A Suggestion to My Colleagues

[bjarvis]

If you're going to join a conference call while telecommuting from home, you may wish to consider muting your telephone while waiting for the meeting to start. While your fight with your wife was mildly entertaining in a slow-moving-train-wreck kind of way, it's not how I'd like to start my morning, especially since I was keen on neither the meeting nor the morning already.

Thank you.

Comments

[manley1.livejournal.com]

Awkward....

[snowboardjoe.livejournal.com]

Heh, that was funny. :)

People forget how noisy a cell phone can be on a conference call. Even if they have it muted, it can still generate a lot of noise if it's getting a crappy signal.

Next time just join in and offer some advice.

[chrishansenhome.livejournal.com]

I once called an accountant contact of mine here who does US taxes for expats in order to get some advice and ensure that his contact information hadn't changed. He was courteous, but was yelling things to his wife in the background, and finally he excused himself and asked whether he could call me back.

When he did, several days later, he said that his wife was in the process of leaving him and moving out at the exact time I called. I commiserated.

[madknits.livejournal.com]

Or they could have been making billing and cooing sounds at each other. Honey Pie. Pumpkin Wumpkin. Sugar Lips. Macho Man. Motor Hips.

Or one could have had a hand in the other's crotch. Oooh, baby, yeah, like that. Ooooh honey!

My motto has ever been "a closed mouth catches no wee beasties."

[bearinslc.livejournal.com]

and was the following phrase used?

"and I TOLD you that I DON'T wand you to use your TONGUE when your going down on me"

Cause that would be way awkward.

[ciddyguy.livejournal.com]

hehe...

Yeah, not the best thing to be hearing on a not so great a morning I'm sure but I bet it gives you some decent perspective of where other relationships may be standing in comparison to yours, which sounds like in this case, doesn't sound all that good. :-)

too many parties to the conference call

[trawnapanda.livejournal.com]

A proper gentleman does not notice or hear certain things

well of course he doesn't. Miss Manners talks about only mentioning things that can be immediately fixed (the spinach-on-the-tooth rule: so tell someone whose fly is undone, but don't point out that someone's tie has a spot on it, because he can't fix that right now, and will go around the rest of the day feeling awkward as The Man With The Spot On His Tie). Getting spousal equivalent to shuttup is fixable, but perhaps not actually stating that his wife is a little shrill for the teleconference.

Miss Manners offers another similar situation:

Dear Miss Manners: The other day a friend phoned me (I did not call her) and then proceded to eat a carrot throughout the conversation. The pops and snaps and crunching chewing noises were louder than her speech. What could I have said?

Gentle Reader: You should approach this obliquely: "We appear to have a bad connection. Would you mind calling me back? There seems to be a carrot on the line."

Of course, everyone can think that up half an hour after the conversation, the trick is coming up with the comments at the time.

[rsc.livejournal.com]

Well, given what you've reported about your work situation recently, I guess you take your entertainment where you can find it.

[quirkstreet.livejournal.com]

I'm waiting for the day when we all have video conferencing and someone forgets to turn off his input when he's masturbating through the whole meeting. ;-)