In this case, eavesdropping was funny. But that isn't always so. There are times when we eavesdrop and end up hearing something that makes us want to wash our ears out with Clorox (don't do this, please).
Here are some of those stories. Appropriate_Ad_8637 asked:
What's the most f*cked up thing you've heard eavesdropping?
Eavesdropping at the wrong time can end up changing your entire view of a person. And then it’s all over.
Valid question.
“Ex thought I was sleeping. She went out on the back patio which was under my master bedroom window that was open. I wasn't trying to eavesdrop, but overheard her talking to her friend about how they were both sleeping with an old man for money and pills."
“Were you the old man...?"
The 90's were wack.
music video loop GIFGiphy“Back in the 90's you could pick up cordless phone calls with an ordinary scanner from Radio Shack. That's how I found out the guy living one floor below me was dealing meth.
Also routinely heard peoples' credit card numbers, sex chats, all that stuff. It was crazy.”
Some parents should not be parents.
“From an open window when I was 19, I overheard my Mom telling my Dad she raised a loser. That still hurts years later.”
“My parents openly talked sh*t about me to family members even if I was around my whole life. Then they wonder why I never bring my son to visit for holidays or anything. I never want to see them again.”
Oh, the things you learn about people through eavesdropping.
I don’t even know what to say to this one.
“I was in line behind two older women at a restaurant maybe 5-6 years ago.
One says "hey, did you hear about so-and-sos son?"
The other says "no, what happened?"
She replies "he ran off and joined ISIS"
What was crazy was they seemed so casual about it. Like that wasn't a crazy thing to hear about your friend's son."
Honestly? Iconic.
Oh My God Yes GIF by A Little Late With Lilly SinghGiphy“Was at a bar, went to the bathroom, and passed a woman talking into a pay phone. She said the greatest sentence I have ever heard. This was over two decades ago, and I still remember it, clear as day:
"Yeah, well every d*ck I suck puts your daughter through college."
I have seriously used that as an example of perfect characterization. You learn her whole life's story in one sentence. It's brilliant.”
Yikes!!!
“Yeah, so a friend of mine got his aunt pregnant.
It went like:
Buddy: "Are you sure? I mean, mom is going to be pissed if she finds out. No no no, I'll go with you. For real, we can't see each other again? Wait, no, we can just go away...together, you know. No this it's not wrong. I love you. Please don't."
From what I can surmise is that his aunt was on her way to get an abortion or something and that she's going to leave.”
Sounds like a very bad day.
“Years ago I walked by a dude on the street. Visibly frustrated, he was on his phone talking to either his boss, or a friend...who knows.
"...And then it got all caught in the gears, just torn apart, jesus christ blood and guts everywhere! Right in front of the kids! what a bad day to – no, I didn't clean it up! I was late for my dad's funeral!"
I can’t even believe what I’m reading for some of these. Imagine how the people hearing this in real life felt.
I mean, she has a point.
love & hip hop lhhmia GIF by VH1Giphy“I work nights right next to a bar. The conversation that's stuck with me the most was when someone's baby mama found them and started a one-sided shouting match outside the window.
She said something along the lines of, "you've got a million dollars in your bank account and still can't take care of your kids." Saw her running and screaming at him as he got in his car and drove off.”
Well, that’s one way to do it.
“Overheard a doctor I worked for tell a patient to get a pack of Camels and chain smoke the entire thing. He was a pulmonologist (lung doctor) so I had to ask.
The patient he was talking to had a cough for six months, no treatment was helping. She called the next day, said she coughed up a giant ball of phlegm after all that smoking and her cough was gone. Serial chest X-rays showed no active disease. The doctor said he learned this "treatment method" in Canada back in the 60's.”
Poor guy.
Beck Bennett Drinking GIF by Saturday Night LiveGiphy“At a bar a few years ago outside on the covered patio with all the other smokers. One of those places that pumps the music on the patio so loud you can hardly speak to the person next to you. A couple on the other side of the patio were yelling to each other really animated, probably because they couldn't hear anything. When suddenly the beat drops and she yells at the top of her lungs "I just don't love you anymore" and the entire crowd turns to look at them shook.
I seen that poor guy the rest of the night sitting at that table in the corner where he got dumped and everyone heard.”
Rude.
“So I had to rent a car the other month. Went to return it but they were closed on the weekends and no drop box or anything
So I call and explain that I could have returned the car sat morning and saved myself 100 bucks but them being closed stopped that.
The receptionist gets the manager and she okays the refund, great says goodbye and attempts to hang up the phone. But didn't.
She then starts talking to the receptionist about how she didn't want to refund me but didn't want to deal with the situation as I was probably an a**hole who would escalate it up the chain and complain to corporate and she didn't want the negativity.”
Should’ve listened.
“My uncle talking about burning down our family cabin and stabbing his wife…I told my parents and they thought it was just the words of a senile old man. He did in fact burn down the cabin, and he tried to kill his wife. He was at least unsuccessful at murder but he's now locked up somewhere. My family didn't tell anyone that it was him that burned it down so they could get the insurance, as he also owned part of the property.”
Doesn’t work like that.
meditation aura GIF by NETFLIXGiphy“Two 20 something guys in a Dollar Tree were talking about a mutual friend and the one of them was saying how the guy said, "You can think yourself well from any illness, it's all in your head. You don't need medications." (Paraphrasing a bit but yeah, it really was a "think yourself healthy, don't use medications or see doctors" conversation.) I couldn't help muttering "What an idiot" as I walked past because, well, the dude's an idiot. They must've heard me because the second dude started praising their mutual friend as a genius. I just laughed.
Yeah, really try to think yourself well from cancer instead of doing chemo, boys, see how well that works out for you.”
Awkward….
“I wasn't really eavesdropping as it was a loud conversation in an employee break room that I just wasn't apart of. Some elderly coworkers of mine were talking about ringtones and one said something along the lines of, "I don't really use a ringtone; I just keep my phone on vibrate. That way it feels nice if I'm sitting on it."
Maybe this should be a lesson to all of us- to mind our own d*mn business. Because we really don’t need to overhear our roommates conversation about what her date smelled like (Mountain Dew and cigarettes). True story.
Also, watch what you say in public. You never know what’ll end up on Reddit.
What follows is a good reminder that we should be careful of the things we say about people when we assume they are in deep sleep.
Curious to hear about strangers online, Redditor KingHanma asked:
"What's the Worst thing you've overheard while pretending to be asleep?"
Parents disclosed life-changing news in private. Or so they thought.
Matrimonial Miss
"I was 12 and my dad (Single Dad) telling his so called 'Friend' (Female) who was at the time living with us, 'Should we tell him that we are married?'"
"So this was my father's second wife and they really were married. I confronted my dad the next day and he had hid the fact from me for a month. I was super disturbed about what was happening around me. It did not work out between them and they ended up getting a divorce. So yayyyy."
"I was 15. I was at my sister's house babysitting my nephew and was asleep on the couch when she and her husband got home at about 2 am. The phone rang. It woke me but I lay there pretending to be asleep as I listened to her answer it. I heard her say, 'What!? Oh my god! Oh my god!'"
"She hung up and said to her husband, 'That was my dad. Diablo [my horse] got out of the pasture and went into the road. He got hit by a car and killed. How am I going to tell him?"
"I said, 'I already know.'"
"That was 45 years ago. It still hurts."
Alarms are better to wake up to than the following:
Hypocritical Parents
"My anti-drug parents drunk as sh*t and on a drug binge. Got up to pee at like 6am when the noise finally stopped and there had to be $200 worth of drugs on my kitchen table."
"We lived in a small, one-story house. There's no way anyone could've slept through their BS."
"And my mom still cries when I talk about weed."
The Confirmation
"He's not asleep."
– AyamXII
"My mom once woke me up to tell me to go to sleep."
"I was asleep. She said my name and shook me, which woke me up, and then she told me to go to sleep."
How She Really Feels
"My step mom talking sh*t about me to my dad when I was a kid."
Best Excuses For Late Assignments That Were Actually True | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
The Warning
"Roommate talking to another roommate about how he deserves to have sex with this girl that he's close friends with and how mad he was that she kept not sleeping with him so he planned on inviting her over soon and getting her wasted and taking advantage of her. I found the girl online and warned her."
Rude Awakening
"When I was a kid, a friend and I were both gymnasts, but at different studios."
"She invited me over for an Open Gym Sleepover, which is like when 30 kids all sleep over at the gym with very little supervision, running and jumping on equipment like trampolines, vaults, ropes, balance beams, and parallel bars. God bless the 90's, we had a blast."
"Now the guy who ran this gym, I had a weird feeling about. My parents once had me try out for a team at his gym, and he inspected my body with his hands. It was in full sight of everyone, including my mother, but it was just weird. My mother later told me she was too stunned to object in the moment. He kept touching my butt and telling me to tighten my 'butt' (glutes), which I didn't understand. He kept doing it repeatedly."
"Anyway, at the sleepover, I lay down next to my friend but stayed awake. I saw Coach Hands stepping quietly between the sleeping girls, taking flash photographs. When he came over to do it to me&my friend, I made eye contact with him during the flash. He quickly went away and stopped taking pictures."
"The next morning, he pulled me into his office with a female coach (his wife?) and explained to me that the photos were for promotional purposes. He even had a little poster board made up. I didn't really beleive him, but at that age (10) I didn't really understand how dangerous he could have been. I never talked to an adult about it, just my friends, and we were all🤷♀️🤷♀️🤷♀️"
I was never in a situation where I overheard someone talking smack about me, but I did have the misfortune of "sleeping" in a hotel suite with friends who hooked up in the bed next to me.
A group of about 20 of my college friends pooled money together to ring in the new year in a posh hotel. Of course, there was alcohol. Plenty of it.
I passed out early as I'm a lightweight, but then I woke up to moaning sounds next to me. I was paralyzed – torn between drawing attention to myself by high-tailing it out of the room or pretending to be asleep and enduring the sloppy sounds.
I decided to ring in the new year by choosing the latter, and I still regret my horrible decision. Happy new year to me.
I've lost track of the amount of times I've been asked outrageously idiotic questions. I have literally been frozen in disbelief. Sometimes I get asked if I'm having a stroke. I'm not, I'm just paralyzed with shock. Let's see who can relate...
Ask Nemo
finding dory GIFGiphy"How do fish breathe when they are eating cabbage underwater?"
"Coming from the new guy in the class to the bio professor in HS."
- kayra551
Oh Girl...
"A girl in my class genuinely thought the sun was the size of a basket ball and "the stars" were the size of golf balls. She failed to grasp how heliocentricity worked despite being shown a model and having it explained to her very slowly and deliberately."
"She failed to understand indoor plumbing and seemed to believe that some water just naturally existed in a state of "hot" since she expressed agitation at the tap water being cold and asked if "anyone can refill the hot water or something." She sincerely believed that all cats were female and all dogs were male, no she didn't have an explanation for how they reproduced and implied it happened via divine means despite the fact that she wasn't religious."
"She didn't understand how wages or loans worked and genuinely thought people could just withdraw as much money as they wanted from the ATM and that poor people were just too lazy to go to the ATM. She said something new this dumb every week, these are just some of the more memorable ones. Oh, and she was around 15-16 at the time."
Up Where?
"Was star gazing with a mate one night out camping. He said dead serious (and sober) "do you think there are like, other planets up there floating around in space?" I didn't know how to reply."
"You sure he didn't mean other planets with life similar to ours? Surely someone can't be that stupid."
- Coltyn03
In the Bed
"Used to work maintenance for college student housing. Every unit has its own parking directly off the street in front of it. Tenant complains he has 6 yeti coolers stolen. I say "oh no, how terrible. Those clever criminals, however did they break into your home? I never noticed a work order for a broken door or window here?" Tenant: "... uh... they were in my truckbed..."
People Explain The Worst Thing That's Ever Happened To Them On Their Birthday
Deep Breathes
best friends vegan GIF by Mercy For AnimalsGiphy"Cow is the only animal which not only inhales, but also exhales oxygen."
"--Rekha Arya (Minister of Animal Husbandry, Uttarakhand, India, 2018)"
"Edit: There are quite a lot of dumb comments made by politicians but I chose this one because it is not as problematic yet definitely very stupid."
I don't even know where to begin. I'm again frozen in my shooketh state. How do human beings survive with every breathe we take? It's a miracle we've made it this far. Shall we continue?
SNL
Scared Saturday Night Live GIF by HULUGiphyMy wife : "What day is Saturday night live on?"
- Eenvy
Hot and Cold
"The sun is cold, otherwise the universe would be super hot."
"Relative to the rest of the universe, sure. Relative to other stars, my understanding is that the sun isn't particularly hot (not particularly cold either, I believe it falls somewhere in the middle if you are comparing how hot all stars are.)".
- Tie_Jay
Holed Up
"I don't believe in outer space. If there was outer space all our air would be gone." My new neighbor said this awhile back. I GTFO and have been avoiding him ever since."
"My grandfather was opposed to NASA because they were, apparently, "poking holes in the atmosphere."
And Toes?
josh holloway sawyer GIF by The Paley Center for MediaGiphy"If someone loses their finger, their child will be born without a finger."
Oxygen Use
"My gf said she had to keep refilling her fishbowl (which is in direct sunlight all day) with water because the fish kept drinking the water."
- xSerebii
"They do use up the oxygen in the water."
- sarcalom
When 40...
"I had this 40-year-old woman come into work and say that she wanted to return a small bottle of hand soap. I asked her if anything was wrong with it, to which she said:
"Well, it says on the bottle that it's foaming hand soap, and I looked inside and there is no foam. So I want to return it."
I had to take a second to see if she was pulling my leg. She wasn't."
"I explained to her how foaming hand soap worked and she seemed so surprised. Then she left with the soap. That was the first customer I ever had working there."
Why so Sad?
"One of my old managers was asking me why the nurses were so unhappy, as they liked to confide in me. I pointed out that the company was short staffed, so the nurses had a HUGE workload in a very emotional intense specialty and it had been that way for almost 8 months (pre-covid)."
"They were also getting paid less than the area norm. She then said "I think of my job like my marriage. People should stick out the tough times and wait to see if it gets better!". Ummm no. Mind you this woman had just bought a brand new house and Tesla on her salary and constantly dropped the ball on the patients I sent her."
In the Sky
Art Moon GIFGiphy"The moon can't be in the sky when the sun is up." -Kindergarten teacher.
"Literally saying this standing so the moon was in the sky behind them."
"Guess when I realized adults can be hopelessly clueless."
Oh Josh
"If you save 20 cents a day for a year, you'll save over $1000. I'm so doing that!". He was reading something on Facebook.
"Overheard two coworkers chatting about this. I had to stop them and say "if you multiply $1 by 365, the amount of days in a year, how much money would you have, Josh?"
"Josh is gullible. Don't be like Josh."
That Germany Trip
"We were traveling through Germany by bus. Every now and then we would come across a sign saying "AUSFAHRT", meaning exit of a highway. After riding on that highway for a good hour or so (and seeing many of these signs), some girl thought she would make a clever remark and went: Damn what's up with this Ausfahrt city, it's huge!!! Everyone who heard it facepalmed and she did as well when we explained."
- ieff8
Indy Don't Know
Harrison Ford GIFGiphy"My uncle cited Indiana Jones movies as proof that the world was going to end in 2012. He was dead serious and I began to question what genes I was born with."
Not in My Country
"There are no gay people in my country." Very intelligent person, never expressed any homophobia at any other occasion, and actually was involved in the gay-straight alliance and similar projects at my high school. I don't want to be the person that says "they're not bigoted because they have friends from x group" but this person had several gay friends. They were just convinced however that for some reason, there were no gay people at all in the country they were raised in."
Gimmes the Citrus
hip hop squares eating GIF by VH1Giphy"Grapefruit shrinks fat."
"I asked well why are there fat people. She said oh because they probably don't like grapefruit. I said, people would eat dog crap if it shrunk fat!!"
I really thought I had heard it all in my days as a waiter, but life never ceases to amaze. I tell you if you really want to hear some nonsense that will follow you forever, work as a waiter for one week. You'll never see people the same way again. I gotta get earplugs.
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Those who work behind bars meet people from all walks of life and hear a variety of unusual anecdotes.
I never worked as a bartender, but I know they get an earful from babbling patrons who have had one too many to drink.
Curious to hear about the wild life stories shared at bars, Reddit xXSlimi_Gacha009 asked:
"Bartenders of reddit, what was the weirdest/craziest thing you have overheard while making someone's drink?"
Attention Seekers
Patrons say the darnedest things.
Bobby
"The first restaurant/bar i worked in I was only serving but I frequently was in the section right next to the bar. One day I was busy serving a large group, but the restaurant was mostly empty and a guy behind me at the bar said 'you wanna pet my parrot?' my initial reaction was the same as if a stranger had just come up behind me and touched my shoulders but when I turned around... It really was a guy with a parrot on his shoulder. The parrots name was Bobby and yes both me and the bartender pet him 😂"
– Midiblye
Sales Pitch
"I was tending bar during an extremely busy happy hour. The place was mobbed and super noisy. Suddenly, a guy sitting at the bar stands up and announces 'Ladies and gentlemen of the bar, I represent the Acme meat company and we carry a full line of high quality...'. The entire bar goes silent while he continues to do his sales pitch at full volume. For some reason he decided that this was a great time and place to hustle up some business. My manager sprinted over to him and told him knock it off and that kind of thing wasn't allowed in here. So he sat down and resumed drinking."
Favorite A**hole Bartender
"Regular of mine who I hadn't seen in awhile was sitting at the bar when I came in for a shift change."
"I came in the back way and noticed he had crutches leaning against the bar."
"Recently in the news someone hadn't had their shotgun properly secured in their truck and it went off..."
"So I jokingly say, 'you're that f'king idiot who blew off his leg arent you?'"
"The whole bar gets quiet and everyone is mean mugging me."
"My regular starts laughing..."
"Yeah, it was him. I had no idea. I didn't apologize, because as his favorite a**hole bartender those comments were expected of me."
"Poor guy was only 20 couple and blew his leg off close to the hip. No idea how he survived."
Murder Plot
"I was a bartender for about two weeks (filling in for a relative who owned a bar and went on his honeymoon)."
"I heard a guy talking to a woman about murdering her husband. I called the cops, but these patrons were gone before they showed up. This was before cameras, so I just gave my story and that was it."
"Not long after, my uncle calls me saying the cops are looking for me. They interview me about the couple. Apparently, the guy was a hitman for hire and the woman was trying to get some insurance money. She got busted."
"It was actually an episode of 'Forensic Files' back when that was on TV. I remember watching the episode and they said something like 'the couple was overheard discussing the murder in a bar.' I was kind of upset that they didn't mention me. Lol. I was hoping for, 'The awesome bartender overheard them, but couldn't really tell us much. He also pointed at the male in the photo lineup and asked 'Is this him?' as if he was unsure. What a f"king dope.'"
"Edit 1: I spent half of the day reading the descriptions of every episode that's streaming on Netflix and watching the ones that seemed relevant. I didn't figure it out and I'm sorry, but I just don't know which episode it was. I recorded it on a VHS tape years ago, but don't know where that is either. I'm moving, so if I come across it, I'll edit this and let everyone know which one it was."
"Edit 2: As I recall, the hitman wasn't a professional by any means. I think the episode said he was just a local junkie who'd pretty much do anything for his next fix."
– Myzyri
Extremely Random
The following conversations were undoubtedly head-turners.
Poop-Blocked
"From a woman to her friend, 'I don't know about you but I just can't poop in a pink bathroom.'"
Proud Pecker
"Someone was boasting about his 'Very small penis! VERY TINY! LIKE MICRO!' he proceeds to lower his pants and show it to his friend 🤷♀️"
Couples
Passions are inflamed where alcohol is in the mix.
Ferris Wheel Payment
"A married couple in their fifties arguing how they were going to explain the fact they couldn't pay the remainder of the 3 million euro bill for a Ferris wheel they'd ordered 18 months ago, already put a million deposit on, and who's collection was due at 8am the following morning."
That's Amore
"Man and woman is sitting at the bar. She starts crying and says 'I just want us to have something special'. The guy looked her dead in the eyes and said 'we do have something special, we have sex. We are both married'. 10 minutes later they are making out and she's rubbing him over his pants. I loved slow Wednesdays."
I'm a cheap date.
So whenever I'm halfway through my first – and usually ONLY – glass of cab sav at a bar, I know I'm talking in a stream of consciousness and volunteering embarrassing personal information.
Once, I confided to all the patrons and staff at a bar in Barcelona, France, about my embarrassing college experience. And I apparently gave a wild performance when the DJ played Prince's "Kiss."
I'm still searching this subReddit to see if any of the comments might be referring to me.
Children are highly observant. And once they commit to memory something they've seen or heard, all bets are off. I would constantly call out people without knowing. Once, I heard my babysitter tell a friend she hated their other friend because said friend was a skank and she never wanted to see her again. So imagine my surprise a few days later when said friend shows up to hangout. I was confused. So I asked... "Isn't she the skank you never want to see again?" I believe the people sharing on this thread understand the awkwardness of it all.
Chemistry GIF by memecandyIn the middle of a library summer reading program, I picked a little girl, probably about 4-5 years old, to come up and be my volunteer for a magic trick, which then you explained the science of after it was done. I asked what her name was, she said it into the mic, zero shyness in front of approximately 200 kids and adults. I asked if she had ever heard of the "trick" we were going to do and she said, "Nope!
My favorite dinosaur is a triceratops! And I like your shoes! My dad is back there HI DAD but my mom couldn't come tonight because she got a shot in her butt and can't sit on the hard chairs this place has." Dad (and all the other adults in the audience) were dying.
Grandpa Died
8th grader, excitedly: Mrs. Rosiedokidoki, guess what I found out? My grandpa was a nazi!
Me: do you know what a nazi is?
8th grader: no!!
Me: maybe you should go talk to your mom about that.
She came in the next day and went, "yeah my mom told me I can't tell people about my grandpa anymore."
On the Swings
I had a child once playing on the tire swing. He was a veeeeeeeeerrry serious kid and he looked me dead in the eye and said how much he liked the swing at daycare and how when he grew up he wanted to have a swing just like his mummy and daddy did in their bedroom... Looking his parents in the eye that day telling them he had a good day and keeping silent was difficult.
Teachers hear the craziest things. Someone needs to compile a comedy list of "overhearings" from educators and publish it as a coffee table book. The profits could single handedly fund schools in underprivileged areas for decades. It must make teachers like part of the family, at least for the day.
Congratulations!
If someone in your family is pregnant, and you've told your child, I already know.
That's Quite a Tree
GiphyWorked at an afterschool program run by the YMCA. Once had a 4th grader explain to me in detail how her sister was also her cousin.
edit: they had the same dad and their moms were sisters, so half siblings through dad and 1st cousins through moms. having a 9 year old run you through that is quite a trip.
Show & Tell
My daughter's kindergarten teacher told me about how one child entertained them at Show and Tell with a complete report on the new alarm system in their house including the code and where the keypad was located behind the curtains!
Save the Water
Kudos going out to all the teachers for glossing over the home stuff they learn!
My sister wrote in her daily journal in grade 1 that our parents had a shower together the night before. Teacher wrote "What a great way to save water!"
I remember when I was about twelve and had just figured out sex on my own, I was at a friend's house and she mentioned offhandedly that her parents bath together. I was like, "that's a thing people do? When their kids are around to know?"
My parents have always been very private, and I thought that was how everyone was.
How many times do you think teachers take and use what they hear? like if it's not a horror story but a funny tagline... you know they use good comedy in real life or the class the following year. They probably owe some royalties for certain witty wisdoms that endeared them to others. The best writers steal, so do teachers. I can feel it.
I'm the DJ
Here's a cute and lighthearted one—I had a girl stay for some help after school one day. At the time I was teaching geometry (10th grade) in a mostly Hispanic school. She told me about growing up in Peru until about the age of 10 or so (I can't remember the exact age she told me). She was telling me that she worked with her uncle sometimes on the weekend. I asked what kind of work—many of our kids worked construction with their families.
"He's a clown... I'm his DJ." That really gave me a smile.
In the Kitchen
We were talking about calling 911, but what a real emergency is. This is tricky with 10 year olds because you want to use real emergency examples but not freak them out. One kid... "so if your mom gives birth in the kitchen, that's an emergency"
Sure enough mom picks him up with his baby brother who was born last week in their kitchen.
Nunna Yo!
None Of Your Business No GIF by Late Night with Seth MeyersGiphy4th grade. A student on Zoom the other day asked why another student had been gone a few weeks, and we all heard his mom in the back yell, "Boy, that is nunna yo damn business!" before he muted. I almost burst laughing but I held my composure.
High Tea Lady
One of my students once said "Mummy wants to know if you want to come round for tea because daddy is away at work."
The mother couldn't look at me for weeks on the playground, cause I think she heard her daughter ask me.
Well, what's wrong with a bit of tea? She probably just wants another grown up around to talk to.
Puff Up
I did a placement once and students had to talk about what they would do with a million dollars. One kid gets up in front of the class and goes "My mum said if she had a million dollars, she would buy lots and lots and lots and lots of weed."
Lord the world is a mess for the youth isn't it? If kids had even half a clue about what they're saying... they'd be too mortified to leave the house.
11th grade blues...
An 11th grader was talking about how he moved back with his grandparent's when his mom dies. He mentioned that his mom also attended this school and so did his dad, but he never met him. He only new his dad's first name. So he says the name in my "get to know other students first day ice breaker." A freshman girl asked a few pointed questions, pulls out her phone and calls their dad. Dad is there within 15 min.
Turns out the dead mom's family moved mom out of the city to hide the pregnancy and the dad only knew the child's first name. Dad spent years trying unsuccessfully to track his kid down. The dad settled down becomes an EMT, gets married, has 3 daughters, the oldest daughter was the freshman. There was a GD family reunion in my ice breaker on the first day of school.
Edit: Thanks for the awards everyone. Some points: the boys mom and dad were high school students when she became pregnant. I don't think that was clear. Mom moved from (downtown major northern city) to Alabama or Louisiana to be with her (grand)fathers, the boy got the (grand)fathers name (not sure if it was the moms father or grandfather). The dad would not have had the money or resources to trace the mom's movement, this would be in the pager/cassette days not cell phones and Facebook.
"Kid Beer"
While I taught 4th grade, I had a kid tell me that his dad works on car rims at night. Another one told my friend, the bilingual teacher, that she came back from visiting family in Mexico over the weekend by going through the river. Edited to add, another one! I taught the son of a 2nd grade teacher.
He came in one weekend talking about drinking lots of "kid beer" over the weekend at his dad's house. His mom stopped by later and I mentioned the story, she shook her head and said, "It's apple juice, I keep telling his dad to stop calling it kid beer!" Thanks for the awards! These are my very first ones!
Now that is Drama
Okay, so not a teacher but in grade 9 there was a girl who got completely plastered in the girls bathroom. And my 14 year old self had one too many slushies at lunch so I ran into her there. This girl's makeup was a complete mess and since I was at the peak of social anxiety problems I just tried to slip away.
As usual I was too late and this girl clung to my arm and fell apart sobbing to me about how her boyfriend had gotten her mother pregnant. I ended up missing the rest of the day to sit in the corner of the bathroom with this girl I had never met before in my life, and we never talked again. But man, I feel bad for that disfunction family.
Mrs. A
hemorrhoids GIFGiphyUsed to teach prekindergarten. I had one kid who would tell me every month when her mom was on her period. "Mrs. A, my mom is bleeding from her butt again." 😅 At least, I hope that is what was going on or that poor lady had some severe hemorrhoids lmao.
If I was a teacher I bug my classrooms. Then I'd go home and wrote everything down, change some names and wrote a novel, heck a series of novels. I'd be a millionaire. In fact...
Dad's Anatomy Issues
Several years ago, I did a brief stint teaching junior high (I now teach high school). In that time, I learned a lot of information from students that, I am sure, parents would prefer I had not learned.
The one that stands out the most to me was the boy who accidentally let it slip to the entire class that dad has a small penis.
The bell hadn't rung to start class yet, so I was letting the kids (seventh grade) be a little crazy and get some of their pent-up energy out before we began class.
I hear one boy say to another "shut up, you'll always have a tiny penis."
The kid, in a moment of suicide by words, just said "I've seen my dad naked. He's tiny. You're probably right."
Thank God the bell rang and I was able to move the kids onto their actual lessons.
Road to Hell
A bit different but nonetheless hilarious. My step brother was in kindergarten & his teacher overheard him say to about 5 other kids, "I've been to hell & back & let me tell you, it's freakin scary!" The teacher had to discipline him but then right after stepped out of the room & proceeded to laugh her butt off.
Quit the Smoke
mothers day smoking GIFGiphyIt was my own child actually. My husband had just quit smoking and my daughter was in kindergarten had proceeded to go and tell everybody that her father had quit doing drugs. Tobacco=drugs. I had quite a number of coworkers and parents come asking me if everything was okay at home.
Children are always going to surprise you. That is the only fact you can count on when you go into education. I remember several times in school my teachers shushing me when I wasn't appropriate, but with a smirk. I once announced my mother's age to the class and that was when my teacher, Mrs. Klein, informed me that gentlemen never discuss a ladies age. But I know she found it amusing and she used it as wisdom. Good on Mrs. Klein.
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