Teenage Babysitter Exacts Ultimate Revenge on Overly Meticulous Mom

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JR Atkinson • Writer and Editor
Nov 14, 2023 6:00 PM EST

Babysitting, like teaching, is one of those professions that are vital to a functioning society but that is woefully under-appreciated and under-compensated. These are our young minds we're talking about. The future of society whose imaginations and intelligence need to be nurtured. The people in charge of them should be paid handsomely for their efforts. Alas, that is not the world in which we live. 

I have a good friend who makes her living nannying, and she always has the craziest stories from the playground. Tales of runaway children, quotable quotes, and idiosyncratic parents can be a nightmare to deal with. I get that it's hard to give up control of your kids, even if just for a night, but it's the name of the game and you have to get with it. And parents who try to mess with their babysitters must get their comeuppance. That's why we love this r/pettyrevenge story from u/PJMurphy. 

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  • 01
    r/pettyrevenge u/PJMurphy 21h ● Teenage Babysitter's Revenge I was young, maybe 15 years old or so, and would pick up the odd babysitting gig for extra money. I took a night for a household that was on my paper route. They asked me to be there on a Saturday for 08:30, and I arrived a few minutes early. The parents were still getting ready, and they asked me to watch the kids while they prepared to head out. They left the house at about 9:15.
    via u/PJMurphy
  • 02
    Before they headed out, the wife gave me some very specific instructions. I could have a snack...2 Oreos on the counter. Nothing else. She said she poured a glass of milk for me and left it in the fridge...it was right next to the plastic milk jug, with a piece of tape on it showing the level. She told me she'd check it when she got back, and if I took any extra milk I would have to answer for it. The kids were okay, went to bed without any fuss, and the parents returned home at 12:20. Mommy pai
    via u/PJMurphy
  • 03
    "Excuse me, but this isn't right, I got here before 8:30, and it's now almost 12:30, that's 4 hours, not 3." "We didn't leave until 9:15, and we got home at 12:15. I'm only paying you for 3 hours." "But I was watching the kids from 8:30..." "That doesn't matter, we were home, and you weren't in charge, we were." I took the money, and rode my bike home. A couple of weeks later, they did pretty much the same thing.
    via u/PJMurphy
  • 04
    Two things are important, first, the Wife was a neat freak. I'm guessing now she had OCD. Everything was lined up perfectly. One of the kids spilled his drink, and I was looking for some paper towels. The cleaning supplies under the sink were perfectly lined up. Same with the pantry...every jar and can was in a row with the label facing directly to the front. Second, this was in the mid-1970's, and all canned food had paper labels. So, the third time they called me in to babysit, they were late
    via u/PJMurphy
  • 05
    So I went into the pantry, and tore the labels off each and every can. All of them. She had a shelf for Campbell's soups, another for canned veggies, another for canned fruits...and I scrambled the unlabeled cans. When they got home, sure enough, Wifey tried to short me.
    via u/PJMurphy
  • 06
    "You know what? Keep your money. I don't want it, and I am never babysitting for you again. And as of today, I'm stopping delivering your newspapers as well. So if you want to read the paper, you're going to have to go buy it at a corner store." I stormed out. I wish I could have seen the expression on her face when she opened the pantry door...and saw shelf after shelf of bare metal cans.
    via u/PJMurphy
  • 07
    SLJ7 20h This is easily the best petty revenge story I've ever read here. Couldn't have happened to better people.
    via u/SLJ7
  • 08
    2FatC. 19h Totally agree. I had a decent book of babysitting business as a teen. Never was treated like that. Ripping off a teen is a thing to do. These asshats would have been cleaning toilet paper streamers out of their trees and shrubs for months. And in the PNW, wet toilet paper makes a yucky mess.
    via u/2FatC
  • 09
    Zoreb1 20h ● I would still have taken the money.
    via u/Zoreb1
  • 10
    predtech 20h Solid revenge. I would have drank all her milk and ate even cookie in the house as well.
    via u/predtech
  • 11
    deesimons. 19h I wouldn't have gone back after the first time, and I would have had my mom tear her a new one.
    via u/deesimons
  • 12
    Ok-Appearance-866 - 18h My husband is chronically late, and it is not uncommon for us to leave an hour after the sitter arrives. We ALWAYS pay her for the time she was AT OUR HOUSE, regardless of whether we were there or not.
    via u/Ok-Appearance-866
  • 13
    SnooWords 4839 - 20h Would have been more fun to switch all the labels! Kids, canned peaches for dessert, opens up the peas.
    via u/SnooWords4839
  • 14
    moisme 16h ● Your post brought back memories of my childhood. We didn't have a lot of money. My dad used to get dented cans from the Green Giant canning company in our town. He also got extra cans from over runs. None of them had labels on them. We had a fruit cellar in the basement and my mom used to ask me to go down and get a can of vegetables for supper. It was always a surprise! I grew up eating just about any vegetable.
    via u/moisme
  • 15
    tyndyrn • 15h Bringing back childhood memories, we used to buy dented cans, as well as ones that had lost their labels. At that time we had both dogs and cats, so if the can we opened was pet food, it did not go to waste. And we all would eat just about every vegetable out there.
    via u/tyndyrn
  • 16
    italicizedspace. 8h That reminded me of a scene. In the early 90s, my grandpa introduced me to a discount store in the PNW that always had a huge bin of canned goods with no labels - 10 cents per can! The elderly (plus students!) were buying those like crazy, shaking them, trying to guess what they'd be getting inside. They usually went for the heavier cans. Better yet, there were mislabelled European wines, e.g., visibly red wine with a white-wine label, for like 3 bucks. I remember stocking a
    via u/italicizedspace

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childcare babysitter petty revenge reddit childhood revenge revenge-stories petty revenge parenting babysitting reddit thread Reddit Parenting FAILS
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