely fine with compiling concert and football merch (and with my sister’s Taylor Swift and Broadway memorabilia), they see my cutesy, little figurines as the early onset of hoarding that MUST be stopped, lest I somehow get them featured on TLC’s Hoarders, Buried Alive.
Somehow, my collection has become the loose screw that is threatening to tear the family apart, as well as making me the local neighborhood embarrassment, in my mom’s eyes. For shame, OP, how dare you go out to greet the mail lady whilst collecting a package shipped in from Japan? What shall the neighbors think? -clutches pearls-
Naturally, in order to rein in their obviously wayward and delinquent daughter, my parents have tried to sabotage my hobby by outright saying that some of my packages weren’t for this house.
Yes, they would take the package, see my name, then hand it back to the mail woman and tell her it was the wrong address, forcing me to go to the post office to pick up the package.
My mother even jogged down the street with a package in hand, insisting that it wasn’t ours.
So, this was quickly becoming a problem. I had to waste my gas to go to the post office in order to get these packages because, and I dunno if y’all know this, these figures can range from 30 dollars to a whopping 400 dollars apiece.
Additionally, gasoline in the state that I live in is very taxed and super expensive. I wasn’t about to just let them go, regardless of price, because I had to work to earn that money, and my parents can kiss my butt if they think I’m going to let them get rid of a figure so easily.
I had tried to ask them to, you know, not do this, but they just give me the same, “My house, my rules. If I don’t want to accept your package, then I don’t have to!” or “I’ll stop when you stop ordering this useless garbage” speech.
Okay, fine. I wasn’t sure how to circumvent them interrupting my packages because I was working, so I couldn’t collect them myself nor could I rely on anyone to collect them other than my stay-at-home mother. But then, she said the line that inspired me to get revenge: “Amy, you really need to stop ordering these things! The mail lady is getting annoyed with having to always walk up our driveway!”
Ah, yes.
How inconsiderate of me, I had thought.
My packages force the mail lady to walk up our short little driveway in lovely suburbia. What should I do to make this right? Surely this warrants an apology!
Now, every time I see the mail lady, be it rain or shine, snow or sleet, I apologize profusely for ordering all my figures.
When she delivers a package with my name on it, I get especially dramatic about how sorry I am that I’m a terrible burden to her daily duties. The mail lady finds it hilarious, and my mother is utterly mortified. My mother has come out begging me to please stop the act, to which I always respond, “But mother! You told me that I am such an annoyance to poor Mail Lady.
I should at least apologize!”
This has been ongoing for six months. As of now, Japan has stopped shipping things into the USA, so a lot of my current orders are on hold until the ban is lifted. I think my parents think I have ceased collecting, and this tomfoolery, I have not.
It is only a matter of time before the bans are lifted, and my collecting and my profuse apologies can continue.
So, until then, I wait, bemoaning my existence to the poor mail lady and coming up with increasingly overdramatic apologies for this poor woman who had unintentionally (and hilariously) gotten caught up in mine and my parents’ drama.”
7. Sabotaging A Scammer Tour Guide
“I moved from the US to Trinidad. My parents come down at least once a year to visit, and we check out different sites, beaches, etc.
Last year, we wanted to go to Pitch Lake, a national park that is very far from Port of Spain.
It’s a big lake that is made of soft ‘tar’ or pitch. They used to extract it for export. Not too many people visiting TT will go there because of how remote the location is, but it’s a very cool site.
So we pull up, and this guy with one ear comes up.
He’s a tour guide. A quick talker and a salesman, but you can tell he knows his stuff. Said he’s been giving ‘tours’ since he was 14. Now, if you use one of these ‘unofficial guides,’ you can get into the parts of the pitch lake you can’t get to with the official guides.
We just started walking, and he followed up by giving his tour. We were all really surprised with how knowledgeable he was on the history, etc. His tour was very well-rehearsed.
It gets towards the end, and his ‘partner’ comes into the picture. This guy was intoxicated, and it was 10 am.
It’s evident he’s just trying to get some of the action, late in the game. We are wrapping up the tour, and it comes down to payment. The guy says he usually gets about $75 US per person for the tour. We are floored. I tell him no way.
Then his stumbling partner says that doesn’t include HIS fee. We eventually get the guy down to a workable but still inflated amount. His partner was pretty large, and it was becoming evident it was a hustle. To avoid getting shanked or something, we paid and left.
It kind of ruined the whole experience. I live here and know how much these guys probably make in a day WORKING, much less walking around spewing nonsense about a public property while drinking.
So, the last time they were here, we were heading to a beach that just so happened to be by where the pitch lake was.
It was early, probably like 9 am. I didn’t say anything to my mom and dad, and as we were passing, I just turned onto the road. “What are you doing?”
Sure enough, here is our one-eared hustler. He’s chatting up a group of about 12 tourists.
White as chalk and with fanny packs on, so I could tell they were most likely going for his sales pitch. They were all packing up water bottles into their packs for the tour. They were British, and the intoxicated strong man was there as well.
I pulled over the car and popped out of the driver’s seat.
Without going over to them, I yelled over, “Hey, is that the tour guide with one ear?” Almost like I was ONLY looking for the tour guide with one ear because he was so good. The guy yelled back, “Yes, sir, it is. The one and only” or something like that.
“Well, stay away from him! He’s a hustler.
He will overcharge you for this tour! Make sure to pay him in advance! And this guy will try to strong-arm you too!”
The one-eared guy started yelling back obscenities. The strong man started walking towards us; he was probably intoxicated and definitely angry. The British began to retreat and motion for their taxi van to leave the shade it was parked under and come collect them. Definitely lost him a load of funds in tour fees.
Now, every time I pass this place, I will pull into the Pitch Lake and try to screw up any shake this guy has going at the time.”
6. The Loud Music Will Stop One Way Or Another
“Okay, so this one is definitely just silly/petty, but it makes me laugh every time I think about it.
Little background. I worked for a company where it was literally just me and the boss/owner, so we rented half an office suite. His MIL convinced her company to rent out the rest of the space, and she brought 3 younger women to work with her.
I only remember one of their names. She was really cool; I’ll call her CC.
The other two were… loud, obnoxious, and dramatic as ever.
They were constantly getting in screaming matches with Boss-man’s MIL (their boss), so much so that the receptionist for the doctor’s office next door came to me asking what was going on.
One of them brings in her Google Home thing (Google Alexa) and starts playing music at max volume. It honestly wouldn’t have bothered me if it wasn’t for the fact that literally 50% of my job was making calls to clients, and they could hear the music over the phone (even with doors closed), and her taste in music was just… awful.
I asked her to turn it down to a respectable level where I didn’t have to listen to it. And she rolled her eyes at me and ignored me.
I could hear CC and MIL asking her to turn it down as well with zero results.
(Mind you, MIL is her boss). This went on for a week.
The following Monday, I notice that when she is playing music, in my notifications on my android phone is the song name/artist and the pause button. Curious, I hit it, and the sweet sound of silence kicked in until she obnoxiously screams, “Google, play music!” – this thing was synced to my phone.
Immediately I text CC to come to my office ‘Right. Now.’ She comes in asking why I’m so urgent, and I make her press the pause button. The music stops, and her eyes light up. Loud, the chick yells for the music to play.
We laugh about it, and I tell her that I’m going to help solve the music problem if she is willing to put up with it for a bit.
She agrees excitedly and runs back to her office to continue working.
The loud girl plays her music. She yells at it to change songs, and as soon as the song starts, I pause it. She tells it to play. I pause it again. I repeated the pattern every couple hours or so daily (usually in groups of 3s), and I could hear her yelling about it being ‘broken or something.’ The time comes when she actually has to do work because ‘big boss’ has noticed she hasn’t been doing jack.
And she pauses the music to make a call.
As soon as I hear her voice introduction, I hit play. She apologized, tells Google to stop the music, and I let her continue her call. She plays one song and makes another call. I do the same thing.
(I’m sure y’all see where this is going.)
Essentially, I just kept it from playing when she wanted music and played it when she didn’t. She was getting so mad, I swear I heard her smashing things. I did this all week. Until Friday. I had finished my work for the week early and decided it was time to really mess with her.
Pause music – she says “Google..” – play music
Pause-play-pause-play (etc.) for a solid 10 minutes before she finally just unplugs it, screams about returning it, and takes it home.
She got fired the following Monday for being a straight-up jerk and a bad employee. During the fight (because, of course, she has to scream at her now ex-boss), MIL brings up the music and actually says, ‘The only reason you lasted through the week was because it was broken and wouldn’t play your awful music!'”
5. Getting A Lady Kicked Out Of Her Apartment For Leaving Dog Poop Everywhere
“My SO and I were renting a ground floor unit at a really nice apartment complex. I wouldn’t say it was a luxury apartment or anything, but our ground floor unit had a little patio off the back that led out into a really nice courtyard area with hammocks, a walking path, an outdoor fireplace/seating area, etc.
A lot of people walk their dogs out there or let their kids play out in the grass, including us.
We have a 1-year-old Cane Corso. We got her when we’d been living in the unit for about 2.5 months, and she was only 8 weeks at the time.
She’s a really good dog, and we trained her well. We could let her out to go potty, and she’d come right back even if there were distractions/people/dogs out (we always stood on the patio and watched her anyways because our pet agreement said we couldn’t leave our dog unattended).
Then we’d go pick up her poop right away if she pooped (also part of the pet agreement as I’m sure is standard at most apartment complexes). We kept a small step trash can outside specifically for her poop bags because we didn’t want to throw them away inside, and the only outside trash cans were on the other side of the building (which I agree is super dumb).
It really was a small trash can, like the kind you’d tuck into the bathroom between the toilet and the wall.
We also had her poop bags hanging on our patio door handle for easy access, so we didn’t have to hunt for them every time we needed them.
This lady and her kid moved in on the ground floor in our building, two units down from us. No biggie. We ran into her one day carrying in groceries, and my SO held open the door for her. She seemed kind of Karen-ish but was polite, and her kid (probably 10- to 11-years-old) didn’t look up from his phone.
Whatever, that’s pretty typical of kids these days. They also had a dog, a little black and white fluffy thing – super cute but not trained very well. Don’t know what kind of dog, but it was much smaller than our already giant puppy.
After about two weeks or so, we realized that there were dog turds in the grass right off our patio.
We found out the hard way because my man stepped in it the first time.
Luckily, he wasn’t barefoot. They were clearly not our dog’s turds as 1.) we always picked up her poop right after she went, and 2.) they were very obviously from a small dog, not our 70-pound puppy.
We’d been in the apartment for about 7-8 months at that point and had never had an issue with this, so we figured it was EM’s little dog. So, I wrote her a polite note that basically was like, “Hey neighbor! We noticed that some of your dog’s poops aren’t being picked up and are right off our patio.
Per the pet agreement we all have to sign, we all need to be picking up our own dog’s poop each time they go. I’m sure it was an accident, and you just didn’t notice, so if you could make sure to do that going forward we’d appreciate it! -Your neighbors in (unit#).”
She wasn’t home, so I slipped it under the door and went back to my apartment.
A couple of hours later, this lady is banging on my door and gets really angry with me, insisting that it couldn’t have been her dog and how dare I assume.
I felt really bad, and I apologized immediately and said I didn’t mean to offend her and that it must have been someone else.
She told me never to bother her with “nonsense like this again” and stormed off. I was like okaaaaayyyyy.
Not three days later, I was sitting on my patio with a book enjoying the cool weather when I see their little dog run out of their back door – no one with it – and it comes over to me.
I said hello to the pup (because I love pups), and then it took a poop right off our patio, ran back home, and scratched the door to be let in. I saw her kid slide the door open enough to let the dog in and then closed it again without coming outside to pick up the poop.
I was annoyed because here I saw it with my own eyes that it WAS their dog, and no one was even watching it when it was outside.
So I grabbed a poop bag, picked up the poop, wrote another less polite note about her kid neglecting to watch the dog or come to check if it had pooped/pick up after it, and dropped the poop bag and the note on their patio right by the door, then went back to my reading.
EM was quicker to come by this time and stomped right up to me, waving the note around. She then stated that her kid was just a kid and probably just forgot to check.
I said I didn’t care; her kid was old enough to stand outside for 3 minutes and come pick up the dog’s poop.
She said, ‘Well, there’s no poop bags/trashcans on this side of the building’ and that she didn’t feel comfortable making her kid walk all the way around the building for that.
The next part is my own fault, in hindsight. I suggested she put a trash can like mine on her patio and leave their own poop bags handy like we do for our dog.
She eyed our stuff, huffed some more, rolled her eyes, refused to do anything about the poop, and walked off. At this point, I was super annoyed.
I stalked my patio door for the next couple of days as much as I could, just waiting. And sure enough on day 2 in the evening when I was about to give up, I see the puppy run outside towards my patio.
I whipped out my phone, took some pictures of the dog outside alone (not allowed) and the dog pooping and then took another phone an hour later of the poop still there and timestamped all of them. Then I sent an email to the apartment office people who were always pretty nice, and they responded quickly saying they would give her a warning about it.
And sure enough, this lady comes back AGAIN to get mad and yell at me about how petty I was to report them to the office, and now they had a $150 fine for not picking up their dog poop. (It’s worth noting that these fines were rare.
PooPrints were not used at this complex.
In order for the office to fine someone for dog poop, they had to have proof it was that specific tenant’s dog’s poop and that it wasn’t picked up. Hence the photos I’d taken and timestamped.) I told her that I had tried to be nice about it with her TWICE before, and it was her own fault at that point for not abiding by the terms of the pet agreement we ALL had to sign (everyone who had a dog at least).
She went off about how she’s a single mom, and she works during the day, and her precious baby can’t be expected to pick up after their dog. I told her that a 10/11-year-old was plenty old enough to pick up after a dog and that if they weren’t responsible enough, then maybe the kid shouldn’t be letting the dog out at all, and she should be the one to do it or maybe whoever is home with him should be looking after it.
She got angry, told me I had no idea how to be a single mom, that her mom stays with him during the day and shouldn’t be expected to look after her kid and her dog, and then she stomped off again.
I expected to hear more about it, but I didn’t.
(The ironic part is I AM a single mom; my kid isn’t my SO’s, and I raised him alone for 2.5 years before I met my SO, so yes, I do know how hard it is, and I live 1,000 miles from my closest family, so I never even had the luxury of being able to have my mom watch my kid.)
Over the next couple of weeks, we didn’t find any more dog poop off our patio.
But we did notice our poop bags were depleting and our trash can filling up way more quickly than usual. I had my suspicions and wanted to test it. We had recently bought some small security cameras for the inside of our apartment for different reasons, and I had my partner set one up outside on the patio.
We faced it where it could see our door and trash can but didn’t point to the rest of the courtyard or other people’s units (we respect privacy around here).
Sure enough, the same evening my partner set it up, I see the kid walk onto our patio, take a poop bag, walk out of frame, and then come back to throw it in our trash can.
Okay. Now I’m ANGRY but also not trying to fight this lady or her kid. So I moved the poop bags to the inside door handle. It’s a glass door, so you can still see them, but we always lock our sliding door.
The next morning, I hear someone knocking on the back patio door, and I go to see her kid standing there looking annoyed.
I didn’t open the door; I just spoke loudly enough to ask what did he need. He demanded a poop bag for his dog’s poop. I said I’m sorry, but these are our poop bags for our dog, and they weren’t free for anyone else to use.
The apartment provides poop bags in a dispenser near the trash can on the other side of the building.
The kid started demanding a poop bag, saying his mom told him he could use ours, slapping his hands on the glass a few times (trying to scare me? Yes, I’m so terrified of a ten-year-old boy…), and finally screaming at me that he’s telling his mother on me.
I said, ‘Fine, go ahead; I’ll tell her the same thing.’
Sure enough, a few minutes later, his mom is standing on my patio also demanding a poop bag for her dog’s poop.
I denied her a bag and asked her to please step off of my patio as she was making me feel unsafe and uncomfortable (my SO wasn’t home).
She told me I was a bratty child (I’m 24…), and she demanded I let her use my poop bags as I had already told her she could before. I said, ‘No, I told you to get some yourself and do what I do – keep them close by and put your own trash can on your own patio – not use the bags I buy with my own money for my own dog and then fill up my tiny trash can with your dog’s poop.’ I pointed out she could use a plastic shopping bag if she didn’t want to buy her own poop bags, or she could use the bags the complex provided on the other side of the building.
She kept going off on me, and I finally told her if she didn’t leave my patio, I’d call the police as she was harassing me (the apartment office was closed on Sundays, and of course, it was Sunday). She acted like she was going to call my bluff, but then my man got home and walked up behind me to ask what was going on, and she ended up dragging her kid away – again, leaving the poop in the grass off my patio.
So, once she was gone, I took ANOTHER timestamped picture of the dog poop, downloaded the footage from my security camera of her kid stealing my poop bags and throwing them in my trash can, and the footage from them that morning yelling at me and demanding my bags and my denying them, and emailed all of it to the apartment management.
I told them that she made me feel unsafe and uncomfortable in my own home and that she and her child felt entitled to come onto my patio and take my belongings.
I also went outside, picked up her dog’s poop, looked in the trash can on my patio, and pulled out the bags with her dog’s poop (they were significantly smaller than my dog’s poops as I’m sure any dog owners could tell the difference in poops of a 12lb dog vs a 70lb dog).
I went and opened all the bags and dumped the poops straight on her patio right outside the door.
On Monday, I heard back from the office lady who said she would take care of it.
By Friday, there was a moving truck, and the lady and her kid were moving out.
Pretty sure they were evicted or at the very least urged to move before a formal eviction process was initiated. After talking to some of our other, much friendlier neighbors, it turns out we weren’t the only ones who had been complaining about her. They’d only lived in the complex for like 2-3 months before they made so many enemies that they were kicked out.
Sometimes I think I should feel bad for playing a part in them getting evicted, but honestly, I can’t bring myself to feel guilty about it. Not my fault she was a lazy, entitled witch who couldn’t even be bothered to get a shopping bag to pick up her dog’s poop.
I never heard from her about the poops I dropped on her patio, but I like to think she stepped in them without looking and knew better than to come complain to me about it.
Sorry, not sorry.
(Also, I’m sure they were given more than a week to vacate as those are the tenancy laws here, but she packed up and left like a bat.
Guess she didn’t want to stay somewhere she was clearly seen as an enemy… I don’t know for sure that she was evicted or if she was just asked to leave or abide by the lease or what. The office can’t give out that type of info, and she and I weren’t exactly on speaking terms for her to give me the scoop about it.)”
Another User Comments:
“As a pet owner, it drives me crazy to see people not picking up after their pets! I rent too, and them being bad pet parents reflects badly on us all.
In my town, there is only one set of rentals that allow pets, so getting evicted means homelessness if we can’t find a private unit.
We’ve been warned by our landlord from a complaint, us and the neighbor. We’re the only ones who keep our dogs on leash and always pick up immediately, and other units let their dogs run out and go wherever and pick up once or twice a month.
One lady picks it up and throws it over the fence. It’s gross, and we can’t use our patio because of flies.
But we’re not the ones causing the problem, but we can easily be kicked out if we get another complaint. I should install cameras to the courtyard to prove that it’s not our dogs just to be safe.” Greenfireflygirl
4. You Won't Be Taking My Space For Long
“Disclaimer: I am no longer the young person I was when I did this.
So, back in 1998 or so, I was living in an apartment complex in Lancaster, PA. I had just moved away from my Mormon family who was devastated that I wouldn’t drink any more of the Joseph Smith (Con-man) Kool-aid ™.
I was enjoying living with my super immature partner who still came home and snuggled with her STUPID Talking Winnie the Pooh Bear (which I later microwaved; keep that quiet as I never told her).
So, she moved out. Then one day as the weather turned wintery, it started to snow pretty well.
I had two cars at the time, and they were around the corner of my building in the lot. As the snow got around 6″–10″ deep, it finally quit. I went out, and like my neighbors, I was shoveling out the spaces where the cars were.
Once they were all cleared, I put them back. By this time, it was getting darker, and I needed some grub. So, I got in the car and went out. I came back to see my neighbor’s car in my space. She was a middle-aged, larger woman who lived on the same side as me.
So, I just knocked and asked if she would give me space back.
She proudly informed me that there were no assigned spaces in the lot. So, it’s first come first steal as it were.
I was able to dig out another space a few down and parked there for the night.
The next afternoon, my friend was up visiting. I told him what happened, and he thought it was pretty awful, and then I thought to myself, “She really wanted that space. Who am I to deny her the spot and all that it contained?”
So, we decided to replace the snow that was removed and then some (pro-rated for loss from melting).
We cleared out 4 other spaces and put the snow all around the car and even rammed it underneath, careful not to damage the car at all. (We may be jerks, but we still respect property.) I’m talking snowplow forcing it under all 4 sides (all while singing Dirty Deeds by AC/DC).
The neighbors saw what we were doing and were laughing like crazy. Plus, we were shoveling out their spots, so it was community service (as Jesus would do).
We then brought out buckets of water and dumped them all over the car. It froze quite nicely.
So, in this parking lot, you saw a minor amount of snow in a few spaces, and this vehicular ice sculpture compacted into the white lot lines.
All witnesses swore they didn’t see a thing which was neighborly. The next day, I came out to see her and two maintenance men trying to free the car from the space.
They couldn’t budge it.
I later got a call from the main office from a lovely older lady named Marsha. She asked if I could stop in. So, I grinned and walked up to see her. As I walked in smiling, she looked back with the same look and was holding back laughter, and let me know that there are no assigned spaces in the lot.
I told her that I agree and that I thought it’d be selfish of me to keep the snow that was in it to myself, so I simply put it back. She also told me that I was being accused of breaking her car antenna.
It was broken for as long as I could remember; it was an old 80’s Dodge/Chrysler New Yorker/Dynasty.
So, she didn’t pursue it.
When the car was finally removed 2 days later, the shape of the undercarriage was imprinted in the ice it was sitting on. It was all the way under. So, essentially, we put the car on an ice shelf when ramming snow underneath.
She didn’t take my space anymore. (Come to think of it, no one did.) We didn’t talk either. So, two problems solved.”
3. Forget I Have Access Over The Router?
“My roommate in college was a selfish jerk. Now I have known him since preschool, and we are still friends, but he is one of those people you cannot live with.
He attended the local tech school that is supposed to be a pipeline into the main school that third roommate and I attended.
However, he barely went to class and sat around playing Xbox…my Xbox specifically, which is where this story begins.
He used to have friends over all the time, and mostly, they’d play Xbox. Now I don’t like having a TV in my bedroom, so I set up my flatscreen and Xbox in the living room.
I’d like to note that both he and the third roommate had Xboxes as well, but they had theirs set up in their respective rooms.
When the latest (at the time) Call of Duty came out, we would spend hours playing together in a big squad.
That is until the third roommate’s Xbox got the red ring of death. Shortly after, my Xbox got the red ring of death.
Well, we think it’s all good because our jerk roommate has the next-gen Xbox 360 that wasn’t prone to the same issue. We’ll just move his Xbox out to the living room, so we can keep playing COD Zombies.
The response 3rd roommate and I got was, and I quote, ‘Nah, I don’t want people playing it all the time because it will probably break. Plus, what if you and our 3rd roommate are playing it, and I want to play by myself?’
We were livid.
How could he spend all that time using my stuff and not extend the same courtesy?
At the time, I had supplied the router for the internet in the house, which meant I alone had the admin password. I also found out you can block specific MAC addresses.
Well, guess who couldn’t connect to Xbox Live when he wanted to play online? I would turn it on and off sporadically over the next few weeks. I found out he spent like 4 hours calling both Time Warner and Microsoft trying to get the issue resolved.
Eventually, he started to put two and two together about when it would go out and come back. You’d think I would stop, but I adapted. I found out that you could open a port to remotely access your router from the internet. At the time, I had a blackberry (I know, I know), which could load the HTML router config page.
Thus, I started turning off his access when I was gone. I was even away one weekend at our rival school and shut him down from 3 hours away.
To this day he still doesn’t know it was me. I still go over to his house and hang out on the weekends.
Screw you, dude. I know they taught us sharing in preschool.”
2. Try To Make Me Fail My Internship? Not On My Watch
“I was doing an internship as a teacher. In my country, it is a required part of becoming a teacher.
I had 3 colleagues. A stoner I didn’t much care for and a South African emigrant/immigrant (she kept coming and going) who I was friends with.
You can see where this is headed.
Well, the stoner turned out to actually be kind of nice. Not competent but nice. My “friend” was relatively competent but secretly a witch and extremely lazy and just rested on the laurels of her English being “that good” TM.
Well, I spent a year doing my thing, not really trying to upstage her but just doing my job.
I was actually better than her.
Our uni professors would ask us what we wanted to teach, and we would give our favorite languages. She would say she didn’t want to teach. The contempt in our professors was obvious when they asked what she was doing there if that was how she felt.
It didn’t appeal to her. Not a good thing for a teacher in training to say to fellow teachers.
So, the final evaluation period comes around, and she tells me flat out in the middle of a class that she is gonna do her best to screw me over because she can’t have me have a better mark in the end because she speaks English as her first language.
Big whoop.
So, I get to the meeting and let her parade her reasons as to why I’m a bad teacher: I talk to my students. I write words with mistakes in them (she didn’t know how bearing as in bearing in mind was spelled). I use too many audio-visual materials (wait, what?)…
I just let her go on for about half an hour while I take notes.
Then she realizes what I’m doing but still asks why I’m writing this down.
I tell her to proceed.
Now, our meetings were supposed to be open meetings, meaning we could criticize but expect the person to defend their actions so we could learn from each other.
I replied to each minor gripe she had with my classes. We are meant to talk to our students; good relation with them is important.
Words were spelled as I did, not as she thinks. We are actually encouraged to use as many audio-visual materials as we can cram in; the kids love them, and anything that engages their attention is great.
But all of this wasn’t me being petty… Well, maybe it was.
What I considered being absolutely petty was ending my little defense by saying that I couldn’t believe I was taking criticism from someone who was never at school despite living right in front of the school while I had to catch a 25-mile bus ride every day just to get to work.
I also mentioned how I couldn’t believe I was being criticized by someone who had such poor control over verbs and adjectives, and she would be “more betterer” off frying chickens.
I have to explain this last one, the one I consider truly petty but well deserved considering the nightmare she put me through.
She worked weekends at her mom’s fried chicken restaurant.
She also didn’t know how to say better so she said “more betterer” in front of a class with 2 uni professors there, one of which was in this meeting. The students caught her, tried to correct her, she said that was the correct form.
When she turned to write on the board the students all looked at us at the back of the room, and we nodded in agreement that she was off her lid and let her carry on.
She turned red. The professor caught wind of the storm coming and just said that she agreed my “friend” was being overly critical and that she thought my classes were good and saw no point in her remarks and that she knew there was something fishy with them but was going to mention that in her final report.
It was still a month until everything was official, and we were just going through the motions, but we pretty much knew our marks.
I managed to get a higher mark than she did and never spoke to me again, not that I’m complaining.
She did try to appeal, but it turns out, both of them should have flunked out because they were absent all the time, but the school we trained at would keep that under wraps as it reflected poorly on the institution.”
1. Light Jalapenos? Not For An Entitled Jerk
“This happened a handful of months ago, but I just thought of it now.
I used to work for a well-known sandwich shop that we’ll call Locomotive-Transport. We closed fairly late (11 PM), and my boss was a lovely guy who decided that clocking in/out was a bad system and instead would simply stop paying us at 11:30, meaning we had to get everything put away, cash drawer counted, dishes done, and everything clean by 11:30 if we wanted to get paid for it.
We had two people on shift at night, and we usually got it done by 11:15, assuming no one came late and that the computer worked at a decent speed (rare). Please note “assuming no one came late;” this is important.
Personal rant: I don’t know why anyone would want a sandwich at 11 at night.
I feel like if you wanted a sandwich that bad, you had enough time during the day to do it, but that’s just a simple wage slave’s opinion. All this to say, it was generally considered a jerk move to come within 15 minutes of close time.
So, one night, I’ve got my headphones in one ear, the drive-thru headset on the other, and I’m jamming and putting the food away. I’ve got everything put up and 5 minutes to close. I’m just wiping stuff down, excited to try and get out early.
Usually, I would have turned off the open sign and the headset by now, but I got caught up in my j a z z and forgot. Didn’t remember until I heard it: the dreaded beep.
To hear the beep after the food is put away and the utensils are clean is like watching a movie character where the serial killer catches them right as they’re dialing the last 1 of 911, only you’re that basic white girl that ignored the creepy sounds in the house way longer than any rational human would have.
It grips your soul and twists like God himself is ringing you out like the pathetic, little, wet-rag person you are. People have cried, and I’m not ashamed to say I’m one of them.
Tonight was no time for tears, however. Tonight was the time for rage and anger.
Tonight was the night for REVENGE.
I pressed the talk button and gave my spiel.
Me: “Welcome to Locomotive-Transport. What can I get for ya?” (I’m extra cheerful and loud to drown out my coworker’s sobs in the background.)
I can hear them laughing and talking to each other in that certain way that every fast food employee recognizes: teenage boys.
Instead of my usual shivers of fear, my heart steals further and icy determination settles on my patented customer service smile ’cause screw dem kids.
PB1: “Um… give me a second…”
Me: “Take your time, just know we close in about 5 minutes.”
PB1: “Haha, oh no. Can I get a Locomotive Frat with uh… -cheese we don’t have-?”
I will save you the molasses-slow order this child put me through, but needless to say, by the time he finished, we were now two minutes to close.
Me: “Alright, is that all for you tonight?”
PB1: “Uh… yeah that’ll be it.”
Me: “Alright, total will be ready at the window-“
PB2: “Can I get a sandwich order? Light jalapeños. Make sure there’s not too many.”
Now, friends, I thought about this all the time. I absolutely cannot stand spicy food, but if I’m in the mood for pain, I’ll occasionally get one or two.
Locomotive-Transport’s policy was 6, but 8-9 was usually what we put on. Light jalapeño meant 3-4. You can all see where this is going, but apparently, Jerk Squad did not.
They pull up and pay, paying no mind to the fact that it is now closing time.
The sign is off; it’s 11:01. I’m beyond angry but still customer service ready.
I pull all the food I need back out again and make the first sandwich as fast as I could, then I get to work on the jalapeño sandwich. I make it with all the normal proportions, but looking into that giant bin of peppers, I let out the evilest cackle I could manage and plopped on as big a handful as I could.
My coworker comes out of the back to find me full-on Joker laughing over this bread and jalapeño abomination. I struggled to wrap the thing; I was laughing so hard.
I quickly shoved the sandwich in a bag, composed myself, and practically tossed it into the car with a, “Have a great night!” The Jerk Squad, not wanting to spend a moment longer than necessary with the common working class, speeds off without a word.
I smile, for even as I finish my work late, I am happy. I have toppled the Capitalist Giant; I have won.
I know it’s small, but it was like watching that witch Veruca fall down the trash chute in Willy Wonka. It didn’t benefit me at all, and the moment was short, but it’s that warm feeling of “screw you” that’s stayed with me for so long.”
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