One of the women in my department is very “nice”. The type of overly fake, obviously performative “nice” that only works on people playing the same game, as well as the terminally oblivious. The type where being in the know and part of the “in group” is more important than anything, even if there’s no “in group” to be a part of. Let’s just say I wasn’t shocked when I learned that her prior job was as “brand coordinator” for a fashion magazine, and that her entire life and livelihood was making connections in a notoriously hoity-toity industry.

She constantly mangles and misuses industry and in-company terms, including peppering in phrases from her old job(s) which don’t apply here, leaving folks confused. She has a terrible habit of using the bathroom for fifteen to twenty minutes both before and after her lunch almost every single day, in addition to normal breaks. She’s never met a conversation she couldn’t insert herself into, regardless of how busy we are. She asks questions randomly into thin air and then makes up her own answers whether or not someone responds. On top of all of this, she has this extremely gaudy fake-wood-and-gold plaque in her cubicle which reads “Be Kind”. Her idea of “kindness” is mostly, “Don’t say or do anything that would get me in trouble, even if it’s 100% my fault.”

This morning, the Head of Operations had a meeting with us in the purchasing department. The number of mistakes, like wrong quantities being purchased or purchase orders being entered with the wrong pricing, has been rising rapidly. As head of the department, I know for a fact that 90% of the issues she’s talking about are directly due to Ms. Nice spending more time during the day schmoozing, gossiping, and turning away from her desk to just chat things up than putting any focus on her work. I didn’t publicly throw her under the bus, and I actively tried to avoid looking directly at her, but every time I caught sight of her, she was just sitting there with a blank, vacant stare like she shouldn’t even be there. I made a mental note to have a private conversation with her ASAP to make sure it all sank in.

About fifteen minutes later — well before I had the chance for that conversation — she had already made another mistake: we needed 250 of something and she’d ordered 25. A simple typo, yes, but this was exactly the sort of thing we’d had an hour-long meeting about, and on the FIRST task she handled afterward, she’d done the same thing. I sent an email to her, asking her to please double-check her tasks before completing or sending them and letting her know that I had already sent the correction through to our vendor.

Thirty seconds later — I guess she actually had her emails open for once — she came storming up to my desk and whisper-hissed at me.

Ms. Nice: “What was that?”

Me: “What was what?”

Ms. Nice: “That email you sent!”

Me: “Did you read it?”

Ms. Nice: “Of course I did!”

Me: “Then you should know what it was.”

Ms. Nice: *Tsks* “I mean, why would you send that in an email!? That wasn’t very kind, you know!”

Me: “[Ms. Nice,] I have talked with you privately three times in the last month, I’ve mentioned it to you on an individual basis dozens of times, and we had that entire, hour-long meeting this morning. We are having between four and twelve significant errors per day in our department, and over 90% of them come from you.”

Ms. Nice: “Oh, it’s not that bad! And when you send it through email, [Head Of Operations] sees it!”

Me: “Yes, it is, and yes, she does. That’s why she specifically said during the meeting that I should do that. So, I did it.”

Ms. Nice: “Well, it was just a little typo! We caught it and fixed it, no big deal!”

Me: “No, I caught it. You sent it off without double-checking it, and because that keeps happening, now I need to take time out of the rest of my duties to double-check everything the group does. Just last week, seven different purchase orders were entered, by you, with glaring and obvious errors, including you ordering 1,000 of something that we’re lucky to sell fifty of in a month, so there’s a full pallet back in the warehouse they have to try to find room for.”

Ms. Nice: “It’s still not very kind! It’s not your job to look over my shoulder all day or anything!”

Me: “I’ve tried being kind. You’ve been getting worse instead of better. And in case you forgot, I’m the purchasing manager; it is literally my job to make sure you and everyone in this department does their job correctly. That’s why my name was on your write-up the last time before this one.”

Ms. Nice: “Well, I would never do anything like that to you! I have too much respect to try and get someone I work with in trouble! I have too much respect to go sending off emails and dragging other people into it!”

Me: “But you don’t have enough respect to just follow directions, or to not take an hour and a half for your lunch break every, single, day?”

Ms. Nice: “I do not! I always punch in on time!”

Me: “Maybe, but when you leave your desk at 12:30 and you don’t get back until almost 2:00, and you’re nowhere to be found in between, it doesn’t matter to me what time it says on the clock.”

Ms. Nice: “Oh, like you don’t take a little extra time in the bathroom sometimes! I’ve seen you!”

Me: “Sometimes. Not every day. And I’m not taking those breaks and also extending out my lunch.”

Ms. Nice: “Well, what if I had a medical condition that made me spend that long?!”

Me: *Raising an eyebrow* “DO you?”

Ms. Nice: “I might!”

Me: “Well then, bring in a note from your doctor and we’ll make accommodations. Of course, that wouldn’t excuse you from having to make sure your work is correct.”

Ms. Nice: “Oh, come on. Do you really think it’s that big a deal?”

Head Of Operations: “Actually, yes, I do!”

Ms. Nice jumped out of her skin; I did a simple if cartoonish head tilt, as I hadn’t seen her approach, either! My boss almost literally dragged Ms. Nice by the ear off to her office for yet another private chat; I’m really hoping this is the last straw of her finally getting her act together, or finally getting let go, a decision that is sadly above my pay grade.

This happened many years back when a friend of mine had a problem with his computer. He needed it to be fixed ASAP, and the computer repair shop he goes to was not open, so he came to me for help. I tried to run him down the troubleshooting steps to see what the problem was. The troubleshooting didn’t produce any results, so I concluded that the PSU (Power Supply Unit) was probably fried.

I met up with him to shop for a PSU and went back to his house. Just to be sure, I ran the same troubleshooting steps in case he did it wrongly. The first thing I did was swap the power cable from the monitor to the PC. To my surprise, it actually turned on.

Me: “[Friend], did you actually do any of the troubleshooting I told you to do?”

Friend: *Sheepishly* “I didn’t bother.”

So, my friend now has a shiny new PSU that he can’t return due to store policy. I told him with a “smile” to be more careful next time so he won’t waste other people’s time and his money.

About thirty years ago, at a time when manga and Japanese animation were really booming in France, I was browsing in an audio and video store. I saw a VHS of “Urotsukidôji” next to “The Smurfs”, “Babar The Elephant,” “Beauty And The Beast”, “The Little Mermaid”, etc.

I flagged down a shop assistant who was passing by.

Me: “This movie is actually a p*rn movie with lots of gore and scary monsters. It belongs in the adult section.”

Assistant: “Nah, it’s a cartoon, so it goes with the other cartoons in the children’s section. Besides, it’s up to the parents to check the content beforehand and make sure that it’s appropriate for their kids.”

The shipping company I used smashed a nearly new MacBook that I had shipped with them. I asked them nicely to pay me back for it, and they a**ed about, blaming me, blaming my packaging, saying it was impossible for them to have damaged it, etc. I was able to prove that my packaging was flawless and get a statement from the Apple shop that I took it to saying the damage was caused by being dropped or thrown. I could also prove that the MacBook worked when I sent it.

[Shipping Company] wasn’t interested and messed me about for weeks, sending me from pillar to post, even threatening to make me pay interest on customs charges — which I wasn’t liable for as the laptop was smashed on arrival and thus worthless at import.

I took it to small claims court. [Shipping Company] hired a lawyer, who sent me letters saying they contested it and would go for full fees, etc., if I lost. I went for it anyway; I did law stuff at university, so I knew the basics, and I thought my case was pretty clear-cut. I won. I won my costs back, plus extra, plus interest.

[Shipping Company] ignored the court order and did not pay.

Now, this laptop was originally being sent to my beloved mother-in-law. She asked me to help her with the problem as [Shipping Company] was also seriously harassing her about the customs fees. However, very unexpectedly, before I could resolve it, she passed away. It was the last thing she ever asked me to do for her. I loved that woman more than pretty much any human on this planet; she was my mother, my best friend, and my mentor. Taking down [Shipping Company] was now my personal vendetta.

I researched my options. I could have taken the usual (more conservative) legal routes to reclaim my money. But no. F*** them. I don’t care about the money anymore. I want revenge, I want drama, and I want Karmic justice.

I went to the high court. I got a writ of control. I, of course, added on more fees and more interest. I then hired the most aggressive bailiff firm in London. I trusted that the s***ty processes and attitude of [Shipping Company] meant that they would ignore the letters and actually get a visit. They did.

The bailiffs rocked up at [Shipping Company] headquarters and explained the situation. [Shipping Company] refused to pay, so the bailiffs started listing goods. Security tried to make them leave, and the office manager tried to bully them out. Obviously, the bailiffs gave no s***s about that, and they cracked on with their jobs. I wasn’t allowed to see the body cam footage but they did send me a detailed report. The final conclusion is copied from it below:

Bailiffs’ Report: “Calls were then made to the accounts manager, who arrived in a hurry. As no payment was forthcoming from them, the agent again explained the removal process and costs involved and called the office for approval to begin removals. The agent began to seize assets. The finance director then arrived on the scene. He was not at all happy about the attendance but ultimately agreed to pay a voluntary payment in full from his personal account in order to stop the removal.”

I know it’s a drop in the ocean to [Shipping Company], but I got more than double what I originally asked for to replace the laptop. They would have had to pay even more on top in fees to the bailiffs. I reckon it cost them at least three times more than the original claim in the end.

But mostly, I just enjoy the mental image of the flustered finance director and his impotent rage, having to pay his own money to stop the heavies from taking desktop computers and fancy potted plants and things out of their swanky head office lobby.

The tiny town I live in is about 93% white, so most of my coworkers and I also happen to be white. A few years ago, we had one employee on the overnight shift who happened to be Black, and he had all sorts of issues even with just showing up to work on time (or at all). He had so many no-call-no-shows that administrative staff pulled him in to fire him. But then, he spun some yarn about two of his coworkers on his shift making all sorts of racial remarks toward him, calling him the N-word, etc.

These were veteran staff I knew personally enough to know they would never behave like that. (Even the shift supervisor for that shift was mixed race.)

So, of course, his canning got canceled for the time being while administrative staff had to investigate his claims.

Nothing came of it, of course, and he kept working at that job for a few more months until they finally fired him after thirteen no-call-no-shows.