The compulsive liar
I sympathise with other posters who have had the misfortune of working in higher education with utter useless cockmunches about whom nothing is ever done.
Several years ago, I had the pleasure of working as part of a 2-person team of techies supporting a degree programme. The guy I worked with at first seemed like quite a jovial chap, although when I went in for a 'taster day' a few weeks before starting my job and got trapped in his office for over an hour listening to him ramble on about nothing alarm bells should have started to ring.

During my first week, someone popped in to our office to have a chat with my fellow techie. I was on my way out to do a job somewhere, and when I informed the other guy where I was going, he suddenly started to refer to me as 'sweets' and 'toots' and other such delightful names, presumably to impress his friend with his new female lacky. Things went rapidly downhill from there.

He never came in to work before 10am, usually around 10.30. His reason was that he stayed later in the evenings. He probably did, but not in the office or any of the areas he should have been working in.

The 'stories'. He'd have an anecdote for every situation, ever. Never funny, never interesting, always long. A lot of our students were under the impression he'd been Whitesnake's lighting designer. None of them semed to question why he'd choose a low-paid technician's post in HE over such a rock'n'roll lifestyle.

He would disappear for hours, literally. Having worked on his own for years he'd got used to doing whatever the hell he liked, and never really had to face the consequences as he was rarely in the office. I would frequently be confronted by people who had been promised stuff by him; lab setups for lectures, software installs, equipment loans. They were understandably unhappy at these things not having been done, and I'd have top try to placate them whilst sorting stuff out. When I was knew and didn't really know where stuff was kept this was particularly frantic.

I started trying to organise things, making equipment loan out at certain times, keeping a record of who had borrowed what, keeping everything in one place, and throwing out loads of old useless crap that made our office a veritable obstacle course to walk through. My line manager and I hired a skip once and chucked a load of stuff in it. My colleague got most of it back out again, stating he could use it at home. It then sat in the office for another year or two. He'd just let people take equipment away, sometimes scribbling their name on a bit of paper, most often not bothering even to do that. The department had been losing stuff left, right and centre and this continued.

After I'd been there a year or so (and had grown to hate his fat, lazy presence with a passion) he started to have personal problems. Unsurprising, if he acted at home in any way like he did at work. He started taking lots and lots of time off. He started to come in even later, except now it was because he had to take his kid to school apparently, and couldn't afford childcare, although he never left early to pick the kid up. So I was left more and more in the lurch with no notice. The later he got at coming in, the more bizarre the excuses became. A bird got into his house, his next door neighbour's washing machine flooded, the exhaust had fallen off his car (this one happened every week it seemed, as well as many many dentist visits) He couldn't just say that he'd fucked up and got up late or something. That's what really got to me. The lying. He had to lie. Not just to me, but to everyone. If someone managed to catch him in the office and ask him why he hadn't done something he'd make some shit up on the spot, tell them he'd do it right away and then disappear for a long period of time, ensuring his absence when they returned. I swear he believed what he told me and everyone else, no matter how far-fetched.

Now during this period I had an awesome line manager. He knew what was going on, and tried every way he could to get rid of this guy, but to no avail. Eventually things came to a head when this bloke used my computer while I was out of the office, and found a thread on a forum where I'd been whinging about him to some people I know. He printed it all out, highlighted all the stuff about him and sent it to the Faculty Manager. It was probably the most work he'd done since I started there. I got a telling-off for 'calling a fellow member of staff a fucking twat on the internet', but he really got it in the neck. They knew I'd reached a stage of desperation and he was told in no uncertain terms to sort himself out, and stop using the fact that he was single parent as an excuse for never doing anything.

Not much changed though, although I caught him trying to look on my computer a few more times. The relationship had completely broken down. He hated me for disturbing his nice habit of doing fuck all, and I resented him for making me do the work of 2 people for the last 2 years. He didn't stop coming in late or lying about why he was late and I really stopped caring. In the end he was moved to another department on the same pay and I got a new colleague for the next 3 years, who is still to this day a very good mate. On his first day though, my old colleague asked him what he thought of "The Alpha Female" as he'd termed me. I often wonder how much of his shit was down to the fact that I was female, younger than him, and wouldn't be patronised by a big fat know-nothing.

Sorry for all that. It's good to vent though :o)
(VestanPance, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 11:45, 2 replies)

You're not the same Vestie from TWTD by any chance?

( Amorous Badger NAKED BEA ARTHUR PHOTOS 4U, Mon 28 Jan 2008, 14:28, closed)

Don't think so....
As I don't actually know what TWTD is....
(VestanPance, Tue 29 Jan 2008, 21:43, closed)