This Office Is Under A-Salt

At work, the staff lunchroom is a little small. The main table can seat about ten, and in one corner of the room is a small table with a microwave and other items on it. In the middle of the main table is one of those large, transparent, acrylic salt shakers.

One day while on break, a coworker picked up the salt shaker, looked at it, and noticing that it was empty, made a face and put it back on the table. Note that they were sitting at one of the two chairs where they could reach the salt shaker on the table and the box of salt on the microwave table without getting up — they just had to lean from side to side. I thought about filling it myself, but not being a salt user, and full of curiosity, I decided to watch to see how long it would be before someone in an office of 75 would break and fill the salt shaker.

Break after break, day by day, week in and week out, I watched the salt shaker picked up, face made, and put back down. Finally, one day, after seven weeks had gone by, someone finally cracked and filled the salt shaker…