Society & Culture Strange people you have worked with

[Sterge]

I used to work at a supermarket

there was a lady there who had apparently been there about 30 years and for 29 and a half years had been 'dieing of cancer' this was well before my time and everyone felt sorry for her until one day she let slip to someone that it was all a lie.
Used to blacken out her eyes with makeup and claim it was the cancer meds that gave her black eyes and not makeup (until she would forget it some days) and used to go in for regular brain surgery at hospital but be back at work the next day.

at the same place not so much weird he was a nice bloke worked former collingwood best and fairest Wesley Fellowes not so much a weird bloke just weird an ex afl player doing casual night shift at a supermarket

 

[ioppolo]

Back when I was at Subway, I swear one the guys a bit older then me would have a crackpipe before work and then one at break. Self explanatory really.

 

[emuboy]

She was a great example of why simply working hard doesn't make you a good manager.

This reminds me of something at a place I worked at years ago.

A girl joined the company who was a great acquisition - she successfully held two different positions over about two and a half years, and was faultless in both of them. Polite, friendly, helpful, impeccable at her job and in her work habits, when a promotion to supervisor became available, it was understandable that she was the successful applicant.

Almost overnight, her personality changed to sullen, rude and at times downright aggressive. She struggled with every facet of supervision, and while approaching her before was easy, I found myself filled with dread every time I had to ask her something. Fortunately, I personally didn't report to her, but I felt sorry for the staff who did, although her attitude was no different to her own superiors, clients and other staff. It was like she had permanent PMS, and when she left, I think everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

This was a strange case in that here was a young woman who had the work skills, qualifications, experience and personality to succeed, had demonstrated these qualities at the same company in two different positions over a reasonable period of time and yet was an abject failure when promoted to a supervisory position.

Tales of staff not living up to what they display at the interview or on their resume are common - the nice girl at the interview who turns out to be nasty when actually hired, the young graduate male teacher who is too laid back and would rather be kicking a football or mucking around with his students than teaching them, or the person who simply doesn't work out at a company - but this example defied explanation.

Maybe some people just aren't cut out to be supervisors or managers?

 

[Caesar]

Maybe some people just aren't cut out to be supervisors or managers?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Principle

 

[Ed_Gein]

maybe she wasn;t cut out to handle the pressure of being a leader. or, she could have had instructions from above to show assertiveness in a way. and of course that not being natural to her, took it too far? i dunno. in saying that, most that i've worked with that have gone through a promotion have generally been the same.

 

[Flawed Genius]

Excellent thread.

I am the youngest employee at my place of work (19) by roughly 10 years of age, and the oldest is a full 59 years older than I am.

The oldest guy there is a 78 year old Yugoslavian (I think?) gentleman. He's worked in the same job for about 40 years, and at this stage he's been expressively told to either take some time off or retire. He simply smiles at upper management every time and says "yes, Jimmy work" and then wanders back to the office. The job does require some physical activity and being 78 all the parts aren't exactly in tip top shape so he's a little slow. Then we find out that his knee is pretty much bone on bone and he only travels from the western suburbs to the south eastern suburbs of Melbourne via public transport every day because he doesn't want to spend time with his wife. I'll reiterate, he is 78 years old with a bone-on-bone left knee and hasn't retired because he hates his wife. Dedication to the cause.

He also refers exclusively to himself as "Professor", and when he wants to say something he throws his hands in the air and goes "Professor Jimmy talk!" then starts talking. His term of endearment for everyone in the office is "you bastard", or "chabanno (sp?)" which apparently means "goat-herder" in Greek or Italian. Apparently I am a "very good boy" because I say hi to him every morning, more out of absolute terror than anything else.

Among other characters in my office are the slightly overweight (read - 120kg) Greek gentleman with a ponytail and a penchant for downloading anything he can possibly get his hands on off Piratebay. This includes four separate conspiracy theory books, which he wanted to give me on a USB, and some movies that were probably not what you would call legal, exactly. He also has some fantastic stories about drugs/alcohol/fighting/Melbourne's underworld in the 80s. His favourite topic is brought into light whenever the papers run something on banning the ownership of pitbulls. He reads the paper and the anger ripples through him, you can literally see it. "Those aren't even ****in' pitbulls! They're not! They're ****in' not. I swear. These papers are full of s**t. I've been breeding them for years and they're not even ****in' dangerous!"

Our office has one seat hidden from view by the door, and the corridor directly outside it gets a ridiculous amount of traffic. That one seat's referred to as the "sleeping" chair. Now our office is not what you would call large or spacious, and we're low down on the food chain, so we get our office painted once every sixteen years. That fact became disgustingly apparent when Frankenstein (as he is called) sat in the chair every day for a couple months and proceeded to nod off for a few minutes, cumulatively about an hour or two a day, with his head resting against the wall.

He'd get woken up to go do a job, and he'd come back and resume the position. At the end of the month there was a 1cm thick film of his hair/grease/grime/dirt/filth where his head had been resting against the wall that had built up over time. He also is the slowest worker in the office, hence the nickname - he once, memorably, took twenty minutes to go deliver a message to someone in the next room.

But all this pales in comparison to our weekend staff. I hate these ****ers with a burning passion. I'm a casual employee so I work when I'm told, and we're generally short on weekends so I have to come in and do some shifts, which I don't mind. However on a Sunday, the roster looks something like this:

7:30a - 4:00p (Gentleman A)
8:30a - 5:00p (Gentleman B)

11:30a - 7:30p (Me)

1:00p - 9:30p (Gentleman C)
2:30p - 11:00p (Gentleman D)

Now C&D are two unbelievably pleasant Islander guys. One's about 25 or 26 and a huge Pies fan. Has a couple kids. The other one's older, supports the Suns, and likes to say hello by breaking your collarbones. But they're both hard workers, get the work done with a smile and don't get in anyone's way. They're both able to be found whenever you need them, which is important in our job.

A&B have been doing the same shifts on Sunday for a good 20 years. They're so deeply ingrained in their routine that it's second nature to them. A particularly good story that has been told to me since I started at the job was that B (who is Frankenstein) was rostered off the Sunday shift accidentally. The person who was rostered on the 8:30 shift turned up, only to find B already there. When confronted about the fact that B wasn't rostered on, he actually got aggressive, and said "This is my shift mate! It has been for 14 years and it won't change now, alright!? Call who you've gotta call but it's my shift and I'm not going home!" The replacement guy just went home and called the boss who apologised and told him never to turn up on a Sunday again, just in case.

Anyway. Gentleman A is the biggest waste of a uniform I've ever come across. For a start, he only has one. Legend goes that the shirt he's wearing on any given day hasn't seen a washing machine since the dinosaur age, which is backed up by the sweat patterns that have been formed in the same places so many times that the shirt is almost tie-dyed with his dried sweat. He smells, he always has one corner of his shirt untucked, and he's got a permanent look of bewilderment on his face. Coke bottle glasses, and runners either with the tongue hanging out or his big toe poking out the bottom of them.

When summoned, if he's available, he trudges over, stands there with arms outstretched and looks at you like a puppy that has just been hit on the nose with a newspaper. When I first met him when I started, I almost spat my morning coffee in his face with incredulity when he opened his mouth for the first time because the noise that came out of his mouth was so pathetic and downtrodden. He legitimately sounds like the world has taken a giant steaming **** on him every morning for the last 20 years.

And despite all of that, I cannot feel sorry for him. The reason is because in our job as I've previously mentioned, you need to be available to be found at all possible times during your shift as there's almost always work to do on a weekend. He is almost impossible to find on weekends. He turns up, mutters hello, and then simply disappears. There's much discussion about where he goes, and some have actually tried to follow him, only to be accosted with questions about "why you're following me". Popular consensus has it that an employee in another department went downstairs for a smoke once and found him in the basement, on a gym mat, absolutely thrashing out pushups.

He constantly questions everything you do as well. I remember once I hadn't worked a shift in a week and turned up on a Sunday to do a late shift. He was there, and I walked through the door and it was open season. "Orrh, hey mate, howyagoin? Uni good? How's everything? How's the weather been, geez? *bead of sweat falls off his nose* Yeah you watch the footy last night? Cracker game wasn't it *shuffle* I bet you're loving being on holidays" and so on and so forth. He doesn't allow enough time between his questions for answers so it's one long blast. If you're ten minutes late (which happens occasionally), he jokes when you turn up about "sending out a search party *sad giggle*". I've had to physically restrain myself from abusing him for that one about four times.

So in short, his hygiene is absolutely appalling, he's total s**t at his job, I'm convinced he's only still standing because he has the same shifts every week and quite probably doesn't need to think for himself anymore, and is possibly the world's greatest sad sack.

If you've made it this far I apologise for the longevity, but good on you.

 

[Groggyk]

Welcome to the wonderful world of Public Health, FG.

Enjoy the next 15 years.

One guy I had as a co worker for many years used to go missing for hours at a time whilst on duty in the Operating Theatre. Activities ranged from running the tan, plowing his bit on the side on his mates couch to skipping down to the market for a spot of shopping before magically reappearing with some steaming South Melbourne Market dimmies in tow.

A genuine character.

 

[Flawed Genius]

Welcome to the wonderful world of Public Health, FG.

Enjoy the next 15 years.

One guy I had as a co worker for many years used to go missing for hours at a time whilst on duty in the Operating Theatre. Activities ranged from running the tan, plowing his bit on the side on his mates couch to skipping down to the market for a spot of shopping before magically reappearing with some steaming South Melbourne Market dimmies in tow.

A genuine character.

How did you know? And I'm telling you, there's no ****ing way I'm working in this job for the next 15 years. It'll get me through uni though.

 

[Groggyk]

How did you know? And I'm telling you, there's no ****ing way I'm working in this job for the next 15 years. It'll get me through uni though.

The dudes you described scream cleaner/orderly, public hospital.

Some new Australian background, throw in a little/lot of weirdness, shabby appearance, add a dash of shift work odd hours, mix with a severe lack of social skills and long service with an inability of management to move em on.

Recipe = public health service s**t kicker.

 

[Cruyff14]

This thread is brilliant.

 

[psychobrown]

Sadly, I may be the strange person my co-workers have the displeasure of working with.

 

[Full Wingspan]

Brilliant thread, has deterred me from my studies for a good hour.

After reading about poster's experiences with colleagues, I can conclude that if we were to combine all of these workplaces into one, we would have a similar organisation to Swift n Shift Couriers.

 

[raskolnikov]

I worked with, and also shared a house with a guy who was into dianetics. Some of the things he said were absurd. He also refused to watch, listen to or read any form of media, saying that they were gossipmongers, which I find it hard to disagree with but that's taking it a bit far.

 

[entourage]

Worked with a bloke a few years back. Straaanggest dude, top guy though. He would always rabbit on about crazy theories and how he was apart of this spaghetti man religion or some s**t. Tried importing and selling steroids and asked me if i wanted any. No thanks pal!
On his last ever shift at work he was given a flask-sized bottle of jim beam or something to that effect, smashed it down and drove home on his motorcycle (lived about an hour away). Kept in touch with him for a couple of months after he finished up at my work and then BAM disappeared off the face of the earth. R.I.P messages all over his myspace wall, couldn't contact him...Called his home phone one day and to ask for him, his mum said he was asleep and well.

End of story.

 

[Igloo]

Worked with a bloke a few years back. Straaanggest dude, top guy though. He would always rabbit on about crazy theories and how he was apart of this spaghetti man religion or some s**t. Tried importing and selling steroids and asked me if i wanted any. No thanks pal!
On his last ever shift at work he was given a flask-sized bottle of jim beam or something to that effect, smashed it down and drove home on his motorcycle (lived about an hour away). Kept in touch with him for a couple of months after he finished up at my work and then BAM disappeared off the face of the earth. R.I.P messages all over his myspace wall, couldn't contact him...Called his home phone one day and to ask for him, his mum said he was asleep and well.

End of story.

Flying Spaghetti Monster. It's serious business.

 

[Rockford]

R.I.P messages all over his myspace wall, couldn't contact him...Called his home phone one day and to ask for him, his mum said he was asleep and well.

If he did indeed pass away then at least we can all take solace that he's enjoying the beer volcanoes and stripper factories in heaven with the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

 

[Simple Jack]

He would always rabbit on about crazy theories and how he was apart of this spaghetti man religion or some s**t.

We Pastafarians are a kind and accepting religion. No need to degenerate us.

Hail the mighty Venganza.

 

[entourage]

Hahahaha that's right, he told me about what it looked like but never saw it-classic. Cheers guys.

 

[ioppolo]

Flying Spaghetti Monster. It's serious business.

Am I missing something here? Is this a serious proper religion or a piss take?

 

[Flawed Genius]

To add to the ever-increasing weirdness, I did a shift yesterday. For some reason, the topic of how hard it must be to become a male pornstar came up.

Then, the lovely Maori guy I mentioned in my previous post pulls out a little Ziploc bag and hands it around so we could have a look.

6 little blue pills. Of course they're Cialis pills, which I'm led to believe are the Grandpa of Viagra. Don't ask me how he got them or why he had them at work.

 

[The Passenger]

Am I missing something here? Is this a serious proper religion or a piss take?

 

[Feerits Elf]

Ever since then have noticed some weird s**t. Often he asks one of the girls for help and when they are leaning over his desk using the keyboard he has a big sniff of their hair. He noticed me catch him one day and gave me a wink. The funny thing is how much the girls think he is a nice guy lol

Anyway, now he's the Western Australian Minister for Transport

lol, ripper story bloke

 

[Cursed Cat]

Am I missing something here? Is this a serious proper religion or a piss take?

um, take a little guess.

or alternatively, you have a computer right ?
I have heard rumours of something called a search engine - I hear 'Google' is a good example.
should be able to help.

ah, screw it :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster

 

[MrNatural]

I too work in the IT Industry at a major telco. Seems alot of the stories on here are about IT companies, coincidence? I think not

Anyways, i have a few people who i either work directly or indirectly with.
Have one bloke who i work directly with, in his early 50s who says and does some weird things.
- Doesnt make eye contact when communicating with anyone. Which i find very weird and annoying. Makes it hard to speak to people.
- On a daily occurence, he seems to have what id describe as a mini seizure. Will be sitting at his desk, you look across and hes breathly weirdly and will be rubbing his hands together.
Sometimes ill try to speak to him when hes in this state, then he magically snaps out of it.
- He will go for his daily walk at lunch with a can of coke zero, and seems to hold the can so far away from his body that it looks like hes chasing it.

Seems to be a smart guy and knows his stuff, but will occasionally say silly things that make you wonder if hes all there.

Another guy who i indirectly worked with, now made redundant. Surely had autistic tendancies.
He'd get to work and attempt to park his car. But would be overly pedantic about it. Park the car get out and check, get back in, move car a cm, then repeat the process again and again until he was satisfied that his parking job was perfect.
Another example. He would be working in a area close by, and we would continually have calls intended for their group overflowing to us, which was annoying. You'd take the call, ask them if someone was available for the call, but noone would put their hand, especially him.
So a colleague of mine and i decided to start calling his number directly over n over until he'd answered. He'd see phone ring, look at it, then ignore. Even when we rang him while the manager was next to him, he wouldnt answer. Would barely speak a word to anyone either.

Alot of the guys call our building, "the sheltered workshop"

 

[Macca19]

Had an old British bloke who was teh coolroom manager at an old job. For the first three years we worked together he barely said a word to me and I thought he hated my guts as he'd either say things in a bit of a sarcastic tone that made me think 'is this bloke having a crack?' or say if he was laughing with someone and I walked in, he'd go from smiling, look directly at me, stop smiling and stare. Turned out as soon as I got promoted and worked near him he was a ripper bloke. Probably the funniest bloke ive met, had ridden in the Tour de France a number of times and was a British cycling champion back when he was younger.

At my current job, we had an older guy, in his mid 50s come in and do some front of house work for us. His resume was great, had run restaurants before supposedly. Turned out to be very strange. He never got the hang of the end of day reconciling especially doing the POS and cash. Most normally take about 4 days to get to a normal level where I dont have to go through it anymore. Took him about 2 months just to get to a below average level. When I'd point out an obvious mistake he'd berate himself "**** sake xxx you stupid ****ing idiot, get it right you dumb ****'. Almost like a tourettes inspired rant.

The wierdest thing he used to do though, cos he was a bit overweight and needed a belt to keep his pants up, he'd often walk into my office to tuck in his shirt which consisted of him undoing his belt, unzipping his pants, pulling them halfway down, straightening his shirt and then pulling his pants back up. Told him the only time you should be taking your pants off in front of me is if youve accidently sliced off your wang and you need an ambulance. Still walked in on him doing it a few times. We had to sack him after 6 months or so because he couldnt accept any form of criticism at all without going on an abusive tirade. Then we found out he was driving past and parking out the front of our work place and he'd drive off when someone would go and talk to him. A bit unsettling.