Most of us have toed the line, or even stepped a tad over it, at some point in our lives. Usually, we assume the repercussions for the times we go too far will be pretty small. A slap or the wrist or a talking to. Well, sometimes, going too far has serious consequences. Read on to learn how these people each got themselves banned for life.
1. Not Excused
I was in the Conan Doyle pub in Edinburgh, years ago. I got kicked out for the stupidest reason ever. Our small group wasn't being disruptive or anything when I burped. My burp wasn't some intentional, obnoxious "display behavior" intended to unsettle other patrons; it was actually quite discreet, and simply the result of drinking carbonated beverages, with nothing more to it than that.
But we were sitting near the bar, the barman heard, and we all got thrown out. Because I burped. And when we objected to it, initially thinking it was a bad joke, we were quickly freed of the illusion. Like I say, it wasn't some over-the-top "eruption" of a belch—it was the same one you'd let loose in front of your own mother, followed by an "excuse me."
2. Old Flame, Present Fire
A friend of mine owns a bar. I have played music in it—at a steep discount because they were my friends. I have also donated to their fundraisers, got them lots of vintage glassware to use for free, and promoted their events, even the ones with other musicians playing. And yet, I'm banned for life. Why? Because his wife can't stand the fact that he and I dated briefly 35 years ago. It makes me so furious.
She melts down whenever anything triggers her about it and makes his life miserable. I had no idea. Apparently, they were dating 30 years ago, and broke up because he broke a date with her to be the witness at my City Hall wedding. They got back together 15 years later. I found out about this when making a Facebook post about that anniversary, and he messaged me to take it down.
He explained the crazy, I complied and thought everything was fine. I was so wrong. Next, I get invited to the bar for a private party of theirs six months later and both of them are being horrible to me. I am very confused, so I asked him what the problem was and he said, "I don't like how we left things last December." I thought, "We?" So, I went back and checked the messages.
It seems that right after he sent me the explanation, and before I responded apologizing for the triggering and saying I would comply, someone blocked me in his account. So, I think she went in and turned it off so he couldn't see that I was cooperating. At the same time, he thought I had blown him off. I sent emails, texts and a certified letter with screenshots, showing what happened, but he is still mad. And I am banned. OK then. It is really sad as I loved the place and loved playing there, and it is a nexus of our social group, but now I cannot set foot in there.
3. Loiterers Galore
Two friends of mine and I had been shopping for about an hour, then went out to the parking lot to meet up with a few friends who had decided to join us. As we tried to come back in through the main entrance, we found this way closed to us. This old, angry-looking security guard stood in our way with both of his arms stretched out to the side and ordered us to leave. I didn't yet realize how crazy this guy was.
We asked why, and he said it was because we were loitering—despite the fact that the three of us who'd been shopping were all holding bags from stores that were inside that mall and nowhere else in town. When we argued that we were clearly shopping, not loitering, he threatened to call the authorities if we didn't leave right away.
He didn't seem to be joking so we decided to walk away and just go to the other mall instead. But the worst part was when we were leaving. As we walked away, he told us that he'd call the authorities if he saw any of us at “his” mall again. That’s how I got banned from one of the two malls in my town when I was 15, along with a half dozen or so of my friends.
The funny thing is, the mall I got banned from was the one my mom preferred to do her grocery shopping at. I often did this with her, and this same security guard would follow us around sending me deadly glares, but of course he couldn't do anything at all because I was clearly just a kid shopping for food with her mom.
4. Left With A Bitter Taste
I was doing a history project on Poland, and it was well-known this teacher gave an extra letter grade for bringing in food from the country. A friend from my previous school brought me to a bakery that made Kołacz that his family loved. This is how I ruined that for him. I ordered one for my class, paying a deposit and specifying the day I was due to present.
I ran in before school to get my order, and the woman behind the counter—the manager—told me that whoever took my order never sent it; there was no Kołacz in the store. Despite me presenting my invoice and pointing out the date they agreed to have it, she refused to refund my deposit on the basis of her claiming "we can make you one for tomorrow."
I had to call the credit card company and dispute the charge that way. A few days later, my friend called me and asked why we were both banned from the bakery.
5. Time For Change
I was a very young kid, and saw that people would drop quarters in an arcade where I went and just never bother to pick them up or didn't know that they had dropped them. So, I would pick them up from around the machines—nothing dangerous nothing suspicious—and use them to play the arcade games. I'm not talking about quarters that people had just dropped either, by the way.
I’m talking about the ones that had been sitting there on the floor with nobody around, covered in dust webs and sand. The attendant argued that they were not mine, but that they belonged to the shop and I was stealing. I can kind of see that point since it was private property. But I was, like, seven years old at the time this happened.
I also spent plenty of my own money in the arcade. On top of that, I was also spending all the quarters I found right back into their rigged claw machines. It was just a terrible thing to do to complain and ban me. All they had to do was to tell me not to pick up the quarters and I would have stopped immediately. I was banned from an arcade for picking up quarters.
6. Ticket Collection
When I was a kid, my best friend at the time told me that you could go behind the skee ball machine and there would be a large opening underneath that would allow you to crawl to the backside of the front/ticket delivery area. And, if you made it there, without being noticed first of course, there would be a little button you could push that would print tickets—easy money.
So, the next time I was at Chuck E. Cheese I put my younger sister on lookout duty/ticket collection duty and tried it out. It was a tight squeeze because they had put the skee ball machine so close to the wall, but I made it behind. And, lo and behold, there was a large opening underneath the machine. So, I shimmy myself underneath. I couldn't believe what I found in there.
I swear, it felt like being underneath Christopher Robin's bed. There were tokens, tickets, and toys. And a lot of money, way more than you would expect. I continued to crawl forward, using the sliver of light that shone through the bottom of the front as my guide. And there it was—the magic button. I reached out, pushed, and held the button.
I could hear my sister start giggling. It was actually working. I held the button for what felt like an eternity, continually nervous knowing that we could get caught at any moment. I finally decided that was enough for this run, scooped up as much money as I could, and shimmied back out. My sister and I split the money and the tickets. We ran this scheme a couple more times before, sadly, getting caught. I haven't been back to Chuck E. Cheese since.
7. Who Me?
I popped into a local shop to grab a sandwich & drink and a staff member forcefully marched over to me and yelled, “You’re not allowed in here! I’ve told you before!” as she grabbed my sandwich and bottle of water from me and put them back. I was so shocked I could barely react. I explained that I had never been there before and was a visitor to the area.
But she gestured for the security guard to come over to guide me out of the shop and stood watching us from a distance with her arms folded and a smug look on her face, occasionally shouting, “If she doesn’t go, I’m calling 9-1-1!” Thankfully, the security guard was a little more understanding about the situation and happily looked at my driving license, which I offered to show, which proved that I lived in a different area but said, “Perhaps it would be best if you didn’t come in here again!”
8. Not So Limitless Knowledge
At the library I went to as a kid, in overdue fees, they let you go up to $70 before canceling your card. I was an avid reader and my mom hated taking me to the library. She always said she would and then changed her mind at the last minute. It was a six-mile walk round trip so I would take a wheeled suitcase and get around 25 at a time.
The fees added up fast. And, so, I was banned from the library as a kid. I resorted to nicking books and returning them. I’m pretty sure some of the librarians just turned a blind eye. They forgive the debt when you turn 18.
9. The Company You Keep
Back in the late 1980s, I was in the Florida Keys with a group of friends. I got plastered and went to bed while some of the guys went out bar hopping. Apparently, they went absolutely nuts. The next morning a deputy sheriff showed up at the place we were renting, told us to pack our things and he would take us to the county line and we were not to come back. So, not only did I get banned from an entire Florida county, I never did get a straight story about what the guys who were at the bar did to get us banned.
Pixabay
10. Paying In Full
I went to a bar that had newly opened with friends. We ordered some drinks, cocktails, etc. They took forever to make it and after an hour we still didn’t have all the ordered drinks. Some of the ones we did get were wrong. So, we wanted to leave and requested the bill. It arrived, and I wanted to scream. They gave us the full bill, clearly wanting us to pay even for the things we never got simply because we ordered them.
And, of course, they expected a generous tip. We argued we would not pay for drinks we never got. They called us all sorts of names, threatened to call the authorities, and said that from now on we were banned from that establishment. We told him we didn’t mind and to go ahead and call the authorities. So, he went into his bureau to call.
We quickly calculated what we owed, slapped the money on the table, and got out of there. They went out of business after like half a year and had to sell the bar. The new owner is okay.
11. Not (Un)limited Free Meals
Every Tuesday was “kids eat free” night at our local Jason’s Deli, and my parents would bring every kid in our neighborhood—about ten kids in total. They weren't paying for them so they figured that they might as well bring all of our friends too. So, imagine 13 kids eating free and two parents eating at the salad bar.
They went every Tuesday with all the kids, and after a few years they said that we weren't allowed anymore. Then a few months later they changed it to one free kid per adult meal on Tuesdays. It was awesome though. We also had a movie theater that showed old movies that was $0.50 per person on Tuesdays. We went on a lot of dinner and movie dates as kids.
12. Not So Mel-on Reaction
My roommates and I along with a few friends went out to a bar one night to drink. We had grown a single beautiful watermelon in our yard, and brought him along to party with us. We named him Walter Melon—pronounced “mell-own.” We snuck the watermelon into the bar, and generally just passed it around and praised him for being a good melon.
At first, the bouncers didn't care; they came up to us and just told us to be careful with it. One of my friends got pretty hammered and starting holding it above his head and dancing with it. The bouncers had had enough of our shenanigans by then and tried to take it. That's when the night got out of hand. My inebriated friend agreed with them that he'd leave with the melon.
A few minutes later, my friend made it back into the bar with the melon under his jacket. He had snuck in through the back and avoided the bouncers. Once they saw the melon again, they got pretty irritated and kicked us all out. We argued for our melon back but to no avail. Fare thee well, Walter. Funnily enough, a group of dudes who left the bar had seen/heard about the melon incident.
As we were all hanging outside the bar waiting for an Uber, the dudes drove past, stopped, and handed us a pumpkin. So, we ended the night melon-less but with a new pumpkin friend. We got banned temporarily but I could probably go back.
13. The Fault In The Stars
I was doing my PhD in astronomy, working on a project. Quite frankly, it was far too ambitious for finishing a PhD out in any kind of decent time due to numerous technical delays, combined with an adviser who in hindsight did not take me seriously as a scientist. This all came to a head in year five, where I finally didn't let him just wave all my concerns away.
Then my adviser decided that the problem was not him or the project, but me—that I just was not capable of independent research, and he'd only just realized that after several years and two first author papers on my end. Unfortunately, due to the structure of the university system and the fact that he was BOTH the department head and the interim dean, when he decided he would not allow me to defend there was nothing anyone could/would do.
I wasn't allowed to submit my paper to the journal either, and had to just walk away from the paper and the two years of work that went into it. I've never been so mad—but I got my revenge. Luckily, I am stubborn and found someone to work with, on another continent, who was horrified about what was going on. I then basically did all my PhD thesis work in two years.
And, finally, I got my degree from a much more prestigious university. I am now a postdoc in Harvard, doing a ton of exciting research with several first-author papers a year, so good riddance to that guy for insisting that this was something I couldn't do.
14. Horsing Around
A friend was boarding her horse at a stable, paying a premium rate, and the woman running the stable was totally taking her for a ride and neglecting the horse for which she was supposed to be caring. She did things like leaving the horse out overnight because of “reasons” like "I just got caught up with friends” all the time.
My friend wanted the glass put back in the windows of the barn, because winter was coming, and the other woman always had excuses about why she wasn't going to do it yet. So, the two of us did it. And of course, the stable woman started tearing into her for doing it, with another nonsensical reason. So, then, I tore into her excuses.
She tried for the line of, "When you are my age, and have my education, you can talk to me like that.” I had the perfect, withering response: "Two degrees and we're the same age, baby, I can talk to you like that." Not my fault I look way younger than mid-50s. So, she told my friend if I set foot on the property—which was rented— she'd evict my friend's horse. She did so the next week anyway.
15. Reading Between The Lines
I went into a local franchise pizza place that was advertising they were hiring drivers, no job experience necessary. I was 18 and had never held a job I could put on a resume up to that point. So, I drive over to the place, which is all the way across town, which right there was a quarter of my weekly allotment of gas gone.
The lobby is packed, I wait for about 30 minutes and finally it's my turn. Literally the first question is how much experience I have with commercial pizza ovens. I tell them that I was applying for the position of a driver which specifically said that no experience was required. They tell me they just put that to get more people to show up. I was mad already—but it was going to get so much worse.
They clarify that they actually do require the ability to spin, insert, and remove pizzas out of the oven with a paddle. I go off on her a little saying that she had just futilely taken an hour and a half of my life and half my week’s worth of gas because they're too stupid to advertise correctly. The manager just smirks at me.
So, I walk out into the lobby with all of the people, and loudly announce, "If you've never worked with a pizza paddle, they won't even consider you for the job. They told me as much. So, if you don't have that experience, then you might as well leave. To the rest of you, do you really want to work for a company and manager whose literal first interaction with you was them deliberately lying to you?"
The manager calls the authorities, but myself as well as 95% of the lobby left before they arrived. Years later I tried to get a pie from the place and as soon as I walked in the manager recognized me and told me if I didn't leave then she'd press charges for trespassing.
16. A Different Frequency
Back in the early 90s, you could buy a watch that also acted as a TV remote. So, having acquired such a watch, a 14-year-old me went into an electronics store and turned all the TVs off. Of course, I got caught and was banned from the store. The watch was good, it just set off the off signal on all the infra-red frequencies.
17. A Sick Ban
I spent three months in the hospital the previous winter mostly on the F floor when I wasn't in the ICU. On my last day, while I was getting discharged, all the nurses, the custodians, and my favorite phlebotomist came round. They said that they never wanted to see me there again. Some of them had the audacity to clap while I was being wheeled out because they'd never have to see me again. That was a ban, indeed.
18. A Shadowy Business
When I was a child my parents took me, my two sisters, and my boyfriend to a drive-in to see the new Harry Potter movie. My parents said that they were going to find somewhere else to sit so that we could all hang out, just us kids. At some point during the film, somebody started making shadow puppets up on the big screen.
After the audience started shouting and booing, we finally realized what was happening. It was my parents, mostly my mother, that were the culprits. We were escorted out by the security team and were banned from the drive-in.
19. Taking Business
Many years ago, I was at the CompUSA and saw that they wanted to charge a 65-year-old man, who barely knew how to use a computer, $150 to install a new application. I told him I would help him out for free. So, we went to the parking lot. I installed the app in five minutes and he was happy. He tried to give me money but I declined.
The five minutes that it took to install the app was not worth the money but it was worth the smile on his face. I went to CompUSA the following day and was barred from entering. The store manager told me it was because I was stealing their customers. So, I was banned for helping their customers resolve their minor computer issues for free.
20. Pouring A Not So Stiff One
I was doing an Uber Eats delivery and informed the owner that it was a flouting of the health code to make me fill up the drinks for the order, which should have been done before I arrived. He then flexed his “I'm the owner” card and kicked me out, canceling my order and banning me. However, I called the local health department and filed a complaint. They did a thorough investigation and told him what I told him.
21. Communication Gap
I was living in an apartment building with locked entry into the lobby and no working buzzer to any of the suites. The only way to contact any of the people inside was to either have a key to the building or have someone's contact information inside. I ordered pizza from my favorite pizza joint, and over an hour passed.
I called them back and asked where it was. They said that they had tried to call me but didn't get an answer. I denied this as I had received no call. They said sorry for the mix-up and sent their guy out with another pizza. That should have been the end of it. But this mess was just beginning. Another hour and a half passed, I called back, asking where my pizza was. The owner informed me that I was banned.
They had my name and number, and I was not allowed to order pizza from this establishment or any other store in the chain, because the delivery driver had called again and I had not picked up. It turns out Verizon was having outages during that time, and no calls were going through from their end, while I was able to get through on the Sprint/T-Mobile network.
At around 2 am my phone blew up with a sudden 13 missed calls and three messages from the pizza guy sitting in the cold with my pizza. Very unfortunate. Thank you, telephone networks...
22. Shades Of Gray
I was extremely inebriated after a night out and took the Uber driver’s sweater instead of mine. They were both grey and looked similar enough that I didn’t realize it until they called a few days later to ban me from Uber. The driver really overreacted, in my opinion. I would have gladly swapped so that we would both have the right sweater. Oh, well.
23. No Guarantees
My wedding ring lost two diamonds a month before my wedding. I called around and found a place to replace them. My now-husband took it in since I worked and he was the stay-at-home dad. They fixed it. He paid. All good. A week before the wedding one of the diamonds that they had replaced fell out. Obviously, I was upset as they had just replaced it.
So, my now-husband took it in for another repair but they wanted to charge us again. He told them we couldn’t afford to pay again for the same repair. So, he left. I was extremely upset so I called them and asked why there was no warranty on a repair that they had just done. I was crying as I was quite over-emotional about the wedding.
They said that they would give me a discount but they were blacklisting me from ever coming in their store. That was okay with me. I was moving in 2 months anyway. They repaired my ring. Hubby paid. All good. Well, a couple of years later I was getting into lapidary and had some nice magnifying glasses and refractors for stones.
We had my ring appraised when we bought it and it was detailed in the quality of the diamonds. I decided to look at my ring. The large diamond had a massive occlusion in it. It was not there before we had it repaired. Shady people.
24. Near-Sighted
I used to donate plasma, until one day when I went in wearing my prescription sunglasses. My regular glasses had been badly damaged, so they were all I had at the time, and I have like -4 vision, so I really can't see without some kind of glasses on at all times. I wore the sunglasses in and got screened by a donor tech, who asked me about them.
I explained that they were prescription lenses. The tech said it was okay, and I got screened and moved on. I end up telling three more donor techs on the way in about my sunglasses because they asked me about them while I was waiting in line to get on the donor floor. All of them said it was fine. I ended up getting plugged into a machine, a needle in my arm. That's when things hit the fan.
I run through three full cycles before the manager stops at my donor bed. She tells me, "Take those off," without any explanation. I ask what she means and she tells me, "Your glasses." I refused, telling her that these are prescription lenses, I can't see without them. She says that wearing sunglasses as a donor is a security risk.
She adds that they need to see my eyes to know I'm not asleep, which is nonsense because all they have to do is swing by and use their vision and common sense to see that I'm holding up my phone and watching a show on it, doing things I obviously can't when I'm asleep. This time she tells me, "I'm the manager, you need to take those off."
I tell her, "I don't care who you are, you're not forcing me into taking off the only thing that lets me see right now. I won't blind myself while I sit here unable to move just because you refuse to use common sense. All you have to do to make sure I'm not asleep is ask or wave." Rather than listen and get the point, she removed the needle and told me to leave.
I tried donating at a different plasma center under the same name, but the tech told me that my name was added to a list of banned patients, with "unacceptable behavior" being listed as the reason. They have it set up so I can't go back until I clear things up with that Karen, which is not happening.
25. A Key Moment
My mother lost her keys in the book section of the Dollar Tree and she found them about a week after losing them. However, before this happened, she asked the woman working there if they had found them yet. The woman promptly went, “No, we clean every night your keys aren’t here,” but with a whole lot of attitude that cannot be conveyed by just the statement.
When my mother found her keys, the woman was furious and accused her of planting the keys there. Basically, the woman was mad because they don’t clean properly, so she kicked my mom out and called the authorities to get it on record that she is banned from the Dollar Tree.
26. Rule Breaker
If you’ve never been, the Vatican museums are basically a long pathway museum that funnels you to the Sistine chapel, with signs every few feet telling you in multiple languages that you are not allowed to take pictures in the Sistine chapel. There were hundreds of people taking pictures in there, complete with flashes and all.
Somehow, I was singled out for holding my camera by my side. It was off and strapped to my wrist. That’s how I got banned from Vatican City for holding a camera in the Sistine chapel, literally just holding it. I was escorted, literally out of the country, and given my camera back. I was told not to come back. I snuck back in ten years later.
27. Clean-up Act
My inebriated coworker knocked over and smashed a few cocktail glasses, then the bouncer came over and threw me out for it and banned me. Somehow because I'd been sitting near her and was trying to clear up the mess, I was apparently obviously the guilty one. I am still annoyed about it, since I wasn't even tipsy when this happened.
28. Drama Queen
I took my dog into Petco for some grooming. He screamed before they trimmed even a single nail on his paw and put every dog in the place on high alert. You can imagine the tension in the store at that point. Unsurprisingly, he, and by extension me, is banned from the Petco because he's so very dramatic.
29. The Sweetest Fruit
My friend was banned from a fruit stand, so he talked me into going there in his place to pick him up some fruit. Long story short, the store owner somehow knew that I was shopping for my banned friend based on the items that I had in my basket, and I in turn was banned myself. Me! Banned! So, now, both us are banned from the fruit stand.
30. Baby’s Day Out
In college we stayed at a campground where there were teepees you could stay in. We got the luck of the draw and put next to a family who decided to bring their four-month-old to sleep in a teepee. I have two kids now and I would not in a million years bring such a little baby to camp in a tent like that. I would genuinely be worried about keeping neighbors awake because babies and toddlers are loud.
However, apparently, this was not the case in this situation. While checking out WE were the ones who got called loud and disrespectful—which we actually weren't because we were with my now-ex's teenage brother and his friend and had to be good. Said family made this complaint because the family had difficulties getting their infant to stay asleep. Our names were written down and we were told we could never return.
PxHere
31. May The Spork With You
It was bowling league day, so we walked over to Taco Bell before play started to grab some food. I took a bunch of sporks for a friend who used them in her art. The manager caught me and made me put them back. I still managed to get out with about 15 of them in my purse. The following week, my friends and I went in there again.
We all nicked a bunch of sporks. I have no idea how many. We got banned for life. We still went in again the week after that, just to see if we could get away with it. It seems the manager who banned us had been fired. The guy working the counter said to ask the new one if we could have a few handfuls of sporks. This absolute angel gave us a box of 100. My artist friend started crying tears of joy when we made it rain sporks on her the next day at school.
32. Final Bid
As a stupid teenager, I went into a pawn shop. Some young guys came in with a sack of tools to sell—dubiously procured, for sure. The pawn owner offered them something like $30 for easily $500 of tools. I overheard and said, “I’ll give you $80 for them right now,” to the guys selling, without even thinking about what I was doing. The pawn owner was furious, and demanded I leave and never return.
33. Something Fishy
My friend is allergic to fish. He ordered chicken tacos and told the waiter he was allergic to fish, He did so as there were also fish tacos on the menu and he wanted to be sure that there was no confusion or possibility they would accidentally give him fish tacos. Of course, they still gave him fish tacos and he ate them.
He went into anaphylactic shock, had to use the EpiPen, called for emergency help and got carted off in an ambulance. Due to this event, our whole group was like, “we're not paying for our food.” Most of us didn't even eat our food because we were helping our friend who was in danger. They were not down with this, and tried to get us to pay. We refused, they kicked us out and banned us.
34. The Last Laugh
George's Majestic Lounge is a popular venue in the area for bands and live shows. They were hosting some stand-up comedy on this particular night. Well, I had a couple of drinks and was feeling good. The comedy was pretty on point, and anyone could tell I was having a good time. An employee came and joined us at our table.
They claimed that they were making sure we were having a good time. I was having a great time, laughing hard. And then, much to my surprise, I was invited to leave the premises. I asked why I was being asked to leave. The response blew my mind: Apparently, I was laughing too much. I asked for a refund and was declined. A couple of others from the audience spoke up for me too.
They said to leave me alone and that I was just enjoying the show. It didn't help. I left feeling very sour about my first comedy show and that venue. This was maybe six years ago, give or take. I refuse to step foot in that venue now, actively tell people about my experience, and encourage people to attend any other venue.
35. Buy Your Own Drink
I used to frequent a café where I often held several meetings. However, though I would have several meetings, I would buy only a couple of drinks. This was because I did not need to buy the drinks since my clients always bought drinks. I told the café people the same when they said I did not buy drinks. I argued that my clients always buy drinks, therefore I bring them customers, but they didn't see it that way. I was banned.
36. Sampling The Goods
When I was 11 years old after school my local Acme store had a ginormous container of samples—I'm talking huge cookies. I would put about a dozen or so of them in a produce bag, walk around the store eating, and walk out eating. My foolish self didn't even think it could qualify as stealing since they were samples. Let's just say the manager followed me to the parking lot and said, "Hon, those are samples. Take one, and don't come back." I never returned.
37. Small Change
My mom’s friend owned a laundromat and she gave me tons of smashed nickels that were the size of quarters. I’d go to the Family Fun Center and have a field day with my friends. The jig was up when we’d go to the claw game and get any prize out for someone for a dollar. It probably didn’t take much for someone to see that this didn’t make financial sense.
Taking a dollar and pumping in countless “quarters”? This, definitely, did not make sense. So, we were told to leave and never come back. We still went all the time to the batting cages, just not inside the arcade.
38. Food For Thought
At my old university, my family spent thousands of dollars on the unlimited meal plan, which meant I got unlimited food all semester, and could take food back to my dorm. One day they were running low on chocolate milk, and they had made a rule of “only one chocolate milk per person.” I was having breakfast with a bunch of my friends, and one of them was about to leave to catch the bus.
She hadn’t even touched her chocolate milk, so I asked if I could have it. She said sure and then left. I took it and started drinking from it. Then the cafeteria lead came over and told me to leave and never come back. I was banned. I figured that they’d forget about it by the next day, so the next morning I went to the cafe for breakfast again. I was so wrong.
I was told to get out of the line or they’d call the authorities. My friends, once they got in, texted me a picture that they had of me—clearly a screencap from security footage—with a “Do not allow on premises” sign on it. I was upset, and contacted my dad about it. I don’t know exactly what he did or said, but my dad fixed the situation.
They were extremely apologetic afterward. They’d put on a big fake smile whenever they saw me until I graduated. Apparently, my dad said that they refunded him for that one semester’s unlimited meal plan. So, I was banned for a day. It was so weird.
39. Small Beans
I worked for an awesome couple at a coffee shop, but they suddenly had to sell due to family health issues. That's when things got REAL bad. The new owner promoted me to manager and she was super sweet to my face, but undermined me constantly in front of the staff. I was the only one trained on the espresso machine and grinder, so I was training everyone just like I’d been trained.
The new owner had worked at Starbucks before and decided we used too much espresso in our drinks since she liked them Large with one shot and five pumps of white chocolate sauce. I bucked. We were an independent shop that catered to the locals, and they didn’t do well with change. Well, now change came often and sometimes wildly.
She canceled all of the vegan and vegetarian options, switched bean suppliers, etc. Of course, locals stopped coming. Then on my wedding day she called me at 9 am and fired me. The gall of this woman. I came back to get my final paycheck, and she filed a “no trespass” order. I was so happy when she had to sell during the pandemic—and I don’t even live in that town anymore.
40. Museum Alone
I got most of my family banned from MOMA as a four-year-old. It was the day after Thanksgiving, and for some reason my family—dad, grandma, great-uncle, and great-aunt—decided to head into NYC for the day and drag a four-year-old to an art museum. So, I'm bored out of my mind, and entertain myself by hanging upside down from a bench.
And then I got stuck. Then I panicked too much to think of any alternative ways to get down, because I was four years old and dumb. Even better, my idiotic relatives—including my dad—weren't paying attention at all, and by the time I realized I was stuck, I also realized that they had left the room. Also, I was too socially anxious.
So, I did not want to make noise in a roomful of strangers after spending hours being told to be quiet. So, I just hung there until I threw up, which got the attention of security guards. I was brought to security. They attempted to find my family. Authorities were called after it was determined they had left the museum.
They were eventually located several blocks away at the Chrysler Building. The authorities brought them back to the museum to collect me and security told them they were banned. We all went back to New Jersey with everyone alternating between yelling at me for causing trouble and yelling at each other over who was supposed to be watching me.
41. A Testing Time
A good friend bought a defective right out of the box Xbox 360 from Frys Electronics. He went to return it to the store the next day. This was back when they were first coming out and very popular but not impossible to find like this generation. So, he waits in the customer service line for about 30 minutes just to explain the problem.
They take the Xbox, validate his receipt and explain that they will playtest it and if it checks out, they will get him a replacement. This would be about 30 minutes or so. Now my friend is a big guy—6 feet, 136 kgs (300 lbs), wears a trench coat, and has a ponytail and beard. He looks intimidating. He is however a super nice guy and not prone to losing his temper. Remember that part...
That being said, 30 minutes comes and goes. He is now checking his watch every five minutes in an obvious fashion. An hour passes and still nothing. Now he doesn't even see the guy that was helping him in the department any longer. 30 more minutes pass and he has had enough. He storms up to the counter demanding answers.
Of course, like any other well-run customer service counter, they have no idea who he is or why he is waiting. He shows them his receipt and initial time-stamped paperwork and demands a manager. It takes almost 30 more minutes for one to come over. For all that time he has refused to sit back down and paced in front of the counter like a caged tiger.
The manager gets there and says the worst de-escalation line possible at that moment: “What seems to be the problem, sir?” My friend loses his temper like he has never done before. He goes off for like 10 minutes on the guy. The security is called over. The manager takes all of 60 seconds to look in the computer for the stock.
He can see they don't currently have any replacements for his model and it could be that way until the next shipment. My friend makes another huge scene demanding his system back and saying that he would take it to another store, so on and so forth they can't find it. So, to diffuse the situation they upgrade him to a returned Halo Edition version.
It even had the built-in Wi-Fi update. It comes with the caveat that he take his business elsewhere in the future. It was a big store and always full. He went back six months later to test the waters and no one said a thing. So, he went back whenever he needed to.
42. Smoke Signals
I was a little bored once at a bar with a real lit candle on the table. I was sitting by myself and decided that it was a good idea to play with a napkin on the candle. It burned a little faster than I expected, so I panicked and hid it under the table to avoid getting caught by the waitress. When she came over she asked, "Is that smoke coming from under your table?" The jig was up and I was of course asked to leave.
43. Going Potty
I do pottery as a hobby. I’ve taken classes off and on throughout the years beginning in college, at local pottery shops, through artist collectives, etc. I also have my own wheel and kilns, though they haven’t been set back up since we moved a few years ago. When one of my pottery teachers retired, I looked for a new studio I could join.
Mind you, I work full time in a medical field and this was very much just a “go once a week, practice, maybe learn some new techniques so I can make mugs and bowls for my family and friends for Christmas” kind of situation. I found a new studio, highly recommended by many people and signed up for their lowest level class.
On the first day, they wanted us all to sign an ironclad non-compete contract that we wouldn’t open our own studio or teach pottery in any context within 161 km (100 mi) for the next five years. I had no intention of doing those things, but five years is a long time and who knows what the future holds. Also, it was unclear whether simply selling my work on Etsy or at craft fairs would break their terms.
So, I politely told them that I didn’t feel comfortable signing such a contract just to take an intro level class and if they would reconsider. They allowed me to participate in the first day of class and I left my tools in my assigned cubby at the studio. A few days later I got a letter in the mail stating that I was not welcome anywhere near their pottery studio ever again.
This was strict to the point that they would mail me the tools I had left there rather than allow me back on the property to pick them up. They did as much and the package arrived the following week. That was, ironically, more than five years ago and I still don’t understand who burned them so badly to make them so paranoid. It also caused me to drop pottery as a hobby for most of that time which was a loss of a nice outlet for me, but there aren’t many other options in this area.
44. Partially Fixed
I dropped my bike off at a motorcycle shop to fix two stripped threads and adjust the new clutch outside and inside. I showed up and they fixed the bolts but never did the clutch adjustment. I should have been able to drive away that day so I asked the dude why they didn't do it and he straight up said, “You only asked us to fix the bolts, not to adjust the clutch."
“If you leave it for another month, we can get around to it." And, on top of that, they were going to charge me for it too. I protested and he just told me never to come back, clearly banning me. I responded with, "Oh, I never planned on coming back."
45. Light As Metal
I was at my local gym and dropped the weights after a workout. This did not fly with the people working there. I tried to explain when you’re pressing 59 kgs (130 lbs)—heaviest at the gym—dumbbells, there’s no easy way of putting them down other than dropping them. Nonetheless, they said they expected the weights to be set down.
This way they would be set down without disturbing the other members. Thus, I recently got kicked out and banned from a local gym for throwing the dumbbells. We weren’t a good fit for each other so, thankfully, they canceled my membership without any penalties.
46. A Point To Prove
Toronto doesn’t really have food trucks so post-bar food is limited to hotdog carts, aka "Street Meat." The carts are locked to a specific location and are there at all hours. I was getting a Polish sausage way past 2 am and the vendor said that I was using too much mustard and peppers and that I had taken enough. I held eye contact with him while I scooped the entire jar of sauerkraut onto that hotdog and then tried to shove the whole thing in my mouth. So, yeah, he won’t serve me anymore.
47. Signs of the Apocalypse
My girlfriend was banned from a bar for ordering a "four horsemen." The bartender gave her four separate shots, which was totally wrong. When my girlfriend complained and started telling her how it was made, the bartender got offended and was, like, "I'm the bartender. Pipe down and pay." It became a giant argument that led up to the bartender throwing one of the shots at my girlfriend. So, my girlfriend threw one back. Once my girlfriend threw it, she was kicked out and banned for life.
48. Too Young
I went to a Vegas nightclub for my 24th birthday. I was all dressed up, and even had a “birthday girl” sash and a tiara. I was so excited. That only made what happened feel worse. Well, the security guard didn’t believe my ID was really me even though my birthday was literally on my ID. They kicked me out, took my photo, and banned me from the club for life. This was my first and last time ever going clubbing in Vegas.
49. Family Ties
Recently my wife got banned from her favorite hair salon. Her sister went in the week before my wife's last visit to got her hair done. The sister was all happy and fun while in the salon. Then as soon as she left she went OFF. She complained to everyone that her hair was ruined, she can't go outside, she is emotionally distressed. Then their mom got involved and started berating the salon.
Eventually, the salon offered a re-dye, but they refused it, only wanting a full refund. The salon denied a refund. Eventually the sisters boyfriend went in there and started berating the employees. Then sister joined in on the berating along with a mystery person we dont know. Eventually the salon banned them all. Not long after, my wife had appointment, and everything went fine...at first.
Then her family learned she was able to get her hair done still and they LOST it. They started up their campaign against the salon yet again. Sending messages, calling my wife awful names, pathological liar, and so on. The salon eventually reached out to my wife and banned her on the grounds of "we don't want to deal with your family drama."
Honestly? I get it.
50. Going Incognito
I was 17 and a few friends and I walked into the Kroger I had just been hired at a few days prior. I was supposed to start that coming Monday and it was currently Friday or Saturday. One of my friends dove into a big cereal box display and took the whole thing down. There was, of course, a big mess of spilled boxes everywhere.
They also broke the cardboard cutout of whatever movie, maybe Spider-Man, the display was set up for. The manager walked over and kicked all of us out of the store and told us not to come back without our parents. We were, effectively, banned. But here's the hilarious part: What the manager didn’t know was that I was an employee there. I’d interviewed with a different manager.
So, I got a haircut and shaved my beard before Monday. That manager never recognized me and I ended up working there for a year and a half or so.
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