4 posts tagged “people are creepy”
Before I worked at my current place of employment, I have never really had a coworker that I didn't like. Chalk it up to luck, or maybe that I just try to be kind and like everyone. But office relations have never really been bad for me since I began working at age 15 or so. Until now.
One of my office mates is driving me batty. She is a nice person. She's not catty and she doesn't gossip, and she always does nice things like bake cookies and bring them in to share. But my desk has been just steps away from hers for the two and a half years that I've been here, and I am just about at the end of my rope. Here is a short list of some of her most-offending behaviors:
1. Talks SO LOUD.
2. Opens her window when it's sub-zero temperatures because she's having hot flashes, or in the summer when it's 90 degrees out, because she "needs fresh air" ( and then we have to turn off the ac in the rest of the office).
3. Plays soft jazz radio constantly, even when she leaves her office for hours at a time. Literally, she put a sign on her radio that says, "Please do not turn off my radio or adjust the volume...shut my door instead" (it is a thin door, and shutting the door does not block the sound, however)
4. She wears a noxious amount of horrible perfume a few days a week.
5. She likes to talk, a LOT. She's always chatting it up with everyone who walks by, loudly and about random things that I don't need/want to hear about, e.g., "I JUST READ THAT YOU SHOULD ONLY EAT ONE OUNCE OF NUTS A DAY. ONLY ONE OUNCE! I'VE BEEN EATING AT LEAST 5 WALNUTS AND 20 ALMONDS AT A TIME. NO WONDER I AM GAINING WEIGHT! CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT?! ONLY ONE OUNCE OF NUTS A DAY!"
6. She does this thing that I call "teeth sucking." Usually after she eats or snacks throughout the day--pretty often. It's like she's trying to suck food out from between her teeth using her tongue and suction. It will literally go on for half an hour at a time.
Okay, so that really is a short list. It would probably a little less obnoxious if she would just shut her door most of the time, but when we've talked before, she has said that she is claustrophobic and doesn't like to be shut in her office. So I don't know what to do. She really is a good person and I don't want to hurt her feelings or demand anything unfairly. I don't really want to confront her either, because (1) I'm a wuss, and (2) It would probably only improve for a week or two, and then things would go back to same old, same old, because I think these things are just her nature.
So my question is, how do I deal with an obnoxious officemate? If I don't come up with something, the jazz radio is probably gonna have a mysterious accident soon. And that's not good for office relations at all.
I hate the telephone. I don't own a cell phone, and given my druthers, I would not own a land line either. But because this is the 21st century, society deems that we must have one in order to communicate with the outside world. I fight back with my caller i.d. and never really calling anyone unless it is a true necessity. (It is not anything personal, mind you; I love talking face to face, email, and writing paper letters. I don't hate people, I just hate the telephone.)
But anyhow. Lately we've been getting these calls: caller i.d. says, "Private Name, Private Number." I don't answer them. I figure, if you don't want to tell me who you are, I don't want to talk to you. And whoever it is never leaves a message on our machine. But poor Kelly. Poor sweet, talk-a-holic, phone-loving Kelly. She will answer every single call and talk to everyone. And one day a few weeks ago, she answered Mr. Private Name, Private Number's call. And do you know what he said to her?
"What are you wearing?"
(Um, yes, seriously. I thought that only happened in old movies.)
And so she said nothing, and hung up, and we laughed at the creepy ridiculousness of it for a good week or so.
But here is the creepier part. Private Name, Private Number has been calling quite a bit lately. Usually 2-3 times a day, sometimes at midnight or 2 a.m. Not okay. If we pick it up, we usually get silence, or a click. If we don't pick it up, he (I assume) listens to our voices on the answering machine message, then hangs up. Ick.
So I've been making sure our doors are locked lately, and drawing our curtains, and we are going to change our answering machine message to the generic man's voice that comes on the machine. But this fear feels silly. Maybe I should just start answering Mr. Private Name, Private Number's calls with, "Does your mother know that you do this?" The poor dude probably just needs someone to snap him out of his creepy compulsion.
I love straight people. I really do. Some of them are down with the gay and just "get it." A lot more of them don't. Some of them try so, so hard to be okay and/or inclusive concerning gay folks. (I've especially seen an increase in this in the last couple years, which is amazing and beautiful.) But when it comes down to the end of the day, it's still pretty hard to be queer in a straight world. Sometimes, just when I think things are going swell, I'm reminded that there's still a lot of progress to be made in the world.
Take this week, for instance. A benefits person at my work asked me to correct a form concerning Kelly by filling out the "dependent child" section of the form. I managed to restrain myself from replying smarmily and managed to reply calmly, "Kelly is not my dependent child, she is my domestic partner, as it is clearly marked on the form. That is why I did not fill out the dependent child section of the form." [I am already taxed several thousand a year on the benefits I receive for her marked as "taxable income" on my paycheck because we can't be legally married. Don't humiliate me further my making me mark her on a form as my "dependent child," you idiot.]
I called my sister on Sunday to wish her a happy birthday. We spoke about many things, one of which was her possibly having children with her new husband. (Oh my God, don't even get me started on that one.) During the conversation, she mentioned something about my mom saying that she was hesitant to move out of the state where they live now because she knew that luck would have it that one of my two straight, legally married siblings that live in said state would start having children as soon as she moved, and then she'd never have grandchildren in her daily life. Um, HELLO, what about the fact that if they move, they will most likely be moving closer to K & I, and we've stated multiple times that we're planning on having children and we're excited for them to have grandparents close by. It's like my parents (and K's, too) just don't understand that we're going to have children, and when we do, they're going to be the cutest f-ing kids ever. Seriously.
So anyway, these were only a couple of the incidents that occurred this week that caused me to question the progress of the queer rights movement in the world. *Le Sigh*. They say it takes 7 generations from the start of a civil rights movement for a population to see full equality. I guess by the time our great, great grandkids are born, they may have a fair shot in the world, barring any circus freak physical features or any other Bushes residing in the White House.
After my big old post about my hell week(s), and me waxing optimistic about how good the world really is at heart, I go and almost get myself hit by an suv while pedaling my bike home. The freaking yuppie morons laughed at me as I stunnedly climbled/fell off my bike right afterward. I was too shaken up at the moment to do anything, but after I gained my composure again I wanted to go find them and kick the shit out their yuppie car.
Sigh. Indeed, a likely way to end this week. That does it, then. I am all done trying to make this week work. I will now proceed to go lay down on my couch and have a bad tv marathon. Oh, and this:
Because sometimes you just have to say F*ck it, and go eat some freakin' ice cream.
