They sometimes say that revenge is sweet but we all recognize that there is also a degree of danger that goes along with it. We may want to get revenge, but we don’t want to heap trouble on our heads.
That is why it is sometimes good to just read about the revenge of others and what they may be doing to get it. We can live vicariously through them, and it is almost as good.
That is why we are presenting the following stories of revenge to you. These stories provide everything you need to satisfy your revenge cravings.
21. MOCK MY SPIDER PHOBIA? PAY EXTRA FOR YOUR GRAPES
“I am a grocery store cashier for a very small chain in southeastern Michigan.
For 6 hours a day, 4 days a week, I ring order after order of groceries. Believe me, it gets monotonous.
About a week or two ago, it was a super busy day. I had been going non-stop for 2 hours, with no time between customers. That’s when, during the short 5-minute lull that miraculously arrived, Karen came along.
I went through my usual spiel, ‘Hi, how are you, paper or plastic’, etc, and started ringing her groceries. She had a lot of fruits and veggies, which is cool, better than some of the things I have to ring (don’t ask, seriously).
And then came the grapes.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I love grapes! Sweet, crunchy, tart, and they don’t require really any prep before you can eat them. Yum! No, my issue was with the large spider that was in the bag with the grapes.
I have a serious spider phobia.
When I was a kid, a spider (no idea which kind, we were on a family biking trip through a nearby nature trail when it happened) bit me on the arm, and over the course of a few days – my parents just thought it was a mosquito bite at first – it swelled up into a big, hard lump the size of a softball.
I still vividly remember the night they finally realized that they needed to take action, and rushed me to the nearest hospital ER. Traumatizing. Ever since I can’t see a spider without shrieking and freezing up. Any other bug in the house? No problem. I see a spider?
One of my brothers has to come rescue me.
So, as you can imagine, the large bag-of-grapes-spider did not go over well.
I managed to mostly quell the shriek, instead letting out a strangled yelp, and jolted back from the register and offending bag, and refused to touch it again until the spider was very dead.
My grocery store is one of those that still has a separate bagger job, so I wasn’t alone at the register. The very nice kid who was my current bagger was kind enough to come around, remove the spider-infested sack of fruit, and go get Karen a new bag.
I apologized and started to scan again.
And as soon as he left, the ridicule began.
“It was just a spider, why did you freak out?”
“Are you seriously telling me that a grown woman had to have a teenage boy rescue her from an itsy-bitsy spider?”
“How pathetic, just get over it, it was the size of a pea at best.”
“I carried that bag all the way over here, I’m scared of spiders and I was just fine. You shouldn’t have had an issue swiping it and moving on for 5 seconds.”
And so on and so forth. Meanwhile, I just had to sit there and smile at her.
As soon as he came back, she shut up, and was all smiles and compliments for ‘such a nice young man!’ That was where I decided to get petty.
Now, in my store, produce is rung one of two ways. (It might be the same everywhere, I don’t know, but anyway.) It is either rung up by count, or by weight, so we have a scale built into the register to weigh items.
Grapes are priced by weight, so I went ahead and dropped the nice new spider-free bag on the scale.
And while I typed in the produce code, I made sure to ever so stealthily place my thumb on that scale and apply the slightest bit of pressure, magically turning 2lbs 7oz into 4lbs 2oz. And at 3.99 per pound, it made a difference.
Mind you, Karen had a huge order, so that 1lb 7oz didn’t noticeably affect the total.
But if Karen was going to mock me like that, then turn around like she’d done nothing wrong and praise my coworker, she was going to have to pay for it.
And pay for it she did.
(I would like to note that I was very grateful for my bagger’s help, and I wasn’t upset over the fact that he was praised, as I did my fair share of it after she left, it was the two-faced nature of the mockery then praise that caused my frustration.)”
20. STEAL MY WARM COOKIES? PREPARE FOR A TECHNOLOGICAL PRANK WAR
“So this happened a few years ago… my office went to the open layout plan.
They got rid of cubicles and basically it turned into what we called the “call center.” Desks lined up next to each other and no privacy from coworkers. Each person gets a laptop, a dock, and two monitors on arms. I get placed next to this gentleman I’ll call John.
John was a fairly nice guy. We got along pretty well. He is probably 10 years older than me.
One day my coworker, I’ll call Dan, showed up to talk to John. They start chit-chatting and I decide to stroll to the cafeteria to see if they had any freshly made peanut butter cookies.
And oh boy they did, still warm too. It should be a crime to sell them because they are addicting.
I make my way back to my desk and Dan is still there. He says something to me and we start chatting. I place my cookies on my desk and turn to engage in conversation with him.
We talk back and forth for a minute and he says he has to go.
Not wanting to waste the warmth of those delicious cookies I turn around to find them… not there. Hmm… did I misplace them? A bit of searching and I come to the conclusion I didn’t.
So I scope out my coworker’s desk for signs of my cookies: empty plastic wrap, crumbs, etc. nothing. I ask my coworker John if he saw them and he denies any involvement but I wasn’t buying it. A bit of pressure and he cracks, says he stole my cookies as a joke and gave them back, none were eaten.
No harm done right? Wrong. They were cold. I wanted those darn cookies still warm and here I had three miserably cool but still pretty delicious cookies. So I verbally vowed revenge.
Now I like to consider myself technically inclined. So my revenge couldn’t be rage-fueled but cold, like my cookies, calculated and intelligent.
After a month of quiet contemplation, enough time for him to forget, I found the perfect tool: a wireless mouse. I slapped that dongle in the back of his dock, where he would be none the wiser. Now I could mess with him whenever and however I wanted. But I had to be smart about it as to not get caught or do something detrimental to his work.
For example: coworker would come over to chat with John, John turns his chair to chat, I secretly get to work by pulling out the mouse, open an unrelated application like Windows Media Player, (which was on his taskbar), and hide the mouse. He would turn around, confused, and continue his day.
Another example would be lunchtime he would get up to warm his lunch without locking his computer. He would have some applications open and I would minimize them. He would come back and mumble under his breath and act confused.
More subtle things would be changing where his cursor was in a Word document or email, since he was a keyboard looker when he typed, he would type his current thoughts in the wrong spot, and it would take him a few seconds to realize his “mistake.”
This went on for weeks. Some days I’d hit him several times and others none. No harm done. Except… he started getting paranoid. Since he knew I was technically inclined he would ask “what could make Windows Media Player start?” I asked him what he was talking about and he let me know what his computer was doing.
I gave him some puzzled looks and plausible reasons like task scheduler or maybe a bug. He then started keeping a log of these incidents.
As time went on I became bolder in my revenge. Instead of waiting for him to get up or talk to a coworker, I would do it when he would be writing on paper at his desk or looking at his phone.
Cue my mess up. It was about 7 weeks in when one day he was playing with his phone when I went to change his cursor location in an email and he saw it move! He looks at me, sees my hand under the desk, and says “I suspected it was you!” The ruse was up.
I admitted it. He laughed, checked the back of the dock, and found the dongle and then it hit him. “This was because of the cookies, wasn’t it?”
And that is how I gained a reputation of being a Cookie Monster.”
19. RUDE MOVER REFUSES TO MOVE TRUCK, ENDS UP PAYING FOR MY CAR RENTAL AND TRUCK REPAIRS
“I lived in a high-rise apartment building and my truck wouldn’t fit in the underground parkade.
It didn’t have a lift kit but it was a 2500 Heavy Duty with slightly larger tires and it did have a headache rack that stuck above the cab a few inches. The apartment had a very limited number of outdoor stalls at the rear of the building, one of which I was assigned.
One Saturday afternoon I was going out with some buds from work and when I exited the building there was a 53’ trailer backed up to the building with 4 guys moving furniture in. The truck was kind of jackknifed in and the trailer was less than a foot from my front bumper.
My truck was also backed in with another vehicle behind it. I was trapped.
I asked the first guy I saw if they could move the truck, and he said I had to ask his boss, asked which one that was, and then waited for the described person.
After waiting 15 minutes asked a different guy where the boss was and was told he was upstairs, supervising. Thanks!
Went in search of the guy and asked him to move his truck so I could get out. Truth be told he only needed to straighten out his backup job and I could’ve snuck by, but he flat-out refused, and frankly was quite rude about it.
Told me tough luck, get lost, and wait.
Went back downstairs to do just that and as I was sitting in my truck, smoking and listening to tunes I noticed there was a padlock hanging off the side door of the trailer and there was a simply huge ring of keys stuck in it.
I waited until there were none of the movers around and I took the ring of keys, put them inside my jacket, and then went and threw them into some bushes some distance away. Then I went back up to my apartment and called my buddies to tell them I wouldn’t be joining them.
About 4 hours later the building manager called me about the keys being missing, the movers were done and wanted to leave. I told them I didn’t know what he was talking about, he asked me to meet him in the back lot which I did.
Boss mover was all up in my face saying he knew I took his ring, and there were over 75 keys on it and most were one of a kind. I just played dumb.
Building management suggested we look at the surveillance video, I was a little scared, I didn’t realize there were cameras back there but I played it cool.
We all went to the office and watched the footage but the cockeyed way he parked the trailer blocked most of the camera’s field of view. You could see me get out of my truck and walk towards the trailer, but couldn’t see me actually touch the keys and then walk back beside my truck exiting the video near the back of the vehicle, but there was nothing in my hands.
The footage proved nothing.
Boss man called the cops but they too watched the footage, asked me if I had the keys, which I didn’t so I said no, and said there was nothing further to be done.
I asked if we were done and when I was going to be able to drive my truck?
I was told to rent a car and submit my receipts which I did. The truck moved the next day but the trailer was left, perhaps out of spite, at the same angle, blocking me in, until Wednesday. When I was finally able to move my truck I noted the side was scratched up and the driver’s mirror was hanging down.
We went back to the videotape and clearly saw the boss man walking back and forth beside my truck before taking the mirror in both hands and breaking it off. It was my turn to call the cops. The moving company ended up paying my car rental tab, $375.00, plus $5500.00 worth of bodywork, paint, decals, and a new mirror.
I hoped it also cost a bundle to replace all those keys.
I lived there for two more years after that and I would check on the key ring from time to time, they were still there the day I moved out.”
18. TEACHING MY PARTNER A LESSON IN HOUSEWORK RESPONSIBILITY
“I (27F) live with a handsome and lovely man (27M), let’s call him Dan, whom I love. We have three cats and have lived together for about 5 years.
I worked out of the house like 12 hours a day and brought work home for another 4 hours or so.
Dan does 10-hour days. I work a ton, and so does he, but the housework is a bit unbalanced.
I’m the organizational one, I take care of bills being paid, and everyone’s appointments. I’m also the one who does more housework, generally.
2-3 years ago, I started noticing that right as I would finish emptying the dishwasher, or right after I scrubbed a pan clean, just as I finished hanging all the laundry — I would hear Dan say from the couch, “Oh, honey….I was going to do that…”
For the past couple of years, I started to get annoyed about this. He will be doing NOTHING while I’m doing something like unpacking groceries, swiffering the floor, running the dishwasher…then I’ll hear “Oh, I was gonna do that babe…”
IF YOU WERE GOING TO DO IT YOU WOULD HAVE DONE IT, YOU HANDSOME JERK.
I called him out about it probably a year ago? Since the health crisis, I’ve been home way more than he has — same hours, just remote. I’ve kind of been letting him do the laundry and leaving chores that he doesn’t realize “magically get done” by me.
YESTERDAY. Dan started emptying the dishwasher and I was sitting on the couch, 10ft away. He kinda kept looking up at me and then around to the dishes — mostly his — which had been piling up, clearly frustrated that I didn’t do it. He kept unloading and then right at he finished the top and bottom and got to the silverware basket, I looked up from my phone and I go “Oh baby…I was going to do that…”
His face went from annoyed to angry, realizing my scheme, and acknowledging that he’s a jerk. It was SO SATISFYING. I’ve done it like 2 times since while he does other chores and he SWEARS he will never do it again.”
17. OUTSMARTING SUPER FANS AT A JASON MRAZ CONCERT
“The year was 2005 (I think) and I had just moved to NYC with my best friend from college (let’s call her AnneMarie).
We were both huge fans of Jason Mraz and we heard that there was a concert happening and lo the tickets had just gone on sale, so we snagged two. It sold out in minutes, so I was really excited I had gotten some.
Now what you need to know is that this venue has no assigned seats.
If you have a ticket you can get in, but you will probably be standing in the back and good luck getting to the bar unless you get there really early and get a good spot in line. I was determined that we were going to get good seats.
The other thing you need to know is that AnneMarie and I had gone to school with someone who worked at the venue and who had told us that she might be able to get us in and get good seats. Might. I don’t like Might.
Might sounds like I’m standing in the back all night.
It’s the day of the show, ya’ll. We get there crazy early and are like 10th in line. I. Am. PUMPED. AnneMarie, not so much. She and I had been having some trouble, and she thought I was being a little extra on this.
I probably was, honestly, but I had had a lot of disappointments right around that time and needed to have control over something. I had chosen this.
Well, AnneMarie had been texting our friend who worked at the venue (let’s say Kelly) and she had not really been replying.
AnneMarie was getting more and more antsy as time went on, and I was getting more and more sure that Kelly was not getting us in anywhere.
So there is about an hour left before the doors open. Kelly finally gets back to us and wants to know if we want to go get drinks before the show, but she still wasn’t sure she could get us in.
I don’t really like drinking, and I was already anxious about the seats. We had been waiting for like 2 hours already and getting out of line with no guarantee seemed like it was a problem to me. So I told AnneMarie to go with Kelly and I would hold the line, just in case.
She knew I was upset she was leaving me there, but she also (again) thought I was being a little dramatic (I may have been).
So now I’m in line, alone, and the people around me were not really interested in being friendly to me.
Because you see the girl behind me and the girl in front of me were getting in a fight about who was the bigger fan. I mean, no joke, they are saying they know what he had for dinner last night and the other says she knows his breakfast. Thought I was extra?
These girls weren’t even on the same planet as me.
So I was passive-aggressively texting AnneMarie about what I was listening to, and checking her status as to when they would be back.
Well, I may have been aggravated when she left, but man did she redeem herself when she got back.
You see, we went to school for acting, and AnneMarie happened to be good at improv. I’m ok at it, but I know the fine art of playing along.
So AnneMarie walks up and loudly says “hey sorry that took so long! Did you tell him you are coming tonight?”
Now, I could have said “who? What are you talking about?!”
But instead I said, “I thought it would be funnier to just let him see me in the front row and see what he does!”
At this point, the girls have stopped arguing and are intensely eavesdropping.
We spun quite a tale folks. By the end, I was Jason Mraz’s ex who hadn’t seen him in a long time and was hoping for a reconciliation but we had been friends afterward so we were sure it was going to be a real pleasant surprise for him.
We were discussing how we would meet him at the end of the show and how funny it was all going to be.
Now this all would have been just fun and games… if Kelly hadn’t completely pulled through, stepped out from the front of the line, and said “Ladies?
Right this way please!”
And led us in at the front of the line.
AnneMarie turned to me and said “Well, I guess he spotted us in line!” And we went in first.
The concert was one of the best I’ve ever been to, though we didn’t get backstage or meet him and he and I never were able to reconcile, but I will treasure the look on those super fans’ faces until the day I die.”
16. VEGAN ROOMMATE PUSHES BOUNDARIES, GETS A CARNIVOROUS PLANT SURPRISE
“Okay, so I (24F) have been living with my roommate (26F) for three years. My roommate is a strict vegan and has been since she was 14.
I, however, am not. This has never been a problem, since I think people can do whatever they want with their lives, and I have never tried to change her mind about being vegan.
My roommate is a bit of a plant lady. She’s been collecting and raising different types of plants for years and has amassed quite a collection.
She even puts little sticker labels with the names she’s given them. (Which is adorable) She’s truly one to die for her plants. I think this is cool but have never really interacted with them besides watering them whenever she’s out. It really doesn’t get in the way of my life so I don’t care that she’s so obsessed with them, and I’m glad she has a hobby.
Here’s why the problem begins. Two months ago she visited a conference on animal products and came back with a more fiery spirit. She started going to events regularly, became a local activist, started preaching to people in the street, etc. Now, this isn’t a problem.
She’s a human being who can believe whatever she wants. Or at least it wasn’t a problem until every conversation with her transformed into telling me why I should go vegan. Why I’m evil for consuming animal products, and how I should be ashamed that I’m not vegan.
This seemed weird since she hadn’t acted like this prior to the conference. But it had gotten so common I started waking up earlier to go to work so I could eat my eggs in the parking lot of my job so I don’t have to hear her rant.
Since we were close to the end of our lease I had decided to pull a little stunt before we parted ways.
I headed to an exotic plants place near where I live and got a bunch of different types of carnivorous plants. I’m talking every single species I could get my hands on.
I also got pots and things to hang them from so they looked pretty. My roommate wasn’t there that day so I had plenty of time to set the place up. I decided to do it in the kitchen since that’s where most of her scolding would take place.
I put them everywhere I could. Wherever she had a plant, I put one right beside it, just to be extra petty. It looked like a greenhouse in there. Honestly, I was pretty proud of my work, I felt like Buddy the elf when he renovated the store.
When she got home she started screaming at me. Blowing up saying that I’m horrible. She was livid. But because I bought them and I hadn’t moved or touched anything of hers, she couldn’t do anything. It’s been like this for the last few weeks and I’ve been caring for them daily, and even researching the best ways to keep them alive and purchasing products so they can thrive.
Honestly, I’ve actually gotten pretty fond of the plants. I went as far as naming and labeling them. I’m moving out today so I thought I would tell this story because it’s kinda crazy.”
15. LAZY PROJECT PARTNER GETS PUBLIC HUMILIATION AND FAILS CLASS
“When I was in 7th grade, I was at a private school, and for a project for one of my classes, I got paired up with the worst person in my class.
Over the weeks of the project, the PowerPoint presentation that we had shared with each other was only touched once by him, and all he did was create a new slide (left it blank).
I. Was. Mad.
For the first time ever, I absolutely refused to do all the work.
My idiot of a partner thought I was doing all the work for him and smiled at me every time classes started, looking smug. He never even bothered to check the PowerPoint. Little did he know that I had already informed our teacher, and that teacher gave me his blessings to just present my part, and I would be graded on that alone.
The day to present came, and we were to present our projects to the entire school. Before the presentations started, he came up to me and asked if he could see the PowerPoint so he could prepare to speak his part. I just glared at him so hard that he visibly paled and went back to his seat, where I continued to give him the stink eye the whole time until it was our time to present.
Luckily, I was in charge of the first half of the PowerPoint, so I started things off. I knew I hit it out of the park, based on how our teacher was nodding his head from the back of the room. At the end of my last line, I turned and looked at my partner, who had gone pale despite all of his freckles.
“Alright, (insert partner name here). Ready to present your part?” I didn’t bother waiting for a response and just clicked the clicker. A blank slide showed up on the screen, exactly what he had contributed to the project, and then the PowerPoint ended. It took a few seconds for people to realize it was over, and there was a general hubbub of confusion.
Finally, the principal stepped up and asked my partner what was going on. Mr. Freckles looked away and mumbled something about it being on a flash drive left upstairs in his backpack. He was allowed to leave the room to go retrieve it. I stood there, in front of the whole school, smiling to myself, for ten minutes.
The idiot still hadn’t returned, so my teacher suggested we move on with the presentations. A couple of teachers left to go find my partner, who was quickly found hiding in a closet in one of the classrooms upstairs.
I got a 98% on the project, and the idiot got a big, fat zero.
He ended up failing the class and had to redo the year. Before I left the private school and went back to public schools for HS, he had managed to get kicked out of the school program, and I never heard from him again.
Edit: To clarify, I was a 13-year-old brat with autism and a very strong malicious streak.
I held grudges like no one’s business, but nowadays, I’m pretty much over it the next day after someone wrongs me.
This also happened back in 2010.”
14. PETTY PARKING STANDOFF ENDS IN DAMAGED AUDI AND A NEW HOOD FOR ME
“I went to the mall just to kill a couple of hours and this lady RAN in front of my truck to stand in a spot I was already halfway in (she wanted to hold it for her friend that was circling around).
She said she wasn’t moving, but I could see she had her refillable popcorn bucket and cup in her bag she was carrying, so I knew she was going to a movie and I had all day to be petty. So I lit up, put on some good tunes, and was just browsing online.
Best part was when she hammered on the hood, put a dent in it and her ring scratched through the paint. Dash cam caught it.
So I got out, she started screaming saying I was about to attack her, nah, just needed photos of her car/license plate, parked behind me and blocking the way for several other cars.
The lot attendant eventually came by and told her they needed to move as a tow truck was already on the way to move them if she didn’t. Again she refuses and sure enough the tow truck shows up (her friend is outside her car leaning against it staring daggers at me).
As the truck starts to back up to hook up they begin to confront the tow truck driver, he pulls pepper spray on them and says (I’ll never forget this):
“I’m on a tight schedule and don’t have time to argue, I can either spray you for risking my safety, or you can comply and pick it up at the lot.”
As he gets into his truck to do his thing, they both hop in the car and try to hurry away, clipping the metal things that I assume lift up the car, ripping their front bumper off as they try to flee around the truck and race out of there.
These ladies were in their late 40s and ended up buying me a new hood, which is just as well since it was having fading issues on the paint/clear coat. Don’t know what other repercussions they had from that, but I can’t imagine a new front bumper on an Audi is cheap.”
13. TRICKED MY FORGETFUL EX-BOSS INTO COVERING A SHIFT I NEVER AGREED TO
“About five years ago I used to work as a traffic control person at road works and construction sites. I did this as I changed from retail to my current career, which were some stressful times. As a side note, normally shifts in this industry are all short notice.
They will call you at 7 pm asking you to work a shift starting at 5 the next morning. Say no too many times and you’ll soon find yourself without any shifts.
Something you should know about me before I continue. I’ll admit I’m a massive troll, but only to those who are jerks to me in the first place.
It’s like being mean towards me pops my troll horns out. Let’s just say my friends fear me come April Fool’s Day once every year.
I left that job due to life circumstances and the fact I was moving to a new city over 2 days’ drive away.
My ex-boss seemed to forget this fact. As I stated above if you say no enough times to shifts they will just not give you any more. They technically won’t fire you and since you’re a casual worker with no guarantee of shifts they can just leave you in a constant state of limbo until you quit yourself.
In my country, they can get away with this, at least 5 years ago.
About 1 year after I left the company and moved to my new city my dumb ex-boss must have forgotten I left. Even if you said no to enough shifts, if they were desperate to fill a shift they’d call you.
I got called up and asked to fill a shift the next morning. I kindly reminded my ex-boss that I left about a year ago and was in a new city, he apologized and wished me well. So far nothing too bad in my book, until another 2 years had passed (3 years since I left).
In this time my ex-boss repeated this mistake another 3 times, was getting a little old for my taste. I even blocked his number, but he got a new phone and still had my number in his contact list.
So when he called me this time I decided to be petty about it.
It was about 6:15 pm and I was enjoying a movie on the couch with my partner.
Me: “Hello, this is OP.”
Ex-Boss: “Hi, OP. I need you to come in for a shift at (random place in old town) tomorrow starting at 7 am. Think you can handle that?”
My troll horns came out as this was the fourth time he’d called me, after each time I told my dumb ex-boss I’d moved to a new city.
Me: “Sure, I can handle that for you. I’ll be there bright and early.”
Ex-Boss: “Good man.
I’d be in a tight spot if I couldn’t get this shift filled.”
I went to bed late that night and made sure to put my phone on silent. I woke up around 10 am to about 20 text messages and 12 missed calls with an angry ex-boss demanding to know where I was and mad as heck he had to personally get out of bed early and cover the shift himself since I no-showed for it.
I’m happy to report I’ve not gotten another call from him since about working another shift for a job I left years ago. I think he finally got the hint.”
12. EXPOSING A TOXIC MANAGER’S DARK SECRETS LEADS TO UNEXPECTED RESIGNATION
“A contact in my network, call her Fiona, was a senior company general manager. She recently quit her job and called me (a recruiter in the same industry) to ask for help tracking her next role and could we catch up for a coffee?
Sure, I said. She asked: “Can you drive over my way? My car is in getting a service.” No worries, I said, and made the 40-minute drive to a cafe near her place.
As I arrived, she was finishing up her breakfast, a big plate of something, presumably eggs and bacon and toast, and drinking a coffee.
I ordered a coffee and gave her about an hour of my time. She then said goodbye and left. When I went to pay, the bill included three coffees (she had two) and her breakfast, about $50. Nice one.
I then find out from a new client, call him Brian, who used to work for Fiona that Fiona had been terminated from her previous job!
Bullying, toxic culture, favouritism, expense fraud, you name it. This is a malignant narcissist of the highest level.
Fast forward six months and Brian, Fiona’s ex-colleague, calls me: “You won’t believe it, but a major company in our industry in another city has just hired Fiona!”
“How can that be?” I asked. “A basic reference check would have uncovered her incompetence and nastiness.” “No idea,” Brian replied, and said he was going to: “Let this new company’s leadership know exactly who they have just hired.”
You see, Brian left his previous job, which was working for Fiona.
He had made formal complaints to management about Fiona’s behaviour but ultimately they backed Fiona, which forced Brian to resign with zero entitlements or a redundancy payout.
Fiona was fired about six months later when the truth emerged. As luck would have it Brian ended up in a general management role himself so he landed on his feet okay.
He was still very unhappy that this new company had hired Fiona, and dreaded what sort of impact she would have on the team there.
So Brian set up an anonymous email account, and through my networks, I identified who the geographic region head was and passed it on to Brian, who filled the regional director in on exactly what sort of leader Fiona had been.
He included four other names and numbers of people at the old organisation who could vouch for what Brian was claiming. He included his own name and number to cover his tracks.
A week later Brian got a call from the regional head of human resources of the company Fiona had joined. He acted surprised but gave them a rendition of Fiona’s behaviour at the old company.
We heard nothing for about six months during which the industry was abuzz with the news that Fiona had landed this big role after her ignominious departure from the old company. Then we heard that Fiona had resigned from her new role to “spend more time with her family.”
Delicious revenge, perhaps not so petty.”
11. AWFUL ZOO FIRES ME? I’LL NEVER RETURN MY KEYS
“When I was 19 I used to work for this small roadside zoo think dirt paths and chicken wire holding back literal monkeys! It happened to be really close to one of the largest and most popular zoos in my country which made this zoo very quiet.
I was hired as front reception and customer service, the first face you see. If I’m anything I’m ‘bubbly’ and they basically hired me on the spot.
The owner of the zoo came in one day a few weeks after I started and struck up a conversation.
In a roundabout way found out I’m disabled and seemed very shocked since it is an invisible illness.
This was the beginning of the end I just didn’t know it yet.
Unfortunately for them, I was incredibly good at my job. Customers were happy, the office was clean and I was finished with the work they gave me with half my day empty and boring.
The head zoo keeper was young, short, attractive, and had a temperature that could rival Regina from Mean Girls. I tried asking for more responsibilities, with a background in art I offered my skills and knowledge in other areas just to fill my day and was met with a screaming almost 30-something man on his tip toes spitting in my face that I needed to sit down, shut up, and smile for the customers.
So I did. That was until the incident.
One day a friend of the owner drops in this pair of birds as a surrender. This cute little white cockatiel and a blue Indian ringneck. I own a bird and so when they put them in an old cage next to the office I was very excited. I wasn’t to feed them but I was allowed to talk to them.
The days went by and the ringneck became very wild and unhappy, the poor little white bird was getting really sick. I tried telling the keepers that the seed was wet and the birds had no dry space when it rained, they didn’t have toys or company and they weren’t doing well.
I was met with violent screaming.
The Head zoo keeper had me pinned to a wall and I was so afraid he was going to hit me for suggesting his level of care wasn’t good enough that I burst into tears and ran back to the office.
I called the owner sobbing that he’d done that and she reassured me everything would be fine and to have a drink of water, calm down, and finish the rest of my day.
By the afternoon one of the other keepers was sent up to the office and popped his head in to see if I was ok.
Apparently, he was sent to ‘snap the neck of the birds’ because euthanasia was too expensive for surrendered animals.
I was unbelievably upset and this keeper patted my shoulder (he was a massive introvert and this meant a lot) trying to calm me down. He said he didn’t like it as much as I did but he had to do his job or he might get fired. I asked him what they told him to do exactly and he said “when I get back up there, there better not be any birds” so I asked can I take them then?
He said “as long as they aren’t here I did my job” and smirked as he walked out of the office.
So there I am smuggling birds in my shirt to my car. The sick little white one tucked up holding onto me all snuggled close and this blue firecracker practicing for the next bull riding competition.
I disinfected a spare cage I had at home and put them in our sunroom to free-fly. I was hand-feeding the little white bird with the medication the vet gave me and giving her some pats when I got an email.
The owner had sent an email stating:
‘Due to your ill health and unhappiness, you are no longer needed and your contract is terminated. ‘
That’s when it hit me. She’d been trying to find something, anything to fire me for besides just being disabled with an invisible illness.
Me being upset that I was verbally abused, physically assaulted, and upset that they were going to inhumanely kill animals was worth firing ME over.
So I’m not proud of it but I ghosted them. They didn’t give me common decency so they weren’t worth my efforts. For weeks and weeks, I’d get emails asking for my keys to the zoo. Asking if I got the email. I just let the emails sit there.
Finally, the owner called after a month and angrily asked for me to return my keys. I calmly said I put them in the mailbox the day she fired me and hung up.
I knew they were so unorganized that no one but me checked the mailbox to the office.
It had been a month and to her knowledge, they could have been anywhere by now. I hope they had to change all the locks to that office and it was a mild inconvenience that really grated on them.
I got a lot of joy watching those little birds play with that big chain of keys I hung in their bird room right up until I found them a foster home where they would be cared for well.
The little white bird was very healthy and happy when we parted ways but I’d never visit that zoo again.
They feed their dead zoo animals to their baboons, they collect the branches and grass for their enclosures from private farmland and have been run off people’s property so often that staff had to be made aware they could get shot and most importantly why would I want to support that horrible place when I can pop up the road to this amazing zoo run by a legend.
It’s a small petty but still petty revenge in my opinion. I wish I could have done more honestly.”
10. MY BATTLE AGAINST URINAL TERROR AT INSURANCE COMPANY HQ
“I have a small cleaning business, and one of the locations I clean often is the headquarters for an insurance company. I’ll just start off by sharing that I’ve cleaned daycares, nursing homes, doctor’s offices, and none of them are as bad as the banks and office bathrooms I have cleaned. I was always under the impression that people handling large amounts of money were less animalistic and would have better bathroom etiquette.
Alas, I have seen things not for the weak in these places. Aside from my recent endeavors, cleaning literal explosive diarrhea off of a wall, floor, and entire toilet, (I don’t even know how a bum can do something like this, but apparently it can) there is one consistent battle I am fighting.
A war has started between me and a stranger I do not know, at this company. I must warn you, if you have gotten this far, what I am about to say, is not for a weak stomach.
Every day, for the past two months there is a urinal in one of the men’s bathrooms that is never flushed. I have made every attempt to persuade this individual to do so.
The worst of it is, my work week there ends on Thursday, and I do not return until Sunday, so when this urinal is left, and I return, the contents inside of it ferment, and grow a thick, disgusting, ungodly film, carrying scent I wouldn’t wish upon anyone to know.
A few things I have tried before this point are attempts to place nice little casual parting gifts, like snacks or trinkets by the vanity next to the exit, buying fancier soaps, and air fresheners for the bathroom, making toilet paper and paper towel sculptures to add to the allure of please be kind to your housekeeper, and I’ll make your experience as pretty as a bathroom can be, I’ve tried making sure, I am cleaning that urinal the best, out of any toilet in the room, it’s been the most pristine toilet you’ve ever laid eyes on, many a time.
But every time I return to the bathroom. A wonderful present awaits me.
The last few weeks, I’ve worked up the courage to as politely and professionally as I could manage, sourcing ChatGPT, and asking others, how to professionally say “please stop leaving your fermented urine in the bathroom over the weekend and just flush the toilet, it is the cleanest and most sanitary toilet in this building and it is not hard, it stinks and makes me actually gag and almost vomit”… in the end, I made a very professional looking/sounding sign, and even added some graphics, to entice some more motivation to no longer assault me every Monday, and placed it between the two in the bathroom.
It didn’t work. I gave it many a time and chance, I then started to understand, we are fighting, and this is on purpose, so I am going to bring the heat.
More and more every day, as he brought the gift of nasal annihilation I brought the gift of reminder.
I began moving the sign closer and closer to the urinal, and even that was pushing professionalism in my opinion. It is obvious, I am the only cleaner in the building, that it is my doing.
Yesterday was the last straw. I got some chunks on my arm while cleaning it, despite gloves, & I finally vomited as I realized what had happened. I doused my arm in disinfectant spray, washed it 4 times, and then sanitized. I felt as though I was touched by the devil himself.
And so today, I sent it. I just couldn’t keep my composure any longer.
I saw it sitting in the toilet once more, and I left it. Strong smell and all. Took the polite sign off the wall above it, and taped it completely over the urinal, the soap and paper towels needed a refill and I left them empty.
& honestly, I hope he gets as sick as I did.
Update: I didn’t lose my job, emailed my client about it being a potential risk and biohazard, as per the comments suggestions, and he seemed to take it seriously, too seriously. In the most professional jargon I could, I said that I think this is intentional, he messaged me on social media, instead of sending an email, saying something that sounded like we should set up the guy, have me come in around 1 pm and clean and if I see the mess he can check the cameras and see who’s gone into the bathrooms.
I found this odd, and had pause worrying it may be unethical despite some opinions about it potentially being more private than sending a whole email to everyone and drawing everyone’s attention to the issue. I emailed him in response and said again in fancy talk that I think it might be wise to just send an email so as to not violate anyone’s privacy, and maybe if that didn’t work we could try something else.
He emailed back saying it was a misunderstanding and seemed panicked about me quitting.
I assured him that I was not.
Seems like it ended well for now.”
Another User Comments:
“I know that feeling. Work in a cinema, some craphead managed to paint the porcelain with liquid crap yet somehow managed to miss the bowl itself.
Like…I don’t even know how it’s possible but still. Had to clean that, nearly vomited as well so I had to hard-douse it in cleaning sprays from a distance to at least induce a chemical haze of smell to even be able to get close.
We also had a guy pee nearly ritually in one of our trash cans in the cabins (it’s this type of cinema), on a weekly basis. Took us a few months to fish him out between the camera and cabin usage timers but I got lucky and found him as he was about to leave.
I had just cleaned the bag out of the cabin, and literally handed it to him, half full of his pee with a smile, and said “Fyi, we have cameras installed, we know it’s you. Consider this a warning, next time we’re calling the cops.”” Clayman8
9. NEGLIGENT NEUROLOGIST REFUSES TO FILL OUT VITAL DRIVING FORM, FACES INVESTIGATION
“To set the story I have epilepsy that is controlled as long as I take my medication.
This means I am allowed to drive I just have to have my neurologist fill out a form basically giving me permission at least once a year. Since I am controlled I usually only have maintenance appointments about once a year. I also am married with 4 kids.
So my being able to drive is important to our daily routine. It’s also important to know that my husband has a job where every 4-8 years we have to move. This takes place about one or two years ago with our most recent move.
When we move one of the first things I do is find doctors and schedule appointments for everyone. After getting established with a general doctor I got a referral to the local neurology department. To go anywhere else is like a 40-minute drive.
Day of the first appointment comes and everything goes smoothly.
No red flags. I have been in the medical rodeo here in the US for as long as I can remember so I can usually sense a bad doctor quickly. The hospital doesn’t have the best reputation so I was cautiously optimistic. After that appointment, I was hopeful…big mistake.
A couple of months later I get the yearly letter from the state in the mail requesting a new driving form be filled out by my neurologist. I call my neurologist and find out about their procedure. They tell me I can drop it off and they will send it in.
My husband offers to take it on his way to work because it’s just down the road from work and he knows I hate their parking lot. He drops it off and we assume all is good.
They usually give you about 6 months to get this form in.
So about 6 months later I receive a letter from the state saying the form was never received and my license is suspended. Obviously, I am wondering what happened. I did everything on my end. So I call the doctor’s office. This is when the nightmare begins.
After that annoying menu all doctor offices have when you call I finally reach a real person. I tell her the situation and ask if they sent in the form.
“Oh I am sorry Ma’am, Dr. Smith (name changed) doesn’t fill out forms. He just throws those away.”
A moment of silence cause I was caught off guard by that one.
“I called several months ago and was assured if I dropped it off he would fill it out and send it in.”
“Sorry. He won’t fill that out. He literally has us throw them straight in the trash.”
“He is required by the state to fill out this form. Does he need me to walk him through it?”
At this point I was angry and my husband who was listening offered to take over. He knew I was about to go off and thought if he kept calm it could be worked out.
He also is familiar with the crappy medical system and has helped people talk to doctors before (comes with his job).
My husband was on the phone for over an hour and had to call a patient advocate at the hospital to get them to do anything.
I was stewing nearby and growing more and more angry. When he hung up he said the doctor’s office reluctantly agreed to fill out the form and the head nurse and patient advocate would make sure it got done.
If it had ended there I might have let things go and just moved on to another doctor.
But no. They filled out the form wrong at least three times.
These forms are super easy and take doctors maybe 30 seconds to fill out for me. I have watched them fill it out. He basically kept checking a box that implied he didn’t treat me for epilepsy and my general doctor had to do it.
Meaning this lazy guy was trying to get someone else to do it. The flaw in that though is I grew up dealing with this crap and I was by now very educated on how this was supposed to go.
So I call them again.
I decided to unleash my anger.
“Neurology department…how can I help you?”
“I have sent over my form from the state 4 times now to be filled out. Once it was thrown out. Three times it was filled out wrong. I need Dr. Smith to fill out this form today.”
“Your general doctor is supposed to do it.”
“My general doctor does not treat my epilepsy Dr. Smith does. Are you stupid? The doctor treating my epilepsy has to fill it out. It’s pretty easy actually, but if it’s too hard for the doctor I can walk him through it.
Or I can call my old neurologist and she can teach him.”
“It’s really not required. We don’t have to do that.”
“Nice try. I have been doing this for over ten years. State law requires he fill out this form. Do I need to talk to a lawyer?
“Oh. Um..yeah just come by and it will be taken care of.”
My husband the mediator stepped in and drove to the hospital with me to get this taken care of. When we get there he can tell the drive just gave me more time to build more anger.
He asked if he could take the form in for me.
I happily handed over the form where I highlighted what needed to be filled out and also written step-by-step instructions on how to fill out the form. I also reminded him if this went wrong again I would be suing and to let them know I would be reporting him to the state medical board.
He was at first concerned that the state wouldn’t take a highlighted form, but I knew they could very easily print a new one. He took it in and instead of handing it to the desk he asked for the head nurse. He waited till it was filled out and had printed proof that it had been sent in.
I looked at the copy and knew the nurse trying to desperately resolve an unwinnable situation had forged the doctor’s signature. No hate to the nurse. She just had a bad boss.
After I got confirmation I had my license again I reported him to the hospital board, filed complaints anywhere in the hospital that could hold him accountable, and made a detailed complaint to the state medical board.
I also left scathing reviews online as well.
I found a new neurologist 40 minutes away and the drive is a nice break away from the kids. Shortly after I reported him to the state medical board I received a letter stating they were opening an investigation into his conduct and that entire department’s conduct.
They also asked I fill out a form stating I was okay with the investigation and yadda yadda. I filled it out and faxed it over.
I found out about a year later that apparently he now has signs hanging everywhere basically saying If you are mean to me I will be mean to you.
The people said they saw those signs and left and decided also 40 minutes wasn’t that bad of a drive. I was also told since then they have had trouble keeping supporting staff in that department. I assume there was some sort of consequence for him to hang signs everywhere.”
8. NEIGHBOR WANTED ME TO CUT HIS TREE, BUT DIDN’T EXPECT THE MESS
“This happened last year.
My neighbors have a fairly big tree and have branches hanging over our yard. I know I can’t really say anything about it so I annoyingly collect dead leaves and branches that often fall into my yard.
So I had enough and bought a pole saw and sawed off a few until my neighbors excitingly ran up to me and said I can “saw the whole tree off so it won’t ever grow back”.
I blankly looked at him hoping he would at least offer money or something but I basically said I’m only sawing off what’s on my side of the property.
He kept trying to convince me I will never have to worry about branches if I cut off his whole tree. I kept saying no. He shut up for maybe an hour and then offered me a few skewers he happened to BBQ. This was literally our first time interacting so it was pretty insulting how much he’s sucking up.
I declined his food and he got a bit hissy.
I saw that there were a lot more branches left for me to saw off so I thought even more, it actually might be a great idea to saw their whole 20-foot tree. So I gladly went up to the neighbor and said, “you know what?
I thought about what you said. I think it is better that I cut down the tree so I don’t have to deal with it.” Even while taking the skewer he offered me earlier. His smile became bright again as I walked myself around the fence and went to town.
Tree timbered down, I went to the neighbor and said, “alright, glad to help. Have to go back to my yard to clean up.” He became hesitant and said, “when can you clean my yard up?” “Clean your yard? You only told me to cut down your tree.
This isn’t my yard. I’m not cleaning this up”.
He instantly got so red and I could tell it was taking him a long while to process what now he had to deal with. I took my saw back and even told him it was a rental and that I had to return it soon.
I decided to make this post because this past year, it was left in his yard and wasn’t touched. He just hired someone to simply get rid of it. Hasn’t spoken to me since and had to say, his skewer tasted really good.”
Another User Comments:
“My sister has a tree that goes over the property line between her and the neighbor. When she first moved in, that neighbor immediately came over not to welcome her to the neighborhood but to complain that she needed to trim that tree! She trims the tree and the neighbor complains that it left a mess in their yard.
Now, every time she gets the tree trimmed, she lets the neighbors know and also gets the neighbor’s yard cleaned up. About two years ago, she got tired of this tree and got it removed, roots and all. Again, she made sure that the neighbor’s yard was tidy!
The following year, the neighbor comes over to complain that the roots are on her side. So my sister goes and looks. Doesn’t see any roots. Calls the tree removal service to come over too. They don’t see any roots either. The neighbor takes my sister and the tree removal service to small claims court saying that they were being unreasonable about not removing the tree roots.
It got thrown out for lack of evidence and the court ended up having the neighbor pay my sister and the tree removal guy each $120 for wasted time in court and being a nuisance!” Theunpolitical
7. GETTING REVENGE ON AN NEPOTISTIC SUPERVISOR WITH A SCREEN SAVER
“Yesterday, early in the morning, late in 3rd shift’s shift, well before 1st shift’s hourly people start showing up in the factory, the deed was done.
The players in this unintended almost-getting-fired episode was myself and the low-life, nepotism-loving, favoritism-showing, flirt with every woman, wise-aleck third-shift production lead.
As our factory environmentalist for the past two years, having worked myself up through the ranks, I take my job seriously as the EPA and DEQ do not have a sense of humor. Overall, I have been with the company for nigh on 15 years. I am in my 60s, and part of my job includes moving a 200-lb cart to the 14 work areas in the 335,000 sq. ft factory to verify, calibrate, and make sure everything is safe to use and operating within spec.
I test lubricants, coolants, air and water quality, verify standards, and test blocks of each work area. The other parts of my job are supervising a crew of 20+ highly-trained men and women who maintain the machinery, working with engineers to improve our products, working with IT for programming and the buyers for purchasing, and on the days the VP of Operations takes vacation, filling in for him.
The production lead for the 3rd shift is a late-30s age, smarmy little snot eater who thinks he’s God’s gift to the factory. He’s loud, whiny, boorish, and probably only got his position because he’s the son of one of our better senior engineers.
He’s not my friend. He’s complained about me for the past six months to his mom (the senior engineer) about how my work interrupts his crew. He’s whined to the VPO that my office and labs are huge and his desk is on the production floor, he’s tried to blame his people’s poor performance on me, etc. You get the picture.
Yesterday, I parked my testing cart near Module #7, unlocked the doors, and pulled out one of the testing trays I use. I went to the front of the machinery and told the operator he could take a break for 15 minutes while I worked on his machine.
He was happy to go outside for a break. He took off his PPE as I started up his machine for testing. It’s a little loud, but I wear earplugs and ear muffles, and I begin my routine of checks on this module. There’s nothing wrong as this operator is a good one and takes good care of it.
In just over 10 minutes, I’ve completed all the testing and the operator comes back. We spend a minute with small talk as I take the machine out of diagnostic mode and put it back to where he was and in less than the 15 minutes I gave him, we were back in production.
I pick up my tray and walk back to where I parked my cart.
It’s not there.
It’s missing.
It’s a cart with testing equipment worth a little over $200,000 and it is not where I left it.
Oh shoot.
I’m in my 60s so the first thing I suspect is Alzheimer’s has finally caught up with me.
I ask the operator if he saw where my cart was and he said he didn’t touch it, but did the darting eye thing which told me maybe the production lead had moved it.
I looked around and saw the little flat-headed jerk in his reflective safety vest down the main aisle trying real hard not to look in my direction while he was talking to the operator of Module #4.
Tray in hand, I walk to where he is and ask if he’d moved my cart. I knew he had just by the way the operator of #4 looked uncomfortable. The lead said, “Yeah, you left it in the aisle over the yellow line so it was a safety hazard (I know I didn’t and if I had thought about it I would have pulled up the video camera recording) so I moved it.”
I waited a beat. Then another while he stood there thinking he’d found me doing something wrong that he could exploit to his advantage. (We take safety very seriously)
After the third beat, I asked him where he’d moved my cart. He finally told me he’d moved it half the factory away and pointed. (Seriously, I’m in my 60s with a bad knee and half the factory away is a long walk) he then nodded to the operator and went off to not do whatever he was supposed to be doing and I went to get my cart.
I’m not a complainer. I’m a conservative from the last century where men take care of their own problems. He knew I wouldn’t say anything to his boss, or HR, or my boss. Don’t misunderstand, I’m not milquetoast. If you violate one of our safety or environmental SOPs, I’ll rain down with quiet ferocity and escort your fired rear out of our factory.
I’ve done it a dozen times in the two years I’ve held this position. I manage the way I manage and it seems to work.
The stage is set for the petty revenge. I may be in my 60s, but I am still a gamer, into VR, former Director of IT, and a 14-year-old at heart.
What the jerk who moved my cart didn’t know, was I am still very good with computers. His desk was positioned in the pod of desks for production leads for every shift where nearly everyone on the floor can see his 32″ monitor. I’d gotten my cart and was pushing it to Module #8 when I heard the bell for 3rd shift to take its final break.
I knew there’d be no one on the floor as they went out for a break or the canteen for a snack.
It took me less than a minute to stop by his computer and swap his screen saver, from the default floating clock we use to the rainbow flag of one of the community organizations I support.
(I’m not gay, but my youngest daughter is and she’s my baby).
Our screen savers are defaulted to set to activate after 1 minute of inactivity and I was well away from his computer before anyone was back from break. I had gotten Module #8 started in diagnostics and was elbow-deep in testing when the operator, a 30-year veteran of the company tapped me on the shoulder.
I pulled out of the machine and lifted my hearing protection. He was chuckling and not saying a word. He nodded his head in the direction of the leader’s desk.
What I heard was “Who put that queer crap on my computer!” As I’d hoped, he didn’t know a lot about computers and didn’t know how to change his screen saver but I didn’t think he’d be stupid enough to scream out “queer crap” as we have several people working for us who are gay or bi.
As long as they show up every day, do professional work, why should we care about their personal life?
He was raving.
I was savoring.
I listened for just long enough to be a witness to his outbursts, if asked, then put my headgear on and went back to work.
This narrative has gone on long enough, so I’ll jump to the end of the story. His loud proclamation was heard by two people who were offended and turned him into his boss, and one who turned him into HR. By the time 1st shift started, he’d been written up at level 3 (skipping level 1 and 2, probation, and any violation in the next 12 months gets him fired), no bonuses or pay raise while on probation, and has to attend 12 hours of sensitivity and inclusion training at the local community college.
No one asked me who put the screen saver on his desk and it stayed on through most of first shift until one of the level 1 ITs came and changed it back to the clock.
edit: As some of you ne’re-do-wells have more situational awareness than I do and brought up an interesting point, I went into the factory today and accessed the video logs.
It seems our surveillance settings are on a 24-hour loop in 15-minute recorded packets. Every 24 hours it overwrites the oldest file in the folder. It must be someone who didn’t want to waste a lot of space with useless videos. I can’t fathom who would have thought to set it up like that, but if the lead wants to check, it’s too late now.”
6. PROLONGING MY WAIT AT THE GAS STATION? ENJOY WATCHING ME WIN YOUR LOTTERY TICKET
“A little back story: Today marks about a week since I left my last job, and I have plenty of time to kill before I start my new job. I am taking this time as a vacation, after all, I have worked hard, and all my bills are paid for 3 months.
So, today, I went to go get coffee and gas from down the road. I get to the gas station, and there’s this middle-aged gentleman buying some lottery tickets. He is taking his time buying scratch tickets and draw games, and I mean REALLY taking his time.
No problem, I think. I have nowhere to be and nothing to do. I have the time.
The first 3 minutes go by, and he’s got several different draw games that he’s fumbling into his little plastic lottery pouch. ‘OK,’ I think, ‘my turn’.
Nope!
The guy starts scratching the scratch tickets he bought… at the counter. The cashier doesn’t look happy and tells the guy not to scratch them at the counter, and the indecisive lottery guy waves him off. Saying something about “It’ll be just a minute.” The cashier tells him there’s a line, the gambler looks back at me (the only person in line) and says, “He’ll be fine.” This is about 5 minutes in line now.
I think to myself that this guy is rude, and I could leave and go to another gas station and get home faster. But it’s fine. I have the time. I’ll ‘be fine.’
The guy finishes scratching his tickets and starts looking them over.
I don’t think he’s got any winning tickets. He tries making small talk to the cashier about “a big one,” or something, while digging into his pocket for his wallet. He pulls out a $20 bill and asks the cashier for the current numbers on the $20 lottery books, clearly thinking the ticket number meant something.
‘Rude AND Superstitious’ I think. Lottery guy goes back and forth between two ticket books. “Give me the ticket with number 143… no, wait, the one with 78… no, wait, 143!…. no no no, wait, wait, give me 78, 78’s the one.” He pays and begins scratching the ticket at the counter again.
It’s been about 8 minutes in line now. The cashier is dead inside. I’m a bit fed up. This gambler is just inconsiderate.
The gambler finishes scratching, sees that he lost, mumbles something about “the next one”, and walks over to the atm. My turn!
Cue petty revenge.
I walk up to the counter and say loudly, “can I get gas on pump 3, and that $20 ticket number 143, please.” The lottery guy hears this and shoots me an absolute side-eye. (It doesn’t help my case that the atm is not in the direct eye line of the counter and I had turned my body to watch him side-eye me… I was being petty.
I had to witness my damage.) So I pay the bill, turn around and walk 3 feet to the lottery checker and scratch then scan just the redemption code, and boop “WINNING TICKET PLEASE SEE RETAILER” flashes on the screen.
I turn around, walk 3 feet back to the cashier as the lottery guy finishes at the atm, so I’m now first in line with the lottery guy behind me.
The cashier scans the redemption code and the machine does its trumpet chime as the screen flashes “$100 winning ticket!”
The lottery guy is all upset at the whole thing, and as I walk toward the door, I got the best petty revenge of my life.
Lottery guy: “Hey, BUD. THAT was MY TICKET! I was just at the atm! I was just coming back to buy that, BUD.”
Me: “Well, I bought it, so it means you didn’t buy it, which means that it’s mine since I bought it.”
LG: “That’s not right, bud, that was my ticket.
That’s not the correct thing to do, dude. I got a wife and a baby on the way. I can give ya the $20 for what YOU spent on MY ticket but I need that $100, that was my ticket dude.”
Me: “Oh, I didn’t know. So you got a pregnant wife and you need this $100?”
LG: “Yes!”
Me: half out the door “You’ll be fine.” And then I go out to pump gas, then leave. I’m a little surprised the guy didn’t chase after me or try to fight me.
Funny thing is I don’t normally play the scratch lottery tickets anymore, so if he were polite in line I wouldn’t have purchased winning ticket number 143.”
5. EMPLOYEE QUITS OVER LOCKED CLOSET, ENDS UP OWING $18,000
“I work for a small municipal department in a rural area. We have ten employees and some volunteers. I am in charge of daily operations, and I answer to someone else. One of the people on my team decided that she did not like me anymore when I was promoted to this position a couple of years ago and had generally been a pain in the butt for everyone.
She complains about everyone endlessly, about how nobody ever does anything except her. When I work with her, I’m in my office from 8 am until 9 or 10 PM working while she sits on the couch and watches TV most of the day. Most days she’ll clean for an hour, occasionally she gets in a mood and cleans for several hours.
She worked with a volunteer the day before but had already left work by the time I got there at 0645 for my 0700 start time.
So, we have a rather loose uniform standard in my department for the volunteers. Basically, they need to wear a T-shirt identifying them as a part of our department.
When they’re responding in an emergency, that requirement is extremely lax. These are all kept in a closet in the station and issued to new volunteers (full-time personnel have a $500/yr clothing allowance). I replenished these t-shirts far too often for the amount of people being onboarded. I don’t think anybody is stealing them, I think it’s more along the lines of “I’m here to respond, but I don’t have a T-shirt with me” so they grab a new shirt.
So we are approaching the end of our fiscal year, and I still have money in my uniform budget. I place a large order of shirts and these get folded nicely and organized and then placed into the same closet, but this time the door gets locked so a hundred shirts don’t wander off in a couple of months.
I left a note on the door that I had locked it and to contact me if access is needed. This went on for a couple of weeks, and my pain-in-the-butt employee was extremely vocal that she believed it was stupid that the door was locked. There were a few other things stored in there, but mostly just junk that needed to be disposed of properly and couldn’t go into the trash (old laptops, computer monitors, etc).
The way our schedule works, I was out of the office for a week. I got off work at 7 am on Friday, and I was not due back in the office until 7 am the following Friday. I worked one day covering at our north station, and then the Friday I returned was my weekend to work.
On the Monday when I was out of the office, I received a phone call from my pain-in-the-butt employee stating that she needed to get into that closet. I didn’t ask for a reason why because I didn’t think it was necessary. So I told her that the key was in the safe (which all FT employees have access to).
I really thought nothing of it.
So, Friday rolls around. I have a meeting with a county administrator at 0700. I get to work at 0645 and open the door to find a large pile of things that had all been in storage with a note “we need to get rid of this stuff”.
Okay, it’s springtime, we’re probably due for some spring cleaning, but if you’re going to clean, have a plan to get rid of the crap that you’re pulling out of storage, don’t just pull it out and hang a note on it for someone else to deal with.
Some of it was from that closet, some of it was not even ours to get rid of, and some of it was stuff we are absolutely not getting rid of and still needed. I found the original blueprints to our station buried in this pile of stuff to get rid of… So the county administrator walks in… he’s instantly mad because the pain-in-the-butt employee spent all day the previous day whining about how I hadn’t been there, and nobody is doing anything, and she had to clean this whole station by herself, same old same old.
Her big pet peeve is garbage cans. If there is a single piece of garbage in a garbage can when I leave, she will call the administrator and complain… when she leaves, if she collects the garbage, it’s all stuffed into one can and not taken out, but I’m more the type to just take it out and move on with my day.
Take the high road because the low road will get flooded eventually.
So, instead of having our meeting, we start digging into this pile of stuff because we aren’t going to be able to do anything to get rid of it on a Friday.
The dump isn’t even open, and there’s no place around us that recycles electronics. I got to put some of this stuff back in the closet… I go to the safe, the key is missing. Weird. Whatever, there’s a spare in my locker.
I go get it and try to stick it in the door and the doorknob has been changed to one that doesn’t lock or even accept a key.
I’m stunned. She was so annoyed by that one closet that she changed the entire doorknob.
The levee just breached. The low road is under a flash flood warning. County administrator calls her immediately. Tells her to turn around and come back to work and change the doorknob back. She tells him “no, I have an appointment and even if I didn’t, I don’t want that door locked, and I quit”.
The best part is we are paying for some education on her behalf, and she’s going to owe us about $18,000 now.”
4. BETRAYED BY NEW JOB, I LEFT THEM A HIDDEN SURPRISE
“In between preferred work, I took a supplement position that had a hard track for promotion specifically due to some past work experience. Who knows, I may stay here if it works out.
My first few weeks were spent doing general helper work (distribution center) to become familiar with their workflow before I took over a scheduling job in the front office from someone being promoted. I’d spend the last hour of the day sitting with this guy and going over the processes I helped with that day.
He was a friendly, welcome-to-the-team kind of guy.
Literally, after 4 days of this going well, he suddenly changes his friendly demeanor and doesn’t want me to check in anymore.
I ask if there is a problem, and are we still proceeding with the arrangement of my being employed?
He says, “Oh, absolutely, no problems, you are still our guy. I’m just busy with an important new project right now. Keep working in the warehouse and we’ll pick up again in a week or so”.
Given that the sharp change in friendliness towards me became borderline rude, I smelled a rat.
So, I created a “Rat Trap” every day for the next week.
At the end of the day, I’d take the boxes of the most special (also expensive & hard to reorder) inventory parts that were critical to making their shipments, and hide them deep in the material racks.
In the morning, if I still had a job, I’d pull them back out and business as usual. A little insurance policy that kept me from being angry in the moment.
Then… it only took one week before I was unceremoniously and without explanation, let go.
Literally, wouldn’t talk to me about it, we don’t need to explain, just hit the road, and now actually rude about it. What happened to friendly?
Turns out, soon after I was hired as agreed, someone in the office unexpectedly had to leave due to a medical condition.
This shook up the office structure, leaving me with no position. But rather than say that, which would have been understandable, they froze me out, and then kicked me out without explanation.
The Rat Trap now sprung, I heard they had a shipping crisis for a bit that took weeks to clear up.
Since they were sure my dismissal was a rude surprise, I apparently was never on the radar for any of it.
Petty, yes, but the “smell a rat” senses were a-tingling, and they were well rewarded.”
3. CALL THE COPS BECAUSE I “STOLE” YOUR LUNCH? WE’LL SEE WHO REALLY GETS IN TROUBLE
“On a day I was off work, I was craving a sandwich at lunchtime on a hot day. I traveled to the nearest subway and got in line. As it was noon time, there were quite a few people in line, and as many places, they seemed understaffed. I get there is nothing the store can do but what they can.
The young teenage girl was the only one to make sandwiches while a manager was ringing up the orders when not helping with condiments.
So while waiting in line at Subway with like six others, I was behind a group of three old ladies, the Karens of this story.
While not the spitting image of most Karens, you could tell from how they talked with each other they were the kind of women with resting witch faces.
So it came time to have their sandwiches made, and of course, every one of them wanted a very custom sandwich.
This meat, that cheese is a little too much. I want it toasted off. That is too much. I want to switch the bread. On and on, it was annoying as the one girl tried to keep up but was getting frustrated and stressed. Then the manager stepped over, trying to help, but with these women, they were not happy with anything.
After 15 minutes of making each of these ladies’ sandwiches, it finally came time to pay. Down to the register they went as my meatball sub was quickly made and passed down. I am plain bread, meat, and sauce, a little ranch. So I waited behind them.
The manager rang up the old bats, and when the total came out to around 30ish dollars, they went off again. I’m not saying that they started to squeal. “We waited forever to be served, and then you two couldn’t even make a sandwich. We want it free,” they whined. I was fed up with it, and after it continued for a few minutes, I stepped up and said I’d take the sandwiches and add them to mine.
The old crows grinned and thought they had one. I paid for the four sandwiches now and added my drink and chips. After my card was approved and I was handed my receipt, I picked up my newly four bought sandwiches and got my drink.
As I started paying, the old ladies went to sit at a table. After getting my drink, I headed to the door to leave with MY food in hand.
“Um, excuse me, you have our food still. Are you not going to bring it to us?” Receipt in hand, holding it up.
Nope, I paid my money for my food and will take them back to work. As I headed to the door. This got the old ladies to get up and chase me out the door, which I didn’t mind. The staff had enough of them, and I can take some abuse from crazies.
“You need to give us our food, or we will call the cops and have you arrested.” I knew this was dumb, but as I said, nothing better on a day off. Please be my guest. I assure you they won’t be doing anything about this.
One of them started to pull out a phone and call while the others began telling me how I must love stealing from old ladies and how they knew this person or that person and I would be in jail for a long time.
Well, they called. I stood there not saying a word, which is hard to do being belittled, but I had the store crowd watching by this point.
Soon enough, a few units pulled in, and as they got out, a look of confusion crossed their face.
Officer: Um, are you the guy they called about because you match the description?
ME: Yea, I am.
Officer: Um, you stole their sandwiches and demanded money from them.
Me: well, look into it, ask the clerk and manager who paid for the sandwiches, and look at this receipt.
One officer walked in, spoke with the store, and watched the video while the other listened to these women insinuate that I took the food from them.
The shock was priceless once the other came out and confirmed I paid for them, and the store also wanted the three trespassed for a disturbance. I was released to leave but decided to go back in and eat.
The three were banned and left with an even more sour look, and the manager brought over a cookie, telling me it was on her.”
2. SALT-LOVING MOTHER-IN-LAW LEARNS A LESSON IN FLAVOR
“I have suffered from chronic migraines since I was a kid.
Something important for every migraine sufferer to know is their “triggers”. Triggers are the things in your life that are most likely to start a migraine. For some it may be extreme heat, for others it’s stress and for me it’s salt. I can’t have a lot and if I do, a migraine will start almost right away.
Due to this, I can only have Chinese food every once in a while and I have to be very careful to read labels for sodium content. Migraines hurt like a MOFO but can also send me to the ER, which is expensive.
My ex-MIL (I’ll call her Karen) loved to cook and added too much salt to everything.
It didn’t take me long to notice that right after eating a meal prepared by her my head would start beating like a drum. We had dinner with them every Sunday so my Ex went to Karen, explained my situation, and asked her to tone down the salt.
Karen was not happy. She thought changing the ingredients of her food would alter the taste too much. She agreed to cut back but the very next time we had dinner with them I went home feeling like my head was going to explode and I knew she hadn’t.
My wife asked her about it later and Karen said she’d originally cut the salt but after tasting it decided it wasn’t flavorful enough and added it back in. She told my wife she wouldn’t sacrifice flavor for me so that’s the last time we had Sunday dinner there.
Months later we had to go there for a birthday party. We arrived early, hours from dinner so Karen hadn’t yet started cooking. I was in the kitchen getting a beverage and saw her precious salt shaker sitting on the counter. I picked it up, went into the pantry, and hid it behind some boxes of cereal. While there I saw the round refill container, grabbed that, and hid it too.
Hours later Karen is cooking and we hear a commotion. She’s upset she can’t find her salt shaker. She goes into the pantry, complaining that she also can’t find the large container either. My wife and I were sitting outside, acting like nothing was out of the ordinary.
She ended up cooking all the dishes without salt and complained the whole time about how terrible everything tasted.
Karen was in a very bad mood as everyone dished up. It wasn’t long before they started complimenting her on the food. People were saying it was some of the best she’d ever made, and from her face you could see she was shocked to hear that.
Several people said to her, “This is great! Did you tone down the salt, you use a lot you know, this tastes like you used the perfect amount” to which Karen hissed, “It has NO SALT because I can’t find my shakers.” Nobody else was bothered by this, they just nodded and agreed it was amazing.
The more they complimented her, the more upset she got.
For some reason, she never thought to ask anyone if they had purposely taken them. We ate and then got up to leave not long afterward. On our way out, we went by the kitchen to take some leftovers home.
While there I pulled the salt shaker and container out, put them in our bag, took them home, and trashed them. It was the first time I had eaten a meal with that family and not gone home with a migraine.”
1. RUDE PARKING LOT ENCOUNTER TURNS INTO SWEET REVENGE
“This is from a few years back, but I still delight at the memory of it.
I was leaving the grocery store and walked to my car when I noticed a car slowly driving down, almost following me. Now, I had a pretty good spot, so I figured they wanted my spot. I unloaded my groceries in my trunk and walked to take my cart back to the corral when I see the mom throw her arms in the air and mouth “oh come on!” I guessed it had to do with having to wait for me so she could get my spot.
Now, this stuff annoys me, I get wanting a great spot, but come on, blocking the aisle and rudely waiting for me. So I slowly made my way back to my car, opened my trunk, got a juice out I got and went to sit in my car.
At this point, I was going to head out and just let them have the spot, but then I heard a honk. I contemplated my feelings on it and decided I had plenty of free time and maybe I should just relax a bit and have my drink, no need to drive off yet.
I did start the car, in the hope to lead them on, and tapped on my breaks for a little, to turn on my backup lights, but I went nowhere. I heard some more honking, and now yelling out the window at me to get out of her spot, her kids quietly looking horrified in the back.
I looked back and waved in acknowledgment. I did notice some cars started backing up behind her, as she was in the middle of the aisle blocking all of it (one-way aisle), and they started honking at her. She screamed more at me, yelling, arm-waving, laying on her horn, and spitting obscenities.
I was determined to sit here all day if needed, leading her on. I kept tapping on the brakes, adjusted my mirror, even going so far as to back up a couple of feet, and then pull back in. She was losing her mind, I struggled not to just bend over laughing.
Eventually, after a couple of minutes of her laying on her horn and yelling, she gave up and drove past. Immediately as she went past me I slowly backed out and allowed the poor person behind her to have it. I could see her raging in the rearview mirror of her van as she pulled into a spot further down.
She got out and kept yelling, waving at me, red in the face, etc. I gave her the most polite smile and sweet wave as I drove off.”
