Inflated Self-ImportanceAmorous Badger asks: Tell us tales of people who have a high opinion of themselves. Jumped-up officials, the mad old bloke who runs the Neighbourhood Watch like it's a military operation, Colonel Blimps, pompous bastards and people stuck up their own arse.
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Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Thu 24 Jan 2013, 12:22)
This question is now closed.
A temp job I had was in the post room of a car-park fine firm.We had four trays: £30 cheques, £60 cheques, cash (call the manager) and other.
Our job was to open the post, sort it.
We got some sights - the one that cleared the room was the cheque someone had quite literally wiped their arse on, the little old lady who sent in a £5 note with a sincere apology that she couldn't afford it in one hit on her pension and a request to pay in installments with that as the start, the cheque someone had stapled a hundred times to the ticket, rending it void, etc, but by far my favourite was a simple note attached to the ticket and cheque, saying "Seriously, who the fuck are you? Tony Blair's personal fucking monkey?"
The ticket read "Time & Date Of Issue: 0901 01-01-00"
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Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Sun 27 Jan 2013, 11:54,
85 replies)
Parking Inspector.Yeah I know they're an easy target but...
This happened many years ago. At the time I was working with another bloke making hand-made candles. It was a business I had bought into after the other bloke (I'll call him Dick) had bought the business, its' clients (mostly stall-holders at all of the local markets) and the old Holden 1 tonner HQ off his brother-in-law.
But that's another story for another day.
Anyhoo - every Easter we supplied many of the local churches (including the big churches in the city) with the huge candles that they burn during the whole Easter week. There was no discrimination between faiths - to some we sold these candles at a huge profit (considering it was basically pouring a candle into a large poly pipe), to others we donated them as it was usually at the behest of a local charity.
These candles were usually 1500mm x 120 mm, sometimes bigger, sometimes smaller, sometimes with crosses for different denominations "coloured" into them. We used a slow burning wick as a normal candle can burn as much as an inch an hour. At that size they usually weighed a good 30-40kgs each & as you might imagine are fairly fragile - you're too rough and you end up with a couple of big chunks of wax, a wick in the middle and no candle. We tried 1 year getting a courier to deliver - after many of the churches received broken candles we decided we'd do it ourselves.
So. There we were the last week of March delivering these big candles in the back of our ute to the churches in the city.
We had parked in a "Loading Zone" almost directly in front of St. Georges Cathedral on St. Georges Tce. We wandered inside to find someone to sign for it and tell us where to put it. We found the archbishop. Lovely bloke - he actually baptised me & did my 1st communion.
We headed outside.
To find a parking inspector. Writing a ticket. For our ute.
I tried to head him off - "We're here delivering candles to the church for Easter."
"Once the ticket is written it's done." says he.
Fair call, but..
"This is a registered commercial vehicle that can carry over 1 tonne (so it can legally park in a Loading Zone) & we are on business." says I.
"Too bad, Ive already written out the ticket." says he.
The Anglican Archbishop of Perth then steps in - "These guys are delivering something that the church needs over the next week or so, they appear to have parked legally. I ask you to reconsider..."
"Sorry sir but as I said, I've written the ticket." The priest gets on the blower. And then talks quietly & hurriedly to someone for about 2 min.
"No worries" said my partner during this - we'd just invoice the city for it and write off the ticket.
Literally before the priest has gotten off his phone the Parking guys phone rings.
He answered, "Ahh-hummed" a few times then whipped the ticket out from under the wiper-blade and said to us "There is no problem with you parking here. I'm sorry to have taken you away from your task, my apologies."
tl;dr?
If you're a parking inspector, don't fuck with the church.
(, Sun 27 Jan 2013, 7:41, 8 replies)
Basically, if you haven't been in Fairport Convention at some point, then you're a cunt.(
Amorous Badger NAKED BEA ARTHUR PHOTOS 4U, Sun 27 Jan 2013, 1:43,
4 replies)
I have inflated self-importanceBut especially when it comes to dealing with tourists in London. I glare at them when they pause on the pavement to take photographs of each other, and curse them for walking side by side so I have to break pace to get past them when I'm jogging along embankment like a big sweaty teacake.
Last week I was on the tube and a little group of French girls were glancing at me and giggling. I thought, well they can't be blamed for fancying me. With my black glasses, padded jacket and oversized headphones they probably think I'm a Hoxton new media man from 1997 off to pitch his web currency idea. But they didn't fancy me, they were laughing because I was listening full volume to 'Crockett's Theme' by Jan Hammer and the headphones had come out.
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browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 21:58,
6 replies)
I did jury service a couple of years ago.When Mrs V got home she asked me all about it.
"I can't discuss it" I said, but she protested.
"Seriously, baby - we've been told in no uncertain terms what the law is - I can't discuss it."
She came out with a phrase that reminded of why I married her:
"I'm your wife!" she cried, "I'm more important than the law!"
Still didn't tell her until after the case was closed, though.
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Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 17:43,
8 replies)
Auf dem parkplatz II(pretentious? mich?)
Quiet rural station, only a couple of cars in the car park, pissing with rain, loads of soggy commuters waiting to go one way, loads of soon-to-be-soggy commuters getting off the train. Some wee cockend is pushing his way through the crowd, including physically shoving one lady out of his way on his mad dash to the car park.
Will I be quick enough? Will I get the UHF radio on, dial in 433.xxxMHz (obscured to stop other antisocial cunts in vans doing this) in time? Key it up and... Watch him stand there, in the rain getting wetter and wetter and angrier and angrier as his central locking won't unlock.
It took him nearly five minutes to figure out he could just use the key. Wanker.
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 17:30, 5 replies)
barry scott"HI! I'M BARRY SCOTT!"
nobody fucking cares, just flog your cleaning supplies and piss off. your ordinary man-ness is really not needed to sell bleach
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Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 15:03,
12 replies)
WHAT?! NONE OF YOU EVER SEEN THE HAND OF GOD BEFORE?!(
Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 14:27,
7 replies)
Petrol Sales AssistantA few years ago I made the grave error of stepping out of my car to speak on my mobile. Trouble was I was in a petrol forecourt, where speaking on your mobile is strictly forbidden.
Not 15 seconds later the young petrol assistant came swaggering out. I cannot emphasise swagger enough. Chest out, shoulders swinging and with barely hidden delight at his little minute of power. He said in a loud tone "You will need to turn that off immediately."
I was almost finished so made my excuses and said fine. PSA goes back inside with a massive grin on his face. Job done.
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 14:26, 27 replies)
Film Location Arse Twattery...Imaging the scene: Snow on the ground, us poor little unpaid 'background artists' freezing our butts off, 7am start starving hungry by 9am and the smell of bacon from the catering wagon driving us crazy. So I went up to the wagon and asked what was on offer, when Mr. Up His Own Arse with an ear piece behind me says "Hot food is for cast only. You're only a background artist. Go away". The man behind the counter says "But we're about to close and we have loads left. Let her have something". But no. Mr. UHOA reinterates that we mere extras may not have hot food. It is better that the food go to waste than to let it go to us. Us extras who have given us services voluntarily rather than charge our usual £150 a day because we were trying to help out a low budget film maker... go figure...
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 13:16, 16 replies)
When living in a town with a Naval station I have observed (and had it confirmed by a mate who was an ex-officer) that Navy Wives have a bizarre undeserved social heirarchy based on what their hubs do.
The Navy does like to encourage the families to form a social support network so that when the hubs is away for 3 months on a boat the other side of the world screwing local prostitutes, the wives looking after the toddlers back home can rely on each other for solidarity, emotional support and friendship.
Except the strange thing is, I'd assume the attitude 'We're all in the same situation, all equals' would prevail- apparently not.
It seems that if you're the wife of a Naval Rating then the wife of a Chief Petty Officer gets to boss you about and lord it over you. If you're the wife of a Commander, you're somehow automatically the Queen Bee of the group and will act as such with no other qualification than the fact you bagged yourself a ranking officer.
All wives, however, are above and beyond the Untouchables, e.g. if you're a Wren who happens to be stationed at base that rotation then you're disliked, mistrusted and excluded by the wives because obviously the only reason you joined up was to shag all the husbands when you're at sea serving on the same tub as they are.
I feel the last one is particularly undeserved, as the lads used to joke 'What do you get if you cross a pig with a Wren? An ugly pig'.
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Rotating Wobbly Hat That's not a banana. THIS is a banana., Sat 26 Jan 2013, 12:59,
4 replies)
Microsoft ResearchNeed I say more? Well, yes as I have mentioned before I work in Cambridge. Microsoft Research have recently relocated to near the train station, where there is a lot of other property re-development going on. Because they are massive bastards they closed one side of Station Road, a very busy road, at a time so they could get their cunting cabling and twating gas put in, it went on for weeks. More over they blocked the pavement on Tenision Road, pedestrians had to walk on the road then finally they put up some crap plastic barriers on the road as a make-shift walk way.
They made me utter a phrase I thought I would never say. "I just want to go to work."
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 10:20, 15 replies)
My dad used to own a big luton van for his various business interests. For some reason that I forget, most likely to hide it from bailiffs knowing him, he parked said van away from home. The location was somewhere quiet and residential but parked legally and lawfully. Anyway, he goes to pick it up a day later and some woman comes out of her house and starts giving him shit about parking there and how she was going to call the police if it was not moved, its an eyesore and all that. So pointing out it was parked legally and not an issue my dad was told "My husband is a magistrate". His reply was "Really? I've never told a magistrates wife to fuck off before".
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 8:27, 1 reply)
A fire heated legume.I had the misfortune of working with an exceedingly lazy gent called Carbags (as that was his nickname - another story for another day). Carbags was my senior and the "chef". I was more qualified than him - he got better money & perks purely cause he'd been there for a long time and knew the recipes but wouldn't (couldn't) share them.
While I was paid a moderate casual rate (with NO penalty rates, leave or loading, sick leave etc.) but in charge of stock, orders, costings, the other staff (including hiring/firing), food prep, cooking, sealing and packing, Carbags cooked and that was about it. He got a salary (about 15k more than me) and an (albeit fairly crappy) company car and quite a few other perks. We both started early (0330) but often I would have to work late when Carbags would skite off early.
Germy (the very tight-fisted owner) was shit-scared of Carbags leaving and not divulging the recipes. I quickly worked out the recipes but held off giving them to Germy as a measure of respect to Carbags (who had his own fears for his job/salary as Germy was really tight).
What used to really piss me off tho was when we (myself & all the other staff) would be going hammer & tongs in order to get an order out on time (definitely all-hands on deck type of thing), Carbags would make sure Germy wasn't around then take 15 min. (@ least) to sit down with a cuppa and read the paper. Apart from him we all had the same break-times.
The last 6 months I was there I had a particularly nasty tummy-bug (recurrent giradia) which eventually became chronic and was found to have been caused by my working with offal etc.(remember, NO sick leave!) - to my personal/professional hygiene credit the Health Dept. checked many times and I never passed it on. (HACCP was a bitch to get but I was the most instrumental in getting the certification).
On the day I decided to leave (with no notice after all the shit I copped from Germy & Carbags - I was casual still and only technically had to give/receive 1hrs. notice) I left a carefully thought out note on Germy's desk detailing
a.) the amount of paid time Carbags had scited (particularly noting that a lot of those times where when other staff had to do expensive overtime),
b.) exactly how much money Carbag's laziness had cost Germy in the 2 and a half years I had been there (I used my fairly extensive costing skill to good effect with breakdowns for everything) - it was actually quite a large amount and
c.) all of the recipes (most of which I cooked about half the time anyway). That was my last laugh sorry, phyric victory.
Length? The time it took for Germy to cut Carbags' salary and make him drive his own car to work!
EDIT: Original link here.
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 7:26, 6 replies)
Small man's disease1995. We lived on Ponsonby Rd. in Auckland, New Zealand: a bit like living in inner city London parking-wise. Inconsiderate assholes parking across our clearly marked driveway were a weekly occurrence. One Saturday morning I need to get my car out but there is a brand new cream Mercedes SEL two door across the driveway. By this stage I had "If you park here again I will flatten all of your fucking tires, OK?" flyers all printed up and ready to go.
I was putting one under his wiper when the expensively dressed shortass prick of an owner comes back, with his exotic and expensive looking girlfriend in tow. I'd seen them several times before, they were lunchtime regulars at a posh restaurant across the road.
He launches into a "Don't you know who I am you bastard, I'll park wherever I fucking like," tirade, and then starts threatening me while carrying on a steady stream of expletive filled invective. He didn't actually do anything about it though, as I was quite a bit bigger than him.
His unimpressed girlfriend had meanwhile got in the car, so I decided on a different strategy. Ignoring him I walked round to her side of the car and motioned for her to wind the window down, which she did.
"See how this pompous little prick is treating me, even when he knows he's in the wrong? Six months from now, this is exactly how he'll be treating you," I told her. He shut up in mid-sentence, suddenly not sure what to do next.
"Stay here as long as you like. I'm just going inside to get a baseball bat," I told him, and walked off. He was gone a minute later when I came back with the bat.
I saw him several times after that, but I never saw him with the exotic girlfriend ever again, and I never found out who he was.
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 7:25, 10 replies)
MumMom: you can't use the kitchen, I'm making dinner soon.
Me: What? There's six burners on the stove! Can't I use -one?-
Mom: I need the kitchen from five to seven.
Me: Am I supposed to eat dinner at four?
Mom: This isn't a college dorm, you can't just show up whenever you want to make food.
Me: Okay fine, I'll leave.
Mom: No stay.
Me. Okay.
Mom: Please go.
Me: What?
Mom: I don't know why everything needs to be an argument.
Me: I'm gonna go.
Mom: Come again soon!
(, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 4:27, 6 replies)
"Check your privilege".A simple phrase, only heard on some parts of the internet. And yet whenever it's posted I feel a strong desire to reply with "check your self-importance, prick".
The idea behind it is that you're expressing a narrow-minded viewpoint and that you should open your mind to other people's viewpoints.
I can understand the reasoning behind the message, but the way it's delivered is so deliberately confrontational and obnoxious it makes you (or me, at any rate) take the other side of the argument by default, because it sounds like the rallying cry of a moral crusade.
Needless to say,
See also: "cisprivilege". I can understand the idea behind it, but the word itself is so clumsy and stupid I can't resist laughing whenever I see it.
One good thing about living in a cultural no-man's land is that you never hear phrases like this spoken in real life. I don't know for sure what the penalties are for laughing at a real-life preacher of this value system, but I suspect they involve heavy doses of condescension, finger-wagging and being branded with such damning terms as "reactionary", "uneducated" or "right-wing".
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The Mock TurtIe ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Sat 26 Jan 2013, 0:55,
9 replies)
Not me, but my uncleWas stationed in Mozambique during the floods. There was an extreely self imortant logistics chief who'd pissed everyone off. Not least by generally being a dick in his new white jeep, lording it over the locals. They convinced him (didn't take much) that he needed an obstentatious title to go with his position, so they voted on Commander of United Nations Transport. The acronym was duly painted UN style on the side of his vehicle!
(, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 23:07, 2 replies)
Used to work in shops. Assholes shop in shops. This one day in head first in a freezer and this woman (I won't say lady) needs something from it. Rather than say excuse me, or wait, she decided to poke me in the side to get me to move. I said "would you like in here? All you had to do was say excuse me" so she lifted her ignorant fucking hand and poked me in the side again.
I reacted badly. I'll hold my hands up and say I wasn't right to start swearing but why these people think its ok to invade my personal space, especially after knowing it causes me offence, is beyond me.
To which the woman turns round and says "how dare you! My husband has his own business! My son is a DOCTOR!"... My reply of "and why does that give YOU the fucking right to touch me you ignorant cow?" Went down like a lead balloon and I ended up in the office. I refused to apologise and my boss basically said "I know people are pricks but don't swear at them".
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Maffers I flow kinda strange like Spina Bifida footprints, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 20:53,
18 replies)
Dans le parking...(d'you see what I did there? Pretentious, moi?)
Brake to a stop just a little ahead of a space, snick into reverse and swing the van round neatly in between two cars in the not-even-quarter-full Tesco car park.
Much hooting and beeping from astern, though, and it seems as though the chap in the black X5 is taking exception to my choice of space. Oh well. I got out, and X5-guy rolls down his window.
"Oi, you! That was my space! I was parking there!"
"Oh really, I don't see your name on it, or any other sort of identification. How about parking somewhere else in the acre-and-a-half of tarmac?"
"You need to move, that's my space"
"Well, I've parked it now, so uh, no."
At which tiny small-man-syndrome Weegie X5-jumps out, draws himself up to his full height (still some 4" shorter than me) and says the immortal words:
"Do you know who I am?"
"Nope, but you shop in Tesco so you can't be *that* great."
I glanced pointedly up at the CCTV camera on a pole nearby, plipped the central locking, and strode off across to the store, listening to his irate shouting getting further and further away...
(, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 19:21, 13 replies)
TV film crew nobody.Once, whilst on holiday in the Dales several years ago, I went to Bolton castle. After having been bum raped in the wallet to get in, a small spotty youth with a clip board and a laminated badge of power approached and commanded us to stay where we were and to remain quiet whilst they were filming some scene for the truly awful drama series Heartbeat.
30 minutes later after getting bored of seeing Bill Maynard sat in a chair being fed his lines whilst the luvvies ran around tinkering with equipment I asked how long we were going to have to wait. The waves of contempt emanating from the youth as he put finger to his lips to shush me nearly earned him some corrective surgery in the nearest A+E. Finally we were allowed to shuffle further from the entrance only to find out we could not go anywhere normally accessable inside apart from the cafe and gift shop.
15 minutes later, the little prick showed his face again in order to keep us quiet and corralled. By this time I had had enough. I asked him if he had payed to get in (he hadn't), pointed out that the rest of us had and were here to look at the castle plus this was Yorkshire and most people around here arent star struck enough to tolerate being ordered around like the plebs he thought we were.
The supportive mutters from the other people got louder as I turned around and remonstrated with the admission fee drone and demanded my money back as loudly as possible.
Oddly enough, I lived in Honley at the time which is a couple of miles from Holmfirth and had become used to the regular filming of Last of the Summer Wine which trains a person to be adept at dealing with the hassle of trying to drive a car through the rivers of tourists and rubber neckers come to look at the TV people.
I was on holiday trying to avoid filming season back home which was probably why I imagined how I was going to torture this arsehole to death with his clipboard, pen, laminated badge and official film crew lanyard after chinning the little dick holster.
Fucking obnoxious little wank stain.
(, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 17:25, 2 replies)
An OfficialNow i wouldn't call the lady that runs the cafe in the Ethiopian Airport at Dire Dawa an official. But she had a uniform.
"Can i have some chips"
"Can't have chips, not on the menu"
"Whats that?" I point to some lady eating chips
"Egg sandwich"
"I'll have an Egg Sandwich please"
"It is not on the menu either"
"But i can make it"
"Yes please, two Egg Sandwiches, they come with chips?"
"Yes"
"Thankyou"
But to be honest this is nothing. In Ethiopia it is still 2005, as they have 13 months and time starts at 6am... So 7am is 1am. If you are in a village night time doesn't have a time. It is just 'Nightime'
(, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 16:58, 9 replies)
Ricky GervaisHe makes me laugh, sometimes. But to listen to him talk about his comedy, you'd think he was the only funny man ever to have lived.
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shinyshinyscalp less a man, more a way of life, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 15:36,
6 replies)
Petty little jobsworths1) The bus driver who wouldn't accept a credit note in payment for a ticket - but insisted on giving me the five pounds for the note, then immediately taking the same fiver back in payment. Cockmincer.
2) The electricity company official who wouldn't deal with my problem unless it was over the phone - so directed me to a phone about three metres away, then took the call and dealt with it. Arseweasel.
(, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 14:53, 12 replies)
I once wrote an email to the owner of the now largely dormant 'speak You're Branes' blog.That terrible bastard was cutting and pasting and linking stupid stuff people had said online and suggesting you might find it funny. What a massive cunt.
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Amorous Badger NAKED BEA ARTHUR PHOTOS 4U, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 14:42,
9 replies)
ShitMost of the first page of this QOTW reads like Ron Manager off The Fast Show.
Jumpers for goalposts. Isn't it?
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shinyshinyscalp less a man, more a way of life, Fri 25 Jan 2013, 14:38,
1 reply)
This question is now closed.