Hey Office Bitchknocker! Got A Problem? Come To *Me* About It!

The BBQ Pit
1

Gaaaa! You miserable, petty, fucking pool of cuntdribble!

:: deeeeep breaths ::

Ok…for reasons that are pit-worthy on their own, everyone at work is switching cubicles, but that’s not what I’m pitting.

I was told that I would not have to move, and considering the amount of viney plant life I have intertwined throughout my cube, that was wonderful news. It turned out to be a lie, but that’s not what I’m pitting.

It’s a two-day move, and even though the cubicle I’m moving into is empty, the brilliant minds behind this still scheduled me to move on the second day, forcing the person who will move into my cube to wait*****, but that’s not what I’m pitting.

What I’m pitting is one of the managers, whom we’ll call DeeDee, and her apparent problem with plant life. As you can see here, my old cube was well-stocked with plants. It’s not that I’m really that big on plants, but whenever someone who had plants left the company, I always seems to inherit them. The one to pay particular attention to is the Golden Baby Ivy stretching upward. It’s climbing a string of rubber bands that runs from my cubicle wall to the ceiling.

When I first put hung that string about six months ago, I wondered if anyone would have a problem with it. I thought perhaps maintenance would have something to say about me tacking things to the ceiling, and I knew DeeDee could always be counted on to try and flex any sad bit of authority she can manage. To my surprise, nothing outside of compliments was ever said.

Now, the cubicle I’m moving to has a large column next to it, and I thought it might look nice if I ran the ivy up the side. I stuck a few thumbtacks in the column and threaded the ivy. As I was setting this up, DeeDee watched from her cube. A couple of times I looked over at her, gave her a civil nod, and continued what I was doing. No reaction.

As soon as I finished, she leapt up and ran to my direct manager (she often leaps up and runs over to other managers – I assume she thinks it gives her an air of urgency and importance). A minute later, my manager comes over to me.

(For visualization help, imagine my manager as a nicer version of Bill Lumbergh, except he talks at a normal rate)

“Sorry Hal, you can’t do that.”

“Can’t do what?”

“Run your plants outside of your cubicle like that.”

“Well, calling that ‘outside of my cube’ is a bit of a stretch, but ok. So, why can’t it go there?”

“I know, I know…it does look nice, but DeeDee said you can’t do that.”

“Ah. DeeDee said that. Gotcha.”
(In my mind, “So, you told her that she has no fucking say in it and to cram it straight up her ass, right?” followed, but my manager is non-confrontation personified.)

"Yeah, I know, but this is her department. "
(Actually, no, it’s not – and that’s the problem. I’m part of the only group in this room that is not part of DeeDee’s little fiefdom. She manages Customer Service. I’m part of Integration, which falls under Technical Support, which was broken off from CS because DeeDee was incapable of realizing that you cannot run a Tech group the same way as a CS group.)

Now, my problem here is not so much that DeeDee is a fucking tool who can’t stand people doing their own thing. It’s that she had to scurry off and involve another manager in this. She watched the entire time I was hanging the ivy, and there was really no mistaking what I was doing. If she had simply come over to me and said “Please don’t do that”, then I would have shrugged, said “ok”, and went about my day. But geez, lady…if you have something to say to me, fucking well say it to me. Yes, it sucks that it had to come down. Excuse the shit out of me for adding a little bit of color and life to this pathetic, sterile, grey and white atmosphere of cubicledom. But I’m fine with hanging it the way it used to be – as long as you ask me, and not make a big issue of it.

So, the rubber band string is back in action in the new cube. I moved the taller plants to the other side of the cube, to create more of a privacy screen. I’m curious as to what tomorrow will bring, as DeeDee’s part of the move will shift her from sitting about 60’ away to sitting two cubes away. With a rubber band string of ivy right in front of her.

*****Actually, my moving day is officially tomorrow, but I moved much of my stuff on my lunch hour today. It’s this kind of reasonable action and initiative that DeeDee finds incredibly threatening for some sad, pathetic reason. Cuntbag.

2

I recommend adding a spider plant to your collection, and letting it run wild strewing baby plantlets all over the cube farm.

3

Wow. I hope your “manager” isn’t a SDMB member or ever finds the website…and I am so glad that I work from home. :stuck_out_tongue:

4

It looks far better on the column than it does hanging in midair. I also agree that waiting until you’d finished the job was particularly crappy of her. People like this are the people that make me wish I could work from home, too.

5

You need to take attitude lessons from this guy. He’s have DeeDee’s eyes in a bottle right next to his monitor if she pulled that.

6

I recomend spiders. In her keyboard.

7

Wow! You’ve got a veritable jungle there. Wonder how long it will be till DeeDee throws a fit about that, too.

8

Oh and Hal Briston, don’t forget those TPS reports. DeeDee needs them on her desk by 9am. :slight_smile:

9

Uhhh, yeah. I’m going to have to disagree with you there, Hal. We all like plants, but those are beginning to get a little bit out of control. So if you could, you know, go ahead and keep your plants from crawling up the architecture, that’d be greeeeaaat. :wink:

But seriously: I think running plants up and down pillars is stretching office etiquitte a bit far. I don’t think it matters one whit whether, when you were stringing up your plant, you looked, winked, nodded, gesticulated, or even made funny arm motions to DeeDee, the alleged bitch in this case. I don’t think you make a very strong case that her silence during your mime-gardner routine in any way prevents her from complaining about one worker’s personal mission to turn the office into a greenhouse, or however she might complain about it using her own terms.

If you had reason to believe that she, or any other coworker, would have a problem with doing a little interior decorating in the office, I think it would have been polite of you to ask your coworkers whether it would be okay to get a bit creative with your pet plants. Yes, she would have been better advised to take her complaint right to you, but you also could have opened your mouth and asked if she had a problem with what you were doing, rather than waiting for her to make the first move.

10

She tattled on you? What, is she 10? :rolleyes:
I suggest using those rubber bands to shoot at her head whenever her back is turned.

11

Understandable position, Ravenman. However, I filed this under “better to ask for forgiveness than permission”. If I were to go to DeeDee and say “Even though you and I have a long history of butting heads and flat out don’t like each other, I’d like to make sure you don’t have a problem with me tacking a vine on that column” (well, perhaps not the first part), there is no way it go off. She’s made enough of a reputation for herself in the company for pettiness that she wouldn’t bother considering it. To her, it would simply be an opportunity to say “no” to someone.

I knew no other coworker would have any problem with it – they’re generally a good bunch of folks, and most knew of the idea well before the fact. I simply rolled the dice that DeeDee would be busy on an actual work matter and not concern herself over this.

12

I’ve never understood the antipathy toward plants that so many managers seem to have. I’ve been told at three different jobs that I have “too many plants” in my cube.

:confused:

It’s not like I had three hundred stapelias or titan arums sitting on my desktop stinking like the drainage canal at the abbatoir. They were all foliage plants, and there were something like FIVE of them. They were sitting in a pretty little arrangement on a piece of desktop real estate that I never used, so they weren’t taking up important space. It took me all of fifteen minutes a week to actually tend to them (watering, removing dead material, checking for problems), so they weren’t a time sink (and if I were doing this on my breaks, it’s even more irrelevant). But there were “too many plants”.

I do seriously think a major part of corporate/civil service employment mindset is a dedication to preventing any employee from actually enjoying their job.

13

Without addressing the complaint direction issue, I should mention that an ivy plant climbing up drywall/plaster would stain the surface pretty quickly. The ivy may look nice for a while, but I don’t think the brown leaf stains upon removal of the plant would be quite as appealing…

14

At the one and only office job I ever had, we were not allowed to have “items of a personal nature” displayed on our desks. This meant, obviously, family photos, but also personalized knickknacks, goofy little toys and yes, plants. :rolleyes:
This rule did not apply to the owner of the company.

15

That’s no fun. I’ve been fortunate to have pretty cool bosses at my current job (bosses - two branches, Atlanta and Houston). I have a Happy Bunny sign book on my desk at work (facing me). I’m moving to a new job in 2 weeks. It hadn’t really occured to me that my sign book might not be welcome, though that’s certainly a possibility considering the content. I hope they let me keep it…

16

What you need to do is chop the ivy into little foot long pieces and root them into a zillion more ivy plants. What you’ll lack in verticality, you’ll make in volume. Then give 'em to everybody and let’s see her cope with all the people she used to tattle to, having an ivy from the mother plant themselves. Ha!

Or wipe boogers on her chair.

17

As midget notes, ivy has an unfortunate tendency to discolor and damage the surface it’s growing against, particularly when it’s as soft and porous as your typical office drywall, which I assume describes the column. The rubber band stringer is, I think, a cool and clever alternative, that will spare the facilities people any worries about replacing a section of sheetrock.

Doesn’t excuse the crappily juvenile way DeeDee chose to handle the issue, of course. There’s a legitimate issue to be raised, and instead she reverted to the fourth grade. I’m just sayin’.

18

:smiley: Ashes[sup]2[/sup], you’re brilliant!

The really cool thing is, if you have lots of little ivy plants, soon they’ll all be big ivy plants, and they’ll be growing up the walls, and you can have a solid wall of green all the way around the cubicle.

Hal B., it’s too bad you have to work with passive-aggressive plant-hostile bitches. We have a very plant-friendly office (one of my co-workers has plants strung all around her cubicle). I’d go nuts if I couldn’t have any plants or personal stuff on my desk.

19

Um, pardon my cluelessness here, but I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a “sign book” in an office. What is it?

Is it:

a) astrologically related? (“July 21-August 20: Do not show this book to the boss, or you will not be a Happy Bunny for long.”)

b) a book of ready-made signs for the office? (“Happy Bunny says this printer is out of order!” “Happy Bunny invites you to break room at 3:00 pm for donuts.” “Be a Happy Bunny! Flush!”)

c) what is more universally known as a “guest book” or “register”? You know, name, date, time, person seeing, and like that?

Jus’ wonderin’, is all…

20

Beware of Doug, I believe this is the item in question.