Years ago, I worked in the deli section of a grocery store with the kind of people who get a promotion and immediately forget where they came from and have unrealistic expectations of you. I had to slice meat and cheese for customers, make sandwiches, and make all the fried foods (wings, fried chicken, potato wedges, etc.). When I was hired, I had my sleeves rolled to just below my elbow, and I talked to the hiring manager about my tattoos. (They’re the names of my kids, so nothing offensive.)

About a year after I started working there, they decided that tattoos and piercings were against the dress code. Anyone with piercings had to take them out, and anyone with tattoos had to cover them up. Since my tattoos go down to my wrists, I asked if that went for me, as well, because I was handling people’s food all day, and if my sleeves got dirty, I didn’t want them near someone’s sandwich or something. They scoffed at me and told me that I should have thought about future employment when getting my tattoo.

So, I figured, “I can’t break the rules, so I won’t.”

The next day, as the main bosses of the store were walking around, I had my sleeves down to my wrists. I was making fried chicken, so my shirt was soaked in chicken blood all the way up to my elbows. We had to cook three boxes every morning — about 150 pounds of chicken — and I was halfway through the third box.

When they yelled at me to stop what I was doing, I just innocently asked:

Me: “What’s wrong? Can you see my tattoo?”

They didn’t answer me. One just stared, mouth agape, and the other looked like he was trying to set me on fire with his mind.

Me: “Well, if there’s nothing else, I’m almost done here, and I’ll start making sandwiches.”

They told me to go ahead and go home for the day.

They tried to fire me, but since it was documented that I asked about long sleeves being unsanitary and I was basically told “sucks to suck”, they couldn’t fire me for following the rules they’d set in place.

They tried to start cutting my hours, so I said (very publicly again) that it felt like retaliation for the sleeves thing and I would need to speak with a lawyer. (I couldn’t afford one, but they didn’t know that.)

Finally, a month later, they told me that I was allowed to have my sleeves rolled up while working behind the counter, to which I responded:

Me: “I actually found another job. I’ve been there for two weeks. Have the day your employees think you deserve.”

Back in February 2010, I was working for a small company. All of us were in the large open office when the owner made an announcement.

Owner: “This is my new PA, Marisol.”

Marisol was Latina. Everyone gave her a smile and a wave except for one coworker.

Coworker: “She’d make a great maid. I’ll bet she’d keep things spick and span.”

Owner: “[Coworker], you’re fired.”

Coworker: “What the f***?”

Owner: “Did I f****** stutter? Leave right the f*** now.”

Coworker: “Why? For telling the truth?”

Owner: “[Coworker], you have exactly ten seconds to get your a** out the door before I call the police. One… two… three…”

[Coworker] stormed off, kicking a wall en route and slamming the door behind him as the owner reached “nine”.

Owner: “Anyone else have any dumb remarks?”

There was silence from us all.

Owner: “Get to work. I’ll have a replacement for [Coworker] by the end of the week.”

The owner was as good as his word. He had a replacement for [Coworker] within two days — a Hispanic man who proved to be the hardest-working guy on our team.

Marisol proved to be an incredibly organized, efficient PA for the rest of my tenure there before I got hired away by a larger company in 2015.

I just got a new job, so I have to send my equipment to my old job. We were working from home, so they’ve sent me three boxes and three labels. I fit everything in one box and send it off. I keep a copy of the confirmation for two months and then delete it, assuming that after that long, they’ve gotten it.

Two and a half months after sending the equipment, my old manager contacts me.

Old Manager: “Did you send the equipment as requested?”

Me: “Yes, I sent it in [Month] and thought you’d already gotten it.”

Old Manager: “They say they haven’t received it. Do you have proof of sending?”

Me: “I thought after so long someone would have said something if they didn’t get it. I guess I should’ve kept the confirmation longer, but I don’t have it anymore.”

Old Manager: “They still say they haven’t gotten it, but I’ll check.”

[Old Manager] contacts me a few more times saying they don’t have the equipment.

Finally…

Old Manager: “They don’t have it. They can see that you didn’t use the shipping labels they sent.”

Me: “If they can see that I didn’t use two of the labels, they can see that I did use the third.”

I never got contacted again.

I worked at a popular lingerie store as a security guard. It was a small store in a mall: one room with some changing rooms in the back and a stock area for employees. At the end of the day, there were just three people working: an employee, a manager, and me.

One day, after closing up, we were filing out when the alarm went off on one of the employees.

Employee: “I must have accidentally stuck one of the security tags in my pocket. I’ll be right back.”

[Employee] ran back to the employee section of the store and came out a couple of minutes later. He went through the door again, and the alarm went off again. 

Joking around, I lifted the bottom of his pant leg a couple of inches with my toe.

Me: “You stealing something?”

As I lifted his pant leg, I suddenly realized that he was wearing pantyhose under his pants. To each their own, but it was certainly unusual behavior. I lifted the pant leg a little further and saw that there was lingerie stuffed into the pantyhose. 

The manager took over from there, but when all was said and done, [Employee] was trying to sneak out over forty pieces of lingerie stuffed in pantyhose under his pants.

There was a woman with dwarfism who regularly shopped at the place where I used to work. She was always lovely and kind, and I think I made a good impression on her the first time we met. I was stocking shelves.

Me: “Do you need help, ma’am?”

Woman: “No, thanks.”

Me: “Cool. Let me know if you do!”

Then, I turned to the gentleman who’d entered the aisle after her and asked the exact same thing, in the exact same tone, with the exact same response to the “no”. She realised I was not doing a pity party but legit just offering customers help while in the area.

When she did eventually need help, she wanted a kind of bread that was always low in stock, as well as being in an annoying top slot on a shelf. Being a stock person, I was able to both grab it from there and, if there wasn’t any, check the other space for it.

I think she was amused after that when I’d spot her and just go, “Need your bread today?” to take the hassle out of it.

Since I don’t work there anymore, I don’t know if she still goes there, but I hope one of my colleagues has taken over bread duty in my absence.