This bloke was a legend. He was blonde, too.
We received several week's formal training in the job I'm in now and when I'd been there a few weeks I went off to the doctor one lunch time. The receptionist took my name and asked if I liked it at the XYZ office. How did she know? Well she was Mrs G, married to my trainer, Dave G. Then she asked if I had met Cecil yet. Well, yes I had but fortunately he was not in the section I was about to join.

That didn't last forever. A few years later Cecil joined my section and one sunny afternoon came to my desk.

"Redemption, you know about these things, is one milligram per litre the same as one part per million?"

"Er yes, it is. One milligram is a thousandth of a gram and there are almost exactly a thousand grams of water in a litre. Thousand times a thousand, that's a million. One part per million, near as damn it."

"OK" said Cecil, "I thought so."

And he strolled off.

Twenty minutes passed. He was back. I was wrong. There followed an argument so contorted and bizarre that I defy even a creationist to produce its like.

I actually attempted to suggest he was mistaken. I repeated that a milligram was a thousandth of a gram. I repeated that a millilitre of water weighs about a gram. There are a thousand millilitres in a litre, therefore a thousand grams. I suggested that a million was a thousand thousands.

To no avail. After several more minutes of mind boggling hogwash, I said, "Well if you're sure of that Cecil perhaps you should go with it." And he strolled off again. What the client thought, I don't know, but of course the client probably knew about Cecil. Almost everyone in the business did.

Once in a while one of our staff goes off to work with another branch for three months, six months or a year. Cecil somehow wangled a three months position with them, extendable at their option to six. He was back in three, and the rumour was that they'd never have him again.

He surprised us all by getting married. A few months later he didn't turn up for work one day. The phone rang in the supervisor's office and it was Mrs. Cecil.

Not "Cecil will not be in, he's got a sore throat.", it was "Where's my husband?" This sparked a search of the 14 floor building we occupied just in case Cecil was asleep, in a coma or dead in some corner.

Cecil was a good lad, concerned about his health. He used to chew raw garlic at work, good for you, he said. And he'd never, never taken a drink in his life.

But he went to play chess with a friend the previous afternoon, not going home first. The friend produced a large bottle of rum and Cecil had a nip. Then he had another. And another. He woke up at two the following afternoon.

He was a very quiet lad about the place after that and soon lit out for the territory. When last heard of was alternately exasperating and amusing the residents of Darwin.
(Redemption blamed it on the Bossa Nova since, Thu 10 Mar 2011, 11:26, Reply)