I work on a web site for a medical center. I bet I see or type the word “refer” about 15 times a day, at least. Do you think it’s bad that every single time I see the word, in my head it comes out “reefer”? Seriously, every single time.
Category: work Page 9 of 10
I compose this WOTD with some amount of rage in me. Maybe rage is a tad too strong of a word, but it’s the closest I got right now.
I think voicemail is the dumbest thing ever in the workplace. I say whenever possible you should send email. I know in some cases this is a generational thing and I should be kinder to my elders, but I don’t care because I think I am right. There are many benefits to email. 1) You have record of the message sent or received. 2) In my case I can actually see whether someone has opened or even deleted the message. 3) If important details are included in the email, you can print them out or save them in the appropriate spot on your computer. 4) When arranging meetings and such, they save time because they don’t necessitate small talk or pleasantries. You can email short messages and accomplish your task.
An illustration of number four and the cause of my rage:
I need to set up a conference call between myself and two other individuals who work at two different places. There is no point in separate conversations between us. That would necessitate me, or some other designated shlep, to act as the messenger and relay conversations back and forth. Pointless. One conference call will take care of all our needs.
I have sent out three emails requesting that the two individuals I need to speak with email me their available times for a conference call. After all three emails one of the men in question has called me back and left me some stupid voicemail with no point and, more importantly, no free times for the conference call and to top it all off, he doesn’t even leave his number.
So now I have to call this man and tell him we can’t talk but can he please just tell me his stupid free times so I can set up this ridiculous conference call.
Had he emailed me in the first place all would be well.
Stupid, stupid man.
So I recently bought some new pants from Long and Elegant Legs – a tall women’s catalog. A woman in the mail room called me to say I got a personal package from Long and Elephant Legs and would I like to personally pick it up. (I think she thought it was from a fetish store.) I thought that would be the WOTD. Little did I know.
One thing I kept from my order was a pair of black pants, which I carefully hemmed up yesterday. (Imagine that – me hemming pants up!) Then today I get in to a team meeting at work and have my feet propped up on a table when I see, to my horror, my pink underwear hanging out for the world to see.
The seam in my pants from just below the fly to the mid-section of the crotch was open. Wide open. As in even if I was just standing in front of you, you could tell. As in, if this hadn’t been a Monday morning and I had been more away, I may have noticed before walking out the door.
Fortunately for me I had a hotel sewing kit at my desk and repaired the hole. I am sure the women in the bathroom stall next to me wondered what the whoosh whoosh noise was as a I frantically sewed.
In the past three years, many things have been found in the streets near where I work:
- One dead and blackened rat on the sidewalk
- One Chuckie doll in street
- One pair of dirty underwear next to Kate H.’s car
- One used condom in the parking lot
- One dildo in the gutter
- One hair extension in the intersection by my building
- One thong near my gym
Contributed by Wonder Boy
With all the discussions lately about appropriate corporate dress codes it reminds me of a “institutional dress code refresher course” I took while working at the University of Washington. Apparently the dress code had been sliding a bit in the patient care areas as some of us were wearing exercise warm ups, cargo pants and fleece sweatshirts while taking care of patients. They had no problem with us wearing black t-shirts (it was Seattle) with our scrubs nor did they have a problem with visible Tats or piercings. They were willing to overlook these items, but their biggest concern seemed to be with underwear.
(Extracted loosely from my memory of the UWMC Official Employee Handbook).
Concerning undergarments: Underwear or lack thereof shall not be visible.
I am not sure what scares me more the verbiage “lack thereof” or the person that had to set the non-underwear precedent in order for the policy to be put in place.