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  #1  
Old 10-23-2008, 02:28 PM
Jodi Jodi is offline
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People Are Funny -- And Dumb

Sometimes I wonder how other people make it through the world without a keeper. .

Today I had a person call me to ask for a set of documents. I get a lot of document requests, but this person needed the documents ASAP. So I said, "Fax me the request and I'll see if I can get it done today. But my company gets hundreds of faxes a day, so make sure the cover sheet says 'Jodi Lastname' prominently on it."

This afternoon, I received the request by fax -- To: Jodi Lastname Prominently.

It's been my laugh of the day. Feel free to post your own examples of benign stupidity in your fellow men and women.
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  #2  
Old 10-23-2008, 02:31 PM
Cat Whisperer Cat Whisperer is offline
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I worked at a Subway one summer, and had a customer ask me how long a footlong sub was. I motioned with my hands; "It's about this big." with a straight face. I think people have a lot of brain farts.
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  #3  
Old 10-23-2008, 02:38 PM
Mike Fun Mike Fun is offline
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You'll like this site, then:

http://notalwaysright.com/
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  #4  
Old 10-23-2008, 02:53 PM
Maus Magill Maus Magill is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jodi View Post
Sometimes I wonder how other people make it through the world without a keeper. .

Today I had a person call me to ask for a set of documents. I get a lot of document requests, but this person needed the documents ASAP. So I said, "Fax me the request and I'll see if I can get it done today. But my company gets hundreds of faxes a day, so make sure the cover sheet says 'Jodi Lastname' prominently on it."

This afternoon, I received the request by fax -- To: Jodi Lastname Prominently.

It's been my laugh of the day. Feel free to post your own examples of benign stupidity in your fellow men and women.
Was the person dumb, or being a smartass? As a professional smartass, that sounds like something I would do.
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  #5  
Old 10-23-2008, 02:58 PM
Carl Corey Carl Corey is offline
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At my job we receive various government publications. One of them comes on CD. There was a mistake on one of the discs, so they sent us a new one. They also included an errata slip that stated the following:

"The disc you received labeled August 5, 2008 contained erroneously data."

(bolding mine)



Way to go, USPTO.


I was hoping we would get an errata slip for the errata slip, but no such luck.
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  #6  
Old 10-23-2008, 03:38 PM
corkboard corkboard is offline
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When I'm drafting revisions to a contract, I do it by hand and our admin types it into the document. There is boilerplate language that gets entered the same way every time. A number of times, I wanted to add the same boilerplate language to one paragraph that I had added to a previous section where it had been deleted.

I'd write in the margin, with an arrow where it should go: "Add Notwithstanding the foregoing...[continue with rest of section 14(C)(ii)]"

And sure enough, the admin would type it in exactly as I had written it, as opposed to typing in what I instructed. This happened on numerous occasions.
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  #7  
Old 10-23-2008, 03:41 PM
Contrapuntal Contrapuntal is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Maus Magill View Post
Was the person dumb, or being a smartass? As a professional smartass, that sounds like something I would do.
Would you do that if you needed something ASAP that normally took much longer, from someone that was a stranger to you?
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  #8  
Old 10-23-2008, 03:54 PM
Santo Rugger Santo Rugger is offline
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Originally Posted by Contrapuntal View Post
Would you do that if you needed something ASAP that normally took much longer, from someone that was a stranger to you?
Give someone their laugh of the day? Sure, why not?
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  #9  
Old 10-23-2008, 03:59 PM
Contrapuntal Contrapuntal is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Santo Rugger View Post
Give someone their laugh of the day? Sure, why not?
Hey, whatever works.
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  #10  
Old 10-23-2008, 04:01 PM
vetbridge vetbridge is offline
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I had a client last week who called to say she was unable to get the diarrhea medicine into her cat. The receptionist told her she could bring the cat and medication in and a technician would demonstrate proper administration.

Turns out she had been trying to insert the medication rectally. When the technician pointed out the label directions specifically stated "orally" she said that she thought that meant in the bum.
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  #11  
Old 10-23-2008, 04:04 PM
G1llyB4tes G1llyB4tes is offline
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Back when I was 16, me and a couple of other friends decided to skip school one day as my parents were out of town. In order to avoid getting in trouble we came up with the idea of calling the school and pretending to be our fathers letting them know we were sick.

I called first; "This is Mr B4tes - G1lly won't be in school today because he has a cold"

It worked. The others called and did the same. The last guy, Gary, called and said "Gary won't be in school today 'cause he's sick". The school secretary replied "Ok, who is this?"

Gary said "This is my father"...

Last edited by G1llyB4tes; 10-23-2008 at 04:05 PM.
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  #12  
Old 10-23-2008, 04:23 PM
Jodi Jodi is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Maus Magill View Post
Was the person dumb, or being a smartass? As a professional smartass, that sounds like something I would do.
I thought of that, actually. But she was a very earnest young minion of some (alleged) big-wig, and I gathered the tardiness was her fault and she was trying to remove her ass from the wringer. So I kind of doubt she was teasing me, though +1 to her if she was.
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  #13  
Old 10-23-2008, 04:29 PM
Skara_Brae Skara_Brae is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vetbridge View Post
I had a client last week who called to say she was unable to get the diarrhea medicine into her cat. The receptionist told her she could bring the cat and medication in and a technician would demonstrate proper administration.

Turns out she had been trying to insert the medication rectally. When the technician pointed out the label directions specifically stated "orally" she said that she thought that meant in the bum.
Poor cat...

For taking things too literally, there is always this!

Last edited by Skara_Brae; 10-23-2008 at 04:30 PM. Reason: typo
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  #14  
Old 10-23-2008, 04:42 PM
beowulff beowulff is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Carl Corey View Post
At my job we receive various government publications. One of them comes on CD. There was a mistake on one of the discs, so they sent us a new one. They also included an errata slip that stated the following:

"The disc you received labeled August 5, 2008 contained erroneously data."

(bolding mine)



Way to go, USPTO.


I was hoping we would get an errata slip for the errata slip, but no such luck.
Year ago, I worked for a company that had a particularly anal President. He got on this "transactional accuracy" kick, and wanted to impress everyone with how important being 100% correct was. One day, a memo came out of his office. Soon afterward, the same memo came out, with a note on it about how there was a mistake on the first memo, and with the transactional accuracy thing, they needed to correct it, blah, blah, blah. So, everyone stopped what they were doing, and compared the two memos. No one could see any difference. People were going around the building asking if it was a joke, or a quiz. No work got done for quite a while. Eventually, someone noticed that there was a single punctuation mark misplaced. Whatever it was didn't change the mean of the memo in any significant way. I'm sure that this impressed everyone with his skills as a manager...

Last edited by beowulff; 10-23-2008 at 04:43 PM.
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  #15  
Old 10-23-2008, 05:04 PM
Larry Mudd Larry Mudd is online now
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My wife and I were watching Mad Men the other night, and there was a brief scene showing a black elevator operator, with another black fella remarking that the service elevator wasn't working and asking if it was okay if he used the "regular" elevator.

My wife: "I'm so glad that Kennedy freed the slaves."

(She's as bright as a new penny, but history isn't her strong suit.)
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  #16  
Old 10-23-2008, 05:23 PM
mudkicker mudkicker is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by G1llyB4tes View Post
Back when I was 16, me and a couple of other friends decided to skip school one day as my parents were out of town. In order to avoid getting in trouble we came up with the idea of calling the school and pretending to be our fathers letting them know we were sick.

I called first; "This is Mr B4tes - G1lly won't be in school today because he has a cold"

It worked. The others called and did the same. The last guy, Gary, called and said "Gary won't be in school today 'cause he's sick". The school secretary replied "Ok, who is this?"

Gary said "This is my father"...
Hee hee.

A friend of mine's brother was trying to get the following Tuesday off work - this was on a Thursday or Friday IIRC. He said he would need that day off for his granny's funeral, and his boss was puzzled that the funeral was days away rather than the 2 it usually would be. Well, friend's bro said musingly, Granny's pretty sick...
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  #17  
Old 10-23-2008, 06:09 PM
truthbot truthbot is offline
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My own dear SO. He was watching "The Birdcage", spellbound. He's a huge Nathan Lane fan, BTW. The scene with Nathan's character being coached by Robin Williams' character on how to Be Butch "Men schmearrr their toast!!!!" caused the SO to exclaim "Nathan Lane is such a great actor! He's so convincing playing a gay man!!"

I had to point out to him that his screen idol, was in fact; gay.

My poor, poor SO put his head in his hands and wailed "NATHAN LANE is GAY????"

It's now official. Nathan Lane, is indeed; gay.
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  #18  
Old 10-23-2008, 06:47 PM
AllWalker AllWalker is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Skara_Brae View Post
Poor cat...
Poor cat?! This was diarrhea medicine. I feel more pity towards that poor, unfortunate woman.





Do you think she would get blowjobs and anal sex confused as well?
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  #19  
Old 10-23-2008, 07:07 PM
Danalan Danalan is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vetbridge View Post
I had a client last week who called to say she was unable to get the diarrhea medicine into her cat. The receptionist told her she could bring the cat and medication in and a technician would demonstrate proper administration.

Turns out she had been trying to insert the medication rectally. When the technician pointed out the label directions specifically stated "orally" she said that she thought that meant in the bum.
One wonders what she's been doing with aspirin.
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  #20  
Old 10-23-2008, 07:27 PM
mnemosyne mnemosyne is offline
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Some class had an exam today at school (university). Either the prof or a TA giving the exam had helpfully written the following on the board:

Quote:
START: 2:35
Finich: 3:55

Glad that university education was paying off....
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  #21  
Old 10-23-2008, 09:19 PM
Eureka Eureka is online now
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I have this great job selling popcorn, pretzels, pizza and sandwhiches to people. We also sell fountain drinks. While many of my customers appear to be frequent visitors--I'm tempted to ask one guy "If I wanted to come see you where you work, where would I look for you?"--others are grabbing drinks and such for the first time. It is apparently not obvious to all that I hand you a cup, you pay, and then you fill your own cup with your choice of Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Dr. Pepper, Diet Coke or Coke (or several others, assuming we've got syrup for them all.)

Failure to notice this does not make you dumb. Telling your friend that she shouldn't be too picky about the amount of ice in her drink may--or at least it makes you funny. Look, I don't see much point in interrupting you to explain that no, I don't care if you want Coke or Pepsi (or Red or Blue Slurpee), when just listening lets me grab the information I need from your conversation.

Making you really funny--offering me a tip. Look, this is a rare place which hasn't instituted a tip jar for minimum wage employees serving food--let's keep it that way.

Also making you funny--complaining because the Organic Macaroni and Cheese gets cooked in the microwave.

And making you dumb as well as funny--getting mad at me because I tell you that the pretzels in the display case are made of plastic, and are not intended for sale. A remarkable number of people think they are real, most don't get mad, but some do.
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  #22  
Old 10-23-2008, 09:28 PM
Harmonious Discord Harmonious Discord is offline
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Somebody at work was stamping forms that had to be photocopied with a stamp "Original Do Not Use". The stamp was to be on a removable post it note, that you could remove before copying. As it was people had to white out the stamp before making copies. The stamp was not in a place you could just cover over with paper.
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  #23  
Old 10-23-2008, 10:40 PM
Spoons Spoons is offline
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Back in the summer I was 16, two friends and I decided to head over to the local college where a number of female high school students from Quebec were staying in residence and studying on a summer program. We figured we'd try to pick up a few--they didn't know our city and we did, after all; and they were French, too. Ooh la la! (Hey, we were 16, remember. Our idea of "French girls" wasn't based on anything approximating reality.) Problem was, only one of us spoke fluent French. He was a student at a French immersion school and had spent a lot of time in Quebec, so there was no question about his French skills. He assured us he'd have no problems with the language. Or with his nerves.

So no problem; he would do the talking. But what about? We decided we'd knock on residence doors and he would ask for a match--it was the 1970s, everybody smoked, and if we had cigarettes but no light, they'd be sure to have one, right? This way, we could get a foot in the door, so to speak, in an attempt to pick them up.

So we go up to a door, all of us with unlit cigarettes. Greg practiced his phrases a couple of times in a whisper: "Avez-vous une allumette? J'ai besoin d'une allumette...." ("Have you got a match? I need a match....") And we knocked.

The door was opened by a stunning breathtakingly-beautiful young lady. "Oui?" she asked. Taken a bit aback by her looks, Greg nervously held up his cigarette and delivered his line:

"Avez-vous un ... match?"

The girl stifled a giggle. "Non!" she said, and closed the door. From behind it, we could hear much female giggling and laughing. Obviously, the young lady had friends over.

We tucked our tails between our legs and headed back, French girl-less, to our own neighbourhood. I guess it was us who were both funny and dumb that night.
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  #24  
Old 10-24-2008, 08:26 AM
Dinsdale Dinsdale is offline
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When in college I worked at Service Liquors. Our manager (The Big Cheese) was a pretty funny guy. I remember one time someone was writing out a check, and asked how to spell the store's name. TBC calmly spelled: S-E-R-V-I-C-E F-A-T-H-E-A-D.

The customer dutifully wrote it out, and only when done said, "Service Fathead!"

Funny how such a small thing can stick with you, but I can still hear the tonein her voice 25 years later.

(He got his nickname one time when he stopped by the store after having ended his shift and going across the street to tip a few. The phone rang and he picked it up genially saying, "This is the Big Cheese!" The caller said, "This is [Store owner's name] - who in the hell is THIS?!" TBC promptly hung up, and when the owner called back the guy who answered pled complete ignorance and denied the phone had rung in hours. That was a fun place to work.)

Last edited by Dinsdale; 10-24-2008 at 08:26 AM.
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  #25  
Old 10-24-2008, 06:57 PM
Jodi Jodi is offline
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I called my Dad today and told him the story in the OP. He laughed and told me one in turn. He said when he and Mom were first married, they used to hang out at a particular bar with their friends. They went often enough for the bartender to know who they were and what they drank (beer).

So one evening they walked in and took a table, and the bartender automatically sent the waitress over with two beers. My dad, an outgoing guy, smiled at the waitress and said "You must be clairevoyant!" Her response:

"No. Maybe she works the day shift."
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  #26  
Old 10-24-2008, 07:49 PM
SeaDragonTattoo SeaDragonTattoo is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vetbridge View Post
Turns out she had been trying to insert the medication rectally. When the technician pointed out the label directions specifically stated "orally" she said that she thought that meant in the bum.
YES! We switched to saying "by mouth" on the labels because of the same sort of problem!

Plus, otibiotic in the eye, and Clavamox in the ear......?!
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  #27  
Old 10-24-2008, 07:54 PM
Morbo Morbo is online now
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I still give my wife grief about this one.

A few years ago we were in Ronda, Spain, checking out the bullring that's there. I was translating for her some of the various touristy fun facts posted here and there, and I told her that Ernest Hemingway lived in Ronda and based his bullfighting book on his experiences living there. (As well as basing the "throwing people off a bridge" passages from For Whom The Bell Tolls on the bridge in Ronda where the Spanish did exactly that to the Moors).

Anyway, after telling her that, she asked me "didn't they make that book into a movie?"

Not remebering whether Death In The Afternoon was ever filmed, I said "I don't know - I don't think so."

Her response: "Yes they did - it's that silly movie that your Dad loves!"

After recovering from my spasms of laughter, I calmly explained to her that Dad's favorite movie didn't have anything to do with bulls, and was in fact about World War II.
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  #28  
Old 10-24-2008, 07:59 PM
Beware of Doug Beware of Doug is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Tech Support, Phoenix, AZ
Customer: ”My phone is broken.”

Me: “Can you please describe the problem?”

Customer: “It’s broken.”

Me: “In what way?”

Customer: “It doesn’t work.”

Me: “Do you have a dial tone? Can you not dial a specific number?”

Customer: “Nothing happens. It’s broken.”

Me: “Where is your desk?”

Customer: “Second floor, cube ***.”

(Upon arriving, I find the phone with no lights, no dial tone, no anything. On a hunch, I ask…)

Me: “Did you spill coffee in it?”

Customer: “No!”

(I grab the phone, tilt it and coffee pours out.)

Me: “Huh.” *glares at customer*

Customer: “I DIDN’T spill coffee in it!”

Me: ”Riiight.”
Customer: (beats Me to death with phone receiver)

(looks around furtively)

(bolts for fire stairs)
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  #29  
Old 10-24-2008, 09:12 PM
neutron star neutron star is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vetbridge View Post
I had a client last week who called to say she was unable to get the diarrhea medicine into her cat. The receptionist told her she could bring the cat and medication in and a technician would demonstrate proper administration.

Turns out she had been trying to insert the medication rectally. When the technician pointed out the label directions specifically stated "orally" she said that she thought that meant in the bum.
Hmm - and most women in America know that "oral" sex is practically expected of them... Get me this woman's number!
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