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People Break Down The Most Ridiculous Complaints They've Ever Heard In The Service Industry

People Break Down The Most Ridiculous Complaints They've Ever Heard In The Service Industry
Artur Voznenko / Unsplash

Some people strongly believe that everyone should be forced to work at least a year in the service industry to teach them patience, self-awareness, and how to properly deal with rude customers.

Think of it like an entitlement-diversion program.


Reddit user ilostmygender_ asked:

"What’s the most ridiculous complaint you’ve ever heard in the service industry?"

Because if there is anything that will ensure we have fewer entitled people being ridiculous, it's making sure everyone gets to deal with those types of people face-to-face.

Check out the ridiculousness Reddit has had to put up with.

Deserve To Party

"Every year, couple of weeks before Christmas, my restaurant closes a couple of hours early (7 instead of 10, and it's usually on a Wednesday, so it's not nearly as busy) so all the employees can get together and have a small holiday party."

"We had a sign up on our door two weeks before the party, letting everyone know we were closing early. As this was the year after covid, and we didn't get to have a party the previous year, we were really excited and ready for it."

"At about 8'oclock, a woman comes to the door, sees it's locked, and goes ballistic. She man-handles the door and starts slamming her fist against it. She ignored all my co-workers who were shaking their heads."

"Finally I go over and unlock the door to talk to her. She just starts screaming about how we're not supposed to be closed, etc, etc and I'm just shaking my head pointing at the sign."

"She finishes with 'you people don't even deserve to have a party'. And with that I just smiled and said 'well now we're definitely not helping you, goodnight.' And closed the door."

"2 days later I get a call from the owner of the restaurant, saying she actually filed a real complaint about it. We had a great laugh"

- Hellvillain

Resturant Manager Or Traffic Officer

"I worked with a manager at a fast food place that got a complaint filed against him with corporate. Lady said she was second in line in the drive thru, the car in front of her gets their food, and goes to drive away, but accidentally put his car in reverse. He stops quickly, goes into the correct gear and leaves."

"Lady comes up and complains that the other customer ALMOST hit her car. Then she later complains that the manager was 'very unhelpful.' Still have no idea what either she or corporate expected him to do."

"Then, we had a customer drive his car up over a curb onto the grass, drive for another 6-8 feet, and hit a large rock in the grass, breaking his radiator."

"Dude wasnt under the influence, absolutely no clue how he didnt see a 3 foot tall rock in front of him, or why he was suddenly compelled to do some offroading in a Lincoln Towncar."

"He immediately comes in and starts yelling about how he's gonna sue the company for damages to his car. Despite the fact that he drove straight into it, over a curb, in broad daylight."

"Like, his car went to that rock like a soldier returning from war runs to the arms of his lover. Without missing a beat, my shift lead tells him that corporate will have much better lawyers than he does, and they'll 'counter sue you for damages to our rock'."

- DisabledBiscuit

"damages to our rock lol"

- rdummy_soup

"Your manager should have offered to ALMOST give her some money to compensate for him ALMOST hitting her car."

- magpac

traffic GIFGiphy

Didn't Ask The Exact Question

"I was serving a couple their meal. I had stopped by after their first few bites and asked them how they were doing. They said great and I moved on to the next table. At the end of the meal, they asked for the manager and complained about my service, that I didn’t check in. When I told my manager that I had checked in on them, she said they said 'Well, they came and asked how WE were doing, but not how the food was. WE were doing fine, but we didn’t like the food…'."

- Matchmaker4180

"Seems a little petty. To be honest, I've only had waiters ask me some variant of "so how are you enjoying your food? Good?" And then I tell them it's good and they move on to the next table."

"If you don't like the food...you can just tell the waiter. You don't need a prompt."

- geico_fire

Hand-ing Some Drinks

"I was using my hands to hand people their drinks"

"I quit that same day"

- goldenbrushes

"Your bad man. You’re supposed to use your feet like that alien pod racer guy in Star Wars the phantom menace"

- nhbd

"Not even using your mind powers, how lazy smh"

- Yab0iFiddlesticks

"I would get mittens, spill half of every drink, charge full price and then tell any angry manager...I just fulfill customers' wishes...."

"Some people should get LITERALY what they wanted....after a short time, they would be cured of their entitlement...."

- applesandoranges990

Changed The Building Layout

"A woman swore up and down that we had an upstairs (we didn't) and then, after twenty minutes of searching, accused us of hiding it from her."

"A whole second story."

- PickanickBasket

"We actually had a similar moment!"

"Customer paid for their washing machine in the till, and was told to go around the corner (of the wall, still in the same building, pointed with the whole hand) to pickup the machine."

"Customer came back 10 minutes later fuming that they couldn't find the second floor to pick up said washing machine."

"Entire building is on ground level. Opening from the tills to the room where they were supposed to pick up the product is as big as the broadside of an elephant. But it's our fault and we scammed him off his money because we didn't want to give him that washing machine."

- Brevlada-00

Severely Allergic

"Someone came back with a breakfast sandwich I made for them saying they wanted to get whoever made it fired because it has bacon instead of sausage."

"They said they're severely allergic to bacon and would end up in the hospital and that the person who made it (me) shouldn't work here if they can't read screens (for what the order says). A trainee was on speaker and punched in a BELT (which is made with bacon) instead of the sausage version which admittedly isn't an easy thing to punch in for a new person on our POS system. So I read the screen correctly."

"HOW can someone be severely allergic to bacon and not sausage which is the same animal and everything ?!? We also use the same tongs for bacon and sausage too, there is definitely tons of cross contamination between them anyways"

"My manager spoke to me privately about it and I said I was prepared for her to fake fire me to humor him lol"

- koopkop

"Reminds me when I worked in a Chinese place and people would be deathly allergic to MSG. When I explained it came in the fried rice we'd make in advance they'd reply 'oh a little won't hurt'."

- Matookie

Season 8 Nbc GIF by The OfficeGiphy

The People Want Adult Films

"I worked at Blockbuster and some guy got angry at me because we 'no longer' carried adult films. I explained that we had never carried porn but he said 'You have Red Shoes Diaries!' - which isn't porn."

"Then he threw the Rugrats movie on the counter and opened his wallet to get his membership card. After he paid, he shook the Rugrats movie at me and said 'People want PORN! Goddamn you.'"

- BarracudaImpossible4

"I worked at a Blockbuster and we had an older guy throw a tantrum because I wouldn't let him in the 'backroom' to look at the 'adult films' which we 100% didn't have. The manager ended up finding out he was confusing us with Family Video."

- Albino_Wendigo

Stephen Colbert Blockbuster GIF by The Late Show With Stephen ColbertGiphy

Cold Cuts Too Cold

"I worked at Arbys as a teen. At the time we had a new angus cold cut sandwich. This woman came in and ordered it. It was like a $12 meal."

"Gave her her drink cup, a min later she comes back and throws the cup at me because we didnt have any drinks she liked. We had like 10 different sodas, coffee, iced tea, lemonade, water, fruit punch, etc. Not sure what exactly she wanted."

"Anyways, I give her her sandwich and fries, she takes them to the table, takes one bite, comes back and slams the tray on the counter complaining that the sandwich was cold. I informed her that its supposed to be made that way. "Where? Where does it say that its a cold sandwich?" I pointed to the menu and said "in the name. COLD CUT sandwich""

"I ask her if she wants me to heat up her sandwich for her. No she doesnt. Does she want me to make her another one that is hot? No. Does she want something else to eat? Nope. Does she wanted a refund then? No! She just walks out! She spent $12 to take 1 bite of a sandwich and didnt even take the refund."

- stitchmidda2

"Sounds like she got buyer’s remorse and expressed it in the most childish way possible. Many such cases"

- akaTim

No Plastic, No Logic

"I worked at a Target at a town in CA that independently enacted a plastic bag ban a year or so before it was a statewide thing, so I got the joy of explaining that new rule to everyone. No plastic bags, paper bags are 10 cents, you can bring your own reusables or buy them for a buck."

"I could sometimes turn the mood by suggesting that they save the dime and carry out their stuff in whatever laundry hamper/bucket/storage tub they also happened to be buying."

"So a lady comes through and buys a cat litter box and a bunch of grocery items, gets in a snit about the bag thing, and when I point to the litter box (basically just a plastic bin) and say she can just take her stuff out in that, she gives me the most DISGUSTED look and declares 'I will NOT put my FOOD in a LITTERBOX'."

"Then she stomped off carrying a wobbly loose pile of groceries in one arm and the box that has never yet seen a cat dangling in her other hand. Good luck in life, girl"

- WankSpanksoff

"Oh god I worked at Macy's in Seattle for two holidays in a row, and Seattle had the plastic bag ban before the rest of the state, so I completely understand what you went through with people just being b**ch about the bag tax. Ours was 5 cents, though. And it has already been a thing for a while before my first season working there, and obviously by the second season working there... I excused the few customers who weren't from the state - in a few cases, they weren't even from the country - from being stupid, but SHEESH."

"Also to be honest when it got busy I'd just give people bags for free. Not worth explaining the whole thing and people going "Well that's OUTRAGEOUS" to me like I have any control over bag-related mandates."

"It was especially stupid when people would be OUTRAGED over the bag thing when they had already come from another store in the mall. Like, okay, even if they didn't charge you for the bag THERE the fact is that you have a bag with you right now from that store that you can just put your purchase in."

- OneGoodRib

Should Smile more

"I was a server at a local Italian/pizza place. I was a waitress and this was a busy Saturday. One table (that seemingly had no issues) asked to talk to my manager. I ask if anything was wrong, they say no, they just want to talk to him. After they leave, i ask what was going on with them. He said they complained that I wasnt friendly enough/smiled enough."

"He asked if the service was poor. No, they said I was very attentive and always had full drinks and everything they needed."

"Was their order messed up? Nope. Food was amazing!"

"What was wrong? She didnt seem happy/friendly/didnt smile"

"Manager tells them that my dad had just died a week ago. Guests suggest that maybe I should take time off of work if I cant smile for customers."

"What. The. F*ck!? Cause like, server dont get paid time off, i HAD to work or I would have lost my apartment etc"

- yosarianmarx

Sarcastic Yeah Right GIF by BounceGiphy

We're betting pretty much every one of those people is, at the very least, a polite dining guest and solid tipper when they're at restaurants, not going to tell people they don't deserve celebrations, and doesn't tell servers they shouldn't be allowed to work if they can't smile and be chipper right after their dad died.

Double Standards That Make People Angry

Reddit user Extreme-Minute-4746 asked: 'What double standards make you angry?'

angry girl in black and white striped shirt
Photo by Julien L on Unsplash

Double standards are an unfortunate part of society.

A double standard is when two or more individuals or sets of people are treated differently when they should be treated the same.

A good example is the difference in the way my brother and I are treated when we cook. I'm big on baking and have a natural talent for it. Whenever I bake anything, even something complicated, like cheesecake, I'm given minimal praise, if any at all. This is because I'm a woman, and in my family culture, women are expected to be able to bake.

My brother isn't as good a baker as me and rarely does it, but when he does, he is praised for subpar brownies because he's a man and it's amazing he can even cook as well as he does.

I'm not the only one who has experience with this.

Redditors have identified many double standards in society and are eager to share.

It all started when Redditor Extreme-Minute-4746 asked:

"What double standards make you angry?"

Civil Service

"As a federal government employee, why do I have to follow all kinds of ethics rules, but politicians and judges don’t?"

– mittychix

"F**k, right? I have to spend six weeks reviewing documentation and hearing out dozens of random companies to award a £100k contract but the minister who runs my department can give his mate's company a multi-million£ contract to run ferries without even getting quotes - DESPITE THAT COMPANY NOT HAVING AND FERRIES AND THE PORT IN QUESTION NOT HAVING CAPACITY FOR THEM."

"I left the civil service after that one."

– Disco_is_Death

"This. Yeah I could get in trouble for accepting a gift over $50 (like I have that much influence anyway) but politicians and judges get lobbied millions..it's infuriating."

– gtbeam3r

"Yes. And they get to keep their jobs for being completely dysfunctional, but if I pulled a fraction that garbage, I’d be fired."

– TrekJaneway

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

"That some people expect you to respect their no, whilst they will most definitely not respect yours."

– IvyBloodroot

"On that note, respecting someone as an authority is often equated to respecting someone as an individual."

"Eg. Teachers who say if you don't respect me (as a superior), I won't respect you (as a person), when they're really not the same thing."

– Paperonia

The Bullied

"School bullying."

"The kid getting picked on has essentially no power. Go to a teacher? Get labeled a snitch and tattle tale. Don't do anything? You're just made an easier target. The moment they fight back, they're the ones who end up dealing with detention, suspension, expulsion, etc. You have more power as a bully in the schools than the victim."

– FriskeCrisps

"It's because bullied people are usually rule followers, and the school wants the problem dealt with as quickly as possible. Best way to do that is to expect the rule follower to follow rules, rather than the rule breaker to suddenly change their ways."

"Fairness ends up on the chopping block."

– darsynia

Services Cliff

"I'm 41 years old and have Cerebral Palsy. If I try to find anything related to the disease - how to deal with it, any kind of ongoing care - it is virtually impossible because all the care is just for children with CP. It's like once you turn 18 the world just doesn't care anymore."

– Zechnophobe

"I’m autistic and in the same boat. “How to deal with a child who…” I'M ASKING FOR ME."

– aroaceautistic

A Two-Way Street

"People who are obsessed with the idea of kids being respectful towards adults, but don't treat kids with respect in turn."

"Edit for example: I went to a very old-fashioned school where the rule was that when an adult entered the room, even in the library and break/lunch, every student in the room had to immediately fall silent - mid sentence, mid word, didn't matter - and stand up until we were given permission to sit back down again. If we didn't, we were chewed out and sometimes even given detentions. The argument was that it trained us into respect, but I was also brought up to believe it's rude to interrupt, and it felt like the teachers were constantly interrupting us."

– MerylSquirrel

"My father in law is like that. He’s “kids should be seen and not heard” type of old school."

"But then he wonders why the children in the family all steer clear of him and why they disregard most things he says."

– Macintosh0211

Doctor, Doctor

"This might be a bit controversial, but I’ve come across a couple of doctors who demand special treatment away from work but preach and practice treating all their patients equally."

– kimchi-pancake

"They charge you a fee or cancel if you’re 5 minutes late but have no problem leaving you waiting for hours. I’ve waited an hour in the lobby and another in the actual examination room."

– SadComfort8692

"Same! i can understand if it’s out of their control but i could hear her, clear as day, giggling with her coworkers about her weekend. i waited 20 in the lobby and 20 in the exam room. i love a good gab but, for f**k’s sake, do it later! if i yapped outside for 20 minutes, it would be a $50 fee and another 4 month long wait to be seen again."

"I suddenly had a $50 i-can-hear-you-nattering-through-the-wall fee. she laughed but it’s been collecting interest ever since…"

– manyfeetball

Alcohol Is Alcohol

"Beer drinkers act like they aren’t alcoholics because they don’t drink hard liquor. Ok sir you just drank 25 beers and then looked at me sideways for drinking a g&t at the family reunion."

– Brainfog_shishkabob

"Same goes for the “sophisticated” wine drinkers..."

"Stop judging me for enjoying a drink on the terrace a few times a year, when you empty 1-2 bottles each evening..."

– 2Madam_Mimmm

"That’s definitely the way it is. I’ve got a snotty alcoholic family member, that THINKS she’s sophisticated, because she drinks high dollar wine, out of very expensive glasses."

"Yeah, pissing yourself and passing out, in front of the mailbox, are definitely the traits of a sophisticated person."

– sweathogbrooklyn

Mr. Mom

"Fathers taking care of their kids."

"I take my kids to doctor appointments, dentist appointments, take them to school, and pick them up. I do all that stuff."

"Every single f**king time, it's, “Dad’s babysitting today?” Or some stupid comment like that. No, I’m not babysitting. I’m being a f**king parent!"

"I hate the double standard that dads can’t do stuff like that with their kids."

"I can’t take my daughter to the park without being questioned or looked at funny either."

"People need to give dads more respect. A lot of us bust our a**es too. I work hard. I take care of my kids, I play with my kids. I clean the house. I do laundry. I don’t stop. I don’t rest, I don’t relax."

– moms-sphaghetti

"Give us changing tables in the men's room!"

– Da1UHideFrom

"Nothing bugs me more than when a place only has changing tables in the women's bathroom."

"It's 2023, I take my son to the aquarium by myself sometimes... Looking at you London SeaLife centre 🤨"

– AstonVanilla

Household Split

"The laundry is always a wierd one. My wife is a much better cook than me. And she hates me cooking when she's in the house. So to compensate I do all the laundry, including ironing before someone mentions it, and all the washing of dishes."

"But even at work, this doesn't seem to be understood as possible. I complained my washing machine had broken and the comment was 'Oh no, what's wife's name going to do?'"

"To which the answer was 'Wonder why I haven't done the washing this week.'"

"But it's infuriating."

– RelativeStranger

Justice Is Bought

"The American justice system. You can afford the best and many more lawyers when you have money."

– TooAfraidToAsk814

"Justice is blind, but the b*tch sure can smell money."

– burgher89

Worship

"I am supposed to respect people's religion, but people aren't supposed to respect my non-religion."

"Particularly when their religion instructs them to not respect my non-religion."

– GeebusNZ

"It kinda makes my head spin that there are people who I get along well with who, per their religion, think I deserve to be tortured in agony for all eternity."

Daztur

Yup, me and my non-religious self have personal experience with that last one!

well-dressed woman holding shopping bags
freestocks on Unsplash

Money is tight for many people.

But sometimes paying more is better than pinching pennies.

Keep reading...Show less

People tend to have a lot of opinions about other people's workplaces, whether or not they've ever worked in that industry themselves.

There are some professions, like teaching and retail, where people will assume they know all there is to know, even if they've never set foot in that position, and there are others, like the CIA, where people view these positions as elusive and awe-inspiring.

But there are beliefs that people share that frustrates those who are actually in the industry.

Redditor Madalyn_Robert asked:

"What's a myth about your profession that you want to debunk?"

Veterinarian Secrets

"Veterinary medicine is not a happy-go-lucky career choice where you get to deal with cute animals rather than people. Most of your patients are sick or scared, and every case involves a fraught negotiation with their stressed-out human."

- Drabby

The Truth Behind Anesthesia

"Anesthesiologist: you're not asleep you are anesthetized. When you're asleep and someone stabs you, you wake up."

- Drsuprane

"Even more terrifying, anesthesia doesn’t exactly prevent you from feeling what’s happening, it (in effect) disrupts the timing clock that allows different parts of the brain to talk to each other. You won’t be able to remember it or be conscious to experience it, but somewhere some part of your brain is receiving those pain signals and is trying desperately to tell the rest of your brain what’s happening."

- Steaveee

Preventative > Reactive

"Maintenance is worth doing and is definitely worth paying for."

"People say, 'I don't know why we pay those maintenance guys, nothing ever breaks around here!'"

"The reason Germany and Japan (and South Korea) became and remain such manufacturing powerhouses is because they know the value of maintenence. If you keep everything in clean good working order, you end up with minimum down time. Working maintenance into manufacturing schedules keeps output level, because you have no unexpected downtime."

"It's the same for your car or your home. Setting aside time and resources for maintenance means you won't lose unexpected time and resources when things break. Good maintenance will spot things before they break and switch them out. That's worth paying for."

- TriviaBanal

The Power of a Reboot

"IT. Rebooting is NOT a waste of time and solves a remarkable number of problems."

- gfhggdssgg

"Instead of using shutdown, use restart."

"Modern versions of windows have something called fast startup, which basically hibernates when you shut down. You don't get the benefit of a reboot."

- gerwen

Giant, Flying Puzzles

"Commercial aircraft are built almost entirely by hand. Like 96%. There's very little automation in the process."

- Kalepsis

"Authentic, handcrafted commercial airliners."

- Keyspam102

"Free range, GRASS FED, Authentic, handcrafted commercial airliners!"

- Wiggly96

Doing Library Things

"I am a public librarian. While curating books is still a portion of the job, much of it these days is taken up by database assistance and training, program development and teaching, and public education. It’s much closer to school teaching, but for adults and without grading homework, than it was in the past."

- SmallDarkCloud

Rate the Emergency

"If you go to the ER via ambulance, it does NOT mean you will be seen quicker."

"ERs take the sickest people first, definitely not the ones who come in by ambulance first."

- DoIHaveDementia

Not in Charge

"Teachers have very little say in anything. We advocate the best we can but most of the time, it’s out of our hands, including holding children back who desperately need help."

- chasindreams22

Define "Recycled"

"Print industry. Your paper isn’t as recycled as you think it is."

- mullett

True Lawyers

"That all lawyers make absurd amounts of money. The ones that won't sell their entire life for big bucks tend to make pretty average money."

- dudeblackhawk

"Yes! Some months I barely make enough for all my expenses. Some months I make a lot of money. Some months I make absolutely nothing. Having a private practice in my country means financial instability. The Estate does pay me to represent people who can't afford a lawyer but it pays very bad and takes forever to get that money."

"Also, we're not all like in the movies. Most of us actually care about the people we represent and we try our best to help them."

- ZucchiniAnxious

Not Everything Is Memorized

"I can write code. I cannot debug most of your Windows problems without googling them."

- Resies

Underpaid and Overworked

"School Custodian here and we are NOT overpaid cleaners. What would you pay someone that can paint, Sheetrock, tape/mud, patch concrete/asphalt, operate/repair commercial landscaping/snow removal equipment, operate/repair commercial custodial equipment, restore various types of floors including vct/hardwood/carpet/tile, replace toilets/faucets, air filters, belts, trim/fell trees, shovel roofs, etc?"

"Not all of us are cleaners/janitors, which are vital and underpaid as well. Some of us are Jack/Jill of all trades and you want to pay us peanuts?"

"All employees of a school are important and administrators shouldn't try to balance their budgets on the backs of workers when I've seen an exponential amount of administrative salary and stupid purchasing decisions, not to mention unfunded mandates from the state."

- Nutella_Zamboni

Speech-to-Language Complexity

"There is sooooo much more to the speech-language pathologist scope of practice than working with kids who stutter or can't say their 'r's."

"An entire half of the field is in the adult medical setting working with people who have dementia, swallowing disorders, oral cancer, strokes, Parkinson's disease, and voice disorders, plus some other niche areas like transgender voice or accent modification."

"The pediatric half of the field also works with AAC devices, social skills, literacy development, syntax, executive functioning, writing, feeding, and more."

- bibliophile222

Realistic Therapy

"Therapist here, specifically a couples therapist."

"Therapy is not just about venting or having someone agree with you all the time to make you feel better. Yes, we validate and listen and venting happens at times. But we also challenge you, encourage you to set goals and make change, and sometimes give 'homework.'"

"Therapy is an active process and if you want to see change you have to be willing to make change. I think the media has really warped people's ideas and they expect miracles to happen by showing up without any effort. I wish I could do that for you! But I need you to partner with me to make things happen."

"Also, very few therapists actually have you lay on a couch."

- Dependent-Citron4444

Well, Then.

"Scientist (more specifically, molecular biologist in biotech)."

"I am not hiding the cure for cancer, and I don't know s**t about actual medicine."

- DaOleRazzleDazzle

It's surprising how much we often think we know about other people's professions, and it's probably annoying to them to hear misconceptions day in and day out from the general public.

This is a great reminder of how much we can learn from each other, even just in the workplace.

Person holding two vintage photographs of family portraits
Cheryl Winn-Boujnida/Unsplash

How well did you really know the people who are no longer with us?

Many of us present our best selves to our friends and relatives but do you share with them your deepest, darkest insecurities and secrets?

Maybe you do. But there are plenty of others who take their secrets to the grave.

But those closely guarded secrets or the truest identities can come to light posthumously in many forms, giving a glimpse of who they were to the people they've left behind.

Curious to hear from strangers online, Redditor WhoAllIll asked:

"What secret was revealed when cleaning out the home of a deceased family member?"

Not everyone had pure morals or ethics.

Shady Business

"Elderly aunt had a hidden room with staircase to basement area no one knew about. She and her son had a meth lab. This was in the 90’s in Philly. Blew us all away."

– pekepeeps

Here's The Story

"We all knew this one uncle had a second family. We expected drama at the funeral."

"No one was expecting his third family to show up. Wife. Three kids. This new family knew the rest of the family by name from pictures. How we are all related, names, hobbies. That was a wildly bizarre experience."

– z-adventure

Late Discovery

"My dad passed away in 1994 (I was 28). While going through his safe I found some adoption papers. While reading through them I got excited at the prospect I might have a brother out there somewhere (I was raised as an only child) but couldn't understand why my parents never told me that they'd adopted a child but never told me. After rereading them, I realized that they papers were about me. After confronting my family about this turns out everyone - family, close friends, I mean everyone, knew I was adopted. Except me. That was a fun day."

– rolandblais

You never know about a person.

Once Upon A Cash-tress

"Many years ago I went with my dad and aunt to clean out my great uncle’s apartment after he passed away. He was never married, no kids, and lived (we thought) very poor. Tiny apartment with a twin bed, table and chair, a couple of pots and pans, a couple pants& shirts, and that’s basically it."

"As we stripped the bed and moved the mattress, we were shocked. He had hundreds of stacks of 10 dollar bills, wrapped in rubber bands, under his mattress. They were all 10 dollar bills. He lived during the Depression and didn’t trust banks, apparently, but we had no idea he had so much cash. He never spent it on anything. Just bundled it and saved it under his mattress. Some of the bills were so old and yellowed. It equaled thousands of dollars. We had no idea."

– Sostupid246

The Neat Hoarder

"My grandfather, who spoke English as a third language, was a bit of a hoarder. Lots of old sh*t stockpiled in his basement, but well organized. Imagine a generic episode of Hoarders, but with a prepper OCD vibe."

"Everything was sanitized, stacked/nested, and grouped logically. It was like the stock room for a store that wasn't yet sure what products it was selling and wanted to be ready."

"So we find a cylindrical container that was kinda heavy for its size, and it had the label 'OLD PENIS'. It was one of those black plastic film containers."

"Hesitant, but curious, we removed the lid."

"It contained a collection of one-cent pieces which had been minted in the first half of the 20th century."

"Part of me was disappointed, part of me was relieved."

"Edit: I'm glad so many people got a chuckle from the mystery of my grandfather's old penis. It was an innocent typo, but he was a jovial man and would have enjoyed knowing it made so many people laugh."

– funkme1ster

Unpublished

"We knew my originally British, naturalized Canadian great-grandmother had been an enthusiastic amateur historian, who had been fascinated by Britain’s war with Napoleon - not for the least reason because she was herself tangentially related to the Duke of Wellington’s family, via a cousin’s marriage to his son’s nephew, or some connection equally obscure and tenuous."

"What we didn’t know is that, likely in preparation for a book she never wrote, as a young woman she had actually interviewed several dozen elderly English, French and Spanish veterans about their experiences during that war - including three actual survivors of Waterloo (two English, one French), and an aide-de-camp to Spanish General Francisco Javier Castaños, at the time he handed the Napoleonic army its very first defeat in the field, and captured nearly 20,000 French troops at the Battle of Bailen (1808)."

"But there it was, stored in a wooden egg crate under her iron-framed bed, among old calendars, untested recipe clippings and copies of Family Circle magazine: a manuscript with nearly three hundred pages of transcribed military memoirs - all laid out in three languages (in which she was fluent) in her elegant, Spencerian hand."

"My parents donated her manuscript to the Imperial War Museum, where no doubt it will never have human eyes laid on it again."

– theartfulcodger

These Redditors share heartwarming discoveries.

Preparing For The Onward Journey

"My dad was in hospice at home for a couple months before he died of lung cancer, and when I went to clean out his house I found that he had already sorted and packed away most of his personal treasures in couple storage bins. It was heartbreaking all over again thinking of him sitting there packing up his own life knowing it was coming to an end."

– F0regn_Lawns

Messages From Beyond

"When my husband died a few years ago i found several notes/letters he had scattered in various places around our home, written to me in advance (he had terminal cancer & knew he was dying). some were marked 'open when you can't stop crying' 'open when the holidays are too rough' 'open when you have to put one of the cats to sleep'."

"They didn't contain any secrets, but they are heartbreakingly beautiful."

– miss_trixie

Sweet Keepsake

"My dad kept a handwritten note in his wallet containing my mom’s old address, phone number, and directions to her house from when they first started dating in the 70s. He had moved it from wallet to wallet over the years. ❤️ He just died this past March and that was one of the first things we found."

– Jinx5326

Scavenger Hunt

"That my dad hid money all over the house, not huge amounts mind you, but $60 here, $120 there. Felt like a bit of a scavenger hunt when we were cleaning out his stuff. He was always a bit of a sneakily generous guy, always gave me and my brothers a secret handshake with money tucked in his palm when we’d go back to school after a weekend home, etc, so wouldn’t be surprised if he’d done it intentionally. Made us smile every time we found some, iirc I think the final total was somewhere around $800."

– Mzunguman

Photographs are treasures.

When my family cleaned out the house of my father's aunt who lived in America, we found stacks of vintage photographs well before the advent of digital photography.

There were photos of my great aunt in Japan from when she was a teenager to photos of her and her husband at a Japanese internment camp at Heart Mountain, Wyoming.

There were no secrets uncovered but it was so profound poring through images capturing decades of her life captured on film.