Weird Stories from Work

[.257Weatherby]

Originally Posted by brightons

My son works at a coffee shop. He's always got these crazy stories of people coming in and putting in these really wierd long, overly-specific drink orders: "I want a half-caff, half-decaff, double mocha espresso with half regular and half soy milk, and I want the temperature to be 147 degrees."

Yup, those coffee junkies have nothing better to do than take up the time of the Barista Chick or Guy with made up facking drink orders.
Like who can tell the temp diff between 147 and 150??
Rob

[Whipper Billy]

My father had an engineering company and needed a project manager for the construction of a facility in another province. No local talent was available and someone found a qualified individual. As he was from out of town, a house was rented for him. After the project was completed my Dad got a call from the owner of the house who had discovered 18" of sand in the basement! Apparently he used to host a lot of beach parties.

[Albertadiver]

Hmm....

Work related. One example is I was face to face with Dustin Paxton in his cell at the Forensic Psychiatry Centre before his trial.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...gary-1.4130893

My 'guard' protecting me was about 5'-2" and maybe 100lbs. I guess I could have thrown the guard at him if he got squirrely.

[Erik]

I was once night watch on a ship moored in the Charlottes. The ship was moored on cement anchors via ropes. One night we experienced what I assume was an earthquake. The ship felt as though it was being tugged, not dissimilar to what it feels like to catch a fish.

Later that night I was checking the bow of the ship where there was a large light pointed into the water. There, I saw a large group of squid, almost perfectly spaced, pointed towards the light. I seem to remember them as phosphorescent, but that part might be invented by my mind. In any case they were definitely quite noticeable in the water and the uniformity of their spacing and ability to hold position while pointing towards the light left a most indelible impression in my memory. Perhaps the most surreal night of my life thus far.

[IR_mike]

Originally Posted by Albertadiver

Hmm....

Work related. One example is I was face to face with Dustin Paxton in his cell at the Forensic Psychiatry Centre before his trial.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...gary-1.4130893

My 'guard' protecting me was about 5'-2" and maybe 100lbs. I guess I could have thrown the guard at him if he got squirrely.

Must have made for interesting conversation.

[Albertadiver]

Originally Posted by IR_mike

Must have made for interesting conversation.

We had a briefing before going into the secure side with staff. They said don't make eye contact, and don't respond to anything. Most of the people in there were zoned right out. The REALLY creepy part is that there are two abandoned wings, and it's literally an abandoned mental hospital. You could film a scary movie in that part no problem.

[IR_mike]

Originally Posted by Albertadiver

We had a briefing before going into the secure side with staff. They said don't make eye contact, and don't respond to anything. Most of the people in there were zoned right out. The REALLY creepy part is that there are two abandoned wings, and it's literally an abandoned mental hospital. You could film a scary movie in that part no problem.

So in other words you didn't get Treeguy the autograph he wanted?

[Trochu]

Our shop is at the end of a cul-de-sac and has an empty building on the one side, with whom there is no fence separating the yard, and three empty buildings on the other. That being said, we don't get alot of traffic on the road. Looking out the window we see a white Corolla drive down the road, drive through the parking lot, drive through our yard, past the back of our building and stop behind the empty building beside us. Guy gets out, walks to the side of the empty building, and proceeds to start looking in all the windows. There have been some break-ins, so one of the guys here is quite attentive, goes to talk to him. Apparently he was looking for our shop and wanted to apply, runs back to his car and gives the guy a resume right in the yard.

I don't know about you, but I generally stick with the front door when handing out resumes.

[ghostguy6]

Not my best stories but only a few I can talk about publicly.

I was working security at Halloween party a few years ago. Well the party gets way out of hand. There were only a limited number of tickets available, 200 or 250 but well over 2000 people show up. Most of these people are drunk from other parties or just getting off pub crawl buses so they decide to have their own party outside in the parking lot. I end up having to escort someone off the property, once I get outside the building I get jumped by his friends who are all dressed up as the cast of Sesame Street. I ended up pulling my baton on them and they run away. Police get called to break up the party. One officer I'm talking to puts on a call to dispatch to put a BOLO out on the cast of Sesame Street. I heard the dispatcher in a very confused voice say " Say again? Your looking for Big Bird and Elmo?". The officer then replied "I am also looking for Burt, Ernie, Oscar, Cookie Monster and the Count in relation to two counts of assault and criminal mischief!". The radio went quiet but you could see the other officers struggling to keep a straight face.

Another time I was working a special event where a lady at the bar turned out to be a prostitute. I was allowed to work plain clothed at the time so I set my phone to record video and waited for her to approach me. Once there was enough evidence we made the arrest. While waiting for the police to arrive to take custody, I was searching her purse where I found a badge and police issued ID from a neighboring police force. When I asked her about it she said nothing, totally refused to say another word. My mind was going crazy thinking I had just ruined a police sting. When the local LEO's arrive everything proceeds as normal. The lady gets charged and I get subpoenaed to court to testify. Turns out she was in fact a police officer and was "conducting her personal business" on the side. She ended up entering a plea deal for her sexual addiction.

Last one I can talk about. Working at a construction site one evening I come across a running vehicle parked around back. I approached with flashlight in hand to notice the vehicle rocking a bit. Well I was very bored so I figured I would have some fun so I turn my flashlight to the highest setting, 1200 lumens and light the car up as they had not noticed me yet.Turns out to be two very hairy men of middle eastern decent totally naked in the car. They are so scared neither of them move. Total deer in the headlights scenario. I asked them to get dressed and wait for the police as the site orders stated any trespassers were to be charged. Police arrive and charge both men with criminal trespassing, public indecent acts and public nudity ($287 and a court date). After the couple drove away one of the officers said there was a motel just down the road. They could have gone there for $80 a night but instead the BJ cost $574 and they would have to stand before a judge and explain it.
the next day when I went in for my shift the site supervisor had posted my incident report in the lunch room for all to read. Turns out there was a rather flamboyant drywaller from Quebec who just happened to drive the same vehicle. It wasn't the guy but he sure get ribbed over it.

[huntinstuff]

College days. Dated this brunette with full sleeve tatoos, across the chest and back. Totally unusual for the 80’s. Fantastic girl.

Fast forward to 2017.

Im working in a store and looking at atv stuff. Chick is standing in the aisle, tall, lean, curly long hair, looking at Kolpin quad seats. She says to me “do you know anything about these. They look a little hard on the ass”. I tell her im not a fan of them.

I ask what quad she has. Oh, a 420 Honda Rancher. Me too! I tell her that I bought a UTV seat at Princess Auto that fits perfectly on the back rack.

As Im talking to her, she takes off her hoodie. Full sleeve tattoos and across back and chest..........I recognize them

I say her name. She looks at me.......OMG!
We live 6 blocks away from each other for over 12 years and never once crossed paths.

[RandyBoBandy]

Originally Posted by huntinstuff

College days. Dated this brunette with full sleeve tatoos, across the chest and back. Totally unusual for the 80’s. Fantastic girl.

Fast forward to 2017.

Im working in a store and looking at atv stuff. Chick is standing in the aisle, tall, lean, curly long hair, looking at Kolpin quad seats. She says to me “do you know anything about these. They look a little hard on the ass”. I tell her im not a fan of them.

I ask what quad she has. Oh, a 420 Honda Rancher. Me too! I tell her that I bought a UTV seat at Princess Auto that fits perfectly on the back rack.

As Im talking to her, she takes off her hoodie. Full sleeve tattoos and across back and chest..........I recognize them

I say her name. She looks at me.......OMG!
We live 6 blocks away from each other for over 12 years and never once crossed paths.

Dear Penthouse

[bobcatguy]

So I had just started plowing a parking lot late one night. First pass I've got my bobcat about 2 feet from the fence with the blade angling snow away from the fence. As I was driving down the fenceline surprise a little doe jumped over my blade and into the parking lot in front of me from between me and the fence. Just got over that shock and started moving again when the buck following her jumped over the blade and chased her around the parking lot for about 5 minutes till they disappeared

[Twisted Canuck]

A thread about false fire alarms reminded me of this one...

Back in '85 I had a summer job at Lethbridge Community College, grounds keeping. Mowing lawns, laying a couple acres of sod around a new building...anyway, one day my boss Mike asks me to go into the fenced play area of the day-care to mow it, had been skipped for a couple weeks. Gate is too small to get Kubota lawn tractor in, so I grab the John Deere push mower and off I go. Of course the grass is a foot tall, and the JD is bogging and blowing blue smoke, but I'm getting it done. Almost finished, and I look up and there is Mike with about 4 fireman and they are all hollering at me (I had muffs and glasses on per safety)...shut it down and I'm all 'what?'....

The main air intake for the whole building's HVAC was right above this little play area, sucked up the blue smoke and set off alarms. Major call out as multiple zones triggered at once by the vent system circulating it...think it cost the college $2K back then, there were about 7 or 8 trucks there and hoses rolled out all over the place...

Whoops! Not my fault, Mike wanted to be mad at me but I was just doing what he told me to.

[huntinstuff]

Originally Posted by Twisted Canuck

A thread about false fire alarms reminded me of this one...

Back in '85 I had a summer job at Lethbridge Community College, grounds keeping. Mowing lawns, laying a couple acres of sod around a new building...anyway, one day my boss Mike asks me to go into the fenced play area of the day-care to mow it, had been skipped for a couple weeks. Gate is too small to get Kubota lawn tractor in, so I grab the John Deere push mower and off I go. Of course the grass is a foot tall, and the JD is bogging and blowing blue smoke, but I'm getting it done. Almost finished, and I look up and there is Mike with about 4 fireman and they are all hollering at me (I had muffs and glasses on per safety)...shut it down and I'm all 'what?'....

The main air intake for the whole building's HVAC was right above this little play area, sucked up the blue smoke and set off alarms. Major call out as multiple zones triggered at once by the vent system circulating it...think it cost the college $2K back then, there were abut 7 or 8 trucks there and hoses rolled out all over the place...

Whoops! Not my fault, Mike wanted to be mad at me but I was just doing what he told me to.

Back in 85 i was a student at LCC!!!!

[Twisted Canuck]

Originally Posted by huntinstuff

Back in 85 i was a student at LCC!!!!

I was just 18, good summer job. Hot days, summer students dressed for the weather....yep, great job! Sometimes I'd go wheeling in coulees with tractor behind residence if I was bored and gold bricking.

At least until I came back to the shop with bits of cactus on the mower's cutting deck and Mike chewed me out good.....

[CaberTosser]

Originally Posted by Twisted Canuck

A thread about false fire alarms reminded me of this one...

The main air intake for the whole building's HVAC was right above this little play area, sucked up the blue smoke and set off alarms. Major call out as multiple zones triggered at once by the vent system circulating it...think it cost the college $2K back then, there were about 7 or 8 trucks there and hoses rolled out all over the place...

Whoops! Not my fault, Mike wanted to be mad at me but I was just doing what he told me to.

I had similar at an Extendicare seniors home 16 or so years back. I had some soldering to do on some baseboard radiant heating zone valve replacements so as was our procedure I had the maintenance man call in to shut down the fire alarm monitoring for the duration of my work day, I would never strike my torch until I had confirmation from them that this had been done. I was conducting my repairs when the fire alarm started going off, naturally I shut off my torch and went to the closest nursing desk to mention not to worry (an announcement to that effect had been made at the beginning of the day when the alarms were bypassed). I also went to the main office to chat with staff there. Despite the alarm monitoring having been properly dealt with, the Fire Dept still showed up, it seems that they had drilled their staff so much on calling the fire dept that someone had called 911 personally, despite the fact that they could not have witnessed anything to report, there was no fire anywhere. They client tried to back-charge us on the call out but that wasn't going to fly as A: We had followed protocol in having the alarm monitoring disconnected and B: it was their own staff member who had made the call manually after being over-drilled in corporate procedure.

These days in addition to having the alarm monitoring bypassed I will also either unplug the nearby smoke detectors or wrap them in a taped-up plastic bag for the duration of my hot work.


Another fun day with alarms was at The Bay in Market Mall in '89. I was a first year apprentice helping to replace a large hydronic heating coil in an HVAC unit and to conduct our work we first needed a fire sprinkler head moved so that we could get physical access for our work. A fire sprinkler subcontractor was hired for that and in conjunction with the building maintenance man they checked the blueprints and isolated, depressurized and drained what should have been that zone of the fire sprinkler system. The sprinkler fitter then got on his ladder to unscrew the 1" sprinkler head. As fate would have it, it was not the correct zone that was shut off be it from the fitters error or an inaccuracy with the as-built prints. The fellow was of course expecting a bit of water and had a 5 gallon bucket up the ladder with him to catch it. What caught him off guard was the pressure blasting off the sprinkler head and hurting his wrist and the 1" line blasting rusty water all over The Bay's shoe department for a few minutes, all the while the fire alarm was going off to the entirety of Market Mall


I guess those weren't necessarily weird, just memorable compared to the average work day.