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Post by the light works on Nov 8, 2015 16:12:55 GMT
in the fire department we have a rule that the dayroom (the firefighters' lounge) is a protected area. anything that is said (barring stuff that is flat out wrong, like threats and harrassment) is permissible and automatically assumed to be held at the highest level of secrecy from the outside world. because those outside will never know the emotional stress that comes from making a livelihood out of being there for everybody else's worst day. part of processing that is to talk about it and part of talking about it is laughing about it, and we do that whenever possible. we tell war stories, and crude jokes, and if you don't like the direction the conversation is going, tell us straight up what bothers you about it, and we will shift direction. but we will still be the most uncivilized heartless people you have ever seen, because you have to be crazy to do what we do.
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Post by ironhold on Nov 8, 2015 22:03:42 GMT
in the fire department we have a rule that the dayroom (the firefighters' lounge) is a protected area. QFT. Most people would be shocked if they heard what I said when I'm alone in my car (I've lost track of how often I've nearly been killed while running my route) or what we say around the gaming table (a lot of us have one foot in the grave and/or experiences no one should ever have). I think most people who have dangerous professions or otherwise find themselves facing severe issues would benefit from having a space to where they can go "what happens in here, stays in here".
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Post by Lokifan on Nov 8, 2015 22:45:23 GMT
Cops and doctors often have the same sort of private, gallows humor. And you don't want to hear some of the stories undertakers tell each other, either.
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on Nov 9, 2015 13:48:01 GMT
Cops and doctors often have the same sort of private, gallows humor. And you don't want to hear some of the stories undertakers tell each other, either. Not just doctors, anyone who works in an hospital. We our tasked with improving or saving peoples lives everyday, a lot gets held inside during that time. The jokes we tell and the comments we make amongst ourselves would be quite shocking to the patients we help everyday. But, as everyone else has said, its a stress reliever, a way to decompress from the stress & anxiety of the job. In some way,. we all wear two hats: our public hat and our private hat. With the public hat on, we do things as is expected of us. But, switch to the provate hat and all rules are out the window. Its part of being human. By the way, some of the best jokes/puns/one-liners revolve around the morgue...
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Post by Lex Of Sydney Australia on Nov 11, 2015 2:54:46 GMT
Cops and doctors often have the same sort of private, gallows humor. And you don't want to hear some of the stories undertakers tell each other, either. Not just doctors, anyone who works in an hospital. We our tasked with improving or saving peoples lives everyday, a lot gets held inside during that time. The jokes we tell and the comments we make amongst ourselves would be quite shocking to the patients we help everyday. But, as everyone else has said, its a stress reliever, a way to decompress from the stress & anxiety of the job. In some way,. we all wear two hats: our public hat and our private hat. With the public hat on, we do things as is expected of us. But, switch to the provate hat and all rules are out the window. Its part of being human. By the way, some of the best jokes/puns/one-liners revolve around the morgue... Until she had to retire (due to back problems) my Mother was a phyc nurse, before that she was a British constable & worked for Australian customs as a processing officer (their the guys you DON'T screw around with unless you want a full body cavity search at passport control ). As a result growing up I heard ALL kinds of 'horror' stories around the dinner table after work. Most of them were that typical sick gallows humour (the stories about the dead bodies that would sit up speak on the morgue table were some of my favourites. ) As a result I have developed a rather 'warped' sense of humour that has helped me to deal with stressful situations far better than many of my peers/co-workers. Throughout history people have dealt with stress in one of three ways. A: Get addicted to drugs &/or alcohol B: Commit suicide or C: Develop a sense of humour so warped that the Enterprise's engines become jealous. A study was done a few years back showing that soldiers, medical professionals, emergency response officers (cops/law enforcement officers, fire fighters, ambulance officers ect) & surprisingly retail workers ALL have a similar sense of humour due to the stressful environments/situations they have to deal with. Most people understood why soldiers, medical professionals, emergency response officers would have similar sense's of humour, but couldn't understand WHY retail workers would. Until they realised retail worked have to deal with on a daily basis Grade A donkeys, long hours, poor pay & conditions & overwhelming workloads (there's a reason Christmas time is called the "Silly Season") & often miss meals or catch them on the hoof.
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Post by blazerrose on Nov 11, 2015 3:44:51 GMT
Amen to the reason for retail workers having warped senses of humor! I won't tell you about some of the crazy stunts we have done, but perhaps I might have known the outcome of a myth several years before the MBs tested it?
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Post by the light works on Nov 11, 2015 5:06:53 GMT
I still have the knack for inhaling lunch in about 5 minutes.
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Post by silverdragon on Nov 11, 2015 7:41:24 GMT
Back in the first days of working, in McD's, I had to leave the shop floor after this happened. A "donkey" walks to the counter.... it was a quiet morning.... "Your fresh orange, is it still orange?.. " [presumably meaning is it "not sparkling"] Without missing a beat, like it was a perfectly normal enquiry, "Just a moment, I will check.... " he pored a little into a cup, tasted it, then returned to the counter "Yup, its still Orange, it didnt change... "
The customer witnessed the whole counter staff apart from out hero Andy, suddenly need to be elsewhere, he stood there perfectly straight, didnt even grin. The MASTER of comic timing.
Which one?... are people gullible enough to be sent to the stores (in a machine shop) for "A long stand", have people gone away looking for a bucket of blue steam?.. striped paint?.. go fetch a bubble for the spirit level?.. I have seen all of those.... and more.
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Post by Lokifan on Nov 11, 2015 8:12:01 GMT
I think the number of workplaces that have some sort of silliness in them far outnumber the ones without--at least, if the workforce has any sort of camaraderie.
And I think it can be used to battle stress but also boredom.
I remember an epic "Name That Tune" contest that went on for months. Periodically interrupted by a rubber band war.
I've seen highly educated engineers hold McNope's Happy Meal Toy races. And participated in them.
One escalating sequence of events:
I've seen "Can you toss this on top of that girder in the ceiling?" contests.
Followed by "Can you get that off the girder in the ceiling?"
Followed by "Who wants to ride the gantry crane up to that girder in the ceiling to get that thing you threw up there?"
Nothing is more disconcerting when you suddenly realize that in the event of an accident, the police will be asking "Who was working the crane controls when the disaster happened?" and the answer is you.
"A little nonsense Now and then Is relished by The wisest men"
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on Nov 11, 2015 15:27:45 GMT
When I worked at for a big box office supply store, we would haze the noobies by handing them a box of 'Rubber Band Balls' and informing them that they had to separate all the rubber bands and organize them by color. After wasting about an half-hour on the first one, the noobies would check on this with management and be informed that 'no, the rubber band balls were intended to be sold that way'...
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on Nov 11, 2015 15:29:26 GMT
As a result I have developed a rather 'warped' sense of humour that has helped me to deal with stressful situations far better than many of my peers/co-workers. ...and spending time with us.
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Post by the light works on Nov 11, 2015 16:08:05 GMT
I had an apprentice who had two rules: a prank entitled him to a retaliatory prank of equal or lesser value. a prank that resulted in risk to his life entitled him to a retaliatory prank of equal or GREATER value.
and you'd be amazed at how tenuous his connection to mortality was.
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Post by kharnynb on Nov 12, 2015 18:13:54 GMT
phone tech support is a great place to lose your faith in humanity too...
other than that, I've worked with too many doctors, nurses and morticians not to get the jokes...
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Post by the light works on Nov 13, 2015 2:09:20 GMT
phone tech support is a great place to lose your faith in humanity too... other than that, I've worked with too many doctors, nurses and morticians not to get the jokes... my brother worked tech support for a tiny software company that made a windows optimization suite. he would get calls from people who Microsoft had specifically told their problems were his company's fault. It was usually operator error (literally running every bit of software on the computer at once.) though one of the callers actually had a defective memory chip.
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Post by GTCGreg on Nov 13, 2015 3:46:20 GMT
phone tech support is a great place to lose your faith in humanity too... That's probably true. I recently placed a call to customer support at a major computer company that I've often expressed how much I hated. It was a billing issue so I sent them an email explaining the situation. This was almost 10 PM Central time. I didn't expect a replay for a least a day or two, so I was surprised to get a response about 15 minutes later thanking me for my email, telling me how important their customers are and that the problem was resolved and I should receive a refund within the next 24 hours. And this wasn't a robo-response as it had details about the problem I had told them about. I hit the reply button and simply typed, "Thank You." The next day, I received this flowing response on how much the customer service person really appreciated a simple "thank you", and that it is nice to know that they are appreciated as they seldom ever hear back from the people they try to help. It got me thinking how these people really are often not appreciated for what they do and I was glad that I took the 15 seconds to say "thanks." PS, I still hate Apple, but maybe not quite as much.
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Post by OziRiS on Nov 13, 2015 7:34:54 GMT
phone tech support is a great place to lose your faith in humanity too... That's probably true. I recently placed a call to customer support at a major computer company that I've often expressed how much I hated. It was a billing issue so I sent them an email explaining the situation. This was almost 10 PM Central time. I didn't expect a replay for a least a day or two, so I was surprised to get a response about 15 minutes later thanking me for my email, telling me how important their customers are and that the problem was resolved and I should receive a refund within the next 24 hours. And this wasn't a robo-response as it had details about the problem I had told them about. I hit the reply button and simply typed, "Thank You." The next day, I received this flowing response on how much the customer service person really appreciated a simple "thank you", and that it is nice to know that they are appreciated as they seldom ever hear back from the people they try to help. It got me thinking how these people really are often not appreciated for what they do and I was glad that I took the 15 seconds to say "thanks." PS, I still hate Apple, but maybe not quite as much. I always make a point of thanking whoever helps me solve whatever problem I have, especially if the company at large hasn't done a very good job. First and foremost I do it because I know all to well how much crap that one person has to take for someone else's mistakes, but I also have this kind of utopian idea that if the positive forces working in a crappy company are properly appreciated for what they do, maybe it'll rub off on the rest of the company in some small way. And if the company is generally doing a good job, then they also need to know that what they're doing works and they should keep at it.
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Post by silverdragon on Nov 13, 2015 9:19:25 GMT
I always make it plain that I am complaining about the problem, not at the person I am talking too, and ask them to "Dont take this personally, but how can 'the company' make this happen"
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on Nov 13, 2015 14:41:59 GMT
I will try to find some links to postings and/or pictures, but Adam spent the day on Fakebook yesterday sending photos of the last day of filming and moving out of the offices. Last blueprint room filmed, last stand-ups filmed, offices emptied. He ended the day with a photo of himself in an airport in New Orleans for the first stop of the new live tour, which will be Jamie's last run with the tour.
It is officially the end of the era. He is encouraging fans to post messages & memories on Fakebook & Twitterer with the tag #MythYouGuys
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Post by OziRiS on Nov 13, 2015 14:57:22 GMT
Even though we all knew this day was coming, it still sucks harder than the intake of a 747!
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Post by the light works on Nov 13, 2015 15:02:05 GMT
I always make it plain that I am complaining about the problem, not at the person I am talking too, and ask them to "Dont take this personally, but how can 'the company' make this happen" I usually start with "I have a problem, I need your help" - although I make an exception for the county permit process. I am highly offended that anybody gave the engineers any kind of award, because the software is TERRIBLE.
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