When I was a senior in high school, I had a Calculus teacher that seemed to favor the “in-crowd” which, in my school, included the jocks and the teachers’ kids. When hands were raised, they would always be called on first.
A couple of my friends and I were getting pissed that our questions weren’t getting answered, since he spent the class answering the other kids’ questions. One day, the three of us decided to bring in bandanas to wave in the air, instead of merely raising our hand when we had a question.
My two friends chickened out, but at one point during the class, I started waving my bandana. Of course, I was called on because, really, who waves a bandana? Mr. Smith (yes, that’s his real name) said, “Yes, Krista”. I then put my hand down and said, “Just checking” with a smirk on my face.
He was confused, but it cracked my friends up. And that’s really what it’s all about, isn’t it?
I once told my supervisor that Company X’s managers were idiots. In front of the entire classroom full of proto-tech workers. He was not happy.
Flash forward 2 months later -> Company X stupid managers, after making themselves into a walking carpets for a certain ISP-which-shall-remain-nameless- lest-they-fire-me-because-they’re-pricks for years and years… lost the contract because they’re too expensive! Heh. I told you…
Nucs are the Navy personnel who operate the nuclear power plants on subs, carriers, and in the past cruisers. Hyman Rickover, who was a character himself, set up the program so that being right mattered far more than whatever rank of the disputants involved. To give you an idea, normal military protocol doesn’t normally involve telling the watch officer what orders to give. As a nuc, I did that regularly, and was expected to do it.
Yeah, but only when they were wrong, and you knew where in The Book to refer them, and were respectful about it. Sure, kidding around was allowed, but being a dickhead when just being sarcastic would do was frowned on.
Several years ago I had a boss that decided to make my life a living hell. He was noisy, obnoxious, and less than professional on more occasions than I care to count. I was the scapegoat for something that entirely out of my control and I paid dearly for it. I had warned my superiors (hah!) on several occasions that things were going to hell in a handbasket, but I was ignored until stats started coming in from PERSCOM. This boss had found his target, and it was me.
Whenever he wanted me for something he would belllow down the hallway, “L-U-U-U-CY! LU-U-UCY,” just like Ricky Ricardo used to do on I Love Lucy. I was a mere GS-4 and he was a Captain. I guess he thought he was being funny. First of all, Lucy is not my name, secondly, you just had hear how he did it to realize how annoying it was.
So, after nearly a year of this and other various tortures, he proceeded to bellow down the hall for me. To which I replied, in my best Lucy voice, “Ricky, Ricky!”. Ricky was not his given name either, and he was big on the ol’ respecting officers and addressing them with their proper title and such. His daddy was general, yada, yada, yada. Needless to say, he didn’t much care for my response. On the other hand, he never did that to me again.
My first real job was at a mini-mart. I always was stuck working with the assistant manager from hell. He thought we was God’s gift to women. His nametag read Robb/ASS MAN, and was very proud of it.
His perverse joy was to have me shelve- which involved reaching high up to bring product down. Often I would glance over to see him ogling my ‘assets’. He couldn’t bring the stock down because he was (and probably still is) too short to reach the shelves.
One night, as we were closing, he asked me if I liked older men (I was 17, he was 34). I replied that I did, but had a strict policy about dating munchkin rejects. I walked away singing “We represent the Lollipop Guild…”.
In '96, my auto plant opened a satellite body shop, all new and shiny and state of the art meaning vendors and company muckamucks of all stripe came to visit. Sadly, my foreman kept removing all my “Do not feed the workers” signs, it really did feel like being a zoo animal on display half the time.
Until they got all the various bugs worked out of the new system, we were running slower than winter sap and bored silly. The company calls for a huge plant wide meeting, congratulating us all on our hard work during the launch and spending nearly an hour on safety issues. Vendor X is out with a broken leg after stepping in an automated area and getting caught, employee Y didn’t lock out some equipment during maintenence and got their hand crushed, numerous near-misses with forklifts and other in-plant vehicles, but mostly they hammered us on being outfitted with required gear (safety glasses, full body coveralls, hearing protection, gloves) for our work environment. The big message was to look out for your fellow workers as well as yourself, your shout might be the alert that saves a life, blah blah.
Later that afternoon I’m caffeine buzzing on all the free pop I drank during the meeting, and lo and behold here comes another group of lookielookers. Except these aren’t corporate folks in business attire carrying clipboards, this group includes teenagers and they’re dressed in sandals and shorts. Well, I listened at the meeting so I cheerily introduce myself and offer to find them hearing protection, glasses and coveralls.
We weren’t even running production at that moment, so they weren’t in a lot of danger or anything but the unfinished edges on all our sheet metal will slice you before you even realize you’re touching it, seeing all those bare knees and elbows is a big no-no.
The fella who appears to be the leader looks at me like I’ve grown a third eyeball in my forehead and barks “no thanks” at me, but I stupidly persisted. I explain the hazards involved and repeat the plant manager’s remarks about safety being a group thing and again offer to assist them. They back away slowly like they’re afraid I’m gonna charge or something, I shrug and go back to my station.
Fifteen minutes later my boss comes running up asking “Did you really just tell the Vice-president of the company and his family that they had to get coveralls on?!”
Oh, is that who that was? :smack:
The next day all 3500 employees got handed a memo about what safety requirements plant visitors did and did not have to follow.
Years ago, I worked at the main warehouse for Waldenbooks. This was while they were still owned by K-Mart, and in the beginning it was a great job, but once K-Mart started losing money, things rapidly started going down hill. All kinds of insane policies were handed down, only to be rescinded a short time later. To make matters worse, the shift manager was one of these sleazy bosses who did everything he could to make himself look good, while simultainiously screwing you over. He’d never hand out bad news, he’d always pick one of his underlings to do that. He’d come down hard on you for stopping by the bathroom on your way back from break, but he’d spend as much time as possible in the break room smoking. He bragged that he’d never read a book in his life. He also violated company policy by running a betting pool, and a lottery pool on company property with many of the rank-and-file employees.
One night there was a group of us who were in what we called “the crew.” We worked an odd-ball shift, and we worked. We busted ass in our department, and then moved on to other departments to finish up their jobs when they couldn’t do it. We were tight knit and grizzled in the sense we knew when we were going to get screwed by the company and we weren’t afraid to let the higher ups know in no uncertain terms we were on to them and we weren’t happy about what they were doing. We’re sitting in the breakroom, smoking, when the shift manager, Tom, comes swaggering in. He booms out loudly, “Who wants to bet when my baby’s born?” (His wife, a former employee, was unashamed gold digger, who married him because he had a good salary and was thought to be on his way “up.”) I was in a cranky mood, and didn’t want to hear him bragging about his kid to-be, so I turned and shouted just as loudly, “Who wants to bet that you’re the father?”
Amazingly enough, he took it well. I only had to spend a week watching my ass to make sure he didn’t catch me making a mistake, instead of the usual month.
This is the only one I can think of right now. The problem is, I think a lot of smartass remarks, but I can never remember if I actually said them.
I was in Algebra II class, and we were supposed to write down some numbers. I wrote them down, but for some reason, my teacher didn’t believe them.
Her: Write the numbers down.
Me: I already did.
Her: Write the numbers down.
Me: I already did.
Her: Rand, write the numbers down.
Me: I already did woman!
All my friends in my group had the look of trying not to laugh and complete shock. My teacher was surprised, but not more so than I was. I spent the next few moments thinking, “Crap, crap, crap, crap.” And then trying to figure out how I was going to talk myself out of it. Luckily she just walked away. Then the entire group roared with laughter.
Years ago, I bought out the stock of a pottery shop that was going out of business. I really didn’t know what I was going to do with all those gaudy Mexican pots and concrete yard ornaments but it seemed a deal too good to pass up.
I filled my barn with the stuff and started hanging out at barter fairs and swap meets all over the northwest.
I was sitting in my lawn chair next to my wares displayed on a trailer at a barter faire, when a cop patrolling the area perused my goods on the other side of the trailer.
I couldn’t help myself, “Heeyy man, you wanna buy a leetle Mexican pot?”
He was not amused and practically ran around the trailer and demanded that I dump the contents of my pipe out, despite the obvious fact that it was merely filled with tobacco.
You spend a great deal of time counting when you run a movie theatre.
The cups are counted at the begining of the shift.
They are counted at the end of the shift.
The results are compaired with ingredients ordered/used. Any wild varience is a red flag.
One day, after our bi-monthly audit by the manager of another theatre, one of the owners stormed in, waveing the audit forms. We were off. A lot.
He was foaming at the mouth, demanding results. I took his audit, compaired it with mine, calmly went to the back room, got a case of small soda cups (2500 count) and droped it at the bosses feet. “Judy counted these small soda cups.”
I went back to the stock room and returned.
Second case of cups thuded on the first
“…and these are the ones she missed…”
“Tell her, next audit, if she needs to count beyond ten, take her socks off!”
