“DRIVE-THROUGH fast food restaurants are rarely able to boast much in the way of atmosphere. But there is a way of livening up the usually soulless experience as this talented chap shows, as he brings some musical flavour to proceedings”
Letter to City of Melbourne – Parking and Traffic branch:
Dear Sir/Madam,
I am writing to dispute the above-mentioned “infringement” notice, which was presented to me at 8.26am on March 11th 2010, approximately 30-40 seconds after I pulled into the car space in La Trobe Street.
Firstly, allow me to congratulate the officer involved, who’s application to his job is something we can all learn from. How’s this for dedication: I park my car at approximately 8.25am. I get out of my car & walk around to the boot, where my briefcase is. I dig into my briefcase & come up with the $8.00 required to pay for my 2 hours of parking. I close the boot & start walking towards the ticket machine (which is right next to my car), when at precisely 8.26am old mate gives me a puzzled look, asks me “where did you come from?” and proceeds to tell me I’ve been written up & given a ticket.
Seriously, I’ve gotta hand it to him – this guy’s a genius. Somehow he knew I fully intended to comply with the regulations and pay for my parking, so he did what any good parking officer would do – he wrote me a ticket before I even had the chance to walk the 8 steps to the machine & pay for one. Officer 355 must get a raise, no questions asked. If the city of Melbourne had more officers that demonstrated this type of innovation, imagine the revenue that could be raised! We might even be able to afford – I don’t know, some police? Another giant wheel near Docklands? More parking officers?!
I accept full responsibility for not getting from my car to the ticket machine in time. The 30-40 seconds I let lapse between parking and finding my $8.00 was clearly my fault. Can you please advise me what the threshold is for time lapsed before purchasing a ticket? In the interim, I will commence winding down my window as I pull in and throwing my coins at the ticket machine in the hope that some find their way in to the coin slot – if I can then get a passer- by to hit the button for me, this should enable me to have the ticket before I get out of my car.
Or you could waive the ticket. Please check the officer’s notes & do so – this is bullshit.
Yours in disbelief etc,
XXXXX XXXXXX
Reply from City of Melbourne – Parking and Traffic
Dear Mr XXXXX XXXXXX
Thank you for you correspondence regarding the above parking infringement.
When we receive a letter contesting a parking infringement, we review the infringement based on evidence we have collected and on the evidence you have provided. Please be advised the infringement has now been withdrawn.
Sincerely
Customer Compliance – Parking and Traffic
Ain’t that a b**ch.
Barbara Kruger at L&M Arts LA.
Was…
Its time!
This was my attempt at being philosophical at work. It came about watching him getting into an argument with the customer. He is a young team leader and with still lots to learn.
TL: Wtf is he stupid?
Me: Well..
TL: ::starts to type out email::
Me: Right whenever you are talking to anyone over the email no matter who they are, always start politely. Put in a hello or hi or something you normally would do.
TL: ::looks at me like he knows better::
Me: Trust me.
TL: ::Follows my direction and enters in some niceties including regards at the end of the mail::
Me: The thing to remember is if something ever goes wrong and all these emails are made public you need to appear clean. He will end up looking stupid, but don’t stoop to his level. He will trip himself up in the end.
TL: Really?
Me: If you answer the emails the way he does then you are no better than him. You need to be like oil my friend.
Him: Like oil?
Me: Yeah oil floats on water everything else just mixes into the water and makes it look muddy.
Him: …
Just then our boss had caught onto what was happening and had read the silly reply back from the person he had been writing to and was quick to put them in their place. He felt a bit relieved after this point.
So remember to be like oil if you ever get into any arguments over emails!
This happened to me quite some time ago. I was asked to provide a little guidance in helping a new small business get connected to the web and help with setting up email addresses and web space. So I had been in and sat down with the two partners asked them about the company and what would be the ideal domain name etc. After this had been agreed I went away and started to get things ready.
So I popped back in to let them know the email addresses were now live and once they had connected their computers in they could use them. On this occasion one of the partners arrived in just after and had with him a folder of the new print material which had been collected fresh from the printers. He proceeded to talk about how “Cool the new business cards” were. I took a look at one and indeed they were quite fresh looking. I started to read the information and noticed the email address had been written completely incorrectly and so had the website url. So I calmed the party down a little and said ‘hey the information is incorrect, if you end up printing these out with the incorrect information there will be nothing I can do to correct the web site url and email addresses to make them match’. He replied ‘Oh yeah, don’t worry about that these are just the test prints. They look cool thought don’t they I think they’re ready for printing’. I looked at his partner, we realised this guy had absolutely no idea of the implications. It was quickly agreed that none would be printed out until the web/url information was verified correct by myself.
Ever since I left the world of learning and started to look for work I’ve noticed a fascination with over hyping ones job role / title. I remember working for a large insurance company and one day everyone within the company department by department were given a new job title. Note this wasn’t a change in job or the tasks we were to carry out but rather new snazzy names. To provide an example the cleaner suddenly became a hygiene operative. I didn’t quite understand the reasons behind this must have been to make the staff feel better about their job I guess.
Whenever we would see an old college buddy we would ask ‘hey what are you up to now?’ and every old buddy you meet without question always claims to have a better job. Even if it’s not better the job title would definitely sound very exclusive. One person told me they were an IT consultant, which sounds brilliant. So I quizzed further “What type of things do you get up to then?”
“Ah well, lots of different things. I have to admit its not that exciting. I was in one firm and I was installing virus checks on all of there machines.” He said.
I couldn’t think of anything more boring so I asked do they not they have an IT department. He replied well yes they do but the IT department didn’t want to make a decision on which one to use so I was hired to work on a ‘security initiative’ with them.
The point I’m trying to make is no matter how snazzy our job role title is we’re all just hygiene operatives at the end of the day.
I just happened to witness this gem as a non participating member. I happened to be in another department using their computer. This department was quite busy at this point due to them carrying out some extra work which they don’t normally do.
We had a young team leader in the midst who regards himself as, quite simply a ladies man. You wouldn’t feel these vibes off him straight off the bat, but he can be very entertaining. Also the companies’ cleaner is a very good looking woman. Not something you would expect but it just happens to be the case. She walked in and kind of roamed around the office. After the niceties hello’s and hi and what are you guys up to, our man went into his stride.
“Oh there is some extra over time work happening in our department. Fancy doing a few hours?” he said.
(I know it doesn’t sound like game talk but trust me you have to start somewhere).
She replied “… doing that?”
He replied enthusiastically “Yeah!”
“I can’t think of anything more boring.” She replied very unenthusiastically.
He took a moment, “Hey don’t say that, you’ll be working with me. How can that be boring?”
“Exactly what I meant, I can’t think of anything more boring than that!” She replied as everyone in the room burst out laughing as the poor boy looked on deflated.