Hello Darkness! The Official Blog of Helen Keller

W O R K P L A C E S U R V I V A L

The above was supposed to look like stenciling. If it didn't, I guess you're just too retarded.

A lot of us have to pay bills and therefore, a lot of us have to go to jobs each and every day. Some of us love our jobs, we get raging javelin-boners just thinking about them. Some of you hate your jobs; your main fantasy is winning the lottery so you can just strut on into the boss's office, take a mean curry-dump right on his empty desk, pull his face close to the steamer by that yellow $70 tie he wears every day and tell him, "No! Hot! No touchy!" Then smack that son of a cheap trick from cheek to shiny cheek and walk on out the door.

Others fall in the middle where the job isn't so bad if it weren't for a few fuckin' people who shit the job right up.

This is for you, this is your Workplace Survival Guide.

Why when I'm at a meeting does this one guy keep asking "What If" questions? I feel like we've come to a conclusion, but asshole wants EVERY possible contingency the universe could offer covered off first. Should I throw him down a well?

Ha ha! No. The majority of What-If snots are people devoid of any real thoughts, ideas or conclusions, but wish to remain vocal so they don't appear to be garbage. Consequently, if you've come to a conclusion in a group, chances are they didn't offer one single damn thing to it, so they have to remain relevant. By asking a multitude of What-If questions, they fake wisdom they don't have. If you wish to survive these sorts of people, the obvious answer would be to grab them by the crotch and hair and fire them right out the window into the paper-boxes below causing you to laugh so hard you shit your pants. But, I've been doing talking to a drunk lawyer and he says that would be Theft Over $5000. Lawyers are never wrong.

Ultimately, you're going to have to swallow down some courage (available in many attractive bottles from Crown Royal) and publically mock the What-Ifs. There are a couple of good ones which illustrate the sheer banality of the exercise:

What if you aunt had nuts, would she be your uncle?
What if a frog had wings, would it bump its nuts when it jumped?
What if everything were different, would nothing be the same?
What if you shut up, could I still fit in a lunch?

By keeping up the stream of your own questions, you can override both the What-Ifer's questions and also dismantle the bullshit notion of "No bad ideas during brainstorming." Clearly, a retard was stapling himself when he cooked up that shit-burger of a rule.

If we're in a meeting, there's this guy who always prefaces any questions with the word "Question". Should I let it slide or should I poison his coffee?

After conferring with the lawyer, she says that poisoning coffee is a breach of contract. However, everybody knows this goddamn douche-bag of a cock of a stink of a taint of a smashed testicle. Somebody will have finished saying something and this bastard's hand will launch into the air like a retard rocket from kindergarten. Then, after being acknowledged will say, "Question." Then, they'll point. Yup, they'll fucking point like children and THEN they'll fire off a question. It's not that the question is bad or anything, it may even be moderately intelligent, thus restoring a small amount of hope that was otherwise siphoned off about the dipshittedness of your co-workers, but it's that damn way they say it.

I suppose you could just ask the guy not to do it anymore. But if that's the sort of approach you're using, you're certainly not reading this freebie guide you poverty-crotch now are you? Since you are, you'll have to recruit allies. Each time the person says "Question" you and your cohorts cry a little. Start with sniffles, then proceed to honking noses, then to wiping moisture from the eyes, followed by full on "I want something" girl-tears.

If it doesn't work, at least you may be offered stress-leave. Then you could go home and watch Commando. I have it PVRed.

Why when I'm at a meeting and we're about to break for lunch or go home, does somebody ask a question that's clearly only relevant to them and has bored the shit out of me? Literally, I crapped a smiler.

I'm sure we've all had this. Let's just say that your boss has sent out a memo asking for a meeting to do some "house-keeping" (that email should be grounds for your boss's dismissal. That phrase gets me so wound up my nipples pop off and I have to screw them back on.) You're going through the house-keeping items, until Sally Misfit starts a barrage of detailed questions dealing only with the items for which she is solely responsible. Nobody else cares because simply, nobody else CAN care. You look at your watch, you glance around at others, Sally keeps on asking, you look at your watch again, you rub your temples, you stare longingly at the door, then Karen, then the door again and Sally is still running off at the mouth.

I suggest summoning forth your primal ancestors and roaring. Yup, roar like you're passing a kidney stone in a manly way. If you are woman, let's hear you roar. I'm talking where if there's a dangle of spit on one of your teeth, it will comically flow in the wind generated by your rage. Feel free to stand up and beat your chest. Go all fucking Kong in the room. Then, sit down as suddenly as you started. Calmly look at either your boss or Sally and say, casually, "Did somebody say it's lunchtime?" Then, pack your shit and leave.

And that folks, are just a couple of ways you can survive some of the more common ulcer-inducing situations at work with a little style, a little grace and a whole lot of controversy. And isn't that what this world is all about?