Hey turkey lovers! The holiday of binge eating is upon us. Gobble down these hilarious Thanksgiving memes while you think of ways to avoid helping with the dishes.
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We all have some quirky food preferences that annoy our loved ones and waiters everywhere, but sometimes it goes beyond just "putting ranch on everything" and "carrying hot sauce in your purse." If you put mayonnaise on French fries you're entering an unforgivable territory, but if you dip French fries in milkshakes you need to get help immediately. Don't collect $200, you're going to food jail.
When a recent Reddit user asked, "What are some foods that most people have been eating the wrong way or not the way it was intended?" food-traitors everywhere were ready to weigh in. Have you been eating the paper on fruit roll-ups? Chopping up the pits of avocados? Do you eat pizza crust first?
If you're looking for ideas to torture your relatives this holiday, here are some tips:
Recently read where people were eating the f*cking wax on Babybel cheeses and I haven't been the same since
My dad served us under-ripe fruit my entire childhood because to him firm = good and soft = bad. The first time I had a mango that was actually ripe I was an adult and the experience was borderline orgasmic.
There was a comment a long time ago from a guy who found out in adulthood that you aren't supposed to eat the cupcake wrappers when someone looked horrified when he ate it.
When I first ate edamame I chewed up the entire pod and couldn't figure out why people enjoyed eating them. I didn't realize you're just supposed to eat the bean inside the pod.
This is really relevant to me today, because I just found out that my girlfriend has been buying smoked salmon for years then cooking it!
My friend eats popcorn by picking the fluffy parts away from each piece and discarding the “seed” center. Every time i tel him hes an idiot but hes too stubborn to just eat a damn piece of popcorn like a human
My buddy's step dad puts sugar in his fucking mac and cheese. Sometimes I think about it and I can't sleep
I saw a person eat a tamale with the corn husk still on it... apparently many people do this...???
Okay, so this is more along the lines of me eating a certain dish the wrong way, but when I was little my mom would make french toast except she would put chilies, onions and sometimes chicken on it. I grew up thinking french toast was a savory dish until I ordered it at a diner and it was sweet. I still like my mom’s version of french toast better tbh.
I had a roommate who put ketchup on his pizza, now I completely understand that it has tomato sauce on it anyways so ketchup doesn’t sound too crazy, but one time I made a homemade chicken Alfredo pizza with white sauce and before even taking a bite he smothered it in ketchup
Apparently a pint of ice cream isn't meant to be a single serving.
My grandpa would peel a green apple using this nifty little device, then salt it and put it on a stick and give it to me
Growing up I HATED steak, my mom didn't want us having under cooked food, so steak was always well done.
I was about 25 when I tried steak at a wedding that was cooked correctly. Now I love steak!
I eat Kiwis with the hairy skin on. My mom said I seemed to like it so she wasn't going to stop me. Later on I find out that I'm a freak of nature for doing it, but I still eat it that way because I just like it. The only downside is that since I like the texture of the hair and skin, I have "forbidden fruit" moments when I'm looking at the abdomen of a tarantula.
Do you even remember the last time you weren't tired? I don't. Life is really, really exhausting. So we can't really blame people for succumbing to the siren song of sleep. Even in some bizarre, inappropriate, and unsafe places. Except driving: we can definitely blame people for falling asleep while driving. Don't do that! Pull over! Someone could get hurt!
Be careful out there, sleepy people!!!!!!
1.) From Horizon317:
On a tractor while plowing a field. I was doing night shifts during the summer and decided to get some extra hours in during the day so I was tired when doing my actual shift. I switched on the tractors gps and set it to give me a signal 50 meters before the field ended to wake me up to turn around. The fields were about 1200meters long so id get about 10 mins of sleep befor having to turn around again
2.) From CuriousVisit:
on the bus, standin up
in my defense, it was a traffic jam and i hadn't slept the previous night
3.) From Antepast8:
In college, I took a cognitive neuroscience course that involved designed experiments to be carried out in an MRI and how to analyze the brain images afterwards. As part of the course, we all carried out our studies, and I volunteered to be a participant for a few.
When I went to get in the MRI, the tech said I couldn't wear my sweatshirt in due to the metal near the aglets, so she got me a blanket to keep warm. And to keep my head propped at the right angle, they gave me a stack of pillows.
I definitely unintentionally fucked with someone's data by falling asleep mid-study.
4.) From fantsukissa:
at the dentist in the middle of drilling without any anesthesia. woke up to dentist trying to tell me to open my mouth more.
5.) From h8fedora:
Underneath the car while doing an oil change.
6.) From ComplexTheme1:
When I was a kid, like 5 or 6, there was a tree in the front yard I really liked climbing. There was a branch perfectly shaped for little me to lie down on. Early one morning, I woke up and decided to take my sleeping bag up the tree and went back to sleep.
7.) From notthatbaddi:
Wiz Khalifa concert
everyone was so high, I fell asleep for a few minutes standing up & the crowd was so thick I didn’t even fall over
8.) From aimlessecho:
I only ask, because as I type this, I can hear my roommate snoring from his seat on the toilet.
9.) From lizzpop2003:
During a job interview. He actually had to shake me awake. Weirder yet, i still got the job.
10.) From jboer:
Techno party with my head on top of a bigass speaker.
11.) From CDC_:
One night, for no particular reason, I was feeling extremely anxious. My mother-in-law offered me a Xanax. It was about 7pm and a few days before Christmas. We were at her house doing the family thing. I took the Xanax and after about 15 minutes started feeling relatively calm. Not really thinking about it, I grabbed a beer from my father-in-law, who didn’t know I’d taken a Xanax.
Finished it, decided to have one more. I went outside to smoke and was lying across the hood of my car. In retrospect, I was already pretty out of it, I don’t normally lay on cars.
Anyway, I finished smoking and turned on my iPad and just started doodling while lying back, kinda propped up by the windshield. That’s all I remember.
The next thing I knew it was after midnight, my iPad was lying in the driveway, shattered, and my mother-in-law and wife were shaking me awake in a total panic. Apparently I straight passed out mid-sketch and dropped my iPad and just sat there in their front yard, fully unconscious, laying across my car.
Don’t drink if you take Xanax, kids.
12.) From Capuchin3:
On a hedge at the end my road. Dad wasn't too pleased at driving past his pissed up son sleeping in a hedge on his way to work.
13.) From Asaram_bapu:
On someone else's wife's shoulder
14.) From Aloine:
In the back of an ambulance.
I’m the paramedic.
15.) From PuzzleheadedNinja2:
Bathroom floors, standing up, in the middle of eating. I have narcolepsy so I can seep pretty much anywhere, not always by choice.
16.) From h8fedora:
This post is a narcoleptics wet dream. Iv slept on the steps of the opera house in Sydney. In the bathroom of my local pub (3 hours 3 beers). Under the car. Whilst milking cows on numerous occasions. Kmart changing room. Traveling 35mph on a quad bike. Those are a few, at the moment my weird place is on the floor in our hallway.
17.) From omansja:
While doing a school presentation,literally.
18.) From MRjazzhandszz:
I went to a party and slept in the train on the way back home, but my friend constantly was waking me up. I would be mad if he did that. So when the train stopt at the last station he left without me (drunk and i did not really know him). So this nice cute lady waked me up when the train was empty. I tought it was my friend so i yelled something mad and she walked away. 5 seconds later i realized it wasn’t my friend and i felt so bad.
19.) From metyuadem:
Does passing out in the gutter count? If so, then happy 21st, 22nd, and 23rd birthdays to me back in the day.
20.) From fi_lift:
Not weird but dangerous. When I was still in highschool I used to work a Starbucks and would open at 4am so I'd have to get up around 3am to drive there. Well there were some days where I didn't get to bed on time so while driving, I'd close my eyes and count to three and then open and correct my driving if I had veered of my lane. And repeat. My logic was, no way could I veer off that bad in 3 seconds. Mind you, that early there really isn't anyone on the road. Well there was one time I counted to 3 and my eyes would just NOT open until it was almost too late. Nothing bad happened but I pulled over, called work and said I'd be 5 minutes late. Took a nap on the side of the highway and went to work.
21.) From Anti_Coffee:
It was super late and I was going down on my ex girlfriend. I was bobbing my head and eventually just leaned against her thigh falling asleep
22.) From Teddynotsobear:
I fell asleep during my wedding. Pretty much the moment we sat down waiting to do or vows and wrap up the ceremony part of the wedding, I fell asleep multiple times while sitting there.
Now it's not because I don't respect my wife, she pretty much died laughing when we went to eat and talk to people. she always thinks that shit is funny.
I have various illnesses, physical and mental. I was on meds at the time, I worked roofing with my FIL and I am not a morning person at all. I've always had the graveyard schedule since I was a child. I've never been able to wake up in the morning without feeling sick.
It was a Christian and Mexican wedding, as in everything is in Spanish besides my vows. I also don't speak Spanish, I can only understand it sometimes. The fucking ceremony was so long, it was basically them talking about the Bible for a good hour or so. So I dozed off multiple times, for awhile at each time. I didn't feel bad at all, my wife didn't even want to do a church wedding because we both dislike religion and church a lot. We only did it because her dad said that he'd only pay for it (he was the one who insisted we get married since we live with him), but he said he'd give us 5,000 bucks for our honeymoon, which he never did.
To this day I don't remember the ceremony at all besides our vows lmao
Whether you prefer to call it Turkey day, Thanksgiving, The Day I Have To See That Uncle Again, or simply The Holidays, this weekend brings us yet another excuse to indulge in gluttony alongside family and friends.
Truly, nothing is more American than eating twice our portion, washing it down with booze, and then triggering each other's childhood trauma with unchecked family dynamics. Or better yet, feasting at a Friendsgiving and then unpacking our origin stories with chosen family.
While the holiday doesn't officially start until tomorrow, people are already making predictions about how theirs will go down, and these are the funniest among them.
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Donald Trump, a very sane President of the United States who is extremely tethered to reality, shared a photo of himself that may or may not have been Photoshopped.
With no context other than the narcissism he's displayed over several decades, Trump tweeted out a picture of his septuagenarian head on Rocky Balboa's body and it is at once pathetic, hilarious, and terrifying.
This is what he says when he looks in the mirror, isn't it? What's the official term for whatever the opposite of body dysmorphia is? Is it normal for the president to share fake thirst traps of themselves?
The reactions were as funny as the photo is fake.
— saeen (@saeen90_) November 27, 2019
It's going to be a long Thanksgiving weekend.
While most interactions with strangers fade into the abyss of our minds, there are some strangers that leave a lasting impression.
Sometimes, they're someone so bizarre and distinctive we return to their memory in order to theorize about what their daily life looks like.
Other times, strangers show up in times of need like mysterious guardian angels, only to disappear back into anonymity.
In many ways, memories with strangers feel more romantic to return to, without the mundane details of their lives they can easily become mythologized as a side character in our lives.
1. vip3r-cia hopes the man from college is having a nice day.
My sophomore year in college I would always see this older man on my walk to my math class he always went out of his way to said good morning and ask how I was doing that day. We never exchanged names just two people checking in on each other.
The girl on my running route who asked if she could run with me sometime and I said "sure" and didn't give her my number or get hers.
I was waiting at the subway station when I hear a man approaching, bopping his body as he sang "Watch me do me... Watch me do me...". After exchanging pleasantries he looks to the gloves I was wearing. He proceeds to take one off my hand saying "ooh wow those are nice gloves! Are those suede?". He takes the glove to his face and takes a deep sniffing inhale, gives it back saying "yeahhh that's suede. Nice nice."
He then looks over my shoulder toward the station security guard, takes a small step to the right so I'd block him from view and pulls a bottle of vodka from his jacket. With the biggest grin on his face takes a huge pull and again bops off into the night singing "watch me do me... Watch me do me..."
10/10 would watch him do him again
One time, I went to the gum wall in Seattle. My friend put his chewed gum on the wall and this guy came up behind him, plucked it off the wall and started chewing it. He told my friend “any gum you put on the wall is MINE.” He didn’t even look like a crazy homeless guy, he was well groomed and wearing a suit. Never been more unnerved in my life, and I was just an onlooker!
I was waiting for my mom to finish the paperwork to adopt my first dog when I was 4. I looked at a random lady in the waiting area and told her I was going to have a puppy and pointed at the dog. She said “what will you name her?” I told her I didn’t know. She said “well she’s very fluffy, hm, a muffin is fluffy. Why don’t you name her muffin?” I smiled at her and walked away to tell my mom. I had my dog Muffin until I was 17 and I’ll never forget the nice lady who gave me her name.
When I was a kid there was a man who would hang out at the side of the playground, not because he was being a creeper but because he was really far into special needs and he had a mind of a child. He would stand there as the kids went running by and blurt out "HI! I AM LARRY!" He did this for all 5 years of grade school. I think about him often to be honest. He was so happy yet all he wanted to was play with us when we would play kick ball or what ever but wasn't allowed to step onto the play ground.
Edit for answers: so to answer some frequent questions. Larry wasn’t allowed on the playground I am sure for liability reasons and Larry was about 30 years old. Also for those wondering this took place in Seattle in the late 80’s making Larry about 60/65 years old I’d guess. This is a total guess though.
Great question and it triggered a memory I haven't thought of in years. When I was 18 I moved to London, didn't know anyone and used to spend my free time wandering around the city, one night I was probably out too late and in the wrong part if town, got beaten up pretty bad and ended up in hospital.
The next day a man arrived with my wallet that was taken during the beating, he must have stayed taking to me for 2 hours, just general chat and asking me how I ended up like this, about my family, homeplace etc. It was the most company I had had since I moved there and it was at a time I really needed some human contact and I think he knew that. I did thank him but he probably didn't realise just how much I needed him there that day.
I was really drunk trying to find my way back to a friends new house after we got separated walking back from the bar. I was in a dress and heels with no coat in the middle of a Canadian winter. A guy was randomly walking and notice how drunk I was and offered to help me find my friends. He stayed with me all night, walking at first and then driving in his car until I sobered up, trying to find my friends house.
I didn’t have my cellphone on me and no money. It could have turned out a lot worse. He gave me a pair of pants and a jacket and when I finally sobered up around 8am I realized that my friends house was on the street behind his house. Thank you kind stranger for staying with me and making sure nothing happened to me.
I was in a bad car wreck in Boston. I crawled out of the other side of the car and had a panic attack on the side of the busy road. A crowd of people came over to help me, but this one woman stroked my hair and gave me her drink until I calmed down. It sounds weird but it was exactly what I needed at that moment.
A few years ago, I was waiting to buy a drink at a concert, and this Russian guy next to me said something to me. I responded, he instantly realized that I was American, and suddenly starts yelling "you're American!! You're going to f*ck my daughter!!" I calmly reassured him that I was not, in fact, trying to f*ck his daughter. He seemed satisfied with that, then handed me a shot of really bad vodka and disappeared.
I think about that guy a lot.
I also feel bad for whoever eventually f*cks his daughter.
My sister and I were in middle school at the time, eating mall food with our mom. Mom decides to get a couple things from the food mart real quick as we're eating and goes to do so; we were in view of the window so she could just look over and see us.
Sister and I noticed an old couple at another restaurant, they looked like they were maddogging us while we were eating. Made me uncomfortable but I tried ignoring them.
My mom popped back out for a moment to check on us, and now the old couple started to throw their own food away and head out. My mom then headed back in to finish shopping; the wife patted her husband's shoulder, pointed back at me and my sister, and they both sat back down and continued watching us.
They finally left when they saw our mom at the check out and my sister and I simultaneously went Ohhh, they were watching over us this whole time.
Thanks, wherever you guys are. Not enough people like you two.
I am Canadian. When I was 17 --more than half my life ago now-- I got a six-month working holiday-makers' visa and moved to the Forest of Dean on the Welsh border halfway between Cardiff and Gloucester. My mother had a childhood friend who lived there, and she said she could get me a job as a shepherd for the summer, but that fell through. I ended up working as a labourer in a factory that crushed rock into powder for obscure and exotic purposes in an industrial park outside Cardiff.
I will never forget the rural bus driver who picked me up and dropped me off going to and from work, even though I've long since forgotten his name.
It was the same bloke both ways, which means he must have been working a 12-hour day, although I imagine maybe he got a few hours off in the middle of his shift when everyone who had to get to work was there, and no one was heading home yet. This was not a bus for tourists. It hit all the small towns once in the morning and once again at night to shuttle people to mines and factories and mills. When you got a job, you called the bus company to let them know you needed a ride. He freely admitted he knew everyone on his route well enough to know when he could pull over and take a catnap.
He made models out of matchsticks. He was always rubbing down matchsticks with sand paper to make little bits and pieces for ships or trains or bridges or houses or furniture. He showed me pictures of his finished work. It was quite impressive. Some of it he sold, and some of it he donated to museums.
My work was dirty. When your end product is dust, you end up black like a coal miner. This guy found an army surplus greatcoat somewhere, and he used to wrap me in it when I boarded the bus at the end of my shift so I wouldn't mess up his upholstery. Sometimes I fell asleep against the window and smudged the glass with the dust in my hair. He started keeping a bottle of windex under his seat just to clean up after me.
My favourite memory of him was of him yelling at the sheep that would stand in the middle of the country roads. He'd start by honking, then yelling, then revving the engine, then finally he'd get out of the bus and ask the sheep very nicely to move. If they still wouldn't, he'd come back on the bus and say, "Right lads, we're here for a bit. Take a nap if you like. I'm going to fiddle with my matchsticks."
I have a picture of him somewhere: White collared short-sleeve shirt with a dark tie; he was middle-aged, round without being fat, bald without it being his defining feature --those were his bold dark eyebrows-- and he had a smile that told the world he'd figured it all out, found his comfortable niche, and wanted no more from life. He had no strife or troubles. He just took people to work, took them home again, and in between he napped, did a bit of model-making with matchsticks, and yelled at the sheep.
To me, he was the very soul of rural England, but as there's a 50/50 shot he was Welsh, I don't know if he'd like me saying so.
Edit: Slight rewording of a sentence.
Edit 2: So, this blew up overnight. Thank you everyone for your kind words, and thank you as well to those of you who have made this the most gilded and silvered comment of my almost ten years on this site. I will add a few things. First, u/DasCapitalist has almost certainly identified my stranger as Bill Tucker, a noted matchstick model-maker and retired bus and taxi driver in the area. Second, yes, anyone who wants to send this to a local paper is very welcome to do so.
Direct message me if the paper needs information from me. Third, yes, I am a writer. What I write for a living probably wouldn't be of interest to most of you, but as a hobby I write historical fiction. I've published five novels so far, and I like to joke the royalties cover my bar bill. Rather than pitch you a bunch of different things, there's a post pinned to the top of my Twitter account that has links to the different books. Fourth, a lot of you were curious where exactly I was in the F
Was in an Uber in Austin a few months ago and my driver was this super chill ex-hippie dude that was forced to flee WA because he ratted out a crime syndicate or something, so then he moved to CA and sold shoes while not actually having an actual residence. He would just flirt with the women that would come into the store and shack up with them for a while until they got sick of him (this was like the 70/80s).
Then he meets this one girl who he crushes on real hard, but she calls him a man slut and wants nothing to do with him because yeah facts he is. They become best friends, she watches him go thru relationship after relationship and one day they joke about moving to Alaska to sell ice (apparently that's a thing?) and they've been married ever since. Now they have a bunch of boys in college at UT. I was in Austin for 6 hours but this dude made my week with his storytelling.
This Indian dude who worked in a convenience store just down the road from where I live.
I went there with my cousin one time just to pick up some snacks and alcohol.
We ask him what we should buy, he picks up this bottle of super strong stuff. My cousin says "Oh my God, I'm not trying to die". He responds with "It's good when you die, you know?" (His Indian accent made it sound pretty funny)
I was lowkey creeped out at first, until he started talking about how he had a near death experience on LSD, and how he takes all kinds of psychadellics, sometimes even when he's on shift.
For some reason I felt really sad for him, even though he seemed like a super happy guy.
I sometimes wonder where he is now and how he's doing.
My credit card got declined at Subway and the lady behind me paid for my sandwich. I thanked her profusely, and then sat down and almost cried. This was months and months ago, but I’ll always be grateful for her kindness.
A girl named Rose. She was a SUPER shy 7 year old girl with cancer. I got to hangout with her at a outdoor camp for one of the days we were both there. After a couple of hours, she began to open up. She never let loose like a child would, but stayed very reserved and told me about the things she could still enjoy doing. At 7 years old, she had read every Harry Potter book. For the rest of the day, I listened to her talk about NOTHING but Harry Potter.
Im not big on Harry Potter, but It was one of the best days of my life.
As someone who sits at a computer all day and rarely interacts with another person in a professional setting, I have nothing but respect for people who work in human resources. Because their job is keeping humans satisfied and happy, and we all know how impossibly difficult that can be. Especially in a work environment.
Go hug an HR person today. They deserve it.
1.) From thot_sauce:
I am on the HR team that supports a wide variety of US cities for our company, including our colorful Florida locations. This is the best story I heard.
We had some woman trying to avoid doing work by sitting out in her car in the parking lot. While she was hiding out there, she needed to use the restroom. Well, instead of going back inside (or doing literally anything else) she decides to pee out her car window. Even though I am also a woman, I was impressed and disgusted by the physics behind this feat. She had stuck her bare ass outside the window and just went for it. Unbeknownst to her, her male co-worker had arrived at work late due to an appointment. He drove past to find a parking spot as this was happening, and got full view. He then reported the incident to us.
One of our HR people had to investigate this, and sure enough, parking lot cameras could corroborate his story. Our HR person confronted the woman. Her response: "Well how did he know it was me?? It could have been anyone." We thought, ok fair enough. The cameras aren't CSI grade zoom, so we only saw the ass part. It was harder to completely identify the face. So we went back to the male peer and asked how he knew it was her. His response? "Oh it was definitely her. The face tattoos are pretty recognizable."
We definitely don't get paid enough for this.
2.) From VoidDrinker:
I had one employee submit a form to increase her own salary, she also forged her manager's signature.
Like, for real?
3.) From Scribb74:
Not in hr but my previous senior manager was renown for sleeping with colleagues(he was married with kids).
Before I started there I remember seeing a huge banner plastered across a footbridge that everyone leaving work by car had to drive under to get to the motorway.
The sign said :
"Joe blogs (not actual name) cheating bastard"
Turns out he was cheating on his wife with a team leader from another dept, and was cheating on his mistress with another team leader from yet another dept.
Both the team leaders found out about each other and had a massive fight in the reception of the building.
By the time I started at the company both of the team leaders were no longer working there.
4.) From Uranoscopy7:
Came in to work early for a morning shift (work in an industrial lab). Heard noises from the back corner of the office portion of the building but can't make out what they are because of distortion. Head that way to see what was going on as I was the only one there (so I thought) at 3 am. See my lab manager fucking the district manager (her boss) while the HR Rep for the district is sitting there ... enjoying the view. I NOPED and went to the lab and tried to forget what happened.
5.) From StanMarsh01:
Saw a guy blatently lie in his recruitment form....(watching him fill it out in front of me!)...it was total bollocks....apparently he was 15th in line to the throne, went to Eaton, studied at Oxford and served in the Army for 9 years after training at Sandhurst....not bad for a 21 year old! Who had in fact spent 3 years in a Young Offenders institute, battling a drug problem......
6.) From ChuckChuckMoeMuck:
My friend was doing hiring for a staffing agency during college. A guy who we went to high school came in looking for a job. He told the candidate that he had two jobs. One paid 10 an hour and the other paid 11. The only thing was that the 11 an hour job requires a drug test. And if you fail the drug test you can't get either.
He said that he wanted the 11 an hour job.Now we knew him well enough to know that he liked smoking. So my friend reiterated the drug test fail rule. Dude said he was good on Friday to take the test Monday.
Come Monday he took the drug test. Pissed hot for weed, cocaine, amphetamines, and some other shit that gets out of your system in ~48hrs.
7.) From Antepast8:
There was a dude in our other facility that was going around and wiping their ass and shoving the shit back up into the toilet paper dispenser so that when the next person goes to reach ...
8.) From Dirk_diggler22:
I work in recruitment so not exactly HR. A guy had applied for a job that required a DBS check (police check). He filled the dbs and all his other checks flew through. The dbs came back as he had committed a crime in the past. Now on our end only the guy who will be applicants manager and a senior in our department can see the dbs result. He called the department unhappy the job had been withdrawn. He then sent a long email in begging for another chance, he said when he was 17 he beat two women up then threaten the cops with a gun. we're in the uk so guns are pretty rare especially in the 1970's he went in to detail about the attempted rape this dude wanted a job in a hospital.........its a no mate.
9.) From Phat3lvis:
I had a bookkeeper that paid himself two checks every week. We did not catch it for a year.
Another bookkeeper quit and files for unemployment. He then claimed a claim with EEOC that he had a disability and we failed to make accommodations for him. The disability was alcoholism, and the accommodations were leaving early to attend AA meetings. Seriously, we had to hire a lawyer to fight that.
A guy I hired hurt himself on the first hour of the first day of work, he claimed he fell and hit his head on the wall. He was out for weeks on workman's comp form the concussion. Then when he came back on light duty, he could only do desk work but managed to fall again in the bathroom and hit his head again. It took me 9-months to get rid of him. It turns out this was not his first rodeo, when I called his former employer the lady I spoke to made an offhand comment about workplace accidents and head injuries and the importance of cameras in the workplace
While doing a remodel of a museum, one of my employees helped himself to a gun that was on display. It was very ugly and embarrassing for everyone. My company was kicked off the job and banned from ever working for them again. I fired the guy and he filed a discrimination claim with EEOC because I did not fire the whole crew, just him.
10.) From asdaaaaaaaa:
My job is a constant HR nightmare. Boss has slept with coworker A. Coworker A is married to coworker B. Coworker B+A have been married (unhappily), for 10 years or something now, B has no idea, even though B invites boss over for dinner once every other week.
Boss is now dating new coworker (my best friend lol), and has already "gifted" her 2000$, despite another coworker suffering from cancer and barely being able to pay the bills when he was still working.
My other boss, who owns other lesser half of company has called me a narcicist in a meeting, told me literally "there are no such things as business ethics".
That's barely the past couple months, been there for four years. Sorry, not HR, we don't have one.
11.) From Largiloquent_999:
Knew a weird dude who would sometimes do all nighters in the office. A lady got there early one day, around 6:30 AM, and found the guy masturbating to porn at his cubicle. Crazy thing is, he wasn't fired! I guess he was good enough at working that they just moved him to another department.
12.) From Whirligig44:
I was sitting in the HR office with one of the members of HR, I was waiting on her to finish a form so that we could go eat lunch. Suddenly, this guy comes in, he was a young temp employee and had only been there a week or so, and says he has something he needs to talk about. I start to get up to leave when he blurts out that he doesn't like that fact that there are so many gays and lesbians working in the company. Once he says that I sit right back down. The HR employee asks him to clarify and he goes on about how his trainer was gay and his team lead is gay and his manager is a lesbian (all true) and he doesn't feel comfortable working around all these gays and lesbians. The HR employee asks him is anyone has every sexually harassed him, which he says they haven't. She then says 'so you want me to fire these employees, strictly based on their sexual orientation, just so you don't feel uncormfortable?' He says yes, after which she tells him to leave the office. She then calls in his manager and talks with her about it, he ends up quitting by the end of the week.
13.) From schadavi:
The workers had races with those motorized forklifts. One did not know that there was freshly poured concrete. Got the forklift stuck in it, damage was >100.000€ (big foundation for a new storage facility). According to the union contracts, such damages are paid for by the company unless it was intentially done.
Walked into my bosses office, told him about the situation. "Hm ok schadavi, can you please return to your office for a while." - "Ok."
As soon as I was at my desk, I heard the loudest "GOTTVERDAMMTESCHEISSE" from his office. Then my phone rang, and he told me to inform the insurance, which ended up paying less than 10k of the damage...
14.) From Dr_Kintobor:
My friend who worked in HR told me about her old job where the boss had drilled a hole from his office through to the ladies changing rooms and was perv whacking it every chance he could get. They found out because someone saw the light through the hole as he took the cover off for a peek. He denied everything and they had to take a dna sample from the carpet under the hole which confirmed it was a) him and b) that he had indeed been whacking away.
15.) From b0bbyk:
I don’t work in HR but I do have a nightmare HR story. When I was on my gap year I worked a part time job as a fitness instructor at a leisure centre. One of my coworkers, call him Bill, was a nice guy and I would often sit and chat to him on my breaks etc. Long term GF and baby at home.
As part of my job I used to teach spinning classes on a fairly regular basis. I would normally leave my phone in the staff room while I was teaching, or behind the reception desk. Both these places were secure and my phone had a passcode on it. I didn’t want it going off while I was teaching because the when it received calls/texts it interfered with the stereo in the spin studio. I didn’t have a locker or anything where I could store it.
Sometime in around January I was at at uni for an interview weekend. My girlfriend at the time had come to pick me up and while she was waiting in the car, she was scrolling through my messages on my iPad. When I got in the car she showed me one of my chats and said why did you send this video to Bill? I had no recollection of sending any videos to Bill, since I did not speak to him outside of work beyond “I’m going to be late” or similar.
I thought it was a mistake but as I scrolled further back up I saw that “I” had sent this same video to Bill a couple of weeks prior. Feeling thoroughly perplexed I clicked into the video and saw it was a video of me (20F) and my girlfriend (26F) on holiday in Thailand. I’d like to stress that it was not a sexual video, we were just joking around but we had just got out the shower and were both naked.
At this point I’m still thinking it’s some kind of big mistake as Bill is a nice guy with a baby at home. However, I look a little closer and realise that the dates / times of when “I” had sent these videos was at times I was teaching spin classes and therefore had left my phone unattended.
Bill, being the sicko he was, had the obviously seen me put my passcode into my phone during all the times we had been sat chatting on breaks etc. and had memorised it. He had then taken the opportunity to scroll through all my personal photos and videos when I had left my phone unattended to go and teach classes. I’m assuming that he had deleted the video once, hence why he had sent it to himself again a couple of weeks later. He’d also deleted the chat history from my iPhone but hadn’t realised it synced to my iPad (this was in around 2012 btw). I would only have been about 18/19 at the time when the videos were taken.
Obviously I reported this to my manager and to HR but it was a bit of a minefield for them to navigate. I don’t know what he told them but I imagine it was along the lines of saying I sent them to him of my own free will, how would he have known my password etc. It took a long while to get sorted but in the end he did get sacked, thankfully. The police also paid him a visit so I’m sure he had some explaining to do to his SO.
16.) From GlennRealGood:
My company used to give branded gifts to our clients. One employee volunteered to drive one about and hour away, and he took another employee with him. What he didn't tell anyone is that he didn't have a license, his car was unregistered, and his brakes were bad. So inevitably his brakes failed while trying to stop at an intersection, and he totaled his car. Thankfully no one was seriously hurt, but he got into trouble when the cops came.
17.) From ClarkinPyxis:
I used to work for a company that is an HR nightmare. Several events occurred:
I was hired as a director of Quality/Regulatory so I come in and start sprucing up documents, policy and all the essential stuff. A VP of sales doesn't take to kindly to fixing the stuff they were lying (fraud) about and tells me in front of HR. "I'm going to make you so miserable that you quit this job" Still works there.
Another sales guy went into a coma (health issue) and the higher ups decided that they could fire him to keep their insurance cheaper and not pay out his life insurance. Luckily HR pointed out the potential lawsuit, after they debated the cost of the lawsuit and whether they could win they kept him on until he passed a week later.
When I left, I had my own company they decided they owned any IP I created when I was employed there. I had no contract and non competes aren't legal in my state.
The C-level employees all were convicted of corruption in multiple countries and are in jail.
18.) From incongruentbliss:
I work in HR and we recently moved from one HRIS system to another- system manages personal information like benefits, time of requests, contact information, etc.
Part of the transitioning is teaching the workforce how to use the app. There are a lot of challenges including the boomers who are technology illiterate, employs who speak very little English, and managers who think learning the system is below their paygrade. I'm normally pretty patient with the language barrier, I mean is not like I am bilingual either, so if they have the basics of English as a second language they already know more than I do.
This one fine day, I had a constrains steam of employees trying to figure out how to access the system in their phones despite the step by step written and pictorial instructions, when I have this one older individual ask me to help him.
Nothing but XXX hardcore porn would come up on his smartphone browser. He legit couldn't understand why I couldn't help him. The browser just kept going back to porn no matter what I typed in.
I usually feel like I can figure peoples phones out but I reached my limit. I couldn't tell if the poor guy had a virus on his phone or if he was fucking with me. Creepy old guy my father's age, barely speaks English, and not embarrassed by the raunchy porn stuck on his screen.
I told him to go get his phone cleaned up and don't come back with it until he fixed it.... I haven't seen him since.
19.) From Ladyughsalot1:
My favorite was the dude who would have meetings with his boss via camera (he was remote) and while they discussed his (abysmal) performance, he would have naked women get up from his bed and walk around. He was told this was inappropriate several times. Continued.
We fired him for fraud, a separate issue that was like a Tarantino film but gives too much away here.
We are surrounded by complete strangers every time we venture out into the world, and we trust that most of them are good people who pose no threat to us. Because we've survived countless Uber rides, late-night walks, and pizza deliveries to understand that everyone isn't out to get us.
But you might pass by a serial killer on the sidewalk, or share a conversation on an elevator ride with a murderous co-worker, and have no idea just how close you are to actual danger.
He murdered another co-worker & slept with her body under his bed for a couple months, the sick bastard.
His name is Erik Grumpelt. Google him if you want. There's plenty of news stories.
I knew them both, murderer & the victim. Our work was very quiet & in shock the day we all heard about it, actually for several days. We just couldn't believe it. What really messed with me was that she had been missing for a couple months and nobody reported her missing or thought it was odd for her to just disappear.
Work just marked her down as a "no call/no show" and eventually terminated her employment. There was no follow up. Like, no other coworkers attempted to contact her? Or if they did try to, they didn't think it was odd when they never could get ahold of her?
My mom worked as the night auditor at a hotel where Neal Falls was often the only other employee present. He was the security guard. I only met him once in passing, but she worked with him every night.
Falls turned out to be a maniac serial killer who was murdering escorts across the country and ultimately was done in by one in a pretty epic and TV/movie-worthy struggle. She fought him off with a rake while he was trying to strangle her, he put his gun down for a second to try and grab the rake, and she grabbed the gun and shot behind her blowing his brains out. Cops found all sortsa crazy murder shit in his car.
Not exactly the kind of story you expect to read about a coworker.
Freshman year of college, I was in a very small English class. It was a super small class so we got pretty comfortable with each other.
A couple months into the semester, a 10 -year old girl was kidnapped, and later found murdered. It was a major news story in Colorado. The biggest shock was finding out that the killer, Austin, was in my English class.
Before he was arrested, we had done a class review of people’s papers and my professor pulled my classmates essay up on the projector. It was odd though, because his papers were usually well-written but this was full of grammatical and spelling errors and fragmented ideas going nowhere. Austin told us he was sorry about all the mistakes and that the draft was rushed because he was busy and couldn’t focus. After he was arrested, a classmate realized that was a day or two after she was kidnapped and murdered.
I had a serial killer live in my basement for a couple months.
One winter we found a homeless man in our storage area. He seemed like a nice enough guy, didn't seem to be an addict or anything, so we told him he could stay the winter down there if he wanted but he had to be out by spring. We brought him some canned food and toiletries, and pulled out an old mattress we had and some blankets. He was extremely greatful and even pulled out an old snow shovel and shoveled the driveway and sidewalk for us. Come spring, he was gone, just like he promised.
We spent the next few weeks feeling pretty good about ourselves, glad we were able to help a guy in a tough situation. Then, a few weeks later, as we were watching the morning news, we hear a story that a suspect in the recent rape and murder of 3 older women in the area had been arrested, and a picture of our former guest pops up.
Gerard Baden Clay was a customer of ours at my old work he was a real prick to deal with and I was the only one who could ever satisfy his unrealistic expectations. When the news broke his wife had gone missing my colleagues and I all thought instantly that he had done something. All the news stories and people close to him came out saying what a wonderful man he was and we were all thinking wtf? He was the biggest piece of shit person i have ever met. Really slimy guy typical of a real estate agent.
Journalist at a local newspaper doing the Sunday evening shift. Got a call about a guy whose car had been hijacked with his 2 year old son in it. I met him at the police station to interview him, get a pic of the kid so we could publish and ask people to be on the lookout etc. The man was devastated. I'd been a journalist for years, traveled all over, I was no pushover and generally really good at reading people. This man was clearly in a state. I had a hard time staying professional and not bawling my eyes out in front of him.
At the end of the interview I clasped his hands tightly , trying to convey how awful I found his situation to be. I told him all I could do was write the best story possible. Maybe someone would read it, see the pic and help find the kid.
The next day (day off after weekend shift) one of my colleagues phoned me, they'd found the body of the little boy at a rubbish dump. And they'd arrested his father for the murder. He'd had issues with the boy's mother so murdered his own son out of spite or something. I don't know. I don't want to know. He made up the story of the hijacking.
My mom in her late teens - early 20s living in the GTA (Toronto) around the time the Scarborough Rapist, Paul Bernardo, was active...
One night she was on the subway and a young guy was sitting across from her who she noticed kept staring at her. She felt uncomfortable especially due to her paranoia, and decided to test her gut feeling by standing up - he stood up too. She quickly sat down, and tried it one more time before the next stop. Again, he got up when she did. Eventually her stop came up and she decided to get off. The guy got off too, and she said she immediately knew something bad would happen. He started following her and she bolted. She got lucky as she crossed the middle of the street because a bunch of vehicles passed and he couldn’t cross, and she never saw him again.
When Paul Bernardo was caught, my mom saw his picture in the news and felt chills - he was the guy on the subway.
Similar story, except my mom knew Paul Bernardo personally. In her early twenties she moved to Toronto from Chicago, and her cousin's best friend was this guy named Paul. Paul was her cousins best man at his wedding, before all this stuff went down. He was really into my mom, and kept pestering her cousin to set them up together. He eventually caved and tried to set them up by telling her Paul was into her, and that she should give him a chance. My mom, who had a lot of male attention in her early 20's, declined as she didn't feel the same way toward Paul.
I don't even want to think about what would have happened had she said yes... Her cousin has basically blocked it from his memory that he had this very close relationship with Paul Bernardo, and my mom tries to forget it as well.
I dated one for a few months! I ended up breaking it off because I always got a super weird vibe being alone with him. Near the end I was making all of our nights out into double dates or just bringing a friend along, so I figured it was better just to break it off.
He ended up beating two people to death while they were in their bed and then he moved the bodies and slept on their bloody mattress for 3 days. He was then caught and is now in prison.
I was on the same dorm floor as John O. Miller, who had murdered two people in Montana. Soon after Christmas/winter break the police went in and arrested him. We had no idea why undercover cops kept following him around. He was kind of a jerk. I didn't interact with him much.
My parents knew Fred and Rosemary West. I stayed at their house when I was a kid. I never would have thought them capable of what they did.
I met one of my aunt's old friends who owned a guitar store in my town. He seemed nice enough. Little did I know, he had his roommate (the owner of a prominent restaurant who had been missing for a couple weeks) tied up in their basement. He killed her about a month after I met him.
Out at a show one night. See this dude that looked like Sideshow Bob with no eyebrows. Puffy shirt like on Seinfeld. Really strange looking dude. Weird vibes. Buddies gf knew him... We decided we're going across town to a house party. Dude asks if he can tag along. We already have five people in a tiny car with no more room. He looked really really bummed and I remember him saying he didn't want to go home that night.
I wake up in the early afternoon, wander down to the bar by my house for some food and beer to shake out the cobwebs and after a while a news story pops on. Guess who got arrested for murdering his wife? Sideshow Bob looking dude! He left that show and went back to his apartment and strangled his wife and mother of his child to death. Called my friends that went with me and we were all tripping out. Can't for the life of me remember his name but this was in Portland OR around 2002-2003 or so.
After reading these heebie-jeebie-inducing stories, we won't judge you if you decide to cancel your plans, lock your doors, and stay inside forever.
A fool and his money are easily parted. But no one thinks themselves a fool. And that is mistake #1.
From the classic Nigerian Prince scam claiming that you've won millions, to a coworker raising money for their dubious Kickstarter project, you can be taken for a ride in the most unexpected and unpredicable ways.
Take heed and learn from the mistakes of these poor souls who lost their money thanks to bad-intentioned friends, strangers, and family.
Got a total of 1k for Christmas from aunts and uncles. Parent's told me they where just gonna "hold" it for me. That was 2 years ago and turns out they already spent it for a brand new TV.
Bought an item off the website of a company that had just finished their second Kickstarter. Before they fulfilled their second Kickstarter they went silent and then recently got involuntarily shut down. Still waiting on a refund, but it looks like the $1100 isn’t coming.
200 dollars, I got an (authentic) email from Apple saying an app I didn't own billed me the aforementioned amount, so we ve called customer service, blocked the app, and had a full refund.
Local mechanic convinced me to take my car to his shop to have him do a brake line for $200. I was going to do it myself, I was just being lazy because it was the middle of winter. I took it to his place and he would not give me my car back unless I paid him a little over $1,000 because he said that it took him 10 hours to bleed the brakes. The best part was I was being super considerate I let him know to do the other customers cars first because it was just a second vehicle of mine. So he wound up having it a little over a week, broke my hood latch and also i saw him drive it to the grocery store and the parts store a couple times.
Greatest scams in my life. One is my parents borrowing my life savings of around 100k of our currency (around 1800usd) and when I ask for it they did not say this but heavily imply this "I raised you and if we count all of the money I spent on you food, clothes, education, etc you would owe me money"
$60k. For profit scam college.
$100. Two dudes in a parking lot sold me a set of shit speakers i thought i could flip later. Based on how stupid this sounds now you can imagine how i beat myself up about it for a while after i came to my senses. Also this was in college when i did not have an extra hundred. Thought about it for quite a while after and vowed I'd never let anything like that happen again.
In hindsight it was the best $100 I've ever spent, in terms of street savvy per dollar. I've been able to easily spot scams and have even helped a few friends not get scammed. Thanks for the life lesson, parking lot scammers!
Guy at the gas station said he and his cancer ridden wife broke down a mile up the highway, needed $10 to get them gas for a 30 mile trip to the city. I just got paid was feeling rich so I gave it to him. Went to the same gas station two days later and the guy was there again with the same problem.
Happened to me in Costa Rica. A French guy comes over panicked and says "Do you speak English? French?"
Me: Yeah, what happened?
Frenchie: I was robbed and lost all my clothes, wallet, passport, everything. I need to get the embassy but have no money, can you help me buy a ticket?
I was backpacking and spending less than $20 a day, but felt the need to help, so I give him $10. We part ways.About 2 weeks later I come back from a trek, and there he is again with the same act. I was gonna deck him, and I say "Oh no, seriously?" Letting him interpret it as sympathy, then I say "It happened to you again?" and he does the fastest fade away I've ever seen in my life, literally turns the corner and disappears.
$10K to relatives who wanted to start a business.
Spent it like water, bought themselves every expensive shit they want and a second hand motorcycle.
In my country, $10K is about 550K, they refused to pay me back and even told me that it was payment for helping raising me.
Yeah, no. Lawyered up and had them pay me at least the amount owed plus lawyer cost.
Am I the asshole when they had to liquidate their business and sell their house to pay me back?
$8500. Someone hacked my bitcoin at the peak because I used a brain wallet. Maybe doesnt count as a scam but it felt like it.
When i was a little kid, an older guy in my school asked for a 5 bucks fee to enter his secret club.
WOW! A secret club with the older guys!
I saved about a week of snacks money and gave him.
There was no club. I had no snacks that week.
EDIT: for a little kid, 5 bucks twenty years ago was a lot of money :(
A few grand. Ex-boyfriend who turned out not to have paid bills for 6 months then cleared out my credit cards and bank accounts. Police didn't really give a crap :(
I had just started out with being a business owner at age 20 and there was a lot I still didn't know- one of them being paying bills.
One day, I get a call from "National Grid" telling me they're sending over an engineer or whatever to cut off our power due to nonpayment. Once we were removed, it would take a few days to get power reinstated. I guess this was all to create a sense of urgency, and it worked on me. They required payment through prepaid Visa cards. I knew that if I didn't have power, the store wouldn't be able to operate so obviously this shook me. I was told to buy the card and give them the number on the card. I was told to call them back. So, I did what any sensible person would do.
I put a "out for lunch" sign on front, closed the store and drove to the nearest CVS. All my mental alarms were screaming "this is weird" but I ignored it due to stress and inexperience. I fell for it.
I drove out, bought a card and called them back to give the number on the back of the card for $500.
Paid 1500 dollars to have a novel edited. All she did was complain about the main character "taking the lords name in vain."
Yes, I am an idiot. No I will not be doing that again.
Between 80 and 100k, we decided to buy our own refrigerated semi instead of loaning one, we paid the driver in advance, and to this point I don't know if he was shot or if he legit went away with the money, the marchandise and most importantly the truck.
Fucking Columbia House or BMG Records!
For you youngsters, those are a scummy mail order company that if you sent them a penny would send you music on vinyl records, 8-tracks, cassette tapes or CDs, and VHS tapes of TV shows. Then they charged you forever as you tried to fulfill the membership requirement.
Nearly 9k some dude sold us stolen solar panels and counterfeit a 9k check for our bank (literally changed the 3k to a 9k We where the only ones who didn't give him money because the bank stopped the transaction.
$364K from 2012 to 2014 because of the fraud of the Merrill Lynch manipulating gold and silver futures markets.
Hot girl from high school hit me up when I was in Iraq. Chatted with me a couple months. Needed $500 for a new phone. Sent it to her. Never heard from her again.
$10,000. I put 10 grand down as an investment in a rave, which the promoter agreed to pay back plus 20%.. the event went well but fire alarms were pulled and the event ended up getting shut down. So I was never paid back my 10 grand. I was 19, and stupid as hell.
Fuck you Jimmy.
Some people believe that when it comes to making big money, a college degree is a must. But as one recent Reddit thread proves, plenty of people can still hit the six-figure mark even if they skip university.
A Reddit user asked for people who make over $100,000 without a degree to explain their jobs and how they got there. The results prove that there's no one way to get to the top.
Nuclear plant operations.
You can get into an Senior Reactor Operator licensing class with certain experience or education. A huge number of the SROs are are ex-Navy nukes. The Navy requires a HS diploma.
Job pays usually starting of over 100K. - not-whiney
Bartender in a high end resort town. I work my ass off during the seasons but off season is easy. - PhreddyPhuchtard
I used to manage a Cooperage (recycling shipping containers).
The job was a lot of physical work, but doesn’t require any special skill beyond management. I had a $67,000/ year salary and earned about $3,500/month in bonuses.
We basically charged companies to dispose of their drums and IBC’s, cleaned and painted any in good condition and sold them for less than the cost of new containers (usually to the same people that paid us to haul them away), and scrapped any unusable. My trucks didn’t move without turning a profit. - Kordiel
My wife. Director-level in logistics. Worked up from retail management. She’s very smart and incredibly hard-working. Most of the people at her company with positions at the same level have MBAs.
Here I am with a Bachelor’s making less than she does lol
Super proud of her, though. - canuckistani_lad
Husband is a union tower crane operator. He dropped out of high school, got his GED at 25, joined the union at 29 and at 34 makes almost $200k a year. It’s a good gig as long as you don’t mind heights.
We live in the [Pacific Northwest]. He works along the Portland Or/Vancouver Wa border.
Best way to get into cranes is to call your local IUOE. Go through the apprenticeship program and work your way through your certifications. Build relationships with your peers and maintain your work ethic. You won’t see the out of work list, you’ll be requested for jobs. - motheroftitans
Started coding as a kid 36 years ago. My first computer was a ZX Spectrum. Got a job as a junior programmer at 19. Did a few courses and got some diplomas since then, but still don't have a degree. Doing what I love with a great salary and benefits can't be beat. My boss is even supportive when I struggle with my mental health and need to spend a month at a time in the psych ward to stabilize my bipolar. - TwirlyShirley8
I’m a freight conductor for a class one railroad in the United States. $108,000 a year. Never stepped foot in a college before, I’m 22 years old. - jprieto1997
Not me, but my wife. She made $290,000 last year, and is estimated to make $350K this year.
She owns a business that does like $1.5 million in sales of surgical device equipment to hospitals. She sells stuff like shoulder and hip replacements, the plates and screws used to fix broken wrists, nerve grafts, and even these crazy magnetic nail things that allow people with different length legs to have length added, or for people with dwarfism to add up to 4” of total height.
She does not have a college degree, but she joined the army and did a 1-yr program to become a radiologic tech. She did that job in the operating room during surgeries for a couple years, and meeting other sales reps is how she came into her job. She was such a high-seller that her first boss was afraid she would quit, and then his business would fail... so he offered her 50% ownership of the company. Since then she has started up a 2nd business selling other, non-competing products, so that she gets 100% of the profits, versus half. - _TheNorseman_
I work as a "B" Pressure welder in Canada. I have my own rig (Truck with welding equipment in it) and I average $125 / Hour.
Depending on the work available and how much time you're willing to put in, you can make anywhere from 100k-400k. Last 3 years I've made 250k working 9 months of the year and taking 3 months off. - dkljkf
My brother-in-law's 3 sons are all journeyman electricians (dad is a master electrician). 2 of them are high school dropouts. 2 of them make over $100,000. The youngest makes about $85,000, but is gaining on his brothers. - AelixD
I’m a welder, moved my way around and now in aviation and have been for a while now. I cleared $100k back in October, probably going to end the year around $120k at 26. What I do is weld main component parts for jet engines. Combustors, bearing housings, vane blades, so on.
No degree, but I did go to vocational high school. This isn’t the route you’d have to take either. People can learn it on the side, as welding is more of a “show us you can” type of work. My field requires multiple tests, both written and physical(which may require some schooling on welding basics) then weld various metal together, X-ray, cut apart, so on.
I’m very fortunate to be in a laid back environment, I have an area all to myself where I’m rarely bothered. Nothing I lift is strenuous, most of my work takes place in a chair. Love it though, wouldn’t want to do much else. Also to note, my job is union and I strongly suggest union to blue collar people. You’re not harassed by management, have a higher entity protecting your rights to do the job you do, and ONLY do that job and not someone else’s. And, unions pay way more, clearly. - ImNoSheeple
Eyelash extensions in a rich city. - omgwhatisleft
Own a private jet catering company, you'd be surprised what the richest 1% of people are willing to spend on stupid things... - chefitup
Dental laboratory manager/owner. My highest degree is a GED. - marcusthegladiator
I have a friend who has been in a federal job for 20+ years. High school diploma, started at the absolute bottom when he was 19. Now makes right around $100K and gets 6 weeks of vacation a year plus sick leave. Federal pay scale is ridiculous, you get guaranteed raises every year, and not small ones either. - ghunt81
I buy used yachts, speedboats and ribs in Scandinavia for very cheap and sell them in Africa. I don’t have a degree, I used to work a lot of “shitty” jobs, I was a garbage man, airplane cleaner, night manager at a Stay Okay Hostel. Saved enough money to buy an ice cream stand, found out how I could sell my ice cream at festivals (ice cream at festivals is and incredibly fast way to make money). Once I had a good amount of money I thought it would be a nice idea to buy a speed boat and go fishing now that I finally have some time to relax, I did that and sent a picture to my friend in East Africa and we started talking about it and then we started talking about the price and how cheap it was, so I learned a lot about export and all that and how to send it to Africa to sell it and it worked, then I tried again a few months later and now I buy and sell about 15 a month. - samaki-samaki
Family gatherings can be a minefield — and funerals can raise people's emotions even more.
A woman recently asked Reddit's "Am I the A-hole?" forum whether she was rude for confronting her cousin's girlfriend at a funeral. And the discussion begs the question: is it ever okay to critique someone else's clothes?
My great grandmother passed away a few days ago and her funeral with this morning. High Roman Catholic Mass. She was 103. One of my cousins," Joseph", brought his girlfriend "Raven". They're both 19 and if my Aunt Sandy is to be believed neither of them work but live in her basement playing video games and smoking pot.
Joseph was a pallbearer so he wore a suit. Raven, however, showed up wearing a pair of knee length denim shorts and an orange and white flannel button up. Strangely enough she didn't seem to notice or mind that everyone else was wearing dark clothing, funeral clothing. A lot of people were giving her looks, and making comments. My great grandmother's children were especially offended.
After the service we went back to great grandma's house for the reception. I'm in my mid-twenties and the oldest of the younger generation of cousins so we all sort of made a place on the back porch. Raven and I found ourselves alone at one point so I very gently told her that her outfit was inappropriate for a Catholic funeral, or a funeral of any kind.
Raven got upset and demanded to know if she was supposed to go out and buy new clothes for one event. I told her no, a dark pair of pants and a dark shirt would have been fine, but wearing shorts and a bright shirt are not appropriate for anyone's funeral and I couldn't believe that A). She didn't know this, and B). Joseph didn't try to get her to wear something else. My verbatim words were, "hey, can I just tell you something? I'm not trying to make you upset, or tell you off, but your outfit isn't really appropriate for a funeral. Especially one like great grandma's, where it's very religious. In the future, you can just wear dark clothing, keep it simple, conservative."
She and Joseph left shortly after and later on I got a text fro him letting me know that Raven was highly offended and he wanted me to apologize. I can see how someone might be embarrassed to have been given a "ticking off" about their clothes but I wasn't rude or unnecessarily mean about it. I don't see why I owe anyone an apology. I didn't ask her to leave, I didn't call her names or yell at her. And we were alone. So no one else was listening.
Was I an asshole?
"She only feels like you are because you called her out and she feels embarrassed/ashamed," frecklybitz wrote. "I see no need to apologize, especially since it probably won’t be sincere."
Another person weighed in with a similar situation:
I was literally in this exact situation when I was 16. I was a guest at a wedding and had NO idea how formal it was going to be and my mom who I was attending with was literally NO help. I wore a skirt but my top was WILDLY underdressed so as a whole I looked way out of place. A few people pointed it out to me but I was already dying of embarrassment inside so I snapped at pretty much anyone who broached the subject. - annie-costa
Jykae put it more succinctly: "I can't believe someone would be over the age of five and not know to not wear white and orange to a funeral."
Many others weighed in to say Raven might eventually be thankful that she learned how to dress for a funeral. But gimmesumchikin made the best point of all, saying, "The real sin here is knee length denim shorts."
"Keep the dream alive: Hit the snooze button."
-Punit Ghadge
Mornings are a special time. A time for sipping on coffee, daydreaming, and freaking the hell out because you spent your whole morning sipping on coffee and daydreaming. Enjoy these utterly random memes because your never too late for a laugh.
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On the road, everyone's subject to the long arm of the law — even celebrities.
Yes, even the rich and famous get pulled over by police when they're speeding, failing to use turn signals, or just minding their business. And unsurprisingly, many of them try to use their celeb status to get out of tickets.
Cops took to Reddit to share stories of the times they pulled over celebs. We can't verify all of the stories so take them with a grain of salt.
I gave Werner Herzog a speeding ticket in the Hollywood hills in the early 2010s. He was very polite and even shook my hand. Nice fellow. - haIfwit
My dad was a cop. Pulled over none other than Marilyn Manson for an unsafe signal lane change (he was bragging the day it happened) in the early 2000s. Said he was non descript and low key, apologetic and didn’t act like a big shot above the law - BlackIsTheSoul
My dad pulled over Clint Eastwood. I guess this was just after they started requiring licenses to drive motorcycles in California. He pulled him over because he was driving squirly like he didn't really know how to ride. His was response to license issue was "Man next thing you know you'll need a license to ride a horse." - osewt
My father was a police officer for 27 years and in one day he pulled over Paul Newman, who, apparently, was notorious for speeding. So, my dad goes to cite him and gets a call for an accident that needed assistance down the road. Then sometime shortly thereafter, my father pulled him over again and Newman allegedly groaned, "Not you again.." - zarina461
not a police officer, but I was a NYC Park Ranger in Central Park. I asked Christianne Amanpoor [sic] from CNN to put her dog on a leash and she said "do you know who I am?"
I said "I dont care who you are, put your dog on a leash" - tyrannustyrannus
Former police cadet and dispatcher here. I was on a ride along and was told this story. So this officer pulls this car over for speeding. She then suspects the driver of being drunk. She calls in his drivers license to run it. The dispatcher tells her, "You have Nick Nolte pulled over? Do you know who he is? He's a movie star." The officer is young and doesn't know who Nick Nolte is. Turns out he wasn't drunk, he was just being Nick Nolte. She gave him a warning and sent him on his way. - kndoue
My friend is a cop in Chicago and years ago he pulled over Sean Hayes for speeding on Lake Shore Drive. My friend recognized him from TV but didn’t let anything on. As he was writing him a ticket, Hayes asked, “Do you watch ‘Will & Grace’?” But my friend just said, “Nope. Here’s your ticket.” - kiggitykbomb
[I was] the sheriff's deputy at Aspen's airport, Sardy Field. I had to threaten to tow both Kurt Russell's and Hunter Thompson's vehicles more than once when they left them where they weren't supposed to, parked right in front of the airport. Hunter was Hunter and just mumbled and groused, and Kurt usually just waved and smiled. Dirty violators, the both of them ;)
I can still remember Russell's license plate... VCD711 - sdfhat
I pulled Blake Shelton over once. I walked up the window went through my little spiel "Hello my name is Officer juscvin with the city Police, The reason I've stopped you tonight is insert crime, may I see your license and insurance verification". He gives me his stuff and it's really late so I havent even figured out it's him yet I'm just thinking this guy looks familiar he was really friendly and pretty apologetic super nice guy I wanted to ask for an autograph or picture but felt like it would've been unprofessional. - juscvin
I gave the long haired guy (early 2000’s I believe) from Hootie and the Blowfish a ticket for no leash on his dog. We were driving on a small beach island and he’s standing on a side road with his dog and no leash. He told my partner and I he was in a band and we asked which band he was in and he told us. We both were like we’ve never heard of this band (lying). I said Hootie?? Good luck with that is it rap and he laughed and said no. He was cool. Still gave him the ticket. - GrundleHuffer
The county [where I worked] had a small air strip near this vacation area. One night one of our Deputies is patrolling and finds a running SUV just parked there at like 0300. Contacts the driver who my friend reported as being kind of shady and not belonging in the area. Driver says he is waiting for Bill Cosby and is his body guard and driver. My friend does not buy it but says he will stick around for Bill Cosby to appear. Low and behold, a jet lands a few minutes later and Bill Cosby gets out. My friend says he walks up to the truck and the driver says "Mr Cosby, this Deputy would like to meet you". All Bill says is "thats nice", gets in the car and leaves. The way it was told is he was a snarky and rude asshole. - Petro6golf
My dad shouted at Prince Harry once for trying to pet his German Shepherd police dog - RealSocks6969
The holidays are stressful enough without adding "secret-keeping" duties for a gender reveal on top of everything else.
One woman is seeking advice from the internet after she accidentally ruined her sister-in-law's gender reveal on Thanksgiving night. She asked the Reddit "Am I the A-Hole?" community if she really is a terrible person for ruining this sacred event, or if her SIL is overreacting.
I can’t believe I’m about to type this crap but my sister-in-law asked me to be the “secret keeper” for her baby (first one) and have a gender reveal at Thanksgiving. As in, the ultrasound tech would give them (the parents) an envelope which would be mailed to me, and then I planned a whole part of thanksgiving to be a big hoorah where they and everyone else find out what they’re having. I planned this for weeks, I set it up days in advance, I took every precaution to not tell anyone what the baby was. I was gonna kill it!
So the night before thanksgiving, I was going thru how the gender reveal would go and whatnot, how I had an indoor set up and then an outdoor setup since we were using smoke bombs for the big reveal. SIL asked me something about the smoke bombs and I said “once you pull the pin, it’ll smoke white for ten seconds, and then it’ll smoke blue” ... and before I could recover, we both realized I slipped!!!
Then she locks herself in the bathroom, crying, saying it’s all ruined and that she doesn’t even want to do it now because there’s no point, refuses to talk to me... I gave her some space, obviously felt HORRIBLE, I went back a while later and said how sorry I was and can’t believe I just effing did that. I told her a story about how I “ruined” my own engagement but that we still got married... and there’s still a baby coming!... and no one else knows! Like, there are people coming that will still play the guessing game, and no one will know that she found out... idk, I felt like shit and we were both crying and I thought it was fine.
Then, we were supposed to go to dinner with our in laws and she didn’t go. Ok great, clearly she doesn’t want to sit thru dinner with me. I get it, it’s still raw, she’s upset. Whatever. But THEN, I get to dinner and see that she posted on Facebook about how her gender reveal was accidentally ruined and that “just so everyone knows.. we already know...” and #neverdoingagenderrevealagain” and that “it was supposed to be a special moment and it was ripped away and I’ll never get it back” and “I wanted to find out, but not like this” AND ON AND ON.
Someone asked, “how was it ruined?” And she answered that her sister in law (ME) accidentally said the color. Mind you, her parents didn’t know, his parents didn’t know, our other sister in law didn’t know, and she really just wanted it on Facebook Live and to have the stupid pics anyways. I want to be supportive and excited because I know she’s like that and I enjoy doing things like this for people but COME ON! No one would have known it was “ruined” if you hadn’t posted that!! And everyone knows who the person that ruined it was! ME!
We went thru with the reveal as planned, it was streamed live so her “intimate” gathering could get all the likes and comments. Normally she tags me and everyone in her posts but this time it was noticeably not tagged.
So reddit, am I the a**hole for spilling the beans? Or is my SIL over dramatic and petty for blasting me all over social media??
EDIT: I don’t care about being tagged but it was getting misinterpreted. Hope this gives more context.
"You made an honest mistake; she’s overreacting to a ridiculous degree," SidHoffman wrote. Then they cautioned not to blame the whole thing on pregnancy hormones:
[W]hen my wife was pregnant I remember her getting emotionally worked up about weird, random things, but this is different because she's carrying the grudge for days and airing it publicly. Way over the line.
And conspiring_b*tch agreed, saying there's a huge difference between an accidental slip and airing out dirty laundry on Facebook:
yours was an accidental slip. Her facebook post was intentionally blasting you. She took it too far. It’s understandable she was upset but to blast you like that was really bitchy.
Others speculated that it seems like the mom-to-be is too into the social media optics of her pregnancy. Said blackforestgirl86:
This whole time, all I could think was, lady, isn't having a baby enough reason for you to be happy? How can you let your joy over a child be ruined by an honest slip-up? Sure, might be upsetting in the moment but in this case it really seems it was more about the whole social media aspect of it than the baby itself...
And Jackniferuby says what seemingly everyone is thinking besides parents who throw gender reveals: No. One. Cares.
Honestly, no one but the parents give a sh*t what gender the baby is. This gender reveal thing is idiotic and attention seeking. I mean seriously she needs to get a grip, because if she is flipping out over this? NO WAY will she handle being a parent very well - being pregnant is the easy part!
So secret-keeper, wherever you are, don't stress!
When Dakota Johnson appeared on "Ellen" last week, chances are neither she nor the show's host thought their interview would go this viral.
The actress was on to promote a new movie, and people are obsessing over the "awkward" interaction she had with the host. Ellen asked Dakota why she wasn't invited to Dakota's birthday — but Dakota insisted that she was. This led to an uncomfy exchange:
It all started with Ellen insisting she "wasn't invited" to Dakota's birthday in October.
"Last time I was on the show, last year, you gave me a bunch of s*** about not inviting you but I didn't even know you wanted to be invited," Dakota said.
"Who doesn't want to be invited to a party?" Ellen asked, and Dakota responded, "I didn't even know you liked me."
Ellen then insisted that she does like Dakota — and Dakota said she did invite Ellen. "Ask everybody," she said. "Ask Jonathan, your producer."
Ellen asked why she didn't go, then joked that she "had that thing," and finally conceded that it was probably "too far" for her to go because it was in Malibu.
Then she asked Dakota about Tig Notaro performing at the party, and Dakota called Tig her "favorite comedian."
People are obsessing over the clip because they feel vindicated that Dakota called Ellen out, because Ellen's humor often springs from making guests feel uncomfortable.
In fact, it's standard practice for Ellen to ask stars why they didn't invite her to their various parties.
Turns out a lot of people are not big fans of Ellen's approach.
Some are applauding Dakota and think she intended to blow up Ellen's spot the whole time.
To quote the kids, "We have to stan."
But the plot thickens even more: some people are speculating that Ellen skipped Dakota's birthday in order to hang out with George W. Bush at a football game.
People think this might have been the source of Dakota's alleged shade.
Do we really think this is what was going through Dakota's mind and not "let me muddle through this TV interview so I can go back to swan-diving into a pool of '50 Shades' money"? Hmmm.
Speaking of people who swan-dive into pools of money... do we REALLY think Ellen is bothered by this?! Sigh.
Either way, lots of memes are springing up.
It's an instantly iconic moment.
Dakota Johnson is suddenly America's sweetheart.
People don't like Ellen, you guys.
Of course, not everyone thinks Dakota is a true American hero for having a pretty standard talk show conversation.
Dealing with the untimely eath of a spouse is hard enough — and when their last wishes include you living near their parents for the rest if your life, it's even more intense.
A woman asked Reddit for advice about this exact situation.
Me (31 F) & kids (2 F, 4 M) moved with my husband (31 M) from where we met, married & had our children in California to Texas. We always said we would raise our kids in small town Texas where my husband grew up. It was his dream & I was happy to support him!
Her husband spent a lot of time helping them out, though.
When we moved – to a house a few blocks away from his parents – we thought we would be getting some help from his parents with the kids. They babysat the oldest twice in 8 months. They showed very little interest in the kids but had my husband over multiple times a week doing things for them (they are in their 60s & in good health) & did come over to dinner a few times. He adored his parents & they adored him. Their only child. Their golden boy.
My husband was diagnosed with a rare cancer that was terminal earlier in the year. He died within 5 weeks of diagnosis. It was tragic & I am still in shock. When he was dying he was in a great deal of pain & on morphine & wasn’t always coherent or thinking straight.
However he told me his parents were devastated I would move the kids back to where I grew up in Canada & they wouldn’t be able to watch the kids grow up. Well…that was my exact plan. My parents are the most amazing grandparents & help my sister out a lot (2 days a week of full babysitting!) & would do the same for me. Canada has a great education & healthcare system & my siblings & parents are live near each other so the kids and I would have a support network.
I lied to my husband. I told him I would stay & raise the kids as Texans as we had planned. He was in so much pain & distress & I couldn’t add to it. I chose the easy way out.
2 weeks after the funeral I moved my sweet babies home to Canada. My parents in law are now telling everyone I betrayed a dying man’s last wish. I have told them we will visit every year & they are welcome to visit us in Canada whenever they wish. They don’t care – they said I have broken their family.
AITA for lying to my dying husband & breaking up his family?
User oasinocean said:
If I had the option to grow up in Canada or Texas I would obviously choose Canada. And this last part may seem a bit callous but: dead people don’t care what happens after they die because they are dead.
Milee30 suggested that if the husband were thinking clearly, he might not have made the request to begin with.
You need help and support. Your husband was unfortunately (and not his fault at all) not able to think clearly due to pain and drugs and asked you to do something he might not have even wanted you to do if he weren't in pain and on drugs. Surely he'd want you to be supported and cared for... which will happen if you move back to Canada.
I'm so sorry for your loss. You deserve some care now, take care of yourself and don't give this a second thought.
And bofh000 pointed out that the wife is the one who has to raise their kids, so her comfort matters above all:
Even if they had been great, really involved as grandparents, you are the kids’ mother and you decide where it is better for them to grow up. Let’s hope it’s just the grief speaking and they come around. Otherwise... sorry to sound ominous, but I wouldn’t let them be with the kids alone when you visit - they will try and badmouth you to them.
Plus, as DonnaTroy points out... free healthcare!
I would have done the same thing. As Canadian citizens you'll have access to all those services that you would never get here in the states and it will be much easier on you financially. Plus you'll have your family support as well. I'm not saying your in-laws wouldn't help, but they can't provide you with everything. They are in mourning for their son and they blame you for taking away easy visitation to their grandchildren. Hopefully with time they will come around and see that you are doing your best to care for them.
Still, personreddits thought she should've told her husband her plan from the beginning:
I am not going to judge you harshly for this one, you had your reasons and ignorance is bliss as they say. Still, if I were your husband, I would have preferred to know the truth.
Enjoy your family and free healthcare in the Great White North, OP!
In a better world where people don't lash out at each other out of petty vindictiveness or jealousy, there would be nothing to shade about a straight forward Thanksgiving post expressing gratitude for those who make our lives easier.
But in the emotional Mad Max world of social media anything can elicit snark, and this truth is multiplied if you have a privileged platform on par with Chrissy Teigen's.
In celebration of Thanksgiving Teigen made a handful of posts expressing gratitude for the people closest to her.
In one of them, she posed with her nanny and chef in People's Sexiest Man Alive onesies to troll John Legend on winning the title this year.
In another post, she straight up thanked the staff who help take care of the kids and home for making her life far more doable.
"Grateful for people that make our dysfunctional house functional," she wrote.
While this is a harmless and genuinely grateful message, one commenter swooped in with an attempt to shade and call out Teigen's privilege to have help at home in the first place.
"Thankful for my household staff of chefs and nannies," they wrote in quotations, likely with the mocking Spongebob stance firmly in their brains.
The attempted shade didn't exactly work, since Teigen was quick to point out that she was literally acknowledging and expressing gratitude for the help she has in her life. So the joke comment was moot.
"Literally just said that but sure you got me," Teigen replied.
This exchange is proof that while people will go to great lengths to get attention from celebrities (often in negative ways), they don't spend apply those same lengths to actually coming up with a substantial burn. If anyone knew what was good for them, they'd stay out of the comment sections and go for a walk instead.
Ah, choosy beggars! One of the most frustrating types of people. At a certain point, it's not about being cheap...it's about violating labor rights, or trying to squeeze someone vulnerable - like a college student - for free work. Keep reading, y'all - this one's a doozy.
At least you're only tasked with caring for one kid. He's six, so that could be challenging, but...I'm trying to go into this unbiased.
Eight months' worth of employment? So far, so uneventful.
I...thought they'd list an hourly rate of payment, but it looks like...you're expected to give *them* $60/week? In exchange for working anywhere from six to twenty hours a week? At least it's free during the holidays - the year's most charitable time!
Kids *can* wake up at 2 AM and require caretaking, but that's still an absurdly early hour. If you expect anyone to be functional and working pre-dawn, you need to offer them appropriate compensation - in the form of MONEY.
Based on these ridiculous requirement, they're lucky their address is obscured.
Omg, hot water! What a blessing. A downright GIFT as far as this 'arrangement' is concerned.
No meals, peasant! You must also buy groceries and cook for yourself. Harrumph.
You'd basically be an indentured servant - and one who's forbidden a social life. Hope you enjoy passive-aggressively enforced curfews and never entertaining friends!
No visitors! No sex, obviously, because that would be enjoyable!!!
Ah, the cherry topping this sh*t sundae: while you're not being paid - yet paying rent for one small room - you'll be surveilled by multiple cameras. What's not to love? Does this not sound like the ultimate employment opportunity?! Here's the room in question, btw:
Needless to say, Reddit was *not* impressed. Of all the choosy beggars cases, this is one of the most shameless. I feel bad enough for the six-year-old being raised by these monsters, I'm almost willing to volunteer. Almost.
Don't worry I'd love to pay for the pleasure of raising your child for you. The being on Big Brother aspect is really just what sold me on this position in the first place. Oh and the 2am - 4am starting time is just what I need to complment my busy university/college schedule!
Yikes. I don't want to meet these people, imagine paying to live with them.
-eyeballemoji
I can picture these two entilted pricks making this post, I'm sure they thought they were giving a student the deal of a lifetime. bet they were so excited thinking of the flood of requests and how they were going to filter the nominees. Hope they got their ass handed to them
-surfdad67
$60 per week is a funny way of saying:
Pay us $240 a month to raise our child
-MilwaukeeMan420
Hmm yes, I’ll be a parent to your child and pay YOU for the privilege! That’s an amazing idea! Thanks!
-BreccaGref
Imagine actually committing to this from December 'til August while studying and trying to maintain a social life, not to mention working an actual job, since you need to somehow pay this family for the work you're doing..... It makes me so uncomfortable that they posted this as a serious offer....
-ZyferX
It's a blessed day on the Internet, because today I learned that mall Santas are spilling tea all over Reddit. I hope you're thirsty, because some of the people who don Santa costumes and invite kids into their laps (a strange tradition, no?) are divulging interesting tidbits - specifically the funniest requests they've ever received. You might protest and claim December 2 is too early for seasonal anecdotes, but I disagree; the whole month's ripe for celebration, and what better way than to hear from Santas themselves? If you're curious about what happens under the hat, read on.
1.
I was a mall Santa sometime in the late 90s. After I asked one little girl what she wanted for Christmas, she answered nonchalantly, "a dildo."
I thought I must have misheard and asked, "What was that?" She repeated louder, "A dildo!" I tried to conceal my snickering by "ho ho ho"ing and said, "Oh... uhhh... I don't know if Santa has any of those!"
Then she told me that I should go to Toys R Us because I could get dolls of all the Rugrats characters there, including Tommy's brother Dil. A "Dil doll."
-kevfucious
2.
I wasn't a mall Santa, but I was one of the 'helpers,' aka photographer and salesman. One time a little girl asked for "boobies as big as mommy's." That was choice.
-the___kraken
3.
I'm not Santa, I'm a Gingerbread Man. http://i.imgur.com/vbKQO.jpg I get asked if they can eat me. A lot.
I work at an amusement park. The costume is very hot and difficult to wear, so I made a Nutcracker costume to switch into. http://i.imgur.com/dx9Oo.jpg I went out into the park in the Gingerbread Man for a while, then went back to our room and swapped costumes for the first time. The VERY FIRST kid to see me as the Nutcracker says, "WOW! You're WAY cooler than that Gingerbread Man!" EDIT- Forgot about my wife's funny one- she's a Teddy Bear http://i.imgur.com/g6fEZ.jpg . One night, we were really slow, only a few hundred people in the park. A little girl came up, grabbed her paw, and said, "C'mon, Teddy Bear, watch the show with me!" (They have a little song-and-dance show with the characters from our park and our "Sister" parks.) Bear goes and sits with the girl and her mother. After a few minutes, the mother, who is sitting next to Bear, leans over and says, "I haven't had this much fun since Anthrocon, IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN!" (Anthrocon is the Furry Convention.)
-Phantom_Scarecrow
4.
My friend was a mall Santa and one day he was sick so he had me fill in. Honestly there are a lot of kids asking for weird things, but this one kid looked me in the eye and asked for "a bushel of dead squirrels". He was probably six years old. Don't even know how he knew the word bushel.
-Daliniues
5.
I am a professional Santa Claus who makes between 50 - 70 visits a year, mostly private homes, tree lightings and the like (I was trying to schedule an AMA for December as Santa Claus, but I'm new to Reddit, and I think its going on now but I don't quite know how it works). I’m happy to share some of the better requests I’ve gotten over the years. I've been playing Santa for 10 years, its part of my full-time job as professional children's entertainer. I love what I do, take the work seriously, try not to take myself too seriously and try to stay in touch with reality as much as possible.
Most of my visits involve a reading of “The Night Before Christmas,” some caroling and a bit of magic. I do all of this so that the children feel comfortable meeting with me when they do give me their requests (or wish lists). The interesting thing about Santa Claus visits is the difference in motivations between the parents and the children. The children want to ensure I am bringing them what they desire for Christmas; the parents want to ensure that they get a great photo of the children with Santa. I get the range from the funny to the poignant to the sad, but adhering to the topic, here are three of my favorite requests:
6 year old boy is waiting patiently on line to meet me, when its his turn hops right into my lap. I ask him what he would like for Christmas, he mentions a few of the more popular toys that year, and then hands me a letter. I receive a lot of letters in person (even kids get antsy trusting the USPS to deliver such an important piece of mail). I ask him if he’d been a good boy all year, he smirks, points to the letter and tells me not to worry about it, and marched away. My curiosity was piqued, so I opened his letter at the end of the gig. In it was a list, a note that said “Dear Santa, thank you for bringing me everything on my list. Love, Anthony” And a picture of Abe Lincoln. The kid bribed me with a $5 bill. I was horrified and quite impressed all at the same time. To this day, I can only imagine what he had done...
Shy, adorable 4-year old girl finally sits on my lap after a great deal of coaxing by me, the photographer and her mom. Won’t say a word, complete silence, which isn’t uncommon for the age and shyness level. I ask her if she likes princesses, ballerinas, soccer; anything to get a nod or a quiet yes. Not a peep. After photos, I reassure her that I will be bringing her some great gifts on Christmas Eve (so that she doesn’t feel bad later on). Walks away clutching Mom’s hand, suddenly bolts back towards my chair, gets a foot away from my face and practically yells “I don’t like Mac & Cheese!!!” Thank God she told me, because I had cases at the North Pole ready to go with her name on it.
Not really a request per se, but one of my favorite stories involves a 30-something gentleman with Down’s Syndrome. Children and adults with special needs are among some of my favorite visits, and when I meet teenagers or adults with Down’s Syndrome I try to find the balance between treating them as an adult and remembering that I am still an important part of the magic of Christmas to them. He introduced himself to me and told me what a great job I was doing (thanks!). He was quite positive during the visit, and deflected the question of what he would like for Christmas. He finally mentioned how much he wanted an IPhone but he was OK with whatever I brought him. Before he left he unintentionally stage-whispered directly into my ear: “I know you’re one of Santa’s helpers, but that’s OK, Christmas is really important to my Mom and I don’t want her to feel sad that I know you’re one of His helpers.” Then gives me the requisite big hug and walks away.
-Junglejimirish
6.
I was asked to be Santa for a church Christmas dinner last year.
The funniest one was a shy little boy who reluctantly talked to me. He said he wanted Alaska. When I asked what he meant, he told me that he wanted to be the king of Alaska.
The saddest was when a little kid asked for his dog to be alive agian :(
-SharkPanda
7.
When I was 5 my brother (7) told me if I asked Santa for a friend he would buy me kettle corn. Santa looked kinda sad and he told he would be my friend, and that he was getting a new email soon so we could be friends, sounds creepier typed out like that, it wasnt creepy.
Tl;DR got kettle corn when I was 5
-Basalted
8.
I wasn't a mall Santa, but my little sister asked for a Lunchable when she was 3. The mall Santa busted out laughing and gave her a small hug.
-[deleted]
9.
Not a mall Santa, but I used to dress up as the Easter Bunny at the country club I worked at and parents wanted their kids to sit with me for pictures. They would always ask me for stuff and I never knew if I should even talk or not. I generally didn't since I had a pretty deep voice, instead one of the hostesses would stand next to me and assist (she was really good with kids too so it helped tons, plus you can't see for anything in that mask).
One kid asked me if I had any kids. I was 16 at the time and had just lost my virginity and did a "OMGWTFBBQ" in my head. Turns out he just wanted a pet rabbit. It didn't even occur to me that this kid was asking for the Easter Bunny's children until much later.
One kid asked me to not let daddy and mommy make any more little brothers or sisters because it was making them too tired.
Also kids always used to run up to me and hug me, and with the low visibility in that mask I was basically either constantly tripping over them or getting nailed in the junk with no warning.
Oh, and one father put his arm around me and said, "I bet there is a sexy bunny underneath that costume."
And one of my classmates from high school decided to sit on my lap and gave some serious butt wiggle and was really touchy feely. I never told her I was in there but I think she knew. I was too young to ask her about it at the time and just kept sitting next to her in Chemistry wondering if she knew...
-CorpCounsel
10.
I was a coffee shop Santa one year, as there were no malls in the area where I lived. All of the employees at the coffee shop were teenagers. I was the only "adult" at 22, and even though I'm female, I was chosen since I was the tallest. (I'm only 5'7") Yes, lowering your voice to try and sound like a guy, for hours on end, does cause some laryngitis.
Funniest request: A paintball gun so I can shoot my friends cat, so I can play video games at his house (he was apparently allergic to cats). Saddest request: Since the north pole is near heaven, please tell my dad I don't want him dead. Sweetest request: Please give some of my toys to my friend because his family doesn't have Christmas at their house. Weirdest request: (from a 5 or 6 year old) I want a toaster that makes macaroni and cheese inside of a pop tart.
Sweet kids. Most of them. Some are jerks, even at 5 or 6 years old. Only got peed on once, and only got threw up on once, and I probably sat with about 500 kids.
-DorrinV
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