You know, your day could be just fine and dandy until the moment someone, who might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, asks you something that makes you ask yourself: Did I really just hear that?
And you did. You did, sorry to disappoint you.
The responses were utterly golden (or maybe not, if you get our drift) after Redditor Swish_Fate asked the online community,
"What is the dumbest question you've been asked?"
"A coworker of mine..."
A coworker of mine, without any context, asked me, "Is Ash Wednesday this Friday?"
"During my exchange year..."
During my exchange year in the US, I was sitting in my English class and we had a few minutes until class started, when one of the guys I spoke regularily to, suddenly turns and asks me if I could speak English since I'm from Germany.
I calmly asked him in what language we had been speaking just a second ago. It was pretty hilarious and even our teacher had a good laugh with us.
In short: Guy asked me if I could speak English, while we were talking in English.
"Thankfully..."
"Are you a real black person? Your skin is too light." Thankfully it was asked by a little kid, but it was so stupid that I still laugh about that years later.
"Asked by a guy..."
Giphy"Won't they hatch?"
Asked by a guy who had just thrown out two dozen eggs that had *just* passed their expiration date. He was concerned about having 24 little chicks running around inside his refrigerator. Dude was a university-level science major.
"At the same job..."
"How do you spell TV?"
To be fair, that one came from a young kid. Here's a runner-up from a middle-aged woman in a meat shop where I used to work:
Grown Woman: "What's the difference between the cooked prawns and the raw prawns?"
Me: "... These are cooked, and these ... aren't."
GW: "But these ones are pink and these are grey."
At the same job, I was ringing up a young woman's purchases, and it turned out she didn't have enough cash to pay for them all. I suggested an item to take off that would bring the total just under what she had, but she decided to take off two, more expensive items. This brought the total down more than enough, and I gave her her change with her receipt.
Her: "Oh!" looking at her change, then pointing at the two items: "Do I have enough money for that now?"
On second thought, maybe I should have put that one first.
"When I was working..."
When I was working at my city's zoo, a woman asked me if she was at the zoo.
In order to ask me that question, this woman had to get off the train at a station called Zoo Station or drive into the parking lot on a road called Zoo Road. Then, she had to walk down a long hallway with lots of pictures of animals all with the zoo's logo (which includes the word zoo) under them, then stand in a long ass line in front a huge picture of a koala and the words "welcome to [city] zoo!" printed in three foot high letters. I was also wearing a shirt and a hat with the zoo's name and a giraffe on it when she asked me this question.
"A man walks in..."
Working in a coffee shop, around mid-afternoon. A man walks in, glances around and walks up to the counter.
Me: Hey, what can I get for you?
Him: Um. (Glances around the store more) Are you guys open?
Mostly out of confusion I also glanced around my store I saw all of the other employees clearly working, and our lobby full of people sitting/eating/drinking/etc.
Me: Yes?
"Both..."
Both come from my days in the food industry:
"What are mashed potatoes?" - a woman who was definitely old enough to vote
"Why did you ring this up as steak burrito and not a vegetarian burrito?" - a man who asked me to put steak on his burrito,
"As a 911 operator..."
As a 911 operator, a caller once asked (on an emergency line) what the weather would be like on Thanksgiving Day in a desert resort popular with off-roaders, that's located about 100 miles away from our city. It was April.
"But my all time favorite..."
From the hotel industry, favorites are generally along the theme of:
"Why didn't you tell me when I booked my reservation (six months ago) that it was going to rain today?!"
"Why is there traffic? Why didn't you warn me there'd be traffic in Manhattan?! Why can't you just tell the cops to let me through?!"
But my all time favorite was at a hotel where for various reasons, the lobby was not on the first floor. The only thing on the first floor as you come in was a bank of elevators, by which you could then reach the lobby.
Had a guest ask, in complete seriousness, "Why couldn't the taxi drop me off at the lobby? All the other hotels it drops me off at the lobby!"
All attempts to answer this were met with increasing rage on the part of the guest, because WHY COULDN'T THE TAXI COME TO THE EIGHTH FLOOR.
Redditor CATBVYS wanted to hear about the students we went to school with, who left a lasting impression, so they asked:
"What made the weird kid at your school, the weird kid?"
The weird kids at my schools always kept to themselves.
Now I suppose I'm the weird kid.
Regular or Diet?
coca-cola cola GIFGiphy"Carried around a briefcase with two, two-liter bottles of coke. I don't know if he would finish them every day but he would definitely crack one open in class and drink it."
mytwocents22
Dressed for Success
"He dressed up as a Jedi every day from elementary to the last day of high school and he had a lightsaber and would chase people who bullied him around with it. I'm actually surprised the teachers didn't take it away. He did have some emotional/personality problems as well."
longdongjohnson2005
"Sure, people like to make fun of him due to his peculiar dressing and weird beliefs."
"But did you ever see any Sith at your school?"
"Think about it."
Junior-Gorg
Worms
"Whenever it rained there would be dead worms on the cement… he ate them. Not like 1 or 2 he brought bags with him from home to fill up and eat like f**king gummy worms. Teachers never believed us when we told them so he had to have eaten hundreds over the years in elementary school."
Meow939
"I'm just imagining your teacher's doubtful expression 'He's eating handfuls of worms any time it rains, huh? And brings home whole bags to snack on? Stop making stories about Timmy now, it's unbelievable the things you come up with.'"
HyperSpaceSurfer
Sad Genius
"Turned yellow (literally) because he went on a carrot-only diet, shaved his eyebrows off (no idea why), and blew up his garage trying to make his own nuclear bomb. He died in his 20s after taking too much cough syrup and drinking homemade alcohol."
"I forgot to mention that he thought he had appendicitis and attempted to do surgery on himself, thankfully he only knicked the skin. He was considered a mathematical genius and got full scholarships to several colleges but didn't think any of them could teach him anything."
Cultural_Magician105
The Power
Excited 90S GIFGiphy"The vine where a kid goes 'I have the power of God and anime on my side' and screams like a banshee went to my middle school. He was maybe 4 grades underneath me but his weirdness turned him into one of the most popular kids in his grade."
PerryPimentel
Vine?! Now that takes me back in time. Wow.
Miracles
jesus wink GIFGiphy"He was tall and skinny. Would say the name of a girl in class a few times and then throw his eraser at the ceiling; in the middle of class."
"He did all sorts of weird things. At winter camp, we witnessed him take a large tube down a snow hill, hit a ramp, and while flying into the air, the back of his boot (with his leg still attached) hit him on the TOP of his head. Imagine that flexibility? We still discuss this over 40 years later like we witnessed Jesus walk on water."
Uncle_Bug_Music
Humper
"We had a kid join our fifth-grade class halfway through the year. The entire grade was given a chat about how this kid is different, but we need to be kind."
He spent every recess humping the playground equipment. We were kind to him but also terrified."
"In high school, we had a kid who only wore wolf shirts. He was Australian, so I just convinced everyone that it was a cultural thing. He was nice and didn't deserve to be picked on."
airhornsman
PHEONIX
"Not only was he large (tall and in stature not fat) for his age, like towering over some teachers, he maintained an impeccable straight, shoulder-length haircut that was half neon blue and half neon green that never faded. He also brought his katana to school which how was allowed in the mid-2000s I’ll never understand and had everyone including teachers call him PHOENIX."
oreoloki
This is Me
"Let's see..."
"He wasn't fully potty trained till almost 1st grade, He would randomly flip pencils back and forth in front of his face, he would meltdown if he couldn't get something right the first time, couldn't play sports due to terrible coordination, stuttered like crazy while talking with a very bad lisp, would nearly puke if he ate any unfamiliar food, and daydreamed about Angry Birds during class all day."
"Really weird kid, the reason I know him so well is because he was me. Autism isn't a fun or quirky thing to have to deal with. Most of my major issues were fixed by the time I got to middle school thankfully due to having very supportive teachers, therapists, and parents. Still have sh*t coordination and can't eat normal food though."
TheNobleOne06
Potato
Good Vibes Dancing GIF by Rosanna PansinoGiphy"He made up a thing where if you said potato to him he would do a silly dance. Halfway through high school, I guess he decided he didn’t like it anymore. But then people would just come up to him and yell potato at him over and over while he just tried to ignore them. I felt bad for him."
ApprehensiveLuck2325
Life Lesson #369...
Be nice to everybody. That's all a person my need sometimes.
