Writes Katrina in Illinois: “I work in furniture, and due to the economy/the real estate crash, the company has been struggling and a lot of employees have been making a lot less money.  This little morale booster was found on the break room bulletin board — right beside the letter notifying us that the company was no longer matching 401(k) contributions.”

related: “That’s what she said”

Meg’s uncanny curatorial ability to uncover the silver lining in any situation was woefully under-appreciated at her last job, but even her former coworkers had to admit that this farewell e-mail was an impressive excavation of meg’s latent passive-aggressive tendencies.

related: this shit is bananas

“This morning we were reminded via an office-wide email that we must comply with the official timekeeping rules,” writes an anonymous federal employee in Colorado. That means recording the correct times time sheets, not being absent during core hours without submitting a leave slip, not being off campus except for lunch hour or approved leave — you know, everything short of requiring hall passes to use the restrooms. (Really, would you expect anything less from the United States government?)

Later that a day, a print-out appeared on the bulletin board for a training called “dealing with difficult people.”

This follow-up note was posted soon after.

Adds our submitter: “As far as I know, no one has actually been fired or threatened with firing for not complying.” (Again, this is the federal government we’re talking about.)

related: four approaches to ice-cube maintenance
extra credit: “the audacity of government” [thisamericanlife.org]

Ruben in Pregon works for an Apple reseller where the managers like to fire up the sales team with little competitions. (iPhones don’t sell themselves, people! For that, you’ll have to hold out for version 2.0.)

When Josh, the store’s very own Dwight Schrute, was pronounced the winner of a recent contest, things unfolded pretty much the way you’d expect.

The only person more universally reviled than the office suckup? the new guy, of course.

Says Ruben: “Most of us are real sticklers for keeping track of new product, but recently we brought on this new guy, Victor, and he hasn’t been doing too well.” Ruben came into work one day to find this MacBook battery on one of the tech benches, along with these notes that explain the entire story in just nine words. (And three question marks.)

Ruben says this pwnage became less hilarious when Victor actually did end up getting fired. “Awwkard!”

related: Your last day of work was yesterday

I’m all, “whoa, they left him a note instead of telling him face-to-face?” and Scott’s like, “Yep, I guess probably because the night operator was a pretty big dude.”

How’s that for way harsh? The numbered list at the end is my favorite part.