Office Crooks

While it hasn't happened to me yet, I'm very wary of office crooks.


They steal lunches, you see.

What I'm saying is don't put anything into a company refridgerator that you might want to see again. Putting your name on it may deter these degenerates, but be advised. More than a few people have told me their lunches, labeled and all, have gone missing. One person had her leftovers from a dinner out the night before in there. While the crooks didn't take her meal, they did take a peak inside the styrofoam container to see if it was worth stealing. How do we know this? The hungry bandits had trouble with the packaging, ripping it open rather than exhibiting the patience it takes to undo the little tab.

Who steals a lunch? Other than a homeless person, I mean. I could see someone skipping out on a bill at a restaurant. I've known high schoolers to pilfer food (one particular incident involving a 99-cent burrito comes to mind.) However, to my knowledge, we don't have any homeless people or high schoolers too cool to fork over a Washington working here. We all have jobs, we all can afford lunch....what's the deal?

I've compiled a list of possible characteristics of food stealers:

- Hungry

- Possibly has to hide amount of food he/she eats from someone at home. This would explain not bringing an appropriate amount of food for their own lunch....thereby having to supplement their food-lust with stolen goods. Furthermore, they cannot buy the lunch themselves because the tell tale sign would show up on their bank statement.

- Perhaps has a penchant for stealing other things at work....such as pens, staplers and tape dispensers

- Might ask people regularly what they brought for lunch. It seems like small talk, but it's actually a reconnaissance mission for that afternoon's raid.

- Works odd hours, allowing them to be in the building at times when fewer people are around. May also take excessive bathroom breaks to "take inventory."

- Has a mini-fridge at their desk. (To my knowledge, nobody here has one. Perhaps that means I just haven't found it yet.)

- Has multiple children/going through a divorce/spouse lost job. A money crunch at home could lead to the cost cutting measure of pilfering a panini.

I'm toying with the idea of bringing in something really fantastic for lunch, bragging about it all morning and seeing if it turns up missing. This would also require me to set up some sort of "nanny cam" in the break room. Not sure what legal hoops I'd have to jump through to make this happen. I'll keep you all posted.

A few other office mysteries I need solved:

- Why the doors on the stalls in the bathrooms leave a gap wide enough that you can ID the person on the pot merely by glancing at the door. It's just awkward for everyone.

- Why they give us all passes to park in the parking lot during football games, then send out an email telling us not to use them unless we are needed to work that day. Why not just give them to the people needed to work...or hold them and hand them out on an individual request basis?

- Why when there's a campuswide alert message that's sent to everyone's phone, the message light on your phone doesn't blink...therefore the emergency alert system alerts nobody.