20 Dumb Things About Being an Office Drone

By Jordan Burchette
TruTV.com

THIS IS YOUR LIFE. AND IT'S ENDING ONE MEETING AT A TIME
The corporate model made the business of doing business more efficient and profitable than ever before imaginable. It also made each cog in its machinery as expendable as a member of Guns N' Roses.



As a result, everything about the corporate climate is lame: the glib condescension of the Microsoft Office Assistant… elevators full of coffee breath… being awakened for any reason—it’s enough to make you want to put a formatted bullet in your brain.



If the following list of soul-trampling, will-snapping aspects of cubicle culture makes you laugh, you haven't worked in an office long enough.



ENGLISH IS A SECOND LANGUAGE (BUZZ WORDS ARE THE FIRST)


If another one of you wankers "pings" me, ties up any more of my personal "bandwidth," or concerns yourself at all with my "low-hanging fruit," I'm going to "fast track" these five "assets" right where the "rubber hits the road."

WEAK, TERRIBLE-TASTING COFFEE


With Chock Full O’ Nuts, Peet’s, Flavia or any of a thousand other corporate coffee packagers that sound and taste like genitals, every day at GeneriCorp gets the tongue-neuteringly bland start it deserves.

THE BOSS WHO WANTS TO BE YOUR FRIEND


Like a parent of tweener kids, he craves the approval of his subordinates. This is the worst boss you can have, since he wants to be your best friend… who can fire you at any moment. He abuses his authority by taking no responsibility for anything and when he has to finally manage you, he obviously gets off on the power. Nice guy!

FLORESCENT OVERHEAD BLEACHING LAMPS


Those dull, glowing tubes soak up the will to live the way Sham-Wows soak up spills. You can't help but view the world through ketchup-smeared glasses because standard-issue office lighting has sapped your eyes of any other hue on the spectrum.

THE OFFICE LOUD TALKER


Inches are indistinguishable from miles to this meat-and-bone megaphone. He's the reason why you're involuntarily up to speed on "Glee," despite working on a different floor.

BACKSTABBING OFFICE POLITICS


If Machiavelli could have envisioned that his principles would be applied to the struggle over who gets Bert's chair when he leaves, he would have gone into farming.

ENDLESS, SOUL-SAPPING MEETINGS


Crammed into an isobaric conference room like the cast of 12 Angry Men, not one of you is leaving until every last bad idea is explored in undeservingly thorough detail. Nine times a day.

DREADING MONDAY MORNINGS ON FRIDAY AFTERNOONS


The weekend starts on Wednesday, which means that the anxiety over the coming workweek begins before this one has a chance to end.

SMALL TALK IN THE BREAK ROOM


You have one moment during the day that is legally your own and it gets hijacked in a pretend kitchen by the other mutants in your glorified corporate LAN party.

INSTANT MESSAGING WITH THE PERSON SEATED RIGHT NEXT TO YOU


Technology has so allowed us to indulge our disdain for our coworkers that they no longer have to see us stabbing them with our eyes when we answer their every insipid question. Sure there's an emoticon for that, though.

MR. OFFENSIVE JOKE/SEXUAL HARASSMENT


He's gotten a load o' every pair of fun bags on the floor. He's made terrorist jokes at the expense of everyone in IT. And he's always the first to die in the daily corporate Japanese horror movie that plays during your nap.

THE PLAGUE DELIVERY SYSTEM THAT IS THE OFFICE AIR DUCTS


Virus productivity in America is doubling year over year, thanks to the germ networking facilitated by the office's central disease server. Now workers can upload and download cold and flu spores to one another in real time, freely exchanging infections on the sickness superhighway.

POST-TRAUMATIC COMPUTER NOISE STRESS


No matter how many footprints there are on your rung of the corporate ladder, you're subject to the unending Pavlovian chorus of breaking e-mails, text messages and IMs that will form the soundtrack of your eventual breakdown.

IDIOTS WHO PUT TOYS ON THEIR DESKS


FAO Schwartz doesn't showcase this much product. It's an adult workplace, not a diorama.

IDIOTS WHO PLAY WITH THE TOYS ON YOUR DESK


At an insertion rate of one in 450 boxes, this extremely rare Bespin Luke Skywalker figure hardly qualifies as a "toy." Philistine.

TEAM-BUILDING EXERCISES


It's Accounts Receivable, not the Los Angeles Dodgers. You wanna foster goodwill within the workforce? Do something about the smell of runny death in the bathroom.

CORPORATE BIRTHDAY PARTIES


Signing cards, singing songs and chipping in on cake for people on whom you wouldn’t pee if the candle blowing turned tragic.

WHEN YOUR HEADPHONES ACCIDENTALLY DISLODGE FROM THE COMPUTER AND THEN EVERYONE CAN HEAR YOUR LOVE FOR THE MUSIC OF JENNIFER LOPEZ THROUGH THE SPEAKERS


This just me?

DUMB WORKPLACE INJURIES


Telling the other folks in the hospital waiting room that you're being admitted for carpal tunnel syndrome or tired eyes is like telling your cellmate that you got thrown in jail for shoplifting bloody Mary mix.

BRUTAL LAYOFFS


We truly valued your service to the company until we didn't.