Why They Stopped Calling On Me

I used to work for a large computer company in the I.T. department. Our computer room was very large (like a football field).

We once had a combined meeting of programmers, support persons and so on, both male and female. I was in the back with fellow workers.

Before the meeting started, I had been talking about a maid service I had read about.

During the meeting, my bosses’ boss mentioned that we needed to keep the computer room clean and I made a snide comment to a co-worker. My bosses’ boss saw that I was being inattentive and cracking a joke and called me out. “Mark, do you have something you would like to share?” to which I said “No, I’m sorry”.

Apparently irritated and wanting to make a point, he asked again and I apologized. “No, come on, share with the group”. I replied that the comment was not appropriate and he again said “We are waiting” to which I finally thought, well he really wants to know…

“I just joked that we should hire the topless maid service that was on the news today.”

I still remember the burning look from him when he realized that pushing me to share this with the group, was not his best decision.

I was never asked to share with the group again.