Back in 2014, we had a shift supervisor take leave due to pregnancy; she took FMLA (Family and Medical Leave Act) leave right before she was ready to pop. She was very outspoken that after whatever her pre-determined time was to pass, she was most assuredly coming back.

I can’t remember how many weeks this was, but she was “definitely coming back”. After she had the kid, she dropped in pretty regularly to show the kid off and gossip with some people.

Our store manager was really hung up on “You’re coming back, yeah? You’re coming back, right?”

And she very clearly and definitely stated, “Yes, I’m not going to stop working now that I’m a mom! I’ll be back!”

And as soon as she’d leave, he’d sit there all “She’s not going to come back, guys…”

Every one of us looked at him like he was stupid, because he was. We all told him she was coming back. She kept saying she’d be back. I could tell she was getting annoyed every time he asked it after a while.

So what’s he do?

He jumps the gun and hires another shift supervisor because she’s not going to come back!

We were fine. We were a little short, but we were handling it, and she was definitely coming back.

You’ll never believe it, but guess who came back?

He hired another shift supervisor, whom he couldn’t get rid of. She came back. Now we were going over payroll. All the supervisors in that store were designated full-time, so they had to get their hours. The rest of us were classified as “part-time” even though we got plenty of hours.

Who do you think got cut now that we didn’t have enough payroll to spread around? Yup, all the other grunts and I got s***ty hours.

He had to let her come back. You can’t screw about with that FMLA stuff. She said over and over she was coming back.

I ended up finding a new job and quitting; I needed more hours. Thing is, all of us quit about the same time, not realizing the others had done so, so then the place was scrambling to hire staff to make up the “mass exodus”.

Two big problems that could have been avoided if the boss had not been a total moron.

This is from when my heavily pregnant older sister was living with my mum and me. It is just my sister and me at the moment. I hear a loud non-human noise from the kitchen, coupled with a loud, very human noise, so I leg it down the stairs, worried for the heavily preggers lady.

I come to the kitchen to see an open four-litre milk bottle on the floor, milk on the floor, my sister sobbing whilst trying in vain to reach said bottle. My sister is mostly unintelligible whilst she sobsplains what has happened, but I get the general gist.

She wanted a tea, the milk slipped from her grip and ended up on the floor, and she then couldn’t get the milk, and now she’s wasting milk, and there’s a mess. 

Whilst picking up the milk and whilst she’s still sobbing, I realise something that tickles me, and I giggle.

Sister: “DONT LAUGH AT ME! IT’S NOT FUNNY!”

Me: “Sorry, but you’re crying over spilt milk.”

Pause, she starts laugh-crying.

Sister: “Okay, so it is funny. But still!”

I work in a women’s clinic scheduling appointments. Patients can request appointments online with a description of what their problem is. This may have been either an unfortunate voice-to-text misread or a revealing slip in typing:

Patient: “Disappointment is for my seventeen-year-old daughter who is pregnant.”

During the height of COVID, everyone had to work from home. So, as the somewhat IT-guy, it was my privilege to facilitate everyone’s home office. Whenever someone was experiencing issues with anything tech-related, they called me.

If we ever had any incidents, management required everyone to call me so I could log and explain their downtime. A bit bureaucratic, but whatever.

One day, I got a call from a coworker whom I know pretty well and also known to be relatively tech-savvy. His wife was expecting soon, and she was already on leave, but still insisted on not sitting around. The call went a bit like this:

Coworker: *Loud vacuum noises in the background.* “Hi mate, my computer isn’t working right now.”

Me: “What’s going on? Does the screen light up? Are the lights on the computer blinking or on?”

Coworker: “No, they’re not on. As a matter of fact, nothing is really working. You see, my wife wanted to vacuum my home office and unplugged the PC.”

Me: “Ah… Can you plug it back in?”

Coworker: “Well, my pregnant wife said this is the only working socket, so no, I will not be able to plug it back in until she is done.”

At this point, I started to catch on that this was a hostage situation, and his wife was listening in on the call. I also realised he was calling just to log his downtime, not to actually report a problem.

Me: “Ah, I see now. How long do you think this ‘unscheduled maintenance’ might take?”

Coworker: “About fifteen more minutes.”

Me: “Very well.”

I marked his downtime as unexpected and incidental, and that was that. When your pregnant wife says it’s the only working socket, it’s best not to argue.

A woman calls our phone company, sounding kinda stressed. As we’re going through the security questions, she starts breathing in an odd manner and making moaning noises.

Me: “Uh, are you okay, ma’am?”

Caller: “Oh, yeah, I’m just havin’ a baby.”

Me: “Uh… ma’am, are you in labor right now?”

Caller: “Yeah, but the contraction just passed. Anyway, about my prepaid cellphone payment. Why didn’t it go through?!”

Her account is a month overdue.

Me: “I don’t see any payments made from you, ma’am.”

Caller: “Well, no, not from me! I don’t have the money to pay that! One of you guys told me earlier today, when the contractions started, that they’d pay for it so that I could text people during labor.”

Me: “Uh, I don’t think that’s something that… happened? I don’t see any noted on the syst—”

Caller: “Well then, you need to do it! I’m havin’ a baby!”

Me: “Are you in the hospital, ma’a—”

I can hear some hospital-like background noises, and what sounds like a (I hope!) nurse chastising her for using the nurse’s desk phone.

Caller: “—Yeah, yeah. Make my payment for me.”

Me: “I can’t do that, ma’am. If you have a means to pay your bill, I can help you—”

Caller: “You’re clearly not a Christian, because a Christian would have paid my bill! I’m having a baby! That’s doing God’s Work!”

The call ended there with the sounds of someone else struggling to take the phone from her.

I left the craziest notes of my career on her account and tried to move on with my day.