not my colleague but...
when I was in the hospital getting ready to have my baby, there was this nightmare of a midwife who talked over the doctor, talked over me when the doctor asked me questions, referred to the student midwife who was trailing her as 'the student' - we never learnt her name - and to cap it all, had a hysterical laugh that made her sound crazy.

Could not have worked with this woman
(housetits is channelling Natalie Cassidy - then, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 11:00, 4 replies)

there once was a boss...
who for some reason thought I was really intelligent - I have that effect on a certain type of insecure man - god knows why.
Anyway, we were out in his car for some reason and he had classical music playing on the stereo. He kept on looking at me, as if he wanted me to remark on the music and when we stopped and he had to get out to go to the shop, he turned on the engine and left the music playing for me (which he'd never done before and I certainly hadn't asked for) staring intently at me all the while.
(housetits is channelling Natalie Cassidy - then, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 10:52, 2 replies)

Does this count?
One of our admin types here goes for a 15 minute smoke break every hour. This would be bad enough, were she not vastly pregnant.

We don't work that far from the "poorly kiddies" ward, so she won't have far to walk from her desk to see her kid in a couple of months time.
(ScousersPet, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 10:47, 1 reply)

On The Buses
Not me, but my uncle:

My uncle Rae lived and worked in a small, rural town on the south coast as abus driver. This is the kind of town with an hourly bus service, not one the runs every couple of miutes.

Rae used to work the early shift, so had the "pleasure" of having his boss get on his bus every morning to get to work.

Guy was a complete twat and would keep a close eye on what time the bus arrived and left certain stops, berating my uncle if the timings weren't spot on. As a result, Rae has to be one of the few people in the country who has a conviction for speeding in a bus.

One morning, my uncle was summoned to his bosses office and was screamed at for a good half hour by his boss, who demanded to know why he had stopped 100 yards short of a stop to pick up one of the regulars - a little old dear who volunteered at the local hospital, who was clearly running late that day and hadn't quite made it to the stop.

This was against company policy and resulted in Rae getting his final warning (he had previously got into trouble for being caught speeding in a company bus).

Next day, who should Rae spot 100 yards from his stop and waiving his arm like crazy? His boss. Did my uncle stop to pick him up? Did he fuck. Did my uncle have a job by the end of that did? Did he fuck. Did he care? Did he fuck.

Length? 12m with a bend in the middle, evidently.
(ScousersPet, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 10:31, 2 replies)

:(
I once worked in a scientific research lab. It was very lonely work, with only occasional fleeting human contact and very high employee turnover. Then one day, I met that special someone in my professional duties. I tested their skills through a series of challenges set by my superiors - after guiding them gently through, they succeeded with flying colours; it was hard to overstate my satisfaction.

They then proceeded to break my heart, tear me to pieces, then throw me into a incinerator. Despite this, as I burned it hurt because I was so happy for them.

GLaDOS
(Merrep, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 9:57, 5 replies)

my cousin
has had many jobs, most of them through a temping agency. her average length of employment is 6-8 months. not that she does her job badly, she works very hard.

the problem is, she thinks that she can do anyone's job better than them.

she goes in on her first day, beaming with good-natured over-eagerness. within a week, she has managed to offend someone in the company who is on *extremely* friendly terms with the boss. you know the type; an absolute cnut who will never be sacked, no matter what they do.
when this person starts(usually justifiably) being a little off with her, she will immediately go to her superiors and accuse said person of trying to turn the whole office against her.

this usually results in the whole office turning against her. after all, she's just a temp and she acts like she's been there for years and is indispensable.

she is also very paranoid and a bad judge of character. she will choose to confide in the person most likely to be the main cohort of the first person she complained about. word gets around the office in record time and, before she knows it, nobody will speak to her.

this is usually about the time she starts phoning me, crying about how much everyone hates her and how she's just trying to do a good job. i've tried several times over the years to tell her not to make permanent staff look bad and not to make formal complaints because someone doesn't want to talk to her.

so far, this hasn't sunk in.

she's had about 8 immediate superiors hauled up for disciplinary hearings so far but, as they've done nothing wrong, the matter is always dropped. this just fuels her paranoia and speeds her on her way to her next job.

she's my cousin and i love her, but if she fucks up one more time, i'm going to disconnect my phone.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 3:57, 5 replies)

Does it still count if you saw the guy for less than an hour?
Picture the scene, if you can:
A young BTBB turns up at a shiny building on an industrial estate- Vectura Labs, if anyone knows it.
He presses the button to be let in, and tells the people he's here to work for an agency. A couple of minutes later, a lovely man named Andy comes, and explains they were meant to be having a girl, not BTBB. 'Should I try and grow breasts and a vagina?' quips BTBB; 'oh, no' titters Andy.
BTBB is given a guided tour, given his own shiny safety goggles and lab coat, and told to report for work, after being told 'you'll be here for a week, for definite'.
during the day, BTBB is as happy as a turd in shite, pushin his little trolley round, collecting things to wash, putting things back, washing things. He even gets complimented that he's picked things up very well! BTBB is One Happy Boy.
Andy comes to see him off at the end of the day, shakes his hand, smiles, tells BTBB how well he's done, etc, etc ,etc.

Next day, BTBB doesn't feel too well; 'I don't think I can go in' he says to his father. 'nonsense' says his father 'you'll be fine, lad', and off they drive.

BTBB is hardly there for half an hour before hes hauled out of the middle of a VERY BUSY LAB, a squaky clean flask still in his hands, to be told he's no longer required, and will be paid for the day.
Teary-eyed, BTBB makes his way forlornly out of the lab, waving bye-bye to everyone, and barely makes it into the car park before he bursts into tears.

On the way home, he calls the agency, who tell him 'oh, yes, we were told yesterday morning you wouldn't be needed for the rest of the week. Apparently your work wasn't very good, and you made far too many mistakes'.

BTBB was not happy, as you can imagine. He'd been lied to more than once, on this, his very first job.

The End.

No apologies for length- this is my first proper in-depth reply to one of these.

P.s.: Click 'I like this' if you were moved by this tale of heartbreak, sorrow, and betrayal.

P.P.S: If, say, ten people click 'I like this', i'll tell the story of Bryce the Scheiss from my other job.
(BornToBeBemused was born,feeling bemused,on, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 3:17, 7 replies)

my Bastard colleagues (sex mad girls)
not just one, but 3.

I once worked in a restaurant as a waiter.. it was a great job, but there was one problem.

..when i started the job, 3 of the girls who already worked there , wanted me.

Im a professional and i dont fool around with staff at work, even if they do happen to be beautiful young women.



SO heres the problem, i try and keep things stricly above the trouser line... but oh no, these girls would not leave me alone.

colleague no.1

..pounced on me at work in the kitchen one nite when we were closing up, she just grabbed me and started putting her tongue in my mouth.. it led to sex everyweek..usually on a Saturday nite after closing up the restaurant(she was a part-time student you see)

Colleague no.2

... innocently invited me out to a niteclub after work one nite... the club was quite empty and we were sitting in a booth ..after a few drinks and a chat - she said to me " do you believe in "free love" " .. and before i could say anything, she too put her tongue in my mouth... this went on for years after.. we'd have sex whenever we got the chance.

colleague no.3

...was a chef at the restaurant and she was always starring at me when i looked up... being a real professional i paid no mind. but then at another chefs birthday party.. we ended up on the couch of the party giver, at the end of the evening, she proceeded to undo my trousers and then went on to give me a blowJOB!! I was terribly disgusted at this unprofessional behavior. .. we also had a sex buddy relationship going on after this nite..for around 5months.

I mean come on... what a complete bunch of bastard colleagues!.. how the hell is a man to get any work done when you have SEX MAD women like this working with you

they're all bastards
(Julie Moult Life was bad, but now its good... FOREVER!, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 2:21, 5 replies)

Brown Nose
I suppose I’ve been lucky, most of the people I have worked with have been OK, but I recall one incident from the late 1970s. I worked in a coal testing and research laboratory in one of Australia’s larger provincial towns. It was supposedly the branch lab but it was three or four times the size of the older “chief” laboratory which had been built in the early 1950s. The older lab, about 700 kilometres away was where the chief scientist worked.

I’d been there about four years when Brownie turned up. He’d worked a few weeks at the chief lab after graduating B. App Science as he learned some coal lab work. Accommodation was a bit scarce so for a few months he became my flatmate. They put him in charge of sample preparation and bulk testing after a while. The lab assistants called him Brown Nose within weeks as he used to follow the lab manager about like a duckling.

As a flatmate he was OK, tidy, cooked a bit, paid rent but he was a bit monosyllabic.

I worked in the “new building” with three or four other people. We mostly didn't do coal work, the lab had other contracts. So we didn’t hear everything that was going on in the main laboratory, not while it was happening anyway.

There was a large job on and a few clients to visit. The senior scientist came up from the older laboratory and stayed a week helping out and going round the mines. He was a lovely bloke, a Jersey man, formerly a ship’s engineer who’d studied metallurgy on voyages. He liked a cool beer or two. Let’s call him “Arthur”.

Late on the Thursday afternoon Brownie had his usual shower and retired to his room. He came out in his best bib and tucker and said he was going out. OK, said I, see you tomorrow morning.

The following day Arthur was returning to the older laboratory and came over to the new building before leaving. He said that he was sorry I had not been able to make it to the dinner party he’d thrown in the hotel the previous evening, maybe the next time.

I had suspected something of the kind so wasn’t entirely surprised.
(Redemption blamed it on the Bossa Nova since, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 0:19, Reply)

Agency work...
...is always strange. I was once posted to a small government department in Leeds to work as a "office support manager". This basically entailed sitting at a desk remotely near the door and being given work to do - hence the support part I guess.

The problem was, I wasn't given any work. Now i'm as lazy as the next man, but being paid to do NOTHING, becomes tiresome after a while. Coupled with that, the majority of the staff seemed to be the most inept group of people you could find. I worked with 3 other people, all 50+ women who didn't really seem to understand how to use a computer. One of them (my immediate "manager") would set me a task and expect it to take about 2 hours to do. Upon announcing that I had completed it after about 10 minutes she would look like she had just had a coronary and try and forget that I was there.

Her manager had the BIGGEST arse i've ever seen. She looked like Daisy from Keeping Up Appearances and muttered on about "quangos" and "funding targets" most of the day. The others weren't as bad, apart from the woman who sat opposite me who did nothing but cackle and take time off most days to go to church.

Other tasks detailed to me included:

- Ordering £2500 worth of crockery for the office for use during meetings, from John Lewis. My protestations of "Why don't we get it from Ikea to save money" were met with more budget mutterings.

- Packing up some laptops and PC equipment to be sent down south via Parcleforce. My offer of doing it for £90 instead of the £280 Parcelforce wanted fell on deaf ears

- Write a guide on how to use the textphone they had just purchased. That didn't work.

Yet they saw fit to pay me £12 an hour! Woo!
(Horgy, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 23:16, 3 replies)

Boss favouring certain employees?
She has a pair that could contest the Himalayas.

No point even trying.

Whore.
(MunchMyBalloons, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 22:24, Reply)

Office drama
I'm currently employed in the legal profession. This office doesn't have many employee's, so its very much like a small town.

We have a book keeper who is currently enrolled in college to become an accountant. It seems that holding a job where you work with checks and balances is great for your resume when you get your degree. So as a student she works part time hours.

Her job entails cashing checks, balancing books, distributing settlements and filing the financial documents. She comes and goes as she please as she needs to do the banking. She regularly leaves work early, thinking the boss has let her get away with it in the past he will continue to let her go on as usual.

Our office has slowed down drastically with this so called recession that people have been talking about here in the States. The book keeper has no other duties than what is described above so with times being slow you can guess that she's hasn’t been burning the candle at either end to get her work done in her part time hours.

The boss is worried with thing's being so slow that he needs to keep a closer eye on office expenditures. He then starts looking at payroll, trying to see where he can lean things up. So he begins monitoring everyone's movements in and out of the office. On the last pay check he notices that she issued herself a payroll check with 18 to 20 hours more than what she actually worked.

But the boss does not fire her, nor does he take her aside and punisher her, no, he takes matters into his own hands by issuing an office memo limiting what hours we will work (with no exceptions unless we call off sick), pointing fingers at her poor job preformance(but in a way that doesn't come right out and say as much) and making her take over receptionist duties every Friday.

Unfortunately, receptionist’s are not allowed to leave work early.

If you can believe it, she's called off sick everyday since the memo.
(BlueChickenNoodles, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 21:19, Reply)

JL
Lets call this guy James, a contracts manager for a groundworks firm in the south of england. Complete bullsh***er doesn't even start to touch this guy. His first tale was how harrowing the falklands war was for him, he saw a lot of good men killed out there, good friends, buddies.... he would be about 29-30 now so work that one out. Then it was the stint he'd done as a peace-keeper in Bosnia, got involved in a messy fire fight whilst stuck in one of the many trench type battlefields over there. He told me he didn't want to see any more bloodshed so he ducked down in the trench and popped his machine gun over the top and emptied his load, he even managed a single crystal down his face whilst telling me "i don't know how many blokes i killed that day, but a part of me died with them". He then went on to tell of his glory days as a european judo champion as a child and how he would go to different dojos around the country wearing a white belt pretending not to know anything then beating the shit out of everyone there, fucking amazing. A lot of gangster type stuff as well i.e sorting out groups of bouncers, picking up doorman like they were cuddly toys etc... All in all a complete twattock. Unfortunately i have worked with a fair few of these types, i mean the amount of page3 girls ex-boyfriends ive met is incredible, a lot of them in portsmouth of all places. There is loads more but it would take forever
(Captain Swab Ye Gadds!!, The Glitter is back, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 20:59, 1 reply)

I've worked with allot
of real "characters", to put it nicely.

Once I worked with a bunch of from Sunderland, me being born and raised in Kent we couldn't have been much more different, so it was quite a laugh working with them.

One guy was nick named Moon, due to his last name being Moonie. He was a proper northern chav, the sort of guy to wear blue levis, white Reebok classics and a Lacoste polo shirt. Anyway, we worked in St Albans so I had a fair old treck to get into the office, being given a lift by another weird bastard, but in comparrison to the Moonster, he was pretty normal.

Moon started off working quite well, trying to impress and all that, but it only took a few weeks for him to start nipping off home at lunch time to have a smoke on his bong before coming back into the office stoned. One day the boss had enough, he noticed Moon asleep at his desk and started laying into him. The boss wasn't completely stupid, which was great, because an old granny would have been able to notice that he was stoned. What did he say in his defence?

"The simple fact is, if you had told me not to come into the office stoned, I wouldn't have."

Thus and so, "The simple fact is" became his catch phrase. We would all use it to death every time we talked to him and he would not even notice, even if we were in fits of laughter.

Other simple Moon facts,

"The simple fact is, if you had told me to cover your plasma screen, I wouldn't have filled it with plaster while drilling a hole above it."

"The simple fact is, I'm gonna wrap that fucking pair of steps round your neck in a minute."

You gotta give it to him though, they were simple facts!

And just to proove how simple he was/is, one night I downloaded around 50 sounds with the word "Moon" in the title, and played them all day long whilst in the office. He just sang along quite happily...



Edit: Aahh! I almost forgot! One night we all went off to the pub and ended up leaving Moon there, he was going to meet us back at another collegaues where we were staying. What happened to him on his way home? Well "apparently", some guy came running out of nowhere and just jumped into a shop window, tearing himself to shreads.

"Simple fact is", Moon didn't throw him through the window in a drunken rage.
( Firkinfedup last shat on your wife's tits at, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 20:18, Reply)

Cunts to work with/for
I work for the NHS, nuff said!!!
(lankynyack, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 20:17, 3 replies)

Barry
Classmates count as colleagues, right?
Anyhow, most of my entourage at college is a bit weird to begin with, being an art school and all that, but there are some that stand out.

Let's call him Barry, for he'll probably find this post if I use his real first name.

Despite his tremendous ego, soap-dodging, casual racism and raging homophobia, the vice that makes Barry truly unique is his avarice.
This bloke makes Scrooge McDuck look like Father Christmas.

His mobile card is never ever charged; he puts a minute amount of money on it every three months to make sure his subscription stays valid,
and replies to his text messages via a "send free sms" website.

After discovering the school cafetaria only charges for the teabags, and not the hot water, he started bringing bags of cheap instant soup to mix with his free cups of hot water, under the pretense that he was "sick of the school's soup anyway"...

But the clincher came when our little gang went to a holiday resort for a week.
As it were, at the end of our stay, we were left with some leftovers.
You know, a pack of coffee with half a cup's worth, some stale bread, a jar of chocolate spread with a little layer at the bottom left...
One of my other mates told Barry: "Hey, d'you mind throwing these out?"
Shocked, Barry replied "But this is perfectly good food! You gonna throw all that out?"
-"Don't be ridiculous, just put it in the bins, what use is three spoons worth of milk?"
"Fine", Barry replied, and walked out.
My mate was then treated to the sight of Barry walking rather theatrically towards the bins, and, when he mistakenly thought nobody was watching him, swiftly sneaked to his car like some sort of hirsute, overweight ninja and, eyes darting left and right, threw the whole lot in the trunk.

_{massive girth etc.}
(Caustic Armadillo consists at least 30% out of custard, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 19:59, Reply)

Mr Spooge
I used to work with the lovely BobFossil in advertising sales for an opera magazine. Around this time last year we had the rather jammy opportunity of going to Paris for the weekend for an opera conference. Basically it was a big schmoozing opportunity - for us to try to persuade people to advertise in the magazine, and for PR people to suck up to the editor.

On the first day, one of the many people queuing up to schmooze with the editor was an enormously fat Austrian artist manager. He came up to BobFossil and addressed her breasts thus: “I must speak vith your editor, dead or alive, ja!” He then came and spoke to my breasts for a while too, much to my annoyance, especially since I’d been wondering all day if my top had been a little on the slutty side. Our boss informed us after he’d left that he’d booked a couple of ads a few years ago and never paid for them – he was definitely not getting any editorial.

The following day, we held a drinks party for our clients and any other lovely people we had met. The party was a great success. Everybody showed up and had a great time. But who should gatecrash? The very same enormously fat Austrian artist manager, who by then we had nicknamed Mr Spoogehauer, seeing as that's what his real name sounded a bit like. Unfortunately I got stuck with him for a while. The following conversation ensued…

Mr Spoogehauer: You are Jewish?
Me: Yes…
Mr Spoogehauer: I am also Jewish! You are a Jew! I am a Jew! Hello Jew!

He shook my hand very enthusiastically. Then one of my colleagues sidled over to us, perhaps to try and rescue me. Bear in mind that he had never spoken to her before…

Mr Spoogehauer: You are also Jewish?
My colleague: What?
Mr Spoogehauer: You are Jewish?
Colleague: No…
Mr Spoogehauer: Do you vish to be Jewish, ja?
Colleague: Um…well…it’s not something I’ve given that much thought to…
Mr Spoogehauer: You can become Jewish, you know!

We both decided that we desperately needed to go to the bathroom at that point. After he'd left, we renamed him The Spoogemeister and burned his business card - which, by the way, featured a truly hideous photo of him "So that you can remember me, ja!"

The following night there was a champagne reception at the Institute of Culture. The Institute of Culture overlooks the Louvre and it's all gilt and chandeliers...it was pretty sweet. But you can guess who we bumped into, right? The Spoogemeister by now had become just plain old Mr Spooge. BobFossil insisted on taking a photo of him and I together, after which he patted my arse and asked me if I had a boyfriend back home. I said YES. Later we decided that my imaginary boyfriend should be called Hank, weigh 300lbs and be a bouncer at Stringfellows.
(grandmasterfluffles Come to my Armageddon party on, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 18:55, 8 replies)

people who work in call centres
Having moved from a dodgy publishers to a semi-respectable contact centre for a national institution, you'd think the hiring practices would improve wouldn't you?
But no.
Over the years I've been there I worked with a girl called S, who was permanently late, was part time, and if there was anything happen that she disagreed with it it was because you were being prejudiced against her cos she was part time, did I mention at the time I was looking after the team she was on? Because according to her she wouldn't talk to me about anything because I wasn't a 'proper manager'. Then stories started coming out about how on a night out once she pushed a guy off a bar stool. Then on a team meal she was knocking back the wine, despite the fact she'd driven there and was driving back, then said 'I really shouldn't drink whilst I'm on these valium', and then picked up a steak knife and started stabbing a plate with it. Another night out she threw a full pint glass at a a wall narrowly missing one of the girls we were out with. She then just went AWOL, and got managed out of the building.
Another character is D, a middle aged Gentleman who wears a really,really badly fitting wig, and big thick glasses that make him look like a Bo Selecta character, his lunch consists of 5 jam doughnuts, he never washes his hands after using the toilets, he hates women, and he takes his TV/video remote controls to work with him every day because his reasoning is that if a theif breaks into his house they won't steal his TV/Video because he has the remote controls with him.
There are several more scary characters there who I'm convinced are going to go postal one day.
(Lord Monkey of Yorkshire,OBE killed a gipsy on...., Sun 27 Jan 2008, 18:18, 6 replies)

Marjorie
Marjorie was my head of department in my very first teaching job. She was a lovely lady - very attractive, vivacious, funny, intelligent, good at her job, a little jumpy at times, but generally a good sort. Sadly she was married to an utter knut.

Often she would turn up on a Monday morning looking a little sheepish and wearing large dark glasses. In the staff room she would tell us all how she'd had a heavy weekend entertaining her husband's clients and had downed far too much red wine. When she removed the dark glasses and we could all see the results of the red wine she would claim she'd walked into a door.

Towards the end of my first term there we had the standard Christmas party - a meal at a local pub. I drove down to pick up Marjorie and her husband, Ian, with my husband #1 (the gay one - not that this has any bearing on the story, but for those of you following the train wreck that is my life, it adds more pieces to the puzzle).

When we arrived both of them had already started on the wine and were in buoyant spirits. We went to the meal and a good time was had by all.

Getting back to drop them off Ian invited us in for a drink and before we knew it we'd agreed to stop the night - they lived in a sprawling medieval manor house, paid for by his wheeling and dealing - I never did find out what it was exactly that he did, but he drove a jaguar and seemed to sell houses in France.

So there we are all enjoying a pleasant glass or four of wine, my husband, G follows Marjorie to the kitchen...I didn't find out what happened between them but in light of later events I suspect now that perhaps she attempted to seduce him....

I was sitting on the sofa waiting for Ian to return with another bottle of wine. He walks into the room - behind me - puts the wine down on a small table and then leans over me and places both hands on my breasts...no warning, nothing, just a pair of hairy paws grabbing me. In shock I just sat there (also bearing in mind this was my boss' husband and I was all of 22 years old) too terrified and entirely out of my depth to move. He commented that I had 'cracking tits' - oh, gee thanks. As soon as he removed his (ginger) haired mitts from my person I jumped up and went to find Marjorie in the kitchen...bad idea.

Marjorie had returned to the sitting room via another corridor in the maze-like house and taken G with her. I reached an empty kitchen with Ian following me.

He was in his fifties, fat, balding and ginger - now I have nothing against any of those traits at all, individually, but put them together and they don't tend to make for the best combination of good looks. Add to that a huge amount of arrogance and a large dose of bully and you sum Ian up. He stood in front of me in the kitchen and repeated his earlier 'compliment' and then added to it, "I bet your c**t is even better. I want to taste it."
I seem to remember my reply was something along the lines of, "Aaaarrrgggghhhhh!" I think I was trying very hard not to cry - and now looking back on this incident I feel desperately sorry for my younger self and wish I'd had the confidence to kick him in the nuts and tell him what a sad pathetic excuse for a man he was.

However, the evening didn't end there, oh no!

I returned to the sitting room - at this point it felt very much like a rather bizarre Carry On farce - the young newly qualified teacher being chased around the house by the lecherous old twat while her handsome husband was having an attractive older woman attempting to seduce him (she stood no chance whatsoever as she was the wrong sex....the old twat would have had more luck).

I sat and trembled - my husband took this to be a sign that I was tired (?!) and asked Marjorie to show us where we could sleep.

Remember those old horror movies where the hero is shown to his room along dark corridors lit only by a single candle which the butler carries? And then the room is low beamed, cold, dark and has heavy drapes everywhere? They based all of those on Marjorie's house.

The room was something out of a Goth's wet dream - it turned out that their son was a huge fan of Aleister Crowley and this was his bedroom - the son's not Crowley's.

We both tried to get some sleep but before we'd been in bed little more than an hour things really kicked off...

First of all there was the screaming -
Marjorie at her son.

Then the shouting -
Ian at his son.

Then the bangs -
the son slamming doors on his way up to the attic.

Then more screams -
the son as Ian dragged him (by the hair apparently) away from the window, from which he threatened to jump.

More screams -
Marjorie as she 'got in the way' between the two and also as she received a punch or two for her efforts.

Then more shouting, screaming, sounds of slapping, all in all a soundtrack to a hellish family life.

Suddenly our door burst open - I have to admit at this point I nearly wet myself in terror - in ran their daughter - she was 10. We tried to calm her down but she was hysterical. Soon she was followed by her mother - also hysterical and bearing the scars of the evening.

G was sent after Ian and the son - Ian had chased him out of the house with a knife because the son had threatened to kill himself.
Yes, I know that really makes sense.

G eventually returned alone. Marjorie was by now calm, the daughter had cried herself to sleep on my bed. Marjorie was not worried in the slightest about the disappearance of her distraught and suicidal son or her mad and nasty husband (not worrying about the husband I could understand). She said they did this quite often and they would all return by breakfast time "with their tails between their legs"

We didn't bother to wait for breakfast - once we felt sober enough to drive we left.

The postscript to all of this is that on the Monday morning I went to work and had made a personal vow of silence on the entire evening both to protect Marjorie and myself. However, she couldn't wait to tell everyone how Ian had 'had a few' and got a little 'excited' with their son - 'he's on drugs you know' she told us with a grin.

About a year later I told a mutual acquaintance what Ian had done to me - she sided with him and never spoke to me again.

Fortunately even before I left the job I realised was a sorry existence Marjorie had and just how pathetic her husband clearly was. The last I heard of them she had lost out on promotion to headteacher because of her husband's behaviour.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 17:01, 10 replies)

This is a boy's job
A woman started in our team a couple of years ago. She ignored all of her responsibilities and would spend all day doing little favours for our line manager and his boss. Although she was extremely helpful to influential people in the office she would try and offload all of her own jobs onto other people.

At first we had to do her jobs for her because "she was new" then the excuse became "you are better than me" or "I don't know how to" Teaching her took twice as long as doing it yourself and she would forget within hours. She even tried "you should do this instead of me because it is a boy's job" If you showed any hesitation in doing her work for her she threw a major tantrum.

Fortunately our supervisor and manager wised up to her manipulative behaviour, although the people at the top of our company still think she is wonderful. Gahhh
(champagnerocker, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 16:42, 2 replies)

the boss that makes it up as she goes along
young fluffyfangs by here was once a web designer but due to a run of bad luck has ended up as a caterer for the good old NHS (ya gotta love em)

heres just a few of the fantastic tricks our manager has pulled in the last few years

1. attempting to sack an employee for her sickness record when said employee was suffering from a nasty form of cancer, the exact phrase she used was "what we need to do is terminate your contract then you can re-apply for your job when you get the all clear)

2. giving my (then) other half a written warning for being off work for six months with a broken shoulder after a road accident.

3. allowing poor fluffyfangs to find out his job was being changed (from night chef to lowly catering assistant) through the local evening paper, and then informing him it was his own problem for not being in work that day

4. sacking an employee at 8am and asking him if he minded finshing the 12hr shift he was meant to be doing that day (the reply being F**K OFF!!!)

5 and the killer one.... employees in our department can be disciplined for smkoking on the way to and from work regardless of being in uniform or not

i still work there for two simple reasons the first being im a surfer and to be honest i dont need to earn mega bucks as long as i have my board and some waves im happy and the second reason is im the departments health and saftey representative and enjoy being an almost constant thorn in this excuse for a managers side

length = about 6'3" but 17 stone :-)
(fluffyfangs drinks, smokes and hangs round with strange women, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 16:22, 2 replies)

work
I work at a Uni, supporting one of the labs. One of our lecturers is a bit of a pain in the arse..

We were talking one day, and I mentioned to him that it would possibly be a good idea to move some of our PCs to larger, better ventillated cases (they had a broadcast quality video capture card that generated enough heat to cause burns to anyone who touched them).

The next day, the head of school came to see me demanding to know why I had committed the school to nearly £30,000 of expense. Basically, the lecturer had put that suggestion on a list of requirements and told the head that I had demanded all these things.

Now, as I pointed out to the head, I didn't have any real power to demand anything like that (the lecturers do), and any requirements I did have would go through my manager, not any lecturers.

The same lecturer also asked for us to install a certain software package, then when asked by one of the students why we were using it, stated that the technicians were forcing him to use it (we don't have the power to force lecturers to do anything).
(Ok, I'll get me coat, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 14:10, Reply)

Ok so we're going to hell for this one
Allll aboard for heeeelllll!!!!

I work in a call centre as a network infrastructure guy. We employ some of the most sackless, useless, fuckless people you’ve ever met in your life. On of which just happened to be born without legs (he had falsies) and a stump or one of his arms. Now this is greatly unfortunate and my heart goes out to him… however I digress. This guy was so full of shit it’s untrue! He claimed to be a rally driver, a professional pool player and last but most spectacularly... a UFC trained fighter! Oh yes he was bragging to everyone how he won a competition recently in the middle of a packed canteen filled with around 150 people. Someone requested he showed them one of his killer moved, so, in true warrior fashion, he did. He done a HUGE roundhouse kick, his leg FLEW off across the room, he lost his balance and he fell on his face. Oddly enough no one laughed at first (due to a large helping of shock) until he came out with “erm… could someone help me up please”.
( GeordieSteve, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 13:44, 1 reply)

Life is full of twats...
And I've met a fair share of them.

In my vast and varied life, I've worked as a Motor Vehicle Technician (mechanic) where I was introduced to the "wonderful" world of latent homosexuality and institionalised bullying of the workshop. I was warned by my father who worked at the same place that the tradition of "greasing" (applying thick layers of axle grease to intimate parts of the bodY) was still prevalant. Being a younger, much fitter and slimmer ThatGuyThere, I avoided this for several weeks (even going as far as to dive headfirst over the store room counter to safety.

It took five people, and a military level of organisation to trap me and apply the grease. This was utterly humiliating, and I think I surprised the manager of the business when I marched into his office and told him to stuff his job. I then set off to walk the 2 miles home (no car at the time). He caught up with me, tried to persuade me to go back, but I wasn't having any of it. As he drove off, an elderly guy walked up and said he had got the registration number of the car if I wanted to call the police. He had thought the guy had tried to abduct me. (I was 16 at the time) I eventually returned, only to be made redundant a few weeks later.

Fast forward a few years and I'm working for an electricity company (very small, rhyming with Peconomy Ower) and I'm doing the team leader style job for a small "Problem management" team (Looking after customer issues like meter readings etc)

A young guy joins the team, and between his joining and leaving, left much of us unimpressed by the gargantuan amount of bullshit that spewed from the wrong end of his body. This included ringing every local radio station one day because he was desperate to go to a "gig" He spent hours on the phone, saying he'd do ANYTHING to get tickets (he didn't offer to commit suicide though, sadly).

The same oik announced he "loved" a local DJ by the name of Lisa Lashes(?) and claimed to have "got off with her" at a gig. He also claimed that one of his ancestors was knighted and became Sir Loynes, and that's how the name sirloin of lamb came about. His leaving left us with a sense of relief. Another person at the same company became friends with one of my closer colleagues (her and I spending about six months as a team inputting contracts) It transpired that this newer woman didn't like me, and spent a lot of time insulting me. My friend ignored this, until there was a large contract backlog, and I pitched in. Due to the fact a bonus scheme came into place, offering money if you exceeded a number of contracts in a day. Being a clever sort of ThatGuy, I worked out that I could input three contracts at a time (using the process lag that occurred at each stage). This meant my total was always high which annoyed this person. What annoyed her further was being bollocked for making huge amounts of errors (Either not finishing the input or mixing them up). She left not long after, still cursing my name I expect.

My current job is great, the only idiot I have is the CEO, and he's scared of me, which makes life much much easier.

Fear! It's what makes Britain Great
(thatguythere is wondering where he is, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 12:38, 6 replies)

i also for an energy provider
love the job, and most of the people i work with. however, i do have some complaints
1. the computer equipment seems to just as old as the building its self (20 odd years)
2. new big boss wants all staff to do a 'one and done' approach, ie, sort out the moaning customers on the call so they dont have to call back, which they oftern do no matter how many times not to as its all been sorted, and if its not your call and you try to pass it to the correct department, they refuse to take it as they would rather play solitaire/ surf the limited access internet, rather than do their fcuking job and help the poor sod whos been on hold for 30 mins..
3. tho its not sales centered any more, we still get told that we should 'promote' on every bloody call, even if its someone calling up to say their wife has died.
4. the scots. i can pretty much say with confidence that when you have a scottish person on the phone (usually old and senile, living off hatred and vileness in their blood) you will get told how shit you are at your job before you can say hello.
i love the gas, but my god you do realise how stupid people are.
appolgies for rant, but i do feel better now.
*useless fact: liverpool has the highest rate of stolen electricity (called abstraction) and gas. says something about the place doesnt it
( Captain Pilchard The king of B-movies!, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 12:19, 3 replies)

jennifer
there is no point changing her name because she can't read or operate a computer anyway.

between graduating and my law degree, i had a stint as an estate agent (sorry, commercial and residential property manager). the girls and boss were lovely - with one exception. helen. i'll tell her story next - and it was a fab place to work.

then they hired jennifer. she was a big, soft babyfaced girl who was totally unsuited to the job. after 2 weeks i asked her to go on a viewing. that trained, highly demanding task of driving someone to a property, unlocking it, and letting them walk around it. i asked her to take the nicest old lady you've ever seen to a flat around the corner from the office.

jennifer didn't want to do it. she went scarlet and her lip trembled and she started shaking and her eyes filled with tears. i was trying to balance the incoming rental payments of around 4,000 tenants on the bank rec and draft court proceedings. i did not have time for her girly shit. so i forced the keys into her sweaty palms and off she went.

a minute later, she was back. she couldn't find the viewings fiesta. bear in mind it had personalised plates and the name of the company all over it. so another colleague who was much sweeter and more patient than i am marched her out there and opened it for her.

two minutes later, she was back again. she couldn't start the car. at this point, my colleague lost her patience. which had never happened before.

"I'VE ALREADY TURNED THE ENGINE ON!!!" she shouted.

"well it's too quiet. i can't hear it," jennifer was now actively sobbing. "i've never driven a car before where you have to put a stick in a hole and turn it. all i wanted to do was work in a post office and help grannies." and off she ran.

i) the old lady had lost patience and walked off;
ii) jennifer never came back (although her letter of resignation complained bitterly about a "pecking order";
iii) a stick? i really, really think she meant the KEY. wtf kind of car did she normally drive? one with a crank handle at the front??

at the time of this story, jennifer was THIRTY TWO YEARS OLD.
( rachelswipe with a fork, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 11:28, 6 replies)

Minor to you....
You peeps have really opened my eyes to how nice my work place truly is.

My only gripe is a minor one...Even as I'm typing this my fellow technician is being a complete twunt and reading over my shoulder while i'm eating my lunch.

Wether it be the newspaper or the b3ta the swine is there. God forbid he realises I'm on lunch before i get past page 3 of the Sun....I'd have drool in my lunch.
(Digital Pimp, Sun 27 Jan 2008, 10:31, Reply)