THIS PLACE BLOWS I QUIT
September 21, 2018 12:18 PM Subscribe
In a similar vein to their listing of the saddest desperation cocktails made by readers, the folks at Deadspin asked for the readership's best quitting stories.
And they delivered.
From a "special" pizza, to saying it with fish, and even seeing things man was not meant to, the readers gave interesting, funny, and disturbing tales of quitting.
And they delivered.
From a "special" pizza, to saying it with fish, and even seeing things man was not meant to, the readers gave interesting, funny, and disturbing tales of quitting.
Joey Quits a crappy job with help from a marching band.
posted by 445supermag at 12:40 PM on September 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by 445supermag at 12:40 PM on September 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
The Askamanager quitting stories post mentioned in the "saying it with fish" tweet is also pretty amazing. My favorite:
"I’ve been a member of an online message board for several years. About 10 years ago or so, one of the other board members announced he was going to quit his job at a grocery store and asked for suggestions on how he should leave. Not expecting him to take me up on my suggestion, I recommended that he have a little parade, driving one of the motorized shopping carts down the frozen foods aisle, with lit sparklers attached to the front and a boombox on the back playing something jubilant (‘We Are The Champions’ or some such). As it turns out, he took me up on the suggestion, had someone record the whole thing, and we got to watch a very happy ex-employee escort himself out at about 1.5mph past the Hungry Man dinners."
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:49 PM on September 21, 2018 [32 favorites]
"I’ve been a member of an online message board for several years. About 10 years ago or so, one of the other board members announced he was going to quit his job at a grocery store and asked for suggestions on how he should leave. Not expecting him to take me up on my suggestion, I recommended that he have a little parade, driving one of the motorized shopping carts down the frozen foods aisle, with lit sparklers attached to the front and a boombox on the back playing something jubilant (‘We Are The Champions’ or some such). As it turns out, he took me up on the suggestion, had someone record the whole thing, and we got to watch a very happy ex-employee escort himself out at about 1.5mph past the Hungry Man dinners."
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:49 PM on September 21, 2018 [32 favorites]
In the summer of 2003 I was working in Rare Books at the Strand, and my second-to-last day of work happened to coincide with the great Northeast blackout on August 14.
At that time, the Rare Book Room was only accessible by elevator (the stairs came later), so a bunch of people were trapped in the elevator when the power went out.
They were getting freaked out and I was trying to relay information to them through the door. I remember the Russian Buddhist curmudgeon I worked with sidling up to me and whispering, "Don't give them false hope."
Once I could give the elevator people an estimate of when they'd be rescued (it was something like eight hours), I had to start the long walk to the Upper West Side where my girlfriend worked. So I walked out into the August heat and made my way up seventy blocks through the throngs of people.
That was a Thursday, but the store was still closed on Friday, so I ended up never going back – effectively finishing my time at the Strand by wandering out into the apocalypse.
posted by Beardman at 12:54 PM on September 21, 2018 [22 favorites]
At that time, the Rare Book Room was only accessible by elevator (the stairs came later), so a bunch of people were trapped in the elevator when the power went out.
They were getting freaked out and I was trying to relay information to them through the door. I remember the Russian Buddhist curmudgeon I worked with sidling up to me and whispering, "Don't give them false hope."
Once I could give the elevator people an estimate of when they'd be rescued (it was something like eight hours), I had to start the long walk to the Upper West Side where my girlfriend worked. So I walked out into the August heat and made my way up seventy blocks through the throngs of people.
That was a Thursday, but the store was still closed on Friday, so I ended up never going back – effectively finishing my time at the Strand by wandering out into the apocalypse.
posted by Beardman at 12:54 PM on September 21, 2018 [22 favorites]
My boss walks over and says “Get a broom and clean it up.” So I get the broom and when I walk into the aisle to clean it, the smell of hot sauce and salsa is so overwhelming to me I almost throw up. This is all within the first 15 minutes of clocking in on my first shift. I say fuck it and walk out.
This is not epic. This is a dick move.
You want to flame out, that's fine, but don't leave other people holding the bag.
posted by madajb at 12:54 PM on September 21, 2018 [25 favorites]
This is not epic. This is a dick move.
You want to flame out, that's fine, but don't leave other people holding the bag.
posted by madajb at 12:54 PM on September 21, 2018 [25 favorites]
Eh, it sucks, but I feel like it also tells whoever ends up having to clean it that they dodged a bullet of having to work with that guy.
posted by fiercecupcake at 1:09 PM on September 21, 2018 [8 favorites]
posted by fiercecupcake at 1:09 PM on September 21, 2018 [8 favorites]
Almost all of them quit over stuffost of us have to just suck it up and put up with.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 1:12 PM on September 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
posted by The Underpants Monster at 1:12 PM on September 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
More of a getting fired story than a quitting story, but one summer during college I was working the grounds crew at a shitty little golf course way out in the country. It was owned by a pair of brothers, Dick, who was a great guy, and Carey, who was a dick. It was a rough job, manual labor, barely above minimum wage, with a 5am start time so you could get the course cleaned up before the first round of golfers came through. Lots of weed-eating, pond skimming, fertilizing and mowing.
One morning I was out trenching a fairway for a new drainage system. It was barely past the crack of ass and I was fairly well hung over. Carey comes riding out in a golf cart and starts yelling at me, "you don't look like you enjoy this job very much. I need people out here who are willing to do some hard work. You look like you'd be happier in a library behind a pile of books." I finally got sick of his shit, dropped my shovel and shouted back, "fire me! Come on, go ahead, fire me!" He just shook his head, got back in his golf cart and drove away.
A few minutes later, the greenskeeper Roger came riding out in his utility cart. "Get in," he said, pointing his thumb to the back of the cart. "Boss wants you out of here." That was the first -- but not the last -- time I had been fired from a job.
posted by slogger at 1:13 PM on September 21, 2018 [8 favorites]
One morning I was out trenching a fairway for a new drainage system. It was barely past the crack of ass and I was fairly well hung over. Carey comes riding out in a golf cart and starts yelling at me, "you don't look like you enjoy this job very much. I need people out here who are willing to do some hard work. You look like you'd be happier in a library behind a pile of books." I finally got sick of his shit, dropped my shovel and shouted back, "fire me! Come on, go ahead, fire me!" He just shook his head, got back in his golf cart and drove away.
A few minutes later, the greenskeeper Roger came riding out in his utility cart. "Get in," he said, pointing his thumb to the back of the cart. "Boss wants you out of here." That was the first -- but not the last -- time I had been fired from a job.
posted by slogger at 1:13 PM on September 21, 2018 [8 favorites]
Back in the twilight of the 20th century I worked at a small photo store doing digital service work (which back then was very specialized and esoteric). I had worked there full-time for many months and then in graduate school would work a few hours here and there. The pay was miserable, there was a high turnover rate because of lousy working environment, but I had a small section of the store to myself and for the most part was non-customer facing. I had to put up with a lot of drama from the owner and the manager who tended to rub people the *wrong* way quite often
It was a half day for me and I came into work wearing a collarless shirt, which was technically against the owner's policy for employees. It wasn't intentional, just an oversight. The manager, Judy, came up to me me about an hour before I was supposed to leave and said that the owner had noticed that I didn't have a collared shirt and she was holding this hideous smock with a neon version of the store logo on it, a shirt reeking of photo chemicals and no doubt given as a free sample sometime in the 1970s.
"Michael wants you to wear this until you leave today", she said.
I thought about it for a second and said, "Does it really matter? I'm leaving in an hour and it's not as if I'm up front with the customers."
She was confused, repeating that Michael, the owner, was requesting it.
"I'm sorry" I repeated, "but I just can't wear it."
She left and and then Michael came out with the shirt, he was very adamant that I put it on, right here right now.t.
It was one of those moments in my life, where I realized, this shit so ain't worth it.
"I'm sorry Michael, I can't wear the shirt and in fact, it's time I gave my notice. It's time for me to move on."
I packed up my stuff as they both tried to walk everything back, but boy was that satisfying.
posted by jeremias at 1:19 PM on September 21, 2018 [45 favorites]
It was a half day for me and I came into work wearing a collarless shirt, which was technically against the owner's policy for employees. It wasn't intentional, just an oversight. The manager, Judy, came up to me me about an hour before I was supposed to leave and said that the owner had noticed that I didn't have a collared shirt and she was holding this hideous smock with a neon version of the store logo on it, a shirt reeking of photo chemicals and no doubt given as a free sample sometime in the 1970s.
"Michael wants you to wear this until you leave today", she said.
I thought about it for a second and said, "Does it really matter? I'm leaving in an hour and it's not as if I'm up front with the customers."
She was confused, repeating that Michael, the owner, was requesting it.
"I'm sorry" I repeated, "but I just can't wear it."
She left and and then Michael came out with the shirt, he was very adamant that I put it on, right here right now.t.
It was one of those moments in my life, where I realized, this shit so ain't worth it.
"I'm sorry Michael, I can't wear the shirt and in fact, it's time I gave my notice. It's time for me to move on."
I packed up my stuff as they both tried to walk everything back, but boy was that satisfying.
posted by jeremias at 1:19 PM on September 21, 2018 [45 favorites]
Yeah, I haven't ever quit epically, but I've been fired all kinds of ways.
posted by notyou at 1:20 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by notyou at 1:20 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
more please
posted by solotoro at 1:27 PM on September 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by solotoro at 1:27 PM on September 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
I remember the exit interview at my last job. You see, I took HIPAA and HITECH laws pretty seriously, and when I noticed a consumer-grade desktop connected to the EMR network I started raising alarms. My Director of IT, a scant 3 weeks into the job was out of the office, but confirmed by text that I was to seize the system in question immediately.
I wasn't surprised he tried to claim he hadn't authorized the removal, but I did notice he started to shake an awful lot when I handed over my phone with the offending message highlighted. I also had printouts of several gross (To the tune of 5000) patient data exposures over the past year that had been swept under the rug, as well as proof that the director of HR (Also sitting in on my exit interview) was laundering several hundred dollars a month in Starbucks Gift Cards.
I was really hoping they would've tried to dispute my unemployment claim, but someone was smart enough to keep that from going to court.
Later that next year I ran into the CEO and her husband at a local museum function. I kept conversation light, but they both looked ready to bolt.
posted by endotoxin at 1:38 PM on September 21, 2018 [19 favorites]
I wasn't surprised he tried to claim he hadn't authorized the removal, but I did notice he started to shake an awful lot when I handed over my phone with the offending message highlighted. I also had printouts of several gross (To the tune of 5000) patient data exposures over the past year that had been swept under the rug, as well as proof that the director of HR (Also sitting in on my exit interview) was laundering several hundred dollars a month in Starbucks Gift Cards.
I was really hoping they would've tried to dispute my unemployment claim, but someone was smart enough to keep that from going to court.
Later that next year I ran into the CEO and her husband at a local museum function. I kept conversation light, but they both looked ready to bolt.
posted by endotoxin at 1:38 PM on September 21, 2018 [19 favorites]
I've never told somebody "I quit" to their face, but I did quit one job by sliding my resignation and key under the (honestly terrifying, screamy) boss' door after she left, as well as leaving my complaints against her crazy ass in the HR office inbox and an address to send my last check and tax forms to.
God that was an awful job. That woman was a full-on nightmare and I legitimately expected her to throttle someone at a moment's notice. Everyone in that office was miserable. I wasn't about to go through being screamed at and threatened by quitting in person.
posted by emjaybee at 1:49 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
God that was an awful job. That woman was a full-on nightmare and I legitimately expected her to throttle someone at a moment's notice. Everyone in that office was miserable. I wasn't about to go through being screamed at and threatened by quitting in person.
posted by emjaybee at 1:49 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Not a "toss the lit match behind you as the cross the bridge on the way out" story, but when I quit my last job my manager, a recent transplant from India (via the Nepotism Express), tried to bully me into giving a month notice "because that is what you give in India". When I pointed out the obvious of us *not being in India* and that my US standard of 2 weeks notice was all he was getting he then replied he would "get back to me" regarding my resignation. I then gleefully informed him he was welcome to do so, but my not showing up 2 weeks and 1 day later was not contingent on whatever he planned to "get back to me" with.
posted by CoffeeHikeNapWine at 2:04 PM on September 21, 2018 [17 favorites]
posted by CoffeeHikeNapWine at 2:04 PM on September 21, 2018 [17 favorites]
he would "get back to me" regarding my resignation.Oh, wow. That's awesome.
posted by uberchet at 2:27 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
You want to flame out, that's fine, but don't leave other people holding the bag.
That sounds like a really poorly designed shelf.
posted by soelo at 2:28 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
That sounds like a really poorly designed shelf.
posted by soelo at 2:28 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Many years ago I worked managing a group home for teens (I was the manager, not the director). One day I was told I was being let go at the end of the week for 'budgetary' reasons, although I expect that it was that director wanted me out for some reason but didn't have cause to fire me. (The budget thing was clearly a pleasant sounding excuse and we both knew it.) What made it frustrating was that one of the guys who worked for me and that I genuinely liked and spent a lot of time training and helping, I quickly realized, had sold me down the proverbial river knowing he would likely get my position, but he acted as if he had no idea it was coming. I asked him directly and he denied it, but then I did find out he had definitely known (he was offered the position even before I was told I was being let go.)
The last day, I showed up to pick up a few things and made pleasant small talk with him for a few minutes. As I turned to leave he saw that I had duct-taped a fake toy knife sticking out of my back and looked pretty crestfallen. I know, it's petty, but man, I giggled about that for a week straight. For what it's worth, I wished all of them the best in the end. Lack of professionalism notwithstanding (me included by that point), the work that was being done there was important, and all these years later I still have many really fond memories of so many of the kids I worked with.
posted by BigHeartedGuy at 2:34 PM on September 21, 2018 [22 favorites]
The last day, I showed up to pick up a few things and made pleasant small talk with him for a few minutes. As I turned to leave he saw that I had duct-taped a fake toy knife sticking out of my back and looked pretty crestfallen. I know, it's petty, but man, I giggled about that for a week straight. For what it's worth, I wished all of them the best in the end. Lack of professionalism notwithstanding (me included by that point), the work that was being done there was important, and all these years later I still have many really fond memories of so many of the kids I worked with.
posted by BigHeartedGuy at 2:34 PM on September 21, 2018 [22 favorites]
It's completely immature but I'm 99% sure when I quit this current job it's going to be with a cake. Fuck two weeks' notice (although that cake looks nice, too).
posted by JoeZydeco at 2:56 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by JoeZydeco at 2:56 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Wow, I've been fired loads of times and quit a few as well. I'm not very good at being servile. One time I was working at a Jefferson Ward (I don't believe they exist any more) which was near my school (on the other side of town from my home, 2 hours away) I told them I could work school days but not weekends because I wasn't going to take that ride if I didn't have a better reason than work. They called me in for a garden sale one weekend, the rain was blowing like crazy, I took the 2 miserable hours in, got there completely soaked and was told I was late AND I was to run a cash register outside in the rain. I told them no, and was told then I should check out and go home (I gather this was some horrible threat) which I did, assuming I wasn't working there anymore. When I went in to get my final check I was told I had to wait and talk to the HR manager, who proceeded to lecture me about my work ethic. I pointed out I had told them I couldn't work weekends, and that I was an adult and I didn't even listen to lectures from mommy. He pulled out his big guns, technically he didn't have to give me my last check until I returned my work vest, a fashionable electric blue vest with a very prominent "Jefferson Ward" on it. I laughed at that. He kind of deflated a little, and recognized the ridiculousness of his position and paid me.
posted by evilDoug at 3:03 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by evilDoug at 3:03 PM on September 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Oh man, I missed that desperation cocktails post. And nobody said "Marsala and Squirt", which is probably the worst thing have drank in a pinch.
I don't have any good quitting stories though. But tons and tons of desperation cocktails...
posted by elsietheeel at 4:34 PM on September 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
I don't have any good quitting stories though. But tons and tons of desperation cocktails...
posted by elsietheeel at 4:34 PM on September 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
I was once the junior in the field camera crew for an eponymously named nightly current affairs TV show whose presenter is now a senator (Australia, you know who I mean). The presenter was an arrogant and aloof character who never mingled in the production office as he passed through to get to his own. He ignored anyone who worked on his show that he hadn't personally chosen, such as camera, editors etc.
Between resigning to move into another field altogether, and actually leaving the station, I scored a coup for the show and the admiration of my colleagues for facing danger down with cunning and making a story. So for a short while I had cachet amongst the team, including the director. The presenter, however, despite using my exceptional product to score top ratings that night, said nary a word.
I can't remember if I pre-planned my speech or if I just took the opportunity on one of my last days on the show. I just know that I saw that the presenter was alone in his office one afternoon so I knocked on the door. I'd been in his office before but never with him in it. The previous time had been after scoring my coup and the producer invited me to take a bottle of wine from the presenter's personal collection. After admiring the audacity of the presenter's huge close-up of himself hanging behind his desk, and the much more attractive close-up of his well-known ex-wife on the opposite wall above the wine bar, I selected a delicious and no-doubt expensive chardonnay. But I digress
He invited me in. And somehow I got the gumption to say something like, 'I've worked for you for 18 months and you don't know my name. There's half a dozen of us on field camera who've all worked for you since you arrived here at the station and we'll put our lives on the line for this show and you don't know any of our names. That's really poor team work on your side.'
And he gaped. For a moment. He said a few words. I don't remember them clearly, my adrenaline was pumping and I was trying to stay cool. He did acknowledge that he didn't know our names and that he should, so that was a win. I told him I was leaving anyway and thanked him for seeing me, and he grumped something and I closed the door and I didn't see him again.
He did, however, sign my going away card.
posted by Thella at 5:39 PM on September 21, 2018 [18 favorites]
Between resigning to move into another field altogether, and actually leaving the station, I scored a coup for the show and the admiration of my colleagues for facing danger down with cunning and making a story. So for a short while I had cachet amongst the team, including the director. The presenter, however, despite using my exceptional product to score top ratings that night, said nary a word.
I can't remember if I pre-planned my speech or if I just took the opportunity on one of my last days on the show. I just know that I saw that the presenter was alone in his office one afternoon so I knocked on the door. I'd been in his office before but never with him in it. The previous time had been after scoring my coup and the producer invited me to take a bottle of wine from the presenter's personal collection. After admiring the audacity of the presenter's huge close-up of himself hanging behind his desk, and the much more attractive close-up of his well-known ex-wife on the opposite wall above the wine bar, I selected a delicious and no-doubt expensive chardonnay. But I digress
He invited me in. And somehow I got the gumption to say something like, 'I've worked for you for 18 months and you don't know my name. There's half a dozen of us on field camera who've all worked for you since you arrived here at the station and we'll put our lives on the line for this show and you don't know any of our names. That's really poor team work on your side.'
And he gaped. For a moment. He said a few words. I don't remember them clearly, my adrenaline was pumping and I was trying to stay cool. He did acknowledge that he didn't know our names and that he should, so that was a win. I told him I was leaving anyway and thanked him for seeing me, and he grumped something and I closed the door and I didn't see him again.
He did, however, sign my going away card.
posted by Thella at 5:39 PM on September 21, 2018 [18 favorites]
Orlando, 1990 or so. The exact date is lost to the mists of time, but I was working in Orlando for a miserable video store chain headquartered in Georgia. I didn't get along wth the regional manager, a man by name of Bob with all the anger management issues implied by being a chain-smoking high-strung man in his mid-fifties who's found himself questioning how he's managed to end up a store/regional manager of a video store chain staffed by teenagers. He never liked me, and the feeling was mutual, but I was competent and showed up sober and on time, which in the world of video store work made me more or less untouchable.
At one point Bob goes into a screaming fit at me one morning after swinging by our location, incensed that the long sleeves of my cotton shirt were wrinkled inside the elbow. I sat there stunned, trying to wrap my head around where in the world this fountain of unhinged rage had come from.
"I did iron it," I protested, "but it's cotton…"
That was a mistake. While I'd heard of a "spittle-flecked rage" I'd always though that was just general embellishment. Not true! The resulting tirade—you know the type, it included most the greatest hits: Excuses, In My Day, Where Do You Get Off, Do You Even, and the ever popular Don't Talk Back To Me—went on long enough that I had time to wonder where a man with dental hygiene bad enough to be mocked by all his employees for his green teeth got off losing it over a wrinkled sleeve.
Cue several months later when the chain goes tits up. I show up for work one morning to find Bob outside the unopened store prepare to shanghai the employees to doing all the break-down work. I'm initially puzzled at why everyone's gathered outside, but the writing had been on the wall for a bit, so when Bob starts barking out orders for what we're to do I just laugh and turn around to get in my car.
"Where are you going?"
"Home."
Bob loses it, starts yelling, and then he makes the mistake of ending on the question, "And you're not going to stay and work?"
I seize the opening, summoning as derisive a snort as only someone barely not a teenager can, scoff a "No" while I laugh at him, and get in the car and leave. My last image in the mirror as I pulled out was him still rage-yelling while most the remaining staff follows my lead. Goddam but that felt good.
posted by los pantalones del muerte at 5:40 PM on September 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
At one point Bob goes into a screaming fit at me one morning after swinging by our location, incensed that the long sleeves of my cotton shirt were wrinkled inside the elbow. I sat there stunned, trying to wrap my head around where in the world this fountain of unhinged rage had come from.
"I did iron it," I protested, "but it's cotton…"
That was a mistake. While I'd heard of a "spittle-flecked rage" I'd always though that was just general embellishment. Not true! The resulting tirade—you know the type, it included most the greatest hits: Excuses, In My Day, Where Do You Get Off, Do You Even, and the ever popular Don't Talk Back To Me—went on long enough that I had time to wonder where a man with dental hygiene bad enough to be mocked by all his employees for his green teeth got off losing it over a wrinkled sleeve.
Cue several months later when the chain goes tits up. I show up for work one morning to find Bob outside the unopened store prepare to shanghai the employees to doing all the break-down work. I'm initially puzzled at why everyone's gathered outside, but the writing had been on the wall for a bit, so when Bob starts barking out orders for what we're to do I just laugh and turn around to get in my car.
"Where are you going?"
"Home."
Bob loses it, starts yelling, and then he makes the mistake of ending on the question, "And you're not going to stay and work?"
I seize the opening, summoning as derisive a snort as only someone barely not a teenager can, scoff a "No" while I laugh at him, and get in the car and leave. My last image in the mirror as I pulled out was him still rage-yelling while most the remaining staff follows my lead. Goddam but that felt good.
posted by los pantalones del muerte at 5:40 PM on September 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
When I was young and carefree (and already had a new, better job lined up), I gave my manager a "Sorry For Your Loss" card with my resignation letter on the inside.
posted by tzikeh at 5:51 PM on September 21, 2018 [51 favorites]
posted by tzikeh at 5:51 PM on September 21, 2018 [51 favorites]
10 years ago I was a sysadmin who built and maintained the backend for a tiny company that got acquired by a huge one you all know (I did not get rich). A few months into basically running the old company on the new company's servers, the founder who was my boss hired a guy he used to work with to be the, uh, Programming Manager or whatever. Getting the band back together.
We did not get along, which I neatly chalk up to him not having any bedside manner. There was also an accent barrier, and I'm usually very good at hearing through accents. After a while, I noticed "being left alone" more, which means not getting invited to meetings. One day I called my brother saying I thought they were trying to get me to quit. He told me to talk to my manager ("Just talk to him!"), who wasn't there that day or something. The next morning I got up bright and early and got there at 8 rather than my usual 9:30 (heinous commute). I had a meeting request from my boss waiting for me in my inbox for 10am and I'm like "OK, that's convenient." Apropos of nothing, this was also 2 days after I got a fancy new car.
Boss got into the office a little bit after me and he had a meeting with others at 9, so our meeting was going to be after that. Shortly after 9am I got an IM from one of the sysadmins I worked with a lot and whom I really liked (that didn't happen too much at the big company). The IM said "Hey, sorry to hear the news!" Naturally, I reply "what news?" He types, "I heard you were being let go today" I'm like, and he's all, and I go, "Well, thanks man!"
I looked at my desk, saw my boss was still in his meeting, gathered up my tchotchkes and a few CDROMs (I regret not taking the extra 5min to get my email) and walked out. I was home by 10am.
A few hours later I got a voice mail from The Boss, saying "hey, we had a meeting scheduled for 10am and you weren't there. So...we're going to have to let you go." Yes, that escalated quickly, but I was already ahead of him. I probably could have gotten more than my last week's pay if I'd actually put myself through the exit process, but I was already gone.
I like that I denied them that final insult, of many insults over those 8 months, and I wonder where Alton is now. I should look him up on LinkedIn and thank him. I still have the car.
posted by rhizome at 5:54 PM on September 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
We did not get along, which I neatly chalk up to him not having any bedside manner. There was also an accent barrier, and I'm usually very good at hearing through accents. After a while, I noticed "being left alone" more, which means not getting invited to meetings. One day I called my brother saying I thought they were trying to get me to quit. He told me to talk to my manager ("Just talk to him!"), who wasn't there that day or something. The next morning I got up bright and early and got there at 8 rather than my usual 9:30 (heinous commute). I had a meeting request from my boss waiting for me in my inbox for 10am and I'm like "OK, that's convenient." Apropos of nothing, this was also 2 days after I got a fancy new car.
Boss got into the office a little bit after me and he had a meeting with others at 9, so our meeting was going to be after that. Shortly after 9am I got an IM from one of the sysadmins I worked with a lot and whom I really liked (that didn't happen too much at the big company). The IM said "Hey, sorry to hear the news!" Naturally, I reply "what news?" He types, "I heard you were being let go today" I'm like, and he's all, and I go, "Well, thanks man!"
I looked at my desk, saw my boss was still in his meeting, gathered up my tchotchkes and a few CDROMs (I regret not taking the extra 5min to get my email) and walked out. I was home by 10am.
A few hours later I got a voice mail from The Boss, saying "hey, we had a meeting scheduled for 10am and you weren't there. So...we're going to have to let you go." Yes, that escalated quickly, but I was already ahead of him. I probably could have gotten more than my last week's pay if I'd actually put myself through the exit process, but I was already gone.
I like that I denied them that final insult, of many insults over those 8 months, and I wonder where Alton is now. I should look him up on LinkedIn and thank him. I still have the car.
posted by rhizome at 5:54 PM on September 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
I was fortunate to be employed in the radio biz, specifically managing an automated Country Music station, when Johnny Paycheck's "Take This Job And Shove It" was a #1 Country hit. Even though I had given proper notice, semi-trained my successor and done other proper things before departing, the temptation to put Paycheck's song on endless repeat as I was about to leave my last day was VIRTUALLY IRRESISTIBLE. I did play it ONCE.
posted by oneswellfoop at 5:56 PM on September 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
posted by oneswellfoop at 5:56 PM on September 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
From the “best quitting stories link”:
I never quit in any spectacular manner, but at the first grocery store job I worked, which was a Fred Meyer, I worked as a meat clerk. I worked there for a long time, and it was obvious that they were incredibly understaffed before I was hired, and then the issue was never fixed ever after I was. We didn’t even have a manager in the conventional sense, one of the meat cutters was basically the manager, and it was obvious that he did not know the parameters of the job. A lot of it was mostly that the meat cutter didn’t know how ordering worked, so he constantly ordered too much or too little of our main sellers (fish and beef) and then simply neglected everything else.
As time wore on I began developing back pain from having to constantly pick up heavy boxes, which was never placed in a position that made it viable to pick up, and was probably in violation of workplace rules. The thing that finally did it for me was one day I was in the freezer getting boxes of fish, but they were stacked up high on top of tons of other boxes. I was told by my “manager” that I’d have to stand on top of the frozen boxes while carefully bringing down 50-pound boxes of fish and other things, which were still positioned up high. I did this, despite the fact that this was most assuredly a violation of some sorts, and maybe even a city or state code violation.
The next day I had sharp, piercing pain in my back, and I could barely get out of bed. I called in sick, which I was totally in my rights to do. A little bit later my “manager” called to say that I had to get into work. I told him I couldn’t, that my back was messed up, and that if the boxes weren’t always stacked in such fucking ridiculous ways this wouldn’t have been an issue. He basically told me to quit being a pussy and to get into work or else I’d be let go. I told him to “fuckin’ fire me then” and hung up. A few hours later he called me back to say that the union told him he couldn’t just fire me for that, and that I could come back to work. I didn’t bother, because I was 22-years-old and the whole workplace was hostile, and my back was killing me.
Here is what our freezer commonly looked like. This is an actual photo I took on Aug 11, 2011. It got a lot worse than this, but this was commonly how disheveled it was. I had to stand on frozen boxes to reach the boxes that were on the shelf, but were higher up than where the ones in that picture are. I’d say that shelf is roughly 6’3” up, and I am 6’1”. I imagine other grocery stores got bad, but the second one I worked at was immaculately organized and clean.
posted by gucci mane at 6:02 PM on September 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
About 10 years ago, I got an overnight job stocking shelves at the local grocery store to save up some extra cash. For my first assignment on my first night, I was told to stock paper towels. So I’m putting them on the shelf and soon I only have 2 or 3 rolls left. But the shelf is full. So I push them back to make room for the last few rolls. All of a sudden there’s this huge explosion of broken glass. By pushing in the rolls of paper towels, I had knocked over about 10 glass containers of salsa and hot sauce on the other side of the aisle. My boss walks over and says “Get a broom and clean it up.” So I get the broom and when I walk into the aisle to clean it, the smell of hot sauce and salsa is so overwhelming to me I almost throw up. This is all within the first 15 minutes of clocking in on my first shift. I say fuck it and walk out.Hah, having worked in grocery stores for quite a bit of time when I was younger (albeit only two of them, but I helped open the second one!), there is much worse than spilled salsa that can cause one to nearly vomit. I primarily worked in meat departments, so imagine all the disgusting things that one has to deal with there.
I never quit in any spectacular manner, but at the first grocery store job I worked, which was a Fred Meyer, I worked as a meat clerk. I worked there for a long time, and it was obvious that they were incredibly understaffed before I was hired, and then the issue was never fixed ever after I was. We didn’t even have a manager in the conventional sense, one of the meat cutters was basically the manager, and it was obvious that he did not know the parameters of the job. A lot of it was mostly that the meat cutter didn’t know how ordering worked, so he constantly ordered too much or too little of our main sellers (fish and beef) and then simply neglected everything else.
As time wore on I began developing back pain from having to constantly pick up heavy boxes, which was never placed in a position that made it viable to pick up, and was probably in violation of workplace rules. The thing that finally did it for me was one day I was in the freezer getting boxes of fish, but they were stacked up high on top of tons of other boxes. I was told by my “manager” that I’d have to stand on top of the frozen boxes while carefully bringing down 50-pound boxes of fish and other things, which were still positioned up high. I did this, despite the fact that this was most assuredly a violation of some sorts, and maybe even a city or state code violation.
The next day I had sharp, piercing pain in my back, and I could barely get out of bed. I called in sick, which I was totally in my rights to do. A little bit later my “manager” called to say that I had to get into work. I told him I couldn’t, that my back was messed up, and that if the boxes weren’t always stacked in such fucking ridiculous ways this wouldn’t have been an issue. He basically told me to quit being a pussy and to get into work or else I’d be let go. I told him to “fuckin’ fire me then” and hung up. A few hours later he called me back to say that the union told him he couldn’t just fire me for that, and that I could come back to work. I didn’t bother, because I was 22-years-old and the whole workplace was hostile, and my back was killing me.
Here is what our freezer commonly looked like. This is an actual photo I took on Aug 11, 2011. It got a lot worse than this, but this was commonly how disheveled it was. I had to stand on frozen boxes to reach the boxes that were on the shelf, but were higher up than where the ones in that picture are. I’d say that shelf is roughly 6’3” up, and I am 6’1”. I imagine other grocery stores got bad, but the second one I worked at was immaculately organized and clean.
posted by gucci mane at 6:02 PM on September 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
I knew this was going to be good. Quitting stories are always great ... a book could be made out of the best/worst of them.
posted by Termite at 6:08 PM on September 21, 2018
posted by Termite at 6:08 PM on September 21, 2018
I don't mean this disparagingly to anyone who's quit so wonderfully, especially since I don't think having done so is necessarily a marker of economic security, but I wish I ever felt safe enough to leave a job this way. The closest I ever got was emailing my resignation to my boss at my last job on a Friday, only to have a meeting with him on the subsequent Monday that made it clear that he hadn't actually received that email. I was excited about the ability to surprise him without having technically voided the two-weeks obligation, but he was still pretty unsurprised when I brought up the fact that I was quitting, so it really wasn't very satisfying at all.
posted by invitapriore at 6:24 PM on September 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by invitapriore at 6:24 PM on September 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
I have always resigned from jobs politely and professionally, out of fear of burning bridges. But I do relish the quitting style of my childhood friend when we both worked at the movie theater. I was an assistant manager in college and she was working box office and the concession stand. While I was in the office with the other managers near the end of the night, a slip of brown paper towel slid under the door. It read, in her distinct handwriting, "fuck this shit, I quit." It was dramatic, effective and so memorable.
posted by JennyJupiter at 6:26 PM on September 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by JennyJupiter at 6:26 PM on September 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
emjaybee: God that was an awful job. That woman was a full-on nightmare and I legitimately expected her to throttle someone at a moment's notice.
I worked for guys who laid someone off on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving; she had been chatting with us about the first house she'd just bought.
Then they laid me off six weeks before our first child was born.
FTGs right in the ear.
posted by wenestvedt at 6:27 PM on September 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
I worked for guys who laid someone off on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving; she had been chatting with us about the first house she'd just bought.
Then they laid me off six weeks before our first child was born.
FTGs right in the ear.
posted by wenestvedt at 6:27 PM on September 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
In college, I did work-study hours at the library. It was great! I shelved, did cataloguing, fixed hurt books, and hunted through the library for books that had been put in the wrong place and therefore wound up missing. (A lot of missing books wind up being in the building. The majority of them, in fact, at least in our college's case.)
Then the college decided to renovate the library, which was desperately needed because the roof was leaking. This meant that all of the books on the top floor of the library-- much of which was reference and a huge chunk of which was law journals-- had to be moved elsewhere for the duration. Because the library actually had a budget for this project, they grabbed someone from, uh, somewhere on campus to be the project head of Operation Move All These Books.
I have no idea where she came from, but it damn sure wasn't a library, because what she did was go over to the library's main office and request that they second me (most recent hire) officially to her. Then she gave me a standard rolling book cart. Then she showed me where all the books were supposed to go after they were moved. Then she, I think, went home.
This was not a small library and this floor was full of heavy, bulky books and heavy, bulky, fragile bound periodicals. It took me a few days to be sure of it, but I was literally the only worker she requisitioned. Just me and a book cart. ONE book cart, which she labeled 'Renovations' with a neatly calligraphed sign. I wasn't supposed to use any of the others. I asked the library office what could be done about this, and they said they couldn't do anything directly because separate budget stream blah blah chain of command blah blah. My complaint started wending its way upward to whoever hired this woman, but in the meantime there I was with this book cart. She'd come in at the beginning of each shift, meet me at the checkout desk, ascertain that I was present and clocked in, and then go away again.
The thing was, I actually did it. It was tricky, aggravating manual labor-- reshelving books can be difficult; you have to figure out how much space to leave for items that may be returned and are not present when you move the shelf; also there really was some very fragile stuff-- and it took me most of fall semester, but I moved that entire library floor. Myself. By hand. With one book cart.
The following day, I came in, met her at the desk, and took her up to the now filled storage space, which I was pretty proud of. I'd made signs telling people where everything was, on my own initiative, and I'd created a logical order for what went where out of pure nothingness. She went up to the empty floor to see that there was nothing up there, came down, and looked around the newly filled space.
And then she said, and as God is my witness she did not mean this as a joke because I do not think she would have understood a joke if one had been vivisected for her, then she said:
"Don't you think everything in this space should be six inches to the left from where it is now?"
I saw red. I have never had to work so hard not to start screaming and waving my arms in my life. As my vision cleared up again, I said, in the most even tone of voice I could possibly manage, staring firmly over her shoulder, "Excuse me, but I've just found out my grandmother is on fire." Then I turned on my heel and departed before she could get over the confusion.
The next day, I went back to the library office, and explained that I worked there again now. She came in and tried to tell me the job wasn't done, and I ignored her very existence and continued cataloguing. The librarians, who of course had learned about what happened basically as soon as it happened, were perfectly willing to aid and abet me on this, and I spent another year and a half cheerfully doing more work-study.
Except shelving. I was done with shelving. Everyone understood.
posted by Rush-That-Speaks at 8:11 PM on September 21, 2018 [87 favorites]
Then the college decided to renovate the library, which was desperately needed because the roof was leaking. This meant that all of the books on the top floor of the library-- much of which was reference and a huge chunk of which was law journals-- had to be moved elsewhere for the duration. Because the library actually had a budget for this project, they grabbed someone from, uh, somewhere on campus to be the project head of Operation Move All These Books.
I have no idea where she came from, but it damn sure wasn't a library, because what she did was go over to the library's main office and request that they second me (most recent hire) officially to her. Then she gave me a standard rolling book cart. Then she showed me where all the books were supposed to go after they were moved. Then she, I think, went home.
This was not a small library and this floor was full of heavy, bulky books and heavy, bulky, fragile bound periodicals. It took me a few days to be sure of it, but I was literally the only worker she requisitioned. Just me and a book cart. ONE book cart, which she labeled 'Renovations' with a neatly calligraphed sign. I wasn't supposed to use any of the others. I asked the library office what could be done about this, and they said they couldn't do anything directly because separate budget stream blah blah chain of command blah blah. My complaint started wending its way upward to whoever hired this woman, but in the meantime there I was with this book cart. She'd come in at the beginning of each shift, meet me at the checkout desk, ascertain that I was present and clocked in, and then go away again.
The thing was, I actually did it. It was tricky, aggravating manual labor-- reshelving books can be difficult; you have to figure out how much space to leave for items that may be returned and are not present when you move the shelf; also there really was some very fragile stuff-- and it took me most of fall semester, but I moved that entire library floor. Myself. By hand. With one book cart.
The following day, I came in, met her at the desk, and took her up to the now filled storage space, which I was pretty proud of. I'd made signs telling people where everything was, on my own initiative, and I'd created a logical order for what went where out of pure nothingness. She went up to the empty floor to see that there was nothing up there, came down, and looked around the newly filled space.
And then she said, and as God is my witness she did not mean this as a joke because I do not think she would have understood a joke if one had been vivisected for her, then she said:
"Don't you think everything in this space should be six inches to the left from where it is now?"
I saw red. I have never had to work so hard not to start screaming and waving my arms in my life. As my vision cleared up again, I said, in the most even tone of voice I could possibly manage, staring firmly over her shoulder, "Excuse me, but I've just found out my grandmother is on fire." Then I turned on my heel and departed before she could get over the confusion.
The next day, I went back to the library office, and explained that I worked there again now. She came in and tried to tell me the job wasn't done, and I ignored her very existence and continued cataloguing. The librarians, who of course had learned about what happened basically as soon as it happened, were perfectly willing to aid and abet me on this, and I spent another year and a half cheerfully doing more work-study.
Except shelving. I was done with shelving. Everyone understood.
posted by Rush-That-Speaks at 8:11 PM on September 21, 2018 [87 favorites]
I worked for a time in a sales job. I'm not really suited for sales. Mainly what we were selling was the payment plan, because that was how the company made most of their money. My boss dragged me aside and gave me what I gather was meant to be tough love but included things like criticizing my voice. I don't mean my tone of voice or anything. Just my voice was too deep and manly. I swear to god. I don't know what I was supposed to do about that. So I found another job.
Instead of getting notice, I promptly went wild, signed all the people up I could and was leading the board on my last night there. I worked alone so I wrapped everything up, sent an email to HR, the district manager, the regional manager, and the head of the company with a catalogue of the shady and illegal stuff he'd done, sent another one to the state regulatory body that over saw us, changed my phone number so he couldn't call me, locked up, and slid my key in through the mail slot.
It was satisfying as hell to moonwalk out of there.
posted by Ghostride The Whip at 8:31 PM on September 21, 2018 [14 favorites]
Instead of getting notice, I promptly went wild, signed all the people up I could and was leading the board on my last night there. I worked alone so I wrapped everything up, sent an email to HR, the district manager, the regional manager, and the head of the company with a catalogue of the shady and illegal stuff he'd done, sent another one to the state regulatory body that over saw us, changed my phone number so he couldn't call me, locked up, and slid my key in through the mail slot.
It was satisfying as hell to moonwalk out of there.
posted by Ghostride The Whip at 8:31 PM on September 21, 2018 [14 favorites]
Top Deadspin comment is tops
"I’m three stories in, and we’ve got one guy who quit because he got caught trying to steal from his business, one guy who quit because he didn’t want to fix his mistake, and one guy who quit because he wasn’t following the dress code. Should I read on, or are they all entitled assholes?"
posted by thecjm at 8:49 PM on September 21, 2018 [19 favorites]
"I’m three stories in, and we’ve got one guy who quit because he got caught trying to steal from his business, one guy who quit because he didn’t want to fix his mistake, and one guy who quit because he wasn’t following the dress code. Should I read on, or are they all entitled assholes?"
posted by thecjm at 8:49 PM on September 21, 2018 [19 favorites]
I worked for a large e-commerce firm once, back in the very early adolescence of e-commerce, in the days before we stopped calling it e-commerce.
This firm was successful-but-slapdash, with ambitious glory-hound managers habitually deferring the hard work of keeping the lights on. It was a generally shitty place to work so I'd been looking around for a new gig.
Suddenly, some few weeks before Thanksgiving, a senior VP realized that no one had ordered the (many, many) extra servers necessary to handle the holiday rush. New hosting agreements had to be executed. New racks needed to be set up. This was back before the world had easy scaling tools. Each new server was going to have to be ordered, received, racked, installed, tested, and brought online individually. Underutilized servers needed to be scrounged and repurposed. We had plans to order servers from multiple vendors, anticipating that no one vendor could surge us the hardware we needed on short notice, which was going to complicate things further.
I gave my notice five minutes before the big come-to-Jesus meeting where the big brains put the holiday scaling plan together. The 2-3 dozen people in that room were all going to be working 80-100 hour weeks most of the way to xmas.
Because I was young and an asshole, I wore a Santa hat to that meeting.
Looking back, I don't think I have regrets about showboating the big meeting: my co-workers were young, affluent, brilliant people, nerd masters of the universe, most of them smarter and more accomplished than me. The local nerd job market was strong and that e-tailer had a lot of prestige, it was a good resume entry. They would have had no trouble finding employment elsewhere, just as I did. But they had drank the kool-aid and were presumably fine with the emergency that didn't have to be. They were enabling their abusers, and it was a pleasure to leave them with the problem and enjoy my holidays at a much more humane company.
posted by Sauce Trough at 9:08 PM on September 21, 2018 [11 favorites]
This firm was successful-but-slapdash, with ambitious glory-hound managers habitually deferring the hard work of keeping the lights on. It was a generally shitty place to work so I'd been looking around for a new gig.
Suddenly, some few weeks before Thanksgiving, a senior VP realized that no one had ordered the (many, many) extra servers necessary to handle the holiday rush. New hosting agreements had to be executed. New racks needed to be set up. This was back before the world had easy scaling tools. Each new server was going to have to be ordered, received, racked, installed, tested, and brought online individually. Underutilized servers needed to be scrounged and repurposed. We had plans to order servers from multiple vendors, anticipating that no one vendor could surge us the hardware we needed on short notice, which was going to complicate things further.
I gave my notice five minutes before the big come-to-Jesus meeting where the big brains put the holiday scaling plan together. The 2-3 dozen people in that room were all going to be working 80-100 hour weeks most of the way to xmas.
Because I was young and an asshole, I wore a Santa hat to that meeting.
Looking back, I don't think I have regrets about showboating the big meeting: my co-workers were young, affluent, brilliant people, nerd masters of the universe, most of them smarter and more accomplished than me. The local nerd job market was strong and that e-tailer had a lot of prestige, it was a good resume entry. They would have had no trouble finding employment elsewhere, just as I did. But they had drank the kool-aid and were presumably fine with the emergency that didn't have to be. They were enabling their abusers, and it was a pleasure to leave them with the problem and enjoy my holidays at a much more humane company.
posted by Sauce Trough at 9:08 PM on September 21, 2018 [11 favorites]
I have a friend who worked as a bagger a grocery store in a pretty ritzy neighborhood in high school. About 3 weeks in, he was a the end of the register when a very high-society mother & her teenage daughter made a small purchase. The daughter started to reach for the bag & the mother said “No, Boy will get that for us.” My friend looked at her & said “Boy Will not Get that for you,” & took off his apron, dropped it on the counter & walked.
posted by Devils Rancher at 9:38 PM on September 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
posted by Devils Rancher at 9:38 PM on September 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
Restaurant, Florida, 1981. 4-star hotel *ahem* Chalet with golden-spoon awards hanging all over the place. I’d been cooking there 6 months & my girlfriend-fiancée had been washing dishes there for about 2 months. When they found out we were about to be married, they told us that they had a no married couples as employees policy, so one of us would have to leave, & they’d decided my bride-to be was the one to go & I was the one to stay because I was a valuable breakfast line cook.
We were planning on moving to Texas in a few weeks anyway, but I hadn’t told them yet, so I had nothing invested in the job, & the injustice of their rash decision to fire my wife chafed, though I stayed on for a last paycheck before we hit the road.
One Sunday morning, the busiest shift of the week, I was running the breakfast line & we were short-handed. It was a one-man operation if it was slow to middling busy, so I basically had no backup if we got busy enough for me to need one, but I was in a groove & was handling the rush pretty damn well, just moving with an elegant haste I was quite proud of - I was in the zone. About 10 am, the owner started to get nervous & asked was I sure I didn’t need his help? I said no, I’ve got this, trust me. 5 minutes later, he’s putting on an apron & getting in my way, trying unsuccessfully to help, & everything started to go to shit. Once you get out of your rhythm on the line in a rush, shit cascades. I had unhappy waitresses in Swiss bodices demanding their basted eggs over medium NOW & it got ugly quick. The final straw was him dropping 2 eggs over easy on the floor as we were plating up a big table, & at that moment the whole thing was well & truly screwed.
I hollered at the prep cook in the back & said “Hey! Can you make pancakes?” & he said “Yeah, why?” & I said “Becasue I quit!” The owner made one feeble attempt to get me to stay, but I was headed for the back door & didn’t even answer him.
I heard later, that from that point on, it was an epically bad day in the dining room, but fuck that jackass for firing my wife under a shit pretext & expecting me to stay.
The next day us & our cat Roscoe were in our ‘69 Nova, headed up I-75, & man, I’ve never been happier to see a whole state in my rear view since.
posted by Devils Rancher at 10:39 PM on September 21, 2018 [29 favorites]
We were planning on moving to Texas in a few weeks anyway, but I hadn’t told them yet, so I had nothing invested in the job, & the injustice of their rash decision to fire my wife chafed, though I stayed on for a last paycheck before we hit the road.
One Sunday morning, the busiest shift of the week, I was running the breakfast line & we were short-handed. It was a one-man operation if it was slow to middling busy, so I basically had no backup if we got busy enough for me to need one, but I was in a groove & was handling the rush pretty damn well, just moving with an elegant haste I was quite proud of - I was in the zone. About 10 am, the owner started to get nervous & asked was I sure I didn’t need his help? I said no, I’ve got this, trust me. 5 minutes later, he’s putting on an apron & getting in my way, trying unsuccessfully to help, & everything started to go to shit. Once you get out of your rhythm on the line in a rush, shit cascades. I had unhappy waitresses in Swiss bodices demanding their basted eggs over medium NOW & it got ugly quick. The final straw was him dropping 2 eggs over easy on the floor as we were plating up a big table, & at that moment the whole thing was well & truly screwed.
I hollered at the prep cook in the back & said “Hey! Can you make pancakes?” & he said “Yeah, why?” & I said “Becasue I quit!” The owner made one feeble attempt to get me to stay, but I was headed for the back door & didn’t even answer him.
I heard later, that from that point on, it was an epically bad day in the dining room, but fuck that jackass for firing my wife under a shit pretext & expecting me to stay.
The next day us & our cat Roscoe were in our ‘69 Nova, headed up I-75, & man, I’ve never been happier to see a whole state in my rear view since.
posted by Devils Rancher at 10:39 PM on September 21, 2018 [29 favorites]
I've never really quit in the middle of a shift of anything, but 15 years ago I had a job in the CBC radio archives which involved a lot of sitting at your desk listening to old reel to reel tapes and very little talking to anyone; I could go entire work weeks without really having a conversation with any of my co-workers. Any time someone left the department there was a pizza party (they always got 3 For 1, blecchh) and they were always hella awkward because you had all these people who barely ever spoke with each other crammed into a conference room and forced to interact. You could cut the forced joviality with a knife, and I always hated them. When I gave my two weeks' notice I asked my boss to skip the party; no hard feelings (which was true, but there were no warm feelings either, I had been there for over two years and I was happy to be leaving), but I just wanted to quietly slip out the door. She said that would be fine, but then went on vacation and before lunch on my last day I could see the tell-tale signs of the Pizza Party being readied. So I went to the person in charge in her absence and very politely told her that I had politely asked for the *non*-pizza party option and that I was somewhat vexed that my wishes had been either ignored or not conveyed to her. She got annoyed and told me the pizza had already been ordered, so there wasn't anything she could do about it, so I said I was going out for lunch and would not be returning for the remainder of my shift, and that I hoped they all enjoyed the pizza in my absence. She gave me the obligatory farewell card, which I could not bring myself to open and threw in the trash on the way out of the building.
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:09 AM on September 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:09 AM on September 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
can't help but feel like a lot of these are rather fun stories about people with good options quitting jobs they don't need; most people who work shitty jobs, and by volume most jobs are shitty jobs, simply don't have the luxury of quitting even under truly miserable and unfair conditions far worse than the things described here. it's like listening to people reminisce about how bonkers life was before they became financially secure.
posted by clockzero at 6:18 AM on September 22, 2018 [12 favorites]
posted by clockzero at 6:18 AM on September 22, 2018 [12 favorites]
I got fired from a pretzel store because I refused to take part in their christian prayer bullshit. Instead I stood in respectful silence, but that wasn't good enough.
Every morning with the bloody prayers. I lasted 3 days.
posted by james33 at 6:41 AM on September 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
Every morning with the bloody prayers. I lasted 3 days.
posted by james33 at 6:41 AM on September 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
Why the heck do they need prayers when they have pretzels?
posted by parki at 6:48 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
posted by parki at 6:48 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
The comments have a couple of hilarious stories, too. Particularly “Mr. Sexy in the Chinese restaurant” and “Pig Farm Stall Cleaner”.
posted by Autumnheart at 6:51 AM on September 22, 2018
posted by Autumnheart at 6:51 AM on September 22, 2018
I once quit a big and important job at a medium-sized company. Things had become unpleasant and I’d been quietly preparing for my departure for months, but in the last few days before escape the boss caught wind that I was leaving (and, um, taking my department with me to start a competing company).
He called me in to discuss. Driving in that day I reviewed all the possible things I could say to the boss, who was a jackass. I had seven years worth of resentment built up. I rehearsed to myself some scathing diatribes, and pithy blammo putdowns.
But, in the end, after he had told me how tremendously unhappy he was with the situation and the tension in the room had skyrocketed, and we were staring each other down across his desk with flushed faces and wild eyes, I simply got up and gave him a little fright by invading his body space to give him a hug.
He was left speechless. I sallied out.
posted by Construction Concern at 6:55 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
He called me in to discuss. Driving in that day I reviewed all the possible things I could say to the boss, who was a jackass. I had seven years worth of resentment built up. I rehearsed to myself some scathing diatribes, and pithy blammo putdowns.
But, in the end, after he had told me how tremendously unhappy he was with the situation and the tension in the room had skyrocketed, and we were staring each other down across his desk with flushed faces and wild eyes, I simply got up and gave him a little fright by invading his body space to give him a hug.
He was left speechless. I sallied out.
posted by Construction Concern at 6:55 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
That last pizza delivery driver one pisses me off to no end. Dude gets a new job, makes a mistake and refuses to fix it and quits instead. Guess what? Some other poor delivery driver, who checked her order before delivering it, had to then redeliver that dudes mistake.
posted by nestor_makhno at 8:10 AM on September 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
posted by nestor_makhno at 8:10 AM on September 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
I forgot about mine. I worked at a 3 star hotel as a bartender. New owners were running it into the ground and put their idiot kid in charge who was a dick to myself and most of the other F/B staff. One dead Sunday night I decided that i had had enough. Made shots for the front desk and cook, borrowed a towel from housekeeping, turned the lights off, locked the register and walked out to the Jacuzzi with a split of champagne. Shitty champagne never tasted so amazing.
posted by nestor_makhno at 8:16 AM on September 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by nestor_makhno at 8:16 AM on September 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
OMG, the restaurant owner panicking and breaking my rhythm on the breakfast line. It was a far less fancy joint, and I didn't have a fiance or an upcoming move, but I sooo wish I'd had the option of walking out whenever that happened to me.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:34 AM on September 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:34 AM on September 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
My family and I were at a small roadside diner somewhere along I-77 or I-95 back in the '80s when the line cook just up and quit shortly after we sat down; we heard a tremendous amount of yelling and swearing coming from the kitchen, and then this dude stormed out, threw his apron on the floor, walked out the front door, got in his car and peeled out of there. A couple of minutes later an apologetic waitress told us they were going to have to close for the rest of the day.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:48 AM on September 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:48 AM on September 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
A friend of mine did this.
Friend: "hey boss I quit, tired of this."
Boss: "what about a 2 week notice?"
Friend: "If you were going to fire me would you give me a 2 week notice?"
Boss: "that's not how it works."
Friend: "laters."
posted by Max Power at 10:06 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
Friend: "hey boss I quit, tired of this."
Boss: "what about a 2 week notice?"
Friend: "If you were going to fire me would you give me a 2 week notice?"
Boss: "that's not how it works."
Friend: "laters."
posted by Max Power at 10:06 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
I've worked a lot of jobs (I tend to drift about) and while many were "shitty" jobs, I've only walked off the job on one occasion. Usually I just collect evidence and turn it over to HR on my way out the door, and leave the dead and dying to bury themselves (it's amazing how cathartic it is to see a HR drone's face go white when I casually mention my supervisor liked showing me porn on his phone at work...). That one time, though...
My pay checks kept coming in a little shy of what I thought I had worked. I figured it was just minor discrepancies with my pre-coffee memories and ignored it until it gradually crept up to five plus hours a week. Now, I am the guy who loses his keys at the drop of a hat, but five hours? I didn't even lose that much during my blackout drunk days, so I start keeping a spreadsheet of my check in/check out times, just as proof I'm not going down the road to early dementia.
Meanwhile, my type-A, wanna-be motivational speaker boss starts getting more and more erratic, from weird, impromptu pep-rallies in the hall, to chaing shifts and schedules for the afternoon in 10:30 am emails with no explanation, altering manufacturing numbers to be 20% below actuality and then berating us for not meeting goals, to cancelling paid holidays the day before, finally, I had enough. The week after christmas when he docked me for not working on Christmas Eve (a paid holiday according to my contract. I simply printed out my spreadsheet of actual hours worked, vs hours shown on my shaved checks, left it on my chair with an explanatory note, emailed a copy of the file to my private account, shut down my computer, turned out the light and walked out the door.
The panicked email I got later in the day accusing me of using company property against them (yeah, that pirated copy of excel, was apparently for approved uses only) and demanding I return to work immediately. I've never laughed so hard in my life, it was the happiest of new years.
Bonus coda: A few weeks later, a representative of the state department of labor contacted me, asking if was going to apply for unemployment insurance from that job. As I had left voluntarily and had managed to find other ways to keep myself occupied and didn't want to deal with all the rigamarole, I said no.
The representative said that was fine but ex-boss had apparently contacted the department, and raised hell to make sure I was to be given no help at all since I had, in his words "not given the full two weeks notice any decent person would, and this proved any claims I made were at best non-truthful, and at worst, outright fabrications." Which was doubly funny as we were in a right-to-work state, and law said that either party can terminiate employment for any reason, and furthermore, the representative was wondering if I needed any help at all, since ex-boss was such a resounding asshole, that he'd personally put me on the fast track. I declined his help and said the less contact I had with ex-boss, the better, and for him to have a nice day.
posted by 1f2frfbf at 10:09 AM on September 22, 2018 [5 favorites]
My pay checks kept coming in a little shy of what I thought I had worked. I figured it was just minor discrepancies with my pre-coffee memories and ignored it until it gradually crept up to five plus hours a week. Now, I am the guy who loses his keys at the drop of a hat, but five hours? I didn't even lose that much during my blackout drunk days, so I start keeping a spreadsheet of my check in/check out times, just as proof I'm not going down the road to early dementia.
Meanwhile, my type-A, wanna-be motivational speaker boss starts getting more and more erratic, from weird, impromptu pep-rallies in the hall, to chaing shifts and schedules for the afternoon in 10:30 am emails with no explanation, altering manufacturing numbers to be 20% below actuality and then berating us for not meeting goals, to cancelling paid holidays the day before, finally, I had enough. The week after christmas when he docked me for not working on Christmas Eve (a paid holiday according to my contract. I simply printed out my spreadsheet of actual hours worked, vs hours shown on my shaved checks, left it on my chair with an explanatory note, emailed a copy of the file to my private account, shut down my computer, turned out the light and walked out the door.
The panicked email I got later in the day accusing me of using company property against them (yeah, that pirated copy of excel, was apparently for approved uses only) and demanding I return to work immediately. I've never laughed so hard in my life, it was the happiest of new years.
Bonus coda: A few weeks later, a representative of the state department of labor contacted me, asking if was going to apply for unemployment insurance from that job. As I had left voluntarily and had managed to find other ways to keep myself occupied and didn't want to deal with all the rigamarole, I said no.
The representative said that was fine but ex-boss had apparently contacted the department, and raised hell to make sure I was to be given no help at all since I had, in his words "not given the full two weeks notice any decent person would, and this proved any claims I made were at best non-truthful, and at worst, outright fabrications." Which was doubly funny as we were in a right-to-work state, and law said that either party can terminiate employment for any reason, and furthermore, the representative was wondering if I needed any help at all, since ex-boss was such a resounding asshole, that he'd personally put me on the fast track. I declined his help and said the less contact I had with ex-boss, the better, and for him to have a nice day.
posted by 1f2frfbf at 10:09 AM on September 22, 2018 [5 favorites]
I've only ever walked iff a job twice in my life - once in college when I got sick if the constant screaming abuse of a new manager at a pizza joint, and once just a few months ago.
The pizza putz was quite something. Every day, he'd SCREAM about the previous night's deposit coming up short, and he was going to find out who did it and beat the fuck out of the lowlife piece of shit who was taking food out of his kid's mouth. We all knew he was the one skimming, he was the only one with access to the safe.
The franchisee was getting pissed and came in for a come to Jesus meeting with the staff and the DM (who had been our store manager until 6 weeks prior). Captain Apoplectic screamed and screamed and accused each of us in turn. Roommate and I looked at each other, burst out laughing, and strolled out the door. (We later learned that the DM arranged for hidden cameras to be installed in the office after that, they busted the manager and pressed charges. He's still in prison AFAIK, having stolen around 10 large in a mere 8 weeks.)
More recently, I was let go from a job I loved and was good at for "office politics" reasons (I'm suing.) Not one to wallow, I hit the internet, nailed a new job in a couple hours, and started the next day. It was never going to be permanent, I simply can't go too long without a paycheck.
It was a local construction company, and I was told I'd be taking inbound calls to confirm appointments, no sales, no cold calling. My husband had done outside sales for the company some years back, so I had no reason to believe they were lying about my duties.
Oh, were they lying. About 95% of the job was cold calling and there were screaming fights over whose turn it was to answer the few inbound calls we had. The office didn't have an ADA compliant restroom, nor did the restroom have hot water. My co-workers were mostly OK, though one would make passive aggressive remarks and the manager just let her carry on. The manager kept insisting "This is a $20 an hour job!" (It was not, and if the outside sales guys decided to burn the lead or the customers porched the sales guys, it was blamed on the call center staff.)
Not quite a month in, I fell ill. Fever, coughing, lost my voice. Went to the urgent care, doctor prescribed three meds and wrote me out for two days, with instructions to come back if things didn't improve. This was a Thursday and Friday.
I went back to the office Monday, still feverish and no voice, and asked to just do emails. Boss said no, I needed to be on the phone. Passed out at my desk, went to the doc, doc wrote me out for a week. Emailed the note to the boss and got a snotty "Look, I don't know if this is going to work out. You need to meet with me in the morning."
I walked in at my usual time, went to my desk, and took down my personal items, gave my basket of candy to one of my pod-mates, my big box of granola bars to another, then walked over to the manager's window and waved goodbye.
"Wait! We need to talk about this!" I shook my head and pointed to my throat. "You're just going to leave without saying anything?" Shook my head again. "Well? What do you have to say?" Two middle fingers, then signed "You're an asshole.", then went out to my daughter in-law's car.
In the in-between, I have a new job that I love, and when I was laid low by food poisoning just three weeks after I started, they not only told me to go back to bed and stay there until I was better, they paid me for the time I was out.
posted by MissySedai at 11:04 AM on September 22, 2018 [14 favorites]
The pizza putz was quite something. Every day, he'd SCREAM about the previous night's deposit coming up short, and he was going to find out who did it and beat the fuck out of the lowlife piece of shit who was taking food out of his kid's mouth. We all knew he was the one skimming, he was the only one with access to the safe.
The franchisee was getting pissed and came in for a come to Jesus meeting with the staff and the DM (who had been our store manager until 6 weeks prior). Captain Apoplectic screamed and screamed and accused each of us in turn. Roommate and I looked at each other, burst out laughing, and strolled out the door. (We later learned that the DM arranged for hidden cameras to be installed in the office after that, they busted the manager and pressed charges. He's still in prison AFAIK, having stolen around 10 large in a mere 8 weeks.)
More recently, I was let go from a job I loved and was good at for "office politics" reasons (I'm suing.) Not one to wallow, I hit the internet, nailed a new job in a couple hours, and started the next day. It was never going to be permanent, I simply can't go too long without a paycheck.
It was a local construction company, and I was told I'd be taking inbound calls to confirm appointments, no sales, no cold calling. My husband had done outside sales for the company some years back, so I had no reason to believe they were lying about my duties.
Oh, were they lying. About 95% of the job was cold calling and there were screaming fights over whose turn it was to answer the few inbound calls we had. The office didn't have an ADA compliant restroom, nor did the restroom have hot water. My co-workers were mostly OK, though one would make passive aggressive remarks and the manager just let her carry on. The manager kept insisting "This is a $20 an hour job!" (It was not, and if the outside sales guys decided to burn the lead or the customers porched the sales guys, it was blamed on the call center staff.)
Not quite a month in, I fell ill. Fever, coughing, lost my voice. Went to the urgent care, doctor prescribed three meds and wrote me out for two days, with instructions to come back if things didn't improve. This was a Thursday and Friday.
I went back to the office Monday, still feverish and no voice, and asked to just do emails. Boss said no, I needed to be on the phone. Passed out at my desk, went to the doc, doc wrote me out for a week. Emailed the note to the boss and got a snotty "Look, I don't know if this is going to work out. You need to meet with me in the morning."
I walked in at my usual time, went to my desk, and took down my personal items, gave my basket of candy to one of my pod-mates, my big box of granola bars to another, then walked over to the manager's window and waved goodbye.
"Wait! We need to talk about this!" I shook my head and pointed to my throat. "You're just going to leave without saying anything?" Shook my head again. "Well? What do you have to say?" Two middle fingers, then signed "You're an asshole.", then went out to my daughter in-law's car.
In the in-between, I have a new job that I love, and when I was laid low by food poisoning just three weeks after I started, they not only told me to go back to bed and stay there until I was better, they paid me for the time I was out.
posted by MissySedai at 11:04 AM on September 22, 2018 [14 favorites]
Which was doubly funny as we were in a right-to-work state, and law said that either party can terminiate employment for any reason
That's not "right to work", that's "at will". "Right to work" means you can work in a union shop and are entitled to union benefits like CBAs without having to join the union. It's a union busting tactic that has nothing to do with giving notice.
posted by MissySedai at 11:15 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
That's not "right to work", that's "at will". "Right to work" means you can work in a union shop and are entitled to union benefits like CBAs without having to join the union. It's a union busting tactic that has nothing to do with giving notice.
posted by MissySedai at 11:15 AM on September 22, 2018 [11 favorites]
A friend of mine had just got a new job and was on the first day. Almost immediately a coworker spent five minutes chewing him a new one over a fairly inconsequential detail - dress code or proper phrasing of rote customer responses or somesuch. He said (paraphrasing) 'I asked the guy I interviewed with who this clown was, and he said it was the franchisee's brother, that he had no real power, and his only purpose, it seemed, was to make peoples' lives miserable, but, since he was the head cheese's brother, he was there to stay.' My friend told the manager that this was unacceptable, clocked out and walked without a word. He was employed there less than thirty minutes. I've always envied him that sort of clear-cut 'Huh. Nope.' situation.
God that was an awful job. That woman was a full-on nightmare and I legitimately expected her to throttle someone at a moment's notice.
When I was much younger, I worked as a bagger at a grocery store. The good manager got promoted to a new store, the bad manger filled in for him and we had a couple of bad meetings where the dept. heads and the manager essentially yelled at each other for two hours. Finally, at one meeting, the bad manager was positively apoplectic with rage, and the meat dept. head, a really big beefy dude, got up, got right in his face and yelled 'I quit!', and walked out. Then the other dept. heads, one by one, did the same, or a variation. I think half the store quit by the end of that night. I, along with most of the other half, quit about a week later. A couple of months after that, I remember driving by the store and noticing that they had put a huge banner outside that read 'Under New Management'.
posted by eclectist at 5:14 PM on September 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
God that was an awful job. That woman was a full-on nightmare and I legitimately expected her to throttle someone at a moment's notice.
When I was much younger, I worked as a bagger at a grocery store. The good manager got promoted to a new store, the bad manger filled in for him and we had a couple of bad meetings where the dept. heads and the manager essentially yelled at each other for two hours. Finally, at one meeting, the bad manager was positively apoplectic with rage, and the meat dept. head, a really big beefy dude, got up, got right in his face and yelled 'I quit!', and walked out. Then the other dept. heads, one by one, did the same, or a variation. I think half the store quit by the end of that night. I, along with most of the other half, quit about a week later. A couple of months after that, I remember driving by the store and noticing that they had put a huge banner outside that read 'Under New Management'.
posted by eclectist at 5:14 PM on September 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
I’ve been a pizza delivery driver and had to do a few “apology runs” because someone screwed up. It was actually better to be the apology driver (at least in my location) because the customer knew it wasn’t YOUR fault and would even commiserate, like “Here we both are because of that jackhole who can’t get an order right!” It was obviously more embarrassing to do it when I was the one who screwed up, but after a sincere apology, nobody was ever very mad. I mean, this is Minnesota, so they’d be more like, “Well, thank you very much! Have a nice day!” in an angry voice.
Working retail was far worse in terms of dealing with shitty customers. Every fucking scammer and thief would blow up at the cash register in hopes that causing a scene would make me ignore their thievery. Nope.
posted by Autumnheart at 6:17 PM on September 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
Working retail was far worse in terms of dealing with shitty customers. Every fucking scammer and thief would blow up at the cash register in hopes that causing a scene would make me ignore their thievery. Nope.
posted by Autumnheart at 6:17 PM on September 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
(Long shpeil ahead)
Because I've worked with the public for decades, including ranting mentally ill homeless people, I'm fairly adept at de-escalation and heading off conflict by handling things diplomatically. I was also raised with classic Minnesota Nice. My 2 stories involve peacemaker burnout.
#1. I was a minimum wage usher at a well-known local theater revue, and routinely had to smooth over situations with pissed-off customers because the management and some of my coworkers were terrible at customer service. The head toady even managed to be rude to the producer's mother when she came to see the show, the manager sent home a 50-something to get their ID, so they'd miss most of a $100 performance, etc. Rude, clueless crap every night. I was getting tired of it, and getting tired of things like my manager upbraiding me in front of staff for saying, in classic customer service up-speak "okay?" (as in "be right with you folks, okay?" )
So one night after Head Toady rudely dumped a pile of programs in my lap, I decided that my okay-saying ass was not coming back after lunch. A couple of weeks later, I received an Official Letter from my manager and the VP of the company that I might be sued for breach of contract. Apparently, they were trying to intimidate my lowly minimum, hourly wage ass into coming back by threatening a lawsuit. After having a good laugh, I decided to head to the library so that I could use the right lingo to inform Mr VP and friend of the difference between a contract worker and an hourly part-timer. In the course of looking up the lingo, I discovered what 'vested vacation pay' was and informed them that they actually owed me money. I thanked them for the letter because I would never have discovered this had they not sent the ridiculous threat.
#2. I worked at a non-profit arts organization with an unstable supervisor who basically had to answer to no one but the Board, who weren't in the office, obviously. I knew it would get gnarly when she was crying and shaking the first week I was there because my direct manager wasn't delegating enough to me yet.
She'd come into my office and rant occasionally or go on and on about what happened 15 years ago, her childhood, etc etc. I was good at talking her down and sometimes coming up with solutions to problems that she over-reacted to, so I got promoted twice and got a corner office. I had been initially somewhat sympathetic to Whackout Boss but lost all sympathy when she ranted about "what a pouty baby" my coworker was when she denied him permission to go to his sister's funeral. She also tried to screw him out of vacation after laying him off. And after a couple people jumped ship, I was doing 3 jobs at once and coincidentally my bipolar was swinging into mania due to a med reaction. So my filter and composure were out the window, and when she was away, I'd be muttering "just fuckin' fire me already, please" near the file cabinets.
One day she stomped into my office for yet another hotly-anticipated rant session. After calming her down, when she was walking out the door to the hallway, I said "why doncha have another tantrum ya fuckin' asshole?" I half-hoped she could hear me. Miraculously, I was not fired
I then took week off to go mildly crazy, and when I returned, the whole office (who I was supposed to manage) was turned against me. In bipolar confusion, I forgot what I had done. Then it clicked later, "oh yeah, riiiiiight, I called my boss a fuckin' asshole".
I still was not fired but said "Just fuckin' fire me already" and walked out on the Board President.
Yep, I definitely throw the match behind me.
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 9:46 PM on September 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
Because I've worked with the public for decades, including ranting mentally ill homeless people, I'm fairly adept at de-escalation and heading off conflict by handling things diplomatically. I was also raised with classic Minnesota Nice. My 2 stories involve peacemaker burnout.
#1. I was a minimum wage usher at a well-known local theater revue, and routinely had to smooth over situations with pissed-off customers because the management and some of my coworkers were terrible at customer service. The head toady even managed to be rude to the producer's mother when she came to see the show, the manager sent home a 50-something to get their ID, so they'd miss most of a $100 performance, etc. Rude, clueless crap every night. I was getting tired of it, and getting tired of things like my manager upbraiding me in front of staff for saying, in classic customer service up-speak "okay?" (as in "be right with you folks, okay?" )
So one night after Head Toady rudely dumped a pile of programs in my lap, I decided that my okay-saying ass was not coming back after lunch. A couple of weeks later, I received an Official Letter from my manager and the VP of the company that I might be sued for breach of contract. Apparently, they were trying to intimidate my lowly minimum, hourly wage ass into coming back by threatening a lawsuit. After having a good laugh, I decided to head to the library so that I could use the right lingo to inform Mr VP and friend of the difference between a contract worker and an hourly part-timer. In the course of looking up the lingo, I discovered what 'vested vacation pay' was and informed them that they actually owed me money. I thanked them for the letter because I would never have discovered this had they not sent the ridiculous threat.
#2. I worked at a non-profit arts organization with an unstable supervisor who basically had to answer to no one but the Board, who weren't in the office, obviously. I knew it would get gnarly when she was crying and shaking the first week I was there because my direct manager wasn't delegating enough to me yet.
She'd come into my office and rant occasionally or go on and on about what happened 15 years ago, her childhood, etc etc. I was good at talking her down and sometimes coming up with solutions to problems that she over-reacted to, so I got promoted twice and got a corner office. I had been initially somewhat sympathetic to Whackout Boss but lost all sympathy when she ranted about "what a pouty baby" my coworker was when she denied him permission to go to his sister's funeral. She also tried to screw him out of vacation after laying him off. And after a couple people jumped ship, I was doing 3 jobs at once and coincidentally my bipolar was swinging into mania due to a med reaction. So my filter and composure were out the window, and when she was away, I'd be muttering "just fuckin' fire me already, please" near the file cabinets.
One day she stomped into my office for yet another hotly-anticipated rant session. After calming her down, when she was walking out the door to the hallway, I said "why doncha have another tantrum ya fuckin' asshole?" I half-hoped she could hear me. Miraculously, I was not fired
I then took week off to go mildly crazy, and when I returned, the whole office (who I was supposed to manage) was turned against me. In bipolar confusion, I forgot what I had done. Then it clicked later, "oh yeah, riiiiiight, I called my boss a fuckin' asshole".
I still was not fired but said "Just fuckin' fire me already" and walked out on the Board President.
Yep, I definitely throw the match behind me.
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 9:46 PM on September 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
(I meant 'vacation pay' re: my coworker in #2)- edit window closed.
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 9:54 PM on September 22, 2018
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 9:54 PM on September 22, 2018
the meat dept. head, a really big beefy dude
I mean, one would hope so, right?
posted by adamgreenfield at 4:04 AM on September 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
I mean, one would hope so, right?
posted by adamgreenfield at 4:04 AM on September 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
Worked for a fun company where one of my three "bosses" decided I was to be fired (after what was admittedly a pretty big fuck up with lots of moving parts) alongside one of the two co-workers who also participated. But started the process off by revoking building access the day of a CAPA meeting with the president of the company.
Turns out, the president had been getting a pretty murky version of things. We both corrected that. The meeting ended with a "well, that sucks but I can see all the circumstances around this, let's do what we talked about wrt CAPA and I'll see you in a month". Then four hours later (without building access but with room, secure room, equipment, and email access!) the VP finally sent up for the meeting with HR to fire us.
I'm still pretty sure my coworker got the axe for getting shouty with VP when VP insisted we were a GLP space (lol we were the wild west with no controlling audit authority to feed into).
posted by Slackermagee at 8:13 AM on September 23, 2018
Turns out, the president had been getting a pretty murky version of things. We both corrected that. The meeting ended with a "well, that sucks but I can see all the circumstances around this, let's do what we talked about wrt CAPA and I'll see you in a month". Then four hours later (without building access but with room, secure room, equipment, and email access!) the VP finally sent up for the meeting with HR to fire us.
I'm still pretty sure my coworker got the axe for getting shouty with VP when VP insisted we were a GLP space (lol we were the wild west with no controlling audit authority to feed into).
posted by Slackermagee at 8:13 AM on September 23, 2018
I worked for guys who laid someone off on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving; she had been chatting with us about the first house she'd just bought.
Then they laid me off six weeks before our first child was born.
My last (almost certainly in both senses) job with a big organization ended when they canned me the second day back after I got married. Incidentally, the same job which twenty years or so earlier had begun this way.
In between, I quit once, got canned once, and each time came back further up the ladder than when I left. After my final departure, I got an offer from the international office but decided that moving my family across an ocean was too much to ask of them. I now work for myself and am considerably happier and more or less as financially stable. Yay.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 8:07 PM on September 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
Then they laid me off six weeks before our first child was born.
My last (almost certainly in both senses) job with a big organization ended when they canned me the second day back after I got married. Incidentally, the same job which twenty years or so earlier had begun this way.
In between, I quit once, got canned once, and each time came back further up the ladder than when I left. After my final departure, I got an offer from the international office but decided that moving my family across an ocean was too much to ask of them. I now work for myself and am considerably happier and more or less as financially stable. Yay.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 8:07 PM on September 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
When I left the toysaurus 22 years ago, I did nothing flashy to hand in my notice.
But on the last day, after I punched out at 4PM, I did pick up the loudspeaker phone and announce "Attention, customers: the store will be closing in 5 hours. Please bring your items to the front for final checkout."
As I made it to the front door, the manager waved and called (obviously glad to see the last of me), "Take care, Lobsters!"
Then I went out to my station wagon (deliberately parked in front of the big window by the exit) and tap danced on the roof of my car for a minute and a half.
posted by Mutant Lobsters from Riverhead at 6:23 PM on September 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
But on the last day, after I punched out at 4PM, I did pick up the loudspeaker phone and announce "Attention, customers: the store will be closing in 5 hours. Please bring your items to the front for final checkout."
As I made it to the front door, the manager waved and called (obviously glad to see the last of me), "Take care, Lobsters!"
Then I went out to my station wagon (deliberately parked in front of the big window by the exit) and tap danced on the roof of my car for a minute and a half.
posted by Mutant Lobsters from Riverhead at 6:23 PM on September 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
In 1999, I got fired from a job I didn't like in a place I didn't want to live. I moved back to Santa Monica, and, in a week, got a coding job at a game studio way the hell out in the Conejo Valley, an hour's drive away. I had an offer at a company in Santa Monica doing web coding, but I took the game job because I a) wanted to keep making games and b) was a twenty-five-year-old idiot.
Within a few months, I realized I had made a horrible mistake. The company was horribly mismanaged, and the project turned into a grind. All-nighters became a requirement, because we were working on an X-Men game, and it had to be released in time with the first movie. I slept on an air mattress for nights on end.
Finally, I went into my manager's office. "I would like to go home, brush my teeth, take a shower, and change into fresh clothes," I said. "I will see you tomorrow, after I get some sleep in my own bed."
My manager blinked at me. He wasn't much older than I was. "But everyone else is staying here," I said.
"They live close to work. I live an hour away. I want to sleep in my own bed."
"But the team needs all of us to work."
"Toothbrush. Mine. In my face. I'm going."
And that's when it happened.
My manager told me that he was a good manager. And did I know why he was a good manager? It's because, when he played Starcraft, he played as the Protoss, the most difficult race in Starcraft.
Friends, he really said that. I swear to you I am not making this up.
In the end, we compromised: I got to take a shower at the company's owner's condo, which was nearby.
We shipped the game. I wound up driving the gold master to Activision, because, hey, their corporate headquarters were in Santa Monica, where I lived.
When one of my colleagues jumped to another company, he said they were hiring. A bunch of us bolted. I wrote out a one line resignation letter, dropped one copy on the owner's desk, dropped another on my manager's, and walked out.
posted by RakDaddy at 10:44 PM on September 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
Within a few months, I realized I had made a horrible mistake. The company was horribly mismanaged, and the project turned into a grind. All-nighters became a requirement, because we were working on an X-Men game, and it had to be released in time with the first movie. I slept on an air mattress for nights on end.
Finally, I went into my manager's office. "I would like to go home, brush my teeth, take a shower, and change into fresh clothes," I said. "I will see you tomorrow, after I get some sleep in my own bed."
My manager blinked at me. He wasn't much older than I was. "But everyone else is staying here," I said.
"They live close to work. I live an hour away. I want to sleep in my own bed."
"But the team needs all of us to work."
"Toothbrush. Mine. In my face. I'm going."
And that's when it happened.
My manager told me that he was a good manager. And did I know why he was a good manager? It's because, when he played Starcraft, he played as the Protoss, the most difficult race in Starcraft.
Friends, he really said that. I swear to you I am not making this up.
In the end, we compromised: I got to take a shower at the company's owner's condo, which was nearby.
We shipped the game. I wound up driving the gold master to Activision, because, hey, their corporate headquarters were in Santa Monica, where I lived.
When one of my colleagues jumped to another company, he said they were hiring. A bunch of us bolted. I wrote out a one line resignation letter, dropped one copy on the owner's desk, dropped another on my manager's, and walked out.
posted by RakDaddy at 10:44 PM on September 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
I was trying to track down a bug in a large, multi-threaded C++ program. It was taking a while. My manager, who had not done development in close to a decade said, "Why is it taking so long? It's only C++!"
I thought about the clause in my employment agreement that stated I'd have to pay back the relocation costs if I left within two years and did not quit then and there.
(For the non-technical, C++ lacks certain basic built-in checks that a lot of other languages have. As a result, it is possible to have bugs that alter things they are not supposed to in plausible ways, meaning that the effect may not be apparent for minutes or hours after the fact. This can result in fiendishly subtle bugs.)
posted by suetanvil at 8:49 AM on September 26, 2018
I thought about the clause in my employment agreement that stated I'd have to pay back the relocation costs if I left within two years and did not quit then and there.
(For the non-technical, C++ lacks certain basic built-in checks that a lot of other languages have. As a result, it is possible to have bugs that alter things they are not supposed to in plausible ways, meaning that the effect may not be apparent for minutes or hours after the fact. This can result in fiendishly subtle bugs.)
posted by suetanvil at 8:49 AM on September 26, 2018
My favorite that I've been involved in was a threatened resignation letter that I sent. I'd been high performing in a very stressful job for a while and was really kind of overwhelmed, so I wanted to take advantage of the employee unpaid leave policy and applied to take several weeks off. My manager was good with it. His manager was good with it. But it wasn't official until my group's General Manager signed off. So, I sent him mail. I sent him mail again closer to the negotiated leave date. I'm pretty sure I did it again and also told the rest of my management chain that he needed to sign the damned thing.
A few days before the date, I emailed the GM and cc'd some other folks. "Dear [name]: In the absence of any action on my request for leave, I am resigning my position, effective [date]. [blah blah it's been a pleasure, good luck]"
Two minutes later, my GM was standing in my office doorway asking what was up with this. I pleasantly explained that I was leaving on [date] and whether I came back was up to the company. He approved my leave.
posted by rmd1023 at 12:47 PM on September 28, 2018 [8 favorites]
A few days before the date, I emailed the GM and cc'd some other folks. "Dear [name]: In the absence of any action on my request for leave, I am resigning my position, effective [date]. [blah blah it's been a pleasure, good luck]"
Two minutes later, my GM was standing in my office doorway asking what was up with this. I pleasantly explained that I was leaving on [date] and whether I came back was up to the company. He approved my leave.
posted by rmd1023 at 12:47 PM on September 28, 2018 [8 favorites]
Late to the party I know and don't have anything nearly as epic as the above stories to share. Just thought that, for those who aren't currently in a position (financially or otherwise) to say "fuck this!" to your job, then this might provide some inspiration as to how to deal with your current situation. (Sadly out-of-print, but not too hard or too expensive to get used).
posted by gtrwolf at 7:57 PM on October 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by gtrwolf at 7:57 PM on October 13, 2018 [1 favorite]
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