People Share Their Slick Passive-Aggressive Revenge Stories

We’d all like to believe that our actions and decisions won’t have consequences. Nobody wants to be wrong, and most definitely, nobody wants to deal with the first-hand embarrassment that being wrong often results in. But it’s important for us to accept that not everything will go according to plan and that there are times where we must admit when we’re incorrect. It’s not like we’re perfect anyway.

Many of us are aware of this, but nothing is more aggravating than dealing with a person who thinks things will always go their way. I feel like sometimes people need to learn that they’re wrong the hard way, just a little, soft slap in the face to remind them. Like, okay, Mother-in-Law, you can say my cooking is “too strong” all you want, but you’ll be begging for my spices when I serve you a flavorless meal. And, sure, Boss, we’ll leave the store open after one of your drunk customers literally just pooped in it… But just wait until the authorities have to handle it and eventually shut you down. Maybe then, they will learn, or maybe not. Who knows, but it’s just so pleasant letting someone fail or watching their silly plan blow up in their face.

This is exactly why the following reads are just so gosh darn good!

25. Wanna Criticize My Driving? Go For It, But You’ll Regret It

As they don’t, “Don’t judge what you don’t understand.”

“Back in secondary school, I (then 18F) went to a friend’s 18th birthday party. The plan was to have cake and give presents at the birthday girl’s home, then drive into the city for a meal, followed by drinks in a bar.

Since I did not live close by, and I would have to drive there and back home in my car, either way, I volunteered to be one of the drivers for the night. The two other people that would drive the party guests around were a family member of the birthday girl as well as a guy I will call Peter.

Peter was the boyfriend of Amy, a girl in the same friend’s group as me and the birthday girl. Our group had the rule that, unless something was explicitly labeled as a girl’s day, all invitations included our respective romantic partners as a +1. From what I could tell, Peter was not close to anyone in our group other than Amy, but they only ever showed up together. I am not kidding, Amy once refused an invitation to my birthday party because Peter would be busy with his studies that night. I never got along great with Peter, but I always acted civil and polite around him.

Anyways, the birthday girl lived in a part of town I had never been to before.

While driving from her place to the restaurants, we drove through a stretch of road that had several hard to see curves with several intersections and traffic lights and several lines of road in each direction. The road is crowded with cars that drove at the speed limit. I did try not to drive too slow as not to block traffic, but I had to drive a little below the speed limit. When we reached the restaurant, Peter pulls me aside.

Peter: “You do know that you can cause accidents by driving too slow, don’t you?”

Me, annoyed, since I am an experienced driver, and he has no reason to lecture me: “Yes, I know. But I’ve never driven on that road before, so I could not go full speed while navigating safely in that traffic.

Also, I am not sure that driving between 40 and 45 km/h in a 50 km/h zone can be actually considered too slow.”

He sneers and leaves to join Amy at the tables.

Later, we drove to a different part of town for drinks. Mine was the last car to enter the parking lot, so the other cars had already parked by the time I found an empty spot.

Now, there is something you should know about my car: It was a solid working car but a bit on the older side. It drove well but was missing some amenities newer cars had. Most annoyingly, it did not have hydraulic power steering. As a result, it was very hard to adjust the wheels while that car was standing still.

It was possible but did require some elbow grease. I was used to it and could move the steering wheel while standing with little problem, but I had also adjusted the way I drove to make it possible to do most adjusting while the car is still moving. Among other things, I was very careful while parking, as in correcting the car’s position mid-parking required wheel adjustment while standing still.

I was letting my car roll slowly into the right position to get into the parking spot in one move. Just before I got to the spot where I had to start turning the steering wheel to get the right angle without having to stop, Peter left the group waiting for us and walked over to my car.

I lowered my window.

Peter, in the most condescending tone I have ever heard, said: “Well, how about I help you out and park that car for you, huh?”

I was just about to explain to him just what I thought about condescending ****** **************like him when my eyes fell on his car, his brand new car his parents bought him when he got his license. His nice car with all the amenities you could imagine. Cue the malicious compliance:

I let my car roll up further, to the exact spot where the wheels had been fully adjusted in order for the car to fit into the spot. Then I shut off the motor, smiled, and said, “You know what? That sounds like a wonderful idea!” and exited my car.

He took my keys, started the motor, grabbed the steering wheel, and suddenly froze. His face turned to me with a scared look in his eyes.

Peter: “Does your car not have power steering?”

Me, with the biggest grin: “Nope. Now go on, show me how to park my car!”

He had to adjust while standing several times until my car was finally in the spot. The friends in my car had a very hard time suppressing their laughter. He exited, handed me the keys, and did not even look at me for the rest of the night. I think I even saw him rubbing his upper arms in pain a couple of times. He never bothered me again.” SufficientMacaroon1

24. Can’t Bother To Remember Any Of Our Names? We’ll Just Play-Along

These students really got her good.

“In high school, I was in classes with lots of non-English students. Nearly half the class were Indian, Polish, or from African countries. Most had been born in England but named with traditional names/spellings, but a few were born in other countries and moved to England before they turned 10.

At one point, our English teacher went on sick leave due to a problem with her throat that caused her to lose her voice. No problem. She was well planned, so the school arranged a long-term substitute who was given all the lesson plans, slide shows, worksheets, and homework.

We’ll call this substitute teacher Mrs. Smith.

As I’ve already mentioned, we had many foreign students in this class. Common examples of names are Patricia being spelled Patrijia, Casper spelled Kacper, a student named Star, and a South African who had moved over when he was 6 with a traditional name.

With the exception of the South African student, all of these students had their names pronounced exactly the same as the English version. A few got caught on Kacper (they thought it was Ka-k-per), but most of the time we just needed to correct pronunciation.

Then Mrs. Smith started. We knew she would be with us at least a month since our old teacher told us that was how long she had to be on complete voice rest. No problem; we can live with that.

Mrs. Smith couldn’t pronounce any names that weren’t English. We didn’t blame her; there were some unusual names in there. Each time she said a name wrong, the student would correct her. That was day 1.

By the end of week 1, it became obvious that she was purposefully saying names wrong.

Instead of Patrijia being pronounced as pat-ri-sha, she would come up with something like pat-rig-ee-ay. Totally wrong, corrected many times, corrections ignored.

As we were a close class, who mostly caught on, we were all a little offended by this. Normally, these students would be happy with nicknames being used, but with Mrs. Smith, it was different.

At the end of the day, one of the students asked why she wasn’t trying to get their names right. Her reply? “Sorry, I can’t be bothered to learn your names. They’re just too weird. Maybe you should ask your mom to give you a normal name.”

Safe to say, we were p*ssed. This was the worst thing to say to a diverse group of 15-year-olds.

The next Monday, one of the students decided to start malicious compliance.

When she did roll call butchering his name, he refused to answer. She asked why he wasn’t answering, and he simply said, “You never called my name.”

Same thing throughout the whole lesson. Any time she called on him, he would ignore her. She tried everything, shouting, standing in front of his desks, trying to give him detention. But every time he ignored her, and when she gave him a detention slip, he simply looked at it and said, “This can’t be for me. That’s not my name.”

She had misspelled his first and last name to such a degree you couldn’t even tell it was meant to be his name.

Slowly, the rest of the class joined in. Unless she said our name exactly right, we wouldn’t answer.

Eventually, someone had a brilliant idea – start calling her something different.

So, we started calling her Mrs. Smithe (sm-ey-the). Not something majorly different, but it annoyed her.

By the end of week 2, she demanded we all stay after class. It was the last lesson of the day, so nobody was happy, but we knew our rights as students. She could only hold us 15 minutes. Anything longer and she had to give a prior warning and get confirmation from our parents that we could be held that long.

So, she starts raving about how shes never taught such an ungrateful, disobedient, stupid class. Mind you we were the highest set for English, so we understood the language perfectly. She’s ranting and raving, calling each student out in turn.

Then the door opens, and the headteacher asked why everyone was still there. We’d been held there 20 minutes, and one of the parents waiting had come in and asked what was wrong.

She goes off about how awful our class is, how we’re disrespecting her, and even calls out one of the students calling them the wrong name. And that student happens to be one of the ones who the parent was picking up.

When the headteacher turns to us and asks what we’ve done, the instigator explains. We’re calling her Mrs. Smithe until she can pronounce our names properly. When asked why, this kid gets the best smile on his face and goes, “She can’t be bothered with our names, so we can’t be bothered with hers.”

We had a new substitute teacher by Monday, and when our normal teacher came back, she gave us all sweets for standing up for ourselves.

Mrs. Smith? She’s banned from teaching now.” Alex-Jay

Another User Comments:

“I did the same thing for a lesser offense when I was 17.

My name not only has a nickname but a diminutive that children are called. (For example, we’ll use the name John, for which the nickname is Jack, and the diminutive is Johnny. So, he called me Johnny Smith.) Nobody had, in fact, been allowed to call me by the diminutive in a very long time except for one of my cousins. I’d made my parents stop calling me that when I was 3.

In high school, one of the gym teachers – only one – started calling me by that name. Okay, no need to get angry; he probably had a student who liked to be called, that, right? So, I’d just correct him.

Several times a day, I’d correct him. It quickly became apparent that he wasn’t mistaken. He was doing it to try to wind me up because he didn’t like me.

I was a good kid. I didn’t ever talk back or try to wind anyone up, so I put up with it. For over 3 years. A few months before I graduated, I had my “*** it” day – the day someone finally did something to me so horrible that I said “*** it” and fought back.

From that moment on, I didn’t take any *** from anyone. (In my first-period class, someone sprayed oven cleaner in my face. I wiped it off, threw him across the room, put my boot on his neck, and made him beg for his life.

I also beat somebody with my calculus book for causing minor pain to my ear.) The teacher made the mistake of calling me “Johnny” on that day.

So, I thought about how I’d made my parents stop calling me that when I was 3. I ignored him. He called my name for attendance, and I ignored him. He didn’t notice; he saw I was there and marked me present. He called my name to talk to me, and since I happened to be right in front of him and looking right at him, and he was looking right at me and talking in my direction, I responded, so he didn’t notice.

Then I had my back turned, and he tried to get me to respond by calling for “Johnny,” and I ignored him.

I kept my back turned. He tried a few more times, and I ignored him. Finally, he stepped around me, got my attention, and demanded to know why I hadn’t responded. I told him there was no “Johnny” in the class, and it wasn’t my name, so why should I respond?

There wasn’t much he could do. If he wanted me punished, all he could do is send me to the vice principal in charge of discipline. Not only did that guy know I was the only kid in the school not afraid of him, but in order for discipline to occur, he’d have to talk to me, which would involve me telling him what the teacher had been doing for 3 years, which could result in me going free and the teacher getting discipline.

So, the teacher asked me, in a red-faced fury, what the **** I wanted to be called. Inspiration struck, and I replied, “You may call me Mr. Smith.” I then refused to answer to anything else. Thus, he became the only teacher in the history of the school required to call a student by title and last name, instead of by my first name. All of my peers were in awe. (They were also a bit scared of me. I didn’t much care as I knew I would soon graduate and not be seeing any of them for 25 years.)

Oh, and my cousin still calls me by that name, decades later. She’s still the only person allowed to.” themcp

23. I’m Getting Free Gas Out Of You Since I’m Apparently Not A Customer

“This happened about 6 years ago when I moved in with my partner at the time.

Our realtor managing the property gave us the form, and we filled it out. There was a section that asked about us requesting all utilities being connected on our behalf (gas, power, phone, internet). I ticked the “NO” box because I wanted to choose my own suppliers.

We moved in. Power was on, gas was on. No internet yet, but that would take days or weeks. But I then realized I never called the gas and power company. ***, I forgot. Though when I rang them and gave them my details, they said, “It’s all confirmed and connected already.” What a coincidence that the utilities the realtor connected us with was the same company I was going to sign up with.

9 months go by.

One day I come home, and there’s no gas. The power is fine.

I call the company. “You haven’t paid your bills!” they said.

Now, let me rewind for a moment. Ever since moving in, they never sent us a bill. I requested to receive them via email. Never got one. (I checked my spam.) But each quarter (our utilities get billed quarterly), I’d get a bill in my letterbox addressed to the previous tenant. I’d mark the envelope “RTS – No Such Name,” and each quarter, I would ring the gas company to tell them, “Got another bill addressed to the previous tenant.” They’d respond with, “Oh, okay. Let’s fix that.”

Anyway, back to the present day of the story. I’m on the phone trying to explain the gas disconnection issue, explaining that we haven’t paid our bill because we never got one, and so on.

They look at my account and then ask me to confirm my name. Once again, the previous tenant’s name appears. I explain to them that I’ve sent every bill back to them and called each time to resolve this.

They deny it all. Never heard from me. No records.

So, I ask them, “Is the gas disconnected now?” They say yes. I say, “Great! I’d like my gas at this address to be connected under a new customer name please because it appears to still be under the previous tenant.”

They tell me I can’t do that. They tell me I’m the previous tenant. So, I ask them to confirm my identification. I give them my name, and they have zero info about me.

I tell them I’m hanging up now and that they can call me on the number in your system for the account to confirm things but to go easy on the person who answers because they haven’t lived here in 9 months.

I hang up. They ring back immediately. I talk to sales, sign up for a new account. The gas is connected the following day. So, I got 9 months of free gas because no one at the gas company would listen to me.” Reddit user

22. We’ll Work Until All The Snow Is Removed, But You’re Paying…

“This wasn’t me doing the malicious compliance, nor the request, but the middle man who witnessed this gloriousness. I worked for a movie theater company in a state that snows every winter.

We had a contract with a snow shoveling company, but my boss refused to use it because the costs of each removal had a possibility of hurting his yearly bonus by a couple of percentage points (like $300 max out of $20,000). “Only if it snows more than six inches,” he would say every time.

Unfortunately, this meant that one of the ushers would have to shovel snow on the sidewalk. Since it’s a safety hazard to block the emergency exit doors of a theater, it meant you had to shovel a path around the entire building and for each exit door. It’s about a quarter-mile around the building. No one likes doing it because it’s cold, and shoveling a simple one shovel-length path can take two hours.

During a snowy Christmas week (the busiest week for movie theaters of the year – imagine Black Friday shopping for two weeks straight), it had snowed just under six inches. We were extremely busy, and my boss demanded to take one of our much-needed ushers to go shovel snow. (I was an assistant manager.) When we asked if the company could come out instead of us doing it, we were told no, to which one of my co-workers (we’ll call him Dan) said he would do it.

An hour later after he had gone outside, one by one, my boss pulled each usher in and wrote them up for “refusing to shovel snow.” When Dan came back in, the other ushers complained to him about it.

Dan asked our boss why, and our boss said that it was because no one wanted to shovel all of the snow, and if Dan didn’t shovel all of the snow, he would get written up as well. This all happened at the beginning of my shift, around 5 pm.

Cue the malicious compliance. What my boss didn’t realize was that it was the last day of the payroll period. Being Christmas week, Dan had already accumulated 40 hours of work earlier in the day. My boss left right after telling Dan to make sure ALL of the snow was removed. We worked the rest of the shift, and everyone assumed Dan had finished and left.

It’s 3 am now, and we go to punch out for the week but can’t because there is a shift that hasn’t been approved yet.

Someone is still working and is at 12 hours of overtime. It’s Dan. I go out to investigate since it should only be myself and my manager. As I walk outside, I see Dan coming back in, smiling the biggest grin on his face and the driest, un-snowed path I’ve ever seen in my life. It looked like two pictures cut together; there was not a spec of snow on the entire front path of the theatre. Dan spent ten hours outside. He sure removed ALL the snow from the walkway. We had a good laugh, clocked out, and left.

We didn’t hear anything until later that week when I was called into the office by my boss and had to write out a statement as to why I let Dan work twelve hours of overtime.

My boss had this smug look on his face like he had “beaten” us. He was not too pleased when he found out that all of our statements included him saying the phrase “remove all the snow” and that he refused to call the snow plow company. My boss was transferred to another theater soon after.” SparkleFritz

21. We Need Permission To Enter The Breakroom? Prepare To Get Constantly Interrupted

“I used to work a crappy retail job in LA, and the boss had just hired a new assistant manager. Picture a blonde Karen who appears to be in her 40s but tells everyone she’s 33, who has just divorced from her Beverly Hills doctor or dentist husband, and now has to actually WORK for the first time in her life to support herself and her four children.

During her first week there, this super-smart lady left her Louis Vuitton bag open on the break room table instead of locking it in her assigned locker, and someone stole $200 from her purse. Not saying it was her fault; it was definitely the thief’s fault for taking something that didn’t belong to them, but Karen’s response to it was just stupid.

Assistant Manager Karen then told us that as a new policy, NO ONE could enter the break room without HER permission so that she would know who was going in there and when so that if anything else was stolen, she’d have a clear culprit. I’m not sure how she intended to enforce this during the times she wasn’t in the store, but maybe it didn’t matter if OTHER people besides her got stolen from.

(For reference, this was the first theft any of us had seen since being at the company. I don’t think they ever caught whoever it was that stole from her because we were too cheap to have security cameras in our “break room” – which was an old single-room bathroom with the toilet ripped out and a table & lockers put in – but part of me really wouldn’t be surprised if Karen had misplaced the $200 herself or had never had $200 to begin with.)

Well, we obviously didn’t like Karen strutting into our workplace and trying to limit our access to our own break room, so cue Malicious Compliance.

Every time our hands were sticky, and we needed to wash them in the break room sink, we interrupted Karen.

Every time we needed to take a drink of water, which we were only allowed to do in the break room, we interrupted Karen.

Every time we needed to sweep something up, but the broom was in the break room, we interrupted Karen.

Every time we had to throw something away, but the trash can was in the break room, we interrupted Karen.

Every time we needed to restock a product that had a box of it sitting in the break room, we interrupted Karen.

Karen could barely get her own inventories and paperwork done because of how often we needed her “permission” to open the break room door. She ended up getting so frustrated that the “new policy” lasted about three days, and she quit soon after that.

I now have a much better job that doesn’t involve retail in the slightest.” moonstone281

20. I Can’t Eat In Front Of Residents? Your Phone’s Gonna Get Blown Up

“I work in a nursing home on the 3-11 shift as a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA). What happens a lot is the CNAs will go to get food around 7:30 or 8:00 after they’ve put the majority of the residents to bed. Some of the residents figured out when we normally eat lunch and come out to passively beg for our food or try to give us money to go get them some (legally, we can’t touch their money), ESPECIALLY if we have pizza. Don’t even mention the word pizza in a nursing home unless you want a mob of people around you.

A few residents complained about the CNAs “teasing them with food that they can’t have by eating in front of them.” The facility made it a rule that we could not eat where the residents can see us. The problem is, the break room is a side room attached to the dining room. Sometimes when we’re in the break room eating, we could look up and see residents staring at us through the glass door. That means we can’t even eat in the break room.

The CNAs didn’t even talk about this compliance. We just all did it. The facility put in a rule that we absolutely had to take our lunch break about a week before this happened because CNAs would put that they didn’t have lunch at the time clock which led to them paying overtime.

Even if there was one CNA on the hall, that CNA still had to take a lunch break according to their rules. When I was the only CNA on a hall, I would pick up my lunch and eat while still answering call lights because I was the only CNA to answer them, but since I couldn’t eat where the residents saw me, so I stayed out of the building for my lunch break.

Because we stayed gone the entire time, they started getting complaints that call lights were being ignored. The nurses were doing their own malicious compliance because the Director of Nursing (DON) was jumping down their throats for answering lights while they were passing out medicine. “You can’t lock up the cart to answer a light during med pass!” is what she would screech at them, so when the aides were on lunch, the nurses weren’t answering the lights either.

No residents were harmed during this malicious compliance.

This lead to a lot of complaints and phone calls to the DON’s cell phone at night because the residents would call their family members who would then call the DON. One night at around 7:45, the DON stormed up to me while I was eating lunch in my car. She was in her pajamas, so I knew she wasn’t happy.

DON: “Why aren’t you in the hall? I’m getting phone calls about call lights not being answered!”

Me: “I’m on my lunch break.”

DON: “You can’t leave the hall unattended!”

Me: “According to the in-service AND the write up that YOU made me sign, I have to take a lunch break whether I’m the only aide on the hall or not, AND I’m not allowed to eat in front of the residents, so I can’t be in there.

We’re also not allowed to work while off the clock.”

When she realized the corner her rules back us into, she practically short-circuited. She wasn’t even making words anymore. She looked around and saw two other CNAs eating in their cars. These ladies were kind of sassy and weren’t going to take any crap from her, so she didn’t even bother. She stormed into the building, and I didn’t see her again until my lunch break was over. She apparently answered the call lights in her pajamas.

For anyone that is curious, the call lights that she answered were for little things like a resident who was on a fluid restriction wanting water or wanting their tv turned to a channel that the tv was already on.

Those were the only two lights that were on according to my nurse. The DON was furious that she had to drive down there to answer those lights since they didn’t even need anything. Welcome to CNA work, ****!

The next day, we had a new in-service that said we can take our lunch in the break room, and they put a sad excuse of a blind on the glass door of the break room. They also put a sign on the break room that said “Staff Only.” This didn’t stop residents from going in it, though. The in-service also said that if there is only one aide on the hall, that aide can not leave the hall unless they find another aide to watch it while they’re gone.

Sadly, she didn’t stop bothering the nurses.

I know some people would think we went too far with our compliance, but they were threatening termination for eating in front of the residents and for not taking a lunch break. I was suspended for three days before this compliance for not taking a lunch break, so there was nothing left to do but malicious compliance. The DON and the administrator of the facility kissed up hardcore to the residents, which is why we had stupid rules like that. Thankfully, both of them are gone. I was told by the next DON that the write-up and suspension would not be on my record, and they paid me for the 3 days I missed because there was no wrongdoing.” VeryAngryCNA

19. Sure, Sexist Boss, I’ll Do All The Work For The Female Workers… Then Quit Randomly

I like the way this man thinks.

“Years ago, I got my first full-time job working as a bank teller. It was a job that, for the most part, I enjoyed, especially since it was in a low-income area with a lot of immigrants, which meant I got to meet lots of really kind and interesting people. I wanted to spend more time working here, but the management was… just not great.

Both our manager and assistant manager were females. That in itself is not a bad thing at all. I’ve since then had multiple female managers that I consider to be some of the greatest leaders I’ve worked with. What was an issue, however, was the massive stick up their butts. There were 3 tellers working there, myself, and two other women.

I’m the only male.

Months into working here, I started to realize that there was a serious case of favoritism towards my female coworkers. They would get extra days off (paid, mind you), longer breaks, they got away with mistakes that would get most tellers fired (losing money, misplacing deposits in another person’s accounts, etc.), and in general just stuff that I couldn’t ever get away with.

When it came to me, I was the packhorse. I was not given any slack when it came to making mistakes, and I was always expected to pick up tasks that the other tellers weren’t willing to do (emptying the coin machine, reordering supplies, opening and closing the branch, processing international currency exchanges, dealing with the “tough clients,” you get the picture).

I brought this up to my management, and they simply told me, “They’re doing they’re part. Why are you complaining about doing your own? Can’t a man handle this?”

Cue the malicious compliance. In response to this blatant sexism, I decided to do what they least expected: become the best d*mn teller they’d ever had! I started to maintain all of the branches’ marketing materials, so it looked much more professional. I developed our own means of promoting our lending products and became the highest producing loan officer in the company for 3 months in a row. I picked up other tasks that were being neglected in the branch and that nobody else knew how to process. I even took multiple trainings offered by the company to be able to process more complex products, such that account holders from other branches started to come to me at my branch to do business.

It was an exciting time, but hellishly busy.

My management, on the other hand, was super happy to take credit for all of my labor, communicating to upper management that they had pushed our branch to reach their own lofty goals and had trained us for such. That was the straw that broke this camel’s back. I shopped around and found a part-time position at a marketing firm across town. It was intriguing to me, and despite being part-time, they would pay better than what I was currently being paid (I forgot to mention, I was paid MUCH less than the other two tellers, who only started working a couple of months before me). I interviewed and got the job!

I went to my manager and told her that I was quitting, that I’d had enough of them taking credit for my work, and that their sexism was belittling and was hurting the entire team.

She couldn’t believe what I was saying but dismissed it and simply said, “Well, fine then. We’re done here. Leave your keys with my assistant.” Before dropping off my keys, I dropped an email to our area VP, cluing her in on the sexism and dishonest practices in the branch.

Two weeks later, I receive a call from this very manager, begging me to come back to train the team on the many different tasks they’d left me to learn and take care of. I told her sweetly, “I’m sorry, I’m terribly busy with my new job. I’m sure Teller X and Z can take care of it all for you. You’ve never doubted them before.” And hung up.

I heard another week later from a teller I’d worked with at another branch that the area VP had run an investigation into this branch.

Their numbers had plummeted after I left, and it was discovered that the manager was not meeting her own lending quotas, and the assistant manager had been removing all fees from all the customers’ accounts and transactions in order to attract them to her to get more business. They were both fired, and I was free.” BlackHoleOpera

18. Continue Your Argument… Time Is Money

“I am a web programmer (among other things) and used to be a consultant at a very high end, very expensive agency.

I once had a client who was incredibly **** about the exact wording on their menu. At the time, pretty much every website had a section on its main menu that said “About us,” and they wanted to be different and wouldn’t have that (but had to have that section, only not with that name), so we got a writer and a graphic artist and a programmer together, and we sat down and came up with a new label for that section: “Portraits.” We told the project manager, who told the client, and we all went about our lives.

The client got very agitated about it, probably because there was one person there who felt he had to have his finger in every pie. The client insisted that they had to decide on a name and the new scope of work their decision would entail. What they didn’t bother paying attention to was that the contract said very clearly that they had to keep paying the entire team or they’d lose us, and the moment they asked for any change of scope, all work would stop, but they’d keep paying the entire team full time.

So, the project manager was working at $300 an hour, me at $300 an hour, the artist at $200 an hour, and the writer at $200 an hour… $1,000 an hour total.

Normally, we wouldn’t all be working full time on the project every day and would only bill the client for actual hours worked, but the contract was very clear that once they told the project manager there would be a scope change, everyone billed for 8 hours a day until they decided, and all work had to stop until the client either approved us to resume on the old terms or finished negotiating a new contract or fired us.

We stopped and billed them 8 hours a day. We wanted to keep working because there was other stuff we could do, but the project manager (who I adore) insisted, they had signed, they could deal with the consequences, and we had to stop work.

(The client was a Fortune 500 company who is mega-successful; they really could afford it.)

Meanwhile, the client paid $8,000 per day while they thought about it. And they thought about it for 4 days before they announced that on the morning of the 5th day that they’d have a teleconference to discuss it.

On the teleconference, we spent perhaps a minute describing our deliberation process over words, gave a list of words we had rejected, and made sure that we were all in agreement that “Portraits” was the word for the job. Then the client people started arguing with each other over whether this was the right word, isn’t this other word better, no that’s boring, well how about this one, no that’s overused.

We all sat in our conference room and looked at each other like, “Are they out of their minds?” and waited as they kept arguing. Literally, an hour later, I got a word in edgewise and told them that it was no problem to me how long they wanted to argue about it because I got paid either way, but this meeting was costing them $1,000 an hour in our time (plus I don’t even know how much for theirs), so perhaps it would be to their benefit to just let us use “portraits” and get on with it.

The boss at that company (who had been very quiet on the call) chuckled and told his people to******* up, and they gave us the approval to go on.

To be fair, he didn’t even balk when he got the bill for $33,000 for one word, although I expect he probably had to look at it twice to believe it.” themcp

17. New Employee Refuses Help, So I Gladly Let Her Fail

“I worked in a pharmacy dedicated to sending medications to nursing homes. Since this is often difficult to do just by hand, there were machines that could help out. I often helped use the machines to package the meds.

A new coworker joined my team. She was pleasant enough, but for some reason, I could not tell you, even to this day, I hated her on sight. Apparently the feeling was mutual, though we were able to work together cordially enough.

Since the machines, while super useful, were also prone to breaking down, a lot of manual intervention was required to ensure smooth operation. Since it’s a pharmacy, we also had to keep track of the medications being used on it (which means counts, often done nightly, particularly with more expensive medications).

This information is relevant.

I had been at this job for a few years, so I was reasonably experienced with the use and maintenance of the machines. My coworker wasn’t. This is also where I point out that my coworker is older than me.

So, my coworker had been at the job a few weeks and had received some training, so my boss at the time told me that it’d be okay for her to shadow me while I worked but also to make sure she did some of the work on her own, so she’d learn via hands-on experience.

This also meant I couldn’t leave until my coworker did since she hadn’t been given the go-ahead to be alone with the machine. Goody.

It went more or less okay for the majority of the shift. I let my coworker do some of the work, as ordered by my supervisor, and she seemed to be getting it.

However, for some reason, she wasn’t relying on the computer, which had kept track of all the medications used (and their corresponding slots) to do the nightly count. Instead, she was literally writing down every single slot and medication by hand, to count later.

“Coworker,” I said, “you know the computer keeps track of that–”

“I know it does, YarnAndMetal, but I don’t seem to get how to do it!”

This is toward the end of the shift.

My nerves were fried from having to deal with her, and I was tired.

“You do it like THIS, Coworker.”

(shows her)

“I don’t get it, YarnAndMetal, so I’m just going to do it by hand. You younger people don’t seem to have a problem with computers, but I do! Let me do it by myself!”

People. The process to see what had been used was literally two clicks of a mouse button. I had shown her once at the start of our shift. Our supervisor had shown her during initial training. Another coworker had shown her while she was training.

I. Was. DONE.

So, I let her do exactly what she wanted. I let her write down every canister by hand, every med by hand, and let her count by hand.

I even offered, as a show of good faith, to help with the counting, but again, “NO, YarnAndMetal, I’ll do it! Let me do it by myself!”

Fine.

As a result, we ended up leaving an hour after our shifts were supposed to end. That’s an hour of OT that we hadn’t been authorized to take, for the record.

The next day, my supervisor asks me why I’d stayed so late last night, so I told her very honestly that my coworker didn’t want my help finishing out the necessary counts last night. My supervisor, being what she was (yes, my wording there is deliberate), immediately went and ripped my coworker a new one.

The day after, my coworker didn’t come in. We all found out she’d quit, effective immediately.

Good riddance, I guess.

BONUS AFTERMATH: I also found out the day after I had to stay so late that the counts my coworker did were wrong. All of them.” YarnAndMetal

16. Refuse To Believe The Shelves Aren’t Strong Enough? Don’t Say I Didn’t Warn You

“So, for a little bit of background information, I was attending an animal care course in college and as part of the course, I was required to complete work experience.

My manager, who shall only be referred to as Manager, was notoriously difficult to work with and seemed to enjoy making people’s lives difficult.

I had been working there for several months on a weekend basis and had only minor problems with Manager so far, such as her asking me to eat my lunch on the counter in full view of customers, which made me very uncomfortable, and a few customers even asked Manager why I was doing this.

But, one day, I was given the task of unloading an unusually large delivery after the store had been cleared out by an animal event in town needing a lot of supplies.

I told Manager that the shelves couldn’t hold anywhere near the amount she had ordered, but she requested I do it anyway. I pulled up the safety sheet, which clearly outlined the maximum weight per shelf, but she insisted.

I had just finished loading up all the shelves and saw them visibly bending under the weight, so I informed Manager, only to get told that was “normal” and went back downstairs to attend to my other duties.

5 minutes go by, and a crash rings throughout the entire store. We all head upstairs and find virtually every shelf demolished and thousands of dollars worth of equipment in tatters.

Manager immediately blames me in full view of the entire shop, despite the fact that all the staff clearly knew she was at fault for this. Regardless, I was fired, and the letter of termination was mailed to my tutor, which led to a meeting with Manager, me, my tutor, and the principal of the college.

Upon hearing my side of the story, my tutor accompanied me to the store, so she could investigate, and she had found that the shelves were built improperly and had also been jury-rigged together after breaking previously.

After this was found out, Manager’s store was blacklisted from the approved work exp providers list for the entire district, and she was facing severe charges for blatant health and safety violations.

A few months go by, and a lack of customers and employees led to her having to sell the shop.” Hazbro29

15. Mind My Own Business? I’ll Remember That When You Drop Your “Stuff”

“So, this happened many years ago when I was about 14.

My father had a camper van, and we would go away to different caravan parks most weekends during the good months of the year.

One weekend, we went to a caravan park that a friend of my father was also going to. We pitched up opposite each other, and it was business as usual.

On Saturday, me, my father, and his friend, who we will call John, went to the nearest village and into the pub. As it was good weather, we sat in the beer garden at the rear of the pub at a picnic-style table.

Also seeing as it was a village, there was no one around the pub but ourselves.

Somehow, John and I wound up sitting beside each other with my father opposite. John has been smoking rollies while we were there, casually rolling them on the table part of the picnic table. Then I noticed him rolling one on the seat part between him and myself. So, wondering what he was doing, I glanced down to see he was now rolling a “special” rolly at which point he poked me hard in the ribs and said, “You mind your own business and don’t look at what I am doing here.”

Time passed, green plant-based rollies were had, and eventually, it was time to leave.

As everyone stood up from the table, I noticed John drop a large piece of plant wrapped in tinfoil out of his pocket.

What did I do? I minded my own business.

We went back to the camper vans, and after maybe an hour, I notice John walking around looking under the chairs and on the floor for something. So, I asked my father what he was looking for, and he said, “John has lost his special plant,” to which I replied, “That must be what he dropped in the pub then.”

My father went and told John I saw him drop it in the pub. John calls me out and asks why didn’t I tell him. And I replied, “You said to mind my own business, and so I did.”

He went back to the pub but couldn’t find it, and when he returned, he was so angry that he packed up his things and left in his camper van.

Be careful what words you choose to use.” fish-and-a-rice-cake

14. Say Missing Work Will Be Waived If We Ace The Final? I’m Not Doing Any Homework Then

“This was many years ago when I was in high school, but it is still one of my proudest academic coups.

Backstory: I was a gifted kid in an IB (International Baccalaureate) program. I also had undiagnosed ADHD and tested well but didn’t consistently complete homework, especially if it was busywork.

I’m in IB History class in my sophomore year. We get assigned pages upon pages of reading and notes for homework every night, and the notes are THE most tedious *******. There’s a really specific format we have to use that involves splitting the page in half, writing a fact from the text on one side, a couple of sentences of “analysis” of that fact on the other, and 2-3 sentences summarizing everything you’ve written at the bottom of the page.

We also had quotas for how many pages of notes we had to do. (I don’t remember the exact ratio because I never ever hit it but it was like a 40-page reading needed 20 pages of notes.) They took FOR-EV-ER, there often weren’t actually enough “key facts” to analyze, and everyone BS’ed the *** out of them to hit their page count. They were also the first thing on the chopping block if we had too much homework (which we always did). And we would get graded down for not hitting the quota, not following the format, or for having poor quality content. Everyone hated them with a passion, especially me.

Our teacher got sick of people BSing their notes, b*tching about their notes, or just not turning them in at all, which happened more often than not.

So, she announced at the beginning of the new term that anyone who missed a notes assignment would get an incomplete instead of a zero, so it wouldn’t affect your grade, and if you did well on the final, any missing assignments would be waived. But if we didn’t do well, they would become zeros, and our grade would drop.

She intended this to just be temporary grace for the good students, so they could afford to miss an assignment here and there and not ruin their GPA. But she was not prepared for the unintended consequences I was about to inflict.

This announcement was absolute music to my ears. You see, not only were our notes busywork, but they were POINTLESS busywork because all the material from the reading would be covered on the PowerPoint in class the next day.

So, I would always just pay attention and take notes in class, only do some of my homework, ace the final because I had still learned the material, and because homework was only 35% of the overall grade, I’d still usually scrape a B in the class, which was fine by me.

So, naturally, when I hear we don’t “have to” do notes, I accept the *** out of that challenge. I decided right then and there that I would be doing no history homework for the entire term and basked in my newfound liberation from hours of *******.

About halfway through the term, my teacher comes up to me and the convo goes something like this:

Teacher (Valley Girl voice – she was only 24 and very immature): “Um, Ginger, I noticed you haven’t turned in any notes at all yet this term.

I’m like, kinda concerned about that.”

Me: “Well, you said if we did well on the final we would get our notes waived.”

Teacher: “Well, I mean yeahhhh, but if you don’t do well, you’re going to lose a huuuge chunk of your grade.”

Me: “Okay, and…?”

Teacher (bothered): “I mean, you should reeeeally turn in SOME notes so that doesn’t happen.”

Me: “It’s okay, I’m good.”

Teacher (REALLY bothered): “Are you seriously planning on, like, just not doing ANY notes all term?”

Me: “Yep. Because they’ll be waived anyway when I do well on the final.”

Teacher (getting condescending): “Oooo-kayy, well don’t blame ME when your grade goes down.”

Me: “Yeahhh…Can I get back to work now?”

I proceed to stick to my word and not do any notes assignments all term.

The final comes around, and it’s our typical format: 120 minutes to write two essays chosen from three prompts. I could have crushed any of them, but I picked the two easiest for me and got to writing. I finished the first one about Columbus’s problematic historiography and realized it only filled one piece of notebook paper front and back (single-spaced). But I had said everything I needed to fulfill the prompt. Cool, onto the next one. I don’t remember the topic, but it too was clear and concise, taking up only a sheet and a half.

I was the first one done (not unusual for me; I often hyperfocus on essay tests) and walked up to turn it in. The teacher thought I had a question.

I informed her I was done. Her eyebrows shot through the roof, and she asked if I was sure. I said yes, left class, and went and enjoyed my early lunch.

It’s next week, and we get our graded finals back. She stiffly marches up to my desk and slams my test papers down. The longer essay got a 98. The page-long one about Columbus got 100. She muttered something sarcastic about, “Well, I guess that little gamble paid off for you, huh?” “Yep, just like I said it would,” I said. She was FUMING as she walked away.

She had been SO hoping to catch me in a big-a** “gotcha,” but as it was, I ended up getting the highest score in the class.

She had to waive EVERY SINGLE notes assignment, and I ended up with an A for the term.” gingergirl181

13. Refuse To Close Your Store That’s Contaminated With Bodily Fluids? Be Ready to Face The Consequences

“So, this is a story I tell people when they tell me their horror stories in working in fast food. Names are throwaway.

So, while I was at university, I had a side job managing a team at a very popular sandwich branch. Myself, Joe, and Johnny would work the night shifts (8 pm till 4 am), and I would work Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night as this shop was opposite from the only night club in town. Very upper-class city during the day but a VERY trashy nightlife.

It would get so busy after 2 am with drunks that queues would be out the door, and we would have to put away tables and chairs to block the toilets as people would either throw them at us/each other or dash off to the toilets for a quicky with a stranger. This, however, happened at around 9 pm. Nice and quiet time, nothing interesting usually happens during this time, and the owner of the restaurant would call in every half hour to see how the shop is doing because he’s worried about losing money by requiring three whole employees to prepare for the night rush.

A group of around 15 girls run in, look underage, all drunk. Like, REALLY drunk.

Cool, serve them, get rid of them.

Happens occasionally, but we still got some time before the mass comes.

One of the “larger” girls collapses against the wall on the floor. Looks passed out. Her friends don’t take any notice, but we are all first aid trained, I get Joe to go check on her – she waves him off, shouts at him, fine – back to work.

10 minutes later. The smell. Oh lord, the smell. The store is actually pretty busy, but after realizing what had happened, we had to stop serving and kick everybody out of the store because of the health hazard I was about to witness. We kick out her friends, and she’s still asleep. John and I lift the woman to a safe location while Joe calls an ambulance in case there is anything wrong.

The smell gets worse as we lift her. I felt sick. I turned to look back, and I saw the largest, wettest, pile of feces I had ever seen in the shape of her behind with a very distinct line in the middle representing what was most likely a G-string/thong. Be mindful that this girl looks like she’s 15.

None of us wanted to go anywhere near it. But a joint effort between the three of us had it cleaned up within minutes. I wasn’t going to risk ANYTHING, so I left the ventilators on full blast and prepared to lock up for the rest of the night.

Incoming phone call – It basically went down as, “How’s the store?,” “We had an incident, so we had to close,” “What? Under no circumstance are you ever to close early!,” “Yes… but,” “No buts! Open back up immediately, or I’ll fire all three of you.”

We throw away anything perishable that wasn’t covered.

We didn’t have a lot out but still, not risking anything else that could lose me my oh so precious part-time job. We then proceed to take a 30-minute break to let the store ventilate and allow the smell to leave (like it would..).

A huge group of lads comes to the store while we’re outside and starts a fight with Joe because we were closed. I tell the lad what happened and why we were closed, but he was having none of it. He said he knew the owner and was a “law student” and would have me sued for false closure. (Enlighten me. I can’t get sued for something like this, can I?)

He calls the owner, and surely enough, I immediately get a call back.

“Open the store now, or I’ll fire you on the spot.” I tell him to wait up a couple of seconds while I deal with a customer. I tell Joe to start recording the call.

“Sorry, I didn’t catch what you previously said, could you repeat?”

“Open the store, or you’re fired!”

I repeat our previous conversation explaining why I had closed the store and that it was a critical food hazard until it was cleaned properly. (Most heavy-duty cleaning materials that could have appropriately cleaned up the mess were locked away by the owner until morning because we “wouldn’t have time.”)

“I don’t think you understood what I said. Open. The. Store.”

Alright. Will do, Boss.

So, I continue to open the store, customers start flooding in.

I get all fresh ingredients out to start rushing through the humongous line we were amassing. A lot of customers are turning their noses once they walk in, but like I said, trashy – these people are hungry! They line up anyway.

Some customers are throwing up from the smell. It really was that bad. They asked me what was up, and I told them that if I were to close, I’d lose my job.

Then the police show up and close up shop for us. Thank God. I was waiting for something like this to happen. We didn’t even have to clean up; we just got told to go home, and they would sort it with the owner tomorrow because the city had a reputation to uphold.

I ended up getting fired because I closed the store.

But instead of just getting fired, I ended up taking it to court for unfair dismissal and got a month’s payout, and the owner had an emergency health inspection the MORNING AFTER.

The guy lost his branch.

He works as a security guard at a grocery store now working for the security guard he previously hired to “look after us” after 1 am. I’m pretty sure he ended up losing his house and car too. Screw that guy.” Reddit user

12. You Said Not To Leave Until You Tell Me To

“Years ago, after trying to make a career out of a miserable job in a shop I’d been working at for a couple of years by that point, I was getting pretty comfortable and efficient at the workflow for the customer service department (AKA cashiering).

Now, this place is known for having the lowest labor hour rates in the industry (this is basically wages divided by sales per hour), so to say management was overworked is an understatement. They had also gone through a buyout by new owners who implemented these strict labor standards only months before I was hired, so everyone was getting used to these new tighter standards and were on edge for possibly being let go if there were any unnecessary positions.

Back when I was young and dumb (AKA had something to prove), I tried really hard to show my management potential. I enjoy the challenge of extra responsibility and making it work. One of the front line supervisors was a guy I really look up to as a stand-up guy, but this day (I’m going to blame stress on his part), he was apparently in no mood, even though I believe he normally trusted me to make sound decisions.

Now, when you are on register in this shop, it takes about 5 minutes from the time you “lock-off” or close the register until you can walk away or longer if it’s a particularly large order (over $150 or so).

Ideally, you (the grunt employee) don’t have to worry because the supervisor will lock you off about 5 minutes before the end of your shift. Otherwise, you would communicate with the supervisor, and they would rush over to lock you off or just jump in to finish your order and let you go home.

So, one day, I’m approaching the end of my 8-hour shift. I have about 5 minutes left, but the manager in charge is in the back office trying to catch up on closing duties, so I take my last customer and lock off.

It wasn’t too busy of a night, so there weren’t any lines by me locking off.

After that, I knock on the office door to let him know I’m leaving. He proceeds to chastise me for locking myself off without letting him know. That nobody is to lock themselves off because it’s the manager’s responsibility.

He’s right. That’s the policy. That’s what I get for trying to help out.

Literally, the next day, we’re working together again. It’s the same situation. Starting about 10 minutes before the end of my shift, I’m watching the clock, waiting for him to come out of the backroom. 5 minutes to go. If I don’t lock off now, I won’t get out in time. Time to go, but there’s still no manager.

I keep working another fifteen minutes until he comes out, looks at me, looks at the schedule, looks at me again.

“Oh, weren’t you off 15 minutes ago?”

I played dumb. “Oh, yeah, I guess I was.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I figured a manager would come let me out.”

He was a little more accepting of my help after that and I was 20 minutes of OT richer. This was only the beginning of many conflicting policies to come under the new management.” Oneillirishman

11. I Can’t Cut My Own Hair? And I Won’t, But Somebody Else Will Be Getting A Haircut

“When I was four, my mother would trim my bangs about once a month with large, shiny, silver barber scissors. I thought these scissors were really cool, and I was enamored with cutting my own hair.

I was also four and not very good at it. The first time I cut my own hair, I cut some of the sides off. My mother had to try and even it out, going from shoulder length to pixie. The second time, I went for my bangs. (There is a picture of me with microscopic bangs in our preschool class photo to help date this memory.)

After I cut my bangs, I got in trouble and was told very explicitly that I was not allowed to cut MY own hair again.

Cue malicious compliance.

Well… Turns out, I had a sister.

She’s three and a half years younger than me, and so if this happened while I was ending preschool, she was around a year old and definitely still in diapers.

At one point, while we were unsupervised, I got the big sharp shiny scissors, brought her over, and cut her hair. She did not have much of it, but what there was, was pretty much gone. She had the kind of baby-fine curl ringlets that some babies have.

After that, I got in REALLY BIG TROUBLE. Unfortunately for me, my excuse of, “Well, you never said I couldn’t cut Sissy’s hair” didn’t give me any traction whatsoever. This is probably why I still recall the event so clearly. Both the joy of the hair cutting and the horror of just how much trouble I was in. Considering how big sharp scissors are, it could have gone down a whole lot worse.

I went on to cut my own hair again about six months later right before the kindergarten school picture.

But I never cut my sister’s hair again unless she explicitly asked me to.

This clearly happened many years ago, but I was reminded of it by my aunt when we were talking about cutting around hair due to shelter-in-place laws.” tallchick8

Another User Comments:

“I saw my sister running her bangs when she was around eleven, and I was around eight. I had a widow’s peak (sort of) and cut that off. That wasn’t enough, so I used the razor she had out (she must have just started shaving her legs or something). I ended up having to go to a hairdresser to fix my now bald spot. She pulled bangs from the middle of my head, and the rest of my hair ended up so thin.

It was ridiculous! I looked like Carol Brady! Lol, thanks for the memory!” Rustymarble

10. My Cooking’s Too Strong For Your Sensitive Tastebuds? Here’s A Bland Dinner

From one extreme to the next. That’ll show her.

“So, my husband and I live with his mother. She basically sits in her recliner and takes advantage of me working, my streaming services, and my eventual frustration at things not getting done, so I do it myself. My husband is disabled, and it’s hard for him to do much more than laundry and some dishes and light cooking. I work 50+ hours a week in a restaurant. Even through all the crap the last few months, I’ve remained full time.

The food my store serves isn’t the healthiest, so I try to only bring home leftovers as a treat for me not having to cook.

Now, I have a very midwestern, German, hearty way of cooking. I make a lot from scratch, but I also know how to utilize condensed soups and elevate a hamburger helper. My husband loves my cooking, and I’m always having him taste-test things. We love cooking together and have always been experimental and up for trying new things.

However, this stopped when we moved in with his mom because she’s very, very picky. She used to cook her share, and we would get by that way. But slowly over time, she got flogging lazy and now won’t do more than microwave ramen or make a sandwich. It’s fine. Whatever. But my husband can’t stand up long enough to cook a whole lot either, so it falls on me.

10-hour day on my feet be ******. I revel in my husband’s enjoyment of my cooking. That brings me joy.

So, he has a new favorite dish of mine that I can’t tell you the clever name of because it’s named after a certain situation we are dealing with as a country, but it IS clever. For it, I utilized (mostly chicken) condensed soup since flour and butter were hard to find. I had plenty of powdered milk in the freezer, and we had plenty of frozen veggies of all kinds and a butt load of rice for the dish.

I usually use cream of mushroom or celery and a couple of cans of mushrooms with peas and carrots – all creamy and good over rice.

But last week, I was doing my weekly grocery shopping and saw cream of broccoli and cheddar cheese soup. That sparked an idea because my hubby looooves broccoli soup and cheese. So, I made the fixins with that along with a bag of frozen broccoli. Oooooh, was he happy! And it was good.

Anyway, a few days ago, my hubby lets me in that my mother-in-law was complaining about my cooking. This was not the first time. I hear all the time about how I don’t do things right, or more like, not how SHE does it. I went on a cooking strike for a while until she whined about she’s spending too much on takeout. Like, REALLY!? There’s a full pantry, and you are getting take out every day!?

She complained that my meals were “too heavy” and had too much salt and pepper, and she didn’t like all the cream sauces I’d use.

Yet, she eats like three servings.

So, cue the malicious compliance. I didn’t go on a cooking strike this time. I made dinner tonight. My husband wanted chicken and broccoli with rice again. So, we went to the store. We got the stuff and came home. The plan all hatched in the car, and my husband thought it was brilliant.

I must also add that my husband and I both love spicy food but generally only add chili sauce or extra spice to our individual plates because my mother-in-law doesn’t like spice (relevant later).

I cut up the chicken, but I saved about half a breast worth (huge breasts of frozen chicken, like turkey-sized). I cook most of it with copious amounts of garlic and butter and ranch powder like always.

But in a separate skillet, I only added olive oil and her chicken. No salt or pepper or garlic. I sauté it up and set it aside. I then make the cream sauce and add most of the broccoli. I saved about half a cup and steamed it. I made the rice like always but reserved a half-cup of plain rice and added the rest to the fixings and mixed it up. My husband taste tests and tweaks.

And then he surprised me. He added black pepper and our favorite chili seasoning to it. I’m wide-eyed, and my mouth is watering.

I dish up the plain rice, broccoli, and chicken into a bowl and hand it to my husband. My mother-in-law can’t be bothered with coming to get her own dinner.

We must take it to her. He’s giggling like a child. I just smile and feel satisfied that maybe she will like her dinner now.

I dish up a bowl of fixins for myself and head to the bedroom where binge tv is waiting.

I hear the exchange though.

“Here’s your dinner, Mom.”

“Oh, well what’s this? I thought Godiva was making fixins?”

“Oh, she did. But I told her what you said after her last batch, and she wanted to make you something more to your palette.”

“Well, why did you tell her that? I told you that in confidence.”

“I didn’t want to set her up for failure, and she wants you to like her cooking. So, I told her, so she’d have a chance to fix it.”

“Oh, ok. Well, thanks, I guess.”

My husband joins me. All grins. We eat, and he hears her shuffle to the kitchen.

“Can I have a little cream sauce for my chicken?”

Husband replies, “Go for it. But I did put black pepper and chili powder in it. We didn’t think you’d want any so we added our spices.”

“Oh. Ok.”

I think she ended up adding some salt or something but no cream sauce. She ate it.

She then let us know that she was thinking of making dinner tomorrow since I always do the cooking.

Gotcha! Go for it. I’m not a fan of her cooking either, but I welcome any day that I don’t have to cook.

I guess you could also file this under petty revenge as well.” machinesgodiva

9. Yes, Your Precious Birthday Brat Can Have Our Super Spicy Wings!

This mother has serious problems.

“I used to work for a fairly well-known chain of buffalo wing eateries. You know, the ones with the 27 huge screens and screaming fans of every sport?

We had a family dining area, and this particular Saturday night walks in Karen with her slew of kids and adults all wanting to celebrate a birthday. Table for 20? No problem. Of course, Karen isn’t paying for everyone, so they all line up to the cashier booth to order, and the birthday boy is first. He appears to be around 10-12 years old and he peers over the counter at me and says he wants the 24 blazin’ wings.

If you know our store, you know our sauces. Blazin’ was the spiciest sauce we had, so spicy that you needed gloves if you were going to have prolonged contact.

I told the kid that those wings were very, very hot, and maybe he’d like to try our sweet barbecue or even our hot sauce. The kid throws a fit. My manager is behind me, and Karen is berating me for not giving her precious birthday boy what he wanted. My manager whispers for me to just give him what he wants, so I put in his order and apologize to Karen. Then I place everyone else’s orders.

By the time the last of the twenty were ordering, the first was getting their food. Who do you think comes to the counter with a tray of 24 blazin’ wings? Karen, of course. She is irate and screaming over the din of cheering spectators about how dare I give her poor, precious child something so spicy that it burns his mouth.

She wants a refund not just for his wings but for their whole family’s meal. She’s threatening lawyers and medical bills, and sure enough, she had to ask the age-old Karen adage, “Let me speak to your manager.”

So, I go tell him what’s happened, and I do feel bad because I have a soft spot for kids (even the evil ones). He comes out and tells Karen that he was present when I told her and the kid they were too hot, and he heard her insist that they be given to him. He pointed to the cameras and mentioned the microphones and informed her she would not be getting any money back, and the kid would not be getting a replacement.

If he wanted a different flavor, she could buy it, or he could eat what he ordered.

She gave us a terrible review, but that kid coming back with his mommy, crying after eating what I told them both was too hot was something special to me, and I still remember it to this day.” AthanasiaStygian

8. Forget To Give Us A Presentation Time? No Presentation It Is

“Let’s set the scene. It’s 2017, I was in a 3-month internship that turned out to be…not exactly what I thought it would be. Two other students and I were sent down to work with an environmental group. Before going there, we were given about zero prep but were told that once we got there, the organization would have all the details and everything worked out.

So, that was a lie.

We get there, and immediately it’s a huge chore to get them to give us anything to do. They’re good people, trying to do good, but they had no idea what to do with us. Several times I go in to meet my supervisor at our designated times, and he’s just not there; no one knows where he is. I ended up cataloging all the books in their library. It was frustrating, to say the least, to go in every week and beg for them to give us tasks. Towards the end, we started giving up, just dealing with the minute plans they do give us.

Now the story.

We’re set to leave in a couple of weeks, so our supervisors tell us that we should give short presentations on our work over the past 3 months.

Cool, whatever, I can talk about cataloging for 5 minutes. All our work was in Spanish, which is my second language, so I’m being sure when making my PowerPoint that everything is grammatically correct and ***. We go in a week before our presentation and have the following convo:

Us: “What day should we do the presentation?”

Supervisor: “I think Friday is best. That’s when everyone is in the office.”

Us: “What time?”

Sup: “Hmmm, not sure. I’ll call you before the day.”

I’m sure you can see where this is going. The days go by, no phone call.

Thursday night rolls around, and we decide that we’re tired of getting jerked around by this organization. If they don’t call before noon tomorrow (we flew out on Saturday and had to pack and say goodbye to people), we wouldn’t go.

Well, one of the supervisors finally calls us at 12:30ish. Asks why we’re not in yet.

“Sorry boss, you said you’d call before the day. We have early flights. We’re not coming in to give our presentations.”

There wasn’t much fallout, and our academic advisors back at university were a bit angry with us, but they couldn’t get us in trouble for anything, and we three already had other references.

It was a bit sh*tty, but it felt very liberating.” lennymusic

7. Want Me To Work Less Hours On The Project? Watch It Fail

Don’t people know that quality takes time?

“Several years ago, I worked at an organization where I managed several projects. For most of these projects, I had a team to help meet deadlines.

My time was split up between these projects in percentages that dictated how much time I could work on each.

On one of these projects, I was alone and was allotted 20% of my work week to work on it (8 hrs). I liked this project, and my contract head from the contracting organization, so I often worked much more than the 8 hours… Pretty often, it was around 20-30 hours extra a week for this project. Yes, I asked for help, and yes, I asked for more time on the project. Both requests were denied as we didn’t have the people for it or the money. No, I was never paid overtime.

Seeing as I was working so many extra hours, often very late into the night, I occasionally asked my manager if I could come in a few hours late because I had been up until 3-4 am working on a deliverable.

At first, this request was accepted, and I would come in late and leave late.

After the sixth or seventh time, my requests started to get declined with my manager saying, “They don’t need the deliverable at 4 am, so why are you working that late?” About a month after the requests were first denied, my mental health started to worsen as I was barely sleeping.

I decided to listen to my manager. I stopped working extra and stopped working until the early morning on all projects. I carefully marked down the times that I spent on each project on an Excel sheet and made sure to never go over my allotted hours. I came in at 8 am and left at 4 pm.

I didn’t answer my phone or work remotely after 4 pm. I worked 8 hours a week on my individual project, and as expected, the next deliverable was missed.

Then the following one was missed, and a meeting was held between the contracted head at the contracting org, my boss, and my boss’s boss. Needless to say, the contracted head was p*ssed about how much time I was allotted onto the project (this was discussed internally without my say because my bosses know exactly how much time I need for the project /s) and requested for me to have more time on the project. My boss raised my hours to 16 a week and continued to decline my requests to have somebody else work on it with me.

I put in my 2 weeks at the end of that week.

Fallout: I trained a buddy on the project during those two weeks. There was no way that he could learn all of the small details that I had learned over the past couple of years in the time I had left there. I apologized to him, and he understood and told me not to worry. A month after I had left, the contract was canceled as my buddy and my boss tried to meet the deadlines but were not able to. I now work at a much better company where I’ve only worked extra if my manager requests it.” alex_k23

6. You Don’t Take Rolled Coins As Payment? Okay, I’ll Unroll Them

I mean, duh. How hard can that be, cashier lady?

“The first time my wife and I moved, we decided to do something “fun” with the change in our change jar and purchase scratch-off lottery tickets.

We were from a small town in Kansas and did not have a CoinStar machine, so we figured it would be much less annoying for the businesses if we rolled the coins for them.

We stopped by our bank to get a few of those paper coin tubes and then spent half an hour counting and rolling the change. We ended up with $10 in various denominations and were actually getting excited about purchasing 10 “Scratch ‘N’ Win” lottery tickets.

Armed with our bagful of coins, we drove to the local gas station. Unfortunately, they would not accept the coins in rolled form. The lady was helpful though and suggested we go to a bank and exchange the coins for bills.

It was just after 4:30 our bank was closed, but there was another bank next to the gas station.

Once at the bank, we asked if they wouldn’t mind swapping out the coins for cash. The lady said they could, but since we didn’t have an account with them, they were going to charge a fee. The “fee” was… you guessed it… $10.

So, onto option 3… We drove to the local grocery store (which had a bank inside it). We figured this was the best of both worlds: they have a bank AND sell lottery tickets. Once it was our turn in line, we asked to purchase the lottery tickets. Once again, it was another company that doesn’t accept rolled coins as payment. Instead of being helpful like the lady at the gas station, or apologetic like the lady at the bank, she was quite rude and snapped at us, “Rolled coins are not valid payment!”

Please imagine the satisfying sound of 4 rolls of pennies being broke open onto her counter…

There are a few things I should have mentioned:

#1 – We were only spending the pennies, nickels, and dimes in this way, as the quarters were easier to consume normally.

#2 – Before hatching this idea and due to the naivete of my youth, it didn’t even cross my mind that people would cheat the system and slip other coins into the roll. My thought was the coins were legal tender but knew trying to buy something with 200 pennies alone was not socially acceptable.

#3 – The lady at the bank (not our bank) explained that they charge a fee because someone has to break open our rolls and put them into a machine to be recounted and re-rolled.” detrickster

5. Charge Extra For A Large Package? Okay, Fine. We’ll Just Flip It Over On Its Side

“This happened to my boss earlier this week, and I was super impressed by her quick thinking – I hope you are too!

I work at a shop that sells a specific artisan food item in the UK.

We’re still open during quarantine because part of the business is online, so we either deliver local packages personally or get a national courier service to send parcels overnight.

While we have the courier service come collect parcels every day, sometimes it’s cheaper to go through the Post Office if delivery is in some weird place like the Scottish Highlands or one of the Isles.

Anyway, my boss goes over to the Post Office to deliver one of these parcels: it’s a cardboard box, which is ALMOST a perfect cube, except it’s a few centimeters higher than it is wide. The address is written along the side.

Once there, the postal worker gets one of those plastic boards with parcel-shaped holes in it to test where the parcel can fit and therefore its size classification.

Here’s where things get weird. The postal worker classes the parcel way bigger than usual, doubling the postage price because it won’t fit through the plastic cut-out. My boss explains if the postal worker puts the parcel on its side, it fits perfectly.

Apparently, that’s not allowed. Postal workers couldn’t possibly send the parcel on its side. If my boss wants to send it, she’ll have to agree to pay the extra postage-end of discussion.

Well, my boss has a trick up her sleeve, aka a sharpie. She crosses out the address, flips the box on its side, and rewrites the address again, so the height of the box is now smaller than its width.

The same box is now classed as a smaller size, we don’t have to pay almost a tenner extra (may not be loads but the pandemic hasn’t exactly been great for business), and I get a fun story to tell.

Everyone wins.” Cubxu

4. Don’t Worry, The Things You Hate About Me Won’t Bother You Anymore

You never know who might just understand your language.

“This happened last summer in late August. I was with my friend on a train in Vienna coming from the airport with big suitcases. We were just sitting, minding our own business, chatting in our native language.

Now, something to know about me… I’m a guy, but most people would consider my behavior quite feminine. I tend to sit with my legs crossed and make some movements with my hands that most people would consider really feminine. Now on to the story.

Across from us were two old ladies, and by ladies, I’m trying to be nice, they were really old hags… Now I say this because even though they seemed nice, all this time they were making snarky comments to each other about us in German.

About me, to be more specific, basically calling me a f*g.

Now again, a really important thing they didn’t know was that my friend and I aren’t actually tourists. We were coming from the airport with suitcases because we were coming back to Vienna to attend our third year of university here, which meant that, by this point, we were pretty much fluent in German. Basically, we understood every single thing they said.

At this point, I get an idea. Everything they make a comment about that I can change at the moment, I will do. So, basically, when they mentioned how I look like a girl sitting with my legs crossed, I immediately went into the biggest “manspread” possible. When they said that the tiny triangle tattoo on my wrist looks like something a f*g would have, I immediately moved my arm so that they can’t see it.

I still can’t believe how they didn’t catch on.

Now comes the biggest compliance yet. They made a comment about how our stupid language is so annoying and that they wish we would shut up already. My friend and I just casually, without even looking at them or stopping the convo, switched to German.

Silence…

I looked at the ladies with the corner of my eye. They were so red that even a lobster couldn’t compete. The train stopped, and they jumped up and scurried away as fast as possible not looking behind them. Now, why they didn’t move seats or go to the next cart beats me, but as the train started to move away, I saw them through the window sitting at the station bench waiting for the next one.

So, a really productive day if I may say so.” ishouldjustshutupalready

3. Talk Bad About My Green Nail Polish? Okay, Blue It Is

“As I was growing up, my fingernails got the worst end of chewing multiple times daily; they and my cuticles were ragged. My mom had tried many times to break me of the habit, but it wasn’t till I was 14 that I really put my mind to it and tried to stop. It was hit (or should I say bit) or miss for several months.

When I had the chewing under control, my mom was really invested in helping me maintain my sobriety. We went shopping and she let me pick out the colors of several bottles of nail polish.

This was in the ’70s. Yeah, I know, way back in the dinosaur era. Vibrant colors had just become popular, and I chose pastel shades of blue, green, and yellow. My mother spent a couple of hours on a Sunday giving me a manicure and used a green shade of polish. They were so beautiful, and I vowed never to chew my nails again.

At this point in time, I was a sophomore in high school. I didn’t have many friends, and I usually walked the campus alone. A couple of days after my nails had been painted green, I was stopped as I was walking to class by one of the ‘mean girls’ and her posse. She (MG, a senior) said, “I heard you’re wearing green nail polish.

Let me see your hands.” I timidly held them out because the rumors about this girl weren’t exactly glowing.

She looked at my nails and said, “Where did you get the polish, and what made you think you could wear it to school?” I told her my mother had bought it for me and there weren’t any school rules saying I couldn’t. “Well, I didn’t say you could, and you’d better not wear it again.” I was genuinely scared because of her reputation. Who was she to tell me what to do? But, I wasn’t looking forward to her beating me up, either. That night, I said goodnight to my parents, went to my room, and sadly, reluctantly removed the polish.

The next day, about halfway through the day, I was again spotted by MG, as always with her MG crew.

She demanded to see my hands, and I told her I wasn’t wearing green nail polish. She reached out and grabbed my arm, pulling my hand up. She said, “What did I tell you?” I replied, “You said you didn’t want to see the green polish. You never said anything about blue.”

MG quickly let go of my arm, and I really don’t remember what she said, but all I knew was, I was alive and in one piece. For the remainder of her last year of high school, she would give me dirty looks but never again spoke to me.” bunluv136

2. Sure, I’ll Make Sure Your Club Sandwich Stays Together

“This happened about four years or so ago.

I used to work as a cook at a dine-in restaurant of a truck stop.

The lack of leadership by the restaurant management bred an atmosphere of being able to get away with just about anything among the employees, including how we interacted with the customers. My coworkers quickly learned I preferred to work than gossip, and they even more quickly regretted the rare time or two they would try to get me involved in some drama. As most of them didn’t like my sarcastic wit, they would let me be.

I pretty much was back in the kitchen most of the time and didn’t have to usually deal with our guests but would be out front from time to time (usually on my way to or from the restroom) and did get to know many of our regulars.

There were all kinds of truck drivers. The ones who were cool and fun to talk with. The flirts. The politically opinionated. Every once in a while an occasional creep who had to be dealt with. All walks of life of drivers graced our establishment, and for the most part, no problems.

Then there would be the drivers who, no matter what you did, were just outright jerks. Rude to the staff. Complaining about everything. And I mean EVERYTHING. The weather. The repair shop. The music playing on the intercom. The showers. The price of diesel. The cost of items in the store (which was a separate department from the restaurant). The truck parking. All things that we had absolutely no control over, and hey guys, we’re just here to serve you food, okay?

Yeah, it would get a little tedious listening to the whiners, so whenever I happened to spot the few habitual verbal offenders sitting out front, I would take the back way around to the ladies’ room.

As I said, I don’t care for gossip or drama.

So, I’m working on the grill line. It’s a somewhat slow afternoon being middle of the week. The front counter is about half full with drivers sitting around chatting and eating when one of our regular jerks comes in. Now, this particular regular jerk was a special breed. The kind I refer to as “Not Happy Unless They Are Watching The World Burn.” This guy took being a jerk to the next level. He never wanted to socialize with the other drivers. Never tipped the servers. Always got his food to go (yes, he would every single time open the container to inspect his order, grumble, and make a snide comment).

He would get the same thing every time: a club sandwich with fries.

And for whatever reason, he would stick his head around the corner of the server line to see who was cooking before ordering, even though he would get the same thing every single time.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see this driver peeking at me for a moment before he disappears from sight. Knowing what is coming, I go ahead and start the order. Now the club sandwich we made was of the triple-decker variety. It had three slices of bread, ham, turkey, bacon, mayo, lettuce, tomato, and cheese, which upon assembly was held together with frill picks (very long toothpicks with colored plastic frills on one end) and cut into quarters.

Sure enough, the ticket pops up on my printer a couple of minutes later.

As I had gotten a headstart, the sandwich is already laid out on my cutting board, and I’m waiting on the bacon and fries to finish cooking. I set up the to-go box and reach for the pan with the frill picks.

Only to discover that there are none.

No surprise, honestly. The other cooks aren’t exactly known for keeping up with the line stocking, so I go over to the storage room to get some.

We are out.

Completely.

There isn’t one single frill pick in the place.

‘Oh, ***’ goes through my mind. Walking back to the line, I quickly brainstorm what to do. Realize that, if I’m careful, I can cut the assembled sandwich and lay it in the box with the fries in such a way that it will not fall apart.

Pleased with myself and my idea, I finish putting the order together and place the closed container in the pass-through window for the server to bag up.

As I have no other orders at the moment, I decide to text my general manager – who is scheduled in later in the day – about the frill pick situation and to ask if he can stop and pick some up on his way in. Before I can hit ‘send,’ I hear a bellow from down the server line.

“WHAT THE **** IS THIS?????”

Immediately on alert, I step around to the server line to see Mr. World Class Jerk glaring – at me. He repeats his question so I ask, “What’s the problem?”

“Why are there no-frill picks in my sandwich????” he demands to know.

My reply is matter-of-fact. “Because we’re currently out.”

“Why not??? Can’t you f******* order right??? Why can’t you do your d*mn job???”

Crossing my arms, I quirk an eyebrow and flatly reply that it’s my general manager who does our ordering, not me and that I wasn’t even aware we were out of frill picks until just now. The server is standing nervously off to the side; she’s waiting to see what goes down.

Mr. World Class Jerk inhales, sputters a little, then spits out, “Well, I can’t eat THIS like it is without the frill picks to hold it together!! Not while I’m driving!!!” He thrusts the box into the server’s hands. “I want each sandwich section wrapped so it doesn’t fall apart!!!” Then, muttering under his breath, he steps back out front as the server scurries towards me.

She hands me the box. I turn, walk past the grill line into the back kitchen, and to the prep table. Setting the box down next to the dispenser. Open the lid.

You want your sandwich wrapped???

You got it.

Each. Individual. Section.

Carefully, lovingly wrapped. In a four foot long sheet of 18-inch wide foodservice grade saran wrap.

Placing the sandwich back into its box, I walked back up to the server line and handed it off to my coworker. She takes it out front. I see her hand it to this jerk, who proceeds to open the lid. He must have been satisfied because he closed the container and exited the restaurant. Walking back onto the grill line I finish sending my text to my boss…and wonder how long it will be before the fallout from my malicious compliance hits.

It never did. I don’t know if he ever called to complain to my boss, but I certainly didn’t hear about it. Though, we never saw that driver come into the restaurant again.” Nolessa

1. Want Me To Arrive At 8:30 A.M. No Matter What? Of Course!

Whatever you say…

“I was working for a child care center while I was in college. We staggered staff in and staggered them out so that we were always fully staffed when all the kids were there, and they all had various arrival and leaving times. So, staff could be scheduled to arrive anytime between 7:30 am and 2 pm.

I worked M-F 8:30-4:30. Even though my schedule was fairly permanent, I would check the schedule that got sent out every Sunday evening.

(It would always get sent between 6 and 9 pm, and it would be for that current week, so we had less than 24 hours notice for our weekly schedule. It was a hot mess express if you ask me, but I’m not in charge, and my schedule is set, so I don’t raise too much **** about it).

One week, I get the schedule, and it says that my arrival time is 9 am instead of my usual 8:30 for the entire week. I figure they’re just trying to make minor cuts, and they really like having everyone under the full-time threshold, so I just assumed they were barely cutting my hours, so they could get away with it. No big deal, but I knew that most of the kids arrived at 9, so I would need more time to set up.

So, I get there at 8:45 on Monday and set up quickly and go about my day. I do a little prep Monday night, so I don’t have as much to prep in the morning. And on Tuesday, I get there at 8:55, clock in, and begin my day.

My week goes on like that with me prepping in the evening and getting there at 8:55 until Thursday when my boss calls me into the office and reprimands me for my “tardiness.” I tell her the schedule tells me that my arrival time is 9, so I’m actually arriving early every day. She says that the schedule says 9 just to indicate that you are the morning shift, but if you’re scheduled for classroom time, you need to arrive at 8:30 regardless of what the schedule says, so you have time to set up the classroom.

I don’t agree with this at all, and it’s obviously not true because not everyone arrives at 8:30 anyway. There has to be more distinction than just morning crew versus afternoon crew on the schedule. But she admits that she’s “partially to blame for the mixup” and doesn’t turn it into a formal write up.

I started arriving at 8:30 every morning (just like I had been before the week in question, I’m not a late person). One week, I was going to be scheduled for the 1-6:30 shift because another coworker needed to switch with me, and we had both agreed to this. So, the schedule comes out and says my arrival time is 1 pm.

I arrive at exactly 8:30, clock in, and sit my pretty butt in the office chair, and wait.

Well, eventually my boss notices that I’m just hanging out in the office and asks what I’m doing. I say, “Well, I was told to arrive promptly at 8:30 no matter what the schedule says, so here I am.” She says, “We don’t need you here for the morning. so you can clock out and come back when your shift begins.”

Um, nope. I say, “You can find a task for me to do until my shift at 1 starts, or I can sit here, but I’m staying clocked in. You were the one that said that I have to be here at 8:30 no matter what. I’m just following your instructions.”

I had to deep clean the entire school until my shift actually started, but it was so worth it because I still got paid for the whole day, and my boss had to admit to me that she was full of it.

Watching her try to backtrack was the funniest thing that’s ever happened to me!” Reddit user

These stories prove that sometimes setting your ego aside and admitting that your incorrect is the best thing you can do. Otherwise, you’re going to be left in an unfortunate situation. If you loved these stories, be sure to check out part one!