Cascading-deletes Memes

Someone's running a DELETE query on production with a WHERE clause targeting a single user ID. Should be instant, right? Wrong. It's been spinning for 44 seconds. Either that user has half a million orphaned records scattered across 37 tables with cascading deletes, or someone forgot to index the ID column. Both scenarios mean you're about to have a very uncomfortable conversation with your DBA. The "Production : tank" label in the corner is just chef's kiss—nothing says confidence like running destructive queries on a server nicknamed after a military vehicle.