I’ve got a funny one that I still sometimes think and chuckle about.

I was standing where two supermarket aisles meet, a little lost in thought, trying to remember what else I needed and where to find it. I probably looked a bit puzzled. A woman came down one of the aisles and stopped near me, looking just as puzzled. For a moment, we both stood there, apparently unsure of our next move. Then she turned to me and asked, “Are you looking for your husband too?”

I don’t know why I found that so funny but its still making me laugh years later.

I worked at McDonalds and was closing the store one night. About 10-15 minutes before closing time, someone came in and ordered a big mac meal then ate it inside. We were busy cleaning up and weren’t really paying attention to him eating or leaving. When he left I went out into the lobby to clean up and restock stuff. Before he left he had taken everything and thrown it in the trash for some reason. Napkins, drink lids, salt packets, everything he could grab, was now in the trash. I cleaned up and left a note about the guy. Apparently that wasn’t the first time he had done that according to my other managers

The month was April. I had just moved to town a few months prior, and I went to FedEx to make some copies of some birth certificates. They had several copy machines, and the first two were occupied, so I went to the third one. I had a bunch of copies to make(about 20 pages to scan).

Soon after I came in to start scanning, the woman at the first copier started talking. I thought she was on her phone. She was saying all kinds of stuff. I wasn’t paying attention, but it was clear that she was mad at someone. And then I heard her start to make comments about someone who was stalking her, saying that “they” had sent multiple people, and that they always had a similar appearance and were always a same age. I was a little concerned.

I finished my first group of pages, and went to grab my second group, and I looked up, and this woman was looking at me. She said directly to me “And don’t even pretend.” She said it in a really weird voice. I had never seen this woman in my life, but I was scared of her now. She looked like someone who was either 50 years old and trying to look 30, or who was 30 years old and it had been a hard 30. But I knew something was wrong, and I didn’t care to find out.

Okay, I decided to move from the third copy machine to the fifth copy machine, farther across the store and nearer to the door opposite from where she was(and opposite from the parking lot entrance).

Some other people actually came in and started using the third and fourth copy machines, so at least there were people between her and me now.

She continued watching me and continued saying things. I didn’t look up again, but I was always listening to hear if she started approaching, because I was ready to run out the entrance behind me, even if my car was nearer the entrance behind her. I was ready to bail. I continued making copies, but paying as much attention to her as to my copies.

Eventually, she finished what she was doing. I heard the door behind her open, and when I looked up, she wasn’t in the building. “Oh, thank God.” I continued finishing up my copies, and then I crossed the building, expecting that our interaction was over. But no.

When I got out into the parking lot, my car was at the opposite end of a small parking lot, but she was still out there, in a truck parked near the door. She was standing next to the passenger’s side (open) and was looking at me as I walked across the parking lot. She started yelling at me. I hurried to my car, hopped in, did NOT bother buckling my seatbelt in the lot, and started reversing to pull out.

The truck started reversing, too, and it started to pull in my direction. But we were on opposite ends of the parking lot, so I knew whichever direction it headed, I was going to try to go in the opposite direction. Whoever was driving the truck had pointed their truck at the entrance near me, so that meant my goal was to go through the opposite entrance nearer to them. The parking lot was mostly empty, so instead of backing all of the way out of the spot, I barely backed my car up, just enough that I could drive not in the place that people normally drive, but instead driving through the entire row of empty parking spaces themselves, still with my seatbelt not on.

And just as I got to the end of the parking lot, I saw a police officer pull an unrelated vehicle out of traffic just outside the parking lot entrance I was leaving through. I felt somewhat safe to leave through that entrance, and I turned left, then an immediate right onto a major street, and I drove in kind of an agressive way, crossing three lines of traffic to make it through a light and turn left just as the light was about to turn red, just so I would be far enough away that the woman would not be able to follow me.

On my way to where I was going, I still made sure to take the most convoluted path to get there, making lots of unnecessary turns and things like that. But I successfully lost the woman. I don’t believe she knew where I went after exiting the parking lot.

Then, that same Halloween(like six months later), I ordered a pizza from a place that didn’t have delivery, but did have a drive-thru. I pulled up into the parking lot to go through the drive-thru. I was going to get into the drive-thru line, but it was super long. This particular restaurant had a pretty big parking lot(big enough that a whole other building could have been built there, but there was just the one), and the line wrapped all of the way around the lot. I decided to walk in and do carryout instead.

And as I approached the counter, what do you know, here comes the exact same woman walking toward the exit, dressed like Belle, from Beauty and The Beast. She looks at me and makes a really snide remark, but doesn’t stop or anything. She just walks through the exit and leaves.

I was thinking “Am I hallucinating this person, or did this really just happen?” I went to the cashier, and mentioned the encounter with the woman previously, and the cashier acknowledges having seen the woman, but says she was unaware of anyone complaining about the woman that night, and says “Don’t worry, we have security, and if you need them to walk with you to your car, we can arrange that.” I said thank you, but didn’t accept the offer. This time, I was parked almost directly by the door. After getting my pizza, I did hurry to my car, but there wasn’t anyone around when I walked to my car, and I got in, did properly buckle my seatbelt, and drove off.

To this day, I have no idea what this person’s deal was. I think she likely may need help, or maybe I look like someone who had done her wrong in the past. I hope that she gets the help she needs.

So my home got burglarized twice in the span of a couple of years.
The first time was by a psychotic neighbor who, at that time, had been unemployed for some 10 years. The same night, in a 3-hour span while I was away, they also broke into my car.
Before it happened the second time, I was approached and tipped off by a stranger near a bus stop, like in a movie scene. Fog and all. I never saw the guy again. I did heed his warning, though, and immediately took precautions. They still broke in and entered while I was away, but the financial damage was limited. No connection to the first burglary.

8 years ago I was staying at a hotel and sitting alone on a park bench outside when a sudden flashback of really bad memories hit me and I had to cry. After a while a woman walked by me. She noticed and asked me if she could help me, so I told her and she comforted me with a long hug.

A lot has happened since then and I only thought about that encounter a couple of times, but I don’t think I’ll ever forget how a complete stranger was there for me when I needed it.

This was about 35 years ago. It was early evening and I was in a supermarket picking up some shopping etc on my way home. A woman comes up to me and asks my opinion about a lamp shade, I reply “Sorry, I don’t work here.”… then walk off confused. My clothes were nothing like the shop workers.
In the next aisle she’s there again and says something like “O, hi again. We must stop meeting like this or people will begin to talk. Maybe your girlfriend?”

I reply “Ha, yeah, yeah. Anyways, no worries on that because I’m single. See ya.”

At the checkout she’s one till over and waves to catch my eye. Then smiles and says something like, “Well that was fun…I’ll be going home to my dogs then…”

“Have a good night. Bye.”, I say still absolutely completely oblivious.
I’m in my car driving home when all of a sudden I realise what she was doing. What a fucking idiot.

Cashiering once; I like to play with my rubiks cubes and had a 3x3 and 5x5 with me.

Well a very disheveled couple with 3 kids came through, and as I started scanning their items I decided to give one of the kids the 5x5.

For a brief moment I checked them out, and distracted their kids. As they were paying and I was talking with the kids one of them said I was “Really cool”.

But the silent “thank you” mouthed from the Mom as they walked away is why they stuck in my mind. Something about coraling the kiddos, while working my regular job, then being thanked for it felt pretty good.

Around 2022, I was driving from a Pride event to an after party and happened upon a car that had driven into a giant, about 5 ft diameter tree in a suburb. I got out and went over to help and there was a woman in the car who was absolutely blackout wasted. She was slurring and said she already called someone. She tried to get out and walk on her ankle that was turned 90 degrees in the wrong direction then fell and hit her head really hard. The sound it made was awful 😭 I had to stop her from getting back up until the ambulance got there. She had a moment of lucidity where she was saying her life was over because she’s going to get a DUI. Thankfully the ambulance got there pretty quickly and took over. I still wonder what happened to her after that and if she ever quit drinking…

Back in my hippie days, we used to get a bunch together and go on road trips in my friend’s van . One trip, we ran out of gas in a park about 400 km from home. Checked around the van and no one had any money left. Most of us had to get back to work the next day. Stupid teenagers in an epic time. Some woman came up to us and handed us $20 (enough to fill up the tank at that time) and said, “I just feel like I should give this to you. God bless.” I never forgot that lovely woman whose kind gesture saved our stupid butts.

Over at the other site there was a guy who frequented r/morbidquestions. I think he was a teenager at the time and had some mental issues. He wanted to stop talking and was convinced the only way his family would accept that was if he would cut off his tongue. So he was trying to build a mini guillotine to do that and posting updates and requests for feedback in that sub. This was across a long timeline with multiple versions of the mini guillotine and many people tried to convince him to stop but he went through with it anyway.

There was an update post at some point. He wasn’t completely successful and had ended up in a psychiatric hospital with a reattached tongue but he seemed to be doing better.

There were many people posting weird things in that sub but this actually felt real. He still pops up in my mind every now and then and if it was real, I really hope he’s doing better, wherever he is.

when I was in high school I was very self conscious, hated myself, thought I was ugly. I ended up resigning myself and being completely unkempt, never getting haircuts, wearing pyjamas everywhere and ect. but one day in the hallway a girl standing in the corner called to get my attention and told me I had nice hair. I was so astonished that I even looked around and pointed to myself and asked “me?” and she said yep. that was the only time id ever received a compliment from another person until I was 22. and as a result these days my hair is by far the part of myself I take care of the most. it’s halfway down my torso in length because I still haven’t gotten it cut. often when my mind wanders, I wish I could tell her how much she helped me become more confident as a person because of that interaction.

This woman at a music festival whose hairstyle I absolutely loved but I didn’t have the courage to go tell her. I didn’t even have any further intentions as I was there with my girlfriend. I’m just annoyed at myself that I didn’t say anything. I’m a strong believer in sharing any positive thoughts about people with them.

Edit: Oh! And the one time someone sent me a blow-kiss from a passing car while I was waiting for the light to turn green, standing there with my longboard. I don’t even care if she was just fooling around - that never happens to us guys.

One day I was sitting on a bench and a girl walked up to me and sat down next to me and started talking and she told me about how she had been sexually abused by her uncle and the effects that had had on her life.

She talked for about 15 minutes, and then said, “Thank you. You’re a really good listener” with a very solemn tone, and then she got up and left.

I’ve never seen or heard from her ever again, but ever so often I think about her and I wonder how she’s doing.

Saw a girl walking across campus, and she was glued to her phone texting or whatever. I also remember she was in Ugg boots, they were in their hay day, this was like 2011. Anyway she fully inadvertently kicked a squirrel while walking and didn’t notice. Squirrel bolted away, I feel like I was the only one who noticed

I thought of her earlier tonight. I was 16, I was on the pediatric ward to get rounds of IV antibiotics to treat the MRSA infection in my lungs. Because I was the oldest kid on the floor by a lot and was supposed to stay in my isolation room while other people were out and about the nurses let me hang out with them (while wearing a mask and gloves) at the nurses station in the late evening. One night it was dark and quiet and all of a sudden I heard the most primal scream I’ve ever heard in my life to this day. A woman burst out of a room down the hall and threw herself screaming against the wall. I was ushered quickly into my room. The next day I asked about what had happened and they told me they weren’t supposed to say but because I had witnessed it, and was upset by it, they told me the why. Her child had just received a terminal diagnosis. She still haunts me, that scream… I’ll never forget it. I hope wherever she is now she’s found peace.