What a wonderful life.
Before Uni, when I first started out on the road to adult working life I worked in my local McDonalds. As I was not a complete ignoramus and could add up without using my fingers or moving my lips, as well as being able to remember more than 3 things in a row, I was quickly promoted to that hallowed being, a ‘floor manager’.

This meant I managed the floor and all the stuff that was on it including the people. So I was 17 and in regular charge of an entire business, albeit for 13 hours of a day. It was on a main road but quite far from any major boozers so we didn’t get the drunks. So it was reasonably quiet and I liked that.

It was there that I mastered the zen art of doing absolutely nothing constructive at all whilst getting the overall job done.

The other staff used to like me because I instigated such initiatives as turning off all the external lights and powering down the internals by 30% so we looked closed at 8pm. This meant a considerably low footfall. If anyone did have the temerity to come in they would find the whole restaurant cordoned off, apart from one table in the far corner of the place by the toilets.

I stayed in my office watching videos most of the time and eating junk food. I used to regularly start the closing procedures at 9pm and then stay on myself in a virtual catatonic state when everyone had left. Sometimes the next manager would find me at 6:20am the next morning claiming I was ‘gurning’ on purpose but actually I was asleep with my face in a gurning position.

Anyway, things I got up to for 13 hours at a time in my office:

- Played myself at Monopoly, Scrabble and the Game of Life using all the player’s counters (not all the games at the same time though)

- Updated from memory my complete book and film database including basic plot points and MS paint drawn cover art.

- Tried to mentally synchronise the multiple CCTV cameras of the staff and customers interacting to episodes of the Archers on the radio.

- Restarting a song when it got to half way on the store audio to see if anyone would complain. I managed to string together over 20 halves of Aqua’s Barbie Girl before some bloke, apoplectic with rage, came to complain. I soothed him by saying that we have to cater for all sorts of people’s musical tastes and it hadn’t really been on repeat but modern music did sound the same didn’t it?

- Painstakingly glued together 70 odd empty fry boxes to makes a giant teepee to keep my Bigmac father, my Chicken McSandwich mother, and nugget and fishfinger children happy and dry. Ketchup dip baths were also provided for the children every other day. Pongo the dalmation and flubber were the family pets.

- Warming to the theme above, I used to make complex dioramas using old happy meal toys. I still remember to this day I created Hamlet Act 2 Scene 2.

Main Cast list:

Hamlet: Flounder (from Little Mermaid)
King Claudius: Hercules
Queen Gertrude: Mulan
Rosencrantz: Twigs the beanie baby
Guildenstern: Scorponok

Supporting artistes:

• Wedding Rapunzel Barbie
• Tomagotchi #6
• Baby Pegasus
• Tomagotchi #2
• Baloo the bear
• Tomagotchi #5
• Sebastian the crab (Little Mermaid)
• Tomagotchi #9

Sadly now I have to work for a living. I leave playing with happy meal toys until I get home nowadays.
(powervator and NONE SHALL PASS, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 16:19, 8 replies)

The hunt is on.....
In my old job, I had access to loads of weird and wonderful chemicals. Any time we had spare, we would use it making stuff.

Now, in the interest of public safety I won't list HOW I made the following products, but I'll list WHAT I made:

A rudimentary nerve gas
A highly unstable bomb
An extremely smelly gas (insert your own joke)
and an extremely effective kettle descaler.

In the process of making these wonderful additions to the progess of humanity, I achieved the following:

a chemical burn to my chin
a chemical burn to top lip
a near successful gassing of myself when a chemical fumed too much
a chemical burn to my tongue
a near successful bout of hyopcalcemia
and a chemical burn to my eyebrow.

Believe it or not, it was all fun and I wouldn't change any of it.

But by far and away, the best story of workplace boredom came from the shopfloor lads. Many moons ago, there was a shopfloor worker who drove a Reliant Robin. One day, he got into an argument with a group of other workers. Nothing bad, just a disagreement of how a job should be done.

Anyway, home time came and this gentleman, went upstairs to the changing room, had a shower, changed and went to the car park to go home. Problem was, his little Reliant Robin wasn't there! He searched the car park, but it was nowhere to be found. Now panicking, he decides to phone the police. Suddenly, a big hand grabbed his mobile phone.

"What the bloody hell are you doing?! My car's been nicked!"

"No it hasn't, mate! You don't need to phone the police, but it's somewhere on the site!"

The hunt began....

Now fuming, the guy, decides to check all the usual places, behind the factory, by the fork lift trucks etc. No luck. Then he checks around the perimeter of the site. No luck, again. By now, an hour has gone and he still can't find his car. He goes into the factory floor:

"OK, lads! You win! I can't find my car! Well-flipping-done! Where is it?!"

All of them are wearing smiles which would put "The Joker" from "Batman" to shame. Without saying a word (and trying to stifle their giggles), they take him to the warehouse.

"I checked here! It's not here!"

One of the lads, pointed his finger upwards, to towards the ceiling.

Whilst the bloke was getting changed, the rest of the blokes, with military precision, performed the following:

They ran down to the car park and told someone else to bring a fork lift truck to the car park with a wooden pallette. When they met up in the car park, they loaded the guy's Reliant Robin onto the wooden pallette and got the fork lift truck to take it to the main factory floor.

When they met up there, they proceeded to shrink wrap the car onto the pallette so it was firmly locked onto the pallette. Now, they took the finished product to the warehouse and loaded it on the highest level of the racking along side the rest of the chemicals and raw materials!

Everyone burst out laughing and the guy permitted himself a wry smile (in a sort of "you-got-me" kind of way).

That was the utlimate "workplace boredom" prank I ever heard.

Length? It took 20 minutes to implement, but they got an hour's worth of fun out of it...
(The Stig, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 16:06, Reply)

Expenses
I like to fill in my expenses claim forms imaginatively.

I've had the same job now for about four years and so far, hidden away in the lists of rail tickets, local authority fees and stationary, I have made successful claims for:-

A stuffed fox
A piglet frozen in carbonite
The golden fleece
The Rosetta Stone
A badger bating kit

No one seems to have noticed.
( SpankyHanky, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 16:02, 3 replies)

JUST BUY A FECKIN CAR DAD!
The last 18 months of my working life have been spent listening to my step-dad, (my boss), harping on about what car he should buy.

First it was a Porsche, then he wanted a Ferrari and now he's decided on a Merc SL55 AMG F1 pace car.

Why he should buy it.
How he should buy it.
When he should buy it.
If he should buy it.
What will happen if he buys it.



JUST BUY THE BLOODY CAR AND TAKE ME OUT OF THIS LIVING HELL PLEASE!
( girlinthehole, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:59, 7 replies)

I spend my working day practicing...
...the "Can you not tell by my furrowed brow that I'm very busy, now please go away?" look while reading b3ta.

It's not terribly successful.

Damn.
(Bicycle Repairman "you're also a bit of a wanker", Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:58, 6 replies)

Last one from me on this QOTW...
I work for an ad agency, pretty much all the big ones of which are international nowadays.

Up to about 5 years ago, one of our departments used to entertain themselves on a Friday afternoon by picking a random name off the international address book and copying that person on absolutely anything going, ensuring a bemused victim in Santiago, or Reykjavik, or Seoul, was bombarded with a load of completely irrelevant emails (because it was (mostly) good clean work-related stuff it got round any accusations of IT abuse, it was just just annoying and confusing for the recipient).

One day they pick Mr Wu (name changed to protect identity), who does nothing for a day or two and then politely writes to say that his IT Department have informed him it's not a glitch on the system - he presumes they've accidentally included him for some reason, and can they please stop. They keep it up for another day or two then drop it when they get a stern email from our own IT Department.

Anyway, week later, all staff meeting, and there's a big announcement. New CEO.'Will everyone please give a warm Welcome to, from the Singapore Office, Mr Wu!'.

Luckily he saw the funny side, but they were told in no uncertain terms not to do it again.
(SnowyTheWereRabbit the Leporid from Hell, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:55, Reply)

Another thing I do
Is look through B3ta and check the profiles of users to see if:
A) They are female.
B) They are attractive.
C) Try and guess their age (if not stated).
D) Be generally impressed by the friendships of the B3tards and think 'Would they like me?' This makes me check the calendar for any bashes near me (In Portsmouth, I'm not travelling to see people I don't know and might not like)
E) Die a little inside.
( gareth_alien will be human again at, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:53, 21 replies)

A couple of years ago we did...
this
(stealthbanana, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:49, 3 replies)

Do nothing
...or that is what I caught one of my friends doing. Bored myself, I popped over to say hello and he was literally staring quietly at the ground. Computer was locked, legs perfectly straight, arms folded across stomach; just silently and vacantly sitting there staring into the ground.

When I asked him about this, he just said "I'm waiting to go home". It was 1:30pm.

He didn't last long, bless.
( slippery doctore, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:41, 1 reply)

Wank breaks
Awesome, especially if you feel slightly jealous of people sneaking off for cig breaks.

I've often publicly announced them too, just out of courtesy in case it takes a while and they wonder where I am.
( slippery doctore, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:38, Reply)

Improvised Assemblies
My dad was a teacher for 35 years, 30 of which were in one school. Pretty early on, he got bored of assemblies so him and a couple of mates came up with a rule by which when your name was down on the rota to do an assembly, you were not given a theme by the other members of the conspiracy until you were actually in the hall, about to get up behind the podium. Someone would just whisper 'Fair play', 'Charity', 'The importance of respecting others, etc., and you'd wing it.

They got so good, and each built up a repertoire of assemblies they were ready to give at a moment's notice, that they got away with it under 4 different headmasters for 15 years without anyone twigging.

I've always respected them for having a go at it, because I reckon if I was dropped in it like that, I would flounder completely.
(SnowyTheWereRabbit the Leporid from Hell, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:33, 1 reply)

Sweet, sweet liquor, eases the pain...
In the 6 and a bit years I've worked in the drinks industry I've devised/encountered some fantastic ways of simultaneously wasting time, and getting wasted on company time.

Here, for the purpose of wasting some more time, are a few examples:

The Tasting: Company expanding rapidly? High turnover of staff? New products added to your portfolio? Why not commandeer a room, set up a laptop with lots of 'fascinating' pictures of crumbly old distilleries, warehouses filled with oak barrels and beautifully shot photos of expensive bottles of booze? Why not then invite small groups of co-workers to taste your products, under the guise of educating about what makes them so damn special? Invite each group to spend just half an hour with you, while you wile away the entire day becoming increasingly inebriated and being paid for the pleasure.

The Perfect Serve: This one can't be repeated too often, as a new product launch, or a "re-appraisal of brand strategy" is required, but it's a fantastic way to waste a whole day, and get fantastically drunk at the same time. For this you'll need: A well stocked bar (being in the drinks industry, a colleague will be able to call in a favour for you); numerous bottles of whichever drink you're going to be making cocktails with (of course, you have cases of it under your desk already); a 'mixologist' (you'll find a colleague who's held this dubious title at some point in their career, and will be more than willing to show off their fantastic flare skills); and a willing group of tasters to accompany you on this all important venture (this is always going to be easy; you work for a drinks company ffs). You then spend the entire day making a weird and wonderful selection of cocktails, initially taking comprehensive notes on your thoughts and findings, before eventually just drinking yourself into a stupor. You won't remember which were the best. You won't really remember what you did all day, but you'll have had great fun and you'll have been paid for it too, and that's all that really counts.

Brand Education Initiatives: Friday afternoons can drag, can't they? Well they needn't, not if you decide to launch a series of deeply ineffective, badly publicised and ultimately pointless initiatives designed to give you and your team an excuse to sit around drinking for a few hours. Of course, you're doing it under the pretence of opening up the brands to the wider company. You've almost made a big deal of the whole thing. You've gone so far as to sort of ask others to join you. Christ, you very nearly sent an email to the whole company about it. Ok, so all you've really done is open some bottles of wine then sit around and discuss your plans for the weekend the latest dance craze the footy results the finer points of the wines in question. But you're being paid for the pleasure, and as we've established already, that's what really counts.

There are other, more elaborate ways to waste time here, I'm sure. Indeed, I'm sure I've indulged in as many of them as possible, but for some reason my memory of the past 6 and a bit years is slightly hazy, and there are big chunks of it missing, particularly where work is concerned.
( Moey, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:32, 1 reply)

Working in a lab
I have access to lots of dangerous but exciting things. Some of which are chemical in nature.

So anyway, a year or three back I had a project student working with me for a couple of terms. He was a bright bloke, who shared my sense of humour, willingness to be diverted from work, and mischievous streak. So one day, when my boss was away, I introduced him to the world of lab pyrotechnics.

I concocted a mixture of chemicals. I won't say exactly what they were, but one was a flammable, finely powdered metal, another was a low grade explosive and the third an oxidising agent. I stirred the mixture all together and placed a few grams of it on a small ceramic tile and placed it on a tripod above a Bunsen burner (yes, pronounced 'boonsen', for you lot who have met me) which I lit and we retired to a safe distance.

My student was standing there with his phone, recording events. A minute or so passed.

Nothing happened.

Then there was a little flicker.

About a tenth of a second later, up it went. I won't post the whole video, but here's a frame I grabbed from it, just before the screen turned white.



I do rather like being a scientist.
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:23, 10 replies)

A typical day
*arrives at theatre*

*completes daily ritual of hating the theatre pigeons and devising 403rd new and original way in which to destroy them (today - highly trained killer lions)*

*deflects all pointless and repetitive questions from Barry the Caretaker Who Is Special But Not That Special, and who has been here making coffee since 7.30am despite the place not opening until 10am*

*gets coffee*

*switches on pc*

*checks emails*

*opens the box office*

*checks b3ta and gazzes*

*opens the post*

*wonders if we should programme in a show telling the story of the Highland Clearances through the medium of shadow puppetry and interpretive dance*

*foot bounces on floor in jiggly impatient manner*

*contemplates can of mulligatawny soup on desk*

*deals with member of public who lost scarf in auditorium about a month ago (no it's not there, no I'm not going to check, we'd have found it by now)*

*wonders vaguely about running off some invoices*

*explains to different member of public that no, they can't just "go and watch" the ballet classes*

*wonders if should report to police*

*asks if the techie is up for a game of Pringles Hockey*

*Pringles Hockey not allowed in newly refurbished cafe*

*forbidden-pringles-hockey-glums*

*stares at ceiling*

*has to go sell a couple of tickets*

*then thinks, oh though, I suppose I should do those invoices*

*chews end of pen for a bit*

*gets bags of change for the cafe*

*tidies desk*

*tears off clean sheet of paper to write list of things to do*

*chews end of pen again*

*thinks, I really need a writing hat*

*builds improvised writing hat out of old theatre programmes*

*wonders if hat looks silly*

*tells the 150th person that day that no we aren't selling tickets for next year's pantomime yet*

*takes hat off as person looked at self in funny way*

*chews end of pen again*

*cleans ink from mouth*

*rearranges scarf*

*checks hair in mirror*

*gets more coffee*

*checks gazzes and b3ta again*

*wanders up to the tech box to look for nails and hammer to put up new noticeboard*

*is frustrated as there only seems to be lightbulbs, cables, and empty diet coke bottles in the tech box*

*wonders if should have used Oxford comma in above sentence*

*trips over cables in tech box due to fruitless grammatical debates with self*

*has a little cry*

*wanders back to own office*

*gets excited about delivery from Viking - ooh, office porn!*

*deflects questions about next week's chair arrangements for next week's private hire from Barry the Caretaker Who Is Special But Not That Special*

*hums a little oooh-what-shall-I-do-now? hum*

*hum turns into full rendition of Barcelona by Freddie Mercury and That Woman Wrapped In a Quilt*

*fetches new pen*

*chews pen*

*gets bored of pen, fetches pencil*

*explains to 800th person why, exactly, they can't reserve tickets without paying for them (because the system won't let me, and I don't want to)*

*sells a couple of tickets*

*herds small children out of office; politely asks mother of small children not to let them roam unsupervised; tells mother of small children that yes, there is a toilet here, and no, you can't use it, this is my office, the public ones are at the other end of the cafe*

*goes through four files to find out the precise length, to the minute, of a show that isn't happening until March because some woman wants to know as she's to cook dinner afterwards for 8 friends and their tennis partners and their tennis partners' pet tortoises*

*sharpens pencil dangerously*

*tears off another sheet of paper*

*finishes nomming coffee*

*wants another one*

*does some sort of technical related thing with splitters and sockets*

*doesn't understand*

*wonders why the can of mulligatawny soup seems to have moved by itself*

*takes random member of public round dark and empty auditorium because they've asked to see what it looks like and they want to know where their seat is before they come to see whichever show their daughter-in-law bought tickets for as a coming-out-of-hospital present after the hernia removal operation*

*wanders off to play in the tech box again*

*listens to the daily history lesson from our techie*

*learns about life in the Navy during the Napoleonic wars (ie picking the weevils out of biscuits and drinking urine)*

*helps to rehang stage curtains for show*

*regrets wearing skirt and heeled boots to work on the one day is required to go up ladders and things*

*sets fire alarm to 3-minute delay for show*

*sends audience upstairs*

*soothes ushers*

*escapes back into office for a bit*

*plays about on b3ta until show ends*

*cashes up box office*

*unsets the fire alarm*

*goes upstairs to lock up scary dark empty auditorium*

*gathers up half-melted abandoned pots of overpriced icecream*

*is sticky*

*hopes not to see ghosts whilst in state of stickiness*

*frightens self with overactive and unoriginal imagination*

*scampers to car park in the dark*

*falls over on icy car park*

*drowns in puddle *
(happylittletulip helpless and delicious, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:22, 8 replies)

Ultra-boredom
As I work by myself I spend a lot of my day alone. When there is little work on, or when I can't be bothered to do any work, I have unfortunatly very little to fill my time with. Some of the things I try are:
BBC News - good to see what's going on in the world.
B3ta - Of course. Main page and QOTW.
Wikipedia - Click 'Random article' until something pops up that I may be interested in.
Inspecting the shelves - For useful stuff that won't be missed. I work in an IT repair room with loads of spares and a section of reclaimed stuff that 'might' work. I've had a few complete PCs and upgrades, a printer. You just have to put all the parts together

My brother on the other hand (hello Si! He might be reading) works in Chichester uni. Chichester uni specialises in sport and dance. Chichester uni has lots of hotties.

It's a hard life.
( gareth_alien will be human again at, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:20, 2 replies)

I worked in my local Woolies
Straight after Uni. I was taken on as extra staff for Christmas, and put in the stockroom with the job of organising it into sections, since it was massive and everything used to just get dumped in there in no particular order.

First week: Being bright eyed and bushy-tailed, I reorganised the whole stock room, perfectly, and initiated a system (bagged chocolate over there, boxed chocolate there, light-bulbs over there, etc.) that ensured I wouldn't have to do much any more except take the odd delivery for the rest of Christmas

Second week: Hid in the back of the stockroom, drinking tea and reading the paper cover to cover.

Third week: constructed a race track in the stockroom and raced round it on a child's scooter until it broke

Fourth week: got quite friendly with the manager, who also spent long periods standing around in the stockroom drinking tea, and spent most of the week alternately discussing Championship Manager and having keepy uppy competitions with a half-inflated football

Fifth week: Chatted up one of the girls who worked on the tills. Then realised she was 16. Backed off and hid in the stockroom. Tried to fix child's scooter. no success so drank more tea.

Sixth week: Christmas rush over, quit for a (marginally) better-paid job.

Never have I done less, and spent more time just knocking about. It was dull though...
(SnowyTheWereRabbit the Leporid from Hell, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:19, Reply)

well
so far i have counted 587 holes in the ceiling tile above my head, give or take the odd eye spasm...
( rachelswipe with a fork, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:14, 3 replies)

Intel Inside
I used to work in a call centre selling hosting accounts for a small web-host outfit up north.

Once you've read the same specification for a dedicated server a million times it can get a bit tedious, so I invented the "Intel game".

Rules are simple: Each time you read out a specification and you get to a bit that says "Intel Pentium..." you have to quickly hum/sing the Intel jingle from the adverts "Dum, dum dum duuuuummm" down the phone, and then carry on as if nothing untoward had happened.

If the customer queries it tell them it's a legal requirement.
( rofl harris, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:14, 1 reply)

It's sad...
... but I've somehow managed to complete the expert level of minesweeper in under thirty seconds.

You don't get that good when your job's fascinating.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:13, 1 reply)

The Flying Party Castle
I've mentioned by brother's career in the Air Force before. He recently finished a stint flying (well, navigating) a Hercules around the place for a few years.

Having music on is unsurprising - apparently the Loadmaster gets to decide on the playlist. However, a couple of years ago, he was going to or from Basra. It happened to be his birthday. So they decorated the flight-deck with bunting and put party hats on.

Serious business, war.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:06, Reply)

Whilst working in the sweet factory
a lot of time was spent watching and waiting for the mixture to come up to temperature. Despite the managements insistence that I spend this time productively, preparing ingredients or washing tools, I preferred to amuse myself in these moments.

Being covered in fudge, and having lots of large plastic buckets at hand, I naturally began testing my ability to lob small fudge balls across vast distances into the buckets. Until, that was, management claimed I was a "bad example" to the packing drones and I should stand up straght and look busy at all times. £3.75 an hour does not spur a nineteen year old to selfless heights of production.

This was the beginning of the end. To alleviate the crippling boredom, I began making small fudge cock'n'balls' and leaving them everywhere.

Apparently, they were still finding them years later.
( baw__bag contains traces of nuts on, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:02, 2 replies)

I worked in a semiconductor plant a few years ago.
For those of you who don't know, I was employed by Zee Germanss in a factory that made computer RAM. Odds are pretty good that the RAM in the machine you're using now, if it's a couple of years old, came through the factory I was working in- we made about a quarter of the world's RAM. Pretty cool, huh? There's a good chance that the RAM in your computer may have passed through my hands at some point.

My job there was to be a Process Sustainer. My duties were mainly to be there in case something odd went on during the processing of the wafers. If a machine stopped processing a load of wafers part of the way through, my job was to get the wafers out of there, clean them up, measure the thickness of the top layer of film on them and compute a new process time for them- after all, they had partly processed, and the new time would be a lot shorter.

So if you think about it, my job was to wait around until things went bad, then fix them. This meant that, if everything went well, I sat on my ass in a cleanroom for twelve hours with nothing to do. I had no internet access, and couldn't bring anything in with me- after all, it was a cleanroom.

I got mightily bored, I assure you.

Then one night it occurred to me that I was in an ideal place to write stories. I had a computer with MS Office on it- why not put it to use?

I've posted some of the resulting stories in the OT board in the past. Go look for them if you're of a mind to.

During that time I wrote ten fantasy/sci-fi stories, all interrelated in that they were all set in the same world- a distant time in the future when people have forgotten technology and use magic in their daily lives, only what they're actually doing is using ancient technology and thinking it's magic. Some are set in such a way that it's told from the view of someone who knows it's technology, while others are presented as fantasy with demons and whatnot.

If I ever get it published, I'm going to dedicate it to my old floor supervisor with the comment "yes, Darryl, I was in fact writing a goddam book."
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Thu 8 Jan 2009, 15:02, 3 replies)

My brother-in-law won't mind me mentioning...
...the time he worked at a large research facility.

Although - being a draughtsman - his office didn't actually need it, every room had just about the same facilities which included a feed of compressed air.

Obviously, as boredom sets in, you are drawn to the inevitable conclusion: "Who can design and build the best compressed air missile launcher without killing everybody else TO DEATH?"

When they put together a contraption that actually blew a hole in the hall, leaving a large steel projectile in the car park, grown-ups came in and told them to stop.
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:58, 1 reply)

blank paper
More than a few times I have opened a blank word document, hit print, and then collected said printout from the printer from the office next door whenever I've needed a blank piece of a4.

Saves me from bending to get at the bottom drawer and makes me look productive.
(Heyzeus, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:56, Reply)

procrastination
was my favourite thing at work.
when i worked at a call center, we used to play the game where you have to put a specified word into a conversation. we got in trouble though with the word 'pineapple' when L decided to ask the customer:
"right I just need to take your place of birth, mmhmm okay im sorry i couldn't hear you then, did you say pakistan, or pineapple?" she started laughing so hard she ended up hanging up on the customer lol.
At the bowling alley no-one would tidy the toilets, so i would do that as there was hardly ever anyone in there, the floor was cool so the shoes came off, and the music wasnt overbearingly loud, so i used to go in there for 15 mins have a dance and a sing.

everywhere ive been ive tried to procrastinate, offering to do the sandwich run is always fun especially doing your best to pocket a few quid as well!
(santas_lil_hohoho is packing her vibrator suitcase, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:54, Reply)

In the 1980s I worked in a seafood shop.
So here I was, 21 years old, no car, living in a very bad area of Rochester NY (to give you an idea of how bad, it was the area that Arthur Shawcross was picking off victims from), and living hand to mouth. My place of employment? A seafood wholesaler and retailer three blocks away. My job? Run the retail store.

By now you've gotten to know what I'm like- working a minimum wage job frying fish and weighing out cod fillets for old Italian women was a bit on the stultifying side, to say the least.

A guy has to entertain himself somehow, right?

The fresh fish was kept in a case that had originally been a glass front refrigerated display from a deli. It was still refrigerated, but the boss had removed the glass from the front so customers could reach in for things themselves. The result: glass doors in the back, a metal shelf across the front with an overhanging lip, and bins with crushed ice in them and fish laid on top.

One day we got a load of Maryland blue crabs in. The body on one of these things is about the size the of the palm of my hand- not very big. You boil them, then eat part of the body and the legs. The thing about them, though, is that they're very active and very hostile.

I happened to know this, having spent some time in Maryland catching them with another kid. Apparently the boss didn't. After the crabs spent the first morning scavenging the fillets on display, they were kept confined in a box in there.

Well, so now I had a supply of pets to play with.

If you set a blue crab on the floor he scuttles sideways, typical crab style, with his claws raised threateningly. They're quick, and if they catch onto something with a claw they will not let go, no matter what. Vicious little bastards. However, if you're quick you can grab them by the back of the shell- basically by what should be their butt- and their claws can't reach you.

So what did I do? I grabbed them by the butt, let them raise their claws, then held them up to the metal lip of the case and put their claws around the edge of the metal lip and shook them. They grabbed onto the lip and wouldn't let go.

My record was eight of them strung up in a row like some sort of demented Christmas decorations.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:41, 8 replies)

Pedantry? Irony? Hypocrisy?
I like to misunderstand the question and/or completely ignore the "There's got to be more to your working day than loafing around the internet" part of the question and post about how I like to loaf around on the internet.

READ THE QUESTION.
( Mike Fishcake teamfishcake.co.uk - better than your mum's face, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:40, Reply)

Fire Trouser
At my last place of work, it got so quiet sometimes, we used to play Fire Trouser.

The aim was to fill the turnups of your co-workers jeans with lighter fluid (which we often used for cleaning bits and bobs) and set fire to it without them noticing.
(Pickettywitchfinder General, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:39, Reply)

Not me, but someone else out of an office of 200 people...
...likes to use the men's toilet and leave a little plastic cup full of shit next to the toilet roll.

It's become a thing of controversy within our hallowed centre and has kept us amused by us playing our own version of "Shit Cluedo", where we try and work out who left the turd in a cup. Well, at least there wasn't a spoon in it.
( Jeccius Steam Borderlands 2 junkie, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:34, 6 replies)

I once worked in a factory
Stories of times gone by and sexual conquests were the order of the day to pass the time. None more so than those from our Indonesian friend called John. He has quite mad and not in a "he's a nutter...lol" kinda way, he was literally quite mad. Barking actually. He would stand rooted to the spot and give all the managers the staunchest most rigid salute when you walked past. I being of senior position in the company in his eyes (possibly as I was white and spoke decent English) always received the full attention of his arm on passing by. This in itself was amusing, but was a tad embarrassing when we were taking customers round the plant or happened to walk past him at the bus stop on the high street and he'd salute and shout "Yes SIR!!" at the top of his voice.

He was, as I was informed by his sister and brother in-law who also worked at the company a commander in the army over in Indonesia. Part of his job had entailed flushing out villages and raising them to the ground. Consequently he had a few battle scars to prove it and which he was only too happy to show us. I'd rate the knife wound in the stomach as the best. The day he came to work with bandaged hands because he'd been doing some sort of martial arts training and burned himself was also quite memorable. Any sane person would call in sick when they had burns covering virtually both hands, but not our John. He insisted on coming in and refused to be given easier work. He even came to work with a broken arm once only to be sent home. He then came in the next day saying he was sick of his wife and couldn't spend any more time at home and demanded to come back to work. He then came in every day for at least a few hours, unpaid, and just hung about and swept up. As I said...Barking!

The delights of working in an air conditioned office pale into insignificance when shown in contrast to the sheer lunacy that happens day in and day out in a factory. Catching one of the storesmen wanking in an obscure back room for the second time in 2 months provided a good mornings entertainment. The stories from the 8 fingered maintenance technician reminding us not to stick our hands into moving machinery were always warmly received by the newcomers. The fact this place used to be a munitions factory in WW2 was also noteworthy as the remnants of the casting pit and 20 Ton crane were still clearly visible.

Suffice to say there was never a dull day in the factory. I am now firmly ensconced in the cocoon environment of this namby pampy world of the 9 - 5. Carpets, A/C, working coffee machines and people who are pretentiously false and nice to eachother are now part of my daily routine. These are things that did not and will never exist in my past life. I miss it a bit sometimes.
(The Archduke of South London I'm in your Girlfriend eating her organs, Thu 8 Jan 2009, 14:32, 1 reply)