Potty Mouth Award

So I had to laugh when I saw this Potty Mouth “work of art” award. 

And it had a real potty in it too!

It reminded me of some foul-mouthed, but fun-spirited colleagues who actually used to keep a scorecard in the office with tick marks for each occurrence of cursing by person.

Let’s just say that there were some clear winners on this account.

In many cases, they did it as a vent for all the frustration at work and also because they thought it was funny. 

I remember my dad who was very religious and he used to say jokingly and with a big smile:

“Don’t use that f*ckin language with me!”

Growing up as a Jewish kid even from the Bronx, it was never really an issue for us.

Although even I have to admit that sometimes hearing someone get really angry and spewing off like that–while not appropriate, it does let you know where their head is at–at least for that moment in potty time.  😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Transitioning To Virtual Ease And Triviality

I took this photo a few weeks ago on the streets in Washington, D.C.

This was a huge box from eBay coming to someone.

In my building, they recently built an extra storeroom for all the deliveries that are coming everyday–there is no where to put all of them.

Jeff Bezos was recently names the 4th richest person in America, as the stock price of Amazon is up 45% in the last year alone. 

While today in the Wall Street Journal, even the revered retailer of Herald Square, Macy’s, had their stock price shed half it’s value in the last year, and other big box retailers are hurting just as bad. 

eCommerce is threatening the very survival of brick and mortal retailers, as they are seriously eating their lunch–and breakfast and dinner too!

But this is part of a much larger transition occurring from our physical to virtual worlds…

As we abandon department stores and the Mall for online shopping, 

movie theaters and playhouses for home theaters and video streaming, 

physical activities for gaming and virtual reality, 

and even factories and office work for telework and robots, 

soon we will have no real place to go and nothing to physically do. 

From the bed and couch to the computer and gym, like hamsters on the wheel of triviality, we might as well package ourselves up in the big eBay box and send ourselves to outer space–but only as long as we can get Internet access there. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal) 

Snipped My Tie

This was pretty funny.

I had a loose thread on my tie as is wont to happen. 

And I know well enough not to try and pull it, because then you can really mess the tie up. 

But I am so busy in the office rushing around doing a million things.

So I pull out a scissors and still in a hurry just try to snip off the thread.

Well, I snipped it a little to close to the tie apparently.

This turned out not as a haircut, but more like a scalping. 

No more thread, and no more tie!  

Thank G-d, this wasn’t a circumcision or we’d really be in trouble. 

One more lesson is always keep an extra tie at work. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Take Your Family Issues To Work Day

So we all love Take You Child(ren) To Work Day.

It’s a great idea to bond with our children and share our work life with them.

This way they know what mommy and daddy do and also a little of what work is like. 

But one of the funny things I noticed is how uncomfortable most parents seem with their kids around them in at work. 

They have this worried and kvetchy look on their face.

They are crossing boundaries between personal/family/home life and professional/work life. 

What is at once two-faces, two distinct roles is now combined for a single day a year. 

Perhaps personal problems from home and between family members is entering the workspace or the problems of work life is evident to your close family members. 

Maybe mommy or daddy really doesn’t get along all the well with little Johnny or Rosie all the time or perhaps little Johnny or Rosie is not that perfect little kid you’ve been showing around in pictures and talking up in the office. 

Similarly, mommy or daddy may not be “all that” in the office that they come home and portray to their family about–that big management position and corner office could be just another run of the mill job and situated in a long row of cubicles deep this way and that. 

In any case, the barriers are being crossed and even if there have been no outright lies told and caught, different sides of the person that are typically kept separate and sacrosanct are converging and the alternate egos and varied personas come head-to-head.

The good news is that the organization usually gives the parents leeway to not really do any serious work when the kids are around for the day and to mostly schlep them to special kids’ events in the workplace–everybody get to meet the CEO and have ice cream?

Thus, the unveiling of dual natures and embedded conflicts is kept to a manageable minimum, if not an uncomfortable merging of work and family life. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal) 

Not Your B*tch

Another story from a friend of a friend in the office.

A person has someone working for them who hasn’t been working out all that well. 

Basically, the staff person is having challenges simply getting their job done. 

The boss asks what the problem is and if there is anything they can do to help the person be successful. 

The staff person blurts out to their boss that “Nothing is wrong–I just don’t want anyone to say I’m your b*tch!”

For all the possible reasons for not doing your job this one was quite a shocking one. 

Sure people have challenges–not everyone is good at everything and it’s not always a right fit, but being worried about what other people think about your doing your job…uh, not a very good excuse. 

Seems like something the boss is not going to be able to really fix…maybe a shrink. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Making The Deadline

It was funny at work recently.

The team was having some “technical difficulties” getting something done. 

It wasn’t like it wasn’t going to happen, it was just taking a little longer than expected. 

I was riding herd on this, since we had made a commitment to get it done by a certain date and time and it was important to get it right. 

After a number of delays, I started to question whether we were really going to be able to meet the deadline, and one of my colleagues asks about how the boss will react if we don’t make it. 

Then all of a sudden, they blurt out, “Is he going to sh*t a brick if we don’t make it?”

I was a little taken aback at the saying, but then it was sort of a funny image of the extreme kvetchy face a person would be making in such a situation–trying to pass not a (little) stone, but literally a big brick. 

As it turns out, we made the deadline–although we had to use the buffer time we had carefully built in–and the team did a great job, so no bricks, no stones, and just kudos all around. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Flying Garbage

Thought this was an interesting way to get the garbage to the curbside truck.

This guy is standing in the yard of this brownstone building in the leftover snow.

Almost like an Olympian, he is picking up bag after bag of garbage and tossing them at least a dozen feet (or more).

The garbage in these big hefty bags are sailing through the air to his partner standing by the truck in the street. 

This guy must be getting quite some exercise not only lifting, but also throwing these bags all day long.

And he actually seemed to be having some fun doing it too.

Like my wife said, “What if you get hit by the garbage…ew.

Fly garbage, fly! 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)