People Recount Their Cold-Hearted Revenge Stories
16. Don't Mess With Your Employee, She Just Might Take Over Your Company
Bet they didn’t see that coming!
“My spouse was the second person hired at a consulting company in a very specialized industry.
In her 15 years with the firm, it grew to a respectable three office (8-10 employees at each location) entity.
She and the owner grew the business on the contacts, expertise, and presentation of my partner to the extent that my woman’s abilities and education were the main reason the new business came through the door.
Over the years, her scope of responsibility grew so that the owner was basically 75% absent and mostly unaware of day-to-day activity. As he got more and more removed from the business, he would make overtures that he would eventually retire and sell her the business.
He was so dependent on her income-generating that he took out a life insurance policy on her.
I did not involve myself too much, but at a major industry dinner party I attended with her, he introduced my woman to the table as “my girl Friday,” basically a secretary (which was weird).
Over the years, she tried to get an agreement in place to buy the firm, even if it was years away.
He always delayed and made promises but never followed through.
I told her, “This guy doesn’t respect you or your contribution. He will never sell you the business because there is no reason to. He can make more by stringing you along, and essentially: You are the business; why would he sell it to you?”
One day out of the blue, my partner received a raise and bonus (a very minor amount of money) and a contract that included a non-compete, non-disclosure agreement.
After reading it, she realized that the owner was trying to lock her down from leaving for another firm.
(She had been getting feelers from other companies.)
To make things even more suspicious, she received a call from a competitor who said they were in the final stages of due diligence, and they wanted to meet her. The jerk was selling the company and didn’t think to tell her or ask if she was interested in buying it.
She ignored the agreement, and there were no other agreements in place. She was totally free.
My partner is extremely loyal. She has missed so many special days working for this guy, stuck around when they were wobbly, even skipped paychecks when there were tough financial times.
She was furious, the absolute maddest I’ve ever seen her. We discussed starting her own firm, and I asked, “How much business is contractually obligated to stay there if you leave?” It turned out that most agreements were either handshakes or 30-day at-will.
I also asked, “How many would leave with you?” She said about 75% including her biggest source of revenue who didn’t even know the owner.
In a very short time, my lady took a 3-week vacation. (She had months of unused time.) During which time, she rented an office (in the same building!) and made all the arrangements to set up a new shop.
She agreed to leave any and all company property behind and do her best to give the old company no obvious ammo for litigation.
She called her clients and said, “I’m leaving. If you want to look into relocating your account with my new company, you’ll need to quit the old one before we can discuss it.” Most understood the implication.
While she was on vacation, she received a panicked call from her boss, “We lost XYZ company. Do you know anything about it?” She said, “I’m sorry, but I just sent you an email; I’ve resigned. All my keys and company stuff is on my desk.
Buh Bye.”
The new firm took basically 90% of the business and seamlessly transitioned into the same company as it was before but with a new owner. Even most of the office staff would come aboard.
Within a year, her old company closed down except for the small office her old boss ran. She sees him once in a while, and he just scowls at her.”
15. I Don't Get My Bonus? The Department Of Labor Wants To Have A Word With You
Play it fair next time.
“I had a great job I loved. Got paid decently, had a wonderful window office with a view, great supervisor; I was just happy.
I didn’t get along too great with my other co-workers, but no worries; that’s because I liked being left alone to get my job done.
One day, our supervisor announces he’s leaving to move on to bigger and brighter things. I was really bummed.
He was cool and kept up the morale. Shortly after he leaves, they promote this horrible vile creature to manager.
She was a selfish manager. I’ll call her BM.
BM hated me. She never really worked with me and refused to talk to me. She went as far as ignoring me in the hallway when I said hi; she would just avoid eye contact and walk on.
If I ever made a “mistake,” she would hold a group meeting to have me tell people what I did, then she would tell me it was all wrong, I messed up bad, and told everyone I didn’t even understand basic things and the right way to do things.
Well, I understood the right way to do things. Any mistakes were mostly due to miscommunications or me overthinking, not because I didn’t understand the basics.
But she never talked to me about it, only would publicly shame me. Oddly, I was the one she always went to if someone else made a huge mistake because I would methodically work to repair everything (even though she claimed I was incapable of understanding anything).
BM made my last few months there awful. I was working my behind off since we were understaffed and the only other person who could help just went off to work on his own project.
When we finally got new people, I was in charge of helping to train them. Once they got slightly trained up around came review time. I was worried because BM hated me, so I knew I wouldn’t get my full bonus.
I had been reporting her to HR for the way she had been treating me and was told, “You should look for a new job.” Well, I sit in for my review and am flat out told I didn’t understand how to do my job, didn’t understand the basics of the industry, and was pretty worthless.
Wait. I did all the work and kept our department afloat for months, I trained the new people, I repaired their mistakes, but I’m the bad one?
I could go on, but needless to say, BM seals the deal. I was done. I typed up my rebuttal to the review (stating the lies she told me and attaching pages of proof). I printed it out, along with a resignation letter, and left.
(I work in an at-will state and company policy doesn’t require a notice.) I had already been job hunting and had an offer, so no need to stay.
And now for the revenge. I am always a fan of ‘cover your butt.’. I save copies of emails, timecards, everything. When my final paycheck came in, I realized I was short-changed on vacation time. No biggie in a way, a quick call to HR, and I would have had a check the next week.
Except HR were the ones who failed to do anything about BM when she was humiliating me and lying on my review.
Instead, I reported them to the Department of Labor. They must have been a bit backed up at the time because it took them nearly a year to get to my case. That was fine by me. You see, the longer a company goes without paying you, the higher the fines, and the more they owe you. Not only did I get my missed vacation time paid out, but they had to pay me extra to make up for withholding that pay for so long, I made up a little for the missed bonus.”
14. Copy My Work... If You Dare
“I don’t have a problem with helping classmates. I really don’t.
I even tutored several classmates during my final semester of undergrad because they needed help.
They all ended up passing their classes with my assistance.
This story comes from a particularly tough Business Information Systems class during my undergraduate education. The students in this class were mostly nontechnical business majors, so this new material wasn’t at all similar to anything we’d learned in other classes.
Needless to say, most of the students were struggling, including me.
I still had a 4.0 in college at this point (though, I finished with a 3.99), and I was willing to put in the max effort to keep my stellar GPA.
I started studying hard. I made my own Quizlet sets, I read the book every night, I finished assignments a week early, and I did outside research.
After grinding it out in this class for about a month, I was working on an assignment in a room designated for quiet homework time, and that’s where our story begins.
Several other students from my class were there and working on the same assignment I was on. Judging by the sighs of exasperation, the irritated whispers, and requests for help, they weren’t having much success.
Having studied relentlessly for a month, I was having an easier time of it. As I got up to go get some water from the fountain in the hall, a classmate asked for my help. I told him I could do that, and I’d be right back.
I returned a few minutes later to find what I can only describe as a bunch of busy bees happily working away.
This was strange since they were hopelessly stuck 2 minutes before, but whatever.
My classmate tells me he figured it out without me.
Now, I’m not an idiot, so I know the 5 people in this room probably copied my work off my computer when I went to get water. Scumbag move number one.
But as it turns out, no one in the class needed help the next day or the day after.
Whoever in the study room had stolen my work had forwarded it to most of the class. Scumbag move number two.
I don’t mind being helpful, but I hate being used, so I made a plan to get back at the people who had stolen my work.
It didn’t take long to organize my plan and carry it out. Here’s how it went:
I changed the answer on the next assignment by multiplying by -1.
$1,500 became -$1,500 on this question.
The next week, I left my computer in the same place as before and went to get water, just like I had done the week before. 75% of the people in my class of 40 people put -$1,500 as the answer to question 3, which was definitely incorrect.
I began studying relentlessly for the midterm.
Our professor had said he wouldn’t adjust the weight of the test (something like YourScore/50 on a test with 60 points available, so your score of 40 becomes 80% instead of 67%) if anyone scored particularly well. This class was difficult, and no one was expecting anyone to score over 75%, so all my classmates figured the weight of the test would be adjusted.
My plan was to “wreck the curve” (even though it’s not a curve) and deny everyone the adjusted weight by producing a sufficiently high score.
I recruited a classmate who hadn’t stolen my work to study with. Together, we aimed to score high enough that our professor couldn’t adjust the weight of the midterm.
Here’s how it all played out:
No one who copied me realized the answer was incorrect. Every last one of those idiots submitted the wrong answer to question 3.
This next part surprised me, but my classmates began insisting the class was unfair, too difficult, or rigged and launched these complaints at our professor.
One day after class, I had the following exchange since I was the last student out of the classroom:
Professor: OP, do you think this class is too hard?
Me: Honestly, this class is hard, but if people spent as much time studying as they did complaining, they’d be fine. They really need to just get to work.
Professor: I thought the same.
Me: (deciding spur of the moment my next move) I also happen to know that most of the class incorrectly copied my work on the last assignment.
Question 3 should be a net income of $1,500, not a net loss of $1,500. I put down the wrong answer initially, everyone copied me, and then I changed the answer later. I think you can reasonably conclude that anyone with -$1,500 as the answer copied off of my incorrect work.
Professor: I figured they all copied, but I didn’t know you were the source. Anyway, thanks for your candor and your dedication to the class.
I didn’t copy, so I don’t know what happened to those who did, but depending on the class, they would either get a zero for the assignment or a plagiarism citation, so they got one of those.
Fast forward to test day, and I’m ready to go. I know since most of the students are business majors, they need 70% to pass the class because it’s a required course.
Hurting them on the midterm will go a long way in helping drop their grades. I take the test, I’m the first one done, and I leave feeling pretty sure I’ve done enough to deny the class the exam weight adjustment.
A week later, we get our exams back. Tests are distributed all around me with scores on the top in red ink.
68, 71, 70, 66, 75, 67, and these are the smart students! Someone at the end of my row takes a test from our professor and lets out a sigh as he begins passing a test down my row.
It stops on my desk.
93%. I’ve won.
Some idiot in the front of the class: So, is there going to be a curve?
Professor: Nope!
Me: What was the high score?
Professor: 93%!
The average score for the exam was 71, so a good number of people didn’t get a “passing” score. Maybe they made up for it on the final and passed, but I don’t care.
I got mine.”
13. Mess With Me Financially? Your Life Is Going To Suck
“My ex stole close to $110,000 from me which I saved up for 9 years, and when I took her to court, I lost due to lack of evidence. At that moment I felt destroyed and lost it all. She even sued me for emotional damages, and I had to pay $65,000. So, I was forced to sell my house and take a big loan from the bank.
I stayed with a friend who helped me find some good lawyers. Sure enough, we found an amazing one.
In just one day, he helped me so much and even helped me get the info of who took the funds from my bank account. Something was wrong with my statements. On the 29th of June, a transaction happened in my name that I never made.
In fact, it was impossible for it to be me because I was not in the country at the time.
I was ready to get back into court when I found out that she bought my house, but first I had to sweeten my revenge.
How? Well, I have a safe that I never told her about hidden in the bathroom behind the cabinet. I thought that since she ruined my life, why not ruin hers even more?
So, with the help of an accomplice, I bought a ton of illegal substances, about $470 worth, and used another friend to hide it there. The safe has a 4-digit code, that being 0000, never got to change it to something else. And before taking her to court again I had that same friend who hid the stuff, turn her in.
It took about a week for the cops to receive a mandate to search the house, they found nothing in the first 2-hours, and they wouldn’t have if my friend hadn’t forgotten to leave the safe cover open.
That $470 worth of the stuff I bought is worth a $6,000 fine and 12 years in prison. Well, I’m not done yet.
Court time again!
I had my lawyer get the footage from when the funds from the bank were transferred and also provided documents showing that I was not in the country at the time.
We also found out the account to which the funds were sent to was the name of my ex.
It was an open-and-shut case. My lawyer also demanded payment for emotional damage, all the funds that were stolen, the house, and also the equivalent to 2-times the debt I had in the bank which is equal to about $167,000. The look on her face when everything came down crashing on her was totally worth it. And on top of the 12 years for illegal substance possession, she received an additional 25 years for theft and false testimony.
Enjoy it, trick.”
12. You Can't Get The Best Of Both Worlds, Kiddos
“This happened earlier today at the grocery store. A mom was in line in front of me with her two young daughters (neither could have been older than 8) buying a random assortment of items including roughly a gallon of Neopolitan ice cream.
Suddenly, one of the girls looks over at a display of candy bars, and her eyes light up.
“Mommy! Mommy! I want a chocolate bar!” She points to the display.
Mom looks over and shakes her head. “No, honey, we’re already getting ice cream, you don’t need a chocolate bar.”
The girl grabs one of the bars. “But I want this so much more than I want ice cream!” She waves the bar in front of her mom’s face. She (the daughter) also pushes one into her sister’s hands to get her on board.
With both of her daughters now waving candy bars in front of her, she suddenly gets The Look. “So, you want candy bars instead of ice cream, is that it?”
The daughters are nodding and emphatically saying, “Yes! Yes! We want the candy bars, not the ice cream!”
So the mom turns to the cashier and says, “Can you please remove the ice cream? They don’t want it.”
The cashier dutifully clears the ice cream from the order and puts the tub next to the register. She tells the mom her total and is handed the money. The mom starts bagging up her groceries while the kids tear open their candy bars and start devouring their treats.
Right as the mom finishes putting the bagged groceries in her cart for the trip out to the car, the kids finish their candy bars, look at the empty wrappers, and then at the tub of ice cream sitting next to the register.
The realization dawns in their eyes. “Hey, Mom? Could we still get the ice cream after all?”
Mom has a smirk on her face. “You said you didn’t want the ice cream. You got the candy bars instead.”
The daughter who started the push for candy bars looks at the small, empty wrapper in her hands and back at the tub of ice cream. “But this is so much smaller than that.”
Mom looks back at the ice cream tub and says, “Oh my goodness! You’re right! Seems like maybe you screwed yourself out of a lot of ice cream later in exchange for a bit of chocolate now.” She sighs. “Isn’t that a shame?”
The daughter tries to turn on The Frown. “But, Mom! Can’t you just go back and buy it? It’s right there!”
She shakes her head.
“No, sweetie. I already paid for the groceries. It’s the next gentleman’s turn.” (Meaning me; the cashier had already started scanning my groceries.)
The daughters take one last look at the ice cream and their empty wrappers before turning and running away. (Not too far, I think they just wanted to not see the ice cream anymore.)
As soon as they were off, I burst out laughing.
“Now that’s a lesson! Way to go, Mom!”
She smiled back at me. “Something tells me it’s a lesson they won’t soon forget.”
Because I’m in such a cheerful mood I say, “You want me to buy that ice cream, so they can have it later? It’d be no trouble.”
She smiles wider and shakes her head. “Nope. If I let you do that, they wouldn’t learn their lesson, now would they?”
Moral of the Story: Be careful what you wish for, kids. You just might get it.”
Another User Comments:
“A similar thing happened to me as a kid. I wanted that little tabletop Pacman game sooooo bad. My dad said it was too expensive and picked an Atari system instead and showed me how it could play a ton of games. I said I didn’t want it; I wanted Pacman.
Well, the Atari system and games went back on the shelf, and we started walking out of the store. I changed my mind within two seconds. (Hey, the weird Atari thing was better than nothing, right?) but too late. The decision was made.
Nearly 40 years later, and I still remember that hard lesson.” threadsoffate2021
11. Catfishing My Boss To Get Paid
“I used to work for a married couple, Billy (M52) and Gigi (F44), who owned a business services/public relations agency. It lasted more or less for a year. They seemed nice and humble, but in reality, they were shady and untruthful. The company began to falter because of poor management and zero intention to prioritize. Billy was your baby-faced next-door neighbor type. He looked about ten years younger and had a “kind” smile.
He was soft-spoken and had an artistic and creative flair to him. Gigi looked matronly with a Mother Earth incarnate attitude towards her children. She prided herself on “being ruthless” when it came to giving her family only the best. She could be really nice when she wanted to, but I found out early on that she was 100% apt at gossip and being two-faced.
The company’s constant changes were a red flag.
They went from Business Services + PR Agency to IT provider, to a business incubator, to “indie beer partners.” What I’m trying to say is that they tried to dip their donut in everyone’s coffee, figurately. Some of us had no real way to escape. The lady working next to me was already 67 years old and scared that no one would hire her. I wasn’t in a great place either.
We were 8 employees in total. They wouldn’t lay anyone off because they believed that the employee should quit.
They paid us only a portion of our salaries (incomplete weekly payments). Employees would run for the hills once they found a better job. Some of us were stuck. It was horrible. Then, they would pay the normal rate for a month and then do it again.
They never cut down on their luxury expenses, so the woman would post her shopping sprees or arrive in a new car like it was nothing.
Zero empathy. Very insensitive.
The man was obsessed with making it big time. So much, that he sometimes failed to see an opportunity right in front of him. He said he was Coca-Cola’s brand manager. I swear I looked it up and could never find any reference.
Gigi had a display full of small local magazines (mostly about design and architecture). They were very proud to be a “team member,” but in reality, they just helped them print two issues.
They wanted “big business only,” but in the meantime, looked down upon tangible potential clients. Like the young Latino couple who showed up trying to learn more about their services. They seemed “lost” because they wanted someone to help them set up a coffee business and had no idea how it was done.
I talked to them and helped them into the waiting room. They even showed up with their baby in a stroller.
That means they must have driven by and decided to come in. An impulsive client should be retained. The guy said his grandpa had a farm, and he wanted to create an import/export company. Once Billy showed up, he listened for a bit, then kind of gave them a kind of an abrupt dismissal. That was a jerk move because that couple opened their own business with someone else and even have a social media page.
It could have been Billy.
Billy lined his office walls with posters of Steve Jobs and Elon Musk. His woman, the Chief Enabling Officer, put up signs on each room. The main employee area was “the machine room,” Billy’s office was “the chamber,” the conference room was “a meeting of the minds.” Every time an employee disagreed with Billy during a brainstorming session, Gigi would call them aside and tell them that “Billy is your boss.
You need to know that he is brilliant and a genius. I want him to have that taste of success.” I experienced that first hand. I also hated brainstorming because that was never on my job description. They just wanted to pick everyone’s brains. In the meantime, we had to see the Pandora jewelry, the expensive makeovers for their daughters, and the “weekend at the spa” updates on social media.
Gigi’s captions were usually about rewarding herself after a “hard week” or “because she deserved it.” Oh! And I’d like to mention that they bought into the “social guru” phrases about “emotional direction.” So if an employee ever got angry, Gigi would tell you, “Remember the one who gets angry is the one who ends up losing.”
For anyone who’s been in this situation, you may understand how painful it can be.
You cannot leave the job because you have no other job waiting for you, and pathetic as it may sound to some, “some income” is better than no income at all. This is an involuntary compromise and it’s abusive. Why were we expected to pay for their luxuries via incomplete wages?
My best friend’s ex is into coding and programming and he agreed to help.
If it didn’t work out, at least we would have something to laugh about.
We created an amazing, fake website with a matching LinkedIn and the whole nine yards. To make a long story short, this was supposed to be an investment company and my friend would be very casual. Nothing too eager.
He started by liking my employer’s page. Then comment. Before we knew it, my boss took the bait and was engaging.
They exchanged emails and he was eager to share all his “projects and ambitious stuff.” On the other side, the investor sent him a list of requirements, like proof of concept, employer payroll, EIN #, etc.
The investor “agreed” to work with them if they could prove they were legit and up to date. No bank account of confidential info was asked.
Within three weeks, I was paid the equivalent to the 2 months and a half I was owed. The investor did an about-face and never contacted him again.
I left the job as soon as I could. My friend who remained until she got paid told me our boss seemed “off” and a bit down after he announced “big things are coming,” but it all seemed to deflate. I never disclosed what was really going on.”
Another User Comments:
“Sounds like an overly complicated way to get your money when you could have just filed a wage complaint with the government.” UseDaSchwartz
Reply:
“Learning to code and then catfishing your boss over several weeks is probably faster than dealing with the government.” JohnByDay1
10. No Cold Medicine Even Though I'm Sick? I'll Show Up To Work Just Like I Am
“My first job post-college was as a barista with a large coffee chain. Now the chain is global, but when I started slinging coffee, it was less than 200 stores. The manager of the store was super passionate about coffee and got a job in the corporate office working with the coffee buyers about 6 months after I started.
Most of us working at the store were either in college or had recently graduated. It was a good job with benefits, stock options, free coffee, flexible schedules, and a generally good culture. Some people were hoping to eventually get into corporate and build a career while others were working there until something better came up. All in all, it was a solid team; we worked well together, the store exceeded its numbers, and while not without the occasional issue, everything was operating well under the previous manager.
That all changed when Debbie became our new manager. Debbie was new to the company. Her father started a regional chain of tire stores, and she previously worked for him managing the stores until he sold the chain. Debbie had been fast-tracked to become a regional manager for the coffee chain but needed to put her time (3-6 months) in the stores to learn the business.
Debbie was a stickler for company policy, but her true passion was in enhancing them. At our first staff meeting, she reviewed some of the policies with the team, then augmented them with her own caveats. The one that is germane to the story is regarding drinking at work. Now, the company policy was that people in the stores should not be under the influence of booze.
Debbie, however, added her own details that she didn’t want anyone working if they’d had a drink 10 hours prior to their shift and that she didn’t want anyone “under the influence of anything, not even cold medicine.”
I’m not sure if there was an incident that prompted this expanded understanding of the policy, but it certainly took a reasonable policy and moved it well into the absurd.
The no drinking 10 hours prior to your shift was particularly harsh on those who worked the early shifts. We needed to be there at 4:30 am, which means that we couldn’t have a drink after 6:30 pm the night prior. I wasn’t a huge drinker, but that just struck me as absurd. But the not under the influence of anything was pretty egregious considering we were selling stimulates by the cup.
Cue the malicious compliance…
It’s winter season where everyone gets sick, and I wake up at 3:45 with a fever and sore throat. I was scheduled to open the store at 4:30 in the morning with another co-worker. Sticking to the policy, I don’t take any medicine and open the store up as per my schedule. I must have looked like death warmed over because several customers asked if I was okay that morning.
My co-worker volunteered to work the bar leaving me the register (easier job) since I looked like trash. At 6:30, Debbie arrives, to allow the two openers to take their breaks. Debbie immediately goes into the back room to do some manager stuff leaving the two openers to continue working just as the morning rush is picking up.
Debbie finally gives the two openers our breaks about 45 minutes late.
(Against company policy.) She also puts me on the bar since drink orders are starting to back up. I explained how I was feeling fevered and lightheaded, but she wouldn’t have it. So, I plow on, feeling worse and worse by the minute. By this time, a few more co-workers have arrived, but Debbie was still sequestered in the back so we were short-handed.
At about 9:30 in the midst of our second-morning peak, I decide I’ve had enough, and I lock my knees.
In my fatigued state, it only takes three or four minutes before I start to wobble and see the sparks at the periphery of my vision. I take a quick look behind me to ensure there isn’t anything dangerous, then I fill the biggest milk pitcher and set it steaming. I close my eyes, squeeze my legs as hard as I can and relax into the impending blackout.
When I came to, there were several customers peering over the bar at me, and all my co-workers were staring slack-jawed at me. It was right then that the large pitcher of milk boiled over, shooting a large dairy geyser into the air. “What happened?” was all I managed to say before Debbie ran out onto the floor. I slowly got up and tried to return to making drinks as if nothing had happened. Debbie intervened and took me to the backroom before eventually sending me home.
Of course, there was an incident report that needed to be filled. In it, I reported how I didn’t take any medicine as per the policy outlined at the staff meeting on X date. The district manager got involved, corporate HR got involved, co-workers corroborated my story, and Debbie’s fast-track career stalled out for more than a year. The policy was changed along with some others regarding sick days.
Nine months later, I’m working for my former manager as a coffee taster, and Debbie is still managing an underperforming store waiting for that district manager role. When I left the company four years later, Debbie had made it to the district manager level but not the regional manager role that she was originally fast-tracked for.
Debbie also had a policy where she wanted everyone to call in sick 24 hours before their assigned shift and find someone to work the shift for them.
(I didn’t get into this policy because my story was getting long.) If you didn’t do this and failed to show for your scheduled shift, you would be written up, no exceptions.
The effect of her policy regarding sick days made it pretty much impossible to take one, especially for an opening shift. If I were scheduled to open Wednesday, I’d have to know that I’d be sick (and call the manager and get my shift covered) by Tuesday at 4:30 in the morning.
But in reality, it would have been Monday afternoon or evening. At the time, cell phones were fairly uncommon (i.e., not affordable) for people working a retail job which compounded the complexity of arranging a sick day.
To me, I felt that I was complying with two fairly stupid policies that day. I chose to create a monumental scene in order to drive the point home.”
9. Park In Our Assigned Disabled Parking Lot? Have Fun Selling Your Home
“So, my little sister (who is the sweetest girl in the world) is 12 years old but can’t walk or communicate. Her mental age is around 6 months.
She obviously can not attend a regular school, but since we live in a big city, there is a wonderful school for kids like her. Even though we don’t own a car, since we don’t need one, we got the city to put up signs in front of our house designating a 4-meter spot for wheelchair pickup and drop-off for her school bus every morning and afternoon.
The signs went up perhaps two years ago, and after the first week, we never really had any issues since most of our neighbors are wonderful and totally understanding of our designated spot.
For some context, we live in a perhaps poorer community, though we’re well off (but in our nine years here, we’ve had nothing but great interactions with everyone here). Sadly, the neighborhood is gentrifying, and we’re getting more self-centered people with their Mercedes Benz or Audis honking while my sister gets loaded onto her school bus (which takes around four minutes but blocks our little street) which really irritates us, as well as the other sane people that witness it.
Naively, we thought this would be the extent of our unpleasant interactions. In September, we woke up like on any other Monday morning to find a shiny BMW parked in our disabled spot. It wasn’t just partially in it, it was positioned perfectly to take up the entire spot. To make things worse, there were about a dozen open spots on the block, and it’s not like they were all vacated that morning since we wake up at 6 AM.
We were baffled. I’d seen this car many times since last July, and it was definitely the same car since there aren’t many burgundy sports cars in our neighborhood. It was usually parked about twenty meters south on our street, so we knew it belonged to a neighbor a few doors down.
We did all the basics in this type of situation, we took a picture, took down the license plate, and called the police to report it.
The cops came by within the hour and wrote a big fat ticket. I believe it was for $700, but don’t quote me on it. Anyways, it was a significant amount.
At around noon, a smug angry guy came knocking on my door (I had the day off from school and was home on my own). It was obvious that it was the owner of the car, so I made a quick decision to record the conversation (or screaming match) on my phone.
I opened the door, and before I could say a thing, the clown lays into me (I’m a 16-year-old guy, and he’s in his mid-forties, midlife crisis maybe). He accuses me of all things ranging from putting up those signs this morning to framing him, to being prejudiced (he was East Asian I believe, but we have a really diverse community). He goes on to say that disabled spots shouldn’t even be a thing… that it’s always empty (totally shooting himself in the foot based on his previous comments), that we should pay for his undeserved ticket… that it isn’t even an inconvenience since the spot next to his was free, and my sister could just get on the bus from there, blah blah blah.
Once he finished, I said okay, and shut the door on his furious face. He rang the doorbell another five times before storming off. To my satisfaction, the recording caught everything fairly clear. In the evening, I told my parents what had happened and gave my dad a copy of the recording.
We have a pretty tight-knit community (for the most part), and there is a neighborhood social group of around 3,000 members.
My dad decided to post a summary of what had happened along with the recording and a picture of the car in our spot on the page. There was an immediate uproar with people saying they would fight back or whatever, and we were humbled by the feeling that our community was standing up for us, but we didn’t think anything would come of it.
The next day, I leave the house to go to school and walk by the guy’s car (back in his normal spot) and notice that the front right tire was deflated. Upon closer inspection, it was slashed. As I said, our community is tight-knit, but I can’t say I expected anything like this to happen.
The guy must have seen the post because he didn’t come back to our house to complain or accuse us of anything.
The following weeks were sweet. Whenever I saw him in public, people would go up to him and remind him that he was a horrible human being (a bit harsh in my opinion, but they weren’t my words).
In November, his house had a for sale sign in the window. The housing market had also gone down by a bit. I’m always kind of curious about how much houses similar to ours are selling for compared to how much we paid for ours in 2011, so I knew what he paid for it in July.
Once I saw the for sale sign, I rushed home and checked the local house listings, and low and behold, he was selling for $90K less than what it was going for in July. He really wanted to get out of our neighborhood!
While his crime wasn’t nearly worth $90K, I must say that I don’t feel bad. Worst case scenario, he sells that obnoxious car of his, which would easily cover the lost funds.
Let’s just say that we haven’t had a single car parked in my sister’s spot since.”
Another User Comments:
“Not only did he have to sell his home, but BMWs tend to depreciate in value very quickly.” minemasterten
8. Since You Want To Be A Big, Bad Bully, Your Truth Is Going To Come Out
Now she’s in big trouble.
“I have lived in my current house for over 20 years.
My neighbors have been living in their house for around 15 years. The parents were nice. They have three kids: two girls and one boy. This is about their youngest daughter (who will be ND) who was the same age as me. She was nice to some extent. At the time, I knew her only as a neighbor friend. She and I never went to the same school.
But that all changed when I changed school during the fifth grade to her school. Ever since then, she and her friends had/tried to make my school life a living nightmare. They would play pranks on me, ridicule and belittle me, and then call me names on social media (mostly Twitter, and at the time, I didn’t have Twitter until I was 15/16. This is important.).
By the way, I was diagnosed at 7 with ADHD and Aspergers (mild autism), so I was their mental punching bag.
So, years go by, and we are in high school. ND has jumped to being in the popular group while I am with the weird and unpopular kind. Their attitudes towards me keep getting worse and worse.
So, one night (when I was around 17), I get a message from ND that she is having a party and wants me to come over.
And I thought it was very unusual because of 1. She has never, ever messaged me unless she HAS to. 2. She has never invited me to her parties before. So, I immediately thought that this was a joke. At this point, I was getting sick of her and her friends making sneering comments about how weird of an idiot I am. So, this was the perfect time to plan my revenge.
I asked my parents if I could go, even though I was underage (the drinking age is 18 here), and they said it was fine because I would be next door. So, I went, and ND was VERY surprised to see me. She and her friends started to giggle. I followed her to the basement and see all of the other popular kids from my school along with some others.
Let me tell you this: I was only there for 30 minutes because after that I had all the evidence that I needed. I see a mature version of ping pong, people smoking stuff, and a lot of underage drinking (a lot of the others were the same age as me maybe younger because this party around October, and I am pretty sure that almost everyone there just turned 17).
I also noticed that neither of ND’s parents nor siblings was there.
I left. I waited an hour because I didn’t want to draw any attention. I was all ready for bed, and when I looked outside my bedroom window (which has a clear view of her front yard), I noticed that the party had moved to the front yard and 1/3 of the party people were leaving.
I started my plan. I went and grabbed my phone and called the police! I told them what everything is going on, as a concerned neighbor, and the officer thanked me.
Just before I went to bed, I saw flashing lights.
The next day at school, ND was nowhere to be found, and there was a rumor going on that she and a bunch of other students were arrested last night due to illegally underage smoking and drinking.
And so a week goes by and still no sign of ND.
Fast forward to two weeks after the incident and during those two weeks, she and her friends completely trashed me on Twitter saying that I was a snitch and that I was stupid, etc., still not knowing that I was the one who called the police. I finally see her in the halls and started to chat with her, and I asked what had happened because I saw police lights at her place.
She told me everything that I didn’t already know and then some. She told me that her parents had grounded her because she threw a party without their permission. And that her DAD WAS FURIOUS! (He is more traditional than her mom), and he has forbidden her to have or go to parties or hang out with her friends and partner or even leave the house unless it was for school or appointments.
She was trapped in her house (which took a big toll on her social standing at school). As she was telling me this, I was having a hard time keeping a straight face because I suck at lying/keeping a secret, and she sees this, and it clicks in her mind that I was the one who called the police, and she was furious and threatens to tell the whole school about it, and I told her to go right ahead and added that no one was going to believe her.
And then she stomps away.
The thing is that even though I was unpopular, I was friends with almost everyone in my grade, especially with the guys from the most popular to the least. I am a goody-two-shoes and one of the nicest and honest people ever. So, she tried, but the people who knew me the most didn’t believe her and told her to go away.
And the guys who were the most popular came up to me and asked if it was true. I told them in the most innocent voice that why would I do that and what proof does she have? And then proceeded to tell them what she and her friends have been saying about me on Twitter and showed them proof of screenshots of their feed. They said, “Yeah, we didn’t think you would have it in you to do it.” And then proceeded to tell everyone that I didn’t call the police.
So because of this, she became a social outcast among everyone except her closest friends and was completely stripped of her popularity status. And after this incident, she had tried to get me in trouble with the principal, but during a meeting with the principal, I returned the favor by telling them that she had no proof that I did it and showed the principal her Twitter feed of everything that she and her friends were saying about me for the last year.
The look on her face when she found out that I had Twitter and knew of her bad-mouthing was priceless. So, in turn, her parents completely deleted all of her social media accounts and took her computer and phone away until University. I didn’t press cyberbullying charges because she wasn’t actually attacking me she was basically attacking me behind my back (me being literal at the time).
I am pretty sure she never ever forgave me for doing this to her.
Wait, there’s more.
ND’s older sister got married during the summer of 2018. Her older sister used to babysit my brother and me when we were in high school (worried mom, and from past events, they don’t trust us – mostly my brother – to leave us alone). And so before this incident happened, my family was on good terms with them, except for ND.
My parents were never actually involved in this until her parents apologized to them for ND’s actions towards me, and they were very confused. So, I told them everything EXCEPT the part of me calling the police.
Anyway, my family was invited to the wedding despite ND’s protest. The thing is, we are now both in Uni, and she got past the popularity part, but SHE WAS STILL ANGRY WITH THE COPS AND GETTING HOUSE ARREST (from her parents).
So, my parents and I went, and since I was single during the time of the wedding (my partner of six months just broke up with me two months prior), I was seated at the single table while my parents were seated at the neighbors’ table. Luckily for me, ND was not seated at the table with me because she is the family of the bride, but her close friends were, and let me just say they were also mad about the incident.
So, it was very awkward being there. Throughout the whole meal portion, they ridiculed me, saying rude and mean things to me as well as trying to sabotage my meal by trying to trip the servers, etc.
It came to a point when during the cake and dessert, and ND came over and made a very rude fat joke/comment about my weight and how much dessert that I was eating.
I snapped back and retorted. “At least I am comfortable and confident with how I look, and I am not starving myself or vomiting my food up to feel confident!” And this shut them up.
After that, they never bugged me again, and I danced my heart out on the dance floor.”
7. Create A Loud Environment? Let Me Blast An Episode Of A Woman Giving Birth
“My landlady’s insane daughter is back from college again for the summer and she’s just as crazy as ever!
Among other things, this girl literally throws fits of screaming and crying at all hours of the day and night, slams doors constantly for no reason, and refuses to speak at a volume quieter than a yell.
She also never wears headphones when listening to anything. Our rooms are on opposite ends of the house so when she’s in her room I don’t care.
However, my room is unfortunately right off of the dining room, and she likes to set up shop at the dining room table, blasting music or whatever trash show she’s binging. If she were a reasonable person I would just ask nicely for her to turn the volume down.
But since she isn’t a reasonable person, and such requests are often met with intentional stomping around at 3 am when she knows I have to be up at 5 am for work, I have to get creative with making her shut the heck up sometimes.
Last night I got home from a 9-hour shift at work, exhausted, and retreated to my room to have a snack and get some sleep.
I wasn’t in my room ten minutes before the demon set up shop at the dining room table. I don’t know what show she was watching, but all I could hear was mumbled dialogue and then the world’s most annoying laugh track after what seemed like every other sentence.
It was 11 at night. I was tired, hungry, and now very angry.
So I booted up my laptop, went into my Netflix queue, and picked one of my favorite episodes of ‘Call the Midwife.’ Cranked my volume up, and not long after the opening credits came the screams of a woman giving birth.
I left the episode running while I had my snack and got ready for bed, and wouldn’t you know, by the time I was ready to sleep and turned the show off, I was met with complete silence from the dining room.”
6. Exposing My Mom For Her Wrongdoings
No more child support fraud for you.
“My parents divorced when I was just in kindergarten so no more than 6. My mom got full custody of us, and she suffered from mental illness (I believe she has borderline personality disorder, and she was also a typical narcissistic parent).
Anyway, ever since the divorce, she would always tell us how it was not her fault we didn’t have enough money for things and blame my dad. Example: if there was nothing to eat for breakfast, and we complained like small children do when they were hungry, she snapped, “It’s your father’s fault, so cry to him.”
I just learned never to complain and do without and spent my childhood taking care of her.
My sister and I were trained from when I was about 8 (my sister 10) to come right home from school and do our homework and clean the house and take care of ourselves. Don’t ask my mom to make dinner, make it yourself, and all of the chores, so Mom doesn’t have to do anything. It sounds bizarre, but we thought that was normal.
It got worse my senior year of high school. My grandma died a few months before that summer, and my mom quit her job and blew through the funds my grandma left her before the summer was over (this was close to $75k back in 2000). She refused to get another job and kept coming up with excuses not to work (i.e. “I need a break.” “Get off my back.” “I hurt my leg.” Etc.) while she was going out boozing with her friend and acting like a carefree teenager.
So, I spent my senior year working hard at school, at my part-time job after school, and pretty much taking care of an overgrown child who refused to work or help out. Any time a utility shut off or there was no food left in the house, she just griped, “You have a job. Why can’t you pay for it?”
If I brought up the fact that my dad sent her child support, she would just complain that she had my sister’s tuition (which I later learned was bull).
She would flaunt that child support check and laugh and refer to it as, “Mommy’s Paycheck.”
Flash forward to when I am about to choose a college, and my mom keeps bellyaching about the costs, and of course, has 0 saved in a college fund. I couldn’t afford a private university since I only was offered a partial scholarship, so I decided to go to a reasonably priced and still highly regarded state university.
My freshman year, I was pretty much able to swing the cost of tuition and room and board (I lived on campus) since last year of high school, I filed my taxes and FAFSA as soon as my w2’s came in, so I had a decent amount of grants.
During my first year of college, I almost became unable to receive financial aid for my second year of college.
Why? My w2’s were mailed to my home address and my mom being the caring and supportive mother she was, shredded them and threw them in the trash. I found out because my sister was home that weekend and saw it. My mom denied it and when I came home for Spring break and pressed her for it, she lied and said her friend had them (her friend was a CPA).
My sister called my mom out on this bluff by calling the friend who said she did not have any of our tax information. She was very concerned and told me and my sister to request duplicate w2’s and have them sent home, and she will have my mom send them over to me.
My mom was mad that we had checked with her friend and called her out on her bluff, but true to her word, her friend did my taxes for me and my FAFSA (I had offered to pay her or at least babysit for her, but she told me it was okay.
I think she knew my mom was mentally unstable and felt sorry for me and my sister).
At this point, I learned that my mom had not been helping out my sister at all with tuition as she had claimed and my sister had mentioned it to my dad who had called her out and demanded to know where the child support was going. My mom insisted he wasn’t paying her enough, and that’s why she couldn’t help us out.
During my second year of college, my w2’s were once again sent home, and my mom once again “accidentally” threw them in the trash. I had to request duplicate w2’s from my summer job not just once but twice because she kept throwing them in the trash. I filed my tax return late that year and as a result, my FAFSA was filed late, so I wasn’t able to get the full amount I was receiving before.
Any time I complained to her about money or no food in the house it was, “Complain to your father.”
Well, the summer before my third year, I was burned out on my mom’s crap. I was working full time for the summer and saving as much as I could but she was refusing to help me out at all while I was home without food or anything.
She was mad that instead of paying the phone bill, so she could make long-distance calls to her online friends and spend all day in chat rooms (this was back when we had dial-up), I had the audacity to spend my hard-earned money on a cell phone and pay that bill myself. She told everyone I should just drop out because I didn’t apply myself hard enough (I was in the honors program) and she would play martyr with all her friends about how “it’s so hard when you have kids in college and they eat you out of house and home and come to you for money.”
At the end of the summer, I had saved a thousand dollars, but the school won’t let me move into the dorm unless I paid 50% upfront which was about $10k. I didn’t know what to do as all summer the university had told me I was fine, and then on move-in day, told me I couldn’t move into the dorm. I called my dad in a panic and he spoke to someone who agreed to give me 24 hours.
I moved in the next day, and my dad showed up first thing with a coffee and a donut for me and told me not to worry: he was going to fix this once and for all. We went from office to office on campus, and he cosigned a loan (which he later paid off for me) and then he paid the balance on my tuition the loan didn’t cover.
He then took me out to lunch and told me the truth: My mom never helped my sister with her tuition (my sister had graduated the summer before my junior year of college). My sister later confirmed this but was not surprised my mom had lied. My dad had cosigned a loan to help my sister out (which he later paid off for her), and my sister was able to get a scholarship and do co-op to pay for her last two years.
He also advised me that my mom was not so poorly off: as part of the divorce settlement he had to pay the mortgage and property taxes on our house and even though my sister was now out on her own he was still paying her the same amount of child support of about $2k a month despite the fact that I was living on campus for 75% of the year and my mom was not giving me a dime.
Just to give you some clarification: my tuition and room and board before financial aid kicked in was $15k a year, so she could have easily helped me out with school since after financial aid kicked in, when I was able to get it, and the balance was usually $6k).
I was hurt to think my mom was just living off my child support and constantly making me feel guilty for wanting anything or for not being able to cater to her every whim (she would get angry that I wouldn’t come home on the weekends to help her clean the house that I was not living in).
I thought about how bad she made me feel growing up and made me feel worthless when, in fact, had it not been for me or my sister, she would have not had a roof over her head after the divorce.
He asks me to grant him access to my account, so he could prove my mom was not paying for college and that I was.
He asked me how I would feel if he took care of college instead of paying my mom child support.
Sounded good to me. He even told me I could spend my breaks at his house instead of my mom’s.
I called my mom and told her that my dad had taken care of the issue and she had no remorse. She told me it was my own fault for not planning my finances better and for spending away my funds all summer.
I just played it dumb and said she was right but pointed out I had done what she told me to do and complained to my dad.
A month later, my mom called me up angry! My dad had spoken with the courts, and there was going to be a hearing in their divorce case. My dad had proven that my mom had not been paying for my nor my sister’s tuition for college and that was the very reason my dad was obligated to pay child support till I was done college.
Since I was living on campus, it didn’t make sense to pay her child support when I was not living at home most of the year, and she hasn’t given me one penny. My dad told the judge he would gladly pay for me to finish college, but he was not going to pay my mom anymore child support nor pay the mortgage on the house.
If my mom didn’t want to take over the mortgage, they could sell the house and I could live with him over my breaks.
My mom was freaking out over this and calling me selfish. I just reminded her that my tuition must cost a lot more than what she got in child support since she was never able to help me with the costs of school.
She just kept laying guilt trips on me about how I was selfish because she didn’t get to go to college right after high school and how she never got to have four carefree years of college. I pointed out to her that she had not worked since my grandma died about 3 years ago and that I was working and going to school at that time while she got to live a carefree life.
She pretty much ripped me a new one at that point. She tried to get back at my dad by not paying utilities on the house to make it seem like she needed the money. She then told me that the electricity and water were now shut off, so if I wanted to come home for winter break, I needed to help her out (she had moved in with her partner at his condo).
I just told her that I would miss her but that I would just go to my dad’s for winter break. She was angry and cried about how selfish I was for not wanting to come home for Christmas. (sidenote: the Christmas before my present was throwing out many of my personal belongings. Why? My mom was angry at me that I didn’t want to come home one weekend to help her clean because to get home I had to take two buses, two trains, spend $20 one way, and wait for her to hopefully remember to pick me up at the train station which was a whole 20-minute drive for her after I had traveled for 4 to 5 hours because I had finals, and I told her I would help clean for the holidays once I came home for winter break.
Her response? She took all of my things threw them in boxes and threw them out on the front lawn. Most of my things were destroyed by being left on in the rain).
I told my mom that I would come and visit her over my winter break once she got the utilities turned on. I told my dad what was going on and he said he and my stepmom and my half brother and sister were thrilled I was going to stay with them for winter break and he can get me a job in his office as well for winter break!
He also called my mom and reminded her that the child support had not stopped, and they were going to list the house in a few months so what was this nonsense about the utilities being shut off? She was mad but magically came up with the funds to turn them back on.
That spring my dad officially by the court took over my college tuition and he even made sure I got my full financial aid since he had picked up w2s for me.
My mom lost her child support and was told by the judge that she better cooperate with the sale of the house and keep up with the utility bills etc. so it would sell. Her partner moved in with her till the house sold, and she moved to another time zone.
The real kicker? It was cheaper for my dad to pay college costs than to pay her child support!
To summarize, my mom abused and exploited me and I got my revenge by causing her to lose her child support and free rent by doing what she told me to do for years: complain to my father.
No regrets!
Are things better now? Depends on what you mean. I am not as close to her as I am father and stepmom whom I grew closer to after college and still close to this day, but I still have a “relationship” with her.
We talk, but I have learned not to trust her because she will let me down (i.e., a couple of years ago, we were supposed to meet for my birthday, and she stood me up. Now I don’t include her at all when I plan birthdays or holidays).
And some have asked how she treated us growing up. She wasn’t 100% bad, but her bad moments were pretty bad.
Granted I have met a lot of people who have had it worse so I try to remember that.
After college, she was trying to pull the same pity cards she had when I was in school. This time, she was trying to convince me to move from NJ to TN (she had moved before my last year of college to a different time zone and didn’t even bother to tell me or my sister.
She just took off!) I liked the area and told her I would see if I can find a job and would consider taking her up on her offer to live in her guest room temporarily. She right away started laying me on a guilt trip and I hung up. She then called my sister and complained about how “I have a daughter that doesn’t want to take care of me.” My sister and I both laugh about that.
She wasn’t even 50, perfectly healthy, and refused to work. No way was I going to move in and take care of her.
She pretty much spent most of my adult life in and out of mental hospitals and trying to convince us that either we want to live with her or we want her to live with us. She moved into my grandparents’ old house in Philly (they passed away years ago.
Didn’t keep up with the repairs and had to sell it for less than what she felt it was worth), wound up staying in various relatives’ guest rooms and coming up with excuses not to work, and finally wore out her welcome at so many people’s houses that she wound up in the hospital and then in a shelter and now lives in subsidized housing.
It’s a cute apartment and is like a loft-style, but guess what? She still complains about how bad she has it and how no one wants to take her in!
I know I grew up in a less than perfect situation, but I always remind myself that there are many others who have had it worse (I at least had my father and my sister) and that going through something like that has taught me to be strong and to rely on myself.”
5. Be Mean To Me For No Reason At A Party? I'll Break All Your Remotes
“This happened probably a good 8 years ago on Halloween. I went to a house party with some friends of mine hosted by some people I did not know. Pretty much everyone there was cool… except the guy who lived there. If I had to compare his demeanor to anything, it was that of an 80s high school movie villain. It was casual enough where I asked about his costume (he was a dog I think), and for whatever reason, he got very offended when I said my mom had a dog.
What followed next was a series of events I still laugh about to this day (due to my pettiness).
The first thing that happened was the line to the bathroom. This was an old row home with 2 bathrooms, one on the main level and one in the basement. The line to the main level bathroom was lengthy, so I decided to see about the basement.
Here, I run into this jerk, and he yells at me that I am not allowed to use this bathroom. Cool, it’s your house; no biggie. As I leave, I hear that bathroom door open, and someone exits it. Whatever, I keep it pushing.
A little while later, nature calls again. This time, I make my way to the main floor bathroom where I have my second run-in with this dude.
Now, from my point of view, he is not waiting for the bathroom as he is on his phone. As I go to open the bathroom door, he reaches across the hall and blocks me from trying. He says he’s next. I apologize and try to make some small talk. He is not having it, and I’m noticing a pattern of unnecessary aggressiveness.
Following the bathroom incident is what I would call the final straw. A bunch of us are in the kitchen drinking, talking, and having a good time. This dude comes in out of nowhere and punches me where it hurts. I go down like a ton of bricks, and my friends who I came with are taken back. I guess, fortunately, one of the jerk’s friends then punches him in his special spot.
Had that guy not done that, I think there may have been a fight. I collect myself, and my friend is like, “That dude hates you.” At this point, it is clear: I need to do something.
I’m older now and not proud of my first move, but I’d been drinking. I went into his private basement bathroom sneakily and did a 360 pee all over this bathroom.
I could’ve left it there, but as I am leaving, I see a remote for his basement tv. Then it hits me… I’m going to steal every remote I can find. Spoiler alert: I did just that. I took the cable box remotes, tv remotes, DVD/Bluray remotes, surround sound, anything I could find. I was wearing a suit for my costume, and there were plenty of pockets in this jacket.
I signal to my friends it’s time to go, and we leave. As we’re walking out, I notice he lives right next to an alley entrance. What better way to punctuate this than by smashing every remote I’d stolen right next to his house. I smashed the HECK out of these and made sure when he found them, they would not work.
I’d say I succeeded.
To the jerk in Baltimore from Halloween, good luck with your tv.”
4. Betray Me? Get Stuck With All The Bills
“I met my ex when I was in a job training program that we joined. After completing our courses in the program, we moved into a studio apartment and were looking for work.
After about 6 months of struggling to find a job, I managed to get a job at a factory. I was also delivering Chinese food for a local restaurant. She couldn’t find a job, so I ended up paying and doing everything for her because she also had a medical problem.
A year-and-a-half later, I go to my job, and I get a promotion in a different position.
I’m working 12-hour shifts in the factory, but it’s now a lot more money, and I’m doing way better. That’s when we get married and then we end up moving to a bigger place on the other side of town. I ended up quitting the Chinese food job, but my oldest sister, we can call her OS, owned a flooring company and needed my and my best friend’s help.
We can call him BF.
So, I have a normal routine where after getting paid from the factory, I get my check cashed, get the groceries, pay what bills need to be paid, and then drive back to the house and wait for my friend to call me so we can hang out for a little bit before I go to sleep and do it all again.
Sometimes BF would stay at my house when we had to go to work, and he would leave stuff there once in a while and have to come back for it. That comes into play in a minute.
One morning, another friend of mine calls me after I run all my errands and tells me BF is going to meet up with me at his house.
He’s got something important to say to me; we can call him AF. So, I drive over to his house, and I’m waiting for BF to show up, AF says he has something really important to tell me and won’t tell me what it is. BF finally shows up and tells me to come outside and get in the van. I asked him what is it he has to tell me, but he won’t tell me until I get in the van.
So, I get in, and I hear the door lock, so I look over, and casually with my finger, he never even noticed, I flip the lock back open.
BF turns around and says: I went to your house last night to get my phone charger and saw a shadow run across the blinds in your living towards your bedroom.
Me: What?
BF: I’m not kidding, dude.
I saw a dude in your house. He was in his boxers standing in your bedroom.
My mind just filled with rage. I grabbed the door handle and opened it up (he couldn’t believe that the door wasn’t locked), I jumped out, jumped in my car I rolled down my window and said: You might want to follow me. I drove straight home and found her sleeping.
She had her sleep apnea machine on, so I pulled the hose off and woke her up.
Me: This is one of those times you well better be telling me the truth. Who the heck was here last night?
Ex: Just a friend of mine.
Me: A man?
Ex: Yes, he came over, and we were watching TV.
Me: Why’s BF telling me he was in his boxers in our bedroom?
I walked out and got the phone and called BF. He was still at AF’s house. Forgive me for not being able to remember all the details of the conversation, but this was 12 years ago. I put him on speaker, and all of us were arguing over this, and there was something she told him last night that she couldn’t tell me. I finished talking to BF for now once he was convinced I wasn’t going to hurt her and hung up.
She was crying and trying to convince me nothing happened.
Ex: Honey, believe me. Nothing happened.
Me: What is it you said to him?
Ex: I told him he was just flirting with me.
I didn’t buy it. So. I decided to sleep on it until I figure out my next move. I woke up that afternoon and acted like I believed her. I went to work that night, and from Friday to Sunday, I was going to Connecticut to work for my older sister again.
BF couldn’t go, so I stopped by his house on my way home from Connecticut.
BF: What’s up, man?
Me: What was it she couldn’t tell me?
BF: She told me that she’s been messing around with him already.
I could feel my heart tear apart, then the anger kicked in again.
Me: Okay. We are going to get her saying that on tape.
BF: I’m not going to be doing that.
Me: You’re doing this. You caught her. Now you’re going to do this for me.
He didn’t want to but agreed to. I hung out with him for a few hours, then went home. When I got there, the entire house was clean, and some of the furniture was moved around. She had never done anything like this before, so I could tell she was trying to get me to believe she was innocent.
I acted like I was happy about it but didn’t really care.
The next day, we went to BF’s house. We hung out for an hour while she was in the other room. BF told me he had an old cellphone he could get the recording with. I told her I had to run to the store to get some drinks. I drove to the store, and he got her talking about it.
After about 10 minutes, I came back. He was in the kitchen holding the phone. I took it to the bathroom and listened to the recording.
A lot of the recording was hard to make out, but close to the end of the recording, I heard this:
BF: But you told me you messed around with him.
Ex: I was going to.
That was all I needed to hear.
Vengeance was going to be mine. Here comes the revenge.
This was when I called my older sister (OS) and then my middle sister (MS). I let them know what was going on. OS had already been through a divorce before and began looking up the process to get one. I told my boss at the factory what was happening and let them know that I may have to take a few days to get things done.
He understood because many people who work nights end up going through this.
OS and I meet up outside of Boston to go to the courthouse in Cambridge to file. I explain to the clerk I want any other paperwork to be sent to OS’s house, so Ex knows nothing about it. They didn’t have any problem with that and told me she should be getting served the papers in a month.
I then convinced her to sign the title of the car over to my OS, so we could save on insurance. I paid for the car, the insurance, and everything else for it, so that car is mine. She was reluctant at first, but I convinced her it would be better for us. I also started treating her like garbage. She would try to talk to me, and I’d act like what she said didn’t matter.
I woke her up one morning by taking the hose off her machine and farting in it. We were still being intimate, but I treated her like she deserved it. She still had no idea what was going to happen next.
My OS got the title of the car re-registered in New Hampshire under her name and had the plates ready. BF and I were working for her in the morning on Saturday and had everything plotted out.
I spent the rest of the day at BF’s house u*til about 10 o’clock then went home. I told her we should get to sleep because both OS and MS were coming to visit at 9 am.
The next morning, I woke up and nudged her to wake up. I got up and took a shower. I brushed my teeth and got dressed. I walked out of the bathroom and into the bedroom.
She was still sitting in bed.
Ex: Why are OS and MS coming over so early?
Me: Oh, they’re coming to help me.
At that time, I started pulling all my clothes out of the closet and putting them in bins and suitcases.
Ex: What are you doing?
Me: What does it look like? I’m leaving you.
Ex: What?! Why?!
Me: Here’s why!
I reach in my jacket pocket and pull out the old cellphone and play back the recording for her.
She hears the conversation and is shocked.
Ex: What was that?
Me: You know very well what that was. You made me a promise, and you broke it. Now it’s over. I already filed for divorce, and they’re coming to serve you today.
Ex: My mom told me you might do something like that.
Me: Maybe next time you’ll listen to her.
Ex: What about all the intimacy we had all this time?
Me: What about it?
Ex: You used me.
Me: Oh, just like you did me for the last 4 years.
She gets up and grabs the house phone and calls her mother. She starts crying into the phone talking to her. Meanwhile, I pull out my cellphone and start calling the landlord to let him know that I paid 3 months of our 6-month lease, and he can go after her for the rest, then I call the electric company and tell them to shut off the power at the address tomorrow.
The cable, gas, and auto insurance were all in her name. Once the car was re-registered in New Hampshire my sister put it on her insurance and I paid her. I then grabbed the phone from her and explained to her mom that I was done with the little liar.
About that time, I went back to the bedroom and found her wedding band and engagement ring on the dresser.
Me: You’re not keeping your engagement ring?
Ex: Why should I? You’re leaving me.
Me: Good, I can get a few bucks from them at the pawnshop.
About that time, OS and MS arrive with a local police officer. The officer watches as we pack up all my stuff into OS’s truck, and I switch the plates for my car. We pack both vehicles up while OS and MS get their say in the matter.
After we get everything, I wanted to take pictures of the apartment and her to show evidence that I didn’t hit her or get violent and wreck the house (she was that kind of person who would cry wolf for attention).
OS: Okay, Ex, we have all the photos of you and the apartment we need, so you can’t claim he beat you up.
Me: And your license plates are in the kitchen, and you can keep the bed because I’m going to get another one.
Ex: What am I going to do with it?
MS: Why don’t you give it to your sidepiece?
Me (laughing): There’s a good idea.
So, I moved out and over to BF’s house until I could afford another place of my own, which only took me about 3 months. Another 3 months later, and we were officially divorced, and she didn’t claim any alimony. She wound up living with her mother for a while, but I heard she started “seeing” her mom’s man.
Disgusting.
As for me, I took it as a lesson not to rush into anything unless you are 100% sure it’s worth it.”
3. Just Shut Up, You Say? Forget My Efficient Plan, Then
“The school I currently work at went through an overhaul of assessment marking and submission policies.
Important fact: ALL Assessment marking was done “by hand” because we were still stuck in the dinosaur age.
So, the headteacher holds a meeting stating that all marking is to be changed to an online system where we would have to type a separate comment for each criteria for all assessment tasks rather than write an overall comment. (You can imagine the uproar from all of the older teachers; they were super comfortable with writing, but can you imagine the two-finger typing method they were used to?
Not to mention finding the letters!?)
I had already seen this change coming as all students went online due to the 2019 world pause, and it was me who implemented this change for my department. I had a lightbulb moment when all that happened, so in my own time, I reworked every single assessment by reducing the number of criteria by HALF of what we had, so we would have fewer lines to mark.
(More work for me but less work for everyone else, but meh, being a team player is always good right?)
I raised my hand in the meeting to tell them what I had done for all of us, but me being the youngest teacher there, they told me to put my hand down, shut up, and sit in my spot while they moaned and groaned about the changes.
Fine. So I sat there waiting for my time to go home.
Fast-forward a week when an assessment with 6 lines is released to be marked. It may not seem much, but if I have (6 lines) X (~50 words) X (60 students), it all adds up. It took me about 5 days to completely finish all of the marking for my students in between all of the other teaching and social life activities I had.
But not for the other teachers.
All of them had to bring work home every night, and some were also coming in as early as 5 am as they were falling behind so badly. (Not to mention the teacher who accidentally forgot his partner’s birthday as he sat at work marking while she sat at the dinner table waiting for his butt who never showed up until bedtime, LOL).
The looks on their faces were priceless when I went home on time every day. (Thank you, speech recognition.) This lasted for about three weeks until all teachers finally finished their work.
After all of the flames settled down, the headteacher calls me into her office and asks me how did I manage to complete my work so efficiently, so I pull out all of my assessment reworks and place them on her table.
I told her remember how you told me to put my hand down, shut up, and sit tight; I was trying to lighten our workload and help everyone out. Then I look up at her whiteboard in her office, and she had written up a plan which stated exactly what I had done for assessment reworking in my spare time to help. So I turned around and said: Told you so.
Then I walked out.
Now I’m the leader of assessment design for my department at school, and everyone cannot thank me enough for ‘giving back their free time’ every time an assessment comes around. (I still haven’t told anyone about speech recognition, but that’s just my ace up my sleeve.)”
Another User Comments:
“I don’t understand how it is even acceptable to have no typing skills while working in the school system at this point.
It’s not like it’s a remotely new technology.
I was in a super small school, like 140-180 students in a public K-8 school, and we had a computer lab and 1 computer in each classroom by 92ish. Even if we are being super generous, schools were getting more reliant on computers around 20 years ago, and most schools went as far as issuing laptops to everyone at least 5-10 years ago.
It’s not like they were asking teachers to do programming. Just typing, data input, spreadsheet use, and basic computer use and troubleshooting should be the bare minimum requirement for teachers nowadays; otherwise, they are doing their students a huge disservice as paper is being phased out in so many industries. Even myself, I’m in the construction industry, and have been pretty much paper-free for about 5 years.” Sparky_Zell
2. You Really Want That Light Out? You Won't Be Pleased With The Outcome
“I was a QL5 qualified (journeyman equivalent) Leading Seaman (E-3) Radar Technician. We were responsible for the search radars (both air search and surface navigation), fire control systems, and electronic warfare systems. You would be specialized in one of the three but still have basic knowledge of all of them. We were also responsible for the computer system that the combat suite runs on. The computer system and consoles all dated from the early 80s (this story takes place around 2011-12), and many generations of software upgrades and tweaks meant that things didn’t always work as fast as they were supposed to.
The display consoles that were used in the Operations Room (CIC) did a self-test every power on. There was also a button on the console to manually initiate a self-test. This was a form of soft-reset. It wiped the active memory and reinitialized the internal computer. The only difference between doing this and turning it off and on was a button vs a switch. An abridged self-test ran continuously in the background.
Hardware faults usually meant it simply didn’t turn on. Soft faults would result for a variety of reasons, including, commonly, a delayed reply to a network query.
There was a single red fault lamp, which, once flagged, stayed lit until the console was reset. The consoles were just dumb terminals, so if there was a fault, it usually meant rebooting to see if it was a persistent fault and replacing a part if required. As the consoles got older, the soft faults became more and more common.
Resetting a console meant it flashed up in its baseline state. Anything an end-user had done like selecting maps or overlays, customizing Quick Action Buttons (QABs), etc. was wiped out and had to be done again.
The Operations Room Officer (ORO) was a Lt(N) (O-3). The offending ORO on this ship was particular that everything be in “perfect condition.” We were ordered to remove the labels we had applied to each console indicating which breaker was used to isolate power.
If there was any amount of dirt or dust on the system, we were told to clean it (routine maintenance was performed monthly, which included disassembling the keyboard and trackball for cleaning). His biggest complaint was about the fault light. Most other Ops Room personnel would accept that the fault lights sometimes lit for no good reason and understood to report to the maintainers if they experienced an actual problem with their equipment.
At the start of every watch, a call would come across the maintenance net for a tech to come to look at the ORO’s console. Every time, it would be simply that the fault light was lit because the console took too long to boot up. Every time, we explained to him that the only way to make the light go out was to reset his console and that the console would be returned to the baseline configuration.
This was, of course, unacceptable, but we needed to make the light go out. I offered to remove the bulb, so it would no longer offend his sensibilities, but this was also unacceptable because he would have no idea if his display was working or not (other than, you know, the images on the screen and being able to use the console).
Since the Senior Tech of the Watch (STOW, anywhere from E-5 to E-7) was informed every time there was a maintenance call, I made sure to clear my plan with him first. The next time the ORO complained about the fault light, I went up to the Ops Room, listened to his complaint, and promised to drop everything and diagnose the fault immediately.
I leaned in and pressed the self-test button. The light went out, and the smug look on his face lasted until about 2 seconds after the console came up after finishing its test. We were sailing on an exercise and had plotted several simulated landmasses, shipping lanes, etc. It took him several minutes to get his console set up again, and he had to ask the Ops Room Supervisor (senior enlisted person in the Ops Room) for help as he couldn’t get the maps to load correctly.
The remainder of the trip, I never heard a peep about the fault lights.”
1. Keep Harassing Us For No Reason? I Know How To Put A Stop To This
“This happened technically yesterday cause it’s 4 o clock in the morning right now, and I can’t sleep because of it, and it’s still very fresh in my mind.
So, I went out into town with a couple of friends who I won’t name, so I’ll say F1 and F2 (they are twin sisters).
So, we’d been in town for about 2 hours-ish, and we went to a nearby park to just kind of mess around for a bit. My friends didn’t wanna cross the main road for some reason, so we were going to go through this small little tunnel-like thing and around to where the entrance of the park was, and a group of kids about 6 I think looked quite young (around 11 ish) was there, and one of them said some saucy comment to me about something.
I didn’t really hear it too well and just kept walking; I didn’t think much of it.
We heard them behind us and just assumed they were also going to the park until out of nowhere, one decided to ram me from behind. I’m really bad with confrontation and so I chose to ignore it until they stopped us at the entrance to the park.
I’d like to say I said some witty comment to them or something, but really, the star was F1; she full-on punched one in the shoulder when they wouldn’t let us leave, which they were not expecting ’cause they were at that age where you always expect the boys to be the tough ones, not the girls.
We headed into the park with these kids following us.
I was at the back. so I occasionally got pushed or kicked from behind, but it didn’t really hurt too much because of their young age, but their attitude was out for b***d. We went to the back of the park and sat down whilst we tried to cool down. We found the guy’s face when F1 punched him hilarious.
We were minding our own business, and they came over to us a second time, and by now, I was thinking of calling the police because these kids were harassing us, me physically and the girls verbally with some horrible name-calling.
I don’t know if they heard that, but I definitely did, and I wasn’t happy.
They pushed me for the third or fourth time now, and F2 went off to call her dad, and they thought she called the police and covered their faces and left the park. But I was not done with them. I wanted their faces, so I could report them. I thought I could probably run faster than them, but I am very, very small for my age (13, 1.4m).
I told the girls to stay where they were and that I’d be back, and obviously, they were a bit worried. I started recording and kind of slowly walked up on them out of the park until I got close enough, which is when I started going for it. I put my phone over my shoulder and ran through the middle of them. (Sadly, I must have hit the record button again cause it only got up to the bit where I started flat out sprinting, but it didn’t matter because of what happened next.) They realized what had happened, and my heart sank so much when I heard, and I quote, “Oh crap, go get him.”
I was like, ‘OH CRAP. ABORT, ABORT.’ cause I knew if they caught up to me, I’d be done; I have no meat on me whatsoever. I ran over to a group of adults with this kid chasing me thinking that I’d be alright cause they would help me if he tried to attack me, and boy, was I right. This dumb kid came over to me and pushed me up against a fence, and I pushed him off.
The family now knew something was up, and the dad started walking towards him, and he got the message and started to take off, but this legend reached out and grabbed him by his elbow just before he escaped. I was really thankful, and I was a bit embarrassed cause my voice kept cracking, and I was stuttering from the adrenaline and the anger from what had just been happening.
The mom asked me what was happening, and I explained it fully from start to finish, and she said this which made me laugh so much at the time: “It’s ok, my partner is actually a police officer.”
I wish I could have talked more, but we all agreed that we wanted to leave the park now. I thanked them so much, and we left.
F1 didn’t really take the whole thing too well, so F2 and I spent a little while comforting her. I called my dad and told him what happened, and he laughed so much when I said that he was an off-duty police officer. We went down and sat in Waterstones for about half an hour and forgot about it.
I hope that maybe that might have scared the kids being talked to by a police officer, so maybe they would stop mixing with these people, but I doubt it.
It’s just a bit scary because we saw so many little girls and boys without parents in town before that, so imagine if they didn’t want to cross the main road that day like we had.”
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