(I work in a small print and design shop inside of an office supply store. For whatever reason, from the day I was hired, the supervisor of the shop immediately hated me. No one else at the location has a problem, and I even built a customer base of folks that will specifically request me when they come in. One such client is employed at the church down the street, and needs help setting up a basic newsletter design for weekly printing. After a week of work and numerous proofs, the client is happy with how things are progressing. I have two days off, and when I come back in, I see the newsletter is changed around entirely. Since none of the other shop employees would have touched a customer’s file without the customer’s permission, I assume the customer requested these changes while I was gone. I review the changes, send an updated proof to the client, and make my recommendations, as usual. Some of the recommendations include advising AGAINST some of the changes, like switching random blocks of text to Comic Sans, among others. Later that day…)

Supervisor: “Would you care to explain to me what’s going on here?!”

(She angrily shoves a sheet of paper at me, which I see is a printed copy of the email I sent to the client.)

Me: “Uh, it’s my recommendation to [Client] for the most recent version of her newsletter.”

Supervisor: “I’M the one who made those changes and I don’t appreciate you trash talking me to other customers! Those were just ideas I had for the newsletter and you didn’t need to send them to her!”

(She storms off and interrupts the store manager in her office, to show her the printed email and complain about me. The two spend some time in the office, and then the supervisor storms out. She won’t look at me or talk to me for the rest of the day. I go find the store manager when I have a spare moment.)

Me: “So… what on earth is up with [Supervisor]?”

Manager: “She brought me a copy of that email you sent and accused you of talking s*** about her to customers. I pointed out that you never once mentioned her name in that email, AND that I have a degree in graphic design and everything you recommended to the customer is legitimate. Mostly, I think she is pissed off that we both disagreed with her choices. I told her you handled the whole situation in a very professional way and that I didn’t see anything wrong with it.”

Me: “Wow.”

Manager: “You know, when [Other Employee] said he thought [Supervisor] was jealous of you, I didn’t really believe him. But now? Now I see it.”

(I work in the fresh cut area in produce. We also make guacamole, which is one of our most popular items. My coworker is on her fourth batch of the day when the manager walks in and asks how it’s going.)

Coworker: “I have so much guac on my apron, it looks like I murdered Slimer!”

(A colleague contacts me on Instant Messenger to ask about project progress. I need some background so I ask him for the project spreadsheet.)

Colleague: “It’s on [sharelink].”

(I try it out and I don’t have access to that sharelink. So I ask him to email it to me.)

Colleague: “Can’t email it to you; it’s too big.”

(Our mailboxes are limited to handling files of 5 megabytes. That is a h*** of a large spreadsheet if it’s bigger than 5 megabytes, considering the project has barely started.)

Colleague: “Okay, I’ve got access to that sharelink for you.”

(I access it, and see indeed, the file is 9 megabytes big. I can’t open it in situ, so I download it and open it locally. I find that it has one active sheet that consists of 75 lines of actual data, and another 1.7 million blank lines (blank, that is, apart from fancy formatting.)

Me: “Why is this file 9 megabytes big? Why has it got 1.7 million blank lines in it? The f*** are we wasting so much computer space? This is ridiculous.”

Colleague: “Well, if you’re so stupid as to be confused by a simple thing as spreadsheet structure, maybe you need to go on a training course to teach you how to use computers. I have a meeting to go to now. Once you have sorted yourself out and learned how we do things round here, I will contact you again.”

Me: “No worries.”

(I let him get on with it. He never got back in touch with me to ask my advice, which was all well and good, as I was able to spend the rest of the day, uninterrupted, fulfilling my role as technical design authority and performing a code quality review of his (not particularly high quality) code.)

Customer: “These sweets, their due date will be in a few days. Can I get a discount on them?”

(They were already discounted by 50% but she wanted more.)

Cashier: “I think so. Let me just speak to my colleague.”

(She calls a coworker over and they discuss for a moment until the coworker takes all the sweets and takes them to the back.)

Customer: “Excuse me, what are you doing? I would like to buy those.”

Coworker: “I am sorry but I have to throw them away.”

Customer: “But they are still good for a few days!”

(The coworker just ignored her and left with all the sweets.)

(We are a very sociable company and many of us turn up early to eat breakfast before starting work. A few people have turned up extra early as we are behind on some of our orders. Colleague #1 from the other team has come to our side of the office before we officially start. Colleague #2 is still finishing her breakfast, which today is a chocolate filled pastry that has mostly melted in the heat and so she is covered in chocolate.)

Colleague #1: “Hey, [Colleague #2], I know it is still five minutes before you start, but is there any chance you could do [very quick one-minute task], please?”

Colleague #2: “Sorry, you will need to wait until I have finished breakfast.”

Colleague #1: “Um, really? You know we are behind and I need to get this sent as soon as possible. Could you please do it now and finish your breakfast after?”

Colleague #2: *shows her chocolate covered hands* “You can either have it in a few minutes, or you can have it covered in chocolate. Which would you prefer?”

Colleague #1: “I guess I can wait a few minutes.”