It's critically important to be extra aware when traveling.

While having fun, exploring and learning about other cultures are the main priorities when traveling, tourists are unfortunately a target for crime and theft. Traveling alone can be rewarding and illuminating, but not every moment is going to be "Eat, Pray, Love." Protect your belongings, protect yourself, look out for your friends and don't try to haggle too much. We're not all Julia Roberts and this isn't memoir-turned-movie magic.

When a recent Reddit user asked, "Travelers of Reddit, what are some of the creepiest/scariest experiences you've had abroad?" adventurous souls everywhere were ready to share their horror stories. Hold onto your wallet, everyone!

1. DAMN, "BarryAllen85."

Met a guy in Munich on the street who had lived in the same house as I did... in Cincinnati... 40 years ago...

2. NOPE NOPE NOPE, "albs68w."

1992 I was walking up the stairs to the ticket booths in the Warsaw, Poland central train station. All of a sudden this dude is falling down the stairs coming to rest a few stairs above where I was standing. Dude had a long screw driver sticking out of his abdomen.

3. Don't forget to make the bed, "Phil567."

I had a pack of wild dogs chase me from my bus stop to my hotel at 3 am in Kosovo. I also had a old woman yell at me in Russian about not making my bed right on the train and then watched over my shoulder til it was to her satisfaction when I was on my way back to Bucharest from Moldova

4. Pro tip: open the door before you pay, "michiganmaestra."

I was traveling in Nicaragua several years ago when I got lost and ended up having to take a taxi at 9:30pm back to my hostel. When the taxi pulled up to the curb, the taxi driver locked the taxi doors and told me that I had misunderstood the fare. He claimed I owed him $100 USD which was several times more than we had agreed upon. I tried to pry the doors open from the inside but was completely trapped. Thankfully, he let me out of the taxi after taking all the money I had on me.

The hostel workers told me I was incredibly lucky. A few days earlier, a taxi driver had kidnapped another young female, assaulted her, then dumped her barely conscious body in a field outside town thinking that she was dead. A few local schoolchildren found her on their way to school in the morning.

5. Hold onto your wallets! "TheBurkalator."

Got pickpocketed by a group of 3 on a Paris metro. I'm paranoid of losing my wallet, so I'm always checking myself. When I realized it was missing, I made a bigger scene than the pickpockets were making (they shoved me into their friend and were trying to convince people I knocked him down). I stopped the train from leaving the station. One of the other passengers left to get got conductor and security. I guess that didn't sit well with the pickpockets, so they gave me back my wallet and took off running.

6. Absolutely not, "trs2848."

I was staying in a weird hostel by myself in Barcelona, woke up to a man staring at me while I slept. He was looking over a one of those wood dividing screens that the shared room had. I pretend to still be asleep because I was afraid of what he would do if I move or confronted him and I didn't know if there was anyone else in the room. He stared for like 2 hours until finally my alarm rang cause I had to to take an early train, so I put all my stuff in my bag and left the room. As I left I told the owner, but I was really in a hurry and didn't ask what he was going to do with the guy.

7. Wow, "krthomso."

A friend and I were waiting for a night train in Naples and after someone tried to steal our bags decided to go everywhere together. It was a good thing because a man who had been whistling at us for an hour tried to follow us into the bathroom.

8. Terrifying, "plantman01."

A good friend of mine in Zimbabwe was grabbed at gunpoint and forced into a van, thankfully they only took her to an ATM and made her drain her account then they left her somewhere outside town. Could've been so much worse

9. WTF, "Anal_Mouse."

In India our bus rounded a corner in the mountains and another bus was on the other side of the curve. Both busses skid to a stop about 1 foot from one another. Both drivers started laughing and poking fun at each other. We saw a bus from the '80s that fell down the mountain about 15 minutes later. Hella intense.

10. AH! "mephistosoos."

We went on a family trip to croatia and on our way to the Beach we pulled over to the side of a road for a pee break. So we opened the car door and like always our dog jumps out first. He ran into the field right next to the Street. Then suddenly my mother starts screaming the name of our dog, because 10meters away from our car was sign that said: Stay Away, old minefield. Thankfully nothing happened

11. Yikes, "michi1790."

I witnessed a creepy old man groping a teenager on a crowded train in Osaka. The girl was just enduring it and you can tell that she was holding back her tears. I whipped my phone out and started filming the guy which made him use his other hand which was blocked from my view so I asked my guy friend to switch places with the girl. After that, on the next stop, the creepy guy got off. I asked the girl if she was ok. She thanked us and her friends also expressed their gratitude. I think all of them (all teenage girls) were aware of the groping but I read somewhere that it is not the Japanese culture to make a scene. I was aware that this kind of thing was prevalent in Japan but I'm still shocked to see it in person. That creepy man and the poor girl's face will be forever etched in my mind.

12. No thanks, "captainchuckle."

17 year old me was in a public restroom near the coliseum in Rome. I was taking a leak at a urinal when some dude rushed in to the urinal right next to me looked over the partition at my junk and he started jerking off extremely violently. I had just started and had to go something fierce so I was trying to cover up, avoid jerk off jerking off, and not get pee all over myself. Suddenly the Roma police came bustling in and grab ol’ boy and start yelling at me in Italian very loudly. As I zip up and throw my hands in the air I simply say “English” and “American”. They demanded to see my passport and then hauled off jerk off guy.

13. *CHILLS,* "rey_gun."

I'm a single female and found a crazy cheap ticket out there. Decided to use it as a chance to get my advanced diver certificate. Anyway, I went on a horse riding trip where the tour picked up a group in a minivan. On the way back, the driver skipped my stop and dropped off the last riders at their hotel. After a moment of confusion (I was unsure of my surroundings, but felt like this was wrong), I asked why we drove past my place. The driver said "oh I'm taking a different way." And I said, "that really doesn't make sense. The traffic is fine. It's more direct this way. Can we just go back?" He was quiet and kept driving, and now my heart was pounding so hard I could hear it in my ears. He said, "there's a really great beach down this way; not many tourists." At this point he was driving through the backside of a shopping complex, nobody in sight, dusk, and I was considering if I should try to jump out of a moving vehicle... but because I'd get stranded in an empty parking lot, it'd be all too easy for him to grab me again.

Instead I said "I can't. There are people waiting for me. I just texted them saying I'm in the car on the way home and will be there in a few minutes. I'll be late if we don't go back now."

Somehow that worked, he turned the car around and his whole attitude changed. He started telling me how he had a wife and kids. My heart was thundering, but I think I sounded normal. (Also I had 0 cell phone reception. The story about the text was a lie, and I had no way to phone for help if he called my bluff.)

F*cking scary. If that shit happens on a tour when you go in a decent sized group, I have no idea how you stay safe as a single female traveler.

14. So lucky, "TheColdPolarBear."

Was almost jumped by a coked up drug dealer in the middle of the night in Peru for refusing to buy coke from him. Luckily his other drug dealer friend recognized me from earlier in the day; the drug dealers in that area run a front of jewelry making and I had bought a necklace from the amigo jewelry maker/ drug dealer during the day (btw the necklace was handmade by him as well and is a work of fucking art). I was preparing for a real fight for my life but the amigo drug dealer put the other one in a serious head lock and yelled at him to back off.

15. Women protecting women! "Rhothlord."

On a train in Athens traveling alone, a group of men tried to push me off the train with them at a stop. Three women started yelling at them and pulled me back. It happened to fast I didn't know until the one that spoke English explained they were trying to take me. They made sure I made it back to the hostel and told me not to wear what I was wearing ( shorts and a tank) while alone.

16. "Gotcha!" "reef_higgens."

I was traveling in Iceland, pretty far away from the nearest town and decided to take a nap on the beach. I woke up pretty disoriented and had a feeling of being watched. I looked over my shoulder and there was a man standing 5 feet away, staring at me... He says “gotcha!” And then runs off into his car and drives away. I was completely spooked!!

17. Definitely a witch, "_Z_y_x_w."

I fell asleep on a long-distance bus in Greece and woke to a toothless old woman running her fingers through my hair. She kept repeating something in Greek over and over; other riders found it hilarious but wouldn't tell me what she was saying. Unfortunately I couldn't get off the bus, so I had to make her get away from me, and then sat there pissed off and embarrassed for the remaining 90 minutes of the trip

Burgers. Steak. Merlot. Cigarettes.

These are just a few of the things that people craved while they were in prison, and made sure to devour at the first opportunity.

People who identified as ex-convicts shared their stories of how they spent their first days out, and they're quite moving...and will make you want a burger.

1. ARTFIENDING appreciates all the small things.

After a three year stint, I caught a random kick out. Due to the high volume of people coming in, they have an early parole act. After winning the prison lottery, my possible ten years turned to three! The strange thing is, your just sitting around one day when your name gets called for mail. The excitement that arose with every word I read can never be explained. It informed me to call and schedule a ride to be there for me the next day. This may be a strange statement, and may be hard to understand, but, after three years of routine 'non-freedom', one night isn't time enough to adjust.

My mother showed up to pick me up. She brought a pair of my old clothes. Oh the feeling of sliding your foot in to a good pair of shoes! Jeans with pockets. Strange happiness for the small things. All too much to handle.

When we made it home my mom went back to work. I just sat there and thought long and hard. I took off walking. My intention was to loose myself somewhere. I didn't care where. I found a good spot to lay in the grass and did just that. Layed there and got lost. No thoughts, no feelings, no memories. Just the blank way I had learned to fill my mind. Almost like I could, and would rather, just die there. And I believe that is exactly what happened. I left everything right there in that spot. I died there.

I do my best to visit that spot once or twice a year. Whenever I need to remember where I am today. And to remind myself where I was then.

2. jptucker1017's new story, a love story, began.

Did a little over three years in the California Youth Authority (I realize that's not a long bid). The day I got out, I went to Longs Drugs (now CVS) for some hygiene items as I had left all mine behind for friends. I remember having a near panic attack being in a crowded store for the first time. It was almost suffocating. When I got to my father's house, I called my best friend (now my wife) and told her that while my parole had been denied a CO had given me one direct call to break the news, and that I had sent a package home with my father for her and that she could pick it up at his house. When she rang the doorbell some 15 minutes later I answered. Outside of my children being born that was the most emotional moment of my life. She didn't say a word, just held me for a ridiculous amount of time. Even though I had been "out" for half a day already, it was the first time I felt "home". We began a romantic relationship shortly thereafter and have been together going on eleven years, married for 6. Since that day "home" is wherever she is.

3. Superfluous1's husband got some peace and quiet.

My husband served 5 years (before we were married).

After leaving the prison grounds and being driven some distance away (as his driver's license had expired while he was inside, he didn't drive) he posed for a picture in an open field where you could see the prison in the distance.

On the ride home, he ate cantaloupe with a real fork (as opposed to plastic) for the first time in 6 years. Once home, had a steak dinner with corn on the cob (his fav).

That first day home was kind of low key, as he wanted it. He says that after years of being surrounded by chaos and violence, it felt weird and unsettling to be in a private home where it was so quiet and there weren't people everywhere.

Also, sleeping was hard. He didn't sleep well for about 3 months after he got out. I guess years of sleeping with noise all the time (it's NEVER quiet in prison, evidently) makes it difficult to sleep in quiet.

4. Bon appetit, Lvx0pher.

After serving 5 years in Florida State Prison on a drug charge, I went home drank a bottle of Merlot ate a steak, got on the Internet, caught up on music that I've missed, and have remained exceedingly grateful for all the little things that make life worth living.

5. KC5629's brother had a craving.

My older brother was in the system from when he was 13 until he was 29...His first day out consisted of visiting me at work and getting in and out burger. He said he had been craving a delicious burger and fries all the years he was in...it's the little things.

6. It was a family affair for wowertower.

My brother and his wife came to pick me up at the gate. I got to see my 2 year old nephew for the first time, and we all went to Burger King and I promptly puked that sh*t out. Later that day we went to our grandmother's (who has a swimming pool). I remember the uncontrollable happiness I felt inside after jumping into the pool. I was laughing hysterically just to be in water, it was an amazing feeling. Then we ate at Red Lobster for dinner. Good f*cking day it was.

7. EastenNinja looked on the bright side.

Try to smoke again

(it's smoke free where I am)

but my lungs had actually cleared up by now and it was awful

so one positive thing from the whole ordeal was that I managed (was forced?) to quit smoking

I'll probably make up the years I lost!

8. unphuckwittable got a surprise party.

discharge takes forever. you put your street clothes back on and then the waiting game starts. they took me down to the holding cells to be discharged at around 9am and i wasn't actually let out of jail until around 2 in the afternoon.

my dad picked me up and we went straight to IHOP. i had an omelet and 2 stacks of pancakes. irrelevant but i clearly remember sending my coffee cup back for another one because there were lipstick stains on it from the last person.

anyway, then on the entire ride home we blasted John Mayer trio's live cd. it was f*cking glorious. i couldn't afford the crazy expensive personal radio from commissary while i was in there so it was my first music i heard in months. i just took in the scenery and fresh air the entire time.

then when we finally got home, i remember just a weird feeling when i walked into my house. i kept just thinking to myself "i can't believe how weird it feels to not be told what to do or watched".

another thing i clearly remember was how weird it felt the first time i walked into my bedroom. the ENTIRE room seemed bigger than i remembered it. everything just seemed oddly different.

then my girlfriend at the time took me out to ruby tuesday's for dinner, then took me to her house to "see her parents." nope. she had 12 of my friends hiding in her living room to surprise the shit out of me.

we all just hung out, drank beers and played pool in her basement til midnight. her mom made me this awesome cake shaped like an xbox 360 controller that said "the future is in your hands" on it. obviously my girlfriend then came back to my house with me and welcomed me home properly.

re-adjusting to freedom was a huge shock to the system, it took a few days.

this was 5 yrs ago and ive had no legal troubles since...

9. Vulgar_the_clown ran for it.

After I got back to the house and was sitting on the back porch talking with friends....I decided to run. In one direction. And run FAST. There was nothing but a huge field behind our house, and I hopped the fence and just booked it. My friends were whooping and hollering and cheering for me as I ran. It was amazing.

10. Cheers, fishflinger.

I was arrested and charged with 2nd degree assault w. a deadly weapon. I was sentenced to less than 2 years prison time, because, the judge saw extenuating circumstances. Since the man I had stabbed was a date rapist, and there were multiple witnesses to say so.

I got out in 2010. I was twenty one and had seen my birthday pass on the inside. I got out, and my family picked me up and we all went out to celebrate. I had about 6 pints of REAL beer, and at least 45 wings, maybe more. About an hour later at the house, I blew massive chunks, I mean a straight deluge of vomit. My pops said he had something that would help. We went out to the yard and for the first time in my life, me and my father smoked pot together. He told me that he was proud of me, and that I did the right thing. Then I passed out.

11. germinik got a fresh start.

I got a job. I was 16 when I went in, and 19 when I got out. Inside was nothing like the movies portrayed it to be. I was positively influenced by older inmates to make better life choices. Getting a job was first thing on my list and I nailed it with in a few hours.

"Urban exploration" is not for the faint-of-heart. You never know what you might find while venturing in to abandoned buildings, closed-down psych wards, or other human-made structures no longer inhabited by humans. But the creepiest thing you can encounter while exploring uninhabited places are unexpected signs of life. The only thing scarier than being alone in this kind of situation is suddenly realizing you are not alone.

Someone asked urban explorers of Reddit: "what is the creepiest 'We're not alone' experience(s) you've had?" These urban explorers (and a few rural ones) share chilling stories of discovering they had company when they least expected it:

1.) From horribleflesheater:

I was on the other end of this. There was an abandoned nunnery on the coast behind a suburban development, a very creepy but beautiful place. I loved it because it had an entirely stone chapel, any sound you made inside had true reverb- an echo a second long almost. I brought a friend in to make some recordings in the dead of night, as we’re leaving a group of laughing neighborhood kids came in on us crouched in the dark over a bunch of electronics. They ran faster than I’ve seen anyone run before

2.) From eye_booger:

My friends and I were exploring an abandoned restaurant in this beach town one winter night. We snuck in through a broken window on the shore side, to avoid being spotted by any cars driving by.

Overall, inside it was your typical abandoned restaurant, but was still really cool to check out. There was a long bar, tables tossed about, etc. We walked downstairs into a wine cellar, and started walking through the labyrinth of hallways (the basement was deceptively larger than we would have expected for a beachside restaurant).

Anyway, we wander into this room off one of the hallways, and shine our flashlight in the corner, and we see an unmade bed / cot, with all of the trappings of someone currently living there (a safety razor next to the mirror, random other belongings). Our stomach's immediately dropped as we realized we were currently in someone's living quarters, and promptly noped the fuck out of there. To this day we still don't know if the person was hiding in the basement with us, waiting for us to leave. Of if we stumbled on it while they were out and about. Either way, we couldn't shake the feeling of being watched by someone from the shadows of that basement.

3.) From ihavetwoarms:

‪I should be thankful this is my creepiest story. So I was at an abandoned medical school in a pretty bad city with my friend. My friend told me homeless people squat there but only on the first floor, she even said one of her friends sat their backpack down and had it stolen by one of them in plain sight. ‬

‪So we avoided it and explored the second floor. We kept hearing random noises like someone loosely following us so we kept on guard but never saw anything. We were then in this room and heard a louder noise and look over to see a cat just chillin. It was the cat following us all along cause after stopping to pet it and moving on, it continued following us making the noises we kept hearing. It eventually came right up to us to be pet. We assumed it was a stray and wanted to get it help, so we agreed that if it followed us out we’ll take it somewhere or to someone who will care for it. ‬

‪It followed us outside then immediately ran from us when we were like “lol welp guess we got a cat now” so I went to see where it went… Only to see one of the doors to the bando open and this like 6ft+ dude walk out and yell at me “Yall fuckin wit my cat?” I just about shit myself thinking I was about to get murdered or something haha. I was like “oh is that your cat? he followed us out.” he’s like “yeah it’s my cat, COLONEL MUSTARD! Get over here!” and the cat comes running to him. He introduced himself and we talked for a bit. He was actually a really cool guy, said he lives there and studies psychology and stuff to keep occupied. Bonus, picture of Col. Mustard!

4.) From Almighty-Twuntwaffle:

The area I'm currently in is a touristy beach place so being winter it's completely devoid of life, there's a lot of apartments/hotels around that are just shells, no windows or doors. At 2am I went to go to the local garage to grab some smokes as we were running low, it's dead quiet and you can hear the teeniest tiniest sounds. I was walking past one such building when I felt like I was being watched, I looked up and around but I couldn't hear or see anything, so I carried on walking but slower now trying to be as quiet as possible while listening for anything strange, suddenly every single dog around just went crazy barking, like dead silence to deafening barking in a second. Made me jump 10ft, looked up and on the 3rd floor of a apartment that got no windows or doors put in yet is a single dog just staring at me. I literally turned around and walked straight back home and figured that I'd just go at a more reasonable time

Edit : picture of what the building looks like

5.) From TheDevilsAdvokaat:

I lived in China for the last 18 years. At night I would get bored and go out riding on my scooter and just explore various roads. This incident was about 14 years ago.

There was a place I had been to in the daytime; down a country road that was mostly green hills and forest. Somewhere there was a little settlement where they were building a whole bunch of new things, including an apartment building that was at least 20 stories high. It was just a shell; no windows or doors or fittings yet, (Or even stairs!) just the concrete for each of the floors and some of the walls.

That night I rode past..and stopped. There were bamboo ladders leading up to the first few floors, and more bamboo ladders inside going all the way up the building. The entire building was filled with people..and they were families too. Mom, dad, cooking pots (they had little fires going and were cooking) children and even babies. There were hundreds of people living there...and as I stopped there with the engine running, more and more heads started appearing, people watching me. They were all silent; nobody called out. They just looked.

So I rode off again....and felt spooked.

6.) From SouthNCE:

So there’s a moderately well known abandoned mental hospital close to my town, a few months back a few friends and I went to explore a bit. (not a rare thing for people here) We found this setup of a few folding chairs and a couple of old mattresses with blankets and whatever else you’d imagine on them. We chilled there for about 10 minutes and then went on with our adventure upwards. Pretty uneventful from then on, a few really cool graffiti murals, awesome view from the roof. When we were coming back down we passed through the room and all the chairs were folded up and neatly stacked against the wall and the beds were made. (or atleast as close to that as it could’ve been) Whoever did it would’ve most likely known that we were there and waited for us to leave to do all of that as it was only a timeframe of about 45 minutes. No threats or anything just an eerie feeling of being watching in an abandoned mental hospital.

7.) From KrakenWarg:

So I take a lot of time lapses of nature and stuff. One clear night I decided to drive out to the middle of nowhere to get a time lapse of the stars. I found a lake that seemed like a cool spot to shoot and set up. About 20 minutes in I hear a noise and look up to see a light above me. Sure enough a drone is right above me just hovering. It freaked me out so I booked it out of there. I later learned I was trespassing on government property.

8.) From pupHD:

I've only been brave enough to do the urban exploration once...well, twice I guess (but the same location both times.)

Near an apartment I used to live in, there was an old hotel that was abandoned and boarded up. One night, a friend was over and hanging out with me. We had a few drinks and, in a moment of inebriated bravado (a little tipsy, but not fall-down drunk at all), we decided that exploring the old hotel would be a brilliant idea.

We made our way over and explored a couple of the rooms (the doors were on the outside, so it may have been a motel rather than a hotel...I'm not sure the difference). The rooms were moldy, dirty, broken down, but didn't have anything unexpected. There was some graffiti on the walls and some used condoms on the ground (eww) in the rooms.

Then, we went in to the office/lobby area. As soon as we walked in, we froze. There, in the distance, in the darkened lobby, was a man staring at us. He didn't move, just stood there and stared us down. We bolted, quickly, and ran at a full sprint back to my apartment.

Thankfully, the man (homeless, drug addict, we didn't know) didn't follow us.

A few days later, my friend was back over during the day. We were talking about the experience with the hotel and, this time spurred on by daylight, decided to look in the hotel lobby again.

When we entered, the man was still there...standing in the same spot, staring us down...and made of cardboard. We had gotten freaked out by a cardboard cutout hawking the hotel's website and online bookings.

9.) From Thatsaclevername:

There's an old flour mill on Harbor island in seattle, it's been abandoned and locked up for awhile. My buddies went through a pretty serious Urban-Ex phase near the end of high school so we were going to all sorts of weird and interesting places in the area just checking it out. Got chased out by cops a few times, usual stuff.

Anyway, inside this flour mill we're working our through some of the regular block areas, and our buddy swears he heard something. We all stop dead in our tracks, lights pointed down, just listening. The amount of noise a dilapidated building makes when you're trying to be quiet is amazing, constant creaking and wind noises. Then I start to hear it, it was shuffling, with the sound of somebody dragging something across concrete.

At this point I can feel my heart jumping out of my chest, the blood pulsing in my ears and head, I'm hyper aware as I try and pinpoint this sound and associate it with something I knew. By the time we're sure it's not just the wind, we've all heard the noises (there was 5 of us in there) and we're starting to think it's coming from near the stairs. We slowly, achingly, creep our way over broken glass and dirt. When we came up on the stairwell, we shined our lights down and up to the adjacent landings for the floor we were on and couldn't see anything.

My buddy turns around, steps on an old water bottle on the ground, making the loudest crackling a water bottle has ever made in the history of recyclables. One of my other friends, looking back down the factory area we came through gets startled and yells "FUCK" at the sound of the water bottle. We immediately heard the most chilling, deep, scream. At that instant we all just put the gas on and ran the fuck out. At the bottom of the stairwells we ran into ~10 homeless people who weren't there before, but we paid them no mind and didn't stop our dead sprint until we got back to our cars. We figured it must have been some homeless person we scared with our creeping around and then sudden expletive, but we never saw the person or identified the sound. So who knows?

10.) From omi_palone:

I live in a big U.S. west coast city. In a neighborhood where most homes go right up to the sidewalk property line and have a yard in back, my place is the opposite: house is at the back of the lot, front yard keeps me buffered from street noise. It's a nice, dark little oasis in the city. My house has a double door / split door, so the top can open independently of the bottom. I often leave the top open when the weather's nice.

I'm sitting on the couch in the living room, all of 15 feet from the door. It's nighttime, I'm reading, and the door's more or less directly in front of me. The porchlight's off, yard's dark, the only light's from the dimmed reading lamp I'm using. The wind keeps blowing the top part of the door open, closed, open, closed. I'm used to it, happens all the time, doesn't sound out of place. Until the door kind of misses a beat--I don't hear it thud closed. I look up, and it's perfectly still, only open 2 or 3 inches. It's one of those wtf are my eyes seeing moments, there's like a 15 mile per hour wind outside, how is the top part of the door partially open and perfectly still? Then my eyes or brain recognizes it: the outline of a hoodie, drawstrings, hood up. In that INSTANT I am frozen and my heart is pounding--someone is literally standing right there, hood up, holding my door open. I can't see his face, but he sees me noticing because he says, "You should keep your doors locked." MOTHERFUCKING WHAT? Now my adrenaline kicks in, I jump up shouting, he bolts. I get the porch light on in time to see him running out the gate. I still wonder how long he'd been standing there or wtf he was doing/thinking.

The door has been very fucking locked since then.

11.) From suh_dewd:

so theres this building in my city that has been abandoned for over a decade. the building itself covers over 40 acres so it's pretty well know by explorers that If the cops come they wont search for you inside but wait for you to come out. the second time I went to explore this building we were looking for a way inside. Keep in mind this is taking place early in the morning maybe 3am. we come across this section of the building that was a large outdoor amphitheatre. we walked down to the center and went up to the boarded up windows, and ever so faintly on the other side of the wood you could hear someone talking.. to themselves... we got the fuck out of there

12.) From EpicMeatSpin:

I explored part of an old Nike or Atlas missile site one night with a few friends. As we were leaving, someone started shining a laser pointer at us from the woods. Somehow, we couldn’t actually see where they were even though that’s usually pretty easy to do with laser pointers.

I still wonder if it was just a laser pointer and not a laser sight instead.

13.) From DrTenuredProf:

Rural experience: a graveyard behind my high school in the middle of cornfields was a go to driving around spot because we had nothing else to do as teenagers. Early on in the school year a lady parked her car in the back of the cemetery and walked into the corn field and shot herself in the head. The graveyard is super old and on a gravel side road so no one noticed for like a week. Kids who were running cross country smelt something rancid and reported it. Once it was investigated the truth came out it was weird. She wasnt even from my area, she drove around 2 hours here and had no relation to anything around the area. No note was left, it was really bizzare.

Anyways, we were driving around months later telling the story to some younger students. Really trying to freak them out, but when we turned the corner to pull in the graveyard a random car was parked in the back of the yard. We slowly rolled up on it while all of us were losing our minds only to see a topless woman sit up from the backseat followed by a topless man. Awkward, but that was the tightest my butt had been clinched up to that point of life.

14.) From official_fox_news:

I spent 2004-2009 living in a dilapidated warehouse that had a space over it converted into an apartment.

In exploring the warehouse beneath it before moving in, a buddy of mine and I were discussing how the place smelled and was haunted. In making jokes about it we started laughing when something shattered on the wall near us. We were seriously startled and contemplating what it could have been when when someone shouts "Shut the fuck up!" and there's a homeless man throwing what I assume is a second bottle at us from across the space.

In a non threatening way, I calmly state "Are you sure you should be in here?" He waves something at me and yells at me to call the police if I don't like it.

15.) From Velvetroses:

There was an old house down the road from where we lived in the country. It was broken and falling apart, but as a kid that was like the biggest draw for our curiosity. We decided to travel through the brush and go inside it on one of our bike rides, and we found loads of neat stuff. Magazines. Old busted antique looking furniture. It was actually pretty cool. We knew from stories our Dad told us about the house that there should have been a few nice apple trees around so we wandered outside to go find them, but what we found was a newer van hidden around a bushy area and covered with sticks. Remnants of a camp area with smoke still coming from the campfire but no one that we could see. We noped out of there and told our parents. Turned out it was someone who had run the border and was camping out in the woods. No other details were relayed to us about it, but pretty creepy for our 12 year old selves.

16.) From SonofBenson:

I decided to climb a tree with a friend in the middle of a large college campus at 2am. Sat up there chatting a while. Then a car pulled up and parked nearly right below us.

We go silent.

One guy gets out. Driver stays put with the engine running. 5 minutes pass.

A whistle comes from behind a nearby building. And one is returned from the guy below us.

A few minutes later someone walks up. There's a short exchange, we can hear and see everything. The guy walks away and the car leaves.

We are silent. 10 minutes pass. We hand gestured and decide it's go time. We dropped out of the tree and ran.

Technically those guys should have felt "not alone", but instead we did for weeks. We were so sure we had been spotted.

17.) From drbdrbdr:

There was a decommissioned Naval Base in the town I grew up in. We used to sneak into the old barracks and one time i turned the corner into the hallway and found a lit cigarette on the ground. There was nobody around from what I could see or hear. We noped the fuck out pretty shortly after that.

18.) From Miranye:

This was back in summer 2012.

Every morning my mum used to take me and my brother to our grandparents, while she went to work. My grandparents lived in a really isolated rural zone. Near my grandparents house there was a huge abandoned factory, and i've always wanted to go to see what was in there. So I begged my uncle (he lived at my grandparents house) to explore that building. He said yes, so we went to the building and searched for an opening to get inside. Once inside, we started to look around the place, and obviously found nothing except old machines and stuff like that. When we was about to leave, we heard noises coming from upstairs, and then steps. We saw a shadow coming towards us, so we got the feck out of there running. A few days later, I was at my grandparents house with all my cousins. Suddenly, the neighbors rang our doorbell, and told us that there was someone breaking into our back garden. My uncle went out to check while one of my cousins called 112 (local police number). Soon after the call, my uncle came back inside, and he told us that he saw that guy that had broke in, running towards the old abandoned building. I never discovered if the guy in the building and the other in the garden were the same person.

Pretty fucked up story.

19.) From nidenikolev:

My friends and I explored an abandoned psych hospital in Suffolk County, Long Island. After checking out the building with the cafeteria and bowling alley, we decided to leave by exiting through the patient room window that we entered in. I realized I had left my flashlight back in an adjacent patient room, so I told my friends that I would quickly grab it.

When I went to the other patient room to retrieve it, I noticed that the door was closed and a light flicker was occurring on the other side of it. I noped out of there so fast...

20.) From fafalone:

We had finally worked up the courage to explore this super scary looking dilapidated house. It was boarded up really solid, nobody was getting in and out without a ton of work prying off boards... We searched exhaustively. The easier way in was to just make the damaged drywall on the back wall a little more damaged to widen the hole.

As soon as we stepped in, there was something vaguely human shaped at the top of the stairs we both saw. We bolted in terror.

Of course, me and my friend were only 9 at the time. Was probably just some homeless dude better at finding entrances than us.

As an adult now I really want to go urban exploring in the NYC subways abandoned stations. But I need to meet someone familiar with all the new post 911 security shit because I'm paranoid about it. An even more exciting target is the abandoned 19th St PATH station, the only even semi modern footage is just blurs captured from passing trains not any better than I can catch myself. But I think their security is tough. There's keypads at the tunnel entrances presumably to disengage some security thing.

21.) From Toucanslam-W:

Not urban, but rural.

Went out for a hike with a buddy of mine, it was pretty late maybe 2am or so. We were just shooting the shit having a smoke on his property. We walk maybe a mile on his trail and we both just start getting this feeling like we are being watched, we just assume its just us being high and anxious, we walk maybe another 2 minutes.

I turn around and point my phone behind us and just see two eyes staring back in the darkness. I am from a rural area and i know that seeing eyes shine isn't that spooky but i am talking about small raccoon or cat eyes. These eyes are MASSIVE, unblinking and staring straight at us. I feel my skin crawl just thinking about it. I start to freak out and tell him to take a look.

He starts to freak out too. He thinks its a mountain lion, and we shouldnt put our back to it. So we begin this super roundabout way of looping back and heading to his house. The entire way we walk one person facing forward and the other walking backwards. It took us maybe an hour and by the time we got back to his house I was shaking from adrenaline and anxiety, but we got back safe.

Later that week I heard a mountain lion for the first time in my life. And let me tell you, it's fucking terrifying.

22.) From LowCalPal:

Definitely not urban, and more sweet than scary. I was once camping in the desert, at least 30 miles in every direction from any human settlements. When I woke up, there was a full, cold, 5-gallon jug of water outside my tent.

23.) From Jesse0016:

My friends and I grew up in a town that had a large abandoned psychiatric hospital. People went in there all the time and we decided senior year of high school to sneak in at 2ish am. We get in with flashlights and start just exploring. We get up to the third floor and start hearing footsteps. We turn the flashlights off and hide in a room. We watch this big black figure shuffle by the door and down the hall. We ran the opposite way to another stairwell and got the fuck out. I’m sure it was just some homeless dude or something but Jesus Christ we were spooked for a while.

24.) From billbapapa:

When my house was being built I did what you're not supposed to do, and went into the construction zone to take some pictures in the frame that was being built.

I did it a few times.

One of the last times I kept hearing weird noises that seemed to be sort of following me and I totally felt like there was someone else there with me.

Anyways, turned out it was a fucking raccoon that was in there, I don't know what he was doing, but when I saw him I got just as scared as if it had really been a ghost and fucking ran for it.

I had an interesting phone call to the builders trying to explain that, "I think I saw a Racoon in the house... when i was on the road looking at the house from my car and it looked at me out where the window is supposed to be..."

25.) From drunkdino973:

Oh another good one! I was exploring an abandoned rehab near my house with two of my friends and it had just freshly snowed, literally while we were exploring. I was approaching one building there when I looked down and saw a very large set of obviously men's footprints in the snow, heading into the building. We continued anyway (we always went prepared to defend ourselves bc you really never know) and we opened the door....to a completely silent, empty building. There was a staircase to a tiny loft and we went up, only to find that someone had cut a makeshift door in the wall and was presumably hanging out in the attic.

We opened that door too, and there was still no one. We never saw anyone but I haven't been back since, it creeped my out far too much.

Surviving a natural disaster is a deeply surreal experience. One moment, you're lounging in your home per usual, and minutes later your life has turned into the movie Twister, and you're watching your neighbor's house fall to pieces.

It's common for natural dsisasters to usher in huge existential moments: your life flashes before your eyes, you feel dissociation from your body during danger, and the works. With the climate shifting quickly, learning how to adapt and cope with dramatic weather systems is a tool kit we will all eventually need. So in many ways, hearing the stories of those who've survived can serve as a lesson for all of us.

In a popular Reddit thread, people who survived natural disasters shared their stories, and it's a miracle most of them are here with us.

1. oliviawilde13 lost their entire high school.

I was a senior in high school in Joplin, MO when the tornado hit. My friends and I were on the highway driving home and the storm was right behind us. We pretty much flew down the highway going ninety and then barricaded ourselves in our friends cellar and when we came out, everything was flat and our high school had been leveled completely.

2. cheapph essentially gazed into an apocalyptic scene.

Black Saturday. Huge fucking bushfire that killed nearly two hundred people, injured four hundred and destroyed three thousand plus buildings including over two thousand homes, in Victoria, Australia in February 2009. Some of the people that died or were injured were people I knew or knew of.

We were a bit stupid; we'd moved from an area where bushfires were very rare and the yearly disaster of choice was floods. So we didn't really have a plan in case of bushfire- which, if you live in a fire-prone area, for the love of God make one. So we weren't listening to the radio, we weren't packed to go, we didn't have an escape plan.

The 'oh, this is real' moment was when I was standing on the top of a hill, overlooking the paddocks, the sky was black and orange and in the distance I could see this line of orange. And I went 'oh, that's pretty close.'

Then we just started hosing everything down, because it was too late to run. The fire got within five-ten minutes of us, my friend's property was partially burnt, went up to their shed before the wind changed.

3. dream-synopsis has lived through a lot of hurricanes.

I grew up poor on the Gulf, so we lived through a lot of the hurricanes. Our worst were Katrina, Rita, and Ike. The scariest part about them is how quickly they build up; you have 3-4 days of worrying, and then suddenly at 3am your parents pull you out of bed and order you to pack because of the mandatory evacuation. So that was always the first "oh shit"--scrambling into a cramped car in the dead of night, with just your vital documents and as much food and emergency supplies as you can fit, not knowing what will happen.

Second oh sh*t: Evacuating. Even at 3am, millions of people are evacuating, and that's millions of cars backed up on every single road. You can't waste gas on air conditioning, so it's boiling hot and cramped in the dead of a Texas summer. You'd move maybe ten feet in an hour. The roads were so clogged that I remember people getting out of their cars and playing Frisbee on the interstate. If you're close to the hurricane, it's even more terrifying, it sounds like the sky is getting ripped open. We were lucky to have family to stay with, but that doesn't stop the destruction. I remember watching CNN when Ike made landfall, realizing the flooded area and collapsed buildings looked familiar, and asking my mom, "Wait--isn't that our neighborhood?" You never want to see your house on CNN.

Third oh shit: Coming back. It always looks like those post-apocalyptic movies: houses ripped apart, streets flooded, trees torn out of the ground or splitting open buildings. Most of the dead are in their houses, but sometimes the bodies were washed into the rivers and streets. (BTW--graves float upwards in floods. The cemeteries were always torn apart, with caskets and corpses thrown everywhere and rotting in the wet sun.)

After Rita, because we were too poor to evacuate, we lived at home for a short while. No electricity besides the generator, no running water, no emergency services, living off MREs and boiled street water. Wild hogs and alligators prowled everywhere (chased out of their usual homes by the storm), and I remember playing in the huge felled trees in the streets. Lots of people kept watch with guns to chase off looters.

It felt like living in a zombie movie. Eventually FEMA would show up, and you'd wait in line forever for your ration of bottled water and MREs while they tried to reconstruct everything. So that was the third oh shit--trying to figure out how you move on from there, after your area has been torn to shreds.

It was odd growing up and realizing not all kids understood the FEMA markings for how many bodies were found in a house. I know that should have been obvious, but FEMA was such a normal part of my childhood that it never occurred to me.

edit: for everybody PMing, yes my username is a reference to The Last Shadow Puppets.

4. Admiral_Burrito will never forget the immense calm after the storm.

I still remember the Northridge Earthquake awhile back. Lived near the epicenter apparently. Woke up to the sound of clanging dishes, only this time everything was moving.

Violently.

It felt like forever (it was less than a minute IRL), and when it stopped, there was this eerie calm (aside from all the car alarms going off).

5. shadow9494 was freaked out by all the cars facing the same direction.

I just moved to the beach in South Carolina about 4 months ago. About 3 weeks after moving down, Hurricane Matthew was heading toward the state. Initially, I didn't plan on leaving, but the most astonishing part for me was that two days before the storm, the lines to get into gas stations were MILES long. Like, it took around 2 hours for people to get gas.

I decided to leave the next day, and the State Government decided to reverse both lanes of I-26. Nothing is freakier than seeing both lanes of the interstate going the same direction. Even though I didn't stay through the storm, just experiencing this made me feel like the situation was completely f*cked.

6. SappyGemstone can still barely wrap their head around the Joplin tornado.

Right. The Joplin, Missouri tornado. Came out of my then brother in law's basement. Saw smoke above the trees. Saw a shitload of emergency vehicles pass by from the city next door. Tried to call my family - no reception. Texted my mom "Hey, you guys didn't die in a tornado, did you?" No response.

Then, ten minutes later, FWAM. My phone starts lighting up with texts. With pictures. With news. I wanted to drive to my parents, maybe see what I could do to help, but my in laws insisted we stay with them. They didn't want us anywhere near the damage. My sisters, who were closer to the area where it hit, went out looking for people until emergency crews came on the scene. The shit they were texting - they dug out some seriously damaged people. Some dead people. My dad called a few hours later - told me he was called to work to assess damage at his plant, and to hunt for some missing guys. He found them - drowned in a pipe outside, caught by the weather.

All of this, ALL of it, seemed unreal. Like it wasn't really happening. It wasn't until the next day, when my in laws finally relented and let my then husband and I go into town so I could see my folks, that the reality smacked me. The damage...it was fucking unreal. A town I graduated high school and college in, just ... split in two, the center a jumble of lumber and debris. It looked like a flattened garbage dump.

Every landmark, gone. And then there was the bizarre shit, the shit that showed how strong the winds were - metal siding wrapped around poles, semi trucks at a trucking facility knocked over like dominoes on one side of the lot, and on the other tossed around like shit was thrown from a kid's toy chest. Cars on top of other cars. Debris jammed through surviving walls. An apartment building that looked like someone took a knife to it and sliced it in half.

THAT is the shit that made it real. And even now, though I have the memories, and I can see pictures online, and the streets look vastly different from before the storm, it still doesn't seem quite like it happened. That amount of damage is just...I think the brain sort of keeps you from taking it all in when it's a place you called home.

7. partofbreakfast had to sleep by the fireplace to keep from freezing.

I was in Michigan during the Ice Storm of 2013. Most of my city went without power for a week, with some areas going as long as 12 days. I was without power for 9.

It's not unusual to lose power in Michigan (a lot of our power lines are old and need replacing), especially in winter. It was a Saturday night when power went out, so I just piled on extra blankets onto my bed and figured power would be back on in the morning. That exact thing had happened at least 10 times in the past to me that I can remember, and it's probably happened even more times than that and I just never realized it because I slept through it.

It wasn't until the next morning, when I woke up to a house that was about 50 degrees Fahrenheit inside and with no power on yet, that I realized shit was getting real. I ended up having to use my fireplace for those 9 days and making a blanket-bed on the floor near it to keep from freezing. My pipes actually did freeze, and I had to slowly warm those up before I could use them. At the coldest, I think my kitchen (the farthest room from my fireplace) dropped down to just barely above freezing.

8. CookinGeek watched a roof fly past their window.

When I glanced up towards the front window while huddling with my family under the dining room table and I saw the roof of our next door neighbors house go flying past.

9. propsie knows better safe than sorry.

The 7.8 Kaikoura Earthquake in November, though it ended up not being too bad for us.

It hit about 1 in the morning on a Monday, and I was grumpy because it woke me up. I tried going back to sleep, but it kept waking me up - like someone was roughly shaking me awake. The bed was getting thrown about - it felt like lying on a trampoline when someone else was jumping on it and there was a long low rumble.

We knew it was a really big one when, after scouring twitter, news sites and radio we decided to start walking towards the hills, at 1:30 am, with our tiny dog in our arms, because there was a tsunami coming. Tsunami sirens are not a happy sound. It ended up being 2 feet high though so we would have been fine.

10. m_jansen was so relieved the robot show wasn't their last viewing.

San Francisco 1989 my boyfriend and I were in our apartment and we felt an earthquake. We are both native Californians and were not phased that all. We went and stood in the doorway and waited for it to stop.

But it just kept going and after a couple of seconds the power went out and the earthquake kept going. We realized this was not a normal quake and we looked at each other in fear. There was not much damage at our house because we were in Bernal Heights which is on bedrock.

Our neighbor went out to his car to listen to the radio and we could hear it. It said the Cyber structure had collapsed and I was very confused. I did not know much about computers at that time and I thought it was very strange that there was a cyber structure which was an actual physical thing that could collapse during an earthquake. Later I found out that this was the Cypress structure which was a freeway overpass.

When the earthquake started were watching the show Small Wonder which is about a little girl robot. It was a terrible terrible show and we were laughing at how stupid it was. As we were standing in the doorway scared that we might die I remember thinking if I die the last thing I will have done was watch that stupid plastic sitcom about a little girl robot. So I was glad I didn't die.

11. reggie2319 quickly realized the wildfires were all too real.

I live in the Gatlinburg, TN area. We recently had some devastating wildfires.

The whole day, I kept telling myself everything was going to be fine. There's no way the fire can get from the Chimney Tops (local mountain peak and popular hiking trail) to downtown. I was underestimating the wind and how dry it was.

It got real very, very fast. I started hearing about fire that had spread to Twin Creeks and Cherokee Orchard. These areas are directly next to the city proper. But I'm a town over, so I should be safe. Then I heard fire trucks approaching my house, and we were told by the fire department that we had to leave. Oh sh*t, this real.

Videos started coming in of the mountains surrounding Gatlinburg. Everything was on fire. The city center was fine, but everything else was burning. It looked like magma flows on the mountains. Oh shit, this is REAL.

And then the news started talking about people trapped in a hotel by fire. My dad was in that hotel. Everyone made it out of the hotel, but it didn't look good for a while.

It felt even more real the next day, when I heard that they had found three bodies. Then five. Then 10. They're still finding remains. I think last official count was 14. It will be higher.

When I saw National Guard helicopters and trucks, it felt a little more real.

Now that I think about it, I still don't think it feels entirely real. Nothing like this has ever happened here.

Thank you for reading, if anyone did.

12. Lozzif was lucky their brother noticed the bubbling water.

I was on the beach when the Boxing Day tsunami hit. Was sitting there talking with my brother when he noticed the bubbling water. He went 'that's not good' We started packing our stuff up and were walking up the beach, I looked back and saw the water receding and just about died. Screamed 'RUN RUN NOW' while my brother (smartly) yelled 'TSUNAMI IS COMING RUN FOR YOUR LIVES' We started running as quick as we could. There was a women about 20 feet in front of us with three kids one in her arms. He grabbed one, I grabbed the other and the three of us just ran. We were lucky and got high enough but I'll never forget that sound. It was f*cking terrifying.

Edit: so this blew up! For everyone saying my bro and I are heroes thank you but I don't agree. We did what any decent person would do. We alerted others and helped those who needed it. That is not a heroic act. We did not place ourselves in danger. We slightly varied our path to help people who needed it. If they were 500m to our side we would not have gone to help. It was fortioutous they were where we could help the best.

13. DavidTennantsTeeth had to evacuate three times in one day.

My family lost everything in the little known flood of Baton Rouge, Louisiana last year that the Red Cross called the "Worst US disaster since Hurricane Sandy."

In mid August it began raining. Then it rained some more, got more powerful, and didn't stop for days. There was talk that the local rivers were going to crest and cause some pretty serious flooding. We lived somewhat close to the Amite River, but our neighbors said our neighborhood hadn't flood in over 100 years.

Local news said that the near by high school may get a little bit of water inside from the rising river. We thought we had a couple of days to plan on how we were going to shelter in place because of the weather forecast.

On the 13th of August, I woke up, walked outside and starting walking toward the direction of the river. Some of the lower areas were collecting water but there was no standing water anywhere near my house or even my neighborhood. I went back home and told my wife we should probably get some supplies in case this got serious. Maybe we should even pack a car in case we need to leave, but I'm sure there will be nothing to worry about.

About 30 minutes into slowly packing there is a loud banging on my front door. It's my wife's cousin. I open the door and she says, "What are you doing?! Get out of the house!" I look behind her and my entire yard is under water and the water line is only about a half inch front going over my doorstep and into my house.

I was floored. The river wasn't supposed to crest until the next day. I thought we had more time.

I yelled at my wife, "We have to get out of the house. Now!"

We packed up both our cars in about 10 minutes with only our most precious memories. Everything else we had built in a 10 year marriage was left behind. We evacuated about 5 miles east away from the river to my wife's grandmothers.

After being there for about an hour someone comes to the front door and says, "You guys need to get out. The river is coming."

Sure enough, her yard was flooding.

We evacuated a second time in as many hours to her cousins house even further east. After only an hour we were told again that the river was on the way and we had to leave.

We evacuated three times that day. I drove back through the flooded waters at some point because we left our cat. When I got back to our house I sloshed through knee deep water filled with trash and our water logged belongings. Got the cat safely though.

When it was all over it was a surreal feeling. We were homeless and lost everything that didn't fit in one car. (The other car got left behind during one of the evacuations and flooded.)

Oh and I haven't even gotten to the "This is real" moment. That moment didn't come until about a week after the flood while we were living in a tiny room at my sister-in-laws house; my wife, me, 3 year old daughter, dog, cat and fish. After about a week, the shell shock wore off and I thought, "This is our new life now. This is real. I'm so glad we have each other and no one was hurt."

We're still homeless. Living at the moment at my mother-in-laws house. But we hope to buy a new home soon.

Drone footage.

Rescue during the flood. Lady pulled from a fully submerged car.

Canjun Navy

14. Scotty_NZ experienced a tsunami while hungover.

2004 Christmas Tsunami, and I was staying in the Rasa Sayang/Golden Sands in Penang. The earthquake woke me up, while I had a massive hangover. Fine, I've been through earthquakes before, no problem. Go down to the beach front pool area, relaxing having bloody mary and some food. Then people start moving towards the beach, so I go to have a look. There was a massive chunk taken out of the horizon. We just watched it. For like, 10 mins. The sea started to retract, and the fisherman boosted out to sea without saying anything. People uneasily moved away, but continued to watch.

The moment I saw the speed the sea was coming back, I knew shi*t was about to get real. I and everyone around me ran. A girl got caught, and her partner managed to snatch her back out. Reactions of a mongoose. It's only luck or a miracle for me, that our section of the beach happened to draw the full wave further down. I got back to the pool area, and turned to see the wave had begun to turn. It still made it to the pools though. The fishing village 200m down the beach was demolished. They were pulling bodies out of the water for the next couple of weeks.

15. ShadyLemon23 was the only one who made it out of the building.

I was still living in Peru when the 2007 earthquake happened. It was late afternoon, and lazy 8 year old me was sleeping in the living room, when I was woken up by my dog barking at the shaking window next to me. Now, small quick tremors are fairly common in Peru, specially in the coastal regions, so I dismissed it and tried to calm my dog so I could fall asleep again. I had walked 4 steps from the couch to grab her, when the entire wall length window shattered in front of me, huge sharp chunks falling right into the couch I had been lying in just seconds ago.

Fully woken up, I could hear what sounded like a million car alarms ringing from the ground and see towers wobbling side to side. My parents were still at work, and I was alone in a fucking 10th floor flat with a panicking dog running circles around me, so I don't know how I managed to get myself together. I lifted my giant English Cocker in my arms and ran into the emergency stairs, just ran and ran until I could see some street lights, since the damn building had no emergency lights and everything was dark. When I finally crossed the lobby's doors, I could see the pavement below me cracking and entire trees shaking from their roots up.

I stayed in the streets for about an hour until my parents arrived. I later learned I was the only person in our building that left, our neighbours took the elevators and got stuck, and those who didn't stayed inside praying for safety. It was a miracle none of them got injured, however, others were not so lucky.

16. NearlyNakedNick no longer lives on the coast for a reason.

Hurricane Ike, in Galveston and Houston in September 2008. The Wikipedia page actually down plays its devastation. I lived off of I45, which the eye of the hurricane followed very closely.

My "oh sh*t moment": When the eye hit us, I took a smoke break from trying to sop up rain that was blowing in through the cracks of the windows and doors (not large cracks, just very strong wind). In the eye of the storm it was eerily quiet compared to the howling winds that had blown down every neighborhood fence. I knew that my smoke break was over, and the eye was nearly passed, when I saw a 30ft tall tree coming down the road towards me, roots dragging the ground...

I lived with a cop at the time, and had several friends who were EMS and firefighters. Despite the media blackouts, they told me, for two weeks afterwards they were pulling 50-100 bodies out of the water everyday around Galveston island.

Where I lived at the time, power was out for three weeks after. Gas stations were dry. Grocery stores were rationing, and only letting in a dozen or so people at a time. An illegal curfew was implemented. Cops would pull you over just for being on the road.

My cop roommate had left me with a shot gun to protect the house while he was on duty during the storm and the day after. Three guys broke into my neighbor's backyard and ours (the fences were blown down) and tried to steal the neighbor's generator, and smashed the back window to our house. I ended up firing at and hitting one of them. But they all got away. Supposedly there were riots in some places.

I realize we were lucky where we were at. Whole neighborhoods had been wiped clean from the face of the Earth, you could hardly tell they were ever there at all.

I was born during hurricane Alecia, took my drivers test during Allison, evacuated for Rita, survived Ike, and now I don't live on the coast!

17. TenthSpeedWriter was given the news ala James Spann.

I'm not sure if the weight of it carries beyond west Alabama, but Tuscaloosa on April 27, 2011 when James Spann uttered the words "Oh god, it's over downtown."

When James Mother Fucking King of Serious Spann says "oh god" on air you know that you are in a state well and truly beyond screwed.

18. RepliesWithAnimeGIF had a formative hurricane experience.

I rode through Hurricane Rita when I was like 10ish. Beaumont Texas.

I told my dad that I wanted to see what Gale force winds were like. Being 10, I fell asleep before the fun started.

My father woke me up and told me to go look outside.

I watched it destroy the f*cking fence.

10 year old me thought that was real as fuck. I then spent the next week repairing said fence with the dad. 2 weeks without power and learning how to put things back together. All in all the house was fine, just light damage. Was an excellent experience overall.

19. badassmthrfkr's LA-based cousin is used to the earthquakes by now.

I was visiting my cousin in LA and while I was sleeping, I was woken by an earthquake and I sat right up: The whole room shook for like 15 seconds which was a surreal experience. After it was over, I took a bit to calm myself and got out of bed to check on my cousin. He was still lying in bed and mumbled to me that it was nothing and told me to go back to sleep. F*ck, I instantly felt like a pussy.

20. Scrappy_Larue's wife started labor during a hurricane.

"I think I'm in labor."
My wife gave me that news while Hurricane Gloria was whipping the hell out of Long Island. Fortunately it was a long labor, because we couldn't leave for the hospital till the storm calmed down. The worst of it was when they returned home, because we didn't have power for the first two weeks of our first child's life.

Behind every living man is a great woman who encouraged their stubbon a** to look after themselves.

A woman wrote into "Am I The A**hole?" from the hospital waiting room to ask whether it was wrong of her to trick her husband into going to the emergency room for his testicle pain.

Using the apt username inthewaitingroomnow, she wrote:

My husband over the course of the last couple weeks has been complaining about testicle pain. It started out mild and then got worse and worse to the point where every couple minutes he doubles over in pain.

I practically begged him to go to the doctor and he kept saying no and insisting that it would go away on its own. It got to the point where he can’t even drive because he loses concentration and would crash.

Tonight he asked me to go get pain killers and I claimed to not know the kind he likes. He said just get any kind and I insisted he come with me to show me. He begrudgingly agreed and got in the car. He wasn’t paying much attention so I drove to the hospital.

When we got nearby he realized and got incredibly mad and yelled at me saying that I shouldn’t have taken him etc etc. I basically pushed him in and he’s with the doctor now.

I know there’s probably going to be hell to pay after but AITA (Am I The A**hole)?

She updated the post with the diagnosis:

Update: he had appendicitis. I don’t know why he felt it in the testicles, and the doctors didn’t either, but it was appendicitis. I think he was just describing it poorly to me but he insists he felt it in his balls. But thankfully he’s going to be fine. Wasn’t too mad either.

While nobody wants their loved ones to be sick, inthewaitingroomnow must have felt vindicated that her husband did, in fact, need medical attention (and after vindication, she was relieved that he is going to be okay).

This seems like an obvious one considering the outcome, and the AITA jury agrees: she is not the a**hole. The ends justify the means.

MiraculousMolecules chimed in with a study:

[Not The A**hole] - There's a statistic about how people in relationships live longer because their partners insist on them getting medical care when they might have otherwise avoided it. Your actions are literally extending his life.

The study, called "Marriage and men's health," came from Harvard Medical School, and found that "married men are healthier than men who were never married or whose marriages ended in divorce or widowhood."

People on Twitter could relate.

They also busted the guy's already-painful balls.

Men: nut up and get the medical help you need.

There's no shame in not wanting to double over in pain.

“Everything I know I learned from dogs.”

– Nora Roberts

I've said it once, I'll say it a thousand times, we really do not deserve dogs. They give us comfort, make us laugh, and throw a lil party every time we walk in the door. Puppers are little bundles of pure unconditional love, not to mention they are pretty dang cute. If you have a dog, these adorably hilarious memes will absolutely make you laugh out loud.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

18.

19.

20.

21.

22.

23.

You might share everything from tattoos to clothing to your inner-most thoughts, but there is probably a secret or two you're not sharing with your BFF. Maybe the truth would hurt their feelings. Maybe it would ruin their trust in you. Or maybe you've committed a felony and don't want them involved for their own good. Awww. Whatever the reason, some things you have to keep to yourself in the interest of preserving the friendship.

Someone asked Reddit: "what have you never told your best friend because you're afraid it may end the friendship?" These 19 people share the dark secrets they're hiding from their BFF's:

1.) From Grandmere13:

I never told my friend that I know that her and her boyfriend used to steal food from my house.

Her boyfriend at the time basically stole from everyone and was always getting fired from work for stealing from the till.

The bit that upsets me is that she knew full well that if she needed food, I'd have given it to her. She didn't need to steal the stuff.

She ditched that boyfriend which is why we're still friends. (And she doesn't steal from me anymore.)

2.) From verbal_pestilence:

that she's a disaster with money and she needs to stop spending and take a hard look at how she's fucking her future

although she's got a solid pension coming

but still she's had multiple bankruptcies. multiple.

smh

3.) From sir_clusterfuck:

that she is impulsive, irrational and does not make good decisions. I love her and she's very fun to be around, but it gets annoying and draining at times

4.) From yous_a_bitch:

i think her eyebrows are too thin and i'm 99% sure if her husband isn't currently cheating on her, he has and will again. also her husband passed the "alcoholic" stage of problem drinking a long while back and it's starting to affect how her kids see him.

5.) From eryaboroy:

Chameleon is not pronounced SHA-meleon.

6.) From HolyOrdersOtaku:

That he gets too worked up about games and that's why I don't play with him very often. Great guy, just don't play Overwatch with him.

7.) From mustydarnell:

I think he's a lazy greasy fuck who's main problem in life is that he holds himself back by being lazy and greasy. Great guy tho

8.) From jenjenanjuce:

She is full of shit about her "psychic powers." She's way too clingy and needy. When she finally cut ties with her mentally abusive ex, I packed all of her things and loaded up a large uhaul to get her moved by myself. She sat around the entire time crying repeating "I can't do this" while I did it. It's been about two months and I just now found out that three weeks ago she started talking to a new man whom she is already telling she loves. It will end badly. I know it will and I just can't pick up the pieces again. Edit: to everyone who tell me to cut her out of my life, this is the same person who pulled a knife on a guy who tried to rape me. Do I need to count the amount of times she's held my hair while I threw up? Picked me up from bad dates? Driven me to work without being given has money? Bunch of judgmental assholes it what y'all are

9.) From Goodlittlewitch:

She literally becomes the most annoying person alive when she drinks. Her husband and I have made a team effort of watering down any drink she has just to avoid gatherings where one of us had to listen to her ramble 😂

10.) From nivla73:

The night my best friend met his now wife( of 18 years) I met her about an hour before and she blew me in bathroom at the party we were all at. I saw them making out an hour later after I went to buy cigarettes. I never said a word and neither has she.

11.) ​​​​​​​From Septoncellardoor:

I had sex with his sister. Not sure if it'd end the friendship. But he'd be weirded out

12.) From eraser_dust:

I think her kid's an idiot. Cute, but an idiot.

13.) From WallyPlumstead:

I never told my friend that I found out it was him that broke into my place.

This occured back in the 1970s when I was a kid.

My family and i lived in the second floor apartment of a 2 family apartment house. Our apartment was a strange one as in addition to our front door, we had several other doors that led to different rooms to our apartment.

One day my mother, myself, brother, and sister went out. When we came back home, all our doors were wide open. We entered our apartment and our place was a mess. All of our stuff was all over the place. Every room was a mess. Like a burglar who tore through our apartment, tossing everything aside. There was no forced entry (we accidentally left one of our doors unlocked). In spite of our stuff being tossed around, nothing was broken. We were dirt poor, so we had nothing of value worth stealing. The most expensive thing we owned in our place was our 25 inch color tv in a wooden console, but that was way too big and heavy to steal. Nothing in our place was stolen.

We called the cops who came over and made a report.

Weeks later I was talking to another kid in the neighborhood who out of the blue told me how he and my best friend (who lived a few houses up the block from me) came calling on me when I wasnt home. They discovered the unlocked door and as a prank were the ones who opened all the doors and went through our apartment messing it up, tossing our things willy nilly all over the place.

I never told my friend (or anyone else) that I found out that it was him that went into my place and messed it up. But I was a little disappointed in him. And he never came forward and confessed to me. Never said anything about it. He never knew that I knew.

Today that same kid is an internationally renowned classical pianist.

14.) ​​​​​​​From slappy_nutsack:

Had a bit of a crush on a chick. (Ok, more than a bit) She was married, so it was a hopeless infatuation. Found out six months later, they weren't married, but engaged. They told people that they were married for convenience.

I made friends with her "husband". He was a shitlord. Everyone, even she knew it. A couple of months later, he and a few buddies beat the ever-loving shit out of a guy. She accused her "husband" but he vehemently denied it. She knew there was bad blood in the group and demanded that he not get involved. He told her he didn't. She believed him.

I have an old, old, old email account running around. It is useful for sending anonymous emails. So I did. I pointed out every person that was involved. I sent it to her, not because of her "husband" but because she was an executive in the company that they both work for. It had the appearance of someone on the outside with a grievance with the company and no one in particular.

She confronted him. He denied at first. But then admitted to it. They had a huge argument.

We're married now. (Me and her, not him). She doesn't know I sent the email.

15.) From [deleted]:

So a long long time ago we were probably 10-12ish, my sister and I were jealous of our neighbor having a pool party and we weren't invited. So we found a dead squirrel in the street. And we picked it up with a barbeque grill we found on the side of the road and put it on her front doorstep with a note saying "This will be you!"

We ran home and told our dad, because we thought Dad was cool. Turns out he totally narc'd us out to Mom. Mom flipped out and told us to go back and get rid of it. So we did. We came home and my mom had her purse and jacket on and told us to get in the car. She told us a neighbor saw what we did and called the police and we had to go down to the station.

We were crying in the car and my mom drove us down the road then stopped. She told us she made up the story about the police and it was a lesson never to do anything like that again. We didn't, we're still friends with our neighbor, and we never told her about it. That was almost 20 years ago.

16.) ​​​​​​​From garbagebutsaidfancy:

They know my memory is bad, but what I'd never tell them is that it's so bad I genuinely believe I'll suffer from dementia at a young age. I forget key details and memories pertaining to the ones I love, and I've honestly just become good at faking my way through conversations to try to seem like I'm a functional person.

17.) From caitybear:

I never told her she saved me from killing myself last october

18.) ​​​​​​​From BrokeInMichigan:

We're not that close of friends anymore, but I had sex a few times with a friends mom. I was 22 at the time, my friend was 18 or 19, and his mom was in her late 30's. She got drunk one night while I was over hanging out, and after everyone else crashed, she came over and started flirting with me. We only had sex 4 or 5 times, but it was amazing, and now I've been into older women ever since.

Pretty sure he'd at least punch me in the jaw if he ever found out.

19.) ​​​​​​​From StalenRos:

I have the biggest crush on her and it's driving me crazy.

I'm also a girl and she has no idea I'm not straight.

The name "Karen" gets thrown around a lot these days, and it's not because it's experiencing a surge of popularity.

Instead, "Karen" has become an insult used to describe white women who abuse their privilege by calling the cops or asking to speak to a manager every time the wind blows the wrong way. There's a fine line between standing up for yourself and engaging in Karen-esque behavior.

One woman is asking the people of Reddit whether she is, in fact, a Karen after she alerted the authorities over an eyeglasses prescription.

It all started with a routine eye exam — this woman's first ever:

I went to [an optometrist] that was in a local mall. the exam was okay, the doctor was nice, and I was out of there in no time. as I was leaving the examination room, the optometrist instructs me to go to the front desk to get me sorted.

She tried to nab her prescription without purchasing the overpriced specs in the store:

I go up and asked for the prescription, since I was just going to buy a cheap pair online, only really needing it to read. and I was told "those are for our records, you can go over to the shop next door to pick out your glasses (the store next door was a part of the practice, I guess?) I inform the reception that I'm not interested in buying over-priced frames for something I'll only be used to read.

The receptionist wasn't having it:

the receptionist goes off on a tirade saying that those online glasses websites are all a scam (my brother uses them, which is why I thought that I can just get my prescription, and be on my way) - well I doubled down and demanded to have my prescription - I paid good money for the exam, so I think I have the right to have my prescription.

She refused to give the woman her prescription... so the woman called the cops:

the receptionist was adamant and refused to hand over my prescription, and the optometrist also said the same, and wouldn't give me my prescription - so I didn't know what to do so I just called the non-emergency line and was told to wait for a police officer to arrive. maybe 10 minutes later a police officer arrives and asks me what was up - I informed him what was going on, and then he goes in to talk to the receptionist. maybe about another 5 minutes tick by and I'm told to come up to the desk, where the receptionist begrudgingly hands over my prescription - I took it - said thanks to the officer and left.

She got her prescription, but her friend called her a Karen:

I told my friend what happened and he says "so you called the police since they (optometrist clinic) didn't give you your prescription? okay Karen, seems like a waste of police time to me lol" but i disagree - why would they charge me for the eye exam to then bar me from using the prescription anywhere but their clinic, with their over-priced glasses.

But she's not sure whether the Karen designation fits:

since the officer somehow got them to give up my prescription - I think I'm in the right.

reddit, was i the a-hole Karen in this situation?

Surprisingly, the people of the internet took the potential Karen's side for once.

Eliryale says the optometrist's office got what was coming to them:

You were being illegally strong armed by a business attempting to force you to buy from them. Look up your local medical authority and report them. This would be the same as if a GP refuses to tell you the result of a blood test unless you got your medication from him.

cyanotticeproyon says it really is illegal for them to withhold someone's prescription:

part of the exam is to give you a prescription of for corrective lenses, if you need them. You can get your glasses or contacts anywhere you want. They were totally out of line not giving you your prescription, and you were completely justified in calling the police. I would report them to the optometry board.

HellaHighAtHogwarts points out that since she called the police department's non-emergency line, it's okay:

If you had called 911, then sure you’d be [an a-hole]. You could have probably gone another route, like filing a complaint. But recently I got my eyes checked and they haven’t given me my contact RX. I know it’s so I will have to buy from them but joke’s on them since I can still order them and 1-800contacts will have them fax it over. Follow up with a review and a complaint though so they don’t do that to someone else.

AllShallBeWell says the optometrists really were breaking the law by not giving her the prescription:

If this was in the U.S., they were literally breaking the law, and calling the non-emergency number for the cops was a reasonable thing to do.

Filing a complaint against them with the FTC is also something you can do, though that's unlikely to ever go anywhere.

ohhlookshiny pointed out that if the police intervention was wrong, she wouldn't have gotten her prescription in the end:

Well you got the prescription in the end, so it doesn't seem like a waste of time to me. If the optometrist had a leg to stand on, the cop probably wouldn't have been able to help.

And side rant, kinda really tired of every woman who dares stand up for herself being called "a Karen".

Score one for the world's Karens.

As Ben Franklin once said, fish and visitors stink in three days.

But if any of these people stayed at your home, you'd probably start noticing the metaphorical stench even more quickly.

A recent Reddit thread asked people to name the most annoying things guests have done in their homes. From wiping their butts on shower curtains to rearranging entire rooms, here are some of the world's most horrific houseguests.

1. There's just no excuse for this.

Let their little kid wipe his ass with my guest towels. Instead of, you know, asking where the toilet paper is. - OldTimerNubbins

2. Those must've been some potent pills.

One of my mother's friends is not only a raging alcoholic but is also on ridiculous amount of prescription drugs. One night she was staying with my parents and fell asleep in a leather recliner because of aforementioned alcohol and drugs. At some point in the middle of the night she shit herself, again because of the aforementioned alcohol and drugs, and instead of being a good guest and decent human being and being embarrassed by it and doing her damndest to clean it up, she threw the blanket she was sleeping under over her mess and then went upstairs to sleep in one of the beds. Then she just told my mother about it in the morning and then left.

My mother used bleach and every cleaner under the sun to clean up the mess, and she did, but she ended up just throwing the chair out because how could you ever really look at it the same way again.

The most shocking detail in this story is that my mother is still friends with this lady. - ArchaeoRunner

3. Wow, "deadbeat" isn't a strong enough word.

My late partner was very sick with leukemia. After over a year of being his 24/7 caregiver I got the opportunity to go abroad for a work trip. My partner insisted I go because I deserved a break from caregiving and that his deadbeat brother would fill in as caregiver while I was gone.

While his brother was staying with in our home, he brought his cat which is a no no for someone who living with zero immune system, did the ABSOLUTE minimum to take care of my partner and left him basically to figure out Meds/food on his own. And the final blow was he stole the big piggy bank that we were using to save for his bucket list vacation before he died. Then denied he did it.

It makes my blood boil thinking about it. - saudadedebahia

4. He sounds like a handful...

A kid whose parents didn’t supervise him. He was probably 8 or 9 at the time and would get into ANYTHING - especially stuff computer related. He would dig through drawers and open boxes looking for gadgets to play with. Only to f*** them up or lose something.

We finally told the parents they couldn’t bring him back when he got into the kitchen and turned on the glass top stove while a pizza box was on it. Started a small, quickly extinguished fire and the house smelled like smoke for about a week. - Actually_Im_A_Broom

5. Who raises these people?

Had a friend visit for a few days. We cleaned our spare bedroom for him, and when he left, there were soda cans, used plates, random food wrappers, just litter all over. This was after he said he made time to clean up. Never again. - RazzleStorm

6. I get why this is annoying, but this lady can come over and rearrange my house any time.

I was at work all day and I always close my door before leaving, ALWAYS. My mum had guests over and decided “hey, let’s show the guests everyone’s rooms and all the rooms in the house in general.” Well, one lady, whom I had never met, didn’t like how I arranged MY room, so while everyone was at dinner (I work from 11:30 am to about 9 pm, 6 days a week, so I wasn’t there when this happened), she went into my room and rearranged my desk, the clothes in my drawers and closet, all my pictures, and threw out some Knick knacks that were given to me by old friends but she thought were ‘trash’ I ‘hadn’t thrown out yet’. I. Was. PISSED. She totally admitted it, but didn’t seem to feel bad at all. My mum was upset too, but not as much as me. They’re no longer friends but I’m not sure why, prolly cuz she threw out some of my mum’s Knick knacks as well. - Loves_me_tacos125

7. You can't reorganize safety!

My uncle once reorganized my entire kitchen.

It wouldn't have been horrible (aggravating yes, but not horrible) EXCEPT that he moved the fire extinguisher and didn't tell anyone. So when I accidentally started a small grease fire I couldn't find the extinguisher.

And that's how I burned my hands, destroyed my stove, and nearly burned my kitchen down.

All because he just had to rearrange my f***** kitchen. - FreddieGregg

8. Maybe you shouldn't have had such an awesome, mess-up-able house!

I asked my friends (a couple) to watch my house while I was away. By “watch” I meant check in every few days and bring in my mail. They thought I meant “stay there, sleep in my bed, make a huge mess, stink up the kitchen with burnt food which they left in the pot for a week (ruining the pot), and...well, I guess that’s it. I was most displeased. - elezraita

9. This person is an ax murderer, no question.

I had a house-guest turn the toilet paper rolls around to face the other direction. I flipped them back, only to find them backwards again the next day. - curagee5656

10. Uhhh... this is not okay.

Didnt really bother me bc it happens pretty often but it is strange I guess, I had taken a nap and my friend let himself in and just kinda joined. It seems like a cute idea but waking up in the arms of a guy you do not remember falling asleep on is quite terrifying. - tirednothigh

11. Hey, some people just plan to be freeloaders.

My best friend wouldn’t f****** leave. When I asked her what her going home plans were after six days, she said “I don’t plan my life that way.”

We are 30. - aj4ever

12. Who would even want to interact with this person?

Play League of Legends for 3 days straight without hardly interacting with anyone. Thanks for stopping by, close friend I hadn't seen in years. Never inviting you over again. - phurgawtin

“With the fearful strain that is on me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die.”

-Abraham Lincoln

Laughter is truly magical. It can transform the worst day into one of the best. Take a little time out this morning and enjoy these funny memes. Each one was carefully picked just to make you giggle.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

18.

19.

20.

21.

22.

23.

24.

25.

26.

While we've made a significant amount of progress in overcoming homophobia, there's always more work to be done.

Hearing men say, "no homo" to their male friends after they accidentally graze their shoulder has mostly gone away as a joke trend, but deeply rooted expectations for men regarding their masculinity and sexual identity have lingered. Men should be able to enjoy the benefits of proper hygiene, fruity cocktails, and emotional vulnerability without fearing their sexuality will be judged. Go ahead, wear pink! Let your boys play with Barbies! It's 2020. Everything is fluid, kids!

Sometimes people can be so judgmental that the hate comes full circle and comes out hilarious. Drinking from a straw is gay? Ok, sure, Blake. Straws are great and so are gay people! When a recent Reddit user asked, "Straight men of Reddit: what's the strangest thing you've been told not to do because 'that's gay'?" men everywhere were ready to share the funniest, most ridiculous lies they've ever been told.

1. The entire state, "iph0ne."

I grew up in California before moving to the east coast as a teenager.

I've been told all Californian's are gay or at least bi, more than once.

2. Bookmarks determine your sexual preferences, "RJ1337."

I was reading a book and a couple dudes called me gay. Not for reading a book, but because I was using a bookmark.

3. Dear god, "amc7262."

There was a thread on here a while back where some poor girl told the world about an ex who wouldn't wipe himself or wash his genitals cause "touching a d*ck is gay"

4. Ha! "PhillipLlerenas."

Eating p*ssy. Seriously. Homie told me it was submissive to eat p*ssy and "kinda gay". He was Jamaican and I hear that's a widespread belief down there.

Also I heard a rapper once say eating bananas without cutting them up was "sus"...

5. Everyone please floss, "DeadWombats."

Floss my teeth.

Apparently, gingivitis is something only hetero people have.

6. One seat in-between or your sexuality changes, "writerintheory1382."

My brother in law and I went to a movie. He told me it was gay to sit next to him. I told him to stop being a b*tch and I sat right next to him. For the entire movie.

7. WTF, "mindfeces."

Enjoy female singers/fronted bands. I came from a very stupid place with a very stupid culture.

8. Why deny yourself joy? "Glubmerrow."

I went on a date with a guy who wouldn't drink cocktails because they were gay. So he'd only drink beer to be more masculine.

9. Straight men can't be nice, "Akinory13."

A guy in the bus offered his seat to a woman that was standing. She looked at him and said "Are you gay or something?" like it's gay to be polite. She still got the seat, but if I was him I wouldn't give her my seat after that

10. What even, "PI3M3I."

Use a straw.

Because apparently it’s like having a tiny penis in your mouth.

I still use straws and haven’t had the urge to suck a d*ck yet.

11. Everyone needs towels, "Shiasurasa."

Linen shopping. By my best friend.

That's nice bro, but I need towels. Deal with it

12. Treats are for everyone, "Tetragon213."

Once was told that baking and cooking were "gay" or "too feminine".

F*ck that shit! My dad was a professional chef, and I'd be damned proud to follow in his footsteps in the culinary world. Also, who doesn't love the guy who can whip up birthday cakes, brownies and snacks?

13. This one is wild, "Reiring."

Going to a cafe and eating /drinking anything there. I'll have as many strawberry sundaes as I want god dammit.

14. Amazing, "BoilEmMashEmBoilEm."

My sister told me this gem. Her male friend said he hated being a guy because he COULDN'T USE AN UMBRELLA. Apparently it's gay to keep yourself dry.

15. Tragic, "SquidgyTheWhale."

I've heard that if you Google it, you'll find a lot of evidence that some men don't wash their buttholes because they've heard it's gay. Makes me want off this planet.

There a multiple ways to make your commute interesting: read a book, listen to a podcast, or if you're really lazy, peep on the people next to you.

Commuters are sharing their stories of the most out-of-the-ordinary things they saw on the bus or train, and they'll make you want to look up from your phone next time you ride.

1. SomethingPretty88 saw a real quack.

A woman on the London tube brought three live ducks in harnesses onto the carriage. They were just stood there chilling and quacking away.

2. Everybody poops, RiseUpLightz.

This really well dressed lady in a business suit stood up and started taking out newspapers to put on the floor. She pulled her pants down, took a sh*t, wrap it up and casually stuff the soiled newspaper into her handbag like it was nothing. The bus driver was yelling at her the whole time and she didn't give a sh*t. Scanned her card and got off at the next stop

3. PlasticEnthusiasm was weirded out, but sisterhood is powerful.

I stayed in Istanbul for a month. During that time, I came to the conclusion that some women lean back to back to avoid harassment.

My first encounter was very weird tho. It was very crowded and there were only two other girls there. Without saying anything, they wiggled their way to me and both leaned their back on my back. Not gonna lie, I was quite spooked. Haven't experienced it anywhere else.

4. Diamond_Jordy met an enthusiastic rider.

A guy kept yelling NO!! Every time the bus stopped at a bus stop.

He yelled YES!! When the bus stopped at his stop.

5. What the fish, Snafuspect?

I live in Detroit and I saw a grown man pull a fish out of a bag and slap a girl with it! Honestly I was scared for my life.

6. rabrabbitrab saw some next-level deodorant.

I saw an elderly lady pull out a can of Lysol, spray her armpits then lift up her skirt and spray it between her legs. No reaction or acknowledgement for what she just did. I moved to the next car.

7. Dwargen saw a train within a train.

A guy was standing next to me with a model train (modeled after the V/Line Trains in Victoria, Australia) that he just bought. Proceeded to strike up a conversation with me, telling me about how he was bitten by a dog, sued the owner, and used the money he got to buy the model. He even showed me both the bite wound and took the model out of its box to show me. A strange experience, but also quite interesting.

8. Minituo saw a real life "Weekend at Bernie's" situation.

I once saw an elderly guy pushing an old man in a wheelchair in the underground. The man in the wheelchair wore sunglasses (not a sunny day) and had staring eyes behind them. He also had his feet crossed in a way no old man would have. His hand were really pale and folded on his lap. I could not see him breathing.

But the strangest thing was that the elderly man was holding the old man's head the whole time. Not gently, but really holding it with his two hands as if it would fall off.

I still don't know if he was dead, a puppet or really sick. But it was somehow really scary.

9. She's not wrong, SonovaVondruke.

Tiny elderly Chinese woman was carrying a live chicken by the feet in one hand and a shopping bag in the other. Tried to get on a bus and the driver stopped her. They argue back and forth for a bit and finally she lets out an exasperated growl, breaks the neck of the chicken, stuffs it in the bag and shouts "It groceries now!"

10. Britney2007's got this in the bag.

Dude across from me takes everything out of his backpack while kind of muttering to himself. I figure he’s looking for something. He then proceeds to put the backpack on his head. Guess he needed to take a closer look.

11. FeGodwnNiEto got a new kind of "German hello."

I was on a sleeper train going from Hamburg to Rotterdam and woke up in the middle of the night to a 60ish year old German lady violently masturbating on the bunk opposite while staring into my very soul. I just pretended to go back to sleep. I wasn't asleep. She knew.

Bonus - in the morning when we arrived and were leaving the train she winked at me.

12. b778av survived, so the guy obviously didn't succeed.

A guy on a train, seesawing back and forth saying: "I will kill everyone, everyone. The streets will be flooded with blood. The day will come close, I will kill everyone, no mercy, no survivors, a feast for everyone. Even the innocent, the innocent will die." and so on.

13. byleist saw a poor man's Edward Scissorhands.

I was taking a train at night and some guy was standing with his back against the nearest door, scissors in both hands, and just snipped at air.

14. You better bee-lieve Thunder_Munch.

I once saw a bee fly onto the DC metro land on a seat. It hung out there for one stop and then took off again when the door opened.

15. Crikey, P0T4T0_AIM.

A lady with a rat in her hoodie and she was whispering to it "be quiet, I don't want to get in trouble again". And a guy was behind me with his phone in his Beenie playing Scremo really loud in his ear. This was on the one bus. Rural Australia is weird sometimes.

16. marklyon describes the nasty quite eloquently.

Giant homeless woman started to bathe herself on the F train. She stripped down on a moderately full car and used two gallon jugs of spring water and a roll of paper towels.

Little rivulets of homeless lady funk streaked across the floor as everyone raised their feet, wishing the train would come to a stop quickly.

17. M0rbidea deserves a pedicure after this.

I saw a man take his shoes off and clip his nails on the train. Left his nasty nails all over the seat and floor once he got out.

The lifestyles of the rich and famous create wildly unrealistic standards for the rest of us. Not only do they have the money to buy fancier houses that they fill with glossy things, but they also have the money to pay people to clean those houses.

So, whenever you see sparkling images of a celebrity's perfectly kept home, just remember they have a seemingly invisible staff, and also that every photo shared on social media is curated to present a specific image.

Even with this knowledge in mind, it's all too easy to compare ourselves to the aspirational images posted online.

Recently, Kim Kardashian posted a series of Instagram stories touring her kids' playroom.

As you can imagine, the playroom was massive and well-stocked with all sorts of different toys. There were bountiful rocking horses, slides, plastic dinosaurs, action figures, books, and drawing paper.

Of course, despite the fact the room is dedicated to children, it was impeccably organized and everything was in its place.

There's even a closet full of decadent costumes so the kids can dress up and put on their own little plays.

While Kardashian's kids' playroom is unsurprisingly lush, that amount of space and organization isn't the norm for most people raising young kids.

In a recent Facebook post, Ellen DeGeneres asked viewers if their playrooms are messier than Kardashian's, and encouraged them to share photos and fun captions.

The parents were quick to respond.

One mom joked: "clearly we aren't Keeping up with the Kardashians."

Another shared an image of her "worst nightmare."

One mom shared visual proof of how quickly her son destroys his bedroom.

She wrote:

Well...my son will be 5 tomorrow. He destroys his bedroom in mere minutes. Sometimes I want to give up. (The Pepsi boxes are "minecraft costumes"...)

Edit: He had literally dumped out every toy container looking for one specific toy. This has obviously been cleaned up. (Several times) Calm yourselves, mom shamers.

Also, yes, he has a sheet. I can't believe so many of you are worried about a sheet.

And the cat...she's fine. She's not scared. She runs in there every time the door opens.

Another mom joked about having to "clean her way out" of her daughter's room.

Some messes had the visual glory of an obstacle course.

But the image of a young girl napping after being asked to clean her room was by far the most relatable to all of us who would rather sleep than organize our mess.

If you wanna feel less alone about the state of your house, scrolling this thread is a great reminder that you're in good, plentiful company.

It can be lonely driving a truck for hours upon end, so it's hardly surprising truckers have used their CB radios for more than just the necessary work coordination.

While the age of cellphones has shifted a lot of the communication away from CB radios, there were decades where long-distance truckers communicated with each other via the airwaves, and the freedom of talking into the abyss often emboldens people.

In a popular Reddit thread, truckers and people who have stumbled upon the airwaves shared some of the weirdest and most memorable things they've heard.

The range from wholesome to disturbing truly sums up human nature.

1. ZapatasGuns's dad got trolled.

Not creepy but back in the early 80's my mom and dad had a CB in their Cadillac. They were once driving with the car top down and my dad was shirtless ( yeah, early 80's...) and they heard something like "calling all truckers, be on the lookout for a beautiful woman in a Cadillac with a naked buffalo." The story always gave me a good laugh, my dad is a pretty hairy dude.

Edit: Sent mom a text and got some details a little off, but I enjoy the actual version even more. https://i.imgur.com/EiBl9lp.jpg

2. According to TheMightyGoatMan, James Earl Jones used to freak people out with the dark side of the force.

James Earl Jones used to freak truckers out by doing his Darth Vader voice over cb radio.

3. fox_mulders_brains doesn't know who was creeping on them.

Hello "my license plate's number", I like your arrrrrrrse, lets have some funnnnnnnn under the sunnnnnnnnn "heavy breathing."

The thing is, it was the middle of the night, no one behind or front of me for as far as I could see.

And didn't see anybody tailing me for last 30mins.

4. ajpa6 didn't expect the trucker bond to be on that level,

About 4 years ago at a New Jersey truck stop, there was a truck parked with a big, flat screen TV in the sleeping portion of his cab. It was night and he had a vintage/hairy porn movie on. He had his curtain open and there were 2 other trucks parked on angles next to and in front of him so that they could also join in the viewing.

One of them was on the CB discussing the movie in detail while breathing heavily and jerking it. I've heard of a brotherhood and close bond between some truckers, but I definitely didn't expect it to be on that level.

5. liddicoatite wishes they could unhear that conversation about horses.

Not a trucker, but I've been on lots of trips (for geology classes) where multiple cars keep in touch via radio. We've often overheard truckers using the same frequency, nothing too interesting. But one time on a field trip to the east coast, we overheard to truckers discussing their sex lives (or lack thereof). After 30 seconds or so of "I miss pussy" kind of stuff, which is awkward enough to hear with your professor in the front seat, we hear one trucker suggest to the other that he should try f*cking horses.

He went on for a while about how horses never complain, and it's just easier to f*ck a horse than it is to seduce a woman or buy time with a prostitute. Then suddenly they were out of range, and we couldn't hear anymore. No one in the car spoke for several minutes, and when conversation did start back up no one said anything about the conversation we overheard. We never talked about it at all.

6. 18wheelsoffury heard a man get a little too in-depth about his sexual experience.

Hearing creepy stuff over the radio isn't very common, it's usually radio checks, warnings of bears ahead (cops), or traffic/weather warnings.

At the truck stops you usually hear drivers sharing stories, talking shit to each other (happens the most), cb shops selling clip n snip/peak and tune services, or pimps handing out tricks for whatever price they feel is justified... sometimes it's the cops baiting drivers.

Occasionally you get bad jokes, somebody playing some annoying prerecorded bullsh*t over and over again, the occasional driver airing whatever he's playing on his stereo, or they repeat some word over and over again.

In the western half of the country, channel 19 is pretty quiet, especially in California. Getting an answer from anybody is difficult. In the eastern half of the country, cb traffic is a little more heavy.

The cb radio isn't really used that much anymore but many drivers still have them because it's handy for a lot of situations.

Creepiest thing I ever heard was some guy describing how nasty the hooker he just f*cked was... in fine detail. He seemed to enjoy the fact that she apparently doesn't shave.

7. onetwo34fivesix7 heard everything from men trolling homophobes to people talking about their alien abductions.

I remember pulling into a truck stop for the night and hearing guys pretend to be gay on the CB. The old school homophobic drivers would get their panties in a twist and demand to know what truck the gay guys were in so they could kick their a*ses. So much graphic flirting and murder threats in one channel.

But the weirdest stuff I ever heard while driving was on Art Bells late night show. People who were absolutely convinced that they had little people/leprechauns/gnomes/fairies living in their gardens. Or they would describe in earnest detail about how the had been abducted by aliens.

8. EmilyJaneMeows heard an in-depth description of a drug deal.

I’m no trucker or have a cb radio, but my dad has a decent amount of small walkie talkies for track and field events. One time while organizing and cleaning his equipment in our living room we suddenly heard talking out of one of the walkies, turns out someone in our neighborhood was using the same frequency to discuss a drug deal with their friend who was also really close to us. We about died laughing.

9. RedLauren remembers the man who used to read erotic fiction to the drivers.

In the 80s, there was a man in Hobart who would sit on the UHF radio for hours, reading erotic fiction for the truckies who were coming through southern Tasmania. It was usually the short fiction from porn mags, and the regular listeners would take the time to thank him for his contributions.

10. PM_ME_UR_SUBARU was propositioned in their sleep.

I always turn the radio down when I go in the sleeper to sleep but this day I had stopped at a store to sleep. It was just my truck there in the parking lot and when I got in bed and realized I had left the radio on I was like eh screw it, I'm all alone in some small town in the store parking lot and not close to the freeway.

Screw it I though, no ones gonna come through I'm just gonna leave it on and sleep. Well I did sleep. I was woken up to the sounds of a guy talking. I was immediately filled with that fear kinda feeling for a few good seconds until I realized it was the d*mn cb radio. When I was fully awake he was going on about how much more he likes "boy p*ssy" more than a girls. Now on some cb radios it shows the strength of the signal and it kinda helps to see how close the person transmitting is and when I got up I saw that it was pretty much full strength. I had my hours back so I was getting ready to get up and do a walk around of the truck and when I got out I saw another truck in the lot parked right behind me and he was just in the driver seat holding the cb mic.

As I got to the back of my truck I just kinda waved and the guy waved back and kept doing my pre trip. Got back in my truck and he was still going on and on. I was planning on saying something back to let him know I was listening but he never let off the transmit button. That fear feeling was strong when I heard his voice. I had thought someone was in my truck or something. Now I always turn off the radio when I sleep.

11. thegreatbanjini heard too much.

Parked at the TA in Baltimore, someone keyed up and said "I've got an itch I can't scratch and lookin for a good buddy, cmon."

Nothing creepy... Just a dude tryin to get fucked in the a*s.

There was a dude with a big radio I heard from the Michigan/Ohio line all the way to North Carolina and all he would say over and over and over again was "WHAT ABOUT THE N***ERS AND THE MEXICANS SATCHMO?!?" 10 hours straight.

12. itsmylife6567 almost accidentally exploited a trucker's kindness.

When I was kid, we were riding down the highway in our pickup with a cab, and I was in the back playing on my walkie talkie. I started saying that I was kidnapped and described my old man's truck thinking nobody would hear me when a trucker came on and said he was right behind us and asked how he could help......scared the sh*t outta me! Thankfully my parents never found out.

13. Next_leap_home still doesn't know where the cries for help were coming from.

I'm not a trucker but I heard a woman's voice saying "Help!" Followed by a man with a thick southern accent repeating "Heelllp".

It went on like that for a while to. This happened about 8 years ago on the toll road in Indiana late at night. Freaked the shit it of me.

Edit: Seeing that this got some interest I just wanted to add that this happened in 2005 around thanksgiving on I-90. I didn't radio for police because every time the woman said "help" it sounded the same like a recording and probably wasn't someone in real danger.

14. pjohnson8320 knew too much.

A full grown man saying I ain't got no panties on!!!

15. Thekeysmaster misses the radio days.

Former local driver...used to always hear a guy on channel 19 say "if you want a blow job go to 21". He'd say it every few minutes or so, every day. Every once in a while I'd go to 21 to see if anyone took him up on it. Also had a friend stationed in New Mexico that had a CB in his car, got chatting with a driver for a large parcel delivery service and he said "for 20 bucks I'll let you pick any box out of the back".

And if there was ever a pretty girl with a low shirt or short skirt everyone would have a field day. Trucks would get in front of them and slow down so the other trucks could catch up and get a glimpse, all coordinated via the CB. But for the most part it's just bored, lonely assholes just looking for attention and something to keep them awake. Definitely not as popular as it used to be once everyone could get traffic and fuel station info on their phones.

16. ZeeiMoss heard the Children of the Corn sing.

My boyfriend and I were on a road trip through the south (we live in NJ). I believe it was in Tennessee when we needed a break from the drive and decided to stop at a large, abandoned barn. The experience itself was normal for urban exploration, but when we returned to the car, the radio was on. Neither of us remember leaving it on. What was playing wasn't music but a group of children chanting something about God.

17. Ltlgbmi32 still doesn't know if that dog is okay.

Driving thru north little rock , where there are 3 truck stops close together, this guy comes on the CB radio and says he's going to kill his puppy because he can't potty train it. I don't know if it was real or not, but there were several minutes of off and on dog squeals, cries, and howls. Other truckers were trying to find where he was, but I got out of range and never heard anything more about it.

18. nzjYoung__ still doesn't know what was up with the fire.

Not on the CB but it was a phone call…I was with a mate in his truck and he has to call one of the workers at the freezing works to come and help unload. He calls using Bluetooth so it was over the speakers in the truck and this woman answered really panicky and we ask if the worker is at home. She then screams at us saying their house is on fire, now we were both confused as to why she answered the home phone while her house was on fire. We left them to deal with it and after unloading we find out their attic was on fire. Weird sh*t.

Taking a group of acquaintances who haven't interacted since they were teenagers and putting them in a room together with unlimited booze: what could possibly go wrong? Oh, only everything. High school reunions are a recipe for extreme awkwardness, latent sexual tension, and public shame; but it's all worth it for the opportunity to turn down a drunken proposition from your high school bully who lost his front teeth in a boating accident.

Someone asked Reddit: "what's the most awkward thing you've witnessed at a high school reunion?" These 27 stories from high school reunions are so messy, cringy and painful, they'll almost make you want to attend yours:

1.) From Gonzostewie:

I play in a band. We got booked by a restaurant "for some class reunion". I show up to set up for the gig & it's my fucking class. I wasn't even invited.

2.) From jacksake1:

Not me but my BIL's highschool reunion. A guy that was severely bullied in highschool started a Facebook group to get the ball rolling on planning a highschool reunion, he planned the venue, food, drinks and asked everyone pay a ticket price to cover it all.

He organised the money go into a provided bank account, received 200+ peoples HS reunion dollarydoos and fucked off. Never to be heard of again.

Ive never laughed so hard in my life.

3.) From weedful_things:

I went to my wife's last reunion a few months ago. The day of the reunion she got a call that it was cancelled. Apparently, five years earlier a classmate got creepy and stalkery with another classmate. The people organizing the reunion invited him not to show up. Then the guy posted on facebook some vague threats. They did actually change the venue and have the reunion, but there were many people that couldn't be contacted with the updated info.

4.) From [deleted]:

Nothing. And by nothing, I mean the awkward feeling at being one of the twelve who showed up.

5.) From merkmill:

My mom’s 35th high school reunion was at a bar that I frequent quite a bit... I walked in with my mom and went up to a bartender that I know to order a drink for my mom and I. He looked up at my mother and I and immediately got super shy and weird and then said, YOURE THE DAUGHTER OF (my mom’s name)???

Apparently he had a huge crush on my mom in high school and my uncle beat the shit out of him because he creeped my mom out.

Very awkward indeed.

6.) From JustaReverseFridge:

My friend said her cousin's high school reunion was really awkward because this guy ran up and kissed his high school girlfriend without her asking and then got in a fist fight with her husband, did not turn out well from what I hear.

7.) From greenVneck:

Two of our classmates passed away before our five year reunion. One of the girls organizing the event thought it would be a good idea to make cardboard cutouts of their faces, as if “they were truly still here with us.” The worst part was that people got drunk and started toting them around, taking pictures with them. It was fucked up.

8.) From badideas1:

A guy from our class passed away from cancer shortly before our 20th reunion. He was never super popular but was pretty well known across our class. During the awards/speech section of the night, the lady (our class president, I think) was trying to get the crowd to settle down for a moment of silence. You could tell it meant a lot to her as she started getting heated. The crowd started shushing one another, and it got just quiet enough to hear somebody say 'geez, did somebody die or something?'

9.) From honey579badger:

When i was like 6 i went to my dad small town 30(?) yr reunion. His ex fiancé (not my mom) was dressed in her prom dress. And kept talking to me saying she should have been my mommy. Even then i knew that was weird. Keep your crazy in lady

10.) From WeedleBeest:

10 year reunion held at a bar owned by former classmate; started at 10 pm. Owner told people adults over 21 only. People said they needed to bring their kids and were told no.

Several people brought their babies and toddlers anyway. Parents drank like teenagers and the kids ran wild. Owner called cops who watched the parents be negligent. Parents escorted out by some cops and their kids were taken out by others.

11.) From FakeNewsLiveUpdate:

I was there with a guy friend when he saw his ex. They approached each other - him going in for a hug and her extending her hand to shake. When they each realized what the other was doing, she put her arms out for a hug, and he extended his hand to shake. By the time they touched, it was just a jumble of hands and arms weirdly touching each other.

He started by saying, “Sooooo...how have you been?” I just said, “Uhhh, excuse me...” and got the hell away from them.

12.) From otterdisaster:

At my 10th (year) HS reunion, a guy I hated and who hated me showed up and came directly toward me. Not saying anything at all to me he then engaged the person standing right next to me on my left. He proceeded to move around the room talking to literally everyone there (only 33 people in my class), and stopping with the person on my right. Didn’t so much as acknowledge my existence the whole rest of the day. It was super weird at the time, but many years later it was the most memorable thing that happened. I laugh about it now.

13.) From Surullian:

At my 10th, the organizers gave "awards" to people for various reasons. One girl from our class was given an award for having the "most kids" of anyone there. She'd had 4 by different guys which was part of the announcement. The look on her face as she slinked up to the podium said it all.

14.) From feralturtles:

Someone made a speech along the lines of, "...to all of those that felt picked on or bullied, I have something to say to you." She then started to sing "Let it go" from Frozen.

15.) From lorum_ipsum_dolor:

The captain of the football team was a pretty sad sight. He looked like hell and was so proud of sneaking booze in with his flask.

I mean, it was a cash bar but the prices were reasonable…

16.) From Hobosock:

Mine is in a few months but the awkwardness has already started.

First, I never had any plans to go. Things like that really aren't my speed. I'm not a mingler and I always want to leave right away. Besides I'll be away on military orders by that time anyway so there's no way I can go.

So a few weeks ago I get added to a (my school) 10 hear reunion page on FB by someone I don't recognize. Immediately think "nope" and leave the page, then don't think about it again. I got a phone call a few days later from an unknown number. Not unusual since lots of people call me for work stuff. I answer and get this really enthusiastic "OMG HI IT'S (NAME) HOW ARE YOU!"

I apologize and tell her I think she has the work number. I don't know anyone with that name. She says my whole name and says she got my number from (friend from school). She was the class president but I honest to god didnt remember ber. She asks about the reunion, I politely tell her I'm not going, I have other obligations. She says "I don't know if that will work, I'll be in touch" and hangs up. I'm like wtf but whatever.

A few days later I get added back to the same group by her. Again I leave it. Not 30 minutes later I get a phone call from her. She wants to know why I left the group again, and again I tell her I have other obligations. She told me that "you don't skip reunions, we've planned this for years. You'll be there." So sarcastically I said "ok well save me a spot then" and up.

A third time I'm added to this group. I'm like ffs and leave again. I get a call and this time she's calling to tell me that my ticket and dinner money are due by the end of the week. I politely remind her that I'm not going. She gets snooty and informs me that the venue and catering have already been reserved and that I will need to pay for my meal as the fund would not cover it.

Once again I remind her that I was never attending and that it isn't my fault that she paid in advance without a proper count. She then told me "you don't have choice, it's already paid for so you have to be there. I said "alright bye (wrong name) and hung up again.

I ended up blocking her on FB, ignoring her calls, and leaving the group 2 more times when other members of the reunion committee added me back in.

TL;DR: class president that I don't remember won't take no for an answer.

17.) From noncore_apostrophe:

Probably the reunion itself. Our 10-year was in 2015; I did not attend as I got roped into helping salvage a 4-wheeler from the river that a couple buddies had found (if you're interested, the guy who kept it got it running again for about $1000 worth of parts and work hours - score).

So for about 3 or 4 months leading up to the reunion date, a few of the "popular" girls from our class started a Facebook group to organize everything. And it seemed to be going really well - people had moved all over the country but were saying they were moving their schedules around to attend, there was talk of renting an event hall on the fairgrounds, one girl's family now owned a local restaurant and offered to put up that venue for an after-hours thing, etc. Everyone seemed really into it, and from what I could see, all seemed ready and willing to put behind them whatever petty grudges & high school BS had existed ten years before.

Comes to the morning of, and absolutely no one has committed anything, and in fact it's almost complete radio silence on the FB group. Someone suggests that since we have no place reserv'd, should everyone just meet at the bars downtown and go from there? So it was that exactly 7 people showed up and played oversized Jenga. They at least looked like they had a good time, but what a let-down; I was initially a bit bummed about knowing I was missing our reunion but when I saw the turnout on Facebook when I got back into cell range, I wasn't that disappointed anymore.

18.) From smanbot:

When my lady teacher came up to me, kissed me on the cheek and told me she loved me. She was very drunk. I felt very awkward.

19.) From 2354PK:

Apparently, every year, my brother's graduating class gets together at this one neighborhood bar over thanksgiving. It's not a formal thing, but anyone can come and they all have a few drinks and it's totally normal. I literally had no idea about it, and apparently my brother didn't either, because three or four years ago we showed up to get a drink together alone and his entire graduating class of 50-ish people were there.

Now, my brother was super nerdy and kind of an awkward kid, but the Marines and college turned that around and now he's a outgoing, sociable guy. Coming out of the closet once he hit 23 helped too, since he was comfortable in his own skin and it showed outwardly.

Thing was, no one seemed to know he was gay. And this is small town in the midwest, where there's nothing else to do but gossip and since no one leaves, everyone knows everyone else. I literally spent all night cringing, while my brother dodged the advances of a bunch of girls aggressively hitting on him. Since the dating pool is the same guys they went to high school with and he was fresh meat, they were all coming on super strong and it was bad. Then everything got even worse when he told them he was living on the east coast because he was gay and married, and his husband's job was there.

20.) From -greenleaf-:

Haven't had a high school reunion yet, but here's a fun one from my Mom's third reunion.

She went with my dad back to her hometown for the reunion. My dad grew up in a different place, so he didn't know anybody there. Bored out of his mind, he decided to have some fun and found a way to discreetly ask someone who the biggest juvenile deliquent, troublemaker was in their graduating class.

Let's call him... Albert Davis.

So, my dad went to the nametag table and found Albert Davis's nametag. He put it on and went around saying hi to everyone just to watch their reactions, because most of them assumed that Albert Davis was in prison.

My mom did not think it was funny.

21.) From Doc-in-a-box:

I went with my wife to her reunion. I may have had one or three before arriving, and when I got there I remembered hearing a story of a guy who was my wife's 3rd grade boyfriend. Later in life he had a rough time of things--drugs, alcohol, run-ins with the law, etc.

As a joke, I wrote his name on my name badge and went about my business. Not long after, a rather strong and stocky woman turned around, looked at me, then at my name tag. When she saw the name she looked up at me, screamed excitedly as loud as I've ever heard, bear-hugged me while lifting me off the ground, and bit my neck. No blood, but decent bruise.

22.) From jobrody:

The lighting was dim, we were old, and some nitwit decided to let people scrawl their own name tags which then hung on lanyards at crotch level. Nobody could hear anything over the snot-nose DJ blasting “Eye of the Tiger” and trying to figure out who you were talking to was pretty awkward.

23.) From thewurstunicorn:

I dropped out of school and recieved my GED. someone invited me to the reunion for the class I would have graduated with. They gave out trophies like most of the other reunions that folks have posted already. I received an award for "most successful". I guess getting a college degree and holding a job for more than a year is successful. Super akward going up on stage for that one...

And no Karen, I will not fucking build your husband's fetish site for sexual favors.

24.) ​​​​​​​From Gooftrooptrue:

I heard that a classmate set the venue on fire. Glad I didn’t go.

25.) From RubyWhiteArt:

People coming up to me asking me what's up and seem to know a whole deal about me while I have no memory of who they are at all.

26.) From kjbrasda:

5 year reunion, took my husband. Guy who liked me freshman year (then never talked civilly to me again) told me he was going to die alone and unloved behind a dumpster. Note: He had been a popular football player, I was a social outcast.

27.) From FROCKbFINE:

The beautiful cheerleader twins got SO wasted at our 20th reunion one of them puked on the table and the other got so drunk she fell out of the photo booth. Their daughters had to carry them out.

Always trust your gut.

Most of us have a decent judge of character and if there's something about another person (especially someone who has made their way into your family or workplace) that feels a little off, you're probably right. Many people can be too blinded by love or charming personalities to see even the most ferocious of blazing, blaring red flags.

Safety is critical, though, and just because a creepy vibe from a person isn't an unaccounted for backpack on public transportation you should still say something if you see something! When a recent Reddit user asked, "Have you ever (correctly) had a gut-feeling to dislike someone who, on the surface, was a cool person that everybody else liked?" people were ready to share their horror stories.

1. Wow, "polaroid2271."

I never trusted my ex bf's uncle. I just knew he was trouble and had issues with him visiting or my ex visiting him.

He was arrested in Florida last year for production and selling meth and hosting a prostitution ring out of his home. Later learned the ex partook in all the activities at his uncle's home. Apparently my gut was right about the uncle, but not about my ex.

2. This is so bold, "[deleted]."

Interviewing a guy for a job. Something doesn't feel right but my interviewing partner really seemed to like him. We get to his portfolio of work and I see my side project that I worked on alone as one of his websites. So I start asking him questions about it. What challenges he had, how the client was, etc.

I let him go on and on then I say, "I have to level with you. This is my work. You are showing me my own work. Look at the source near the footer. It has my website in the comments.

He went ghost white and I just sat there.

After that I coached him a little on how not to suck and he left. We called the contract agency that sent him and let them know.

3. Always trust kids, "kittyface93."

My sister's first husband. I was 5 when they got married, and I only actually met him a few times in person because they lived on the other side of the country. My family really loved him--he was charming, athletic, smart, handsome, financially secure, and seemed like a great dad when they had kids. Plus, he was never anything but nice to me. But I always sensed something shady about the guy. When I was in the 5th grade, I remember getting in huge trouble for a class assignment--an essay describing our families--in which I described him as a bad person--pretty much word for word, "there's something I just don't like about him." It was one of the only times I got spanked as a child.

Well, fast forward a couple years, and my parents discovered that he'd been abusive to my sister and the kids almost the whole time. They ended up divorcing, and he has proven to be a complete sociopath ever since. He hadn't paid a dime in child support, despite being well off enough to buy a new luxury sports car every few years, and uses their two kids (who are now teenagers who know he's full of sh*t) to play mind games with my sister--bringing her to court for full custody, knowing he won't win due to his past, just to cause her inconvenience and rack up legal fees for her, just as an example. He also has refused to let the kids fly out to visit our side of the family a few times for no reason whatsoever. He's an asshole, a narcissist, a complete f*cking sociopath and somehow 10-year old me was able to sense it before anyone else in my family.

4. Visors are a red flag, "RanxShaw."

My mom brought her new boyfriend over the house one time for me to meet him. He weirded me out. I can't tell you why but I didn't like him. Maybe it's because he was a 35 year old man who wore visors. Friendly and funny guy who my family liked. A year into their relationship he beat the hell out of my mom and stole her dog. Probably the closest I've come to an assassination attempt.

5. Follow your instincts! "Blake001."

My childhood best friend's mother's boyfriend. He creeped me out and I hated being over her house when he was there. Her family went on a ski trip with mine, and my parents both thought he was great-funny, charming etc. They didn't understand why I didn't like him.

Years later, my best friend told me that he sexually abused her starting when she was about 9. I probably was picking up on her fear of him.

6. This needs to be a movie, "TheySayImZack."

It was a coworker of mine, call her "M". M was friendly, and everyone liked her. Something was up with her though, and I had a bad vibe. She was always complaining about money issues, but then would go out for meals or come into work with new clothes that were not indicative of someone with severe money problems. She allegedly complained of such severe financial problems that she was telling people she was having trouble putting food on the table for her kids. It was that level of desperation. Everyone really liked her, I didn't. I had a really odd feeling about her, like she was being constantly deceptive.

People would always help her out, either by giving her gift-cards to Target, extra clothes or canned food.

She also complained of car issues for a period of several months. This wonderfully kind lady at work - "C" - let M borrow her car during the workday. This was so that M could use whatever money she said she had to go to the store and buy food for her family. Additionally, she used C's car to take a nap from time to time. She claimed to work another evening job and she was often very tired.

Every year, our company sponsored a local family that needed a lot of help. We were a small business at the time (<50 employees) and we'd all donate something to the family at Christmas. It was usually toys, clothes, gift cards and so forth. This year, we decided as a group to my silent opposition that M would be our "family" this particular year. We amassed close to $1,100 worth of food, toys and clothes and presented it to M before Christmas that year. She cried, and said thank you.

Three months later, C's car was stolen right out of the employee parking lot. Coincidentally, M didn't report back to work that day after lunch. Long story short, M had made a copy of C's car key at some point and stole the car and drove out of state with the intent to flee and not return. We had come to learn that M had a long history of criminal charges, and M was eventually arrested in a traffic stop after C reported the car stolen.

As it turned out, M was a financial criminal, specializing in identity theft. She had swindled many people, and had a long criminal history including multiple felonies.

Right from the beginning, I knew something was up with her that I didn't like, but I couldn't put a real finger on it. I don't know why I saw it and no one else did. I actually began to question my morals, asking myself "Why do I dislike M when everyone else does not?" I wrestled with it personally for some time, but in a weird way felt vindicated when the truth revealed itself.

7. This is terrifying, "seagullhunter."

My mom was a single mom and did the best she could. However, she thought it might be better to leave me with the neighbor than at home alone. From the age of 6, I pleaded with my mom to let me stay home alone until she got home from work, that I would be ok. My intuition was right. The neighbor was convicted of multiple murders of single mom one and two towns over when DNA evidence came into being. He only liked to date and kill nonobese women. Fortunately my mother was fat.

8. UGH, "KitchenSwillForPigs."

A few years ago, when I was still in college, I took a summer job at a movie theater. I met a lot of really cool people there, including my SO. But there was this one guy who always gave me the creeps. We'll call him Drew. He was friends with almost everyone, including my SO, and had been for years. We'd attend the same parties and he'd do all these little things that would feel like red flags to be, but apparently not to anyone else.

Fast forward about a year. I no longer work there, my SO and I have been together for maybe a year, and he has been promoted to manager. Drew has also been promoted to supervisor. It should be noted that there were a lot of teenagers employed at this theater. One day, two of the younger girls come into the office (if they were 18, they were only just) to talk to my SO. They tell him they're sorry, because they know my SO is friends with Drew, but they have to tell him something. The younger one tells him that a few weeks prior, she was sitting alone in the break room, eating her lunch. Drew walks in and says to her "Do you touch yourself?" She doesn't answer. He says "Because if not, you should." I think he said more, but my SO eas so furious when he told me that story that he was having trouble telling it.

My SO fills out the report for the poor girl and passes it onto the GM, who then informs him that Drew had five counts of sexual harassment on his file already. But corporate loved him. So they could never fire him.

My SO never spoke to Drew again. Last I heard, he was fired removed from his job at a brewery by security for sexual harassment. Many of our other friends are still very close with him. I don't understand it, but I'm just thrilled to have that creep out of my life.

9. NOPE NOPE NOPE, "TurboVeggie."

Apparently, when I was 4 or 5, my grandma introduced me to some new boyfriend. Everyone liked him, but I would have nothing to do with him. Wrinkled my nose, wouldn't be left alone by him.

I guess he just came into her apartment one day and walked at her with something behind his back, said nothing. She got an eerie feeling and said, "Are you going to kill me?" With a dead faced stare he came at her. She managed to jump over some furniture and get away (she's always been in great shape, running 3 miles a day until age 80). She got somewhere safe, called the police and never saw him again..

10. Amazing, "saladada."

My sister's boyfriend. I just immediately found him to be very "fake" and disingenuous. But the rest of the family loved him and be found him very charming. He owned a running store franchise that was more successful than the original store and was also doing well trading on the stock market. He sold the store back to the owners for a ton on money to focus on the stock market, but this was around the time of the market crash. So to help with that he worked at the store as a salesman. They eventually got married and bought a huge house.

And that's when the cops came knocking at the door to their large home with a view. He wasn't rich. He never owned the store. He was only ever a worker and had been stealing cash from the register/products and selling them on eBay. The divorce came quick after that.

11. She should start a business, "Love_Trust_Hope."

Not me, but my sister. She has this uncanny ability to detect crazy people. My first boyfriend who was secretly abusive, she called it after knowing him for two days. My next boyfriends mom who eventually forced me to take a pregnancy test because I had been "looking rather pregnant" and she wanted to know, she knew after the first visit meeting her. My toxic ex best friend of seven years, she knew after 1 year. All of the people my sister calls out for being crazy, I now believe and avoid wholeheartedly.

12. Ouch, "doublejpee."

When I first started dating my wife, her best friend also started dating a dude named Brian. We drove her friend over to Brian's house one day and went inside and met him, and I could tell right away that he was a fucking scumbag. It wasn't anything he said or did, I just credit the instinct all guys have to detect obvious pieces of shit.

I didn't say anything because I was also the new boyfriend and didn't want to create any problems.

Three months later Brian knocks up the friend and tells her he can't have anything to do with her anymore because he's had another girlfriend for a year, and our friend was just a side fling.

13. Wow, "Augustus_Flagg."

My church hired a new worship pastor and my parents had him and his wife over for dinner. Instantly had a bad feeling about him. He was very charismatic but just made me feel sort of offput. Anyway I let my mom know and she goes, "he's great you just need to warm up to him."

About a year later the guy is getting charged with sexually assaulting one of the girls in our youth group who babysat for him. Turns out he also got an 18 year old girl pregnant at his old church out in Minnesota who is just now speaking out about this. The guy also has a baby of his own and he's 29. So he's facing a number of charges including relations with a minor.

I've spent a significant chunk of my time in therapy (humblebrag) undoing the trauma inflicted by the horse-in-the-mud scene in The NeverEnding Story. I hope to one day move past this childhood trauma so I can shift focus to the wounds inflicted by Bambie and Watership Down.

Children's movies are full of creepy, heartbreaking and straight-up terrifying moments that can haunt kids for days or years after. And then there are non-kids' movies, like Psycho and the Exorcist, that kids somehow end up watching—even though they're too scary for most adults. It's enough to make you wonder if screenwriters and therapists have some kind of an arrangement....

A woman named Ashley Bowers shared an exceedingly popular tweet asking people to share the movies that traumatized them as kids. Her answer? Jumanji.

Her tweet clearly resonated with former kids of Twitter.

These 29 people share the movies that left them with lasting emotional scars:

1.)

2.)

3.)

4.)

5.)

6.)

7.)

8.)

9.)

10.)

11.)

12.)

13.)

14.)

15.)

16.)

17.)

18.)

19.)

20.)

21.)

22.)

23.)

24.)

25.)

26.)

27.)

28.)

29.)

People brave enough (and in good enough shape) to go hiking see some extraordinary sights: both intentially and by accident.

Avid hikers shared the stories of the creepiest things they saw on the trail, and they will make you terrified to go outside—if you weren't scared enough already.

1. gadela08 saved a woman's life.

My friends and I found a 22 year old girl, face down in the mud, both legs broken with compound fractures. she had no cell phone, no water, no food, and nothing to keep her warm. her friend was dead.

a little backstory - my 2 friends and I were hiking in a pretty popular spot in our area. it's a 150-ft waterfall that takes about 45 mins of uphill hiking to get to.

we decided to go bouldering around the bottom of the waterfall, there are various little pools and boulders where the water runs off from the waterfall. this bouldering trail is not on the main trail, and not many hikers ever veer off of the main trail.

when we found her, obviously we called 911 and gave her any supplies we had. eventually a helicopter showed up and they flew her to the nearest hospital.

turns out she was hiking with her friend the NIGHT BEFORE when they both fell off of the waterfall. her friend must have gone to get help, but unfortunately died less than 100 yds from where we found the girl. so no one knew she was hurt or that she was even there.

it's a miracle she was still alive and mind blowing to think what she had gone through when we found her 20 hours later.

2. orilykid got horses in the back.

I was backpacking in Yellow Stone above the tree line at about 10,500 feet. We are hiking on a ridge above a lake when all the sudden we come across a horse skull. No body just the skull, pretty cool looking. We get to our campsite not to far away from the lake near where we found the horse skull. When we get climb down to the lake we find the body of the horse rotting on the edge of the lake with with negative film strips floating in the water and laying around the shore near the body.

3. FunnyHunnyBunny broke the space-time continuum.

This old woman hiker in her 70s some how saw us in reverse order through a wormhole or something. The first time we saw her she said "oh, well hello again!"

I just passed it off as her being old, slightly senile. Then 30 minutes later, we saw her again and this time she just said "hi" as she passed us. I'm not even sure how she got there...she was going the opposite direction of us on the trail both times.

4. Cue "Into the Unknown" from Frozen 2, BrownCow5.

The words "Per audacia ad ignotum" drawn in the snow in the absolute middle of nowhere, yet no footprints around them. The words were probably a few hours old. The closest translation we could find was "through audacity towards the unknown."

5. wjescott met Deer-th Vader.

I was hiking in the Hoh Rainforest on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington back in '03. I was trying to do this really snazzy hike from the Ocean to Mt. Olympus.

Well, day 1 is a blast, get everything accomplished.

Day 2, fog. Fog as thick as anything you can imagine. I can't get a decent GPS fix, so I'm pretty much blind, but I know if I follow the Hoh river upstream, I'll get to one of the campsites I'm going for. Day goes by, and fog isn't clearing up at all. I get to a fairly big clearing and set up my tent. I grab a power bar and chill out as it starts going to the darkest black night I've ever experienced. I'm seriously a bit unnerved at the whole thing...not scared as much as just...anxious.

About 2 in the morning, I start hearing this huffing noise. Like Darth Vader without the helmet on. My imagination starts to go freaky, and I reach for my flashlight. I pull the drawstring on the tent a little...very quietly...and poke my head out. Still dark as death. I hear the noise coming from maybe, MAYBE five feet to my right.

At this point, I'm seriously re-thinking my belief in sasquatch.

I poke my flashlight out and turn it on. I'm a few feet away from a MASSIVE Roosevelt Elk, who'd lost his way in the dark as well. He sees the flashlight, bolts the other way, tags a tree and knocks himself clean out.

I laid in the tent until I heard a groan, a bunch of commotion and the big guy grunt away.

6. ITS_A_BADTIME_BOB almost saw White Walkers.

I was backpacking in New Hampshire and camped out for the night after a day hike. I wondered off from our fire to go take a piss and stumbled upon a circle etched into the ground with tuning forks surrounding the circle standing up straight...It looked like a creepy ritual circle and it bugged me out so I booked it back to the group.

7. LibbyLibbyLibby stumbled upon the set of Australian Midsommar.

Bushwalking in NSW (Australia) me and my friend came across this weird platform looking thing made out of rocks. Later that year the cops arrested some bloke on suspicion of the murders of a series of backpackers who had gone missing over the course of a few years, and at the sites of several of the murders slightly off in the bush were these 'altars'. Current affairs show runs footage of one (the trial and run up to it were all over the news) and yeah it's that thing we found. The 'altars' were typically no more than 300 yards from the victim's shallow graves. The guy who was arrested and subsequently convicted for the murders is Ivan Milat, Australia's worst serial killer.

Nb the cops are pretty sure that at least one other person was involved in the murders than the one now in jail for the crime, they just couldn't prove it.

8. PoeticDeath saw art in the wild.

One time I was out hiking in the back woods with a buddy of mine. Waaaaaaay out there with nobody in sight. In the evening I start to gather some wood for a camp fire that evening and I pull this stick, out of the trees. Stick is maybe 5ft long 3" wide? It looks like a nice walking stick, straight and mostly smooth... Then I notice that one end of the stick is REALLY smooth, like it's been whittled by someone. I'm thinking, oh wow what are the odds of that! It IS a walking stick, someone has carved a smooth handle on one end! NOPE It's not a handle. It's a dick. Someone had carved the end of this stick into a dick. Someone was fucking the forest. Literally. This wasn't some crude carving just FYI. This was a work. Like the person put HOURS into carving it, and was very good at carving. This was a 6" dong carved with love and feeling, right down to it having "bulging" veins and other fine details.... WHAT THE F*CK.

9. BrothaBatman stumbled upon some furry fun.

My dad and I were out camping in the Mountains. We had set up our tents and then we heard screams in the woods. We as black folks don't stick around to find out whats going on. So we packed up our stuff and drove to a different part. We thought it was mountains folks eating people or something. We drive down by the store and told the clerk that we heard screams. Turns out it was an orgy for people who dress up in animal costumes. He was telling us that they have been doing this for years.

10. It's a good thing Figgywithit didn't meet Hannibal.

Hiking alone at dusk doing a five mile loop in the Santa Monica Mountains in Los Angeles. I see another lone hiker approaching from the opposite direction. As he gets closer, I suddenly realize I know this person: It's the guy who played Jame Gumb, aka Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs. We get within three feet of each other. He looks at me. He sees the lightning bolt of recognition hit my face. His sad and resigned expression back said it all: "Yes, I'm him. No, I'm not really a serial killer."

I walked briskly by him anyway and didn't look back until I was a good 100 yards down the trail.

10. Pun intended, adk09?

My buddies and I found a cooler in a gully while camping.

It was dark and we left it, but authorities found it a few weeks later and there was a body in it. So that's cool.

11. Safety first, lycaon_guy.

I was backpacking in western China and ran across a military rocket, cached at an abandoned campsite in an area with a fairly large anti-Chinese (terror oriented) nomadic population. I noped out of there as fast as I could.

12. Rowdybunny05 is a Goodfella.

I like to hike really deep into the woods. Sometimes I use narrow deer trails. One day I was out in literally the middle of nowhere and found a 6 foot deep hole, about two feet wide, and about 5 feet long. No shovel. It was NJ. Mafia.

13. Edna69 must be a common fetish amaong the elderly.

Naked old dudes masturbating. This has seriously happened to me four times.

The creepiest was this one time I was hiking alone. Decided to camp in a clearing next to a creek for the night. I hadn't washed for a few days so I decided to swim in the creek. No one around, so I do it nude.

Climb out of the water and begin towelling myself. Drying my hair and the towel covers my face. Pull the towel away from my face and there is an old dude there in front of my, naked, jerking on his penis.

I shout at him that he's a creep so he scampers off making weird growling noises.

I did not sleep well that night.

14. bethelbread has seen multiple dead bodies from multiple species.

I once found a man who had hanged himself. I was riding my bicycle on a path at night and my light shown directly on him hanging from a train bridge with his feet maybe 6" off the ground.

Skip forward a few years and I am hiking in Patagonia with another traveler I met. The trails were not well marked so we kept getting lost. We were trying to find out way through some brush as I was telling him the story of finding the hanged man. Towards the end of my story, my friend says, "Look, a pile of bones!" Pretty freaked out at first, thought maybe they were human. Upon closer inspection, we saw two spines and a bunch of rib bones of a Huemul (chilean deer). No heads at first. They are endangered so we wondered if maybe some poachers took the heads or if it was a mountain lion food cache. We poked around some more and found the skulls, the antlers were locked together and it looked like they died that way. We tried to pull the antlers apart but they were impossibly stuck. In the end, we strapped them to my pack and I brought them back to this tiny town called Cerro Castillo. I gave them to this old woman who ran the hostel. Would have loved to keep them but the Huemul is a national symbol and I didn't think I'd be able to get the skulls out of the country. The lady was ecstatic, she let me stay for free and tried to give me $40 when I was leaving. I have a picture of them somewhere.

15. FluentinLies learned a new euphemism.

I was just leaving some public showers in a really quiet beach on a cold morning on Tasmania having slept in my hire car the night before when a guy came up with me and started chatting. Fair enough, I was packing my stuff back into the car, having some nice small talk. When out of the blue he pulled out a carrot from his inside pocket.

"Do you like carrots?" he asked.

Slightly confused, I replied that, "sure I like carrots"

He then looked at me - a hard, concerned but slightly excited look - and said "are you sure, you. like. carrots.", before proceeding to slowly arc the carrot up to his lips - letting it slide in and out in an exaggerated way. All the whilst staring into my eyes.

Andddd there are the alarm bells ringing in my head.

"ooh no I was confused, I don't like carrots, sorry, okay, bye!"

TL;DR - I think I was propositioned for sex at some public showers through the medium of carrot.

16. seanboxx saw the closest thing to a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.

I found an ATM once under a bridge when I was walking through a creek...sadly, it was empty.

Delivery drivers have seen it all: they've dealt with kind regulars who tip big, stingy entitled people, and the occasional oddball they can never forget.

While awkward moments are abundant when your job involves interfacing with the public on a large-scale, there are some stories that stick out far more than the rest.

In a popular Reddit thread, delivery drivers shared the deliveries they'll never forget, for better or worse, and they truly run the gamut.

1. SillySilhouettes saw the entitled side of humanity.

In near hurricane conditions I was delivering subs for Jimmy Johns. Took me a little longer than usual to get to a house, I am completely drenched, standing in the rain because the front door didn’t have a stoop. The guy opens the door and says “took you long enough” grabbed his sandwich and didn’t tip me.

2. plantman01 was passively propositioned.

I had a delivery for a hotel at 2am on saturday. I went to the front desk and they asked me to come to their room. I went and knocked and a middle aged bald man answered with only his head poking out, I couldnt see the rest of his body. He opened the door and asked me to come inside and put the pizza on the table, which I did b.c I'm an idiot.

When I walk inside I see another middle aged fat man sitting on the bed and the guy who opened the door closed it behind me. Then, I turned around and saw the door guy was only in a thong. Nothing happened and i left without saying a word, but it was definitely strange.

3. WinnifredThadeousPoo had a bear sniff their edible arrangement.

I used to deliver Edible Arrangements. One time I was at a house in your average northeastern suburban neighborhood and I had gone to the door with the arrangement but didn't get an answer. So I go back to my truck, put the arrangement in the back side door, and was standing outside the open passenger door facing the truck, trying to call the customer to see if they'd be home soon and I can leave or if I should try to find one of their neighbors to take it in.

As the phone is ringing, the customers car pulls in the driveway and so I hang up the phone and wave, and as they roll down their window I start to say "Oh, hi! I have a delivery for you-" and the customer who's house this was just very calmly said "I don't want to alarm you, but there's a bear right behind you.."

I turned around and not 3 feet away was a young bear (bigger than a cub, but not yet full grown) just sniffing around their bushes. I didn't know what to do, my legs just turned to jelly and I froze. So I said to the customer "What do I do??" and she looks at me like I'm crazy and goes "GET IN THE CAR"

Now, the smart thing to do would have been to jump into the passenger seat that I was literally standing right outside with the door open and everything but in my nervous state, I slam the passenger door and run all the way around (the long way around the truck, too smh) and get in the driver's seat and lock the doors.

The side door to the refrigerated side of my truck was still open, but at least I was separated from the bear. The bear didn't notice me until I slammed the door shut but all he did was wander up to the side door and sniff the beautiful fruit arrangements in my truck. He hung out for a few minutes until the customer finally had enough and laid down on their horn until he took off running down the street.

There were a few other interesting deliveries from that job but none turned my legs to jelly like that bear.

4. ting4ling listened to a man talk about his sick dad.

I made a delivery and some form of small terrier bolted through the door and bit me hard enough to leave a mark through my winter gear. I let the owner know and he apologized because it wasn't his dog and he didn't know to anticipate that.

It was his dad's dog and his dad's house and his dad was inside the house dying. The family had been sitting there trying to ease his passing for a day or so and needed that pizza to help sustain them.

He wasn't overly emotional, but clearly wanted to be able to talk to someone about it. I'm the sort of person that wants to let people get all that out. Unfortunately I was on the clock and really needed to get as many deliveries in as possible. I still feel like I should have stayed a little longer.

5. ChargeYourBattery delivered pizza to a heartbroken boy.

I used to deliver pizzas. This one order was to a nice house in an OK part of town. I ring the doorbell, and wait patiently for the door to open. When it does, I'm greeted by a lady and her young son. She's clearly been crying, but is doing a good job of holding them back. I don't acknowledge it, it's none of my business and she's clearly not looking for solace from the pizza guy. I remind her what the pizzas cost, and she hands me some cash. Standard stuff.

As I'm digging around in my bag for change, the kid pipes up: "I have to tell you something."

"What's that?" I say, half listening as I try to work out how much change to give back.

"My Dad's not coming home."

...

Oh Sh*t. "I'm sorry to hear that," I tell him. I stare at my bag as I pull out the last of the change, trying to avoid looking at either of them as I hand it back with the pizzas. As I leave, habits formed over a thousand deliveries almost make me tell them have a good night, but I catch myself enough to say "enjoy the pizza" instead.

Judging by his Mum, the parents would have broken up some time that day. I'm guessing I'm probably the first person that kid told.

6. reddit_rump_rush withheld their delivery after The Incident.

This literally just happened to me 30 minutes ago on a delivery. I'm an Ice delivery driver and some big box stores like for us to not only to deliver the ice- but also to stock the front of the store, which is a large insurance risk for us.

So as my helper and I are dragging a pallet to the front, accompanied by a store employee we all notice a foul smell. Let's just say it's a store not exactly known for the most cleanly of people.

Before we can get to the front a second employee runs up to us in a panic yelling, "There's sh*t. There's sh*t everywhere."

Behind him is a literal trail of smears- someone had pooped down their leg and dragged it probably 50 yards all over the store. They had one employee attempting to clean it with a shop vac. Cleaning poop. With a shop vac.

"Hey ice guy can you help us out here?"

"Yeah no f*cking chance."

"Then I'm denying the delivery."

So here I am writing this out 30 minutes later- sitting in the store managers office explaining to him why the reciever denied a delivery.

Also sorry for the formatting I'm on mobile.

7. Skittliboo got tipped in both cash AND kitten play time.

I used to deliver pizza. Favorite experience: The guy opened the front door and is smoking a joint. And then...KITTENS. 4 kittens come round the corner meowing, and start trying to climb my pant legs. The guy just giggles and giggles, so I put the pizzas down and play with the kittens for a while. He tipped me a 20!

8. MrsFlip's partner had the scariest delivery experience.

My SO was delivering boxes of magazines to a small shop. It was really early like 4am, the shop not yet open but he'd leave them round the back by the door. Rolls up, hops out of the van, grabs box and takes it to the spot. Walks back to the van and there was now a man sitting in the drivers seat. It was dark and no one else around so he just yells to him to get out of the van but didn't approach. Next thing he knows the guy is out and running at him with something large and shiny in his hands.

SO freaks out and runs, the guy chases him. SO doubled back around, jumped in the van and took off right as the guy caught up and slammed the object into the windshield. It shattered but stayed in place so he couldn't see shit but just drove out of there anyway. Eventually pulled over when safe to find an axe was lodged in the window. A f*cking full sized axe. He was shaking too much to drive after that so flagged someone down to call the cops. They never found the guy.

9. DylanBob1991 helped herd a random dog AND didn't get tipped.

I pulled up to the house and there was a large German shepherd in the yard (which was fenced in) going nuts, barking and snapping at me. It takes me about 5 to 10 minutes of grappling with this dog to make it to the door, and it runs around the side of the house.

So the folks open the door, pay for the food, and suddenly the dog bursts around the corner of the yard, slams past me and bolts into the house.

He's sprinting in circles, freaking out and knocking stuff over including a nice looking lamp that broke. The people there start losing their f*cking minds trying to stop the dog from turning the whole house into rubble.

The one dude asks me "why the f*ck would you bring your dog with you on a delivery?"

Which was an absolutely bonkers question that let me know this was not their dog. I helped them get it out of the house and they tipped me zero dollars.

10. Harambehasfinalsay had a nightmare day at work.

I was delivering medical supplies in Portland and the surrounding areas a couple years ago. I thought it was going to be a normal day when I woke up, but I was very much mistaken. I still have flashbacks of what I witnessed.

I start my route by driving to the warehouse and receiving my deliveries. I login to the app on my phone and call dispatch so they can send me my route. Everything's going swimmingly, no red alarms at all. I wrap everything up there and head out on the road.

The first delivery is out in Seattle so I head on over there as quickly as I'm allowed and listen to my favorite podcast while I'm at it. Time passes by, I'm getting close to my destination and I'm rounding a corner that has a lot of vegetation and is basically one of those hills that you have to break the entire way down. This is where it all goes wrong.

A couple of older people start crossing the road while I'm on this super steep hill that spirals down and I start braking more, but it just wasn't enough. I hit a spot of ice and my van goes sideways and well...they didn't make it. They should not have been walking down across that hill.. but yeah.

I call the police and tell them everything that happened. They arrive and start taking witness reports and stuff. By this time I've puked probably five times and have no idea what I'm facing here. Time passes...cops come to me with a look on their faces. I'm literally sure I'm going to jail.

Number one...they left a suicide note on their table at the residential nursing home they lived at. They walked into my car together on purpose.

Number two.. the delivery was for the lady that passed away. That still bothers me. She planned it because she knew a van was going to be coming down a blind corner. She f*cked my mind up for a solid year and I even moved back to Florida to go to counseling and shit. Literally have never told this story but it felt really good to get it out of my head.

11. TrailMomKat's pregnant belly saved her life.

When I was about 6 months pregnant with my first son, I delivered for Papa John's in an area that was mostly not so great. Now, that area has the highest violent crime rate on average or something or other for our state, so that should tell you how bad it was about 10 years ago before it got downright awful.

Well, one neighborhood in particular was the worst of the worst, and usually another driver would take it since I was pregnant, but that Friday night we were short and super busy, so I did it without hesitation. Gotta eat after all, right?

So, I get there, get out of my truck with the pizza, and get a really, REALLY bad feeling. Quickly look around, and see a group of guys watching me. I put on my war face more or less, and as a second thought, stuck my big belly out a bit so it'd be way more obvious in the dark.

One of them approached me and was like, "oh, you pregnant?" I just shrugged and said "yeah... that definitely ain't a basketball, dude." He chuckled at that, walked back to his friends, and I heard him say, "naw, yall, come on, she's pregnant."

They all walked away and the dude that I'd spoken to gave me a nod and smile, told me to take care. Found out later that one driver had been brutally beaten in that lot less than a couple months before I'd been hired, and if I hadn't been pregnant, I might've suffered the same or worse. Glad that didn't happen.

12. Boobedelic made it rain on themselves for a tip.

I worked for as a delivery man for a small cakery. We would make custom cakes for anyone and any and all events. This one time I had to deliver a cake that had a dick on it. When I came to the house and rang the bell, this lady opened up drunk as hell and just screamed saying "the dicks here". So it was a bachelorette party. This lady just pulled me in with the cake and told me to bring the cake to the middle of the party. The price was 4500 Rupees or around $40 but they made it rain over me. So I had to pick it up and they didnt even give a tip. Then I came back to the cakery and got scolded cause I got late.

Edit: Not india, pretty close tho. Also every developing country has a upper middle class that celebrates western culture like bachelorettes. Also, when this happened I had a girl friend I was just uncomfortable with the whole situation. But the last and more important thing was that they were kindy milfy :)

13. plutonn has a wholesome one.

I met a nice puppy when I was delivering to a farm.

14. TXBY436 walked into a sad scene.

I used to delivery appliances for a company that had a contract with the city we were based out of. Essentially the contract would allow low income residents a voucher to obtain second hand kitchen appliances. We went to deliver a fridge to a lady and on arrival her mother opened the door. Not only did she open the door but her almost lifeless body could not stop the weight of the door and she fell on the ground cracking her head open.

She was probably on her 3rd 40oz of some off brand malt liquor. The kicker is though, she was watching her daughter's two children. Called 911 to inform them and stayed until help arrived. Not sure what ever happened to these kids after that, but I hope they were not effected too greatly by this ladies choices. Truly some sad sh*t in this world.

TLDR: Had to drop a fridge off for work. Lady who opened the door was f*cked up, fell, cracked her head open, also was watching her daughters children. Real sad sh*t.

15. awh has a handful of stories.

Delivered pizza from about the day I got my license all the way through the rest of high school, university, and then as extra income during my first full-time-job. Now I'm back to deliveries (for Uber in Tokyo) as a side job after a 14-year hiatus.

Back in about 1993, guy was trying to punch his wife and missed and got me instead. I GTFOed, kept the pizza for myself, and called the cops once I got back to the store (this was before cell phones)

I was delivering the night I turned 18. 12-year-old kid and his buddies saw me bring a pizza into a building and were waiting for me pointing his jacket at me when I got out. "Give me everything, I have a gun!" "No you don't; that's your finger!" (where was a 12-year-old kid in middle-class suburban Canada going to get a handgun?) "Uh.. Yeah... You're right. It was just a joke!" kid shouts over his shoulder as he and his buddies bolt

It was a snowy day in Canada and some kids were hucking ice chunks at cars on the street and one hit mine. I threw a handbrake turn as I put the window down. "SORRY, SORRY!" they all shouted as they scattered

EDIT: One "nice" story: It was my first winter driving and we had our first big storm. The store was open and they expected us to come in and work because of course everyone was ordering pizza because of the storm. I had no real experience driving in the winter so my Dad insisted on driving me around to all my deliveries. At the time I was an annoyed and ungrateful 16-year-old kid, but looking back on it, it was the greatest *amn thing for him to do for his son.

16. aboughtcusto's dad has seen some weird stuff.

Not me but my dad was a fedex delivery driver. One place he was knocking at the door waiting for an answer and then begins hearing heavy breathing behind him. Slowly he turnes around to see a fucking ostrich staring at him.

Second one, he made a delivery to this man's country farmhouse. As you walk to the house you can clearly see into the barn. As he was approaching he saw bodies hanging from the scaffolds. Turns out the guy was big into doing special effects for movies and helped with silence of the lambs.

17. LewisRyan delivered pizza to white supremacists.

I deliver pizza.

I walked up to a trailer park house and knocked, dude answers the door wearing a swastika armband and he’s bald, I tell him the total and he invites me inside while he gets the money there’s 10 more dudes all bald all wearing arm bands, sitting in a circle in metal chairs guy gives me the money, I go to leave, he grabs my arm and gets in my face and asks “do you like n****rs?” I don’t want to be murdered so I respond “nope not at all hate those fuckers” and leave as quick as possible.

The scary part is every other delivery driver but me that night was black and they might have never been seen again if I didn’t take the delivery.

18. omza dealt with peak entitlement.

I occasionally pick up delivery routes at the supermarket I work at part time, and the range of customers is crazy. The city has two universities (loads of students), and a butt-load of elderly and highly self-entitled (not mutually-exclusive) customers.

The system we use for deliveries/sat-nav. shows us "Customer Comments" right before each delivery, usually consisting of instructions like "There is a lift to the right as you enter". Additionally, we are a fairly small branch, and so the comparatively smaller line we stock is made known to customers when ordering. If you don't want items to be substituted if unavailable, you mark it as so when ordering (not a hidden button).

The other week, this lady had put a note to give her a call 45 minutes before I arrived... as if she was the only customer to whom I was delivering. The note went on to tell me "not to even bother bringing any substitutions as she does not want them". I immediately knew this was going to be an issue, as I could see there was about 6/7 crates for this customer.

I was only a 10-minute drive away, so called and apologised that I couldn't do so sooner. She said it was fine, and that she would be waiting outside to meet me, describing how I could identify her upon my arrival as "the two unmistakeable ladies". It turned out to be a mother and daughter, and the order was a food shop for the daughter at uni. which the mother had placed. Without any cue, the daughter began going through the crates removing items saying "not this, not this, that isn't organic, this is cruel, that has oil in it, definitely not that... omg why did you order those?!" like an ungrateful little something.

She also berated her mother for not ordering certain things, and got stroppy when she didn't find certain other items right away. The mother said "oh I'm sure the man will be able to get you this" as if I had the entire stock of the shop in the back of my van. When I explained I couldn't do this, she began pointing at other crates saying "but you have this there?!" (a different customer's order).

The mother begins to tell me how she's never shopped online before, and her daughter has a very strict, doctor-ordered diet; whether she did or didn't isn't really my concern, but it certainly came across as the daughter having other reasons. Again, it's not my concern, but she shouldn't have gotten her mother to order, and perhaps should have shopped from somewhere which catered to her needs more. When I also explained that I can't just give her other items from the van, she said "but every other time I've ordered they've done so-and-so?!" - first order, sure...

Now the real part that pissed me off is how the daughter had pulled things from the crates; on my system, I have to find each item individually from each crate number, and then manually remove them. Which means I have to know which crate they were in originally, since usually it's only one or two items that get sent back. A lot of the items were fresh as well (from the meat/fish-counters) meaning they had to be binned.

Anyway, they got impatient, angry, and unreasonable, and I was late to all the remainder of my drops. That's only one of many stories...

19. madowlie never returned to that house.

I delivered pizzas in my late teens to early twenties. I have many stories, but only one very scary story. I drove up to the house and notice a group of men hanging around the side yard. I walk up to the door and did the pizza/money exchange all while these guys are yelling things at me in Spanish. I did my best to ignore them, but I guess they didn’t like a young female ignoring them.

Once I got off the porch they started yelling louder while running at me. I sprinted to my car and locked the doors. They stopped right in front of my car yelling who knows what at me in Spanish. Luckily I had an opening to get out of the drive and sped off. Told my manager about the incident and she made it a rule that only the men would deliver to that house for now on.

The rest of my stories are funny. My favorite were the stoned kids offering me a joint as a tip or that one time I wrote tip on my hand to piss the lady off who never tipped.

20. ghettomedic delivered a sandwich to a naked, wandering frat guy.

I spent a summer as a delivery driver for Jimmy Johns in a college town. There was a street where many of the houses were rented by fraternity and sorority members and passed down among the members from year to year. Needless to say, a lot of partying, and a lot of late night JJ's, went down on this street.

So one weeknight, around midnight, I'm delivering a Hunter's Club and Turkey Tom to a house that, from the front, looks empty. I ring the doorbell, nothing. Knock on the door, give my "this ain't the po-lice 'Jimmy Johns delivery'" proclamation, still nothing. Try the doorbell again. Nada. Another knock, to no avail.

After waiting a minute or two in front of this dark, obviously unoccupied house, I decide to head back to the store. As I turn to leave the porch, I hear the click of a gate latch from the side of the house. I walk over and am met by a very intoxicated young man, BUCK-ASS NAKED, walking down the driveway.

He looks right at me, a smile comes over his face, and in a Spicoli-esque burnout drawl, says "Jimmy Johns...................HELL YEAH", and saunters off down the driveway onto the sidewalk.

Perplexed by this exchange, and realizing the futility of requesting payment from a man with no pockets, I just got in my car and left. But to this day, anytime I hear anyone say "Jimmy Johns" I think back to my Mallette Street bro and say to myself "...HELL YEAH."

The job of a couples therapist is to help a couple work on problems in their relationship, or to help keep things running smoothly. Much like individual therapy, it's a hugely useful tool that more people should utilize. Unfortunately, this post might not help with that last part.

A woman shared her story on Reddit about her ex-boyfriend marrying the couples therapist they were seeing during their relationship. Yikes. She is asking if she would be in the wrong to report that therapist to the American Counseling Association, which could potentially get the therapist fired. The internet is pretty heavily in favor of this woman filing a complaint; let's see if you agree.

During their sessions, the woman says her former couples therapist had an "extremely judgmental attitude" towards her, and prioritized the feelings of her then-boyfriend.

In 2017, I (F25) saw a couple's therapist with my then-boyfriend (M36). After 3 sessions with her, I refused to return due to her blatant flirtatious behavior and extremely judgmental attitude toward me, which my ex-boyfriend called me delusional for pointing out. She had told me that I seemed too immature, not ready for therapy or a serious relationship. The whole thing was focused on my ex-boyfriend and his complaints about me; she never asked about my feelings or perspective in the relationship.

The couple broke up two months after ending their therapy sessions. Just a few months after that, the woman says she saw her ex-boyfriend and the therapist together.

We broke up about 2 months after the sessions, but I stayed living with my ex-boyfriend until November. Once after I moved out, I had to return to our old apartment to get mail (this was in December), and that was the first time I saw the therapist with my ex. They happened to be getting ready to go out on his motorcycle and were both wearing full-face motorcycle helmets, but I KNEW from her body type and hair that it was her (along with my instincts, which suspected something was going on the whole time). But nevertheless, I moved on with my life.

She recently found out that her ex married the couples therapist "barely over a year" after their sessions with her had ended.

I just found out yesterday my ex got married due to a friend telling me about a photo he posted on facebook. The photo was of him and my ex-therapist, celebrating their one-year wedding anniversary. I found her facebook with the name change, and sure enough, they got married September of 2018 (or earlier; that's just when she posted the wedding photos). This was less than a year after the break up with me ex, and barely over a year after our sessions with her ended.

Now she wants to file a complaint about the therapist to the American Counseling Association, but she fears she will just come off as a "bitter ex."

I am considering filing a complaint with the American Counseling Association. My friends and mental health counselors I know say I have enough evidence. I am not upset that my ex moved on - so have I. I thank the Universe every day that I am no longer with that Narcissist. However, I feel deeply disturbed to find out he married our therapist, especially remembering all the harmful stuff she said to me in the sessions, which to be honest really messed with my head. I fear coming off as a bitter ex. AITA?

Commenters seem to agree unanimously that this therapist's behavior was unethical and inappropriate, and many are encouraging the woman to file a complaint to prevent this from happening again.

DrKomeil wrote:

NTA, this is a major ethics breach and may betray a longer string of inappropriate behavior with clients. This is especially shocking as it's her job to help couples sort through their issues. If she has dated one client, she may have dated others, and that calls into question her ability to do her job if she takes interest in a client who is still in a relationship.

This isn't a scorned lover trying to get their ex fired from an unrelated job. Her sole job is trying to make relationships functional and healthy, how can she do that if she's shopping for her own dates?

The original poster, lemonadedays, responded, explaining how the therapist would hit on her boyfriend and gaslight her during their sessions:

You're absolutely right. This has nothing to do with him. I don't care that he married her. I care that she seemed to taking a liking to him during the sessions and didn't help us at all. She would giggle at every stupid comment he would make. I flipped out about it, and they both use it against me. "See, this is how she is, she can't control her temper".

DrKomeil responded:

My dude, she groomed your ex in therapy so he would fall into her arms. She cannot be allowed to work with people in relationships if she's going to be complicit in torpedoing those relationships any time she gets horny for a client.

pillmayken, a therapist, strongly urged her to file a complaint:

Hi, I’m a therapist. PLEASE REPORT HER, her behavior is ridiculously unethical and who knows what else has she done or if she even should be allowed to practice. NTA times a million.

Another therapist, darnyoulikeasock, weighed in:

NTA! I'm not a therapist but I work in a behavioral health center supporting therapists. This is completely unethical behavior and would definitely result in disciplinary action by the board. Please report her! Invalidating and not addressing your feelings, calling you immature, and discouraging you from seeking therapeutic aid by telling you you're"not ready for it" (the fuck? There is literally therapy for 18 month olds, you're ready for it) is all bad enough, but overtly flirting with in session and later marrying her client is the cherry on top. R E P O R T H E R please!

bill-end pointed out:

Even if the marriage / relationship was a year after, I bet OP's fella started banging this therapist after the first few meetings. Very unprofessional. If I were OP, I wouldn't hesitate to report them.

Are there any professional bodies that can prevent her practicing though? I don't know if they can be struck off like a surgeon or doctor who is guilty of malpractice.

And bmoreskyandsea empathized with the woman's plight, writing:

NTA.

Report her. It's highly unethical and gives therapists a bad name. Her board/association should be aware.

As the survivor of a narcissist I can understand how this can still be triggering, even when you know you dodged a bullet. Don't second guess yourself because you are afraid of coming off bitter, it was unethical, your gut is right. And the fear is PTSD from a relationship with a narcissist who likely gaslit you at many opportunities. WE are all behind you.

Please don't let this therapist's horrific, unprofessional behavior stop you from seeking couples therapy, or any other kind of therapy. Most therapists are perfectly good, trustworthy people who provide a life-saving service to society. The worst thing they're likely to do is put you put you deep, deep into debt.