A friend and I are customers in a shop, mostly just doing the tourist thing. Someone’s kids are sprinting around the store doing a hide-and-seek kind of game around the shelves. They’re noisy but not destroying anything, so I’d count that as a small blessing for the staff.

Friend: “Hey, let’s get lunch after this. My stomach is starting to gnaw at me.”

I grab my phone and use it to Google food places nearby, and we find a fish place with pretty good ratings. We’re kind of gathered around my phone, looking at their online menu.

Me: “Their parmesan pollock looks pretty good…”

Kid’s Voice: “Pollock!”

I look up, surprised, as one of the kids goes sprinting through the store yelling “pollock” loudly like he just learned a new swear word. My friend snorts in amusement, and I shrug. It doesn’t take two minutes for the other kids in the store to take up the new word.

Friend: “I guess it does kind of sound like a word you’d say when you stub your toe…”

I snicker.

Apparently, the kids’ mom thinks so, too, because she storms over to us while we stand in line and starts berating us for “teaching children bad words”.

Me: “Ma’am, I didn’t teach your children any bad words.”

Mother: “Then why are they yelling that word all over the store?”

Me: “Because they probably don’t know what it means, just that it sounds like it might be a bad word?”

Mother: *Crossing her arms* “If it’s so harmless, then maybe you should explain the word.”

She has a smirk as if she thinks she has caught me in a lie and I’m going to fumble with the explanation.

Me: *Rolling my eyes* “Fine. It’s a fish.”

Mother: *Blank stare* “Excuse me?”

Me: “A pollock is a member of the cod family.”

Her blank stare continues.

Me: “Cod. You know, like codfish? We’re going to a fish restaurant, and I want to try it.”

Mother: *Suspiciously* “If it’s called cod, then why did you call it a pollock?”

I open my phone and show her.

Me: “Because it’s called pollock on the menu.”

The woman scowled at my phone for a long time and then turned and stomped away, muttering about made-up words to hide swear words.

My friend and I paid for our items and left the store, still occasionally hearing a child’s voice yell, “Pollock!” The fish, swear word or not, tasted great, by the way.

Due to assorted events I won’t bore you with, I inherited a stray puppy. I knew he wasn’t lost and didn’t have an owner looking for him. I was the only one of my immediate friends willing to put in the effort to see he was cared for. He was a rambunctious pup, getting into all the standard sort of trouble you would expect of a puppy, but he got along great with my cats and seemed like he would make a great pet for someone.

Unfortunately, I personally have never been a dog person; dogs are too much of a commitment to care for, and I just like cats more as pets.

My original plan was to take him to the local pound and let them find him a home, but when I called them on the phone, they sounded less than confident that they could rehome him. I couldn’t understand why; he was the perfect adoptable age and seemed like he would be snatched up immediately. Still, I didn’t want to risk them putting him down, so I decided to make my own good-faith effort to find him a home first. I put out a few ads online and almost immediately had a couple with a young girl show up at my house.

The girl simply adored the puppy, chasing him around and playing with him as I spoke to the parents. Unfortunately, the parents I was not as certain about. It seems the girl had declared that she wanted a puppy a day before, so they were here to pick one up without any more thought. 

Me: “I don’t know his medical history; you will need to take him to a vet to get looked at and his shots.”

Woman: “How much would that cost?”

Me: “I’m not really sure. A few hundred maybe?”

Man: “You said he was free!”

Me: “He is, I’m not charging anything for him myself. But I did say that his medical record was unknown; he still needs all the stuff any new puppy requires.”

Man: “Why didn’t you do all that already?”

Me: “I’ve had him for less than a week and was hoping to adopt him out quickly. To be frank, I’ve had neither the time nor the desire to spend that much on a puppy I don’t intend to keep. If I had trouble finding him a home, I might have done it, but there are already a few who seem interested in him, so it didn’t seem necessary.”

Woman: “If we keep him inside, he probably doesn’t need shots anyway…”

There was a little more back and forth here, but the net result was the distinct impression that they were saying they would take him to a vet to appease me but had no intention of doing so. They also seemed taken aback that he wasn’t fully house-trained yet, and I was a little worried that they didn’t know what to do about training him.

The mom seemed to have reservations about it, but the dad plowed right thought them, and neither seemed to have given any thought to the actual effort of owning a dog.

I’m not an expert at rehoming animals, but my instincts told me this wouldn’t work out. I probably should have said as much to the parents immediately. However, their daughter clearly adored the pup; I’ve always had a hard time saying no to cute kids, and I didn’t want to make her cry.

Me: *To little girl* “He really seems to like you.”

Girl: “Yeah! Can we take him home?”

Me: “Well, I’d like to give him to you, but dogs need a lot of stuff to take care of them, like a collar and leash, bowls and food, maybe a bed, and a few toys. He wouldn’t be happy without them.”

The girl had already told me they didn’t have a yard since they lived in “a big house with lots of houses in it” so, at the very least, I knew they would need a collar and leash to walk him properly.

Man: “Don’t you have all that stuff?”

Me: “No, I haven’t had him for long. I have a small bag of dog food I could send with you, but other than that I’ve made do with a fenced-in yard and reusing the cats’ stuff for him since I was hoping to rehome him quickly.”

Girl: “You mean we can’t have him?”

Me: “Well, I’ll make you a deal. I can hold him for a few more days while your parents buy him everything he needs and make an appointment with a vet to make sure he is healthy. Then, if you bring me a photo of everything you got for him and proof of the vet visit to show you’re ready for him, you could take him then.”

Girl: “Okay!”

Man: “Why can’t we take him now?”

Woman: *At the same time* “Why a vet visit?”

Me: “I’m sorry, but I can’t give him to you until I know he has everything and I have proof that a vet visit is planned.”

Woman: “That costs too much!”

Man: “You said he was free! We can just take him now like you said!”

Me: “I said he was free to a good home. I’m sorry, but that means a home willing to pay to care for him.”

Man: “You promised our girl a dog. You didn’t say any of this other junk. We want the dog!”

Me: “The ‘other junk’ is supposed to be presumed when you get a pet. I can’t give him to you unless I know he will be cared for.”

Girl: “It’s okay, Dad. We can get him tomorrow.”

Man: “No, we’re not waiting or wasting money on a vet.”

Me: “Sir, your daughter is watching. Is this the behavior you want to model to her?”

Man: “Give me that d*** dog!”

Me: *Bending down to the daughter* “You are great with the puppy, and I think he would love you. But I’m really, really, sorry; I can’t let your parents have him when they say they won’t take care of him.”

Girl: “We can’t have him?”

Me: “I’m really sorry, but no. He needs parents that will love him.”

Woman: “How could you do that to her?”

Me: “Ma’am, I’m sorry ,but it’s the two of you who are doing it by not being willing to care for her pet.”

Man: “F*** that. We’ll just take him now.”

Me: “I have your names, your phone number, and your car’s license plate on video — the same video that would record you leaving with a dog I didn’t give you. If you try to take him, the cops will be at your door in an hour.”

Girl: *Now crying* “But he likes me!”

Me: “I’m so sorry. Maybe once your parents are ready to care for a pet, you can get one.”

Woman: “What if we came back with a picture of a leash and all?”

Me: “I’m sorry, but at this point, I’m not confident that he would get the medical care he needs. The answer is no.”

There were some more angry words from the parents, and I personally felt terrible watching the cute girl clinging to her mom trying to hold back tears. I really wanted her to have the puppy, but I couldn’t do it if the parents didn’t plan to care for him. 

Eventually, they left.

Two days later, a slightly older married couple showed up. They already had two dogs, knew exactly what it took to care for them, and had even brought their dogs to meet the pup to make sure they all got along first. They took the puppy home instead.

I’m not sure if I should hope the little girl got a pet eventually or pray that no canine was forced into her parents’ home.

Around 2000 or so, I was living in a pretty sweet two-bedroom apartment right above where I was working at the time. My sister’s boyfriend had recently moved to town and needed a place to stay. We were already kind of friends, so I gave him a bedroom. The rent was split, but it was still my place overall.

[Sister’s Boyfriend] had a pretty annoying habit of making food and then eating it in his room and leaving the dirty dishes in there. I bugged him about it for a while until he finally started at least putting them in the sink — still dirty, but at least accessible.

Eventually, I got petty mad about this and basically told him to clean the f****** dishes. His reply?

Sister’s Boyfriend: “That’s not happening.”

Okay, then…

For the whole time he’d been living there, he was allowed to use my computer (a pretty bada** gaming rig I had built) to check his emails and such.

After he said that garbage about the dishes, I had a little idea. When he left for work that day, I hopped on the Internet and found a free tiny program called BootLocker. It basically locked the computer with a black screen with a password prompt. No password, no computer. It even had an option to lock the BIOS, so if the PC was rebooted, it would ask for the password before even booting.

There was also an option to include some words below the password prompt. I chose, “Clean dishes = checked email”.

Then, I went about my day.

[Sister’s Boyfriend] finished work and was home before me. Needless to say, when I got home, the dishes were clean, but he was not happy. Poor widdle baby.

Cue his revenge.

He had a pretty fancy television in the living room. I had it hooked up to the computer so movies could be watched, games played, etc., on the sweet big screen. (Thirty-two inches was way bigger than my monitor!) Plus, we had free cable from work downstairs.

After the BootLocker thing, [Sister’s Boyfriend] thought he would get me back by activating the parental controls on his TV. I got home after work — when he wasn’t home — and went to watch some TV. It was a no-go without the four-digit code.

It took me roughly two minutes online to find “What do I do if I forget my [Brand] TV code?”

The look on [Sister’s Boyfriend]’s face when he got home and I was watching TV was golden.

He moved out not too long afterward.

My boyfriend is the sweetest, most understanding, most nonconfrontational person ever. He’s twenty-seven and 6’4” tall — 100% gentle giant.

We were on a plane on our way to visit family. [Boyfriend] had the aisle seat, and there was a girl who was maybe twenty years old sitting in front of him. Before we took off, [Boyfriend] leaned down to get something out of his backpack under the seat. Without warning, the girl in front thrust her seat back with all of her might, slamming into my boyfriend’s knees and face.

Surprised, he leaned back. But the girl seemed confused about why her seat wasn’t going back very far — because, y’know, [Boyfriend] has long legs and she had literally hit his face. He let her continue to slam her seat into his knees multiple times until, finally:

Boyfriend: “Please stop.”

She had no headphones on, was not distracted, and could obviously hear him, but she didn’t answer him — though she did stop. Then, she did the thing where she flipped her long hair over the seat onto his lap, which I really only thought people faked for TikTok.

There was an old lady sitting next to [Boyfriend] (bless her heart), who poked the girl and said:

Old Lady: “You’re being very rude.”

The girl still didn’t answer.

This old woman had a petty battle with this girl the entire flight as the girl repeatedly flipped her long hair back over the seat and the old woman moved it out of [Boyfriend]’s lap. He ended up with bruises from the girl’s seat.

I genuinely can’t believe people like this are real. It was only a one-hour flight! I was in a different part of the plane, but if I had known this girl was literally hurting a stranger — much less someone I love — I would not have let her get away with it. She needed to move her seat up for takeoff anyway; he didn’t let her push her seat back again, though she really tried. There was never a single word from her through the entire ordeal. Absolutely insane.

I was having lunch at this restaurant last Sunday with my friend. All the other tables were occupied. Two girls appeared, but since it was packed and there were no empty tables or vacant seats, they just stood there awkwardly, looking around, waiting for some people to get up and leave.

Me: “We’re almost finished. You can have our table after we leave.”

But instead of being thankful, they just threw me a dirty look and rolled their eyes as if I were trying to flirt with them. My face went red, and I didn’t know what to say. I was just trying to be nice. It wasn’t as if I was trying to initiate small talk with them or something. Then, my embarrassment turned to anger. The least they could do was just nod their heads.

Then, I heard one of them speak to the other.

Girl #1: “Maybe we should just go to another restaurant.”

Girl #2: “No, this is the only Chinese restaurant near our place. And that guy—” *points at me with her lips in a not-so-subtle way* “—is almost done.”

Fine. I raised my hand and called a waitress over.

Me: “We would like to have a few more drinks, please.”

She brought them out a few minutes later. My friend was trying so hard to stifle his laughter that I swear he broke a rib or two as we VERY slowly ate the rest of our meal. The rude girls left quickly soon after.