Postmen and tradesmen have been sharing the strangest things they’ve seen in people’s houses – 21 uncomfortably close encounters

Ever been caught on the hop by the postman or a delivery driver? Or realised you had something embarrassing on show a moment too late after showing a plumber into your bathroom?

Well, spare a thought for them and the bizarre things they have to witness when knocking on people’s doors. Over on Reddit, user lionclaw0612 asked ‘Postmen and tradesmen: what’s the strangest thing you’ve seen on the job?’ and followed it up with this:

‘I do sword fighting and was repairing my helmet when the door went. I didn’t want to miss the delivery and undoing the strap would take too long so I answered the door wearing a medieval full faced helmet and gave the postman a bit of a fright.

‘I bet they run into all sorts of weird and unusual things. What’s your strangest or funniest story while on the job?’

And the answers did not disappoint…

1.

‘Postman here; the other week I had a parcel that needed a signature. When the door opened, it was a young woman who was in the process of blowing up the biggest balloon I’ve ever seen. It was almost as big as her. I asked if she was having a party for giants, and she shook her head and went super red in the face.

‘I said she needed to sign for the parcel and I said I could hold the balloon as she was fumbling around. She shook her head and reached for my scanner while still blowing up the balloon. It was in her way and she struggled to write. I said it only needed to be a scribble, but she was taking her time and really puffing into the balloon like her life depended on it. I told her I didn’t need an essay as she was taking far too long.

‘She eventually handed it back, still puffing like she had run a marathon. As I was picking up the parcel, the balloon popped. It made me jump as it was super loud. She hastily took the parcel, dropped it, fumbled some more then quickly shut the door, looking flustered. I thought the whole encounter was a bit strange, but amusing.’
–Unique-Song5067

2.

‘A customer projectile vomited over my shoulder after they opened the door to me. I had to duck out of the way. Didn’t even get splashed. She then just took the parcel and went inside leaving me to vault to fence to not stand in her stew.’
–Latter_Table193

3.

‘I used to do door to door charity, One that sticks in my mind, knock a door, it opens a peek and a guy kinda looks though the gap, he says he’s busy, I say I’ll give him the quick version.

‘He says ‘No mate, I’m really busy’, pulls the door open and he’s got a fucking eagle on his hand, like just sat there chilling. I look at him, look at the eagle, look back at him and say ‘Yeah, looks like you’re busy mate, maybe next time’.’
–Novel-Catch4081

4.

‘An old lady died in her bed while I was working in the same room. One minute we were chatting, she was watching me work, and then I thought she had just nodded off. When her husband came in to inspect the work he noticed she wasn’t breathing and had simply passed away.

‘She was in her 90s, the sun was shining through the windows, and it was just her time to go.’
–seven-cents

5.

‘Supermarket delivery driver here, just a few days ago I delivered 48 eggs to a house with a little ‘Free Range Eggs for sale’ table outside.’
–Grimdotdotdot

6.

‘Not a tradesman but I knocked on the door of the house next door as their drains were clearly blocked, and leaking onto the pavement.

‘The attractive young lady answered the door in skimpy nightwear, the kind of thing you wear for a partner, complete with cats ears. It was the middle of the day so it seemed a bit weird. She seemed quite happy to discuss the problem with me despite being close to naked. My husband kindly volunteered to go over next time if necessary.’
–Existing-Tax7068

7.

‘I regularly answer the door whilst holding a snake (i have over 70 of them and am sometimes doing snake stuff when the door goes).

‘I also used to have a room full of tarantulas (I don’t have so many now) and the electric switch box was in my spider room. I garnered a bit of a reputation for that and the meter readers etc used to always say ‘you are the one with the spiders?’ when I answered the door.’
–SuCkEr_PuNcH-666

8.

‘I answered the door whilst breastfeeding my baby once. The postie handed the parcel to my toddler and was clearly uncomfortable. He came back later to ask me to sign for the parcel, clearly he was so flustered he forgot!’
–Existing-Tax7068

9.

‘Used to deliver pizzas many years ago. Delivered to an address one Saturday night and the bloke opened the door by peering round it. When he saw me with the pizza, he said he’d just get the money, opened the door fully and walked to the end of the corridor wearing just a very small leather thong. To be fair, I was just interested in earning money so took the cash and my tip and went on my way.

‘Got back to the shop and all the other staff were waiting for me and burst out laughing. It was his thing apparently and everybody had seen it at some point so now it was saved for people who hadn’t been to him yet.’
–BigFella17

10.

‘When I was a courier there was a guy on my route who had a pet pig/hog and I would often see him taking it for a walk like it was a dog.’
–drunkbellend