Cheers big ears

I am for some reason blessed with very good selective hearing and where I sit manage to over hear a lot of discussions. Some are of course very dull and work based and immediately tuned out of, some are full of juicy gossip, some are heated arguments which not only me but the rest of the office hear and some are little snippets of information.

This morning was one of the latter. As you’ll recall my gripe on Friday was about my inept supervisor (I don’t think I gave him a name but to stop me referring to him as ‘my supervisor’ throughout the blog lets call him Harley – he rides a bike) and his inability to follow simple instruction. I was hoping that this morning he would be in the office so I could go and wave several documents under his nose and demand he sign them. However, he was nowhere to be seen on my arrival and by 9am had still not shown up. A few enquiries and no one seemed to know of his whereabouts. Moon Monkey rocks up a bit later and I over hear him talking to someone about Harley. He called MM yesterday and said he was having to go into A&E and would let him know if he’d be in on Monday. That’s all that was said so that’s all I caught.

Of course this information doesn’t get passed down to us mere mortals who might like to know where our supervisor is, maybe even have some concern for him and his state of health (I genuinely do hope he’s okay, as much of a numpty as he is he’s still a nice bloke). No, no, no, we simply have to sit and wonder and create a whole plethora of possibilities.

Later still someone on reception rang asking for Harley’s mobile number which I handed over but warned them he might be ‘off sick’ today. Andre overheard this and asked if Harley was ok so I explained what I had heard MM chirping on about. CJ and the grumpy New Zealander overheard this as well and asked if I knew any more – of course not, don’t be silly that would involve MM actually speaking to me.

So this piece of information has travelled around the office and the majority now know Harley is off all day, might be in hospital or just visiting and we wait to see what develops. Enough said.

On a completely separate note Kirstie is chatting to me at my desk about her husbands work. He works in a fairly high security prison and at the weekend had saved a prisoners life when he found him trying to hang himself and cut him down. All very dramatic. Whilst we’re having this conversation CJ is chatting to Grumpy NZ about whatever it is they talk about and suddenly she turns to us and says “are you talking about Harley?” Now Kirstie is a bit flummoxed by this interruption because I don’t think she has heard about Harley’s A&E trip and even if she had this remark was sprung upon her in rather a random fashion. We both look at CJ slightly perplexed/annoyed and Kirstie says “Er, no” and stares blankly at her. Neither of us decides to offer up an alternative explanation to the conversation we are having so CJ says “oh, er sorry I was listening to 2 conversations at once there” and turns back to GNZ all embarrassed.

Er yes CJ we are talking about Harley, he tried to hang himself at the weekend and we’re just chatting about it idly over coffee here at my desk in an open office. Stupid bitch. Andre even had a giggle when this happened and piped up with “you talking about your husband Kirstie?” just to make CJ feel even more of a prick which I appreciated her for. Kirstie got back to her desk and emailed me with “I feel a bit bad about being so rude to her” so I pointed out that maybe CJ shouldn’t have been ear wigging in the first place and also not butted in on our conversation uninvited?

That shut CJ up for a short while anyway.

The other conversations or perhaps I should say ‘person’ who I keep overhearing today is FB. Thank the lord it is her last day in the office today for a while (it seems like she has been here an eternity) so she is making the most of it with an early start (12.50pm) and by talking loudly to anyone who will listen. My favourites so far have been when she was pleading with some random Scottish guy who is sat next to her today (he really sounds like Sean Connery) to check some work for her and her outbursts about her hair.

FB - “Sean would you mind checking through this document for me?”
Sean – I’m sorry FB but I’m very busy and don’t want to get pulled into that”
FB – “Oh go on it won’t take you long, please”
Sean – “No, I’ve far too much on myself”
FB “But it’s so short, please, please, please!”
Sean – “NO!”
FB “It’ll take you no time at all, pretty, pretty, pretty, please, please, please” (I’m not making this up, this is pretty much word for word)
Sean – “NO!!”
FB – “I’ll just email it to you now”
Sean – “And I will delete it”
FB – “Go on its easy all you have to do is read it through”
Sean – “And I have this little delete button which makes it easy for me not to”

This actually went on for some time more but I think when Sean reached for his 007 regulation shotgun she finally shut up. The hair outbursts have been like this:

FB – “Oh I am having such a bad hair day!!”

Cue emails between me and Kirsty along the lines of “every day is a bad hair day luv” and “I think she’s been having a bad hair life!” etc etc. I may have mentioned before that FB’s hair is like some massive awful birds nest of curly split ends and stands out all over the place.

FB – “Oh my hair is driving me mad, I am having such a bad hair day! Although maybe every day is a bad hair day”
Sean – “Well I didn’t like to say anything but…”
FB – “Oh Sean, ha ha ha ha ha!”

I don’t think he’s joking you freak.