Induhvidual Tales

A manager was viewing the weekly statistical report for several ongoing projects. She determined the report was in error because the numbers changed from week to week. Total costs and revenue seemed to be going up over time.

Recently a co-worker told another co-worker, "Man, you are a few sandwiches short of a picnic."
She replied, "WHAT?!?! Are you saying I'm FAT?!"

After the wedding reception, my husband and I headed for the hotel, still clad in our wedding clothes. Coincidentally, the desk clerk was an old friend from high school who looked at me in my Victorian wedding gown and veil, accompanied by a man in a tuxedo, and asked, "So, what have you been up to?"

At coffee time on the construction site one Monday morning, another worker asked me what I did on the weekend. I told him that my union, The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, helped sponsor the MS Society. We had a booth at the mall selling raffle tickets as a fundraiser.
He asked me what MS is. I explained it stands for multiple sclerosis. He sat there with a confused look on his face for a few seconds, and then said, "Is that true? Are there really people with more than one scrotum?"

At the office holiday luncheon, our group of about 50 people played a variety of games. At one point, four people tied for first place. The Induhviduals in charge needed to come up with a tiebreaker. "OK," one said, "Everyone think of a number. Whoever gets closest to 75 will win."
Always the clown, I shouted, "Seventy-four! Doh!"

At the phone company where I work, a customer called in one day to correct his listing because he noticed it was misspelled in the phone book. It was corrected for him. The next day he called and complained because when he woke up, he looked in the same phone book and it wasn't yet corrected.

[Editor's note: Yeah, I don't believe it happened either. But wouldn't it be funny if it did?]

I am the director of business development. Our president has the habit of walking throughout our facility periodically peeking into our offices. One day he came in to my office very excited and exclaimed, "I have a plan. We're going to double our business revenues in two years!"
I replied, "That's great, what's the plan?"
He looked at me with a combination of sadness and confusion, then turned and walked away muttering, "You just don't get it."

I worked for a man who weighed about 10 pounds and looked like Skeletor(R) from "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe(R)." Each morning Skeletor(R) would shave his head AT HIS DESK while screaming "WRONG" at every answer he received from his staff.
Skeletor(R) (and don't think that we didn't have the action figures hidden in our desks) also wrote everything with a dull pencil on colored stationery. He would beckon a staff member to his office and make him or her stand at the right-hand corner of his desk while he wrote a memo that he needed typed immediately. Upon completion, the illegibly scrawled note would be shoved to the corner of the desk where we were forced to stand and he would say, "I need it NOW." Upon returning to my desk, I would sit down and promptly hear him call me back to his desk using a less-than-flattering nickname and repeat this process. Upon returning to my desk (again), I would hear him scream, "Where's that memo you were supposed to be typing?" as if I hadn't just spent the entire 15 minutes at the corner of his desk waiting for him to write the second memo.
And I was the human resources manager. Each of his secretaries quit within days of being hired. Temps usually lasted until lunch.

I'm in a class called Advanced Physical Science, the highest level of science for freshmen at my school. After we finished discussing gravity, one of my fellow geniuses asked, "Is the reason the world is round because people are pulling on the world from all sides, because we all have a gravitational pull?"

Last March I was (un)fortunate enough to spend two weeks on a U.S. Navy ship involved in a NATO exercise in the Baltic Sea. We were scheduled to put into a port in Gdansk at the end of the exercise. One day, while I was in the ship's gym, a young seaman, who was riding a stationary bike and writing a letter, paused and asked me, "Is Poland one word or two?"
I replied, "It's actually three. North Pole Land, South Pole Land, and regular Pole Land."

My wife, wishing to convey her appreciation for exceptional service by one of her employees, said, "Employees like you are a dime a dozen."

When I arrived at my new company, my new boss said that it had been touch-and-go whether the company was going to confirm my appointment. He showed me the glowing reference my old boss had given. It was great, apart from one of the opening lines where he misspelled conscientious as "contentious."
Oh, how I laughed (not).

Our company Intranet lists all employees and their titles. The field size for titles is limited, so some had to be abbreviated. An Assistant Manager wasn't amused when I asked him what an Ass Manager was responsible for.

Sadly, I must inform on my wife. While discussing the U.S. Postal Service and how they operate constantly in the red, she claimed it must be due to bad management because those little stamps are 37 cents for just a piece of paper - and that's almost 100% profit right there.

The water department has destroyed the street where I live to install new water mains. Last week, a worker was going door-to-door telling us that our water service could be interrupted. One of my neighbors made this inquiry: "I see. Do you think that will be the hot water or the cold water?"

A store clerk asked for my zip code, apparently as part of their market research. Rather than just saying, "No," I told the young Induhvidual at the cash register that it was unlisted. The Induhvidual looked at me with obvious confusion and said, "I didn't know that you could do that."
I replied, "Of course, but like telephone numbers, it costs extra." I looked back as I was leaving, and observed the Induhvidual still lost in thought, and the next customer impatiently waiting for service.

I had a few Sacagawea gold dollar coins that I wanted to get rid of so I used them at the Wal-Mart to pay for part of my order. The cashier looked at them, puzzled, and asked what they were. I told her that they were the new dollar coins. She replied, "Are you sure?" I told her yes, I was sure that they were money. "Alright then, if you say so," she said, and took them.
Next week I'm planning to pay for my entire grocery trip with buttons and rocks.

One time I asked my sister what she did at work. She said, "I just sit there and look pretty." Her (ex)husband replied, "No wonder you always come home so tired."
[Editor's note: I don't even know what that means, but it's still funny.]

A friend was sitting in history class at his university, waiting for the professor to arrive. He heard a guy behind him talking to one of his friends, saying, "Hey, I wonder if Christmas would ever fall on Friday the 13th."

We upgraded everyone in the office to Microsoft Office XP, and since then a particular In-duh-vidual has blamed the upgrade for everything that has gone wrong with her computer. She even accused the software upgrade of shortening her mouse cord. It turns out she just got new bifocals and was sitting farther from her computer than usual.

I asked my manager, "What is Karen's last name?" My manager replied, "Karen who?"

I was forced to attend a seminar on leadership. We were broken into small groups and each was asked to state what skills a good leader possesses. I wrote, "Needs to be good with elephants and crossing Alps." The others at my table were amused, but the seminar coordinator didn't get it. I said it was a reference to Hannibal, known for his leadership qualities. Her reply: "What leadership qualities? He was a cannibal, and anyway, it was lambs, not elephants."

I was on the phone asking directions on how to get to an Induhvidual's business:
Me: I'll be driving on I-95. Is your company east or west of the interstate?
Induhvidual: It depends on which direction you're driving.

I work at a large hospital. A few years ago, an employee dressed as Mrs. Santa and visited the children's ward. Unfortunately, this was the day she was downsized. She returned to work where she was summoned to the VP of Operations, who gave her the news that her services were no longer needed. She packed her desk and left the building, still in costume.

My team was giving a demo of the latest version of our software to the visiting French upper management team. One of the French executives asked if a particular feature was implemented according to the specifications. I replied, "Yes, well, at least according to the spec du jour." We had a good chuckle, then my boss looked right at the French executive and said, "That means 'of the day.'"
Did I mention that our visitors were from France?

Overheard in an elevator:
Induhvidual 1: "Wow, it's going to be 24 degrees tonight. That's sub-zero!"
Induhvidual 2: "It's below sub-zero!"
Induhvidual 1: "That's what sub-zero means: below zero."

Seen next to a water dispenser with a large jug of bottled water: "Employees are forbidden to use the bottled water to make coffee." So it's okay to just DRINK the water, but if you have the audacity to run it through a bunch of coffee grounds and THEN drink it, you're in a world of hurt.

The day before the latest stamp price hike, a cow-orker announced she was going to the post office to stock up on stamps before they raised the prices. Note: she just completed her MBA.

My university just published a new class schedule. There isn't enough room on the schedule for full names so we end up with interesting abbreviations. I was looking through the Psychology section, when I noticed a course that I assume is really Psychological Assessment II. But it was listed as "Psycho Asses II."

A cow-orker related an experience that she had at another company last year where she was a supervisor. The company encouraged employees to wear costumes to work on Halloween. So last Halloween she was mortified to be ordered to lay off some of her employees, while dressed as a clown.

I was complaining about being bored by a repetitive project, and I made a comment about wishing I had a book-on-tape. My co-worker looked at my blankly and asked, "What do you need to know about tape?"

Seen on a resume: "I am an expert poofreader."

I have a high-school pottery class. One morning, a fellow student sat down at his pottery wheel and complained that someone left it all messy. He failed to understand that every student has his own exclusive wheel assigned to him, and he was looking at his own mess from the previous day.
At the end of class, he started to get up, and I reminded him that he was supposed to clean up after himself. He said, "I'm going to leave it as a lesson to whoever did it to me that they're supposed to clean up their own mess!"

A few years ago, my wife quit her job to be a stay-at-home mother. Before she quit she offered to work part time. Two bosses took her to lunch to discuss this possibility. During the lunch one boss looked at her and said, "But you're working so hard already. I don't understand how you'll be able to do all your work in half the time."

A former boss of mine was collecting contributions for a political cause. One day we found him making photocopies of $5, $10 and $20 bills, front and back. When questioned, he said, "My accountant told me to make copies of everything, for tax purposes." I tried to explain that his accountant was only referring to receipts and deposit slips, but he could not be dissuaded.

At a restaurant, my slightly toasted friend was inspired to order fried mushrooms, an item not found on the menu. The server, resembling the one exasperated by Jack Nicholson's character in "Five Easy Pieces," tried to resist taking the special order. She finally gave in to my friend's disjointed insistence and recorded his detailed instructions for preparing the mushrooms.
Weeks later, we returned to the restaurant, equally toasted, and spring-loaded to order the mushrooms again. The very same server came to take our order.
My friend, a bit flustered at the prospect of providing a long explanation, said, "Hi, uh, we're the mushroom people."
The server replied with cold satisfaction: "Yes, I thought so."

I showed a cow-orker the cartoon of "Dogbert the Investment Banker" from the week of October 21st (http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/1021.html).
This was part of the conversation:
Cow-orker : You'd think he would, like, catch on about the dog by now.
DNRC Member: It's a cartoon.
Cow-orker: Well, in that case, it loses the realism of the thing. I mean, like, how dumb are we supposed to think that guy is? If a dog tried to consult with me more than once I would, like, recognize it.

I'm in college, and a good friend of mine had come over to my dorm to study for a test with me. An environmental group had put up fliers in my hall that read, "One American uses as much energy per year as 250,000 Ethiopians." My friend read this, looked at me indignantly, and said, "Well, what do they want us to do? Just stand still or something?"
On a related note, she is in the honors program at my school.

I always knew that my cow-orker, Bob, was the boss's pet, but it really hit home one day when Bob and I were working together in my office. The boss called:
Me: Hello
Boss: Is that you, Bob?
Me: No, it's Doug.
Boss: Oh Doug, you're just the one I want to talk to.
Me: That's great, boss, what's up?
Boss: Where's Bob?

I was giving holiday dates to an Induhvidual to enter into his electronic diary. I said, "Good Friday, 29th March," to which he replied, "And what day of the week is that?"

I was talking with a person who runs an IT consulting company about including a list of assumptions in a presentation. She disagreed with including the assumptions, saying, "Making an assumption is something completely different than assuming something. Assumptions are conclusions, and assuming is a pre-conclusion. I don't think you can say that something is an assumption when you've assumed it." THAT'S VERBATIM.

An air-conditioning manufacturer recently introduced a new line of diffusers (the thing in the ceiling that air comes out of), specifically for prisons, that has "anti-suicidal" features. In the write-up, they state the reasons why this is a good thing:
"Suicide takes a toll on facility administration by wasting time and money combating negligence claims. Suicide also increases facility staff stress and decreases morale."

I worked as an accountant in a paper mill where my boss decided that it would improve motivation to split a bonus between the two shifts based on what percentage of the total production each one accomplished.
The workers quickly realized that it was easier to sabotage the next shift than to make more paper. Cow-orkers put glue in locks, loosened nuts on equipment so it would fall apart, you name it. The bonus scheme was abandoned after about ten days, to avoid all-out civil war.

I would like to make a nomination for the most demeaning job title in the workplace. At my local supermarket there are signs informing customers that a "Checkout Captain" is available to help them pack their groceries.
[Editor's note: I'm glad it's a captain, because I wouldn't want their privates to touch my food.]

My cow-orker complained to her son's football coach because he put her son on the "special teams." She told the coach that her son might be slow but was not mentally challenged and deserved to play with all the other boys.

During a workshop we were invited to tell the audience about our personal projects. A cow-orker said that he intended to go trekking in Tibet. The moderator asked him whether he planned to see the Dalai Lama, which is clueless enough. But my colleague topped it, saying, "Sure I will, and maybe even climb it."

One of my teammates was giving a presentation to our department about an exciting development. He clicked to bring up the next slide and announced with great enthusiasm, "and walla, there it is!!" On the slide in huge letters was the word "Walla." The audience was stunned at first, not knowing if it was suppose to be a joke on the spelling of the word "voila" or not. Then he turned to a member of our department who was from France and said, "You know, walla! Walla!!"
Coincidentally, earlier that week he had mentioned to our team that he wanted to go into management.

A conversation I've just had with my Pointy-Headed Boss (PHB):
Me: "PHB, your phone is ringing."
PHB: "How do you know that?"
Me: "Because I can hear it."

I decided to change dentists. I phoned the new office to make an appointment. As part of the questionnaire, the office assistant asked, "Do you have any conditions like a heart rumor?"
I replied, "Is that anything like a heart murmur?" to which she answered, "I'm not sure."

I was recently standing in line for the fully panoramic theater at the Smithsonian in Washington. A friend told his 14-year-old daughter that the theater was "360 degrees." There was a pause while she considered this, and then asked, "Won't it be too hot for us in there?"

I saw a beautifully handcrafted cross-stitched pillow in the rear window of a nearby car. The message on the pillow read, "I break for hugs." I guess the driver must be very fragile.

I was listening to a coworker's conversation when he uttered the following, upon learning that hunting wild turkey was actually a challenging endeavor: "That surprises me because I always thought turkeys were the stupidest mammal."
He made an unintentional argument for a different animal.

Soon after our high-tech company moved into a new building, we had trouble with the elevators. A manager got stuck between floors and, after some door banging, finally attracted attention. His name was taken, and rescue was promised.
It took two hours before the elevator mechanic arrived and got the manager out. When he returned to his desk, he found this note from his efficient secretary: "The elevator people called and will be here in two hours."

When I remarked that this Friday is the longest day of the year, our receptionist looked puzzled and asked, "You mean it's longer than 24 hours?"

During our recent quarterly division conference call, our division CIO made the following statement: "We do a great job of servicing our customers from the front end, but we must all remember to continue servicing our clients through the back end."

The other morning, two people walked by me on their way to the elevator. One said to the other, "So, where do all these elevators go? Are there other floors?" I laughed so hard milk flew out of my cube neighbor's nose.

One of my Dad's retired friends spends nine months a year in Wisconsin and goes to Florida for the winter. One year, while he was in Florida, he got a call from the police. His neighbor in Wisconsin, who had a key, had entered his home to check that everything was okay with the house. The house was a shambles and he called the police to report a burglary. The police officer reported: "The house appears to have been ransacked."
My Dad's friend immediately bought a plane ticket and flew 1000 miles home to discover that the house looked exactly the way it always looks.

I saw this statement about a company's services:
"You've taken your first step into a bold new realm that will transform your imagination into a vision."

I work in a bank. An Induhvidual tried to return the stamps she had purchased because they "did not work." The stamps were self-stick, and she was licking the shiny paper that you're supposed to peel off.

I was at the gift shop at the Framingham Service Area on the Mass Pike a few days ago. Having made my purchase and turning to leave, I saw a young woman walk up to the cashier with a tiny person-shaped stuffed doll in a box marked "Voodoo Doll." Her question to the clerk: "Does this really work?"

While in a bookstore last night, I overheard an Induhvidual customer ask the sales clerk, "How often is Newsweek published?"

A few years ago while traveling in rural Texas, we stopped at a restaurant for dinner. When I asked the waitress if their soup was homemade, she looked confused and said, "No, we make it here..."

I was working as a consultant for a major phone company. In this huge meeting where we were discussing how to combine multiple systems and how no one wanted to give up their sacred cows, one bright Induhvidual said, "Well, we really need to think outside of the box." His counterpart replied (and was totally serious), "If we think outside of the box, we're all gonna die."

On one of the bowl games the day after New Year's (2002), a player made a very good one-handed catch. Later in the same game, the same player made a one-handed catch with the opposite hand. The Induhvidual who was commentating said, "Wow, that guy must be amphibious!"

I was editing a document for a coworker and said, "There should be a dash between the words 'first' and 'place.'" When I saw the corrected copy it read "first dash place."

I managed a pet store that specialized in sales of tropical fish. One afternoon shortly after Christmas a lady called with the astonishing report that her fish were drinking too much water. After a brief pause, I asked her how on earth she knew that.
"Well," she replied, "I noticed that they were gulping all the time and when I woke up this morning I discovered that the aquarium water was half gone."
I had to put down the phone and laugh for a good minute or two before I could summon the composure to tell her that she needed to check the floor for the water that had leaked out overnight and bring the tank back in for a replacement.

True story: Years ago a local, family-owned grocery store in Elkton, Virginia, had plastered across the front of the store window a message in two-foot-high letters proclaiming, "YOU CAN'T BEAT OUR MEAT." It was only up there for a couple of days.

An ad in our local newspaper for a new fish shop announced in BIG letters, "Open 7 days a week, including Sunday!"

I work for the government (i.e. the largest corporation). My new computer makes a loud hum and it's really distracting so I complained to the IT department. The next day, the box that the computer came in was in my cubicle and I thought they were going to take it back. But the IT guy showed up later that day and put the computer in the box, ran the cables out the back and stuffed it under my desk. Now I can't hear the hum but it overheats and crashes 2-3 times per day!

I work in a library. We are installing vending machines to charge a fee to patrons to print from the Internet. We had to charge for printing after many years of it being free because the voters of our town repealed the food tax, resulting in lower revenue for city services. When I explained this to an irate patron, he threw up his hands and said, "Well, we can thank Bin Laden for that!" I expressed confusion at this reasoning, but he assured me that Bin Laden is responsible for the loss of all our personal freedoms. I wanted to ask him when free printing qualified as a personal freedom, but I managed to restrain myself.

A man called me to complain about a Florida vacation package we put together. I asked what was wrong with the vacation in Orlando. He said he was expecting an ocean-view room. I tried to explain that is not possible, since Orlando is in the middle of the state. He replied, "Don't lie to me. I looked on the map and Florida is a very thin state."

A woman called and said, "I need to fly to Pepsi-Cola on one of those computer planes." I asked if she meant to fly to Pensacola on a commuter plane. She said, "Yeah, whatever."

One of the young ladies in our office is getting ready for her "dream" vacation to Mount Rushmore. My colleague asked her to bring him back a picture of the other side of the mountain. When she asked why, he proceeded to convince her that on the other side of Mount Rushmore are the backs of the presidents, on their knees, with their heads stuck into the mountain. She is so excited that she is going to look for a special tour of the backside.

I went to a home improvement store to buy a new faucet for my kitchen sink. I did not see the particular model I had in mind, so I asked one of the Induhvidual employees for assistance.
He said, "We stopped selling that model because it was the number one theft item in the store." I waited to hear the punchline, until I realized he was serious.
I might have to find a new home improvement store if they ever achieve their goal of carrying no products worth stealing.

During a round of layoffs at the company, a farewell card for one unfortunate cow-orker was circulated. People were signing the card with "good luck!" and "Been great working with you" and so on. When the card got to the desk of one manager, he did not bother to read the card. He just wrote "Happy Birthday" and signed his name.

At a business lunch, platters of calamari were passed down the tables. As a platter reached one of the employee's wives, she was heard to remark during an unfortunate lull in the conversation, "No, thanks. I never eat anything with testicles attached."
The stricken silence lasted a few moments. Then 150 people lost it.

I work in a camera store. An Induhvidual came in and said his camera wasn't working and asked me if I could look at it. I agreed and said I would check the battery first. The Induhvidual said, "I've had this battery for five years and I've never had any problems with it before."
I changed the battery and the camera worked.

I would like to shove a live bear cub up my boss's nose and then have the mother bear go after him whenever he opens a phone conversation with, "Hi buddy how's it going yeah me too!"

My boss was having a discussion with another employee about some work rules that pertain to people doing manual labor. He said these rules don't apply to us because we don't use manuals.

Yesterday my boss called me and said, "Effective immediately, I want you to stop your current activity and start working on this new area." When I asked specifically what I was supposed to do, he replied: "It was not my intention to give you a task today, just a mind-set!"

A VP was speaking at a meeting and said, "Well, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him crap." Someone up front said, "That's drink...can't make him drink." To which the VP said, "That's stupid."

Here is a mangled expression the CIO at our company told me the other day. We were discussing an issue we both agreed upon and he said I was "preaching to the blind."

When a high-powered agent of the company walked into the lunch room, our secretary remarked to our group that she couldn't stand him because he was "so ego-testicle." One of my cow-orkers spit coffee out of his nose, which just added to the moment.

One of my relatives met a woman who wanted to call her kid LATRINE. It took me an hour to stop laughing long enough to ask if anybody had pointed out what a latrine is. They had. She was apparently still intent on using it.

When I received my new credit card, it had the number two (2) after my name instead of Roman numeral II as it should have, indicating that my name is the same as my father's. I called the bank's customer service number and asked that their records be changed to use the Roman numeral two (II) instead of the number two (2).
The customer service rep said, "I'm sorry, sir. My computer doesn't have Roman numerals."

I just went to see the Cirque du Soleil. During one performance, where a man and woman were flying around by having scarves under their arms attached to this huge wheel thing in the air while doing complicated acrobatics at the same time, an Induhvidual behind me said to her companion, "That must take a lot of practice."

At my bookstore a customer returned three of Shakespeare's books because, "The DARN things are in the form of PLAYS!"

At the grocery store, the checkout woman scanned all of my items then picked up the rubber divider and looked it over for the bar code so she could scan it. She asked, "Do you know how much this is?"
I said, "I've changed my mind, I don't think I'll buy that today."
She said, "Okay." I paid her and left.