h/t WeeWeed
Listen,
bear spray
DOES NOT
work like bug spray.We would like to not have to say that again.
— Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation (@OKWildlifeDept) May 23, 2022
This made me think about really dumb things I’ve seen people say or do over the years. You know, the ones that are just a head and shoulders above the usual.
While I’m quite sure every profession has their own share of stupidity, years of working in retail management left me convinced that a huge number of people have no common sense whatsoever, and as most of us know, common sense is often inversely related to IQ. And education!
Here is perhaps my all time favorite unbelievably dumb story. You’re going to think I’m making this up, and it was an attempt at a joke, or someone trying to aggravate me. I promise you, it wasn’t.
Before I went into retail sales and then management, I sold building materials wholesale. My favorite part of that was selling millwork, in particular high end windows and doors like Marvin and Kolbe & Kolbe. There are dozens of details that must be exactly right when dealing with a large custom order of windows and doors, and any mistake can result in the windows not fitting, or other costly problems. Because of the complexity and expense of Marvin orders, most of my retailers simply refused to deal with their own customers and always had me deal directly with the orders.
One of the lumber yards in town had a guy who just wasn’t too bright, and he was kind of treated like the unpopular kid in school by his fellow salesmen. He was a challenge to deal with because he had a way of making errors happen and also promising his customers things that could not be delivered. I wish now, looking back, that I’d been more patient with him, not that I was cruel or unkind. But he sure made my job extra hard. Anyhow, there’s no one left after thirty plus years to harm in an anonymous story.
One job he sold had a pair of french doors in the great room. They were to be placed at the end of the long room, one on either side of a center fireplace, so naturally there was one of each hand. A few days after the order was delivered he called me in a panic, insisting I meet him at the job site to discuss a major problem with the contractor. When I asked him what the problems was, he told me the doors were the wrong hand, both of them.
I never did find out for sure if the contractor and his employees were as dumb as the salesmen or making him the butt of a bad joke. Of course I suspect the latter, but I worked with some really, really dumb contractors too.
I can’t tell you how many times they came in to Home Depot and told me they needed to know how much siding they needed for a 2,000 square foot house. Or how many roof shingles, also giving me square footage without roof pitch and other pertinent information.
Share your best stories, be they professional or from some other walk of like. It’s time to toss a little fun in the day.
As a resident of this state, I can tell you there is definitely a certain amount of stupid running around here….
Something missing.
I got to see him the year before he passed away!
I got to see him live too, he was most excellent.
I saw Merle Open for Bob Dylan back in 2005 !
Most Awesome !
I needed this post. I think this is great for CTH. Thanks Menagerie! Laughter is good medicine and I need a remedy!
In my junior year in college, (BSN program north of Dallas), one of the male students (sorry guys), gave a suppository that was still in the foil wrapper….
One of the male students in my clinical ortho rotation used an emesis basin to pour the hydrogen peroxide in to clean the pins of a patient’s fracture.
As a young patrolman we were called to assist a woman with abdominal pain. After the ER doctor examined the patient he discovered there were several suppositories up where the sun don’t shine. See, when the first one didn’t work another one might work. And so on.
About 14 years ago a man came in to the Ford Dealership that I was a Technician in. He was all bent out of shape because he had been at the grocery store, and since he left there his Door Ajar light was on and he “Knew” it was unsafe. After looking quickly at his car, I didn’t see any groceries. I asked him where his groceries were and he said “In the trunk.” I walked up to the trunk, opened the trunk lid, closed it, light went out……He never closed the trunk lid…..
When is a door not a door?
When it’s ajar.
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
When is a car not a car?
When it turns into a driveway.
I’ll take aim at myself, decades ago there was a place called Beefsteak Charlies that had a salad bar with unlimited shrimp. I’m not very sophisticated and my wife, then girlfriend and I went with another couple. The other couple loaded up on shrimp, so did I. I thought that shrimp were horrible and couldn’t understand the big deal but kept eating them. About the time the steak came out and I noticed the other couple had a bowl full of shrimp shells. Didn’t notice what my wife did but I ate a lot of shells.
Remember seeing the commercials for beefsteak Charlie’s but never went. Slightly before my time….hard to forget a name like that.
OK, I’ll admit it. I eat the tip end of the shrimp, tail casing and all. Especially if they’re fried. Grosses my wife out. I also eat the skill of a baked potatoes.
I prefer the potato skin with additional butter!
And hard as a rock.
mmm mmm good!
Sweet potato skin, too!
Me, too,
Always have, always will.
That’s the filet of the shrimp
Take your wife for sushi. Order the prawn sushi. They will bring you the tail on rice and fry the giant heads. You can entertain your wife eating giant fried shrimp heads.
As you are eating the heads, be sure to explain to her that shrimp are actually underwater cockroaches. Over time, this will pay for itself.
At the chinese restaurant, I would eat the shells of these salt and pepper shrimp. (not sure if you are supposed to or not!) but they were good.
https://www.thespruceeats.com/salt-and-pepper-shrimp-recipe-695176
I did something similar during a business trip to Panama City, FL, some 40 years ago. I loved shrimp, but had never before been served shrimp in the shell. (Young, dumb …)
After laughing at me a bit, the locals kindly showed me how to peel them.
Shrimp really do taste much better without the shell.
So does crayfish! Nothing better than a good crayfish boil. Luckily, my Cajun buddy at the time showed me the intricacies of getting to the tail only. He sucked out the abdomen too, but I couldn’t do that.
Crawfish…in Texas at least.😉
Is this for real, puzzled? Or a joke?!
Well, if it’s real, you probably got a good helping of calcium or something very good for you that day!
Pro Tip>>> Never try this with lobster.
For real.
You could have been the gent in my story.
Here’s one from today that gave me a little snicker. During a Zoom call between General Milley, Lloyd Austin, Laura Cooper, and the Ukrainian Defense Contract Group, the Americans were pictured in front of 3 Ukrainian flags that were upside down.
https://www.businessinsider.com/pentagon-ukraine-flag-upside-down-press-conference-2022-5
All things considered, that IS pretty fitting.
I’m surprised the american flags weren’t upside down too.
Yep, every mail sent has an upside down flag stamp. Now someone is gonna ask me where to buy upside down flag stamps, eh?
Ooops. Posted above before seeing that you do the same.
They should be!
I put American flag stamps upside down on everything I mail. I won’t change them to their proper position until, please, God, we get our Republic back.
I have often wondered if anybody who receives what I mail notices. My small act of defiance.
So do I!!!!
Me. too.
My mother told me years ago that if you put a stamp on upside down it means you live the recipient. Am I the only one told this it was she pulling my leg?
I have never heard this. I suspect she was pulling your leg. 😊
I was told as a child that it meant you miss the recipient
I’m surprised there WERE American flags at all!
High ranking idiots! A good NCO would have kept them straight but perhaps a better one set them up!
Those guys are trying to protect the country.
The country of Ukraine that is.
Yeah, whatever happened to CODE
STINKPINK ?I heard they went to work for Billy.
Among the military, there are many stories of … fun… things. Most are harmless and funny, others, notsomuch. On a map, there are squares that indicate every 1000 meters. These are called grid squares.
When we wanted to get rid of someone for a while, or just felt like messing them, we would send them after a box of grid squares. Normally they would come back somewhat embarrassed for falling for it. But I had one Specialist 4 who said “Cool, Sir” and went off hunting. Two hours later he came back with a box full of little grid squares he had cut up from an old map we had in the Ops room. I gave him the rest of day off.
Sometimes you’re the windshield, sometimes you’re the bug. I was the bug that day.
YOU were a good Officer!
Having been a Spec 4 long ago I can only imagine the guy saying to himself, and maybe a buddy, “dunno how I’m gonna keep a straight face when I give him these!”.
And after you graciously gave him the rest of the day off he HAD to think to himself “got him!”.
And after THAT, you likely had a lot of respect and loyalty from him.
You can give orders and get things done.
You can earn loyalty and get the extra mile.
At least that’s how it worked with me.
Gallon of pipe stretching oil…
Bucket of prefabbed holes….
The smart guy sent for a bucket of vacuum brought back light bulbs 😉
Ahhh, the pipe stretcher.
Thats an old plumbing one.
”Go look in the gang box for the pipe stretcher”
Re “Go look in the gang box for the pipe stretcher”
If you sent someone like me who grew up in the service station business to get a pipe stretcher, he would bring you one of these…
LISLE Pipe Stretcher Kit – Bing video
I’ve used one many a time!
These parts, it is a gallon of left-handed prop wash.
Or the left-handed pliers or box wrench.
Foreman asked why was the ‘prentice was throwing away half the siding nails.
Because the heads are on the wrong end of the nails.
Dolt! Those nails are for the other side of the house!!
Bucket of steam.
I enjoyed it when my RTO would ask one of the new Privates “Get me a tube of frequency grease”. Never failed to make me chuckle
As an enlisted newbie I was sent out on one of these “get this mission” but I had been around longer than they knew and I was onto the game….my mistake was just going off doing my own thing all day and returning without the nonexistent item. Had a day off but paid for it in sweat and ringing ears from the royal ass chewing.
My father always told the story that in the Army field artillery training in Germany a not so with-it soldier was told to go over to the other battalion and get the gun report.
Early 1990s I lived in France, and travelled to Germany regularly for business.
Every week when I went to through security, their equivalent of TSA would take my laptop out and weigh it.
My laptop had had a hard drive replacement, and since a ‘stock’ drive was not available, a larger one was put in. Of course this increased the weight of the laptop.
I tried to explain this the first few times, but every week the laptop would end up being scanned/x-rayed.
After about 4-5 trips the agent asks me ‘Why does your laptop weight so much more than the spec says?’
Since he didn’t accept the real answer, I said ‘The spec is for an empty laptop. I have a lot of data in there now’.
Never got stopped again (around 1993)
Sweeeeeeeeeeeet!!!
wow!!
Too awesome!
My British husband drove a bus load of scouts across the Channel into Europe for a week of camping. He was a meticulous packer of all their equipment on his coach when they left. But after a week, everything that had to be repacked in the same coach had been used and was harder to get in the limited space he had.
Nevertheless he got it done, only to be stopped by some officious custom agent in Dover who demanded that he take everything out so they could “inspect” for drugs, contraband, whatever the fool thought a bus load of 13 year old boys might be smuggling.
By the time that he found nothing, cars behind my husband’s coach were lined up as far as this eye could see, waiting their turn. The official ordered my husband to hurry up and get the tents, bags, etc back in the hold.
“Nope,” said my husband. “You wanted it out, you can repack it.” And that’s when all the cars behind him started honking non-stop. It was so bad that eventually the head officials ran out of his little booths to see why the holdup. My husband explained, then stood back and wouldn’t budge.
So the head job’s worth ordered 6 customs agents, and they packed it all back up. My husband said he’d never seen government officials work so hard or so fast in his life. It took them forever to get it done.
A small victory against British officialdom. He said he never enjoyed anything so much in his life.
Oh and this…by delaying him during the unloading, his legal driving time was up, so by law he couldn’t then drive a repacked coach anywhere. By the time customs has repacked, his rest time was finished, and he could proceed Stupid is as stupid does.
You win!
HaHa, TSA is always there for a good laugh. I borrowed a Sous Vide from my brother in CA to being home and try out before purchasing one. It is a long tube with electronics on the top, heating wire wraped around the base tube, and a small propeller at the bottom to make the water flow through the heating wires. No issues in CA heading home, but the return trip to CA was fun as I only had carry on, and as I went through the TSA screening, the TSA person watching the x-ray screen had a terrified look on her face, like it was some sort of explosive device, as my luggage when through the scanner. I looked at her and said it was a Sous Vide for cooking, and she took my word for it and let it go on through without further inspection, or asking another co-worker what it was. Just goes to show you how the TSA show works.
Fun travel fact, apparently it is not an issue to check a drill press, chopsaw and other tools. After my dad passed, I transported some tools out to my brother in CA. 3 – 70lbs bags worth, I got upgraded to first class a lot back then,so it was all free baggage. My co-workers when we arrive in CA, were a little suprised by the heavy three large bags that come out on the checked luggage carousel, for a 3 day trip, they thought I over packed, until I told them I was transporting tools to my brother. It was nice of them to help my roll them out to my waiting brother’s car. I moved a lot of stuff from MN to CA for my brother. Still haven’t figured out how to get the china cabnet out there, it is large, awquard and fragile.
TSA almost made me miss a flight when I was hand carrying a custom lithium niobate integrated optical circuit back to CA from Bell Labs for a prototype fiber optic gyroscope I was working on. Had a whole bunch of fiber optics attached to it and a big coil of optical fiber. They were convinced that it was a bomb, even though they could not detect any explosives.
“Abby-someone.”
Glue some cat hair on the China cabinet and tell the flight attendants that it’s your therapy animal. Call it Muffin for added effect.
I used to work at Mt Rushmore right after High School. The questions I got were amazing. Someone asked me whee they store it in the winter time. I had question of that caliber every day.
I grew up around a Major League baseball team. The new guys were always sent from person to person to find the key to the “batter’s box.” Let’s be clear, I fell for it too. But I was only 12.
Common sense = colloquial wisdom. Always colloquial, seldom wise.
As a 14-yr.-old new hire in a retail grocery store, at my first shelf-stocking experience my ‘trainer’ declared “Oh, h3ll, not enough room” & instructed me to go ask Charlie for the shelf-stretcher. Charlie informed me he didn’t have it, to go ask Jim for it, so I did. Jim said he had given it to Bob in produce section, so see him…. you can see how this went, right? It took awhile for me to figure it out, but the whole crew had a good laugh at my expense!
Ditto, but our version in hvy equipement (tanks) was a ‘thread stretcher’ to help whenever a newbie had trouble starting a nut or bolt in a difficult spot.
We had the good old hose stretcher.
“Tread stretchers” were even tougher to find.
I had to find the bag stretcher for the Safeway job and the board stretcher for the job site….
Same here at jewel Food store in Waukegan Il.
Go down the basement and get a bag stretcher.
There’s no bag stretcher and no basement.
In the glass business the newbie was sent to find the glass stretcher.
In the carpenter business:
‘ oh phooey, I cut the board twice, and it still too short.’
‘so, go get a board stretcher out of the tool box.’
In car repair business or driveway chat to see whom is naive’:
if a loud, noisy muffler…. ‘ need to go get a new muffler belt’
in the military,
the commander (smoking a cigarette) says to the private to dig a 4′ x 4′ x 4′ hole in the ground.
the private does so and does a fabulous job.
the commander tosses his cigarette but into the hole.
then the commander says to fill the hole back in.
the private does so, and does a fabulous job.
The commander asks the private,
‘in what direction was the burnt end of the cigarette but pointing’?
If the private does not know – with certainty
then the commander asks the private to find the answer (by re-digging the hole)
Lesson via mundane activity, yet foundation building…:
to pay attention to detail,
to test respect of military hierarchy (can the private be trusted?),
conditioning (mental and physical)
… Some do learn the hard ways, via experiences ….
Others of all ages, to this day, unlearned, get duped by wef schwab etc.
imho
I used to work at Dillard’s. During my stint there, I was pregnant with my first, and it was a pretty rough pregnancy.
My all-time favorite customer came in when I was seven months along. Asian lady, about three times my age, three times my weight, and half my height. Accent you needed a knife to cut. Looked me up and down and went, “Oh, you’re pregnant, I thought you were just fat.” (I was about 20 pounds under target weight at that point.) This set the tone for the rest of her shopping visit.
She was looking for a jewelry set for her daughter, who was also half my height. So she had me model every single necklace in the department while crouched down, and then complained to my manager when we only had three box sizes, neither of which fit the gaudy monstrosity she finally bought. This after she sent me up and down the stairs about six times sending the boxes back and then changing her mind and wanting them back.
Another time, this was this elderly lady, a little bit disabled, mostly just the usual effects of aging. I helped her carry her purchases out to her car. It was raining and she insisted on me staying under the overhang holding the purchases while she brought the car up. Afterwards she handed me the wad of ones that had been her change, and when I tried to refuse (we weren’t allowed to take tips) she told me to stuff it in my pocket and go buy myself lunch. Absolutely lovely lady.
I had to do a double take. The icon alongside the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation looked like a forehead slap emoji with a hat on. Lol.
IQ and common sense most certainly are adversely related.
I went to school with a girl that was brilliant at math. Blindingly brilliant. And her tennis shoes were almost never tied.
I, along with her other close friends, would stop her in the hall and tie them for her.
She just could rarely be bothered.
A favorite of mine from my earliest working years.
One of my first jobs was shoe sales. Within a couple of months I was promoted to assistant manager.
We had a large shipment arrive and I delegated moving some of the shoes to each employee. While I was working on my pile, an employee came to get me. It seems a different employee was creating a nightmare.
He had decided that moving the boxes with the shoes in them was too heavy. He was unpacking all of the shoes from their boxes, moving the boxes and then the shoes and was putting the shoes back in the boxes when he had them all moved.
When I asked what in the world he was doing, he replied that the shoes in the boxes were just too heavy for him.
I explained that he could have just carried fewer boxes. Sigh. That made for quite a mess.
WOW!
That’s a SPECIAL kind of stupid right there!
Your story reminds me of the guy who got a job unloading 40 lb. bags of cement. He got reported for carrying only one bag at a time while everyone else always carried two bags. His boss came out and asked him what his problem was. He proudly told the boss that he didn’t have a problem, but he had noticed that everyone else was apparently too lazy to make two trips for every two bags like he did!
Being in construction all my life I would bet a great deal that many who read your story …..do NOT get it!!
LOL, well I get it, although I did think on it for a minute.
Even less would admit that…….
As a contractor it was always a problem giving instructions and getting general laborers to follow through when specifying a task. I soon learned to give them only one task and and told them to quickly report back to me when finished. If I gave more than one job, they would only do one and would always say they didn’t hear the other one.
Giving instructions was always fun; most would listen intently (like my dog). I would then ask if they understood & get a response of “yeah yeah”. I would then ask them to tell me what I said; the usual response was they were “not sure”.
I learned eventually to hire carpenters and forget general laborers. I no longer had to babysit and could work with my own hands to get more done.
Disclaimer: not all laborers are bad, and some younger ones are excellent.
In later years when I moved into cabinetmaking, I learned to work alone mostly.
That sounds like a carbon copy of my work life… ALWAYS one task ONLY…….
Ok. I’m the brunt of this joke. I had a temp job working as a receptionist at a distribution center. The drivers would come in with their route’s orders for the day and to drop off any cash that the delis, etc. had given them for product. The distribution center was in a warehouse neighborhood and some of the locals were a little seedy so part of my job was to buzz the truck drivers into the office. One day I buzzed in a respectable looking guy and when he steps inside, I notice he has a gun drawn. I jump under the desk. I feel the guy leaning over the desk. All of a sudden I hear, “Brinks guy!”
Did you face turn bright red?
Absolutely. Without question, the most embarrassing moment of my (then) young life. It was the Polly-O cheese company and as you can imagine I was forced to endure the good natured ribbing of what felt like the whole company, including all the Pollios running the place. It wouldn’t shock me if (some 30 years later) Joe Pollio Jr. isn’t still telling the story of the time the girl went under the desk after she buzzed in the Brinks guy.
And you wonder why people don’t trust each other. My partner had a son who literally was borderline retarded. Whenever we’d meet he said something like “who smashed into your car?” in order to get a rise out of someone. It was followed by “Just kidding.” Every time we met. Yeah, it was a trip to yucksville.
And now he sleeps in the White House.
I went camping once with some Algonquin friends, including a 6’2″ teenage girl. Planning to make our supper from digging clams, we each grabbed a plastic bucket and a little shovel and headed for the low-tide shore. That girl was amazing — she got three times more clams in half the time. Then she set the plastic bucket over the campfire to cook. I never could tell if she was smart or stupid
Haaaaaay Menagerie!
Two things.
1. Thanks for posting this!
2. I can about promise this’ll be able to go on and on and spread a lot of joy if there is some way to make it a “sticky” or something folks can see and easily come back to.
I’m not a betting man, but I AM a speculating man, and I’mma speculating you won’t regret it!
Many decades ago, when my brother was in medical school and started to work in a big city emergency room, he was in the position of prescribing birth control pills to patients who wanted them. One of his patients came in pregnant after being on the pill for a few months and couldn’t understand how that could have happened. Turned out that she was putting the pill into her female parts, not swallowing them orally.
I worked at a cigar store in a town that hosted the Pan Am Games. The Cuban athletes brought with them scores of fake Cuban cigars to sell to unsuspecting locals at bargain prices.
For two weeks we dealt with calls in our store to see if we wanted to buy Cuban cigars or what they were worth.
So one day I stepped out of the store and went to a nearby payphone. I called the store. I talked to my unsuspecting coworker as an cocky aggressive customer with Cuban cigars to sell.
I told him I got these Cohiba Churchill Robusto cigars from the Cuban HOCKEY team. I wanted to know what they are worth.
He told me (correctly) that they were counterfeit and unfortunately had no value.
I replied, but what could I get for them?
He kept his patience and repeated what he said previously.
I said, Look I know my cigars. Cohiba Churchills are a size and Robusto means they are Robusto with flavor. (Robusto is actually another size).
I then asked what he would give me. He politely replied nothing. The call ended and I returned to the store. I walk inside and he is telling everyone about this guy who was an idiot who got fake Cubans to sell.
I asked, “From the Cuban HOCKEY team ?”
He turns to me and says “Yeah”. He never put two and two together that it was me and my referring to a non existent team did not connect.
There was this one time…
At Band Camp 🙂
Until you have tried to design an idiot proof product, you can never appreciate how clever and innovative idiots can be.
So true!!!!
20+ years in a busy fire department, I’ve seen a lot of stupid first hand.
Yup!
The guy who was told to get rid of wasps in his garage…that smoke got rid of them.
He proceeds to squirt charcoal lighter fluid on the nest…and then lights it.
Got rid of the wasps-the garage –and damaged the house.
He was a “brainiac” —Uber credentialed…degrees galore….
But absolutely no common sense whatsoever!
Spouse’s ex-brother-in-law had fellowships and IQ up the wazoo. In later years, he was the CHIEF JUSTICE for one of the state SUPREME COURTS in the U.S.
Spouse said he almost needed help crossing the street.
His then-father-in-law came in after a day’s work fertilizing the crop and said, “Well, I just put another $2,000.00 into the field.
The brainiac asked him why he was burying his money instead of putting it into the bank…
That is why there now is “beta” testing! (Let them show up to show us ha ha)
It’s a two step process. First you make it idiot proof, then you go find an idiot to prove it.
Exactly. Always bet on the idiots…
One evening I was invited to a Charity function and met a Microsoft Executive. We spoke of many things regarding computing and such, and he was extolling the time and effort they had put into the new (at that time) Windows 2000. He used the dreaded phrase: “It’ll be idiot proof!”
I raised an eyebrow at him and said, “You guys mainly beta-test with regular customers and trained users, right?”
“Yes.”
“What you should do is hire idiots.”
“Huh?”
“Hire idiots. Seriously. There’s not an office on this planet that doesn’t have one employee that, on a regular basis, so screws up the systems that it takes hours to get everything straightened out again. These are the people you should be looking for. Normal engineers have to think up potential failure modes. Their minds don’t really work that way. Idiots do this by instinct! Put idiots in a room, tell them do perform certain tasks, and have the engineers watch them bungle the systems! Imagine how much you’d learn!”
He backed away from me, horrified…
Nothing is foolproof given a sufficiently talented fool.
Ouch, calling the baby ugly. I manage 130 employees and intelligence is not a prerequisite for entry level positions where I work. I will always give more of my time for the less enlightened as long as they have the drive. They make all the difference to me, because otherwise they would’ve failed without the time you take to get them to be functional and they stay on longer than most these days. I’ll take the over achiever over the under achiever any day of the week. I try to forget the stupidity of the day before I pass the threshold into my home lol.
Here goes my true story:
Teaching Elementary School for first time,
I organized the students’ desks forming an U, so all could see the board easily. NO NO NO! told me the VP in charge, District’s School Board priority is peer cooperation and pupils helping each other, so tables in groups.
But 1/3 of kids can’t never see the board without twisting 360 degrees.
Nope, groups. Okay.
Next year, the District School Board came up with a new snake oil remedy for children’s poor academic results, the same VP did the rounds forbiding tables in groups because…..many students CAN’T SEE THE BOARD.
This is literal in every detail
Sorry, I meant to say 180 degrees ☺️
Good old days – in a big pharmaceutical company, interns/newbies would be sent to the stockroom for dehydrated water, Fallopian tubes, and whatchamacallits.
Dehydrated water really comes in handy when you’re in a pinch.
Sounds like this was back when Pharma actually knew what they were doing.
Old Steven Wright joke. “I bought some dehydrated water, but I don’t know what to add.”
Bernard Food Industries Dehydrated Water 8oz Can. New Formula! Essential Camping & Survival Supply. Funny Gag Gift & Adult Stocking Stuffer for Men & Women.
Left handed spatulas during my restaurant days.
One young sailor (not me) was sent to retrieve 50ft of this material from a female Chief. His injuries were minor.
When research scientists relocate to a new institution, large equipment comes with them. But the small stuff has to be procured from the new institution. So when my new boss’s lab arrived, I made my list and off I went to Central Supply three blocks away.
Once there, I handed my list to the clerk who said, “Sorry, but you have to requisition supplies on a requisition pad.”
I told him I knew that but the lab was new at this institution and if he would look, he would see that the first item on the list was “one requisition pad”.
At which time he looked me in the eye and said: “Ma’am, you have to requisition a requisition pad on a requisition pad.”
Speechless.
With too many years in retail, and a few of those in its sub-basement a/k/a food service, I learned early on not to be surprised by anything idiotic I saw or heard. That’s the risk of having a door that opens at street level.
Printers used to send newbies to the stockroom, to get a “bucket of halftone dots”.
I fell for something like that in the printing field.
Many, many years ago I was driving in packed traffic on a CA freeway. There was the carcass of a big dog in my lane directly ahead. Because of traffic there was no way to drive around or stop. So I went into instinct mode.
I closed my eyes and raised my feet.
God was with me and I made it through without causing an accident. Praise God!
I was a medic in the Army. In training we were told that when a guy showed up at sick call complaining about painful or burning urination (which happened a lot), one of the questions to ask was “have you had a discharge recently?”
The trainee next to me leaned over and whispered, “If he’s had a discharge, why is he at an Army sick call?”
Unfortunately I no longer have a copy of a Powerpoint file that was given to me by my counterparts at the Army Night Vision Labs (Now the Night Vision Electronic Systems Directorate (NVESD)), so I could share them here.
It was just a collection of pictures of electronic connector matings that had been performed by enlisted men (& I write men, because I doubt many women would have the physical strength to do what was in those photos.)
There were pictures of male to male connector matings, where the connector pins had been forced out the back of one or both the connectors. There were round, quarter-turn bayonet connector mating with incompatible keying pins, where enough force was applied to either shear off the keying pins or expand the backshell so the pins would fit and allow mating. There were DSUBs (rectangular connectors) mated to round connectors.
The presentation would be added to, as new connector destructions were observed and photographed. When I saw the presentation it was over 100 pages of mangled electrical/electronic connections.
Another PPT file given to me was a collection of the intro slides of numerous “PowerPoint Rangers” (guys who were never in the field or battle and just made neat presentations all day). It was impressive, with animated video with sound of tanks flying through the air, mortar rounds being shot, waves of soldiers jumping out of helicopters, rows of howitzers firing, etc.
It got so bad, NVESD made a rule that no PowerPoints could have video in them, because they were bogging down the installations networks.
Having tried to make some connections under stress, duress and darkness I empathize with the first part of your story!
When I worked in customer service for a elementary school publisher, I once had to walk a customer through how much her order cost (each item x the amount), figure out her sales tax for her, and then add it all up so she had a total. She was the math teacher!
In the Army we sent newbies to get a box of grid squares or chemlight batteries and other non existent items. The supply sergeants sometimes sent these guys “up chain” sometimes to a high level commander (all in on the ploy of course). I was newbie but onto the game, and took a day off with my buddy…but that did not work out too great either as we both received a royal ass chewing and many pushups for our impertinence!
One of my coworkers in the gas station where we worked many years ago (great job in the 70s) while in school told a new employee that he needed to have the anti-freeze checked in his Chevy Corvair ………We laughed for an hour while he looked for the radiator. Worked on a VW, too a few days later.
One day my brother and I (~ 6 & 8 YO at the time) were fighting in the back seat of our dad’s Corvair, as he was accelerating onto a freeway. He yelled at us to cut it out and just as he yelled, the car acted like it hit a big bump and got really quiet.
We two immediately stopped fighting and looked out the back window of the Corvair to see the engine lying on the slow lane of the freeway behind us. My dad was looking at the instrument panel, confused and was trying to figure out what was going on and why the car was slowing down.
My brother and I simultaneously said “Dad! The motor is in the road!”
Our dad somewhat angrily replied (as we were being a nuisance right before and he was experiencing some kind of issue) “Oh be quiet! I’m having problems with the car!”
Then we said, “No, really! The motor is in the road behind us!”
He then looked in the rear view mirror, to see the motor and a CHP car that had stopped behind it with its flashing lights on, to prevent anyone from hitting it. As luck would have it a CHP officer was entering the freeway right behind us.
We coasted off to the side of the freeway and later the CHP officer help my dad carry the motor back to the Corvair, where they put the engine in the back seat.
My brother and I had a blast, we got to ride in the tow truck on the way home. Our father wasn’t quite as happy.
I wish I had a personal story to share..Anyway, something I saw years ago, on the back of a package of brown and serve rolls, last line of instructions:
Remove from oven before serving.
Swear on my father.. That was actually there.
Be safe peeps.
I’ve seen plenty of instructions that say, “remove plastic film before placing in oven” (ok, understandable maybe) and “heat in microwave for 5 minutes WARNING: product will be hot after heating” (uh….)
Your lumber yard person would be upper management material here. Back to fixing the bathroom – a repaint is turning into major repairs: who would have thought the bolts holding down the toilet were supposed to be affixed to something other than tongue depressors underneath, or that masking tape and drywall tape are not interchangeable? Not the biggest problems with our builder, just the most recent.
Reminds me of the contractor showing his in-progress house that was in the final finishing stage. He stopped twice at windows and opened them to yell out to the yard “green side up!”. I know it’s an old joke, but it’s all I’ve got without some serious thinking.
Ukrainians laying sod?
People who believe that the more they adjust the thermostat the quicker it’ll reach that temperature. Example. If I set the ac for 60 instead of 68 it’ll cool off quicker
It may be true with some models of AC. (Not if it’s just a basic on/off thermostat though.)
When our son and daughter (twins) were born via emergency C-section and in the NICU (stark naked in an oxygen rich covering) an elderly orderly asked me if they were identical!
Why were you stark naked?
Ba-DMP!
We had a very large almond Grove farm growing up. City kids would come out to learn about farming and such. We would always take a few snipe hunting once it got dark. Thousands of hysterical notes from dumb city kids. Until one night we lost a couple. Found them late but no more snipe hunting.
When I was Safety Officer for a contract to the Government, the Project Manager came in my office in a snit because someone had gotten injured on the site. He wanted to punish the injured for some violation of safety rules.
The guy had gotten a nail through the bottom of his shoe working to clean up a debris pile.
The PM wanted to know if he was wearing his Safety Shoes.
I had to remind the PM that Safety Shoes work from top down, not from the Bottom up.
He stopped, took a breath, smiled a ‘never mind’ smile and left.
.
My brother had a friend who was a little slow on the uptake.
One day they went to a burger joint for lunch, and the counter girl let them know that there was a buy one get one free special on-going.
This guy, thinking he would flirt a little bit with some jaunty banter, blurted out, ‘how about I buy three and get two free’ . . .
RIP, LL.
Lol
When I worked as a senior Tech for Packard Bell / NEC in their call center, I used to get some of the most interesting calls. When I was an escalation for new techs, I used to have lots of fun on the phone.
I had an agent call regarding the customer not seeing the color red on the screen. (This is usually caused by the VGA cable not being seated properly).
I asked him if he had the customer check the red ink reservoir?
He said, “There is not a red ink reservoir!”.
I told him that there was. He asked where it was. I proudly exclaimed. “Silly, its right on the back of the monitor next to the blue and green ink reservoirs. You can’t miss it”.
Too much fun!
One more that’s not work related: While playing a card game, a cousin’s girlfriend kept saying: “Well, it’s half of one and six dozen of the other” when she drew a card that didn’t help her hand. The first time she said it, we thought she was being funny and we all laughed, but then she kept repeating it. Finally, my cousin told her, “If I were you, I’d go with the six dozen!”
I’m pretty sure she never figured out why we were laughing at her!
My dad was reconfirming that the concrete form for the days cement pour was square using two separate tape measures (measuring the both hypotenuse sides). Unfortunately his subordinate had a tape measure that had 6″ cut off and the end reattached (the subordinate forgot to tell him to add back those 6 inches on the measurement) and they nearly pulled up the forms to reset them before it was discovered that the pad was square!
The subordinate was Polish and dad said back when you could say it. “So you’re telling me your tape measure is a Pollock too!”
I had a boss, whose secretary could not get her new computer to turn on. I asked her if it was plugged in and she assured me she had checked and it was plugged into the power strip. Problem was the power strip was also plugged into the power strip (by the secretary) .
Okay, I’ll play. A few years back I offered a family member several dozen of my farm fresh eggs. This person, who shall rename nameless and genderless, exclaimed, “I’m not eating anything that comes out of a chicken’s butt! I’ll buy my eggs at the grocery store.”
… not the sharpest crayon in the box