Author Topic: Overheard at Work  (Read 13252795 times)

ketchup

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14650 on: August 29, 2016, 10:10:13 AM »
My latest effort to subvert this is to make this kind of meeting a 10-minute personal progress check at each person's desk. No one is happy about it, but at least I don't have a group of unproductive programmers sitting in a meeting for an additional 50 minutes. Eventually my manager will catch on to the lack of meetings and will demand a meeting to analyze why I am not holding longer meetings. (I kid you not. This happened about six months ago.)  The philosophy is that there is no problem that cannot be solved by adding meetings.

Hah, in one of the meetings we were waiting ~ 20 minutes on one person that wasn't necessary to the meeting. About 20 people sitting around waiting, I had to pipe up "Do you guys realize how expensive this meeting is?" I got deer in the headlights looks.
Well, you need approval to buy a $100 computer monitor, but anyone can schedule a meeting costing the company thousands in man-hours.

LennStar

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14651 on: August 29, 2016, 10:33:05 AM »
Only meet in rooms with no possibility to sit down.
The meetings will be short and people will actually think if they need a meeting.

MgoSam

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14652 on: August 29, 2016, 10:42:21 AM »
Only meet in rooms with no possibility to sit down.
The meetings will be short and people will actually think if they need a meeting.

Yup agreed! I remember reading about a General that would have stand-only meetings because he felt like it was efficient and made things end promptly. I like this idea.

BDWW

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14653 on: August 29, 2016, 10:46:37 AM »
All this reminds me of one of our clients, a know-nothing middle-man management company, which works for another management company.  Why their clients don't work with us directly and save a ton of money instead of going through 2 middle men who essentially just forward shit to us at the last possible second is beyond my fucking comprehension.  Also with this client, it seems like every year or two there is a new person in charge of said forwarding-of-shit, because of internal politics etc.  Whenever we give them a heads up about something urgent, we usually don't hear back for usually weeks, often months, and yes, sometimes years.  At which point they are in a huge panic because their client has noticed and complained or they got in trouble somehow because major damage was done because of of neglect, at which point they try to blame us if they can.  And more than once i've gone to a job we got paid to do, only to find that it has already been completed by someone else, who also got paid for it by our client.

This is a great argument for NOT privatizing government services.  No guarantee the private company will be more efficient than the public service.  ;-)  And less oversight.

I suspect this is tongue-in-cheek, but the trouble with that theory is the government just outsources to private companies. So then you just have another level of bureaucracy. I used to work for Northrop Grumman, and holy h*ll was that was a nightmare. All the normal giant company BS, with weekly meetings with state officials thrown in the mix for good measure. It's amazing anything ever gets done.   

Aeowulf

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14654 on: August 29, 2016, 10:47:43 AM »
Only meet in rooms with no possibility to sit down.
The meetings will be short and people will actually think if they need a meeting.

I stood in every meeting, for the duration. It took months before people stopped asking me if I wanted a chair.

Well, you need approval to buy a $100 computer monitor, but anyone can schedule a meeting costing the company thousands in man-hours.

Or the best was them freaking out about a 15 minute charge not being correct, when 20 people wasted that all at once...

gimp

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14655 on: August 29, 2016, 04:49:09 PM »
Not technically overheard.

Company switched to empower retirement to do our 401k interface. (Still backed by schwab, I believe.)

They have a nifty estimator of contributions, retirement age, and estimated income (my contributions, employer match, and social security.)

The retirement age slider doesn't go below 50. Bah!

SwordGuy

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14656 on: August 29, 2016, 06:15:10 PM »
All this reminds me of one of our clients, a know-nothing middle-man management company, which works for another management company.  Why their clients don't work with us directly and save a ton of money instead of going through 2 middle men who essentially just forward shit to us at the last possible second is beyond my fucking comprehension.  Also with this client, it seems like every year or two there is a new person in charge of said forwarding-of-shit, because of internal politics etc.  Whenever we give them a heads up about something urgent, we usually don't hear back for usually weeks, often months, and yes, sometimes years.  At which point they are in a huge panic because their client has noticed and complained or they got in trouble somehow because major damage was done because of of neglect, at which point they try to blame us if they can.  And more than once i've gone to a job we got paid to do, only to find that it has already been completed by someone else, who also got paid for it by our client.

We should all be happy so little gets done with our tax dollars.

Otherwise we would actually get ALL the government we pay for, God help us all.

This is a great argument for NOT privatizing government services.  No guarantee the private company will be more efficient than the public service.  ;-)  And less oversight.

I suspect this is tongue-in-cheek, but the trouble with that theory is the government just outsources to private companies. So then you just have another level of bureaucracy. I used to work for Northrop Grumman, and holy h*ll was that was a nightmare. All the normal giant company BS, with weekly meetings with state officials thrown in the mix for good measure. It's amazing anything ever gets done.

Papa Mustache

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14657 on: August 30, 2016, 10:04:07 AM »
Depending on the type of guys he hangs out with, a trailered car might be looked down upon. Some guys put alot of emphasis on driving their cars rather than only showing their car (moved by trailer).

All the nuances found in any cultural group.

Trailering a car (or multiple cars) takes a very stout truck and trailer to do safely and it uses more gas than just driving the car alone.

I suspect that this guy has more financial problems than fuel economy.

A muscle car might get 10 mpg. The fuel for a show trip might cost him $150. That's 750 miles of driving. It might be that he's staying in hotels, eating out for the whole weekend and partying.

There are the folks that go to car shows, walk around and see the cars on the cheap. Then there are those people who go and treat the event like a Mardi Gra celebration - first the show, then the cruising, then dinner and drinks and then all night parties.

Another angle is that he might be one of the endless upgraders. Just like electronics - some car folks are constantly revising their vehicle. New wheels or shiny bits. He might be wearing out whole sets of tires in a weekend if he is the type to show off with stunts.

We tend to attend shows we can drive to and return home from in a day. I don't have a car to put in a show. We keep the trip cheap and eat cheap or picnic. As I get older I'm less impressed with a shiny show car and more impressed with meeting interesting people and seeing cars that get used.
« Last Edit: August 30, 2016, 03:12:55 PM by Joe Lucky »

kayvent

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14658 on: August 30, 2016, 10:35:44 AM »
All this reminds me of one of our clients, a know-nothing middle-man management company, which works for another management company.  Why their clients don't work with us directly and save a ton of money instead of going through 2 middle men who essentially just forward shit to us at the last possible second is beyond my fucking comprehension.  Also with this client, it seems like every year or two there is a new person in charge of said forwarding-of-shit, because of internal politics etc.  Whenever we give them a heads up about something urgent, we usually don't hear back for usually weeks, often months, and yes, sometimes years.  At which point they are in a huge panic because their client has noticed and complained or they got in trouble somehow because major damage was done because of of neglect, at which point they try to blame us if they can.  And more than once i've gone to a job we got paid to do, only to find that it has already been completed by someone else, who also got paid for it by our client.

This is a great argument for NOT privatizing government services.  No guarantee the private company will be more efficient than the public service.  ;-)  And less oversight.

In capitalism's defence, those types of companies _eventually_ die out or investors' or owners want to eventually increase efficiency to raise margins.

Only meet in rooms with no possibility to sit down.
The meetings will be short and people will actually think if they need a meeting.

In the Agile Software Development model there is a type of meeting called a stand-up with that exact purpose: get the meeting over quickly.

Kitsune

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14659 on: August 30, 2016, 10:38:48 AM »

Only meet in rooms with no possibility to sit down.
The meetings will be short and people will actually think if they need a meeting.

In the Agile Software Development model there is a type of meeting called a stand-up with that exact purpose: get the meeting over quickly.
[/quote]

Yeah, my ex-boss was a software dude who thought that getting all the sales people and project managers for a stand-up meeting every morning to talk about what everyone was doing would be a GREAT idea. Note that NONE of our work actually overlapped on a regular basis. Typically took 45 minutes, no chairs permitted, PERIOD. Great when 8 months pregnant, standing on super-sore hips and knees for 45 minutes of colleagues droning on about disparate stuff... Not that I'm still annoyed or anything.

mtn

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14660 on: August 30, 2016, 11:00:03 AM »

Only meet in rooms with no possibility to sit down.
The meetings will be short and people will actually think if they need a meeting.

In the Agile Software Development model there is a type of meeting called a stand-up with that exact purpose: get the meeting over quickly.

Yeah, my ex-boss was a software dude who thought that getting all the sales people and project managers for a stand-up meeting every morning to talk about what everyone was doing would be a GREAT idea. Note that NONE of our work actually overlapped on a regular basis. Typically took 45 minutes, no chairs permitted, PERIOD. Great when 8 months pregnant, standing on super-sore hips and knees for 45 minutes of colleagues droning on about disparate stuff... Not that I'm still annoyed or anything.
[/quote]


(I'm a dude)

That would have put me over the edge. I'd have brought a chair in and sat down, and if I got any feedback about it I'd tell them I'm going home sick.

Aeowulf

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14661 on: August 30, 2016, 01:19:37 PM »
Heard from the wife, through his wife: **(counts because I used to work with him?)

She's freaking out because she can't get her hair dyed because he is buying a new motorcycle to celebrate getting out of the military. Just got out of the military, moving to California with no jobs lined up, and the kicker: $60k in debt.

I really thought they had it all together, but apparently not....

LeRainDrop

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14662 on: August 30, 2016, 01:28:24 PM »
Just overheard him on the phone - apparently since he bought the country place, he can't afford to drive the cars to the car shows. because it puts too much mileage on them, and they burn so much gas he's going through $400 a week just to show his cars. Dunno why he can't tow them on a flatbed.

Maybe you should suggest to him that he buy a flatbed?  ;-)

Chris22

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14663 on: August 30, 2016, 02:09:46 PM »
Heard from the wife, through his wife: **(counts because I used to work with him?)

She's freaking out because she can't get her hair dyed because he is buying a new motorcycle to celebrate getting out of the military. Just got out of the military, moving to California with no jobs lined up, and the kicker: $60k in debt.

I really thought they had it all together, but apparently not....

Getting out, or retiring from?  If it's retiring from, he's got a guaranteed income of $35-40k+ coming to him for life, so it's not like he's setting out for the great unknown with nothing.  Motorcycle though, no idea if that's dumb or not. 

johnny847

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14664 on: August 30, 2016, 07:17:21 PM »
On the subject of not being able to get work done....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XD2kNopsUs

TravelJunkyQC

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14665 on: August 31, 2016, 12:28:08 PM »
The office administrative assistant has been quietly taking every one of us into the conference room for 5 minutes since lunch. When it was my turn, I was obviously curious. Turns out, she was informing us individually that since we're changing pay-processing companies, there was going to be a slight change in that our 2-week pay cycle would be delayed by one week (currently we're paid in advance, so now we'll become like normal companies).

She wanted to let us all know in person about the change, and privately, to make sure that I could "plan accordingly" and that if there are any issues or I need an advance for the week, she can take care of it.

+1 on the discretion and care that she takes, I think that's wonderful.
But it makes me sad to know that this might cause issues for some coworkers.

Kitsune

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14666 on: August 31, 2016, 01:08:34 PM »
The office administrative assistant has been quietly taking every one of us into the conference room for 5 minutes since lunch. When it was my turn, I was obviously curious. Turns out, she was informing us individually that since we're changing pay-processing companies, there was going to be a slight change in that our 2-week pay cycle would be delayed by one week (currently we're paid in advance, so now we'll become like normal companies).

She wanted to let us all know in person about the change, and privately, to make sure that I could "plan accordingly" and that if there are any issues or I need an advance for the week, she can take care of it.

+1 on the discretion and care that she takes, I think that's wonderful.
But it makes me sad to know that this might cause issues for some coworkers.

Well, right now, that'd be an issue for us - we're finalizing debt repayments (20K in a year, woot!) and have money directly sent into savings on payday (preparing for an upcoming maternity leave), so yeah, it'd affect things, and we'd definitely need to know or payments would bounce. (That said, the solution would be 'transfer some money out of savings to cover the payments coming out, put it back on on payday a week later, re-calibrate automatic savings withdrawals", not "ask company for an advance", but...)

trailrated

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14667 on: August 31, 2016, 01:15:06 PM »
I was talking to someone that is in their late 30's about their 401k... They have been contributing for about 15 years but don't trust the stock market so the entire amount has gone directly to the "cash value" fund.

BTDretire

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14668 on: August 31, 2016, 01:59:04 PM »
I was talking to someone that is in their late 30's about their 401k... They have been contributing for about 15 years but don't trust the stock market so the entire amount has gone directly to the "cash value" fund.

I calculated a $5,000 deposit each year in the S&P 500.
14 deposits =$70,000 with S&P growth = $136,000
 It's a little more than that but calculator only went to 2015.
Sad to miss out on that.
  I have a retired friend that did day trading for a while. He never said, but I think he lost a lot of money.
Now he says the stock market is rigged and will not put any money in it.
Several of his friends have tried to change his mind, but he has $400,000 to $500,000 in cash.
He could have $1,000,000.

MgoSam

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14669 on: August 31, 2016, 02:43:48 PM »
I was talking to someone that is in their late 30's about their 401k... They have been contributing for about 15 years but don't trust the stock market so the entire amount has gone directly to the "cash value" fund.

I calculated a $5,000 deposit each year in the S&P 500.
14 deposits =$70,000 with S&P growth = $136,000
 It's a little more than that but calculator only went to 2015.
Sad to miss out on that.
  I have a retired friend that did day trading for a while. He never said, but I think he lost a lot of money.
Now he says the stock market is rigged and will not put any money in it.
Several of his friends have tried to change his mind, but he has $400,000 to $500,000 in cash.
He could have $1,000,000.

I know someone who has a ton of cash but also doesn't invest because he used to be a day trader. While he would get greater returns using index funds, he is scared that he would try to day trade and so is instead happier to leave the money in the bank.

RyanAtTanagra

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14670 on: August 31, 2016, 04:41:03 PM »
The office administrative assistant has been quietly taking every one of us into the conference room for 5 minutes since lunch. When it was my turn, I was obviously curious. Turns out, she was informing us individually that since we're changing pay-processing companies, there was going to be a slight change in that our 2-week pay cycle would be delayed by one week (currently we're paid in advance, so now we'll become like normal companies).

She wanted to let us all know in person about the change, and privately, to make sure that I could "plan accordingly" and that if there are any issues or I need an advance for the week, she can take care of it.

+1 on the discretion and care that she takes, I think that's wonderful.
But it makes me sad to know that this might cause issues for some coworkers.

Well, right now, that'd be an issue for us - we're finalizing debt repayments (20K in a year, woot!) and have money directly sent into savings on payday (preparing for an upcoming maternity leave), so yeah, it'd affect things, and we'd definitely need to know or payments would bounce. (That said, the solution would be 'transfer some money out of savings to cover the payments coming out, put it back on on payday a week later, re-calibrate automatic savings withdrawals", not "ask company for an advance", but...)

Wanting a heads up so you can move money around if needed is reasonable.  Being completely screwed if a paycheck is a week late, not so much, which is unfortunately where a lot of people stand (and where many of us used to stand, me included, I remember that feeling).

RyanAtTanagra

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14671 on: August 31, 2016, 04:42:51 PM »
I have a retired friend that did day trading for a while. He never said, but I think he lost a lot of money.
Now he says the stock market is rigged and will not put any money in it.

Haha, I guess that's one way to make yourself feel better about losing money... wasn't my fault, the system is rigged I tell you!

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14672 on: September 01, 2016, 05:28:02 AM »
Getting out, or retiring from?  If it's retiring from, he's got a guaranteed income of $35-40k+ coming to him for life, so it's not like he's setting out for the great unknown with nothing.  Motorcycle though, no idea if that's dumb or not.

MedSep, with only 20%.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14673 on: September 01, 2016, 08:11:51 AM »
I was talking to someone that is in their late 30's about their 401k... They have been contributing for about 15 years but don't trust the stock market so the entire amount has gone directly to the "cash value" fund.

Could you explain what a cash value fund is. Everything I found looking it up talks about annuities.

TravelJunkyQC

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14674 on: September 01, 2016, 08:15:44 AM »
The office administrative assistant has been quietly taking every one of us into the conference room for 5 minutes since lunch. When it was my turn, I was obviously curious. Turns out, she was informing us individually that since we're changing pay-processing companies, there was going to be a slight change in that our 2-week pay cycle would be delayed by one week (currently we're paid in advance, so now we'll become like normal companies).

She wanted to let us all know in person about the change, and privately, to make sure that I could "plan accordingly" and that if there are any issues or I need an advance for the week, she can take care of it.

+1 on the discretion and care that she takes, I think that's wonderful.
But it makes me sad to know that this might cause issues for some coworkers.

Well, right now, that'd be an issue for us - we're finalizing debt repayments (20K in a year, woot!) and have money directly sent into savings on payday (preparing for an upcoming maternity leave), so yeah, it'd affect things, and we'd definitely need to know or payments would bounce. (That said, the solution would be 'transfer some money out of savings to cover the payments coming out, put it back on on payday a week later, re-calibrate automatic savings withdrawals", not "ask company for an advance", but...)

Wanting a heads up so you can move money around if needed is reasonable.  Being completely screwed if a paycheck is a week late, not so much, which is unfortunately where a lot of people stand (and where many of us used to stand, me included, I remember that feeling).

I realize I didn't explain myself properly. I agree that it is best to know in case most things are automated and need to re-calibrate some things as you said. My sadness was with the "possibly needing an advance" thing, not with the "need to know in case you have automatic withdrawals".

trailrated

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14675 on: September 01, 2016, 08:17:31 AM »
I was talking to someone that is in their late 30's about their 401k... They have been contributing for about 15 years but don't trust the stock market so the entire amount has gone directly to the "cash value" fund.

Could you explain what a cash value fund is. Everything I found looking it up talks about annuities.

Sorry if that wasn't clear. Essentially it is like an account that just puts your funds into straight cash. It is like a savings account in the 401k that is worth exactly 1 dollar per share. So if you put in $50 you have 50 shares worth $1 each. So say retirement comes around and you put in $400,000 over the course of your career, once you go to withdrawal it will be worth.... $400,000.

TexasRunner

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14676 on: September 01, 2016, 08:21:00 AM »
I was talking to someone that is in their late 30's about their 401k... They have been contributing for about 15 years but don't trust the stock market so the entire amount has gone directly to the "cash value" fund.

Could you explain what a cash value fund is. Everything I found looking it up talks about annuities.

It is similar to just using your 401k account as a savings account, just with even lower rates.  If savings accounts are running .5% interest return, you might get .4%.  Basically it is part of everyone's 401k and Roth accounts but are only *supposed* to be used to hold money between transactions or before you can allocate your deposit.  Leaving that much money sitting there is (1) losing out on long-term market growth of 7% or so and (2) losing money to inflation.

Overall just a terrible idea.

I found out one of my coworkers is leaving everything in his 401k in the cash value because he is waiting for the market to drop.  He has been doing this since 2011....

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14677 on: September 01, 2016, 11:18:13 AM »
At my place of work I hear absurdly anti-mustachian sentiments spoken all too often.  I’ll have to refrain from publicly rebuking every single co-worker here. 

We regularly have potluck lunches (“pitch-ins”) at work to celebrate birthdays, holidays, etc.  Personally, I would rather skip the pitch-in and bring my own lunch, but I play nice and bring in a thoughtful contribution.  Today I made a crockpot full of meatballs.   

The reactions and contributions of my co-workers astound me.   

Coworker 1: “I’ll bring a bag of chips.  I can’t afford to buy a dish that feeds 12 people.  Do you know how much that costs??” 
Backstory:  He’s mid-20’s, married, and he and the wife still live with his parents.  He makes between $30-$40K.  He complains about being “poor” but buys every video game & computer game that catches his limited attention for 5 seconds.  He goes to the movies at least once a week. He gets fast food every day.
 
Last time we asked him to bring some veggies.  Easy, right?   Instead of cutting up some vegetables he BOUGHT a $20 pre-cut veggie tray with mostly withered vegetables that no one would eat. 

Coworker 2: “I can’t afford to contribute. You know I don’t get paid enough!”
Backstory: late 30’s, divorced, lives with a roommate, makes $30-$40K.  I know she manages to afford a weekly spray tan.  She also gets a bi-weekly mani/pedi.  She shops often. She’s always dressed to the nines and has a mammoth size collection of clip in hair extensions to compliment any look.   Fast food every day.  And I’m sure I would cringe if I ever saw her cigarette budget. 

Neither co-worker contributed today but they have no problem eating everyone else's contribution!

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14678 on: September 01, 2016, 11:24:40 AM »
At my place of work I hear absurdly anti-mustachian sentiments spoken all too often.  I’ll have to refrain from publicly rebuking every single co-worker here. 

We regularly have potluck lunches (“pitch-ins”) at work to celebrate birthdays, holidays, etc.  Personally, I would rather skip the pitch-in and bring my own lunch, but I play nice and bring in a thoughtful contribution.  Today I made a crockpot full of meatballs.   

The reactions and contributions of my co-workers astound me.   

Coworker 1: “I’ll bring a bag of chips.  I can’t afford to buy a dish that feeds 12 people.  Do you know how much that costs??” 
Backstory:  He’s mid-20’s, married, and he and the wife still live with his parents.  He makes between $30-$40K.  He complains about being “poor” but buys every video game & computer game that catches his limited attention for 5 seconds.  He goes to the movies at least once a week. He gets fast food every day.
 
Last time we asked him to bring some veggies.  Easy, right?   Instead of cutting up some vegetables he BOUGHT a $20 pre-cut veggie tray with mostly withered vegetables that no one would eat. 

Coworker 2: “I can’t afford to contribute. You know I don’t get paid enough!”
Backstory: late 30’s, divorced, lives with a roommate, makes $30-$40K.  I know she manages to afford a weekly spray tan.  She also gets a bi-weekly mani/pedi.  She shops often. She’s always dressed to the nines and has a mammoth size collection of clip in hair extensions to compliment any look.   Fast food every day.  And I’m sure I would cringe if I ever saw her cigarette budget. 

Neither co-worker contributed today but they have no problem eating everyone else's contribution!

This one made me really angry. I think I need to stop reading this thread...

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14679 on: September 01, 2016, 11:49:06 AM »
At my place of work I hear absurdly anti-mustachian sentiments spoken all too often.  I’ll have to refrain from publicly rebuking every single co-worker here. 

We regularly have potluck lunches (“pitch-ins”) at work to celebrate birthdays, holidays, etc.  Personally, I would rather skip the pitch-in and bring my own lunch, but I play nice and bring in a thoughtful contribution.  Today I made a crockpot full of meatballs.   

The reactions and contributions of my co-workers astound me.   

Coworker 1: “I’ll bring a bag of chips.  I can’t afford to buy a dish that feeds 12 people.  Do you know how much that costs??” 
Backstory:  He’s mid-20’s, married, and he and the wife still live with his parents.  He makes between $30-$40K.  He complains about being “poor” but buys every video game & computer game that catches his limited attention for 5 seconds.  He goes to the movies at least once a week. He gets fast food every day.
 
Last time we asked him to bring some veggies.  Easy, right?   Instead of cutting up some vegetables he BOUGHT a $20 pre-cut veggie tray with mostly withered vegetables that no one would eat. 

Coworker 2: “I can’t afford to contribute. You know I don’t get paid enough!”
Backstory: late 30’s, divorced, lives with a roommate, makes $30-$40K.  I know she manages to afford a weekly spray tan.  She also gets a bi-weekly mani/pedi.  She shops often. She’s always dressed to the nines and has a mammoth size collection of clip in hair extensions to compliment any look.   Fast food every day.  And I’m sure I would cringe if I ever saw her cigarette budget. 

Neither co-worker contributed today but they have no problem eating everyone else's contribution!

Oh geez.

I used to organize potlucks at my old company.  We'd do them for holidays.  We had 30 people, and a variety of workers...mostly PhDs in their late 20's to 40's, but some engineers and some techs.

One friend was in her 40s and Chinese.  Each year, she and her husband and daughter would make homemade potstickers.  Then my Mexican friend would bring tamales or enchiladas (that his mom made).

I told the single guys to bring chips, soda, cookies, or ice cream. 

One year, my other single friend (early 30's) - well, she went to Costco, bought a bag of meatballs, bought sauce, and put it all in a crockpot in the morning.  My Chinese friend, who had spent 3 hours making potstickers...well, that was the last time she made potstickers for the potluck.

At my current company, I threw a potluck summer picnic because we went years without one (then the company laid off 5/6 of my people two weeks later).  We used to have a large night shift, and they ate together all the time.  They kept acquiring kitchen tools - toaster oven, electric skillet, rice cooker, crockpot, George Foreman...

People eating and not contributing would also tick me off.

I'm a red panda

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14680 on: September 01, 2016, 12:04:57 PM »
I've always found potlucks to be really wasteful.

We have 50 people in our office, lets say 30 people decide to go to the potluck.  20-25 of them will bring enough food for 5-10 (certainly way more than the amount of food they could eat on there own), a few people will forget or just not contribute, but not many.  Well now we have enough food for 100 people... 


I've tried to convince work that we should rotate who brings food for each potluck, rather than asking everyone every time- but the people who run these things think that everyone who goes to the pot should be bringing things. 

ender

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14681 on: September 01, 2016, 12:09:51 PM »
One friend was in her 40s and Chinese.  Each year, she and her husband and daughter would make homemade potstickers.  Then my Mexican friend would bring tamales or enchiladas (that his mom made).

I told the single guys to bring chips, soda, cookies, or ice cream. 

One year, my other single friend (early 30's) - well, she went to Costco, bought a bag of meatballs, bought sauce, and put it all in a crockpot in the morning.  My Chinese friend, who had spent 3 hours making potstickers...well, that was the last time she made potstickers for the potluck.

If one of my coworkers had told me at a potluck, as a "single guy" to just bring cheap crap to a potluck I would have been rather annoyed.

And I don't understand your lament of the person bringing meatballs/sauce and a crockpot. Crockpots are nearly perfect for work potlucks.

tomatops

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14682 on: September 01, 2016, 12:22:04 PM »
Canadian here: my boss was complaining for about 30 minutes out loud to me (obviously, this was worthy of stopping me from being productive) that her neighbours as her age, have a house just as big as hers, don't work, and are paying less tax because they've chosen not to work and are reaping child care tax benefits. Her rationale was it was BS because they were being unproductive members of society.

Secretly, I said to myself: "That couple represents everything I want." #SaveSaveSave

arebelspy

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14683 on: September 01, 2016, 12:51:29 PM »
I've always found potlucks to be really wasteful.

We have 50 people in our office, lets say 30 people decide to go to the potluck.  20-25 of them will bring enough food for 5-10 (certainly way more than the amount of food they could eat on there own), a few people will forget or just not contribute, but not many.  Well now we have enough food for 100 people... 


I've tried to convince work that we should rotate who brings food for each potluck, rather than asking everyone every time- but the people who run these things think that everyone who goes to the pot should be bringing things.
That's what we did at my elementary school. Kinder and first grade teachers bring it once, 2nd and 3rd, 4th and 5th, and specialists (PE, art, music, library) and support/office staff once.  You only bring stuff once, but get 4 potlucks.
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MightyMauler

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14684 on: September 01, 2016, 01:34:37 PM »
I've always found potlucks to be really wasteful.

We have 50 people in our office, lets say 30 people decide to go to the potluck.  20-25 of them will bring enough food for 5-10 (certainly way more than the amount of food they could eat on there own), a few people will forget or just not contribute, but not many.  Well now we have enough food for 100 people... 


I've tried to convince work that we should rotate who brings food for each potluck, rather than asking everyone every time- but the people who run these things think that everyone who goes to the pot should be bringing things.
That's what we did at my elementary school. Kinder and first grade teachers bring it once, 2nd and 3rd, 4th and 5th, and specialists (PE, art, music, library) and support/office staff once.  You only bring stuff once, but get 4 potlucks.

I learned long ago to make easy dishes for potlucks because most culinary efforts go unappreciated.  We do have way too much food now, but on the up side, I'm the only one here who eats leftovers so I'm set for the next week! 

antarestar

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14685 on: September 01, 2016, 01:46:25 PM »
Best potluck dish ever! I get asked for the recipe and requests to bring it. It tastes so much better than just 3 ingredients.

Cranberry Salad - aka super easy and special cranberry sauce.
2 cans whole berry cranberry
1 can mandarin oranges
1/2 cup toasted walnuts

A day or two before the potluck pour the cranberry in a large bowl and break it up. Stir in walnuts and then gently fold in mandarin oranges. Cover and put in fridge until mealtime.

Dezrah

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14686 on: September 01, 2016, 02:28:43 PM »
A coworker of mine is getting married in his hometown soon.  Most of his colleagues won't be able to make it so we had a Mexican barbeque to celebrate instead.  Per the requests of the hostess, I brought some homemade cheesesticks.  They taste amazing but they have to be consumed as soon as they come out of the oven.  You would have thought I was Martha Stewart the way people marveled at how I used the oven.  I'm glad they appreciated my efforts but that's hardly a skilled cooking endeavor.

Admittedly, it's pretty fun to offer someone a treat that wildly exceeds their expectations.  Cheese sticks are so "meh" most of time since they're usually made out of old pizza dough or something.  Good thing they're so much effort or I'd be making them all the time and be 10 lbs worse for it.

No one touched my shoo-fly-pie at the Thanksgiving potluck though.  People have no sense of adventure.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14687 on: September 01, 2016, 02:32:14 PM »
One friend was in her 40s and Chinese.  Each year, she and her husband and daughter would make homemade potstickers.  Then my Mexican friend would bring tamales or enchiladas (that his mom made).

I told the single guys to bring chips, soda, cookies, or ice cream. 

One year, my other single friend (early 30's) - well, she went to Costco, bought a bag of meatballs, bought sauce, and put it all in a crockpot in the morning.  My Chinese friend, who had spent 3 hours making potstickers...well, that was the last time she made potstickers for the potluck.

If one of my coworkers had told me at a potluck, as a "single guy" to just bring cheap crap to a potluck I would have been rather annoyed.

And I don't understand your lament of the person bringing meatballs/sauce and a crockpot. Crockpots are nearly perfect for work potlucks.

Yeah, that seems super sexist to be mad at the woman for bringing pre-made meatballs, but only expecting single men to bring bring pre-made crap.  By extension, presumably the married men are expected to press their wives to make stuff for a potluck they won't even attend? 

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14688 on: September 01, 2016, 02:51:09 PM »
One friend was in her 40s and Chinese.  Each year, she and her husband and daughter would make homemade potstickers.  Then my Mexican friend would bring tamales or enchiladas (that his mom made).

I told the single guys to bring chips, soda, cookies, or ice cream. 

One year, my other single friend (early 30's) - well, she went to Costco, bought a bag of meatballs, bought sauce, and put it all in a crockpot in the morning.  My Chinese friend, who had spent 3 hours making potstickers...well, that was the last time she made potstickers for the potluck.

If one of my coworkers had told me at a potluck, as a "single guy" to just bring cheap crap to a potluck I would have been rather annoyed.

And I don't understand your lament of the person bringing meatballs/sauce and a crockpot. Crockpots are nearly perfect for work potlucks.
Yeah. Pop, soda.chips should be the domain of single mothers....

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14689 on: September 01, 2016, 02:56:03 PM »
No one touched my shoo-fly-pie at the Thanksgiving potluck though.  People have no sense of adventure.

Wait, what?!  Was it wet-bottom?  Seriously, I'd be all over that!  Mmmm... shoo-fly-pie..... *drools*

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14690 on: September 01, 2016, 02:57:36 PM »
One friend was in her 40s and Chinese.  Each year, she and her husband and daughter would make homemade potstickers.  Then my Mexican friend would bring tamales or enchiladas (that his mom made).

I told the single guys to bring chips, soda, cookies, or ice cream. 

One year, my other single friend (early 30's) - well, she went to Costco, bought a bag of meatballs, bought sauce, and put it all in a crockpot in the morning.  My Chinese friend, who had spent 3 hours making potstickers...well, that was the last time she made potstickers for the potluck.

If one of my coworkers had told me at a potluck, as a "single guy" to just bring cheap crap to a potluck I would have been rather annoyed.

And I don't understand your lament of the person bringing meatballs/sauce and a crockpot. Crockpots are nearly perfect for work potlucks.

Yeah, that seems super sexist to be mad at the woman for bringing pre-made meatballs, but only expecting single men to bring bring pre-made crap.  By extension, presumably the married men are expected to press their wives to make stuff for a potluck they won't even attend?

I think you're missing the point--he was expecting the woman to bring chips or similar. Instead she brought something that required no effort and one-upped the potstickers.

That is how I interpretted it, anyways.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14691 on: September 01, 2016, 09:22:14 PM »
That's what we did at my elementary school. Kinder and first grade teachers bring it once, 2nd and 3rd, 4th and 5th, and specialists (PE, art, music, library) and support/office staff once.  You only bring stuff once, but get 4 potlucks.
Sounds like a fascinating sociological experiment. Did anyone eat the PE teacher's stuff ? Do kinder teachers eat glue ?

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14692 on: September 01, 2016, 11:19:11 PM »
No one touched my shoo-fly-pie at the Thanksgiving potluck though.  People have no sense of adventure.

Wait, what?!  Was it wet-bottom?  Seriously, I'd be all over that!  Mmmm... shoo-fly-pie..... *drools*

So now you need to have a sense of adventure to eat PIE?  Did they think it was actually made of flies?

arebelspy

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14693 on: September 02, 2016, 12:05:45 AM »
That's what we did at my elementary school. Kinder and first grade teachers bring it once, 2nd and 3rd, 4th and 5th, and specialists (PE, art, music, library) and support/office staff once.  You only bring stuff once, but get 4 potlucks.
Sounds like a fascinating sociological experiment. Did anyone eat the PE teacher's stuff ? Do kinder teachers eat glue ?
Surprisingly, the ratio of edible stuff was about what I'd expect from the normal population.
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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14694 on: September 02, 2016, 08:58:36 AM »
Best potluck dish ever! I get asked for the recipe and requests to bring it. It tastes so much better than just 3 ingredients.

Cranberry Salad - aka super easy and special cranberry sauce.
2 cans whole berry cranberry
1 can mandarin oranges
1/2 cup toasted walnuts

A day or two before the potluck pour the cranberry in a large bowl and break it up. Stir in walnuts and then gently fold in mandarin oranges. Cover and put in fridge until mealtime.

Yum!  Thanks for reminding me of something similar I had years ago.  Used fresh oranges, though mandarin would work just as well, especially for potluck because it's so easy.

I have a fellow special ed teacher who never brings anything to our Christmas and Cinco de Mayo potlucks.  It's now a running joke, and I still invite him to eat.  (Mostly out of guilt- I know they pay him a pittance for whatever reason.  Not that I make so much, it's just more than him.)

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14695 on: September 02, 2016, 09:11:25 AM »
No one touched my shoo-fly-pie at the Thanksgiving potluck though.  People have no sense of adventure.

Wait, what?!  Was it wet-bottom?  Seriously, I'd be all over that!  Mmmm... shoo-fly-pie..... *drools*

So now you need to have a sense of adventure to eat PIE?  Did they think it was actually made of flies?

Surprisingly yes, people were put off by the name and just went for the sure thing, like chocolate pudding pie or something. I don't think calling it "Amish molasses pie" would have resulted in more takers.

And no, the pie was moist at best but not wet. Funny story, I called my 80 year old grandma to get her recipe and she told me to to Google Amish shoo-fly-pie. She's rediscovered her love of cooking with all the internet recipes at her finger tips but I guess the rest of us have lost the special unique details hidden in the carefully saved index cards.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14696 on: September 02, 2016, 09:47:16 AM »
I've always found potlucks to be really wasteful.

We have 50 people in our office, lets say 30 people decide to go to the potluck.  20-25 of them will bring enough food for 5-10 (certainly way more than the amount of food they could eat on there own), a few people will forget or just not contribute, but not many.  Well now we have enough food for 100 people... 


I've tried to convince work that we should rotate who brings food for each potluck, rather than asking everyone every time- but the people who run these things think that everyone who goes to the pot should be bringing things.

My neighborhood has a potluck every Sunday night.  We do pretty well by now.  There are generally minimal leftovers.  I had a bunch of leftover carrot salad this week, which was awesome, because I ate it for lunch.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14697 on: September 02, 2016, 02:12:31 PM »
Our payroll manager came to me today asking what we needed to do. Today is payday and an employee received a live check but it got rejected at a check cashing place.  The employee called the manager freaking out and the manager asked why they didn't go to the bank our corporate bank accounts are with.  It turns out the employee has an account with the same bank but it is so overdrawn that if they took the check there to cash it the bank would take the whole paycheck to apply to their overdrawn account.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14698 on: September 02, 2016, 05:58:11 PM »
Our payroll manager came to me today asking what we needed to do. Today is payday and an employee received a live check but it got rejected at a check cashing place.  The employee called the manager freaking out and the manager asked why they didn't go to the bank our corporate bank accounts are with.  It turns out the employee has an account with the same bank but it is so overdrawn that if they took the check there to cash it the bank would take the whole paycheck to apply to their overdrawn account.

As mentioned in the inheritance thread I literally don't understand some of these scenarios. I make over 5K/month and when I applied for overdraft at my bank they offered me a 250$ limit. It charges 24%/year interest and has a 5$/day fee if the overdraft lasts longer than one calendar day.

I understand that usury and interest collecting is how these banks make make money but at the same time I can't understand how they are willing to lend such grave amounts to people.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #14699 on: September 02, 2016, 08:47:34 PM »
Last year I had a parent want to donate money to my class so that we could purchase a few Chromebooks for the kids to use. They donated the money and then I went about ordering the CB's through our purchasing department. Turns out one CB was going to cost about $700. I could get the identical CB on Amazon for about $250. The extra money was the service fee we had to pay for some company to maintain the machine or something like that. What a waste . The thing that sucked the most was that I could not give the money back to the parents to buy on their own and donate directly to my class. Once donated it is gone for good.

One more. We have access to 403b retirement accounts and a colleague shared his statements with me. He was paying outrageous fees and his account was severely lacking in growth for the amount of time he had been investing. I shared my roth account at VG for the same time frame to give him an idea of how much fees impact growth. I showed him where to move his money and what his best options were for a low cost everything fund, like a 2045 retirement, etc. A year later and he still has not done anything to change it. 

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!