h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Or the one about the (internal) servers going down for 'essential maintainance' at 00:00 on a Saturday and not being back on line until 00:00 on a Sunday I DON'T CARE!!!!!!!

emails from my boss telling me he's put an appointment in his own Outlook calendar - does he want a round of applause???????

Oh and, just because I (sometimes) wear skirts doesn't mean that I have:

1 Painkillers
2 Nail File
3 Emergency Sewing Kit
4 Throat Lozenges
5 Plasters

Your PA is NOT a walking pharmacist!!!!!

Blimey, Granny, I have all of that, except the sewing kit. I did startle a my co-workers once when a friend came into the office I was working in and I said 'what do you want, sex, drugs or rock and roll?' It turned out he wanted painkillers. We had the sex later that night.

Either I am substantially more tolerant than the rest of you (which seems unlikely) or I work with people who are less annoying than you do (which also seems unlikely) or I am the most annoying person in the office, and everyone else is avoiding me (which may well be true).

The only thing which really annoys me is unprofessionalism. My previous boss used to look at me blankly when something was a problem, and then say 'Its on the list' - I ended up saying 'Well get it off the f*****g list will you, and do the damn thing'. (This is the guy I also told 'The only reason I am not having a tantrum right now, is that I am too tired to shout at you').

Hmm, maybe they are all just scared of me!

Mwua ha ha haa ha

B

Ooooooooooo! While we are on the subject of unprofessionalism: The past two people I have worked for have openly and repeatedly slagged other members of staff off in front of me. It is REALLY uncomfortable - and no matter how much I try and discourage it it carries on. Even 'I don't think you should talk to me about this' doesn't put them off. In the end I have to wander away from my desk for a while and hope the rant has blown over by the time I get back.

If you have a problem with your staff, tell THEM, not me! Or be a better manager and resolve the problem!

A separate rant: if you buy a new mobile phone, choose your new ring tone at home. Do NOT sit in the open plan office and go through every one the phone is supplied with and try out some more from the internet. This sort of action is likely to make your usually sane colleagues want to commit murders!

k - in early again

some people have no empathy skills... - these are some of my pet hates

If you come into my office for a chat because you're bored and I appear visibly stressed and am typing away like a maniac it might be better to go away and bother someone else rather than just blather on?

Don't send me emails with nothing in the subject line - I'm supposed to assume that every message from you is important or what?

How hard can it be to turn the light off in your office when you leave? While you're at it turn your computer off as well - nobody is so busy that they can't afford the two minutes it takes to turn the thing on in the morning. And don't leave half a dozen coffee cups in your office - the reason we now have to stir our coffee with a drinking straw is because the teaspoons are scattered in offices across the building...



Feel better now...

Sprout

I worked for two years in a open plan office then I moved to where I am now and share an office with one other guy. You don't have to put up with very much that way. People knock on the door as well which means I've got enough time to ALT-TAB from hootoo to something that looks like work

Liam.

Ug Open Plan! Nearly caused me to leave my lasgt job on long term stress illness, escaped just in time, now instead of 30 I share with 3.

Open plan demands a code that I admit couldn't follow myself, you need tohave a quiet voice (mine isn't) you need to have firmly marked out "rights of way" rather than a free for all with people walking all around you.

You need to be sensible on your Group pick ups - last place if two phones were ringing, and you tried to get the one near you ()and therefore in yuor team) you frequently picked up someone on the other side of the office and in a different section and then had to be polite to the caller when you told them they may as well be speaking Klingon as you have no grasp of the other sections work.

You also need to watch you back - We got very lazy and just propelled ourselves from desk to desk on our chairs, often at great speed

(anyone seen that video clip going round of 4 lads and a lass pretending to row across the office in theier chairs (the girl is the cox) followed by a bloke on a bike?)

Anyway, Open Plan, a crime against humanity IMHO.

CH

The video clip mentioned above is at http://www.smashie.co.uk/funstuff/video/

and if that gets moderated do a google search for things1.mpe


CH

All three of them made me laugh out loud!

Thanks.

B

Strangely it is professionalism that really annoys me. People who actually think their menial office jobs are really important and harass me to produce reports and stuff for them.

I view it as our duty to do our work to the bare minimum standard to avoid the sack until the socio-economic system collapses and a new system is in place that gives workers the value of their labour.

Vive la revolution.

i have nothing to add co i don' work in an ofice, i'm still at school...but this is still a fun conversation to read
^. .^
= ' =

If you have no personal internet use poolicy at work

*Don't forward a web page from today to your boss unless this is part of your job discription

*Never leave you explorer window open while you pop away from your desk


*Make sure your screen is not observable from the bosses desk

If you get caught don't tell them I told you.

Always make sure your sound is disabled if you are viewing "dodgy" pages,

My old boss once run a file (stupid of him I know) and in a loud voice the PC shouted "Hey everybody, look over here, this guy is looking at a porn site"



CH

Get your own f**king stapler/pencils/pens!!!!!

My real bugbear is having to spend 20 minutes hunting high and low for normal routine stuff such as the above because some lazy barsteward couldn' be arsed to walk 5 yards to their own desk or acquire one of their own!

I also agree that there should be lunchtime celebrity death matches for colleagues who don't get on. I really don't care what so and so did or said to you, neither do I want to hear the opposite story from the opposing party. You're adults, go and sort it out!

I see having my pens and stuff nicked as a valuable opportunity to leave my desk to get some more.

That may be OK for the first 2000 times it happens but after that it starts to wear thin...

Going to the stationary cupboard has to be better than your work.

surely.

especially when you can get hold of such exotic items as police-style notebooks and tiny multicoloured post-it notes.

I must get out more than you

Besides, we don't have a stationary cupboard, I work in a laboratory so getting this stuff is the same as getting chemicals, glassware and the like. I have to go out of the building, across the road and into another building to get them from our stores and fill in the requisition slips.

Unless of course I buy my own stuff to get nicked...

I'm stuck in this pod awaiting in coming calls any excuse to be off line is a welcome break.

ah. requisition slips and the like.

we have a more freestyle attitude to stationary distribution. a sort of bare-fist style.