# Workplace griping, anyone? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 12, 2010, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401 "2010-11-12T06:39:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 100
**Author:** ![Double\_Foolscap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85e7bf/32.png) [@Double\_Foolscap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Double_Foolscap)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2011, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1981 "2011-08-25T16:36:18Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > Dear workmate who won’t shut up about conspiracy theories - I’ve heard them all before, and you are wrong. Yes I do, in fact, know more about it than you. No, the random person you watched on Youtube is not a high ranking CIA agent. > > Shut the FUCK up. You’re missing an opportunity to double down on the crazy. Nod intently at their crap, and when they stop to take a breath, interject, “…And you know why that is?” Then accuse a random organisation. Rotary Club, YMCA, a rival college fraternity, whatever. Keep going as long as you can, and accuse them of being in on it or being close-minded if they object. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2011, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1982 "2011-08-25T16:40:22Z")
> [@Flutterby](#): > > No one else has to listen to mine, I don’t want to listen to yours! I had this battle with a couple of different people, one of whom would have their music blasting at 6:45AM. It took many complaints, but I won out in the end. And, as you would expect, I am now considered a troublemaker. ---
**Author:** ![Flutterby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Flutterby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flutterby)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2011, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1983 "2011-08-25T17:46:25Z")
> [@blondebear](#): > > I had this battle with a couple of different people, one of whom would have their music blasting at 6:45AM. It took many complaints, but I won out in the end. And, as you would expect, I am now considered a troublemaker. Of course you are! Why do you hate fun? They turned it off, thank goodness. Or maybe they closed their door. I’m one of two people in the open space and everyone else has an office with doors that close and won’t disturb anyone if they want to blast music. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2011, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1984 "2011-08-25T17:50:17Z")
> [@Double\_Foolscap](#): > > You’re missing an opportunity to double down on the crazy. Nod intently at their crap, and when they stop to take a breath, interject, “…And you know why that is?” > > Then accuse a random organisation. Rotary Club, YMCA, a rival college fraternity, whatever. Keep going as long as you can, and accuse them of being in on it or being close-minded if they object. I’d go with NAMBLA. Or UNICEF. (Sorry, I just watched the Jon Stewart clip on NAMBLA yesterday. 😃 ) ---
**Author:** ![Daerlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Daerlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daerlyn)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2011, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1985 "2011-08-25T18:36:55Z")
And . . . our engineer just got canned. That’s bad. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2011, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1986 "2011-08-25T22:06:54Z")
> [@Double\_Foolscap](#): > > You’re missing an opportunity to double down on the crazy. Nod intently at their crap, and when they stop to take a breath, interject, “…And you know why that is?” > > Then accuse a random organisation. Rotary Club, YMCA, a rival college fraternity, whatever. Keep going as long as you can, and accuse them of being in on it or being close-minded if they object. That is a really good idea, and I’m slightly ashamed I didn’t think of it. In a semi-related rant, this guy and another workmate are not speaking. No, I will not carry messages between you, this isn’t kindergarten. I will, in fact, do more work myself to avoid carrying messages, if it comes to that. Sometimes, I hate people. ---
**Author:** ![Lacunae\_Matata](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lacunae\_Matata](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lacunae_Matata)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1987 "2011-08-26T00:03:38Z")
Dear Mrs. Boss, Part Deux: If you were not a short-sighted idiot, you would learn to prioritize. Ask yourself questions like “Is it more cost-effective to ask my employee to stop what she’s doing to make (7) copies for me, or should I make my own Damned copies while she finalizes three sales contracts worth tens of thousands of dollars?” And if you chose the first option, you should probably turn in your keys and give yourself over to spoiling the grandchildren and meddling in your children’s lives. Sincerely, Me ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Girlfriend](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.girlfriend/32/193_2.png) [@Dr.Girlfriend](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Girlfriend)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1988 "2011-08-26T01:15:06Z")
**purplehorseshoe** , that is just wrong! We’ll back you up if you do choke the bitch. More training tomorrow morning, stuck with boss and branch manager again. I’m bringing my squirt gun in with me if they start gossiping through the training again. ---
**Author:** ![Sierra\_Indigo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f0a364/32.png) [@Sierra\_Indigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sierra_Indigo)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1989 "2011-08-26T01:28:35Z")
This is kind of halfway between work griping and minirants, but fuck it, I’m in here right now. Our system, it is slow. I type faster than it, I mouse faster than it, I keystroke faster than it. This means a substantial portion of my day is sat sitting, staring and waiting for the system to catch up with me. It’s not really long enough for me to go and do something else, but it’s long enough that I’ve got a lot of time to think between screens. And I don’t want to think at the moment. I’ve got a lot on my plate. So in short, fuck you system, for being slow and giving me time alone with my thoughts. ---
**Author:** ![Lacunae\_Matata](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lacunae\_Matata](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lacunae_Matata)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1990 "2011-08-26T01:32:53Z")
> [@Dr.Girlfriend](#): > > More training tomorrow morning, stuck with boss and branch manager again. I’m bringing my squirt gun in with me if they start gossiping through the training again. I recommend a cattle prod instead. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1991 "2011-08-26T03:34:05Z")
I’d be interested in seeing what kind of synergy can be experienced by bringing a squirt gun AND a cattle prod… ---
**Author:** ![Projammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/projammer/32/559_2.png) [@Projammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Projammer)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1992 "2011-08-26T03:57:50Z")
Every few months there is an email to everyone in the organization. “Suchandso Employee is no longer employed by [Organization] effective immediately.” Give us the details dammit! Otherwise we just have to amuse ourselves by making up our own backstories. ---
**Author:** ![Moonlitherial](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4bbf92/32.png) [@Moonlitherial](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moonlitherial)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1993 "2011-08-26T14:22:29Z")
Nooooooo. I was maintaining sanity because the project from hell was ending August 31st. Finally the arguing over whether issues were the responsibility of the project or sustaining would end. Today they announced - we’re extending another month. I’ll be under the covers whimpering. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1994 "2011-08-26T14:50:16Z")
DING DONG THE WICKED WITCH [del]IS[/del] WILL BE [del]DEAD[/del] NOT MY PROBLEM ANYMORE! I just got word that my incredibly frustrating, power-hungry, jobsworth, passive-aggressive manager won’t be managing me anymore as of the first of next month; not only that, but I’ll be going back to my previous manager, who was, I shit you not, my absolute \*standard and ideal \*for everything a manager \*should \*be. Hoorah! > [@StarvingButStrong](#): > > Oh, and as to stupid – not in the main sense (he did manage a college degree after all) Clearly you haven’t yet realized how little indication of someone’s intelligence a bachelor’s indicates. I’m pretty sure at least some colleges hand them out at job fairs. > [@purplehorseshoe](#): > > Did … did somebody _paint their fucking nails_ in the office suite? […] I may have to choke a bitch. Sounds more like a bitch is trying to choke _you_. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1995 "2011-08-26T14:53:23Z")
> [@Projammer](#): > > “Suchandso Employee is no longer employed by [Organization] effective immediately.” > > Give us the details dammit! Otherwise we just have to amuse ourselves by making up our own backstories. It must be policy in most places not to disclose why people get canned (legal reasons, I would guess). In my office it’s kind of ridiculous, since the conceit is that we’re all “friends and family”. One of the most popular employees got fired a while back, there was no discussion other than the boilerplate announcement. As far as I know, none of his “friends and family” ever tried to contact him in any way–it was like he never existed. ---
**Author:** ![PacifistPorcupine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@PacifistPorcupine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PacifistPorcupine)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1996 "2011-08-26T16:51:14Z")
To the IT support guy: Did you ever think that putting a script on our UAT box that makes it point to our production environment might be a bad idea? Could you at least make the names a bit more descriptive? When the correct script is called blahblahblahUAT and the wrong one is blahblahblah, Windows is going to show them both as “blahblah…” And guess what, the new support guy in this revolving door support environment is not going to know why there are two of them. He’ll just click the first one as step one of a new install and MAKE THE PRODUCTION ENVIRONMENT UNUSABLE. Thanks for the adrenalin rush, you dumbfuck. ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1997 "2011-08-26T16:54:17Z")
Thumbs up, **ShotFromGuns** , but whatever will you gripe about now? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1998 "2011-08-26T17:17:11Z")
Well, someone who left is coming back, and while we normally work together pretty well, we’ve occasionally clashed in the past because, e.g., she essentially asked me to become an expert on something and then didn’t want to listen to what I was trying to tell her about the thing I now knew a lot more than her about, because instead of requesting what she wanted from the thing and leaving it up to me how to do it, she tried to tell me how to do it, in a way that would break one of the essential functions of the thing. I think we’re past that now, though, but I could always hope it recurs! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/1999 "2011-08-26T18:20:42Z")
Sometimes I really hate doctors. I had to call SEVEN pediatricians to get a weekend appointment so my baby could get her 4 month vaccines. This is the only pediatrician who works on weekends. WTF is with the rest of them? Do they not understand that women work? Do they not get that many mothers with children are in the labor force and cannot fucking take the baby for a well baby visit at 11:30 on a Monday? What the fuck is this anyway? The 1950’s where mommy’s at home just playing homemaker all day long? I work, you creeps. I also work on weekends. Why the fuck can’t doctors do the same? Then there’s doctor number two. Just fucking renew the fucking prescription. This is not a goddamned controlled medication. This is heartburn medication for GERD. Either I take it or I get a really bad stomach ache every day. Yes, I tried changing my diet. No it did not work. Yes, I lost weight. No it did not work. The only thing that works is this medication. I do not want to discuss this bullshit with you because you have no solutions for me other than possible surgery which has a very mediocre success rate. So be a person instead of an arrogant know it all and renew it. I do not need to come in and talk to some fucking moron asshole in a white coat and explain this and pay you a goddamned fucking $20 co-pay while you take up two hours of my time in the middle of the afternoon and expose myself and my tiny baby to awful germs in your ugly waiting room. Just call the damned Canadian pharmacy and renew the fucking prescription so I can pay $50 for a three month’s supply of the medication instead of four bucks a pill that the goddamned greedy pharm companies charge. I just fucking hate doctors. I don’t need a physical. I do not need to explain my desire to not be in pain from GERD to you. I don’t need to discuss options or get into detailed bullshitting about an operation I don’t want or other medications that I’ve tried and do NOT work. I need a refill for the med that does. Just call it in and stop giving me a hard time. Your job is to stop people from being in pain not complicate their lives. I hate doctors. I just fucking them sometimes. I’ll probably have to run over to their stupid office tomorrow morning instead of making further hurricane preparations. Double screw them for making me go to one doctor while my husband takes my daughter to another one because this particular idiot practice only sees people for emergency visits. They will only do well baby visits from 11 - 3 on weekdays. Bastards. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401/2000 "2011-08-26T19:15:36Z")
Anytime I see the statistics on stay-at-home-moms, I’m shocked. Working parents of all genders have become so common that it’s easy to forget what a large percentage of the population (especially female) stops working for years, or permanently, after the birth of a child. I’ll supplement your rant with one about my DHMO. There is not one provider anywhere in my city who’s in-network and has weekend hours. Not _one_. I appreciate that my employer wants to save money on our benefit plans, thus doing a huge cost-shift last year on the premiums for our dental PPO to push us to the HMO, but seriously, dudes, I \*cannot \*afford to be taking time off work to get the checkup I so desperately need. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401.md?page=99) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/workplace-griping-anyone/560401.md?page=101)