18. Flying Popcorn Dust
“There was a UPS strike in the 90s and I was employed by them in high school as a sorter. Blockbuster Video at the time had this mail order deal where you’d get a VHS tape and bags of popcorn. […] Anyway, all these boxes full of microwave popcorn and VHS tapes would slide down the belt and about half of the popcorn bags would explode or break. After about an hour there was popcorn dust all over. I asked my boss for a mask, and he said that they didn’t have any. Some of the drivers walked by wearing masks, and I followed them and found a full cabinet full of masks. I confronted my boss, and he was like “the masks are for drivers, only”.
So I went back to the sorting area and just stopped working. I just stood there. The belts were backing up with these boxes of popcorn and they would burst and clouds of powdered popcorn butter would fill the air. I waited about 45 minutes before the belt shut off.” – Reddit user rikers_evil_twin
If this boss knew how much trouble he’d get just by denying a mask, he’d think twice before doing that again. We can all agree that not many people received their VHS tapes that week since the incident!