Dear Holly,
As far as I was aware, it’s a woman’s basic human right to take tea breaks every half hour whilst at work, plus several minutes preparatory time to boil the kettle and open the biscuits, and then a period of wind-down to wash the cups and take a leak. However, my boss has suddenly taken exception to this and is ranting some codswallop about productivity and down-time. He needs to be put in his place but the only problem is that I’m far too busy to make a formal complaint about him, especially since Janine in admin has started bringing in home made brownies. Can you suggest a swift and effective way we can exercise our rights without interrupting our conversations about Cheryl Cole?
Patricia,
Nottingham
Dear Patricia,
I think it’s about time you took a stand against your boss’ tyrannical behviour. Take a leaf out of the Egyptians’ book and drum up some anarchic spirit with your colleagues, or even start a riot. These days even us school kids are going mental and fighting with the police, who are apparently trying to pass a law to prevent any one except the Queen from going to University. Only last week my class collectively disobeyed our teacher after she found a human turd in the art cupboard and tried to make us stay behind and miss PE until someone owned up. But the old bag was no match for an angry herd of children running towards her at full speed armed with swimming kits, and she soon stood down.
The only disappointment about the whole Egypt thing is that if you look closely at the news footage of the riots, there’s not a loin cloth or gold headdress in sight, and not one of them does that funny walk with the angular hand movements, which is very disappointing. I spent a good half hour trying to spot a mummy in bandages somewhere in the mob, but there was no sign. In fact, from where I’ve been sitting, it just seems to be a lot of angry shouty men with moustaches wearing 1980s jumpers and slacks. Nevertheless, these people are an inspiration to all of us, and unless we also take a stand then next thing you know none of us will have the right to leave the odd jobby lying about.
Hope that helps,
Holly
