Let's bitch about our stupid, annoying co-workers

just tell them later you were drinking too and fell asleep in the toilet right before the party

I am hiding in my office. We are the department who puts it on, so I will have to go up and help when the caterers show up and make sure things are in place. *sigh*

Ok you're new and as an org we're not great at getting people settled and I only joined in January and in fact I'm only joining this team the same time you are and I'm happy to help because I'm being a better guy than previous and because I remember it's not ideal

But lookit

You need to let people finish their sentences
And you need to listen to what they are telling you
And you need not to keep saying how you did things in your last job.

I'm sorry. You just do.

And motherfucker there's a new rule I just made up it's all yours so go ahead check it out see how it works for you write your name on it and put it in your drawer nobody else has this rule here it is you don't get to use the word "should" anymore that word is not for you anymore.

And I'm only telling you this because listen here's the thing I'm actually trying to be a better guy. No seriously this was my big effort. I know right.

the "how I did things in my last job" is my hugest pet peeve. had one rep do this over and over again years ago and the problem was his previous job was working at Fuddruckers and he was now working in a call center.

booming post dmac

Hysteresis does not justify setting the room thermostat at 25c (77f). Especially when that thing is blowing negatively refreshing warm dry air right down on to the top of my head.

saga of the smoothie stand continues:

we have a Whatsapp group chat for the whole team including the manager (there's only six of us). This morning said manager texts the group "can everyone who is working this weekend wear a Xmas jumper please?" and I take an hour to calm down upon seeing it. I don't celebrate Xmas and I haven't done it for five or six years - I find it stressful and costly and unfulfilling and I'm much happier at home by myself with a book than I am traipsing around Scotland trying to catch all sides of my family for an arbitrary day of food I'm not fussed about having. But I could just as easily not be celebrating for religious reasons or to avoid the shadow of grief and trauma in my life or any number of reasons - the point is, I really resent the assumption that I partake in the festivities. I can tolerate Xmas music, I can tolerate a tree in the staff room, but I don't want to spend my money (which, in all honesty, I probably don't have to spare anyway) on a jumper that's ugly to celebrate a holiday I no longer have time for.

So I calmly reply in the group chat so everyone can see I don't take part and that way it helps me fend off questions later. "Is this going to be a thing going forward? Only I don't take part in Xmas for personal reasons and I really don't have the money or inclination to buy a jumper to mark a holiday I don't celebrate. I don't mind you guys having the Xmas playlists on or wearing jumpers but its important to me that I don't have to do this. Sorry!" I think that's as firm/polite as I can be in saying "you cannot coerce me into this and the fact you are trying is a terrible idea", it feels perilously close to an HR situation to force someone to wear clothes that potentially compromise their religious beliefs and I think it's important that a lesson is learned here.

it turns out, every branch of the chain is doing this to raise money for charity. I replied "oh I didn't realise. I'm happy to donate!" I haven't heard anything more about it yet. But it's such a shitty approach, to assume "seasonal" is a default setting. I wish we lived in a world where people asked "are you doing anything for the holidays?" and not "what will you be doing?"

i'm hearing/reading a lot of this horrible insidious shit lately. a friend on twitter was talking about how she works in a shop and there's a "pyjama or onesie day" which is mandatory.

wish people would abandon this fever for behaving like fucking infants or at the very least not enforce it as a rule in a place someone must attend in order to earn money to live.

I mean, when I go into a shop or whatever when this is happens, the staff don't ever seem to be that more motivated or happy because of their enforced "fun", if anything its the opposite - the sense of embarassment and frustration just makes it seem so demeaning and I don't want to spend money if it encourages this sort of thing

Our secret santa was opt OUT this year which of course caught a bunch of people off guard when they lazily didnt reply to the email and are now stuck with it.

my boss messaged all of us to tell us he wanted his Secret Santa to donate the money in his name to our internal <Insert Company Name> Lives Matter fund.

then tells us we're under no obligation to do that ourselves while he's clearly trying to get us all to do it.

not really a 'Secret Santa' anymore at that point.

Haha our office manager just set up a gift registry for ours! Its actually not a bad idea, dunno why no one thot of it before

we use Elfster

I asked for a King Diamond t-shirt because I'm the black sheep of the department and don't want a shitty candle or a King James Bible

whoa people actually gift bibles in a secret santa? what if you gave them a gideons bible you obviously picked up at a motel?

I wouldn't actually get somebody one, but one of my Secret Santas listed her 3 favorite books as gift ideas and Bible was #1

I got her one of her other items, a candle.

it was something like Bible, Sidney Sheldon novel, Archie comic or something

whoa people actually gift bibles in a secret santa?

LOL someone gave someone else a singing mini Koran in one of my old jobs.
Then again that same company thought giving a red lacy bra to a lady whod had breast cancer was funny somehow

I feel like I have told this story before.

the FUCK?

at one of my previous jobs, a colleague gave one of the bosses (male) a ball gag in the secret santa. tbf to the boss, he put it on in the restaurant

same company thought giving a red lacy bra to a lady whod had breast cancer was funny somehow

!!!!!!!!

Those are exclamation marks in place of my ability to conceive of what the fuck they were thinking.

The Office apparently wasn't nearly awful enough

There is a special place in hell for people who stand in the elevator jabbing the close door button while other people are still trying to get in

But is there a special elevator to get there

what if the people trying to get in are bad

i had to move from an amazing desk in an open area with a skyline view to a small dark room. the desks are arranged in such a way that when i'm sitting at my desk, there's about a 6 inch space between the back of my chair and the desk behind me. this fucking guy who needs way more clearance than that insists on squeezing through that small area behind me, despite there being another unobstructed path to the door. dude's stomach bumps my chair every time and for whatever reason he's getting up about 200 times a day.

sometimes i'll catch a glimpse of him at the fork in the road and see a flash of decision making going on in his head, and he ALWAYS chooses the path behind my desk

bossman in an officewide email: "today we celebrate the black women who led the charge to the polls for doug jones's victory last night in alabama"
guy i share my office with, to no one in particular: "tf we doin celebratin another corporate ass white man ascending the ladder of the blue wing of the corporatist party"
me: i'm gonna get lunch. you want anything?

i had to move from a desk below a skylight to a small dark room, which i'm actually okay with, but this motherfucker now sitting a row behind me will not shut up

haha same with my dude too. and on top of that, he has a weird ass voice

The close door button doesn't actually do anything unless you have a key. Hence why nothing happens the majority of times it's pressed

It works in our building

Yeah this "close buttons are fake in lifts" thing is odd, cos Ive definitely been in buildings where it has worked (as in there is a marked time diff in using or not using it)

https://www.thecut.com/2016/10/the-soothing-futility-of-the-elevator-door-close-button.html

(however, the main reason the ones here don't do anything is due to the ADA laws, so it's possible other countries don't work the same way)

How does the ADA law relate to it?

The law requires that the elevator door must remain fully open for a specified amount of time, to allow those with disabilities extra time to get on. once that was passed in the 1990s, the buttons basically became placebos in US elevators.

ah ok makes sense

my biggest pet peeve when I go into the office - when the elevator has room for more people but everybody has needlessly shoved forward, making the elevator look full to capacity. most people just say "I'll get the next one", except this happens in the majority of the elevators around 5 pm, so you might wait a while. when it happens to me I just get on and make the people spread out like they're supposed to.

Secret Santa today at 4:30 motherfuckers :D

Ask me about our work lotto syndicate when I'm sober

A new coworker has proposed a game for our department office party later this week. We each write down one fact about ourselves on a yellow index card. The cards are then pulled from a hat and read aloud and the rest of us try to guess who it is.

department office holiday party

"I once killed a man just to watch him die"

"I own 3 kimonos"

"I secretly touched all the door knobs in the office with my genitals."

“i am made of bees”

My shit client told an already overwhelmed colleague "I have no idea why you highlighted those rows in purple" and her asshole Waldorf stand-in muttered derisively "maybe she's color-blind".

The person who prepared the Excel...a good friend...actually is colorblind. Our leaders...said nothing.

I have never wanted to hit so many people.

ugh

I swear 90% of workplace assholery and bad undercurrents come from people making assumptions instead of politely asking questions. I idealistically think more workplace diversity will help a little because people will encounter more situations where choices they don’t understand will require people to ask and *scales fall from eyes* but some people just won’t get it

I remember switching to a new software development group and being pleasantly surprised that every application had a settings in the options for an alternate color palette, because one of the senior members of the group is color blind! And the feedback from users was great.