Wet Snacks
Long time listener, first time caller.

I was DJing at a wedding a number of years back in a very small town in Scotland, about 2 miles from the very small town in Scotland I used to live in.

It was a stupidly cheap affair, in a pub's back room with tesco value snacks as the meal (and cake), a dress from top shop and, well, me as the entertainment.

I played the usual shite, then after the bride and groom had buggered off, I got to raid the buffet for a bit of an after gig snack. There was a load left as most of the guests were far more interested in getting pissed and hitting each other than a fatty sausage roll or chicken wing. They bought me a lot of beer too though, bless em

I filled a plastic bag with snacks and decided to walk the couple of miles home and collect my gear in the morning rather than spend my hard earned on a taxi. Was rather chuffed as I wouldn't be forking out for a kebab now either.

Bag in hand, I stumbled home alongside a local golf course. The free lager needed out now, so I slipped off the road and let 'im loose. Weird thing was, I could feel it leaving my body, but didn't hear it hitting the ground. Yes, I was pissing in my bag of free food.

If that isn't abusing freebies I don't know what is.

Don't understand what this length thing is all about.
( Cheeses of Nazareth Where's Captain Kirk? www.whereiskirk.com, Sun 11 Nov 2007, 3:37, 6 replies)

Scottish Invasion
About a year ago, I was working in the sales team at T-mobile. Shit job, but the commission was good.

Anyway, they had recently launched a 'Web and Walk' contract add-on that allowed you to get the internet through your phone. As it was a new product, they were offering us six quid commission on EVERY one we sold. "Result" thinks I, and I go on to offer it in almost every call. I sold to old people, young people, guys and girls, and at the end of the month I had sold something like 40 of them, earning me about 240 quid on top of my usual commission and wage. I put the money towards a new computer, and thought no more of it.

Turns out there was an additional bonus we hadn't been told about. You see, T-Mobile were one of the sponsors of last years World Cup, and, as an additional sales incentive, the top 40 sales people for that month would be flown out to watch a game in Germany. And I had ended up in the top 40. Me and one other guy from our centre, whose name was Alan - the only two Scotsmen, going to watch the England Vs Trinidad and Tobago game. Joy.

The day before the match we flew from Glasgow to London, paid for by the company. Got down there about 10ish and caught a cab to our hotel, where everyone was meeting up. We had to be up at 6 the next morning to catch the flight to Nuremberg, so we were planning to get to bed pretty early. We put our bags into our rooms, then figured we'd head down to the hotel bar and see if anyone else was down there. We found a table with other T-Mobile employees and introduced ourselves. After chatting for a bit, one of them asked, "Are you not gonna get yourselves a drink?" We were pretty skint, and told him so. "Oh, that's alright" he said, then came out with the sweetest words in the English language - "It's a free bar"

Free bar? Hell fucking yes. We felt like Jonathan King in a nursery. A pint and a triple whisky to start, then a few vodkas, bottles of Magners, and whatever else took our fancy. Everyone else started heading off to bed, muttering that they had to get up early (lightweights). It ended up being just me, Alan and a Geordie boy left, locked in a drinking battle till the early hours of the morning. At one point, we decided to try a shot of everything from the top row of the bar. Advocaat is fucking disgusting, incidentally. Eventually gave up around 2 and stumbled about the hotel, trying to remember where our rooms were. The place was fucking massive. After half an hour, we remembered our room numbers were printed on our keys, and eventually got to bed about 3am. I had to physically drag myself out of it again at 6. After showering, changing and eating half a packet of Pro Plus caffeine tablets, I felt somewhere near normal again. We managed to choke down some breakfast without throwing up before being ferried to a private terminal to wait for our flight. The Geordie we'd been drinking with earlier hadn't turned up, and the flight was delayed while they phoned the hotel to wake him up.

While we were waiting, we were offered refreshments from, wait for it, yet another free bar. Two Bloody Marys and a vodka and fresh orange later, we were ushered onto a private plane, swaying slightly and no doubt stinking of booze. On the plane, we were just getting to sleep when an air hostess came round offering drinks.

"Champaigne sir?"

"Yes please. Leave the bottle love"

On touching down, I was like a monkey with no arms - completely out my tree. The guard at passport control took one look at me, swaying in the non-existant breeze with a huge grin plastered across my face, and asked, "Are you alright sir?"

"Aye, mate, I'm fucking brilliant."

"Ah, so you're Scottish," he said, as if that explained everything, and handed me my passport back. We got bored of waiting for everyone else to get through passport control, so me and Alan decided to explore the airport for a bit. Being quite drunk already, this perhaps wasn't the best idea, and unsurprisingly we ended up getting lost. We eventually found our way outside where everyone else was sitting on a bus, waiting for us. After a minor bollocking from one of the bosses, we were off to the Hilton hotel for some hospitality. For 'hospitality,' read 'more free drink.' This trip was getting better and better...

There was a buffet set up in the middle of a massive ballroom which we immediately gravitated to. Normal buffet procedure, as I'm sure you're all aware, is to pick up a plate and politely pile a few items onto it for eating later, NOT to stand in the middle of the table stuffing your face with as much food as you can, blocking everyone else from getting in. Guess which option we chose?

After our display of drunken gluttony, we noticed waiters moving serenely around the room, taking drinks orders. There were 4 exotic sounding German lagers to choose from. Not having tasted any of them before, we took the only sensible option. "I'll have one of each Hanz, and keep them coming" At this point, we were drawing a lot of dirty looks, and there seemed to be some barely hidden tutting at our behaviour. Did we care? Did we fuck. Free drink is free drink.

God knows how we made it to the stadium - we were all over the place. We had started singing 'Flower of Scotland,' and 'Scotland the brave' with our arms around each others shoulders on the walk over, and everyone else seemed to be trying to avoid walking beside us. I can't imagine why.

We passed a stall selling memerobilia for the match, and, in our drunken state, decided it would be a great idea to buy Trinidad and Tobago scarves. After all, it's not like we were supporting England (and if any England fans think this is out of order, let me put it this way. If, by some magic stroke of luck, Scotland manage to qualify for Euro 2008, and England don't, would you even consider supporting Scotland? Didn't think so). After making our purchases, we staggered on to the stadium, and tried to find our seats.

Turns out they were slap bang in the middle of a sea of England supporters. Rowdy, noisy, aggressive England supporters. But we didn't care - we were running solely on alcohol and adrenaline by this stage. During the match, whenever Trinidad and Tobago had possession we were up out our seats cheering them on, and when England eventually scored our shouts of 'Offside!' were thankfully drowned out by the rest of the crowd. At one point, one of the England players was fouled, and our shouts of 'Come on ref! That was a blatant dive' started to attract the attention of a number of big, scary looking England fans. Someone in the crowd told us to shut up, which only added fuel to the fire. We again sang 'Flower of Scotland,' but changed the lyrics to 'Flower of Trinidad.' I don't know if you've ever experienced hundreds of people turning to stare at you with violence in their eyes, but it's not something I'd wish on my worst enemy.

Somehow, we survived with only a few insults hurled our way. The rest of the T-Mobile contest winners were seated around us, and I could see them flinching as we booed the England team whenever they had the ball. England eventually won two nil - I really hate to think what would've happened if they'd lost. I suspect our bodies would never have been found.

The rest of the day is hazy - I can barely remember the flight home. Not long after getting back, I had a disciplinary meeting to discuss 'my conduct at work-related events.'

Strangely enough, I never won another sales incentive, no matter how good my sales figures were.

And that's the story of how I wrecked a freebie for everyone else involved. My mother would be proud.
(Pavlov's Frog figures no-one really reads sigs anyway, Sun 11 Nov 2007, 14:53, 16 replies)

Taking teh piss
How about somebody I know who was putting a large system into a large hotel who was provided with free food and accomodation in said 5* luxury hotel for SIX MONTHS.

The only thing he had to pay for during his stay was drink & phone calls. So for 24 weeks, he drank like a fish and phoned everybody he knew including his mother-in-law in the US for hour-long chats.

The day before he checked out, he brought the server down for one last "safety check" and promptly wiped his room account at the same time...

Now *that* is abuse.
( Linbox has a serious dunk habit, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 15:44, 2 replies)

Freeby/Abuse
As a child, my folks were given loads of promotional stuff from drug companies hawking their wares - nothing expensive, stationary mainly.

One time my Mum was given a gimmicky towel, a small towel that had been compressed into a wee brick, and could be uncompressed and used normally after soaking in water. She kindly gave it to 14 year old me, as I though it was quite cool (I was always a geek).

So I took the wee brick with me to an Army camp with the cadets (nice and compact you see, saved on packing and carrying).

A couple of days in, I thought I might need a small towel, and soaked the brick in the sink for ten minutes.

It softened up, and I pulled it out of the sink by its corners, proudly displaying the legend "VAGISIL" to the other hard as fuck army cadets in the room.

Thanks Mum.
(Udidin is chuffed to have made the newsletter, Fri 9 Nov 2007, 15:08, 5 replies)

First Taste of Paradise
When I was but a young strapping lad of 11, my parents decided to take us on a family holiday. It was somewhere in Spain (most of my family holidays have been to Spain, and all the different locations have kind of merged into one in my memory). I was a typical 11 year old - still a child, full of wide-eyed innocence and a love of causing trouble. However, I was becoming aware of a number of things that seemed to be 'grown-up' activities, like drinking or smoking. Being naturally curious, I decided to try these activities at the best possible opportunity, to see what all the fuss was about.

Such an opportunity arose around a week into the holiday. To break up the monotony of lazing around the pool by day and eating out at night, my parents booked an entertainment night with dinner, dancing, and free bottles of wine for every table. I'm sure you can probably tell where this is going...

First up was the meal, then afterwards the adults headed to the dance floor to boogie. My parents took my sister up to dance, and told me to watch the table. Sensing my chance, I checked around me to see if anyone was watching, then, satisfied that the coast was clear, poured myself a large glass of red wine and hid it under the table.

At first I tried sniffing it. Uuurgh, it smelled weird. Then I tried a little taste, and discovered that it tasted worse than it smelled. However, I was a determined little bugger and I wasn't going to let that put me off. After checking that no-one was watching, I held my nose and drank as much of it as I could.

Hmmm...not bad, but I can't really see what all the fuss is about. Maybe I'll have another drink...

After draining a full glass, I poured myself another and managed half before giving up. Deciding alcohol wasn't all it was cracked up to be, I left the table to visit the toilet. On my way there, I found myself veering to the left slightly. It was strange, but by concentrating I managed to walk normally again.

I entered the toilets, and went into one of the cubicles. Still slightly puzzled over my difficulties walking, I unzipped my trousers and started to pee. All of a sudden, I noticed I was swaying. What the hell was going on? Why couldn't I stand still? The harder I tried to stop, the more I swayed, until I had to throw out a hand to stop myself headbutting the wall.

I leaned against the wall, trying to get my balance. Gradually, I noticed the room seemed to be moving slightly under my feet. What the fuck? Had the floor come alive? Had the toilet been hit by a really shit earthquake? This was getting weirder and weirder. I decided I'd better leave this room with it's travelator-style floors and return to my seat, where I could ponder this mystery in safety.

On leaving the toilet, I paused to have a look around. Now, I was quite shy when I was a child, and normally the thought of dancing would bring me out in a cold sweat, but for some reason I felt an incredible urge to hit the dance floor and strut my stuff. Some hitherto-unused part of my brain was telling me I was the best dancer in the world, and it was only fair to share my gift with the world.

So I swaggered onto the floor, assumed my best John Travolta position, and proceeded to dance like a bare-footed mong on a hotplate. I swung my arms wildly, waved my legs around and yelled "Wooooo!"

Man, this dancing was easy. I should've tried it ages ago.

At this point my Mum notices me and, having had quite a few glasses of wine herself, decides to head over and dance with me. Queue me being spun round and round by a mad drunken woman, both of us stumbling all over the place laughing like lunatics. When we eventually sat back down at our table, red-cheeked from exertion, she asked me if I wanted to taste wine to see what it was like. I agreed, and she let me take a drink from her glass. Yep - just as I remembered it. Still disgusting.

That night, when we got back to the apartment I rushed into the bathroom and projectile vomited red wine everywhere - all over the toilet, sink and floor. My Mum came in, shook her head, and said, "Jesus - I had no idea one little sip of wine would do this to you." She put me to bed and cleaned up the whole bathroom, and I could hear her and my Dad arguing about it - he blamed her for getting me drunk. She nursed me all the next day, through one of the worst hangovers I have ever experienced in my life.

So by abusing a free bottle of wine, I gave my Mum a massive guilt trip and myself a hellish hangover.

You'd think I would have learned some kind of lesson from all this.

I didn't.

Oh well...
(Pavlov's Frog figures no-one really reads sigs anyway, Tue 13 Nov 2007, 21:50, 3 replies)

Barclays Graduate evening
For reasons known only to themselves Barclays bank decided to organise a Graduate promotion evening at the Hilton Hotel (milton keynes) right opposite my university which was a small place.

They decided 1 or 2 A4 sized notices around the university would be plenty to notify all possible students of this event.

So 2 days later me and 2 flatmates turned up at the hotel properly suited and booted believing this to be some event where by they were looking to interview graduates for possible future employment.

They weren't.

Turns out they were trying to flog their student accounts package to us.

The attendees;
- approximately 9 Barclays employees
- 4 students, comprising 3 of us from my flat and 1 girl from the college in town.

This girl had driven to the event so remained sober. Of the other 3 of us 1 was teetotal, leaving James and I facing food and wine for approximately 50 people!

We got stuck in being social while Barclays delayed the start hopeful of late arrivals.

Then not to lose face they asked (!!?!?) if they could do their presentation. By this point (barely 30 minutes after arrival) we've each consumed an entire bottle of wine each.

We grab fresh bottles and take a seat. They go on about accounts etc but I'm not paying attention and nicely one of the helpful Barclays staff brings James and I 2 more bottles of plonk after 20 mins of presentation as we've run dry.

At the end they ask for any questions, as you can imagine from 4 bored students there were none.
SO, off goes girl from the college and our Tee total friend leaves too.

So now the poor Barclays staff are stumped. They have 2 semi pissed students and A LOT of freebies, wine, food etc.

As my car was in the car park they put plenty of sandwiches etc in my boot and decided to leave. James and I retire to the presentation room with yet more wine.

By the time the hotel staff wanted to close the room we were pretty far gone.

So of course we went to the bar to finish what we could.

By the time 3am rolled round James and I were on different planets. He heads off walking and I don't even make it out of the car park (on foot!). Together we put away nigh on 20 bottles of wine (I was a very heavy drinker back then!).

James stops for a wee in the field (which was a short cut home) only to keel over backwards creating a fountain of pee which rains down on top of himself and his suit, meanwhile the back of the suit is crusted in mud.

I realise I have no hope of walking the 1/2 mile home and crawl to the back seat of my car to rest. I stick my feet out the window and begin eating voluvents and sandwiches, chucking anything nasty out the window.

Roll on 6am and the first rays of sunshine rouse my slumber. I pull myself up, push open the car door to discover a molehill of half eaten snacks. The movement of someone in the car park certainly surprised the duty security guard in his little gate house who proceeds to watch me wobble across the car park and head for home.

Eventually I went to lectures for the day and got home about 5pm. Nobody had seen James and his girlfriend comes looking for him. A little voice pipes up "I'm in here", where it emerges he's spent about 18 hours curled round the toilet being very ill.

Anyway, needless to say I had no intention of using or working for Barclays it's just how can a student turn down an offer of "FREE WINE"???
(golddust QOTW now revolves around being a cunt, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 18:09, 3 replies)

Penny tray
The texaco station down the road has a little penny tray on the counter. The other day after filling up, I found I was 2pence short (£30.02 - hair trigger on the pump) so it came in handy.

Later that night, it got me thinking. I really want a new ipod but am feeling a little skint. I needed to take the penny tray to the next logical step.

So a few weeks later I filled up as usual and went to pay. I paid back the original 2p i had taken from the spare change in my pocket. Then, without warning, I jumped the counter and forced the clerk down to the ground quite violently with the end of my gun. After some fairly nasty whacks to the back of his head, he was ready to co-operate. The gun firmly jammed into the back of his neck he opened the till drawer and I took the lot. One last *thwack* and he seemed to pass out. I grabbed the video out of the cctv recorder, filled my pockets wtih marlboro gold and calmly exited via the staff door. I only then noticed the little old lady in the corner cowering with fright. I remembered the gun and shot her in the chest.

I drove home elated! I couldnt wait to count it. Imagine my result when i had over 2 grand! Enough for about 8 160GB ipods.

The moral of this is, if youre going to abuse freebies, fucking abuse them, dont fuck about with extra sausage rolls, armed robbery is where its at. It feels fuckin great as well!
( I have run out of coke is a little sweaty, Sun 11 Nov 2007, 23:59, 5 replies)

unintentional freebie
Whilst I was in China last year, as usual we were out on the town. We happened to stop at an unusual bar we hadn’t been to before.

Anyway we got talking to this Chinese guy, his name was Jackson (obviously not his real Chinese name- but a business English name)- a local business man - he could speak very good English. It seemed like he was trying to talk business to us, but after a short conversation we realised he was into the textile business and we were IT. So neither of us had anything to buy off each other. Instead we stayed in the bar for a short while, chatting about culture differences before heading off to another bar - with our new friend in tow.

This was about 9pm. We get to another bar and end up drinking into the very early hours (about 6am) at which point our new friend decides to leave and go home - we bid him farewell. We then finish our drinks and get up to leave about 30 minutes after Jackson. We then discover that the tab behind the bar has been paid by Jackson - well over £300 worth of drinks.

I never saw him again to thank him, on what was probably the most silent act of generosity I have ever seen. Apparently this is quite a common thing in China - its a sign of gentlemen respect. He silently paid the bill of, jumped into the taxi and went home.
(Dan dan dan They tik urh jerbs!!!, Mon 12 Nov 2007, 14:21, 7 replies)

Hotel Rooms! Gullible Hosts! Excess! World Cup Glory!
Some time ago my girlfriend worked in a responsible position for a major food company. Various sales people would give her small gifts to promote their products and naturally a huge amount of this stuff found its way to our house although you can run out of room for Simpsons merchandise and chocolate after a few months.

One chap, Paul, was desperate to sell her stuff, and invited her (plus one) to a weekend supplier jolly and charity dinner. This sounded good so I was straight down Moss Bros to rent a tux and prepare.

We got to London and found our way to The Royal Lancaster, overlooking Hyde Park, (and the geekier amongst you will recognise it as the hotel featured in The Italian Job) and were escorted to a £400 a night room. We were staying for two nights. We met our host downstairs, later, who said that we were more than welcome to enjoy ourselves, but as his company was paying and he was responsible, please guys, please, don't get carried away and irresponsible.

Within an hour I'd emptied the minibar. We ate the overpriced food, stashed the overpriced soft drinks and poured the booze down our throats. Then, just for the fun of it, we called roomservice, who were also pricey, and asked them to restock the minibar. What followed was a real weekend of excess. We went, that evening, to a very good restaurant in Camden (Cafe Soleil, I think), where booze was laidon, as was a 4 course meal. It was ace, I got tanked, and drank very pricey cocktails until unable to walk. I remember some ill judged comments about someone pissing himself, and a tirade about obesity (our host weighed twenty stone and sweated freely).

This carried on, accompanied by belly dancers, until the early hours whence we repaired to the hotel. And carried on getting pissed. Bottles of beer at £4.50 a pop were brought in threes, baileys and whisky drunk by the bottle, and then a fight broke out about the 2002 Rugby World Cup (with the final being played a couple of days hence). I'm told I was called a whinging pom and responded with a tirade about convicts. Then all hell broke loose.

So I left the mayhem behind me, went to bed and re-emptied the minibar.

Saturday dawned, and with it came a hangover and hunger. So we ordered room service (this is a theme). We had the minibar restocked and went into it ravenously, and spent a significant sum on breakfast. To be honest, we spent the whole day on the booze, ordering drinks left, right and centre, and having two room service meals. We wanted to make the most of it!

Then the banquet... 9 courses of deliciousness, accompanied by enough wine to submerge Wales. Again, it carried on until the small hours, and finished with a bacon sandwich feast.

Bedtime came, the minibar was emptied again, and sleep took us.

The following morning I was feeling seedy, but the world cup final was on, so I heroically pulled myself upwards, went to the fridge, and got stuck in as my girlfriend slumbered beside me. As Jonny Wilkinson's kick gave us victory I felt compelled to celebrate, and orderd a breakfast for the pair of us at £90 quid, and accompanied it with a couple of bottles of champagne.

As we left, we were hungover (and pissed), slightly swollen, and staggering under the weight of hotel branded stuff.

We worked out that we spent approx £2300 of someone else's money.

Best. Weekend. Ever.

*I have been informed this was actually in 2003, not 2002. Just goes to show how good the weekend was!*
( disasterprone "Pyjamas caused the Holocaust", Thu 8 Nov 2007, 16:22, 4 replies)

My mates and I were flying to Buenos Aires
and Fiona and I were sitting together and her being a true Scot wanted to grab as many bags of complimentary nuts as possible "so I don't have to buy lunch during the day when we are there".
I said I would help her so we kept wandering to the different food prep areas on the plane saying we were hungry and can we have a bag of nuts.
This continued for the entire 8 hour flight and kept us amused and giggling.
We manage to amass around 85 bags of them.

As the plane neared B.A. and we started our descent, a gaggle of giggling Space Waitresses arrived at our seats, one had a very large, brown, hardwearing carrier bag (the type with straw handles) 3/4 full of peanuts and dumped the entire lot on our laps.

We shrieked with laughter and delight, raised our arms in triumph \o/ and told them they were the best Space Waitresses EVER to grace the skies (Malaysian Airways).

On the return trip some of the crew were the same and as we took off, one came over to us and said "We have plenty of nuts if you are interested".

We we all peanutted out by then and politely declined.

BTW, she returned with half of the peanuts in her suitcase, bless her tartan socks.
( Flowerpot No longer has the vapours thanks to DTH, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 16:39, Reply)

Freebees from the National Lottery
About 9 years ago I was sent to Camelot’s head office in Exeter for a day of training. The day was completely pointless but I did get a free Camelot pen, some headed paper and best of all, a sample "Jackpot Winner" printout slip.

At the time, my best friend Neil was obsessed with the lottery; he was having trouble getting a job and was still living with his parents. All he ever talked about was winning the lottery, "When I win the lottery" this and "things will be different when I win the lottery" that. It really got on your tits after a while.

Neil was a practical joker. A couple of years previously he had posted me a fake court summons for an unpaid parking ticket, this had sent me running out of my halls of residence on the verge of a panic attack to phone my dad. Here was my chance to get my own back. I printed out a letter on the Camelot headed paper explaining that there had been an error in that weeks draw and that he had actually won the jackpot. I attached the sample winning printout slip and enclosed in the envelope the official Camelot pen. Apart from the winning slip being marked “Void” it looked authentic. At the very least he would think he was a millionaire and that all his worries were over for a few seconds before harsh reality dawned on him. I put the letter aside to post the next day.

That night the news had a report of a man who had shot himself in his attic because he thought he had won the lottery but hadn't. Shit. Would my prank horribly backfire? You have to understand that Neil was completely obsessed with the lottery; he hated his life and saw a big lottery win as his only way out. Neil was not in a stable frame of mind about the lottery and my prank could easily send him over the edge....

.... But the letter was so good! It looked so real, I would never get a better chance to get my own back and he would definitely fall for it!....Should I send it? Yes or no? Send it? Don’t send it? Get my own back or be a friend?

Did I send it? No. I wasn’t worried about abusing freebies from Camelot but I was worried about Neil’s mental state. I showed him the letter a few years later when he was a bit happier in life. He was stunned at how official it looked and thanked me for not pushing him into a fully-fledged mental breakdown.

Click "I like this" if you would have posted the letter.

EDIT - Fictional account of the letter being posted for the whingers (Yes that's right, "Fiction", like half the sodding QOTW entries).

In the end I thought, "Fuck it" and posted the letter, little realising the disastrous results my actions would cause. On receiving the letter Neil fell for it hook line and sinker. He went on a celebratory bender that lasted two weeks, maxing-out his credit cards and overdraft in the process. It wasn’t until he tried to claim his jackpot that he discovered that it was all a practical joke, but by this time he was twenty thousand pounds in debt and hooked on crack cocaine. In a fit of rage he murdered the newsagent who told him the bad news and burned his shop down, tragically killing his wife and two young children who were trapped upstairs. Neil is currently on 24-hour suicide watch at Broadmoor high security psychiatric hospital, where he is expected to remain for the rest of his natural life.
( Colonel Dracula Two manky hookers and a racist dwarf, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 16:18, 5 replies)

Buffet for 200
About six months ago, I was invited to a two-day residential training course as part of my job as an IT spannermonkey. Well, lunch each day was provided by a catering company, and comprised of around 20 trestle tables arranged in a rectangle and piled high with the finest buffet foods - sandwiches, Indian snacks, sausage rolls, buns, fruit and the like.

On the last day, we're all (about 200 of us) milling around in the main hall having just enjoyed a splendid lunch. Then... over the tannoy...

"Attention all conference attendees. The catering company have informed us that attendees are welcome to help themselves from the buffet. Doggy-bags are available at the ends of each set of tables."

Now, did I mention all 200 of us are recent graduate employees? Which means all of us spent three to four years with no money, eating beans from dented tins by candlelight...

Carnage ensued. The coaches were due in ten minutes.

I have never seen such a scene of mass destruction. 200 ex-students descending on the food. But by far the best bit was the look on the caterer's faces as we pillaged the snacks, and loaded as many bags as we could get our grubby mitts on...

Oh, and the bit when one of the tables collapsed, sending vol-au-vents everywhere...

Happy days...
(hangableautobulb is an anagram of the best album ever, on, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 14:55, Reply)

I win
I bought an Aero chocolate bar in my local ESSO petrol station t'other day for 37p. Got home, opened it up, bit into it, and I was shocked. Fucking shocked.

There were no bubbles in it, just solid Nestle chocolate!

I was bloody jumping, untill I realised I had basically been eating a Yorkie. Yorkie's are 40p.

I had unwittingly got free 3 pence worth of Yorkie chocolate, for the price of a 37p Aero.

Take that, Thatcher.

Length eh? 6 inches, brown, and in sections.
( Harold Bishop's Love Child some sort of terrifying sex magician., Fri 9 Nov 2007, 15:49, 3 replies)

IKEA Criminal Mastermind
Forced by your significant other to go on a family trip to IKEA?

Liven up an otherwise dull and boring experience by offering a prize to your offspring for the child who can steal the most pencils.

The boy Scaryduck Jr - who rattled as he walked past the tills - won with 186, pipping his sister who racked up a mere 152.

Subsequent shopping trips can be enlivened by stealing all the pens from Argos and confusing the staff by replacing them all with IKEA pencils.

And there's literally pence to be made from your swag at car boot sales.

I realise, as the evil Fagin figure behind this sorry affair, that I should be doing hard time in a Scandinavian prison, forced to knit lingerie for the female inmates. Where do I hand myself in?
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 19:24, 3 replies)

wedding
Went to a mates wedding. He was marrying a dog we never liked, in fact, we were pretty much against the whole thing but he seemed happy so we went along with his big day. Anyway, her dad was paying, including the free bar.

We were wankered pretty quickly at the reception on JD&Cokes mainly, we were classy back then. Johno asks the bar man for 8 triple JD& cokes for the 4 of us. The bar man says, "look lads, its a free bar, dont take the piss alright, I'm not putting 8 triple JD's on the bill."

A beat later, Johno says, "can i have 24 JD&cokes please".

"Thats more like it" said the obliging barman. Result!
( I have run out of coke is a little sweaty, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 15:16, Reply)

Dialup cds vs those fecking birds :)
I remember reading this story and it making me smile; was on the BBC site yonks ago.

Some elderly bloke started receiving free dialup installer disks in his mail. This guy quietly contacted the Internet provider suggesting that he doesn't want to receive any more mail of this nature as he doesn't have a computer. So the company apologise, and continue to post them out to him. So he contacts them again requesting to be reomved from the mailing list etc etc but he keeps receiving them.

Now this bloke has obviously received alot of these disks and thought what the fuck to do with them all. So using "good ol' British thinking" (sorry, been watching Al Murray a bit too much) he comes up with a solution. As an OAP he and his "still able" friends were all avid gardeners and were having problems with the local bird community eating all of thier crop (the flying variety, not the chav kind). So his "British thinking" was this; take one strip of wire, 2 free dialup disks and some glue. Glue the disks back to back to each other (shiny side out) and tie the wire around them. There we go, instant vegetable pest repellant. He hung one above his vegetables and it would spin in the wind, reflecting light around the garden and dazzling all of the birdies etc and scaring them away from his patch.
The great thing about this? All his friends wanted one so he made them loads and SOLD THEM ON to them for some free shiny pennies.

Twas a shame the Internet Service Provider found out and took him to court for making money off their backs lol; because he'd informed the ISPs not to send them to him beforehand however he was not fined a penny.

This bloke is a hero :D
( Jeccius Steam Borderlands 2 junkie, Sat 10 Nov 2007, 12:19, 2 replies)

Right...
On the bus this morning I heard three members of the insect Order Hymenoptera chatting to one another.

The first said "I've just come back from STINGapore!"
The second said: "Its SWARM there, isn't it?"
And the third replied "Yes, but the atmosphere is BUZZING!!"

Now tell me, were they not an
AMUSING THREE BEES?!!!
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Fri 9 Nov 2007, 11:56, 6 replies)

Blind drunk in front of (minor) royalty
It's the early 90s, and I'm in my first proper job, working for a charity which happens to have the word 'Royal' in its name and happens to be celebrating an important anniversary.
To mark this event, there is a service of Thanksgiving at St Paul's, followed that evening by a reception in the Mansion House (for non-UK people or those who have to move their lips when counting - both locations are in London). As a member of staff - and there weren't many of us - I have to attend both functions, and mix with the great and the good.
The service at St Paul's was fine, finished at 1pm with the function at the Mansion House starting at 7pm. Six hours free in That London - what should I do ? Shopping, sight-seeing ? No, I meet up with an old university friend (who co-incidentally is now a Professor of Astrophysics) for a drink. This, predictably, is where it starts going wrong.

I was obviously not such a good friend as it wasn't until we had our first drink that he told me it was his birthday that day. I had 2 alternatives - vanish to the toilet and buy him a packet of novelty condoms as a present, or buy lots of drinks. Which one did I choose ?
By 6:45, I am fairly wasted. I stagger off in the dark towards the Mansion House, repeating the mantra to myself "I must not drink any more tonight" and munching Polos to try and disguise the 7 or so pints that were sitting uneasily in my stomach.

On arriving at the Mansion House, I'm surprised to find that the butlers are dressed up in Civil War uniform, and absent-mindedly accept a glass of champagne off them. Crivens - my promise not to drink didn't last. Oh well, just the one glass...

I then endured a 2 hour wait in the Mansion House Library, where the "high ups" were located whilst our Patron, Prince Michael of Kent, was being shown round the rabble in the main hall. The canapes ran out quickly - my lunch had been purely liquid - but even then I could have survived OK but for the fact that every time I took a sip of champagne, men dressed in Civil War costume kept replenishing my supply.

By the time HRH came to greet the staff, I was last in the line and visibly swaying. I was virtually blind drunk, but managed to slur something - what it was, I'll never know - to His Beardiness when I was presented to him. Apparently my boss was horrified when she saw me in the line-up of people awaiting their introduction, and just prayed that I didn't vomit over him / anyone. I was visibly pissed from some distance away...oh well.

That ordeal over, when the food was served I rushed to stuff myself, but it was all too late. I ended up collapsing in the toilets, being woken up enough to be put into a car for the long drive home, whereupon I passed out again and apparently farted like a bastard until dropped off at my destination.
Next day at work was Not Good. Apparently most of my colleagues (the female, sexually-frustrated, stuck in a crap job and unhappily married ones) wanted me sacked, but I just got a severe bollocking and told never to drink alcohol again at any formal function.
Funniest thing - I meet HRH a month later. Out of all the staff, he recognised me, saying "I've seen you before...".
I felt like saying "more than I can say for you" but felt that would have been pushing it.

And with that, my B3tan cherry is popped. Sorry for the length, but it's my first time and I don't know what to do with it...
( I_Was_Mordred, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 17:12, 1 reply)

Ah, I remember one...hmm, maybe more related to last week
My mate and I at the grand old age of 12 were at Royal Cornwall Show (annual agricultural sheep-fuckers fest). There were lots of freebees, but we were actually supposed to be taking notes (I don't know what on to this day). After stuffing our face with free bits of cheese and samples of Cornish cider, my slightly tipsy mate dared me to go into the Natwest tent to see if there were any freebees. Now, this tent looked scary because it had big ass body-guards outside, but I said "Alright". So I went up to the tent and enquired quite loudly: "You got any free stuff?". At that point I noticed the 100+ people gathered inside the tent looking all business like and sitting down listening to a seminar of some sorts, who had all turned around to look at me. The bodyguards, or whoever they were, said to me, "Go away, we have nothing free." And then came the moment of genius improvisation (i.e LIES) which impressed my mate no end....I said, "We've got accounts with you, so you'd better give us something." With much rolling of eyes, one of the guys went into the tent and brought back two pairs of sunglasses and two pieces of cake. Rock on. And that's how I abused Natwest for their freebees.

The joke is on me now, as I actually do have an account with them, and they suck somewhat. Click 'I like this' if you think Natwest should go to hell.
( its_hatorah_bitch is b3ta the devil you know on, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 14:54, 1 reply)

Free drink
I get free water out of my taps so I left them running and filled up a load of buckets a few weeks back. Now I've got as much water as I can drink for probably the next few years, or something.
(Jamey, Fri 9 Nov 2007, 13:45, Reply)

Freebies, Little Girl
.
I once saw this outside a school. A balding man was trying to get a girl to come onto his car by offering her freebies.

"If you get in the car, I'll give you a fiver"

"Err - no" says little girl.

"A fiver and a bag of sweets" says baldy

"Err - no" says little girl

"Last offer. A fiver, bag of sweets and I'll take you to see some puppies" says Baldy

"Look Dad" says little girl "I've told you, I'm not getting into a fucking Skoda!"

Ba-bum-tish


Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Fri 9 Nov 2007, 1:26, 2 replies)

Bog roll
I worked for a paper manufacturer a few years back. I'd already got some of the factory staff on side by buying the right people drinks and pretending to agree with them when they were moaning about their salaries/working hours (think London Underground staff). So when I decided I was off I used my notice period to syphon off as much freebie bog roll as I could ignoring the staff "limits". At least twice a week for nearly three months I had so many loo rolls in my car (a Vectra at the time) there was merely a small area around the steering wheel and pedals to sit. I got pulled over by the Police twice...

I filled my parents loft and garage completely with bog rolls. I still had a week and a half to go so not wanting to let the side down I carried on taking them and flogged them to the neighbours at bargain prices.

A very heavy weekend of drinking paid for by my neighbours and my family never paid to wipe their arses for two and a half years.

My mother was so proud.
( dan j the filthy bastard, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 15:27, Reply)

A scum-sucking journalist writes
I would like to point out HERE AND NOW that I have never abused my free National Press Pass to get into places for nothing with the bare-faced lie "I'll write you a glowing review when I get back to the office, honest".

Nor have I ever waved it in the face of a bored traffic cop to drive my car down the A31 near Poole which had been closed off while they scraped up a particularly nasty accident so I could get home 30 minutes earlier.

That would be, on the whole, A Bad Thing.

I have never done either of these things because they are WRONG.

That is all.
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Thu 8 Nov 2007, 14:43, Reply)

Free bar disaster...
I once got a nice freebie from my Mum who worked in marketing. She couldn't attend so sent me and the future Missus bryce in her place. Big mistake.
It was at a very posh hotel and it kicked off with free champagne on arrival that me and the missus took full advantage of. Then dinner and more drink. The after dinner drinks at the bar. I held up surprisingly well but the missus was wrecked by 10pm. I was fairly pissed off as it meant having to leave my free malt whisky supply, but I had no other option than take the boozy girl home.
We make it to reception without incident, but can't see any taxis outside. I leave the girl sitting outside (thinking that the fresh air might help, and that she can't walk too good anyway) and go into reception to see if they can get me one. For some reason at this point the girl wants to come see me and starts staggering towards the front door. They have one of those automatic revolving doors that starts moving when it senses your approach... Disaster! This is too complicated for the pissed up wench to negotiate and she gets the timing all wrong. Thunk! Head trapped betwixt door and door frame! Needless to say myself and the reception staff started howling with laughter, pointing, calling friends to look etc.
I never got another freeby from my mother again...
(brycemonkey No fatal accidents since:, Tue 13 Nov 2007, 16:27, 1 reply)

Regrets? I’ve had a few…but then again, I did get shit-faced.
I’ve just remembered this one…

Many, many years back, I was regularly and delicately tickling the proverbial fancy of a luscious and frisky young maiden. Happy days.

I would, on occasion, entertain her in the time-honoured tradition of taking her down the local pub and getting her squiffy, before dropping trollies and attempting said rudies as rapidly as possible on arrival home before my wood subsided -as tended to happen after copious amounts of cider.

(I know…Casanova would’ve been proud)

Anyhoo, on one occasion I was lining up at the bar asking for my usual, when I noticed a couple of clear(ish) plastic tubs up on a shelf containing what can only be described as lightly-coloured icy gloop. (There wasn’t even those crappy fluorescent, star-shaped, half-arsed promotional thingies you get in pubs to say what the offer was). I had to ask…

“What the fuck’s that?” I gently enquire, in a semi hypnotic state whilst watching the stirring rotor blades operating within each container.

“Alcoholic Slush Puppies” Said the cumly bar wench. Pointing to one container she continued: “There’s vodka and orange in that one, and tequila and raspberry (??? if I remember correctly - it was light blue) in the other. Works out at about 4 shots per glass apparently.”

“Shit the bed!” I profess enthusiastically, conveniently forgetting that I am now in conversation on what must be one of the gayest drinks in the world. “How much?” I ask.

“Cunted if I know” The serving maid replies (Am I correctly conveying the message that I’m not in exactly the most sophisticated and distinguished of establishments here?). “Nobody’s asked for one yet” (I stand back in amazement). She continues: “I’ll check on the till”.

She approaches the till, which just happens to be one of those touch screen jobs that has a direct link to the brewery database…Can you see where this is going?

I then hear the four words that take this story to it’s wonderful turn...

“This can’t be right” The perplexed strumpet exclaims, “It’s only counting as a fruit drink, and they’re 50p each”

I keep my composure and expertly disguise my jubilance, being careful not to let on that a massive neon sign has just lit up in my head, surrounded with sirens, explosions and fireworks all spelling out the words ‘FREE ALCOHOL!’….

I took a deep breath…….

“WOOOOOOOOOO-FUCKING-HOOOOOO!!!!!!. I’LL TAKE 10 OF EACH!” I scream, waving my arms around widly and jumping in the air, clicking my heels like Morecambe and Wise used to do.

£10 and several brain-freezing minutes later, my ladyfriend and I have slipped quite merrily off our respective mental-boxes. Abso-fucking-lutely twatted.

My companion then has a stroke of wisdom. “Let’s just keep this to ourselves” She requests. “Nobody else will order this stuff, nobody’ll find out for ages – we’ll be proper sorted”

This girlfriend was a lady of intelligence, beauty and compassion. Now it might have been due to the alcohol, but unfortunately for her, she forgot for a brief instance that I was a loud, gobby cock-rot who is incapable of keeping a secret.

She may as well have put an advert out to be broadcast in the middle of ‘Coronation Street’

Within one week I had packed the place out with friends, relatives, colleagues and basically anybody who’d listen to me; all insisting that they were served by the one barmaid who was obviously too thick to have the initiative to question the till. What a sight we must have all looked – From young whippersnappers to OAPs…boys and girls, men and women…all drinking these wussy little slush cocktail things…and all getting utterly arse-holed

Unsurprisingly, we got busted pretty soon after and the price went up to £5 a drink. Cue the pub being deserted from that minute on, and everybody blaming me because each individual thought that I should have told just them, and nobody else.

Length? About three inches…and it smashed your fucking face in.
( Pooflake braces for an onslaught..., Sun 11 Nov 2007, 18:07, 2 replies)

RESULT: a word you will soon tire of reading
I will leave it to your collective higher judgement to decide whether I am a criminal, lucky, obsessive or just a scav-meister cock-itch who is as tight as a gnat’s chuff.

The thing is…I may be any or all of the above, but because of this, freebies just seem to rain down on me.

When I was a kid, my mate’s mum was a director at Mars (the confectioners, not the planet) . That meant just a visit to his house would mean a constant stream of free chocolate bars and a carrier-bag full of twix and maltesers to take home with me. I’m still mates with the guy though and would be even if his mum didn’t have that job… that was just a lucky bonus.

Result

When at school I won first and second prize in a ‘non-fixed’ competition without even entering. The compo was a prize draw: the first prize being concert tickets (to see a band I’m too embarrassed to name but I worshipped them at the time), and the second prize was a signed 12 inch EP of the band. 2 of my mates won the prizes. First prize mate asked me to go with him to the gig, second prize mate already had a signed EP and gave the one he won to me.

Result.

When I was about 15 I got a crappy part time job at a local supermarket in the ‘low-tech’ early days of barcode scanning. All my friends / family would come to my till (despite how busy it was - funny that). It might have something to do with the fact that I would whoosh the items past the scanner beam, only actually scanning 2 or 3 out of 20-odd. I was also great at dishing out free alcohol to my fellow under age school-chummies. I ended up very popular…and we all did alright for groceries

Result

My First Proper Job – I worked in the distribution dept for a free newspaper and had a tip-top scam going. www.b3ta.com/questions/whyishouldbefired/post86689

Even so, as the paper ploughed more and more into becoming an ad pamphlet, I ended up being the ONLY article writer. It was a piss-pot fortnightly publication, so I picked which jobs I wanted to cover (i.e corporates and celeb-filled ones etc), and copied other people’s articles from ones I couldn’t be arsed to go to. Blag a nice company car, blend in with the gits from the bigger papers and… ta-dah! Shitloads of free food, champagne, gift bags and the promise (and subsequent delivery) of unbelievable gusset-busting pleasures in return for positive articles…for years

Result

I’m now an IT manager with control over …well let’s just say a rather fucking large purchasing budget.

Now IT Suppliers (a cut-throat industry if ever there was one) are willing to walk over their own grannies’ twitching corpses to bung me free stuff, generally software, hardware & all-expenses paid trips to casinos, race-nights, football matches etc. I also get phone calls like this: ‘Please do this quick questionnaire and get a cheque for £25?’ they plead. I agree, give them my home address for the cheque and then answer ‘yes’ or ‘5 out of 10’ to every question as fast as possible even though I’m being paid by the company for my time in the first place.

Even when I’m not genuinely filling my pockets with free stuff at seminars etc., I invent fictional seminars and tell my bosses I need to attend, thusly I can have the day off work and claim on mileage that I haven’t done.

I was also my (now fired) manager’s gadget monkey. It was a simple arrangement. I made sure he had the latest PCs and gadgets available to show off to his friends and colleagues (all at the company’s expense). I would also teach him how to use each item so he looked like an expert, instead of the 'thick-as-a-whale's-cock' arse-potato that he really was. To acheive this of course, I needed 1 of each item for myself. Before he got hoofed out, I gained about 6 grand’s worth of the latest kit in 6 months. All bought on the sly by my boss. Ironically, it wasn’t for this that he got the sack. He got the sack because he was a pleb who was crap at his job.

He's gone mental now, he rings the company and says nothing down the line...despite the fact that we have caller ID on the phones. He also rings me at home and asks me to do jobs when I go into work. I tell him to fuck off (on my expensive pre-paid pda)

Anyway…Reeeeeesult

I get free money – well credit anyway. I’m one of those dweebs who gets the 0% credit cards and changes cards 1 day before the offer runs out to another one that has 0% on balance transfers and doesn’t charge you for the transfer. It’s not even remotely difficult to do and I’ve been doing it for years – I even bought my car like that. I can’t quite understand why everybody doesn’t do it to be honest.

B.O.G.O.F offers? Gimme gimme. Over Christmas, A local supermarket did B.O.G.O.F Cider. I bought a pallet load, and now have a belly the size of Lithuania and happy liver sclerosis (probably) to show for it.

Virgin Fucking Media – After my unending stream of rants against the cuntquaffers that are Virgin Media, people often ask me why I stay with them. Well kids, here’s why. Since they changed their TV packages to M, L & XL 'sizes', they have made the M package free. Cue me buying one of those decoder boxes for next-to-nothing off Ebay and… Free multi-room XL package with all sports, movies, pay-per-view and…well you get the picture. I certainly do.

Re-fucking-sult. (I still think I’m entitled to rant at them for their shite products and service though – after all, they don’t know I’m spluffing free TV off them).

Despite all this, I am still a moaning spongemong cos it gets me freebies – I’m the annoying scrotesack you see in the shops wagging his finger at some spotty oik shop assistant bellowing ‘I’m not paying £300 for a fucking Xbox and unless you want me to go to the shop next door and buy it for a better discount than this then you’ll throw in some stuff’, before leaving with extra controllers, games and the whole thing costing less than the asking price. Leaving all bystanders feeling like proper cunts because they just paid up the full whack and didn’t say a word.

Result…for me anyway

I AM the scum who downloads music, movies, software and games. I don’t sell it at market stalls or anything (too much effort), but, my local Chinese Takeaway does deliver my whole food order for free in return for copies of the latest CDs and Movies

Result = My ever expanding belly getting even larger

I have a friend who works for a transport company which happens to have its own petrol pumps on site. Yep, you guessed it….

Result

Finally, in my spare time I am the lead singer and guitarist in a band (and also a DJ).

I therefore get free beer & free nosh aplenty – in both respects. To quote Dire Straits – ‘Money for nothing and your chicks for free’. Also, due to ‘packing up the gear’ I am usually last to leave whatever place I play at. Cue late night lock-ins and walking away with the remainder of the buffet (if it’s worth it) and surplus wine. When I was in my youth and in my ‘proper’ band (i.e playing original material with a record deal) we used to love supporting more established acts so we could help ourselves to their tour riders…which would always be crates of Carling…’Original’ eh?

Good times…oh, and a result.

Length? You got off lightly – I was holding back…
( Pooflake braces for an onslaught..., Fri 9 Nov 2007, 17:59, 5 replies)

Rome c.1988
My dad was attending a conference in Rome and took me along with him. I was but 16 and at that stage where even a cartoon would get my hormones bubbling, so when I saw the elegant girls of Roma in their tight sweaters and short skirts, I was perpetually priapic.

One evening, I was sitting in the hotel lobby perving at an Italian magazine (which seemed to be something like Newsweek, but with more bikinis) when I noticed a woman sitting opposite me weeping silently. I say woman - she was probably 21 and looked very sophisticated.

She was also gorgeous. Think Monica Bellucci in a black suit and white shirt with one too many buttons undone. She smelled of expensive perfume and had a lot of leg showing through a deep slit in her pencil skirt. My teenage boner was straining at my shorts within seconds.

Being the chivalrous kind, I went to the cafe, ordered an espresso and took it to her with a lame expression of consolation. She smiled through her tears and touched my arm with slender, red-nailed fingers, muttering something that sounded like gratitude. It might as well have been an electric shock. She dabbed away the tears with a tissue and appraised me.

Did she see the rigid cock twitching at my fly? Was it that that made her stand, take my hand and lead me up to room 304 where she closed the door behind us? By now I was having palpitations and my cock was like granite. She started to strip, taking off each item until she stood there in stockings, g-string and bra. Her body was what I'd been dreaming of for the last few years. Then she undressed me as we stood beside the bed.

She sat on the edge of the bed and regarded my swollen weapon. She squeezed it with those delicate hands and made a few preparatory strokes so that a bead of pre-cum glistened at the tip. Smiling, she applied the tip of her tongue to the bead and I watched with goggling eyes as that silvered filament stretched between my dong and her mouth. She wound it around her tongue while maintaining eye contact. I was going to come any second just from looking at it, but she seemed to know as much and took me full in her hot mouth, sucking and tonguing as I gushed forth across her tonsils.

Then she lay back on the bed, slipped out of her bra (gah!) and motioned for me to pull down her pants. With trembling hands, I did so. And beheld my first shaved lady parts. Remembering what I had read in numerous smut mags, I applied myself busily to her clit and lapped away as she writhed her hips.

Then she grabbed my hair and implored me - so I understood - to plunge my still rigid weapon deep into her molten wetness. I did, and felt the muscles there sucking at my bell as I thrust frenziedly, staring with amazement at the motion her perfect tits.

Well, it went on for a while longer, including a variety of positions and then I left her sleeping to return to the lobby, where my dad was supposed to meet me. Presently, he arrived and I asked him: "Dad, have you ever seen that dark haired girl who sometimes sits in the lobby here?"

"Ha! Don't have anything to do with her, son! She's a high class pro who services the ultra-rich. £500 a time, I've heard."

My throbbing dong and depleted nuts glowed with the satisfaction of a freebie well earned.
(frankspencer, Fri 9 Nov 2007, 9:21, 10 replies)

They're abusing MY freebies!
As I have mentioned before, I'm an engineer working for a big semiconductor manufacturer. I'm also an American.

American engineers are highly dependent on caffeine.

This is Monday.

I arrived here at 7:00 am, and typically work a 10 hour day to get ten hours of overtime per week. No problem there- I'm hourly, so I get time and a half. But this morning?

I got here, hung up my coat and went to the company cafeteria for my first cup of coffee. I had no cash on me, so I was going to skip breakfast and just stick to the coffee. And then I saw it.

16 oz. coffee- $1.25.

I looked at the elderly woman behind the counter. "They're charging us for coffee?!? Since when?"

"They started this morning."

From her reaction I can only guess at my facial expression, but I would imagine that the sight of a puffy-eyed engineer being charged a large amount for shit coffee would have looked like I was approaching psychotic rage. I snarled, "Those fucking bastards!" And strode from the cafeteria, leaving the coffee behind, to go to the ATM and get cash.

Apparently they decided to lift the charge on coffee for now, as apparently I wasn't the only one to react negatively, but now we know it's coming.

You can ask me to work an absurd schedule. You can test my blood and urine for odd substances. You can require me to go to classes on sexual harrassment or diversity awareness or whatever other wankage you feel is necessary for all employees to attend. But for the sake of one and all-

Do not fuck with my coffee.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Mon 12 Nov 2007, 18:32, 15 replies)

This isn't my story, but I think this chap deserves props.
www.snopes.com/business/deals/pudding.asp

For the link-shy, it's the (true!) story of a man who took advantage of a special offer that gave you free air-miles with every purchase of some brand of pudding. Man bought a metric fuckton of pudding and accumulated over a million airmiles. Best of all, he donated the puddings themselves to the Sally Army so could declare them as a tax write-off!
( Bob Todd whee, Sat 10 Nov 2007, 18:12, 3 replies)