It’s one of the sad facts of life that as we get older, we start to lose our grip on reality little by little.

We can see it in our elderly relatives, grandparents and great aunts and uncles who need a little extra help to get through the day.

But not everyone would send that relative to pick up breakfast for the family!

Well unfortunately, that’s exactly what happened in this user’s story, when a confused old man was sadly sent in to order breakfast for his family.

His malicious compliance had Redditors split, so check it out for yourself!

Very strange breakfast order

So I work as the manager of a kitchen that is a part of a larger business (think convenience store).

We have a setup that is a little like subway with the counter and the array of ingredients all laid out for customers to choose different ingredients to make custom meals.

During breakfast, we offer “bowls” that can have a base of scrambled eggs, biscuits and gravy, or yogurt.

An old man comes in to order food.

But he quickly realized something was off about the old man…

This guy is old enough that he’s sort of slowed down, for lack of a better description. He is ordering food for what I can only assume are two people, and not himself.

To the malicious part, where I want to offer some clarification.

I am realizing as this guy is ordering and offering some small talk, that he probably should not be the one getting food for someone else, but rather the other way around.

Thus, I am complying with him but the people who got the food are, in my opinion, worthy of a lesson.

And the bizarre breakfast bowl picked out by the man would be a lesson enough!

Both of these meals are similar, but not exactly the same. They both start with scrambled eggs.

After that, things get strange.

When we get to the part where toppings are selected for the bowls, he clearly starts choosing ingredients that would be appropriate for a yogurt parfait, not scrambled eggs.

Banana, strawberry, granola, blueberry, candied pecans… of course I realize that this is not supposed to be an egg bowl.

So instead of stopping the man, he lets him add more and more toppings…

It occurs to me, though, that maybe they won’t send grandpa and instead get off their lazy rears and get their own breakfast, and get him something while they are at it.

Now it get’s better, as he begins to add some other ingredients.

Avocado, pico de gallo, mushrooms… at this point I am certain that this guy is very confused.

The other bowl has a healthy dose of flax seeds, chia seeds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds. It looks like bird food.

I am concerned for him to drive a vehicle to where he is going, actually.

But before leaving, the man left him with some very poignant advice!

He takes his monstrosities and thanks me, saying as he leaves that it’s no fun getting old.

Part of me is inclined to agree with this guy, that this poor old man’s family sent him out to get breakfast completely disregarding his mental state.

But the other part of me wonders if maybe there really is someone out there who loves a scrambled egg, flax seed, chia seed, sunflower seed, and pumpkin seed bowl!

This story had Reddit pretty split, with some people thinking the old man was doing some Malicious compliance of his own.

But for others, this story left a bad taste in their mouth.

This Redditor said OP may have jumped to his conclusion a little too quick.

This commenter said that instead of trying to teach a lesson, OP should have showed some kindness to the confused old man.

And finally this person said the only thing OP accomplished was humiliating the man in front of his family.

Let’s try and treat old people with a little grace, right?

I mean, someday we’re all gonna be ordering the birdseed egg special, and wouldn’t we all want a little understanding?

If you liked that post, check out this post about a rude customer who got exactly what they wanted in their pizza.