(Our office is filled with IT people, which means we may be working odd hours or away from the office. As a result, we keep each other updated through email. One of my coworkers has worked late one night, and discovered her car had a flat tire. This is how she informed our office that she’d be late the next day:)

Coworker #1:
“A large metal rod has been found,
In between my car’s wheel and the ground.
Though the car’s not at fault,
The dramatic result,
Is the tire is no longer quite round.”

(I am the first to read the email. I feel I have to respond appropriately… in haiku.)

Me:
“When road debris strikes,
There is but one thing to do:
Curse the parking lot.”

(This opens the floodgates.)

Coworker #2:
“I feel for you and I believe you’re wronged,
And blame your car for wheels are not its strength.
I would go on in this same vein at length,
But on my desk my daily tasks are thronged.”

Coworker #3:
“Blame not the victim of dread circumstance,
Are you at fault should something prick your toe?
The tire is deflated enough by chance,
Puff it to round and watch [Name’s] best car go!”

(The CEO of our company then joins in, who is not to be outdone.)

CEO:
“The happy tire revolves the live-long day,
Never to give [Name] cause for slightest care,
But meeting rod, is punctured; losing air,
Becomes a cause of grief and great delay.

And now the tire that once was round and gay,
Is flat and [Name] must seek for quick repair.
She takes her car a new direction where,
She finds relief but fears the price to pay.

For tires purchased must installed be,
And lo the seller will total cost:
Not just for tire but all the special care,
To balance, mount plus tax, recycling fee…
Gives cause to ponder all that has been lost,
Not seeing rod in road and driving there.”

(Finally, after getting her tire fixed, the first coworker sends a short message.)

Coworker #1: “I pity my friends who work at ‘normal’ companies with ‘normal’ people.”

(I am in a bookstore buying some books for my younger brother. I am Japanese.)

Me: “Hi. I’m going to buy these.”

Cashier: “Okay.”

(I see the cashier pick up a radio and operate the register for change. I don’t take any notice until a security guard comes up.)

Security Guard: “What seems to be the problem?”

Cashier: “This Jap was trying to buy these books. Now, I can TELL she’s really got something else with her; she’s trying to distract me while stealing it.”

Me: *horrified* “WHAT?!”

Security Guard: “Did you see her pick anything else up?”

Cashier: “I KNOW she’s not getting these books for herself; they’re fifth grade! And there’s a ton of stuff on the counter.”

(I look. They include candy and an assortment of small handbooks, none of which are worth stealing.)

Cashier: “Plus, she’s a teenager! The only reason teenagers come into shops is to steal! They never read!”

Security Guard: “Just stop being bigoted and let me search her bag.”

(The security guard searches my bag. The cashier just looks smug.)

Cashier: “You are SOOOO in trouble, ‘ching-chong’!'”

Security Guard: “There’s nothing in here that she hasn’t brought. And I think you’d better apologize to her.”

Cashier: “As if! I’m going on break!”

(The cashier goes off. When I next went back to the store, thankfully, I heard she was fired!)

(While working at a group home in my community, we receive a scam call. Our manager has given permission for us to prank any scam calls or telemarketers.)

Caller: “Yes, hi. I am calling from windows technical support. We’ve been monitoring your computer and several windows have viruses.”

(I used to work in a call center for a car-sharing company. I decide to go by my old script.)

Me: “Hi. Thank you for calling [Company] today. May I have your name and membership number please?”

Caller: “No, ma’am. You misunderstand. We are not [Car-Sharing Company]. We are technical support.”

Me: “Thank you. Yes, could you repeat that number?”

Caller: “Ma’am, we are from technical support.”

Me: “Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that! Yes, the parking brakes on a Prius can indeed be hard to find.”

Caller: “No, ma’am, nothing is wrong with your car. We are not the car company. We are technical support.”

(I speed rapidly through a full troubleshoot scenario for finding a Prius’ parking brake and disengaging it. The poor scammer kept trying to convince me he wasn’t the car company. They ended up ending the call first!)

(At the factory where I work, we run eight-hour-shifts, 24 hours a day. We tend to come in ten minutes early on our shifts so the previous shift’s colleagues can ‘hand over’ the shift, along with any points of attention. It is 2 pm, which is the starting time of the shift. In my area, I work with one other colleague. At 2 pm on the dot, I finally see him coming to the room where we work. I approach him.)

Me: “Why do you keep coming in just past 2 pm? We should be here at 1:50.”

Colleague: “They only pay us from 2 pm on, so there’s no need for that.”

Me: “Then why are you leaving at 9:50? They pay you until 10 pm as well you know.”

Colleague: “Well, the colleagues from the next shift are already there then, aren’t they? So there’s no sense in sticking around until that time.”

Me: “So you don’t want to come here 10 minutes early but you expect them to be here?”

Colleague: “Yeah.”

Me: “That is wrong on so many levels…”

(Strangely enough, he didn’t get his temporary contract extended!)

(My entire job description is to create material numbers for the company; then we can start to build the products people hire us to create for them. As a recent college graduate I can’t complain. I wrote a program that does 90% of my job for me. I take this to my supervisor so that I could be praised and put into an engineering group.)

Supervisor: “So, this program basically does your job for you?”

Me: “Yes. More than half of all my work is done by this program now, with only minor input needed by users.”

Supervisor: “So, I don’t need as many people working for me now?”

(A troubled look starts to show on the supervisor’s face.)

Me: “No. All of my current coworkers can be moved into the technical roles that we have been training for. We can hire a couple of high school graduates to do the work of the eight of us.”

Supervisor: *alarmed* “And this program is perfect, there are no flaws at all?!”

Me: “Well as long as the engineer assigning the work checks for correct tagging everything should be fine. There is a minor issue with transcription but no big problems.”

Supervisor: *relieved* “Oh! So, the program isn’t perfected yet. No worries, just keep me appraised and let me know if the program is getting close to finished.”

(The supervisor starts shooing me out of her office.)

Me: “But it’s done. I can’t—”

Supervisor: “No worries. Just keep me in the loop.”

(The supervisor all but slams the door in my face. Soon after, she tried to bury me in work so that I couldn’t ‘finish’ the program and shrink her empire. I still am bored out of my brain, but now I have time to look for a new job!)