22nd May, 2002.

I returned to work after several days sick leave, and if this morning's performances have been anything to go by the Cow-orker must have been festering in my absence.

I'm on the phone catching up with something that's happened while I was away. Cow-orker arrives (late, as usual) and in a moment of rare perception notices two things:

1) I'm on the phone, and therefore can't run any further than the phone cord will stretch; and
2) I have one ear that's not obviously busy.

She closes in for the kill and procedes to try telling me everything else that happened in my absence...

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Cow-orker is engaged in a fierce argument with our manager over a situation she knows nothing about, using only unreliable extrapolations based on personal prejudices as the basis for her argument. Our manager's phone rings, and he siezes the opportunity to escape. Cow-orker turns, mid-sentence and without pausing, and continues arguing at me (an innocent bystander in all this) rather than let the momentum of all that self-righteous indignation go to waste.

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Heh. One of the technicians from downstairs rang, Cow-orker picked up the phone and they hung up on her before she could identify them and talk at them. Fifteen seconds later they called my direct number to find out what they needed to know.

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You know the Cow-orker Tolerance Threshold in your workplace is about to be breached when the Cow-orker is speaking to you and your manager stands behind her pulling faces at her back and flapping their arms about in imitation of the Cow-orker's gesticulations. .

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