My cube is not the supply cabinet

The BBQ Pit
1

My job entails mailing a lot of materials. I have regular letter sized envelopes and plastic UPS packs at my desk because I need them on hand. Coworkers are constantly coming by and “borrowing” those materials because they know I have them and my cube is closer than the supply cabinet. (In their minds, anyway, sometimes it’s further. I guess they like chatting with me!) This is annoying, but not nearly as annoying as people coming by for supplies I don’t freaking have. A conversation I have had lo, these many times:

Coworker: Kyla, do you have any cardboard UPS envelopes?
Me: No.
C: No?
Me: No.
C: Why not?
Me: Cause I don’t use them.
C: You don’t…use them?
Me: No. I only have the stuff I need on hand.
C: Well, where are they?
Me: I don’t know. The UPS supply drawer?

They leave and come back a minute later.

C: We’re all out of the cardboard envelopes!
Me: Yeah?
C: Can we get more?
Me: I suppose. Why don’t you ask the office manager to order some?

That’s right! I have a bunch of packing materials at my desk and yet I am not responsible for making sure you have your materials! That’s not my fucking job! If you want it, take some initiative and talk to the office manager about getting it in the office. I’m not your goddamn babysitter.

The conversation I just had, though, totally tops this.

Coworker: Do you have any legal sized envelopes?
Me: No.
Coworker: No?
Me: No. I don’t use them.
Coworker: I guess I’ll go look in the supply cabinet. And I’ll bring some back for you!
Me: Why? So I can keep them on hand for you next time you want them? Because my cube has an invisible sign that only you can read that says “Office Supply Cube, Please Ask Kyla About Any And All Packing Materials You Might Need”? Yes, please! Bring me your envelopes!

Wait, no, what I actually said was more along the lines of “Thanks, but don’t bother, I don’t need them.”

Also, stop stealing my pens, jerkwads!

And I have a toothache and have to go to the dentist. I hate going to the dentist.

2

I don’t envy your position. But surely there is a way to turn this around and have some evil fun with your co-workers. Sounds like you’ve already figured that out. Have at it! Do it with a coureous smile, and you’ll probably enjoy it even more!

3

I don’t know if this would work. If I started smiling courteously at my coworkers they’d probably have an intervention.

4

I think the worst incident of office theft that I’ve seen was when my pen was stolen. Yes, in fact, my name was engraved in gold on it.

5

A few years ago when I was the AP file clerk at my company, everyone seemed to think that if they needed a FedEx envelope or some pens, they’d come to my desk. Pissed me off to no end, so I know exactly where the OP is coming from. Lazy ass fucking bastards and bitches.

6

I once went to the supply drawer and grabbed three boxes of pens. That’s something like 45 pens, give or take. The person sitting at the desk near there scolded me for taking too many pens, telling me that I wasn’t leaving any for anybody else. “Just you wait”, I told her. Sure enough, by the next day, every single pen had been taken from me.

7

What I’d do is tell them to wait and I’ll help them out as soon as I’m finished with what I’me doing. Then ignore them as you go about your work. It would be real good if you have to make some phone calls and you can stretch them out a bit.

8

One of our vendors gave everyone in the office these nice pens with their logo on them. Since our rep with them is working temporarily out of our office, if you didn’t get one, she’s here and you can ask her for one. I came in one morning to see that someone had stolen my pen - leaving the cap on my desk. If they had just stolen the whole pen, I would have assumed I misplaced it, but leaving the cap was just too much. “Look!” they say “I took your pen! Hahahaha! You’ll never find out who I am!”

Yeah? Well, I watch CSI. I’ll catch you one day, pen-stealing fucker.

9

OMG GOD, a new guy, whose name I don’t even know, just came by looking for envelopes. Someone freaking told him to come talk to me! AHHHH! I told him to look in the supply cabinet. “But they’re all locked,” he points out. Which is true. The office manager keeps the keys. But all you have to do is ask her for them! Which is, in fact, normal supply retrieving procedure! But why why why do that when you can come ask me for your packaging supplies?

I’m almost the point of sending out an office-wide email. But I have a tendency to be awfully direct in my office-wide emails and have gotten in a little trouble in the past for it.

10

Perhaps you could ask the office manager to send out an email for you saying to come to him/her instead of you?

11

I tend to chew on my pens, so if I’ve used a pen more than once, it will have tooth marks and the end or cap will look rather nasty. Nobody ever steals them.