What’s the most unusual reason you’ve heard someone call in sick for work? – 17 eyebrow-raising excuses

If you work in-house, chances are you can call in sick to work. But life isn’t always that straightforward.

Sometimes ridiculous things can prevent you from clocking in, leaving you with little choice but to tell your boss what’s gone wrong. Reddit user piranhamode was clearly curious about these excuses, so they put this question to the good folks over at r/AskReddit:

‘What is the most unusual excuse you’ve ever heard of from somebody calling off work?’

Here are the most popular – and peculiar! – replies…

1.
‘A plane landed on the expressway preventing traffic from using the road.’
-2thecorAY

2.
‘I used to manage a small team at an IT helpdesk. One morning, my most punctual, reliable employee didn’t show up. He calls me two hours into his shift, sounding genuinely panicked.

“I am so sorry. I can’t come in today. I’m trapped.”

‘Me: “Trapped? What do you mean, trapped? Is everything okay?”

‘Him: “Yes, I’m fine, but… there’s a moose on my porch, and it’s been sleeping in front of my door for three hours. I can’t get out.”

‘I was completely silent, trying to process if this was an elaborate prank. I just told him to keep me updated.

‘An hour later, he emailed me a picture from his upstairs window. There, magnificently and absurdly, was a full-grown moose, curled up and fast asleep on his front steps like a giant, antlered dog.

‘It’s the only time in my career I’ve had to log “Act of Moose” as the official reason for an absence.’
-InnerObligation2676

3.
‘A guy I worked with in retail 15 years ago called in to say he had a nightmare and didn’t think he’d be able to get back to sleep/come in to work 5 hours later.’
-dennisbauls6

4.
‘I emailed the office that I wouldn’t be in for a few days because my (then) wife had had our son – in the front seat of my car on the side of the turnpike. (They knew he was due any day, and we were actually on the way to the hospital, he just came faster than we expected.)

‘I got an email back from a coworker with a link to a local news article saying, “I thought I recognized your car!” :D’
-throwaway47138

5.
‘Years ago during the mob wars in St Louis we had a girl calling into work saying that she was behind a car that blew up on the highway. She was a known exaggerator so we laughed it off. Turned out it was true.’
-TahoeBunny

6.
‘I had a coworker call in, tell our boss he couldn’t come in because his balls were so swollen from doing a bunch of coke and jerking off for 8 hours.

‘My sister is a manager in retail and she had on older women call in because her hemorrhoids were acting up and texted a close up picture of her hemorrhoids’
-Deekers

7.
‘I had a coworker that called in because she dumped hot ramen noodles all over her vagina’
-rosealexvinny

8.
‘One of my daughter’s Primary School Teachers had to take a day off because her Beagle had climbed onto the roof of her house…

‘Again.’
-grudthak

9.
‘Colleague rang my boss one morning after a rather important football match.

“Boss, what would happen if I came into work drunk?” “You’d be fired.” “Right boss, what would happen if I rang in and said I couldn’t come in because I was drunk?” “You’d get a written warning.” “OK, ok boss. What would happen if I didn’t come in today but didn’t give you a reason?” “A verbal warning.” “Cheers boss, I’ll take that.”’
-Active-Strawberry-37