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If They Take My Stapler Then I’ll Set The Office On Fire

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Yesterday I had an occurrence at my office that necessitated speaking with one of my female employees about hygiene. It was so disturbing that I took to Facebook to ask the advice of the Pajibettes as to how to broach the subject with said employee. All of it was helpful in one way or another, but unfortunately much of it will be ultimately futile. What you have to understand is that my office is comprised of three people: my two female assistants and myself. One of my assistants has only been on the job for two weeks and wouldn’t dream of stirring the pot at this point. Ergo, there is absolutely no way that this issue can be dealt with anonymously.

I imagine that if I worked in a cubicle farm it would be no problem. An email could be sent to everyone in the office stating “This (insert behavior) isn’t acceptable” and the guilty party would immediately know what they did. Or a complaint could be brought to Human Resources and Lainey could deal with it as she sees fit. Alas, as I am Human Resources as well as many other things, there’s no way for me to avoid this duty. Of course I’ll have to tell you what the offense was as right now it doesn’t really make any sense why I’m so hesitant to bring it to her attention. I’ll try to be as delicate as possible due to the fact that I don’t want to appear disgusting or uncouth because, if I’m anything, it’s a paragon of sophistication and class.

Men tend to catch a lot of hell for their bathroom habits and, as I live in a household with four women and it’s constantly brought to my attention, I’ll not deny that sometimes we can be a little bit of a challenge when it comes to restroom etiquette. We leave the seat up, we smell, we splash, we know. However, as I share a bathroom with two women at work, I try to minimize any trauma I may visit upon my two assistants and I would like to think that they do the same. That’s why I was taken aback when I walked into the bathroom yesterday and was visited by what appeared to be the remnants of a Hostel-esque death scene.

There was blood everywhere. It appeared that a multitude of people were disemboweled, skinned, sawn in half and then their bloody carcasses were flung about the room with such reckless abandon as to bring to mind the inside of an unlicensed slaughterhouse. As I stood there in front of the toilet with my poor, terrified, yet still impressive member in hand, I questioned how I was to broach the subject with the perpetrator of this unspeakable act? My first inclination was to draw a bunch of chalk outlines everywhere, put up some police tape and scream like TK watching Drag Me To Hell. Upon hearing my manly shriek, the two ladies would come sprinting to the Cubicle of Horror to see what had so disturbed my tender soul. At this time, I would ask if either of them knew who the murder was? I was 100% sure of the culprit, so there was only one drawback that I could foresee to this plan: the complaint to The Labour Standards Branch and the inevitable lawsuit to follow.

It turns out that I do actually have a very small amount of professionalism tucked away in a dark and dusty corner of my vault of talents. I sat the offender down in private and ask that she pay a little more attention to the state of the facilities during certain periods of the calendar. While there was embarrassment on both of our parts, the bathroom is now pristine and I remain employed. I’m seeing a professional about the night terrors and I hope to be able to use the bathroom without breaking down in uncontrollable sobs soon.

What are your office horror stories? Perhaps there’s that cubicle neighbour you can’t stand? Maybe there was a bathroom incident similar to mine. You may not work in an office but are forced to share a space with a person who wears a crown of asshats. Here’s your chance, tell us about the circus of horrors that are your co-workers.

*Please note that there may have been a very small amount of hyperbole used in this post. Just a dash for seasoning, if you will.

Robert Scott is irredeemably Canadian and lives on the frozen tundra amongst the moose. He has no idea what he’s doing here and reserves the right to make grand claims without any evidence to back them up. He is steadfast in his attempt to prove that Canadians aren’t nice or polite and looks forward to the day when America becomes a province.









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Comments

Honestly, as a long time manager of large work forces, I've seen it all. I've had to let people know they are repulsively odoriferous, to clean up after themselves in every way imaginable, etc.

I've had to mention to people that things like religious beliefs, one way or another, are a touchy subject and you shouldn't say things like "anybody who believes in is a fucking moron" because it might, you know, jeopardize your job.

Oh and btw, everybody knows you are fucking Linda in accounting, you don't have to leave IMs from her on your highly visible screen to anybody that walks by talking about how to avoid her husband tonight.

Further, if you are high on coke, please don't come into the office and wear your sunglasses while on a "phone call". When you fall asleep and start snoring, it's pretty evident to everybody.

BTW, Brent from IT called. He thought we were testing a new DB instance on your machine. Turns out you just have several terabytes of porn, more storage than any of our production systems. Not so great.

Probably the most repulsive single incident I can remember was the guy who came in to interview (he was terrible, we knew we had made a bad mistake 15 minutes in) and talked to us extensively, even though we didn't want to know, about his family. Since we were having an unofficial company get together across the street after work, we figured we'd be polite and let him know, just a few folks kicking back for a few minutes before heading home. Except his plans included going "hands on" with one of the admins, really forceful shit, and then telling her where she could report to service him.

All of the above and much more have happened during my tenure, and I've had to deal with them all. Good times, good times. The names were changed to protect the guilty.

-Frob

Posted by: frobme at September 30, 2010 8:13 PM

Hahhahha, "Labour," you type funny. HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Posted by: coveredinbees at September 30, 2010 8:18 PM

Wait, how do you fall asleep if you are high on coke?

Posted by: Brenda at September 30, 2010 8:29 PM

I was never sensitive to light when I was on coke. Oh how I miss those 4 hour midnight walks...

Posted by: The Minn at September 30, 2010 8:42 PM

Wait, how do you fall asleep if you are high on coke?

Oh that's easy, you tank up on depressants or whatever before you come in to work, to "take the harsh off".

That guy was a piece of work.

-Frob

Posted by: frobme at September 30, 2010 8:44 PM

The Whistler.

Shrill.

Off key.

Tuneless.

Constant.

Whistling.

I developed a facial twitch.

Posted by: greer at September 30, 2010 8:50 PM

I'm sure I have blocked out many worthy incidents, but I currently sit at a cube next to a person who constantly sighs, sneezes, clears the throat, sighs, types very emphatically, sighs and makes that uhhhhh huuuuuuuuhhhhhhh sound like every five seconds. I'm composing my passive aggressive note in my head every day, but will never have the courage to type and print it. Even co-workers have expressed sympathy that I have to sit so close to this person because even people in cubes acres away can hear the constant expressions of ennui, stress and frustration that seem to be the constant companions of this person's internal life. I wear my headphones a lot, but it doesn't help that much.

Thanks for letting me write that, I feel much better about going to work tomorrow.

Posted by: Mrs Smith at September 30, 2010 9:01 PM

Mrs. Smith - I feel for you. That's justifiable homicide in my book.

Worst for me: IT guy came to fix my computer and SWEAT-ED on my keyboard and left his greasy ectoplasm where it lay.

*shudder*

Posted by: malechai at September 30, 2010 9:15 PM

I have worked with a secretary for almost eight years. She is a horrible person. Listens to her office radio too loud, tells other people they need to slow down their pace because she will not have them making her look bad, abrasive, and has a habit of "tasting" food off of your plate. And she is a finger licker, as in all ten fingers, lick lick lick. Always smushes Carmex all over her mouth, compulsively. Wears sequined vests at Christmas. I could go on forever. But the best part is when her Irritable Bowel Syndrome flairs up and she runs past my office gripping her ass, screaming, "ooo ooo ooo." What makes it awesome is that we work in a high security prison for men, and that kind of behavior draws a lot of attention, none of it good. She makes my soul hurt.

Posted by: Mulva at September 30, 2010 9:18 PM

I have this coworker who is diabetic and does NOT take care of himself. Normally, it wouldn't be any of my concern, but it affects us at work because he passes out on a regular basis. We've been fortunate so far that he hasn't been up on one of the 10 foot ladders during an episode. Twice, we had to call the paramedics to come and help him.

Quite frankly, it angers me, because he's 26 and should know by now what he needs to do to take care of himself. He has medication; he lives at home and his parents buy it for him. But he doesn't eat right, and some days, he doesn't eat at all, because he spends his money on stupid shit like DVDs and CDs instead of lunch. Our HR guy has talked to him about it, but they can't do much of anything because he's covered under the disabilities act (or so I'm told).

Posted by: MelBivDevoe at September 30, 2010 9:21 PM

Six or seven years ago, I nearly got in a fistfight with a sports writer. He was an AVID sports bettor, even though he really couldn't afford to lose. One Monday, he spent HOURS pissing and moaning because a personal foul on a Browns linebacker allowed Kansas City to kick a game-winning FG with no time on the clock. That kick cost him hundreds and he just could not let it go. Eventually I told him to shut the hell up, nobody cared and he shouldn't bet if he couldn't afford to lose. He didn't see it as I did.

Posted by: Tracer Bullet at September 30, 2010 9:38 PM

Well let's see. We had Shit Man, so dubbed because he went into the co-ed bathroom, forgot to lock it and plopped his ass down with a magazine. How do I know this? I walked in on him. Fun times.

Then we had this crazy bullshit artist dude with one hand that he couldn't use. I don't remember what the deal was, but I remember he held it like a dead baby. Anyway, he was to all the employees - but not my boss - seen right away as a liar, scammer and someone who had no idea what he was doing. He was hired to whip the office into shape or some such shit. He stole work that I had done and presented it as something new to the heads of the department. A few of us had to point out all the crap going on and he finally ended up getting fired. Not long after, I was watching Inside the Actor's Studio and what do you know, there was that bastard sitting in the audience - he even asked a question so my future husband and I got a really good look at him and both busted out laughing. I had a really good time rubbing my boss's nose in that bit of news.

Posted by: Cindy at September 30, 2010 9:57 PM

My building has multiple organisations working in various offices on the same floor. The toilets are shared, and there are two mystery women who have bad habits.

The first forgets to lock the door, and then gets very offended if you accidentally walk in. JUST LOCK IT. ENGAGED. Is it so hard to protect yourself from privacy breaches when you're defecating?

The second talks on the phone in the toilet. It's awful for me, and I can't imagine it's any better for the person down the line...

Do people have such appauling toilet behaviours at home? Or are they worse, and they actually TRY to keep it together at work?

Posted by: Gilligiggle at September 30, 2010 10:22 PM

I have recently been gassed out by the person sitting in the cubicle across from me. Twice. Like had to leave my desk because I couldn't breathe.

It should be fairly obvious if, moments after you let out a fart so foul it crawls across to the next desk, you co-worker coughs and gets up and leaves. You would think.

Posted by: that girl at September 30, 2010 10:23 PM

Where the hell would I start? My post-college career has consisted of teaching high school, being a technical writer, teaching middle school and then being an administrator in a public school district.

I know where to start: adults? Are WORSE than kids. Yep. Worse. BECAUSE THEY SHOULD KNOW BETTER.

Teachers who would glady chew out a kid for the slightest offense show up to professional development workshops demanding to know "HOW LONG THIS IS GONNA BE," show up late, take calls, have normal-voices personal conversations during the presentation and then leave all their food and drink trash shit all over the tables like some maid lives there to clean up after them.

Granted, not everyone does this. But I'm AMAZED at the number who do.

I bet I've seen every bit of boorish behavior that humans can engage in, from the shoe store manager (I was in college) who told us "girls" that anyone who blew him in the back room would get a raise to the middle school teacher I had to forcefully escort out of the building and into the police officer's car because he showed up for work drunker than Cooter Brown and his sister.

When I was a tech writer in a cube farm, the guy across from me went to "meetings at corporate" when he was running home to bang his girlfriend and take a three hour lunch (we were on the same team and committees--if he had a meeting at corporate, I would have, too). This happened DAILY. Either no one figured it out or no one cared. I suspect the latter. He was good looking and young in an office filled with older women.

The local Jesus freak at the same job would put long print outs of a single commandment (as in from the ten) in our boxes if he felt we were going astray. I'll never forget getting 20 pages single spaced all caps of THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY. I confronted the weasely motherfucker and he admitted he put it in the wrong person's box. Asshat. I told him if he ever put that bullshit in my box, I'd proceed to put it in his box.

A principal who hired me called me Lisa my second year at that high school and asked how teaching Biology was going. My name isn't Lisa, and I was an English teacher. And that was the first time he had spoken to me since he hired me.

My current boss is a workaholic, micromanaging control freak who is also the MOST insecure, paranoid person I have ever met in my LIFE. We once had a two hour, closed door meeting about how I need to be more CAREFUL ABOUT MY FACIAL EXPRESSIONS DURING MEETINGS WITH HER BOSS BECAUSE MY TWO SECOND FURROWED BROW MIGHT BE MISINTERPRETED.

I am so not kidding. She better retire in May or the gaslighting will be turned up a few notches.

NOW I'M AN ANGER BEAR. THANKS, SCOTT.

Oh and I wish I could have spoken to your employee. I wouldn't have been as nice. That's NASTY.

Posted by: Snuggiepants at September 30, 2010 10:25 PM

Temp job: We had The Talker Boss. He was a good old boy who really loved the thought of chatting up the Cute Fresh Meat Admin Assistant every chance he got - the the point where I honestly have no idea how or when he did any actual work. He was too busy plopping down by my desk, telling filthy jokes, making racist remarks, telling me all the plot lines of Fringe (his TV obsession) and TWILIGHT (oh his granddaughter just loves those movies, have you seen them? OH WELL THEN LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT THEM PLOT POINT BY PLOT POINT). He called me "Pickle." I shit you not. I really fucking needed that paycheck.

Mid-level development position in New York: We had The Ultimate Business Cliche Boss. "We need to incentivize our donor base." "Let's ideate about our next initiative." "We need to get really granular with this; you're up on the 30,000 foot level." "This statement needs to be more impactful." "Do you have any bandwidth to take on this project for me?" "My take-away is that we need more transparency to become thought-leaders in this field, this could be a real game-changer and promote synergy throughout the brand..."

THIS GUY WAS IN CHARGE OF FUNDRAISING FOR AN AFTER-SCHOOL PROGRAM. Would you give him a fucking dime? It doesn't even sound like language!

And yet, somehow, it was always my fault when we weren't meeting goals - clearly, I didn't understand the team's shared vision.

Jeesus Fucking Christmas I am glad I quit that job.

Posted by: Tammy at September 30, 2010 10:39 PM

Oh, where to begin. There's the fellow at my first job who considered personal hygiene optional and used his trashcan as a spittoon (LOUDLY--to this day I get twitchy when I hear someone hawk a loogie). Then there was the consultant who chewed tobacco and carried his "dip cup" around with him everywhere (a recycled clear plastic bottle). In my naïveté, I actually assumed the guy REALLY liked iced tea until I found out. Then there was the consultant who was not only obviously 'roided out of his mind, he rented a fancy sports car, parked it on the roof of the deck we could see from our office, and pointed out his "brand-new car" to everyone in the office.
Later, there was the co-worker who left his cellphone on his desk with the ringer on max and a non-stop alarm set to go off every afternoon at 3.15...when he was always in a meeting and not there to turn it off. Oh, and he had a habit of coming to work sick and coughing in his cube like he was dying of consumption all day. Or the executive they almost hired who flew down Sunday on the company jet for a Monday interview, only to be arrested Sunday evening when he showed up to meet what he thought was a 12-year-old girl he'd met online.
I really have to go get the good ones from my brother-in-law, though: he spent a couple years doing HR for the night-shift at an aluminum processing plant in SC, and he's got some doozies.

Posted by: Snorklewacker at September 30, 2010 10:41 PM

Oh Tammy. Just reading that gave me the hives.

IMPACTFUL ISN'T EVEN A FUCKING WORD.

I HATE corporate bullshit speak. It means NOTHING. Just SAY shit.

Posted by: Snuggiepants at September 30, 2010 10:42 PM

Tammy, wow. That last guy should be dragged out and beaten about the head and neck with a copy of the Oxford English Dictionary. The full version, not the abridged or the microscopic-print version.

As for the first guy, a never-ending series of sexual harassment workshops sounds like just the punishment needed.

Posted by: Snorklewacker at September 30, 2010 10:44 PM

You'll notice I didn't comment on your fb post for a reason. This is an example of when I would have yelled, "NOT IT" and completely avoided the issue. I am AWESOME at HR.

Posted by: Lainey at September 30, 2010 10:46 PM

I had an employee nonchalantly use the term "Wetbacks" when referring to Hispanic customers when we had a meeting with reps from a Spanish language cable network.

Posted by: JFD at September 30, 2010 10:48 PM


Snugs and Snorkle,
The worst part is that he's so painfully earnest and driven, he doesn't even realize how ridiculous he sounds. He got into nonprofit work from a corporate strategic marketing background, and he honestly thinks its helpful to say things like this. You know, teambuilding!

Corporate America is guilty of many injustices, but what it has done to the English Language is a crime against humanity.

Posted by: Tammy at September 30, 2010 11:00 PM

My 40 year old boss dated (and broke up with) my 23 year old coworker/close friend.

Yeah, cause that wasn't awkward.

And it was supposed to be a secret so I was the only one in the entire goddamn place who knew. Everyone started to suspect seeing as how she spent every free moment hanging out in his office but no one said anything. Now that they've broken up, he treats me like an ex because she and I are friends and the same age.

Posted by: Victoria at September 30, 2010 11:02 PM

I've mentioned her before, but my cube-mate is the most absolute miserable bitch there ever was. She is twice my age, and she just is delusional. I'm talking multiple personalities, batshit fucking insane crazy. But we're tucked into a dark corner of the office, so she only bothers me. She talks for HOURS a day on the company phone, gossiping and bitching to her family and friends. She talks about me, at full volume, but thinks that because she doesn't use my name that I don't know who she's talking about. Also, she has a crazy hair cut. I spend a lot of time dreaming of the things I'd say to her when I finally leave my job, and also, I make crazy raptor faces at her when her back is turned. It's possible she is making me insane.

Posted by: Dorothy Snarker at September 30, 2010 11:07 PM

please.. stop talking to me over my cubicle wall. Quit asking repeatedly if I'm there. If you need me, send me an IM please, I spend a lot of time on the phone and get really tired of muting my phone just to say "I'm.on.a.call."
Also if you're going to tell a story, make it have a point.

Posted by: webelos8 at September 30, 2010 11:47 PM

Dorothy Snarker I have a boss who is slowly dragging me into the abyss of insanity, so we should get coffee sometime.

The current phrase that's driving me crazy (besides using impact incorrectly) is "building _______________." Apparently you can BUILD relationships! You can BUILD leadership! You can BUILD MEANING!

What the HELL does that even mean? If you want to have good rapport with someone, just say it. Better yet, do it. I'm a fan of doing things more than talking about them. If you see leadership potential in someone and want to develop it, go right ahead.

But the blanket statement "we've got to BUILD LEADERSHIP!" drives me bonkers. Hand me a hammer, I'll build something alright.

And build meaning? Beats me. I've ASKED what the hell that means and got stuttering and stares and then glares.

If I start talking about pointless meetings in which we plan to plan to plan things, I could be here ranting until the wee hours instead of letting the sleepy pills and vodka do their magic. So, yeah. I'm off to BUILD REST!

Posted by: Snuggiepants at September 30, 2010 11:53 PM

In my middle 20's I worked for a company that was just starting up so I actually worked from home. Sweet job huh? It would have been if my boss hadn't been the control freak from hell.

After a few months she decided/suspected that I wasn't working enough so she made me keep a detailed account of every thing I did every day. Down.To.The.Minute. Meaning, the woman knew exactly how often I peed and how long it took me to pee. I had to fax it to her home office very night and if I even had a minute of unaccounted time during work hours, I was grilled about what exactly I had done in that particular minute.

She travelled a lot for work and on one memorable trip she left me a to-do list for the week she was gone. It was three pages long and included things like "go to my house and organize my bookshelf", I did every single thing on that list with the exception of two items. I couldn't do either of those items because the client decided he needed her to look at them, not her assistant. The day she got back I emailed her my completed to-do list with detailed descriptions of why I couldn't do two of the items. She emailed me back later that day suggesting that based on my to-do list it didn't appear that I had worked very hard the week she was away. I immediately emailed her back pointing out everything I had done and asking her to provide reasons why she believed I hadn't worked. She didn't bother to reply. I could have cheerfully boiled her head in hot oil. Thankfully I quit soon after that.

Posted by: Kelly at September 30, 2010 11:58 PM

I'm certain I have a few thousand more stories than these, but I've been a corporate-warrior type for a while now. I'm beyond "nothing surprises me any more." I don't even see it.


/Classy Guy

There was the guy who called me "fuckhead" more or less every day. I was a contractor, so, lower than whale shit. He was an employee, so, one word from him ... A few years of this they hired their first female engineer. Some maze-path meeting - the cube-farm version of a hallway meeting - sprung up outside her cube. She had to go somewhere. As she wallked off he pointed at her chair and said: "Bierce-bo, sniff that seat."

Classy guy. He eventually progressed to sneaking up & slapping a hand down on my shoulder when I was engrossed with a hot soldering iron in my hand. I eventually asked for a meeting with our mutual boss (about three levels up.) Told him what was going on. Then I told him the problem is that eventually chowderhead was going to get his arm broken. Not a threat, said I. The point is he's startling me. One of these times I was going to react before I could figure out what was gong on and stop myself.


/Gender in the Workplace

To balance out the sexual harassment above, another was eternal-chip-on-shoulder-woman. Everything was a gender issue. I got assigned to a project of hers. So, I emailed her & the boss "How do you want my time, task & results reporting."

Next thing I know, there's a meeting of the three of us in his office - no agenda. She starts out: "I'm very upset that you asked him as well as me. That's (blah) (blah) (blah)" I had stopped listening. Says I, "Well, I didn't know, so I asked. This being the first time you and I have spoken, how would I know what you'd like?" "Well, I'm very upset." "OK, be upset."

This is when the boss went: "Whoa. Knock that off." That's when I - um - pretty much guaranteed that that particular contract wouldn't be renewed. Something about I hadn't done anything wrong, asked a simple question, and chip-on-the-shoulder-woman getting upset about it was her problem, not mine.

A couple months later she & her partner in perennial offense were blatantly talking - loud, out in the hall - about a new hire. How this was a sub-standard engineer, but a "triple", so untouchable. Female, black and disability. Turns out the two of them were infamous. Everybody minced around them to avoid whatever stink they might make. Between them they set gender in the workplace back a decade.


/Stalker, Not Clear on the Concept

There's the guy who stalked me - not in a good way. Yes, I fired him, but that's after the "I'm your boss, so to get paid you have to tell me what you are doing." talk. The "please stop yelling at people" talk. So, after the last effort *not* to put him on a performance plan, which was a pleasant, factual and in the event utterly ineffective conversation I notice him composing a nasty-gram to *my* boss. Seeing this, I told him to get out of the office, cool down, and try to get through his head what we'd just talked about, starting with the fact that if he sent the email he was writing, it would be a race between me & my boss to see who could fire him first. Next day he has a 10 minute screaming fight in the hall with the VP of another department.

So, he's gone. On a hunch I had us take the machines he had access to off the network until we could scrub them. Turns out he had a time-bomb installed.

Anyway, for a few months he popped up around town, off in the distance, staring at me. Good times.


/Death Threats

Friend of mine. Started cranking some reviews into software development at a startup. One guy goes slowly crazy. Seems to have fixated on my buddy.

Things escalate & I manage to stay mostly out of it. Aside from spotting a stack of very inappropriate stuff from this guy on the printer. Handed that off to the VP: "Doesn't look to me like this should be sitting out. Let me know if there's anything else you want anything from me on this."

The problem child has a melt down that includes threatening to jump my friend in the parking lot & kill him. Then he's spotted hanging about.

So, very clever, a couple of us decide to lighten things up by playing body guard. Don't let him go through doorways first. Walk in a box around him. All very exaggerated.

Then I asked someone: "So, who's the beefy guy sitting out in the atrium." "Oh, he's an off-duty cop. We hired some security."

Didn't I feel like a schmuck.


/Conclusion

People are just crazy & work brings out the worst in them.

Posted by: BierceAmbrose at October 1, 2010 12:22 AM

When we told the new guy at work he could decorate his cubical, he brought a battle axe and a REAL AR-15 to hang up on the outside wall.

Posted by: Mick at October 1, 2010 12:36 AM

Until recently I worked for a small (6 employees) company owned and operated by a married couple. They were both in their late 40's-early 50's, second marriage for both. They were easily the most disturbing couple I have ever known (and that's saying something). Their relationship bordered on "master-slave", she looked at him with total "white--knight" awe and he was frequently nasty and downright verbally abusive towards her. I mean he would regularly loudly berate the woman in full earshot of the entire office and she would stand there with her chin tucked into her chest and the overall body language of a scolded puppy. Then she'd scuttle out of his office and lash out at everyone else, dumping piles of useless busy-work upon us. The first few times it happened my jaw dropped, I have never heard anyone publicly humiliate their spouse like that before. To say it was massively uncomfortable is an understatement.

To compound the weirdness further, this woman would wear some incredibly inappropriate outfits to work: too-tight tops that showed way too much cleavage and bare midriff (not the most flattering look, even for a moderately attractive woman her age) and skirts so short she couldn't get into or out of a standard office chair without flashing her feminine bits to anyone in front of her. The "Jersey Shore" girls would reject some of her outfits as being too skimpy.

Working around those two and dealing with their bizarre relationship completely creeped me out. He was a total and complete jerk and she had an almost religious zeal about pleasing him, it was impossible to have any respect at all for either of them. It was just impossible to ignore. No one ever really learned what the back-story was there or what the real deal was with their dysfunctional marriage but let me tell you, my final day there was by far my happiest.

Posted by: Dr. Remulak at October 1, 2010 12:57 AM

I have diagnosed the boss with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I am not a trained psychiatrist but I play one in the office.

Seriously, I used to joke that she was, until one night I looked up the traits and there were 12 and the boss fit 11 of them. I think seven was sufficient for a clinical diagnosis, or maybe five ... whatever, she fit the definitions almost perfectly.

Posted by: , at October 1, 2010 1:11 AM

For my part, I'll just say that as a moderately attractive guy in an office populated with older women, daily sexual harassment is only funny for about a year. Then I get tired.

In terms of moderate annoyance, I've worked at a job with flextime my whole adult life; first in Arkansas and now in Texas. I'm an actor and musician when I'm not working, so I keep night owl hours. I like it that way, and come in around 9:30 every day. Someone (usually the same 2-3 people) find some way to work that fact into our conversation. Every. Day. Oddly enough, these are generally people with kids that taint-punch them awake every morning at 6 AM so they have nothing better to do than go to work. I get it. You're jealous. Please stop implying I'm lazy; I just go to bed later than you because my life doesn't revolve around a spouse and kids.

Posted by: Ian at October 1, 2010 1:18 AM

Well, clearly whatever baggage I'm carrying from these is messing with my words. Thanks a lot.

Couple of boss stories.

/Flappy Joe

Guy had a 45 minute circuit, visiting each consumer / constituent / sponsor for our *very technical* piece of software, part of an *immense* bombs & rockets type thing. (Yep. Y'all paid my salary for a while. To build ... questionable things.) Completing each circuit he'd flap in & redirect us based on the last thing said by the last person he'd spoken to. The level of panic would escalate with each lap.

Every 45 minutes. Every day. Until he gave himself a heart attack. Then, we finished in a couple months the stuff we'd made no progress on for a couple years.

/Nervous Ned

Director guy, called me, his newest manager, every night. Literally. Anywhere from 7 to 9 PM. He'd rant and scheme and ask what we were going to do until 10 - 10:30. On the company cell because I had to always be reachable.

He didn't get the hint that this was not OK until the morning I walked into his office, put my cell & sundries down, & walked out.

/Fickle Finger of Fate

Not a boss, but a sys admin. Talking about some new stuff we needed to do eventually, he decided to unload on me for all the crap that'd been dumped on him by surprise for the last year.

So, yelling, with lots of profanity, wagging his finger in my face. For 15 minutes. Me sitting not saying a word, with him standing "over" me.

It was actually funny, since he was maybe 5'3" 130 pounds & I've been yelled at by experts.

When he showed no signs of being proud, or tired, I stood up.

Posted by: BierceAmbrose at October 1, 2010 2:23 AM

We discovered that one of the engineers at my agency was a furry. 'nuff said.

Posted by: Jo at October 1, 2010 2:38 AM

Prior job (and I've told this story before, many times, but it IS my favorite) bitch-head drunk lady who thinks she's over me (but isn't) calls me at home the day I've called in with complications from cracked ribs (muscle spasms in the diaphragm suck, yo) and says:
Sharon, do you know what happened to me?
Nope.
I shit the bed, Sharon. I woke up in SHIT.
Wow.
So you have to go to work, Sharon.
Um, no.
Yes you do. I woke up covered in SHIT.
You probably shouldn't drink so much at night, Catherine.
Get your ass into work, Sharon!!
No.

Then she called the office to tell them that she called me to tell me to go to work, they tell her to fuck off, she's not in charge of me. I called in later that day to check on a report, they tell me she called them, blah blah blah. Crazy bitch calls me again in the afternoon.
Sharon, I can't believe you called and told them what I said to you. Be an adult and don't tattle on people!
Catherine, don't ever call me again. Seriously. Good luck cleaning your sheets.

Crazy bitch.

Current job is pretty okay, actually. I have very little problems with my coworkers, even before I started telecommuting. I actually enjoy my work and hope that all the crazy restructuring doesn't affect me. Most of what we talk about is the crazy reps from the publishing companies who have impossible demands, are already aware of what we can and cannot do, then act all surprised and indignant that we can't do the magical fucking bullshit they have requested.

Posted by: MyySharona at October 1, 2010 2:44 AM

I got fired earlier this year for ticking off someone who works for a major movie corporation. This wouldn't be odd if I had worked in the movie industry, but I didn't. I worked for a museum that had nothing at all to do with movies.

The story is long and stupid, but I'll shorten it as much as I can to tell you about the behavior of my former bosses, which was terrible.

Let's just say I made an honest and inadvertent mistake and released some press release information before it was supposed to go out. I wrote about it on my personal blog, which I admit was kind of dumb, but I honestly believed the press release was already circulated or I never would have DARED do it. Because I mentioned the name of the movie studio we were working with (we were exhibiting some props) the studio's bot-search thing found my blog (which had a readership of about 6 people, almost all family.)

Someone who worked for the movie corporation called the museum who they had given the props to and who had loaned them to us. They in turn called my boss and another guy I worked with and told them. I was asked to remove the blog post, which I did immediately after I heard that the information was still not circulated. I apologized, offered to call whomever I inconvenienced and grovel to them if needs be, whatever I had to do because I really felt bad about screwing up. About an hour later, with no warning, I was fired.

I was taken into my bosses office and then told I was fired for a multitude of things that had never once been brought up to me as problems, things that were so trivial that I didn't even remember doing them...basically they accused me of doing a lot of stuff that should have been addressed a long time before it got to the point of firing me over them. They even made some of it up, I kid you not. I had a great reputation at my job, I never - or hardly ever - had any complaints about my work, and I had no idea anything was amiss. They handed me a piece of paper (that I know for a fact was typed up right before they called me into the office) with a list of my "problems" on it, and they were laughable, and not anything on that list even mentioned the blog post I did. They basically told me I sucked at my job, I was a total bitch, and I couldn't do anything right. I had to go to HR to be debriefed, or whatever it's called, and I was told that, yes, they were angry about my blog post, but I was officially being fired for not knowing how to do my job.

Skip forward a couple of weeks. I had to file for unemployment support, and when they asked why I had been fired, I told them the official reason I was let go (which is what the HR person told me to do). Someone from the state agency called me and told me that I lied to them about why I had been fired. According to my former employers, they said, I had been fired for releasing confidential information on the internet! I told them that yes, that had happened, but that I was told I was fired for not knowing how to do my job. She also told me that the HR lady said I had been warned in writing about it before they had to take the steps to fire me. That was not true at all. Even though I told them exactly what happened, they docked me 6 weeks of unemployment pay because of "Misconduct."

The people I had worked with for years, thought of as friends, liked and respected threw me under a bus to cover their own asses over a blog post that had been online for less than 4 hours. Maybe I deserved to be fired for screwing up, but they could have at least had the professional courtesy not to lie to me, and the state department of industrial relations, about why I was being fired.

Posted by: ZombieNurse at October 1, 2010 2:45 AM

My colon has, during the course of my life, settled on a comfortable and steady evacuation schedule, which just so happens to coincide with being at work. At the same time every morning, I visit the facilities and take care of business. I am a courtesy flusher and I don't hog the stall (though I might partake of some hands of Solitaire on my smartphone from time to time, and no that is not a euphemism for masturbation you deviant turkeys).

A very large gentleman with very large gentleman habits and appearances (fast food everyday, smokes constantly, mouth breather, piggy eyes) will enter the bathroom on approximately 72% of my morning testamonials and proceed to hack up whatever has become lodged in his cavernous gullet. It is a snorting, hacking, coughing, spitting Loogypocalypse and it is completely fucking disgusting. I understand that he might have a respiratory malfunction completely out of his control, but I am developing toilet-specific PTSD. His revolting nature has transformed me into a twitching, aggravated, sphincter-clenching mess of a man during what needs to be a relaxing moment, and there is nothing I can do about it.

I want to grab him by some folds and scream into his face, "STOP SMOKING AND EATING GARBAGE YOU GIANT MOTHERFUCKER!!! I CAN'T SHIT IN PEACE BECAUSE YOU NEED TO COUGH UP THE LAST 47 CIGARETTES TO MAKE ROOM FOR ANOTHER EXTRA LARGE VALUE MEAL??? FUCK YOU, GODDAMNIT!!! DO YOU HEAR ME??? FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK YOOOOOUUUUUUUUU!!!"

Oh, and I've tried to wait until later in the day to make a doody. Guess who waddles in most of the time? You guessed it.

Maybe I'll sneak out and shit in the bushes. Much less stressful.

Posted by: Kballs at October 1, 2010 8:20 AM

God I wish I worked in a cubicle! I work in an "open" office and a colleague who sits 1 metre from me regularly picks his nose. Like, incessantly. As if he had metal in his finger and a mega powerful magnet in his nostril. Then several times I decided to stare at him until he stopped. Nope, didn't bother him one little bit.
He also likes to eat extremely spicy food which regularly disagrees with his gastric system. Then he burps and belches for the next 3 hours.
We also have a bitch manager who works in another dept. but has sway over us as well. She's the unprecedented example of indecently high levels of entitlement combined with a seriously deficient self-esteem. She doesn't ask her colleagues(us) for a favor - she commands and threatens when we don't do it instantly. When I once (if ever) find another job, I have an entire speech ready just for her. Have been composing it in moments of leisure for the past 2 years...Sigh

Posted by: astounded at October 1, 2010 8:25 AM

While in my early twenties I worked at a manufacturing plant. I did accounting work, but my boss (one of the owners) liked to treat me like his personal assistant. He pissed off the office staff by telling them they had to work on a holiday. In turn, my boss got pissy when the staff got mad, so he dictated a memo for me to type. Basically, it said: “If you don’t come into work on X day you will not be paid for the following week. Please sign on the below line to indicate you understand.” When I told him that this was illegal, he didn’t care. He told me to pass out the memo to everyone. The staff then got royally pissed, and a group of them barged into his office telling him they were going to call OSHA and the Feds, etc. Well, he blamed the whole thing on me! Said he never, EVER said what was on the memo. Of course he knew it was illegal. Blame poor old me because I didn’t type what he told me to type. Thankfully, everyone knew it was BS, but the steam coming out of my ears would have powered a fucking train.

He also stole money from his own company by expensing ridiculous shit. He bought and sold homes on the side, and all the home improvement costs were charged on the company. He purchased an Escalade, an E class Mercedes, a Porsche 911 Turbo (which was shipped to Florida for custom work), and a Porsche Cayenne all on the company dime while our company trucks were breaking down and our install crew was eventually forced to share 3 trucks (down from 12 that the owner refused to have repaired). He expensed his monthly $1000 cleaning bill for his home. He expensed his Botox, his ab lipo and his hair replacement treatment. He expensed his Polo shirts, his 7 jeans and his Prada loafers. While at the same time refusing to give anyone a raise, upgrade the 10 year old computers, and pay any of our bills. We had the water shut off, we lost electricity more times than I can count, we had to replace cell phone providers 3 times, etc. It’s a bitch of a job when you’re in accounting and every single day you receive no fewer than 10 phone calls from vendors asking (mostly not very nicely) where their money is.

Posted by: Scully at October 1, 2010 8:51 AM

Ugh...

I'm an office manager at a law firm and yes, lawyers can be the fucking worst. Especially the older ones. But their assistants are who really drive me fucking crazy. These women (and men) are so fucking catty that I had to switch to heavy duty meds to cope sometimes. I swear if I hear a 50 year old woman complain one more time about another 50 year old woman doing something that she wants to do, I'm gonna burn that goddamn building down. Jeezy creezy...

One of my worst stories involves lunch stealing. Yeah...all of these fucking adults (I'm one of the youngest at 30) and someone is still stealing food. So there was a rash of lunch thefts and I took a few measures to stop it. It slowed down but didn't stop. One day, one of my employees pulled me out of a meeting to ask to go home because she'd had an emergency. What was it? Someone had stolen her lunch. Hmmm...not really an emergency in my book and I let her know. She then proceeded to tell me that she was on a high dose of lithium that she took in powdered form and in order to take powdered lithium she mixed it in with her food every day. The food that she'd brought in for lunch. Oh holy Christ. So, of course, I let her go home. I head over to my bosses' office and tell her about the situation. After I finished, I started to laugh. When my boss asked me why I was in hysterics, I told her, "We're about to find out who has been stealing lunches. Lithium is a Class 1 drug. In about an hour, whoever took her lunch is going to be whacked out of their minds."

Sure enough, about 45 minutes later, I walked around the offices checking on everyone and there was Kevin. He was slack in his chair, head lolling back, conscious but definitely dazed. "Hey, Kevin. You okay?" I asked him. "Yeah, yeah. I guess I a bit tired today" He couldn't focus his eyes on me and was slurring his words a bit. Oh boy, I thought.

I called the ambulance (since he had overdosed, obviously) and then fired him that same day.

Lesson: Don't fucking steal someone elses' food. Asshole

Posted by: Trouble at October 1, 2010 9:01 AM

Over the summer at camp, my boss decided he would regale all of the employees with a rousing story about his bow hunting.

And by bow hunting, I mean blatant animal abuse.

This sick bastard would practice his skills in his back yard. He lives in the suburbs. There is no forest behind him and no legal game for him to be hunting. Instead, he would set up no-kill traps and shoot whatever he found whenever he found it.

He was telling a particularly gruesome story about shooting an arrow through a squirrel's eye and out of his heart when I couldn't take it anymore. I told him in no uncertain terms that he was creating a hostile work environment and if he said one more word about slaughtering innocent animals I'd be force to pursue legal action.

You must understand that this jerk had be harassing me all summer. He hated how I interacted with my co-workers, campers, and parents of campers. He hated every single activity I came up with in the fields of music and drama (my entire job). He hated my hair. He hated my car. He hated my shoes. He hated my voice. He hated my instruments. And he told me all of this constantly.

He also knew that I am an animal rights activist, which is the one cause I'm willing to display on my car. He had mocked me for it before, trying to provoke a fight so he could fire me. He kept staring at me when he described the brutality of his actions and had a self-satisfied smirk on his face. He did it to get me to blow-up at him and I didn't give him the satisfaction. When he said I was overreacting, I called his boss right in front of him. She was there in 5 minutes to reprimand him for harassing me (again).

Don't even get me started on how he started chasing me on the last day because I told him I wasn't hired to pick up trash and had 30 first graders waiting for their last music class of the summer. Jackass.

Posted by: Robert at October 1, 2010 9:03 AM

Snuggiepants, word. I look at her and wonder if I stay here, will I eventually turn into THAT?? Then I panic. Coffee sounds good. With a side of Xanax.

Posted by: Dorothy Snarker at October 1, 2010 9:15 AM

I used to handle my boss's match.com account for him because he doesn't know how to spell. He would give his phone number out in the first message to women. He was always looking for a rich widow.

Also he buried his dog on work property. He put a christmas tree decoration on it.

Posted by: stupidgirl1121 at October 1, 2010 9:20 AM

I've seen some truly bat-s*** crazy stuff since entering the workforce 30 years ago. I am of the firm belief that American business succeeds in spite of itself.

Posted by: Ignatz at October 1, 2010 10:11 AM

I worked for Satan for 5 years. He was the owner of a small marketing firm. I have a variety of stories, mostly about his erratic behavior, toxic screaming work environment, and shady business practices.

This story, however, stands out.

We'd take on interns during the school year, and one of them was one day discussing Passover with a Jewish coworker (said Intern was African American). Intern commented that he'd been to several Seders.

Boss (who is also Jewish) comes barreling out of his office, walks over to Intern, and exclaims loudly,"Yeah, man, people forget, my people were slaves too."

The entire office just stopped as this jackass continued with "Yeah, I was telling my boys all about it, we were slaves too!"

Intern very gracefully nodded, and went back to his desk. He later got an apology from the entire rest of the office.

I pray daily for hell to open up and swallow this ass-faced monkey fucker.

Posted by: MantherthePanther at October 1, 2010 11:08 AM

Zombienurse: an outsized, cowardly response from your employer, if you ask me. It's not as though you undermined the integrity of the institution, for God's sake. You made a mistake, one that the drama-queen central movie industry considered a big one, but I just don't see it as that big a deal.

Trouble: I'm an attorney and seriously can't imagine being a sane office manager type amongst this nonsense. I'm actually surprised it wasn't an attorney stealing the lunches.

Posted by: samantha t at October 1, 2010 11:20 AM

Share a cubical with a guy that is so disgusting, I can never tell what he is eating unless I look. The dude has slurped crackers before. I routinely walk over to the secretary and ask her to brush off the crap that flies out of his mouth and land on the back of my dress shirt. Oh, and the tool dresses like he is a director from a 1970's porn movie. Hawaii shirt opened practically to his naval. Not that you really see anything other than wonder why he is wearing a wool sweater under a shirt...and then the realization hits in. He talks to me like I am a child and an idiot because I am a summer intern...not only am I a year older than him, I have held positions of much larger authority than he will ever hope to hold. He raids the office refrigerator...I have actually caught him eating my lunch, next to me, at 930am. His excuse, I didn't put a name and a date on it. He has a rape van. I am not fucking kidding...its a beat to shit conversion van that has the windows boarded up and for some reason he always has climbing rope and duct tape in the back. The base security one day detained him and wouldn't release him until my boss picked him up because of the weird shit in it. He is the only person I know of that is not allowed to bring his primary vehicle on to a military base. Me and him had to fly to Nevada to observe a test firing with members of congress and fly directly back. I show up at the airport with a press suit. He shows up with sandals, sunglasses, a flack vest, and cut off jean shorts...and no fucking luggage. I start to panic when this clown admits he plans on going the way he is. Apparently he has done this before because our supervisor shows up just to see us off. Needless to say, one of us was allowed to go on that flight. I literally had to deliver a speech on a combat system I had never witnessed in action before and barely has any concept of its operation because this clown couldn't dress moderately appropriately.

I am literally begged to return each summer by a slew of supervisors every time I go back to school. It feels good to be wanted.

Posted by: Diablo at October 1, 2010 11:21 AM

Yeah, I asked my psychiatrist to prescribe some Xanax for me. He asked why and I described my top dozen boss stories.

He was genuinely horrified, mumbled that she most likely has a personality disorder (YOU THINK?), and urged me to get away from her ASAP. I assured him I have a plan, but could I have that prescription in the meantime?

Nope, he said. He told me some breathing exercises. Fuck that. Next stop, my regular doctor.

I can tell I'm not holding it together as well because, though I pride myself on being extremely professional, I'm not hiding my feelings about Boss Lady as well around colleagues. I'm assuredly not hiding them well around her and haven't been for a while. I've even attempted to talk to her about some of the issues, but it always goes VERY very very badly and I end up deeply regretting having ever attempted it. She gets SUPER defensive (I mean, immediately) and then starts acting like a petulant child. Takes EVERYTHING personally, no matter how innocuous your statement was. But then she'll cry, apologize, want a hug and then bring you a gift the next day. Aaaaaand the behavior you were talking about? Doesn't change. But you got a prezzie!

Imagine these characteristics in a boss:

Insecure to the nth degree. Infinity insecure.

Catty and gossipy about everyone (including you, when you aren't around)

Paranoid as HAIL

Outer persona is that of a sweet older lady who wouldn't hurt a fly, so those who don't know better describe her as "SO NICE!"

Attempting to get the world's record for micromanagement---I have to get her permission before I send out a particular type of email that I KNOW she wants me to send out. But she has to KNOW FIRST. BEFORE. I'm 39. I have a master's degree in this field (she does not, by the way--see: insecurity). And I have to get permission for emails.

Unorganized like you wouldn't think was humanly possible. It takes her four to six hours to complete a task which should take about an hour or less. If I complete the same task/type of task in less time than it takes her, she gets pissy with me (see: insecurity). Once, when I was describing an idea I got for something, she burst into tears and ordered me out of her office.

She's completely inefficient.

Technophobe and very thin-skinned about it--the woman saves every document to her DESKTOP because she CAN'T UNDERSTAND FOLDERS in Word. Or on the C: drive. CAN'T. UNDERSTAND. FOLDERS. So her monitor is littered with LAYERS of documents. She refuses to understand search desktop, too. So I've spent entire work days watching her squint at her screen, trying to locate a single document AMONGST THOUSANDS. This year? She ordered a LARGER MONITOR SO SHE COULD SEE MORE OF THEM. And got it. Fuck. Me. I once tried to explain folders and showed her. She got very flustered and confused and ended up snapping at me that saving them to her desktop was JUST FINE. Keep in mind we have documents for every grade level and every six weeks and then dozens of other categories, as well. Thousands upon thousands of documents.

I used to try to help her. Maybe a couple of years ago. These days, I'm feeding her rope.

Posted by: Snuggiepants at October 1, 2010 11:22 AM

If Kballs post isn't the most eloquent of the week, well....I don't know what I'll do.

Simply hilarious.

Posted by: IneptFake at October 1, 2010 11:46 AM

I have any number of stories about coworkers' passive aggressive behaviour, insane bosses, weird office politics and whatnot but instead I'll share something sort of crappy that I did. I fired someone for chewing gum too loudly. I mean she also sucked at her job but no more than anyone else I hired in that position. I very politely asked her to stop the gum chewing, or rather just the annoying noise she was making with the gum and she stopped for about 10 minutes and then kept doing it. I'm sure it was a nervous tick she wasn't even aware of. Well, I couldn't take it so I fired her.

And now I want to quit because I'm tired of working in a dungeon. I work in a 100 year-old hospital that looks gorgeous from the outside (if you live in Montreal then just think of the castle at the top of the hill) but inside it's a total dump. And I'm sick of dealing with bathroom issues like the one that sparked this whole thread. I understand that patients use the bathrooms and sometimes they have trouble um... making it to the bowl and I try to be sympathetic but I'm just tired of it. Yes, there is an employees only washroom. It's worse than the ones for the patients, I think because the custodians neglect it. It's vile and after 6 years here I'm just done. I hold it in as long as I can everyday and sometimes walk to the mall, which is 15 minutes away just so I can use a clean bathroom!*sigh*

Posted by: Nique at October 1, 2010 12:09 PM

Once I had a boss who was crazy-cakes but the most awkward situation I personally had to deal with (she did much worse to her assistant) was when she one day brought in a skirt she didn't want anymore and gave it to me. It was an ok skirt but I took it more out of politeness than actual desire to have it. I wore it the next day, again, just to be polite and she asked for it back!!! She looked and me and complimented me on how good I looked and said that she didn't want to give up the skirt after all and could she please have it back. I didn't know what to do, I mean I was wearing the damn thing, was I supposed to walk around in my underwear the rest of the day? I laughed off her request and never wore the skirt again. Never gave it back to her either. She tried to give me clothes many times after that but I always suggested she try them on first and when she did I would compliment her and she would always decided to keep the clothes.

Posted by: Hannah at October 1, 2010 12:16 PM

I thought of something! I know, I know, TRY TO CONTAIN YOURSELVES.

Anyway, I had this real jackass of a manager when I worked in banking as an assistant manager. He would refuse to open up his teller window (which managers had to do since we were smaller branches in store)until someone straight up asked him to. Then, he would bullshit while running his teller window, causing him to be short some cash all of the time. He also drug his stupid ass whenever he worked until close. Seriously, he would still be counting his drawer while everyone else was finished and waiting to leave.

We had several people quit while he was manager. This douche is talking with me about something work related when he says, "All of the people that are leaving, do you think it has something to do with me?" I looked at him and said, "Yes. Your personality sucks and you're slow." He replied, "I guess I'll have to work on that then." He didn't work on that.

Posted by: Pinky McLadybits at October 1, 2010 12:23 PM

Yo, some women be goddam disgusting bitches.

I don't know if they just weren't taught any better or if they're just inconsiderate and don't give a fuck how it affects other people, or what, but be assured that women (who have been in the workforce for more than a few years) know that not all men are slobs and not all women are tidy and clean. Believe me, we know.

Posted by: Slash at October 1, 2010 12:30 PM

As for stories, I have a few, but the most recent coworker story is not particularly bad, but:

This is someone I currently work with every day. She is about 45-50 years old. She's kind of a slob, but that I can take (there's nothing like your bloody bathroom story among her transgressions). It's her behavior at lunch that I can't abide. I no longer eat lunch in the kitchen with her (ie, I go out of my way to make sure we're never eating lunch in there at the same time) because of it. The list:

- We have a relatively small table (about 3 ft. in diameter) to eat our lunch at. She often reads the newspaper during lunch and spreads out the entire paper across half the table to do so. You might think that this doesn't happen when other people are sitting at the table. You would be wrong. I once had to ask her to move her paper so it wasn't hanging in my food while it ate.
- Sometimes she has the TV on during lunch (usually to some kind of cable news) and turns it up so loudly other people at the table have to raise their voices to be heard above the TV.
- She chews ice. All the time. First, she'll chew her lunch, which is fine, everybody makes some noise when they chew. But when she's done with the food, she starts in on the large plastic cup full of ice. She continues this until she's finished and leaves the room.
- She often cooks fish in the microwave. This bothers me a little, it bothers other people a whole lot.
- She often leaves food in the fridge long enough for it to go bad and start smelling. She also often puts food in the fridge that is not covered or otherwise secured in some kind of container so that when it does go bad, it makes that much more of a mess/smell.

Otherwise, she's OK (she's pretty weird, but usually not in ways that affect any of us), so my story sounds extremely petty now. But lunch is one of the few times during the day I get to relax, and she ruins it.

I am also fortunate in that our office is pretty small and I have an office (not a cube) so if someone really starts to bug, I can close a door. That is a huge advantage that I do not take for granted.

Some of you people have goddam nightmare stories. You have my deepest sympathies. I agree that much of American business succeeds in spite of the fucking crazy, incompetent assholes running it, not because of them.

I guess I'm lucky, my bosses are OK. There is a bit of nepotism here, but it doesn't bother me all that much.

Posted by: Slash at October 1, 2010 1:03 PM

"I have any number of stories about coworkers' passive aggressive behaviour, insane bosses, weird office politics and whatnot but instead I'll share something sort of crappy that I did."

GREAT THREAD: when have you ever abused your power? I complained about a paralegal in his review because he only spoke to me on speakerphone when I was a new associate because I thought it was rude (I actually think it's rude for anybody unless absolutely necessary, for the record). In retrospect, it was petty and stupid to do that.

Posted by: samantha t at October 1, 2010 1:40 PM

I worked in retail for a long time, at several different places, including a very popular lingerie store. I have seen some of the most disgusting displays of human behavior, including the following: 1)someone shitting in a fitting room, 2) someone menstruating on the chair in a fitting room, 3) someone dragging their obviously sick child all around the store until he finally vomited, then exiting as quickly as possible, 4) women stripping nearly naked in front of me when I bring them a new size, 5) people trying on underwear in the middle of the store, 6) people verbally berating teenage cashiers for the stupidest things, including not getting a shitty free mp3 player, because she wasn't one of the first 70 people in line, and another because her two-shopping cart purchase was taking too long to process.

I work in cubicle land now, and it is absolutely WONDERFUL compared to what I had to deal with before. Yes, there is a woman near me that is entirely too loud, tends to sing, and often wears too much perfume. But you know what? She's nice, and hooks me up with tickets to sporting events.

Posted by: Kristobel at October 1, 2010 1:44 PM

I have had a series of horrendous bosses. Horrendous. My friends all say that chaos follows me.

But the worst was a summer job. I was waitressing at a very high-end resort in Muskoka. My manager loved me, but one of the assistant managers hated my guts. She was a tacky, trashy girl. She wore four engagement rings that various men had given her. She had said no to all of these poor schmucks, but kept ALL FOUR RINGS. And wore them every day. Tacky.

Anyway, one day the restaurant was really slow, so she told me and one of the bussers that we had to go to the garbage dump area and sort beer bottles from the other recyclables. This is the job of the Facilities department, but she hated both of us and had volunteered us to do it. When I protested, she threatened to fire me. It was the most disgusting jobs I have ever done. Bugs and rodents and mould... BLAGH. I gagged frequently.

After a few hours, she sent someone to come get us because the restaurant had gotten busy. She told me to wash my hands and go serve tables.

I was dumbfounded. I had just spend hours in a garbage dump, elbows deep in vermin and filth and she wanted me to serve food to people.

I said no.

She threatened to fire me.

I yelled at her, in the middle of a high-class, busy restaurant:

"Fine, Jenn. Fire me. I would rather be fired than be the cause of a major outbreak of food poisoning. You might not care about our guests, but I sure as hell do. You've had me sort garbage for hours, and there were RATS AND MAGGOTS IN THERE. Do you know how gross rats and maggots are? I refuse to serve food to anyone until I've had a chance to disinfect myself and my clothing."

At which point, several of the guests had gone green and one woman was quietly gagging.

I was sent home to clean up, and I was paid for the whole day. Jenn was reprimanded for trying to foster an unhygienic situation. Win for Pea!

Posted by: Pea at October 1, 2010 2:37 PM

when i came back to work after a week long bout with pneumonia, the lady next to me was convinced i was still contagious. i had a note from my doctor saying i could return to work and was on antibiotics for the whole week.

well, i went ahead and coughed, just once, and she started spraying lysol. she sprayed so much that people at the other end of the hall complained.

and i had a huge coughing fit from the chemicals.

oh, this is the broad who turns the heat up to 78. so it was tropical warm and the lysol cloud lingered for hours.

Posted by: glittergirl at October 1, 2010 3:04 PM

Kristobel, I worked retail throughout high school and college; people shit in changing rooms ALL. THE. TIME. In high school I work at the Wrentham Premium Village Outlet Mall (the largest outlet mall in North America!) and they had a guy on the maintenence staff who was the designated shit-in-the-changing-room cleaner. There's over 200 stores, and he'd have to clean shit out of the rooms every. single. day. I weep for humanity.

Posted by: Marra at October 1, 2010 3:29 PM

Nique: you are my new hero. Everyone who chews gum like a cow should be fired and then restricted to their own domiciles until they learn to use their orifices in a responsible fashion.

This also applies to people who pee on the seats of public toilets and don't wipe it off.

Also: people who steal other people's lunches.

Such people can be allowed back into society but only if they wear one of those monitoring anklets Linday Lohan had, calibrated to report back on their specific disfunctions. Or maybe shock collars. So, if you're at work and you hear the crinkle of a gum wrapper, or the fridge open or someone flush the toilet... and then a primal scream... you know justice has prevailed.

*Sniff* Excuse me, I'm getting all emotional just thinking about it.

Posted by: malechai at October 1, 2010 3:39 PM

I had a co-worker who was a total slut. Beyond words. Dressed slutty at work, dressed sluttier on the weekends and constantly called in sick because of her slutty ways. Whever she would call in sick, which always happened to be on a Monday morning her mother would call in for her. Her mother. Did I mention she was in her 40's? She loved sharing her escapades and I finally managed to erase most from my memory, except one. She was telling me how she was blowing this guy in the car of the parking lot of some club (in her 40's ok) and his spooge went all over her wind shield. She didn't have any napkins so she took off the maxi pad that she was wearing and wiped her wind shield clean with it. What a classy dame!

Posted by: Summer at October 1, 2010 4:18 PM

Ok, so a couple of years ago - right after I got married actually...My boss announced in a company meeting that I had a big surprise for everyone and went on to say I was pregnant. Yeah, wasn't pregnant. Have never been pregnant. Not even fat. He just thought it would be funny. I pray for his death.

Posted by: Rachel at October 1, 2010 4:45 PM

Snuggiepants:

OMG, thank you! I wondered if I was the only one who noticed this type of behavior at PD workshops. What's the worst is when it's a fellow teacher from your school and you feel like you want to scoot your chair away from them so the presenter doesn't associate you with each other...

Posted by: tinmo at October 1, 2010 5:58 PM

best.thread.ever.

i have been laughing for an hour.

Before i got laid off (yes, sad times for me, except that i'm having more fun than i've ever had in my whole life), i had a boss who had crazy OCD, and possibly aspberger's. He's an accountant. When he and the other accountants went out to lunch, he insisted on driving his own car. Because, you see, he didn't trust anyone else to drive, but no other human being was allowed in his car, because they might get it dirty. So 3 people would ride in one car, and he would drive himself alone. Seriously. He would constantly im me and ask me where his files were. 90% of the time i would spend 10-15 minutes hunting through the file cabinets only to have him im me again and say "oh, i found it. it was on my desk." There were never more than 2 files on his desk, so i quickly figured out that he was just iming me before he even looked on his own damn desk, right in front of his face. He also didn't like talking on the phone. A client would call, RETURNING HIS CALL, and when i called his office he would say "i really don't want to talk to him right now." Really? You just called him 45 minutes ago and asked him to call you back, and you're not on another call, but you just don't want to talk to your own client? Get over your social anxiety. I can't remember any specific instances of crazy, at the moment, but suffice it to say that everyone kind of grimaced when they talked about him, and tried to warn everyone who came through the office that he could be a little grating.
At the job where I work now, someone leaves a huge wad of toilet paper next to the toilet every night. USED toilet paper. WITH POO ON IT. Every night. HOW HARD IS IT TO GET TOILET PAPER IN THE TOILET BOWL?? I've never found it all that difficult.

this is very therapeutic.

Posted by: kittycat at October 2, 2010 1:02 PM

Oh man.

Most of the employees where I work are disabled. Mostly mental disabilities.

My department is especially crazy between the autistic kid (who, for MONTHS, we had to explain that x minor issue wasn't worth stopping work over and announcing every five seconds) and the bipolar guy.

...I could probably write a novel about him. But to start, about a month and a half ago, he made a mistake on a project that he was working on that the guy who got it next had to spend an hour fixing.

The supervisors brought it to his attention, and he pretty much melted down in the middle of the room - like, he started yelling at both the supervisors while everyone else (and there were like ten of us) stared and were like, "what the fuck."

He got suspended for two days over that.

The next day, our supervisor (we're in the same department) asked me if I'd retrain him. (I should note that at the time, I'd been there 7 months. He's been there over three years.)

I think I almost said "oh hell no" faster than what she said. I also think that I'm not getting a promotion because of that, but that's another story.

I should also note that he yammers on constantly about stuff (to no one in particular - he seems especially fond of Hitler). Which wouldn't be a problem if his work was fine, but I've spent ages correcting his issues (and, in fact, I needed to re-do an entire project of his because it couldn't be passed on in the condition it was in.

I also forgot to mention the lady who has multiple personality disorder. And argues with them every single day.

Posted by: Inferno at October 2, 2010 6:53 PM

@kittcat. The used toilet paper sitch happened just a couple of days ago at my work. I've been at my job for seven years and this has never happened before so it wasn't too hard to figure out that the culprit was the new guy in accounting.

Also a former female boss of mine once called a meeting to determine which of us three women on her staff was having an affair with her husband. Bitch was paranoid and was convinced, based on a phone call by an anonymous person that it must be true. She was also convinced that a couple of members of staff, including her own brother were stealing from her. Good times. Good times.

Posted by: villain's minion at October 3, 2010 3:26 PM

Oh. I'm a little late on this but here it goes.

One of the girls from work was in those days of the month and had an accident at her chair one day. Went and got the sponge that is used to clean the dishes from the lunch room, cleaned her chair and put it back where it was. The cleaning lady who does all the dishes did not find out until a couple of days later. Yep, after she had done the dishes a few times.

Also, the guys from work have said that many times that they have gone to the bathroom to use the urinal they have encountered themselves with a 4 to 5 inches long pubic hair.

Posted by: MissRos at October 3, 2010 6:26 PM