Commuting - Stupidity at work

Man I'm bored, so I'm gonna vent.
The senior mechanical engineer at work wanted some tensile tests done on a length of beaded wire. So I go out of my way to help him test it on a machine that I run back at this lab I used to work at.

It's a $20,000 machine, accurate to 0.0005 lbs and 0.0005 in. I can grab data at up to 4khz.

I run 12 samples through, get the data, format it nicely for him. And this guy's a ****** with an IQ of about 10, he has no idea how to read the graphs I give him of stress/strain and the statistical analysis I gave him.

And he's damn arrogant. So he comes up to us yesterday and he wants us to re-test the chain in house by hanging a frigging 10 pound bucket of paint from the end of the chain and measuring the elongation with a 36' tape measure. He is seriously ********.

You know you can allways tell and engineer, you just can't tell them much! :D

i must say that i thought my boss was clueless, sorry to hear about it...
does he really expect you to be able to measure the elongation of the chain with 10 lbm with a tape measure?
can you just not pull the information of the previous experiments? at 10 lbf the elongation is 0.0009 in. or whatever.

yeah, I am here at my job with some serious issues going on. it is getting so sucky that I have a long term plan to escape this summer for good by going back to school. the politics and personalities here have turned really awful. I am an upbeat person and am open to things, but here people don't want anything to change, just want their paychecks to come in, and are waiting their few years out before retirement.

sorry for the vent, but I just am so damn frustrated!!

Here's mine.
I have my yearly review, my boss says all is doing well. A week later she calls me in the office, seems one of my co-workers was upset that I do the crosswords from the paper on the job. I really didn't think this was a big deal, but it is deemed unprofessional. I agree to not do the crossword puzzles, even with clients.

Two days pass, my boss calls me in to her chamber and once again brings up the complaint that I was doing crossword puzzles. She adds, "I had to think was this before or after we talked." She smiled. "It was before, so you're still okay."

I was a bit livid, held my tongue, but fumed, and still do. It is like one of the checks in the I'm moving to AZ column. What I offered her was that I work with people who at their own whim leave the unit, not notifying anyone, to SMOKE. She agreed this was an awful habit, and suggested I do the same to work the crossword puzzles. It's not the same. I don't jones to do a friggin' puzzle the way people jones for a smoke.

My job, as much as I love it, is in the balance. In a month I visit my mum in AZ, and I'll see if I like it or not.

naisme, she wants you :D

Haha fortunately, I'm allowed to do crosswords since I stay in the lab which is behind the room full of cubicals.

The thing is I can pull the data off the previous tests. In fact, I have the average elongation per unit length per lb of load with a tolerance within 95% statistical confidence all calculated into a nice plug and chug equation.

Except the head of mechanical engineering doesn't know what the word confidence bound means, doesn't know what that has to do with tolerance, does not know what curve fitting is, and DOES NOT KNOW HOW I MANAGED TO FIND THE AVERAGE :-o

His superiors wanted data and he had no clue on god's good earth what the data I gave him means even though over the past 2.5 weeks, he's come to my desk at least once a day to ask me about it and it's the same speech I give him over and over again.

So yesterday, when the entire production management crew along with marketting started wondering wtf I was doing with a string and a paint bucket, I said, "my boss wasn't sure about the results from the professionally ceritified machine, so I'm here to verify the results with this paint bucket."

My boss likes to sneak up behind me while I'm at my desk or at the printer or copier and put his hand on my shoulder/back/lower back/waist/neck in a friendly gesture as he asks me what I have on my agenda for the day. Unfortunately he's a dude and so am I.

The other day he needed a tape measure that happened to be in the back pocket of a coworker of mine. Naturally instead of asking, he went in for the grab. We're both very scared.

Considering yourself lucky that your hot erotic female boss is hitting on you, naisme ;)

Haha fortunately, I'm allowed to do crosswords since I stay in the lab which is behind the room full of cubicals.

The thing is I can pull the data off the previous tests. In fact, I have the average elongation per unit length per lb of load with a tolerance within 95% statistical confidence all calculated into a nice plug and chug equation.

Except the head of mechanical engineering doesn't know what the word confidence bound means, doesn't know what that has to do with tolerance, does not know what curve fitting is, and DOES NOT KNOW HOW I MANAGED TO FIND THE AVERAGE :-o

His superiors wanted data and he had no clue on god's good earth what the data I gave him means even though over the past 2.5 weeks, he's come to my desk at least once a day to ask me about it and it's the same speech I give him over and over again.

So yesterday, when the entire production management crew along with marketting started wondering wtf I was doing with a string and a paint bucket, I said, "my boss wasn't sure about the results from the professionally ceritified machine, so I'm here to verify the results with this paint bucket."

so i dont want to sound mean here, but where did your boss get their degree from? was it one of those on-line college?

Engineers in management specialize in stupidity. My boss is a civil engineer and a manager. Need I say more?

i have the same problems all the time its nice to know that its pretty common. it reminds me of 2 jokes I know:

A man is driving a hot-air-balloon and realizes that he is lost.
He reduces the height of his balloon and finally he discovers a man at the
ground. He lets sink even further his balloon, and calls:

"Excuse me, can you help me? I promised my friend to meet him half an hour
agobut im lost.

The man at the ground says: "Well, you are in a hot-air-balloon. 30' off the ground the temperature is 60 degress. Its position is northern width between 40 and 42 degrees, and between
58 and 60 degrees western length."

"You must be an engineer", the balloon-driver says.

"Yes, I am", the man answers. "How did you know that?"

""everything, which you have told me, is
technically correct, but I have no idea what to do with the
information - and I still don't know where I am".

The engineer replies: "You must be a manager."

"Yes, I am", does the balloon-driver answer, "how did you know that?"

"you don't know where you are or where you
going. You have made promise which you cannot keep and you expect that I solve this problem for you. You are in the same position you were in before we
have met, but somehow everything is now my fault.

The 6 Phases of a project
1 enthusiasm
2 disillusionment
3 panic
4 search for the guilty
5 punishment of the innocent
6 praise and honors for the non-particpants

maybe youll like AZ

Sounds like an experience I had years ago when I worked at The Boeing Co Developmental Center: Engineer brings an Air Force negative of a Russian Bomber into our lab. Seems his team needs a look at some device mounted on the side of the fuselage. The opposite side which didn't show in the image! Tells me to just turn it over & make a transparency for him! Could not convince him it wouldn't work. We took turns argueing with him & finally our Supervisor ordered us to do as he asked. The guy picks up his reversed image the next day then complains to our boss that we are a bunch of incompetents and asks if there's someone else in his crew who could help him out? Took several days to convince our boss the guy was wrong! After all, he was the engineer. :rolleyes: Don

Haha that sounds like this joke on the Simpsons, "we have the compound under satellite surveillence, from what we've been able to see, the subject's not on the roof."

Here's another good one, he comes to my desk at 9:30am one day, asks me how to make the words bigger in his email. So I go over to his desk and after 10 minutes of arguing finally realized he wanted to make a word bold. Ok.. I show him.
11:45, he comes back, asks how I make it small again which I assume means he wants to turn bold off.

1) He couldn't figure out to click the button again.
2) I go back to his desk and it's the same exact email with 5 lines in it and slightly different grammar.

He spent 2 hours writing an email with 5 lines in it.

Jeezuz! What a bunch of F**Ktards. I used to work in a plant that drew cold heading wire and galvanized it for bolts, wire fenses, bridge wire etc. One manager used to talk out of his ass so much you were temporarily dizzy. As for the smoking I can agree with the previous poster. We have an accountant her that makes about 130k a year. She goes for a cig break 4x a day for 10 mins at least each time. So, in her great wisdom she sacks the poor Philippina that cleaned for us and did a great job to save money, now the palce looks like crap and it took her 6 hours to create a bill with about 10 lines on it. Lets work this out...130k/12mnths/22days per month ave/8hrs per day=$61per hour 61x6hrs=$366 to produce 1 sheet of paper with 10 lines on it!

It's 8:45 am in the morning, we all just got in, it's 4 degrees outside, I'm trying to enjoy my warm tea and breakfast and my first task for the day as assigned by dumb and dumber is to untangle a ball of wire since that job so obviously calls for a mechanical engineer.

I note that there's a coil of wire sitting on his desk that looks like a tesla coil and his first response is, "er...... yes... why yes it is, electrical wire, it is coiled."

I am in at 7 a.m.

I startup my computer. I surf the internet, drink my caffeine, eat a muffin and ponder what my day will consist of. Management is sitting around twiddling their thumbs not willing to assign anything. I am not willing to stick my head out and take up a project of my own design because it just gets trashed anyhow.

Glad it is a three day weekend. Gonna work on my bike this weekend and dream of getting a nice new road bike.

Last year, under "weaknesses", my evaluation states "ehenz should take more of a leadership role with his peers".

This year it states "ehenz uses his stature to influence his peers and dictate situations."

I figure this year I will do my best to lead, without being followed. :rolleyes:

Last year, under "weaknesses", my evaluation states "ehenz should take more of a leadership role with his peers".

This year it states "ehenz uses is stature to influence his peers and dictates situations."

I figure this year I will do my best to lead, without being followed. :rolleyes:

Good grief, man, what business are you in?

Good grief, man, what business are you in?

Get this; Social Work

I have a McJob, I work for the City I live in as a janitor-- hey, it's union, OK, and there aren't any frigging computer tech jobs available.

My co-workers are the literal dregs of society, not bad people just not too bright. One day we are sitting in the breakroom and my two bosses, yes there's 5 people on the crew but I have two bosses, are talking about this new chemical.

So they are reading the label and it says 5 ounces of this chemical per gallon of water, or something, I'm not even sure. They go on to talk about how much 5 ounces is. My head boss is trying to figure out how many ounces to a cup, how many cups to an quart, something like that.

I say, well, a pop can is 12 ounces, so a little bit less than 1/2 a can would be 5. She replies, yes, but we aren't talking about pop, we are talking about chemicals. Then she ignores me and goes back into cups and pints and stuff.

I have a McJob, I work for the City I live in as a janitor-- hey, it's union, OK, and there aren't any frigging computer tech jobs available.


First off, being a janitor is nothing to be ashamed of. I was one for many years prior to going to college. Its still a good fall-back option that I would use in a heartbeat. ;)




I say, well, a pop can is 12 ounces, so a little bit less than 1/2 a can would be 5. She replies, yes, but we aren't talking about pop, we are talking about chemicals. Then she ignores me and goes back into cups and pints and stuff.

Doh~!~ :D

Engineers !!!! When they they come out with stupid crap I usualy ask them " are you taking the piss ? or are you truely stupid?" Does'nt do my job prospects any good but it makes me feel a bit better ! Its the ones fresh out of university that are usualy the most arrogant & the most wrong !!