Pumpin' the tane down in New Orleans sounds sexy, but Tina and the group left out the part of having to deal with actual people. Those hard working people who work in the gas stations have to deal with far more drama than we could believe.
Redditor u/tylerpv10 wanted to know what all the petroleum attendants needed to share by asking.... Night shift gas station clerks of reddit, what's the weirdest thing you've ever encountered?
Years ago.......
Giphy
Years ago I worked overnights at a gas station, in a pretty bad neighborhood in Florida. My first night working there an older guy came in, walked up to the counter and reached across and punched me in the jaw pretty hard. The guy I was working with chased him out the door while I called the cops to send someone over. My coworker came back in pretty quick looking frightened and said to send an ambulance because the crazy guy just died outside. EMT and police came, guy was alive but had a pretty bad heart attack. Every other shift was pretty timid compared to that.
RedditTrollin
"I sing for my supper!"
Not a gas station, but a train station cafe. There were overnight works going on so we stayed open until 1 or 2am for the builders. One night this older gentleman comes in, well dressed. Asks for a coffee but can't pay when I make it. I give it to him anyway since I'll just throw it otherwise, and he asks me for some cake. I refuse, and he goes "I sing for my supper!" And then starts to belt out Frank Sinatra right there in the shop. And he just. Won't. Stop. He's there for like, half an hour.
I tried to get security to look after him because he clearly wasn't all there. Found him later, singing for the builders who were giving him sandwiches. Eventually called the local police who got him supervised until he could catch a train home in the morning.
SuetyFiddle
"See you later...."
I worked in a rural gas station/ garage when I was in high school. One evening I was working and there were some pretty bad storms brewing. It didn't take long for there to be a fairly large group of people stopped at the station to find some shelter.
I didn't think much of it, wasn't the first time it had happened, but then they started blowing the tornado sirens. All the sudden there's a bunch of adult and families looking at little 16 year old me looking for answers.
There's no basement so I did the first thing I could think of and shoved them all in the walk in cooler. Shut us all in and rode out the storm. When it passed I went out and there was a big plate glass window busted and some stuff blown around the store.
All the people came out of the cooler and were pretty much like, "See you later," and left.
I was pretty much left there by myself like what the heck just happened.
littleredhoodlum
We Close Soon....
So, my store closes up at 10 pm. I come in one morning at around 4:45ish to find an old Native American man passed out in our kitchen. We have a rather large kitchen because we work next to an industrial area w lots of truck drivers/oil field workers who start their work day early, so we make lots of food for breakfast and lunch.
So I call the police because what the hell am I supposed to do (There's a very bad neighborhood behind the store that's constantly hit for drug busts.. like hard stuff.. plus we find bloody needles in the bathrooms all the time.) the police show up like 15 minutes later with some paramedics and the guy was just asleep lol. Apparently he came in around 9:30 pm the night before to use the bathroom and got locked in when the two night shift employees locked up. He didn't have a phone and didn't think to look for ours, so he got a six pack of beer out, ate some of our bread and went to sleep next to the grill 😂
GarryBuseysPants
TWIX....
Giphy
I had a friend who worked at a gas station. He said someone came in one night and produced a gun and told my friend to empty the register. Being completely dumbfounded by the situation my friend told him that he had to buy something first. This is because to open the register an item from the gas station needed to be scanned at the register. According to my friend they stared at each other completely silent and bewildered for a few seconds. After that my friend had regained enough of his faculties to explain this to the robber. Then the robber scanned a Twix took all the money in the register and left.
Cliff_Doctor
Oh Meth....
Meth heads that just need "to be let in for a second" because their car broke down/injured/sick granny/anything to try to trick you into letting them in so they can stab and, rob you, and kill your corpse.
Richard-Hindquarters
$300....
Idk if this was necessarily weird but more luck. During and after high school I worked a this crappy gas station that closed up at 11pm. I started doing my cleaning duties when I noticed a penny on the ground I picked it up kept sweeping until I noticed a dime by the door. This wasn't unusual since people drop change all the time. As I was picking it up though something caught my eye as it blew past the door I went outside looked right, nothing, looked left and there sat a fat wad of cash it was nearly $300 laying on the ground.
Yes I kept it.
No one ever stopped back by asking about it ether.
Hexpul
"don't worry, it's not my blood."
A friend of mine worked nights in a convenience store by herself and she told me about a time when a woman came in drenched in blood. When asked she said flatly, "don't worry, it's not my blood." She bought a pack of cigarettes and was on her merry way.
ozQuarteroy
Another time around 3 AM.....
I was a 7-11 night clerk for about 5 years when I was young. Nothing too outrageous happened. The big nightly event was the 2 AM rush, the cut-off for selling alcohol when I'd run a bar through the beer cooler doors. There was always a bunch of people coming in just before, and always a few coming in after that would beg and argue and I'd just have to say no.
One time around 3 AM an older drunk but well-dressed Mexican guy comes in, two really pretty girls with him, argues and pleads with me to sell him some beer for about 15 minutes. He was oddly pleasant, seemed like a guy no one said no to, but I said no. He went out with the girls then came back in alone. Looked at me and smiled, pulled a giant wad of bills from his pocket and peeled off a twenty, sat it on the counter, walked over to the cooler and pulled out a case of beer through the bars. Then as I'm telling him I can't sell that to him he reaches in his other pocket and pulls out a baggy of drugs, wags it in the air in front of me significantly, sits that on the $20 bill and says "esta todo bien, mi amigo", with a wink, and walks out the door with the beer.
Another time around 3 AM again these two young girls came in and wandered the store for about a half hour, laughing their asses off at everything. Literally rolling on the floor laughing, reading the labels of the candy bars and stuff like that. I talked to them enough that they told me they'd eaten some mushrooms. Finally they picked out a couple of candy bars and a couple sodas. At the counter I rang them up and they realized they didn't have any money... which was hilariously funny and they were on the floor laughing again. I bagged their stuff and told them not to worry about it. Sweeping the lot after they left I could hear them still laughing down the street.
dxrey65
Hey Cowboy.....
Giphy
Working security in a bad neighborhood . This guy walking minding his own business in a cowboy hat, cowboy shoes . And a thong carrying around a raccoon. It looked like he was feeding the raccoon something. I locked my doors asap.
chevy1500
The old wives' tales.
They are the stories of legend.
I think we all need a big DEEP Google dive though.
Where did they originate?
WHO ARE THE OLD WIVES!
You don't hear about them as much anymore.
It's like science and logic are suddenly a thing.
But they sure are a good way to keep your kids and their behavior in line.
Redditor the_spring_goddess wanted to discuss the tall tales we've all been fed through life, so they asked:
"What is an old wives tale that people still believe?"
"Wait an hour to swim after eating."
What a crock!
So many summer hours wasted.
I want revenge for that one.
Say Nothing
Giphy
"An undercover cop has to tell you he's a cop if you ask him."
LonelyMail5115
"Pretty much most advice when it comes to cops are old wives tales. I’m not even a cop but most of the advice you hear is pretty off."
I_AM_AN_A**HOLE_AMA
Say Something
"That you have to wait 24 hours to report someone missing."
Severe_Airport1426
"I really think this one is important and should be the top regardless. As it’s a piece of advice that needs to be relearned and the only way to do that is through awareness."
crappycurtains
"This used to be true. I think they changed it after some guy named Brandon went missing back in the '80s or '70s. You used to have to wait 24 hours if the missing person was an adult because they had 'a right to be missing' and then everyone realized that was stupid and stopped doing it."
AlbinoShavedGorilla
Body Temps
"That drinking ice cold water after eating oily foods will solidify the oil and permanently remain in your body. I informed my coworker that if your body temperature ever reached that point, you’d have bigger problems than weight gain."
chriseo22
"Oh, I have a cousin who 100% believed this. One of those guys who believed every early 2000s internet rumor and old wives tale. One night I chugged a big glass of ice water after dinner and he started freaking out and saying my guts were gonna harden."
"I sarcastically told him to drive me to the hospital if that happened. Obviously, nothing happened and the next morning I said something like 'Thanks for being on standby in case my guts filled with hardened oil.' He just walked off muttering under his breath."
apocalypticradish
Arms Down
"When I was pregnant, I was told by young and old alike that I should NOT raise my arms above my head or exert myself in such a manner because it could cause cord strangulation to my unborn sons and daughters."
Fatmouse84
10 Years Actually
Unimpressed Uh Huh GIF by Brooklyn Nine-Nine
Giphy
"Chewing gum stays in your stomach for 7 years."
"I remember accidentally swallowing a piece of gum when I was a kid in like 1995 and just accepting my fate like welp, gonna have this in my stomach til high school I guess."
Gecko-911
I was so afraid to sallow my gum when I was young.
This tale is haunting.
High/Low
Hungry Debra Messing GIF by Will & Grace
Giphy
"You can tell the sex of the baby by how you carry."
LeastFormal9366
"Pregnancy certainly wins awards for the most old wives tales. So much absolute BS was repeated to us by everyone we talked to."
IllIIIlIllIlIIlIllI
The Cursed
"If you’re a woman and you wear opal jewelry but opal is not your birthstone (October), you’ll never be able to have children, or will be widowed, or just generally have bad luck or something. You can counteract this by having a diamond in the same piece of jewelry as the opal, though."
"I have a nice opal ring that my parents gave me years ago, and I’ve had other women give me this 'advice' unprompted more than once when I’ve worn it. I have absolutely no idea where it started, but I’m pretty sure this little chunk of silicate rock has no concept of what month I was born in, let alone of how my reproductive organs work."
SmoreOfBabylon
Stay In
"Going outside with wet hair will make you get pneumonia. Or an earache. Or maybe arthritis. Depends on which old wife you listen to."
"Jokes on them - I haven't blow-dried my hair in decades and usually leave the house with wet hair in the morning. On winter mornings, the tips of my hair get frozen. No ear infections or pneumonia or arthritis yet."
worldbound0514
Dreams and Facts
"You never make anyone up in your dreams you've seen everyone in your dreams somewhere else before and never make anyone up entirely."
"How would you possibly prove that to be true? My partner adamantly believes this and tells me this 'fact' whenever I have a dream about someone I've never met before."
mattshonestreddit
"My late wife used to tell me that before she met me she would have dreams of standing at an alter on her wedding day but could never see the guy's face, no matter how hard she tried. After meeting me the face was filled in with mine. Don't know if it's true but one of those things I like thinking of every now and then when I miss her."
Darthdemented
Cracked
Getting Ready Episode 2 GIF by The Office
Giphy
"Some people still believe cracking knuckles causes arthritis."
Choice-Grapefruit-44
"There's a doctor (Donald Unger) that cracked his knuckles a couple of times a day for 60 years, but only on one hand, just to prove it. Both hands remained exactly the same."
MacyTmcterry
I love my knuckles.
Do you have any tall tales to add to the list? Let us know in the comments below.
