Thread: Shrimp Thief

On Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:59:09 GMT, "Michael \"Dog3\"" <[email protected]>
wrote:

>This blog post, while being comic, has serious undertones to it. When I
>worked, there were bottled water thiefs. I don't remember food missing but
>water certainly was.
>
>
>To Catch a Shrimp Thief
>Mon Jul 07, 2008 at 03:35:44 PM
>http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/sh..._a_shrimp_thie
>f.php
>
>
>Life in the New Times' offices is often exciting -- but nothing could have
>prepared us for what unfolded today.
>
>A coworker who shall remain unnamed brought in a spiral party platter of
>cocktail shrimp for lunch; the kind where all the little buggers are
>arranged around the tray in perfect fashion, with a container of cocktail
>sauce in the center. He went to the fridge around 11:30 to fetch his snack,
>when he discovered someone had tampered with his lunch. The thief pilfered
>two shrimp, even going so far as to rip open the plastic seal on the
>provided cocktail sauce and dunk away. We can't be sure, but the bastard
>probably double dipped too. The culprit must've also been in a hurry,
>because the cocktail sauce was quickly ditched elsewhere in the fridge, and
>tray was haphazardly shut.
>
>Needless to say, I was on the case.
>
>I immediately sent out a chain of e-mails letting everyone know that, yes,
>we're aware there was a briny theft in the office today, and yes, we're
>going to find that person and make sure he/she is brought to justice.
>Here's an excerpt:
>
>We will find you, and when we do, we will out you. We snuffed out the
>popcorn-burning bandit - that was easy. [editor's note: popcorn burning is
>another serious office crime] You are next. Go pop some mints now, because
>your fishy odor is going to attract us like dogs. Dogs who bite. Dogs who
>bite hard.
>You might say I overreacted a bit. You'd be wrong. Inner-office food theft
>is a serious issue. Not only is it insulting to the person whose food gets
>stolen, it creates an environment where people don't want to bring their
>own food into the office. The good news is I received an outpour of e-mails
>from other concerned coworkers, saying they would back any attempt to
>capture and punish the shrimp thief 100%.
>
>This begs the question: Do any of you work in an office with a food theft
>problem? What have you done to combat shellfish larceny?
> -- John Linn

That's so annoying. When I was younger I worked somewhere that had no
refrigerator and there wasn't enough lunchtime to go out anywhere. So
you had to bring a lunch box. You also had to make sure you kept it
near your work station or something would be missing. They'd take a
whole sandwich. Soda pop was the worst. Louise once had someone go
in the fridge and open her lunch and take a few bites out of her
sandwich and eat some of the chips she had brought. Luckily we lived
close to where she worked so she went home for lunch that day and
started keeping her lunch at her desk.

Lou

It wasn't in an office, but I once worked in a restaurant that had
examples of the dessert on a display tray to entice the customers. When
they ordered, they were given fresh from the back. The ones up front
would be allowed to get stale, then would be tossed out when they no
longer looked appetizing.


We had a guy we rarely saw who would run in, steal the cheesecake, and
disappear. It was funny when he stole week old cheesecake. It got less
funny when we had to keep replenishing with fresh.


Finally we sliced the slice open, put in cayenne pepper, then smooshed
the dessert shut so it looked normal. We had no trouble after that.


I'm not sure how it would apply to shrimp, but the general idea holds.
With syringes, all sorts of things can be made less appetizing to the
common thief. Once the thief doesn't know how things will taste after
they've been pilfered, honest upstanding brown bagging citizens will
find it safe to go back to the office refrigerator.


--Lia

Michael \"Dog3\" wrote:
>
> This blog post, while being comic, has serious undertones to it. When I
> worked, there were bottled water thiefs. I don't remember food missing but
> water certainly was.
>
> To Catch a Shrimp Thief
> Mon Jul 07, 2008 at 03:35:44 PM
> http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/sh..._a_shrimp_thie
> f.php
>
> Life in the New Times' offices is often exciting -- but nothing could have
> prepared us for what unfolded today.
>
> A coworker who shall remain unnamed brought in a spiral party platter of
> cocktail shrimp for lunch; the kind where all the little buggers are
> arranged around the tray in perfect fashion, with a container of cocktail
> sauce in the center. He went to the fridge around 11:30 to fetch his snack,
> when he discovered someone had tampered with his lunch. The thief pilfered
> two shrimp, even going so far as to rip open the plastic seal on the
> provided cocktail sauce and dunk away. We can't be sure, but the bastard
> probably double dipped too. The culprit must've also been in a hurry,
> because the cocktail sauce was quickly ditched elsewhere in the fridge, and
> tray was haphazardly shut.
>
> Needless to say, I was on the case.
>
> I immediately sent out a chain of e-mails letting everyone know that, yes,
> we're aware there was a briny theft in the office today, and yes, we're
> going to find that person and make sure he/she is brought to justice.
> Here's an excerpt:
>
> We will find you, and when we do, we will out you. We snuffed out the
> popcorn-burning bandit - that was easy. [editor's note: popcorn burning is
> another serious office crime] You are next. Go pop some mints now, because
> your fishy odor is going to attract us like dogs. Dogs who bite. Dogs who
> bite hard.
> You might say I overreacted a bit. You'd be wrong. Inner-office food theft
> is a serious issue. Not only is it insulting to the person whose food gets
> stolen, it creates an environment where people don't want to bring their
> own food into the office. The good news is I received an outpour of e-mails
> from other concerned coworkers, saying they would back any attempt to
> capture and punish the shrimp thief 100%.
>
> This begs the question: Do any of you work in an office with a food theft
> problem? What have you done to combat shellfish larceny?
> -- John Linn
>
> --
> Best license plate seen in a long time.
>
> ~ S CARGO ~
>
> To email - michael at lonergan dot us dot com

Ick. Fortunately, working from home, lunch theft seems not to be an
issue.

Julia Altshuler <[email protected]> news:sPWdnfdOK58e9-
[email protected]: in rec.food.cooking

> It wasn't in an office, but I once worked in a restaurant that had
> examples of the dessert on a display tray to entice the customers.
When
> they ordered, they were given fresh from the back. The ones up front
> would be allowed to get stale, then would be tossed out when they no
> longer looked appetizing.
>
>
> We had a guy we rarely saw who would run in, steal the cheesecake, and
> disappear. It was funny when he stole week old cheesecake. It got
less
> funny when we had to keep replenishing with fresh.
>
>
> Finally we sliced the slice open, put in cayenne pepper, then smooshed
> the dessert shut so it looked normal. We had no trouble after that.
>
>
> I'm not sure how it would apply to shrimp, but the general idea holds.
> With syringes, all sorts of things can be made less appetizing to the
> common thief. Once the thief doesn't know how things will taste after
> they've been pilfered, honest upstanding brown bagging citizens will
> find it safe to go back to the office refrigerator.

I'm not saying it's wrong in those cases but wouldn't that be considered
food tampering? Food tampering is illegal IIRC. Case in point... the
restaurant manager here that was prosecuted for putting bleach in a
waiter's ice water. Burned his throat and made him horribly ill. The
manager said she did it because she thought the waiter was spending too
much time in the bus area drinking water. Not sure what her sentence was
but I hope she had to do kitchen duty in prison.

Michael


--
Best license plate seen in a long time.

~ S CARGO ~

To email - michael at lonergan dot us dot com

"Pete C." <[email protected]>
news:wVJck.22714$[email protected]: in rec.food.cooking

<snipola>

>
> Ick. Fortunately, working from home, lunch theft seems not to be an
> issue.

B...b...but what happens if you forget what you've eaten? I mean, SOMEONE
has to be blamed, right

Michael



--
Best license plate seen in a long time.

~ S CARGO ~

To email - michael at lonergan dot us dot com

Michael "Dog3" wrote:
>
> I'm not saying it's wrong in those cases but wouldn't that be considered
> food tampering? Food tampering is illegal IIRC. Case in point... the
> restaurant manager here that was prosecuted for putting bleach in a
> waiter's ice water. Burned his throat and made him horribly ill. The
> manager said she did it because she thought the waiter was spending too
> much time in the bus area drinking water. Not sure what her sentence was
> but I hope she had to do kitchen duty in prison.


Note the difference between non-poisonous cayenne pepper (hey, some
people might like cayenne pepper in their cheesecake) and very poisonous
bleach. I'd never suggest that it was okay to make someone horribly ill
(no matter how much I thought the jerk deserved it). With a syringe,
you could make strawberries terribly salty. (Some people might like
salty strawberries.) Or you have something that looked like tomato soup
but was really mostly hot sauce.


--Lia

In article <[email protected]>,
Lou Decruss <[email protected]> wrote:

> whole sandwich. Soda pop was the worst. Louise once had someone go
> in the fridge and open her lunch and take a few bites out of her
> sandwich and eat some of the chips she had brought. Luckily we lived
> close to where she worked so she went home for lunch that day and
> started keeping her lunch at her desk.
>
> Lou

Those balls must've been draggin' on the floor, fercripesake!!

--
-Barb, Mother Superior, HOSSSPoJ
rec.food.cooking
Preserved Fruit Administrator
"Always in a jam. Never in a stew." - Evergene

Julia Altshuler <[email protected]>
news:[email protected]: in rec.food.cooking

> Note the difference between non-poisonous cayenne pepper (hey, some
> people might like cayenne pepper in their cheesecake) and very
> poisonous bleach. I'd never suggest that it was okay to make someone
> horribly ill (no matter how much I thought the jerk deserved it).
> With a syringe, you could make strawberries terribly salty. (Some
> people might like salty strawberries.) Or you have something that
> looked like tomato soup but was really mostly hot sauce.

True. Poison is another issue altogether <GRIN>. I've been a worker in
and out of restaurants since college... off and on. I've seen a LOT of
stuff including an extra large baking potato stuff up a car muffler.

Michael



--
Best license plate seen in a long time.

~ S CARGO ~

To email - michael at lonergan dot us dot com

On Tue, 08 Jul 2008 09:09:33 -0500, Melba's Jammin'
<[email protected]> wrote:

>In article <[email protected]>,
> Lou Decruss <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> whole sandwich. Soda pop was the worst. Louise once had someone go
>> in the fridge and open her lunch and take a few bites out of her
>> sandwich and eat some of the chips she had brought. Luckily we lived
>> close to where she worked so she went home for lunch that day and
>> started keeping her lunch at her desk.
>>
>> Lou
>
>Those balls must've been draggin' on the floor, fercripesake!!

Unfortunately it seems many work places have at least one jerk like
that. They had a customer appreciation day and we knew the lady who
handles all the cookies and deserts for events like that. We went and
picked them up the night before. We had to pack them up like they
looked like they were to be shipped and put them in a locked office
with other boxes on top of them. There was one very overweight guy
that would have had no problem opening the boxes and eating a large
chunk of the 800 bucks in goodies. They were always bitching at him
because whenever someone brought treats in he'd eat half of them. He
just didn't care and continued being a pig. People like that have no
remorse in stealing food. He's about 40 and I'd be very surprised if
he lives to be 50.

Lou

Lou Decruss wrote:
> On Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:59:09 GMT, "Michael \"Dog3\"" <[email protected]>
> wrote:

>> A coworker who shall remain unnamed brought in a spiral party
>> platter of cocktail shrimp for lunch; the kind where all the little
>> buggers are arranged around the tray in perfect fashion, with a
>> container of cocktail sauce in the center. He went to the fridge
>> around 11:30 to fetch his snack, when he discovered someone had
>> tampered with his lunch. The thief pilfered two shrimp, even going
>> so far as to rip open the plastic seal on the provided cocktail
>> sauce and dunk away. We can't be sure, but the bastard probably
>> double dipped too. The culprit must've also been in a hurry, because
>> the cocktail sauce was quickly ditched elsewhere in the fridge, and
>> tray was haphazardly shut.

> That's so annoying. When I was younger I worked somewhere that had no
> refrigerator and there wasn't enough lunchtime to go out anywhere. So
> you had to bring a lunch box. You also had to make sure you kept it
> near your work station or something would be missing. They'd take a
> whole sandwich. Soda pop was the worst. Louise once had someone go
> in the fridge and open her lunch and take a few bites out of her
> sandwich and eat some of the chips she had brought.

How ridiculous is that?? Grrr. What's really bizarre is that it
seems to be universal, every office has the same stories. Blows
my mind. Who are these people?

I've had people swipe my change and empty my candy bowl.
The only time I worked in an office with a refrigerator, there were
so few of us, it just wasn't an issue.

nancy

"Nancy Young" <[email protected]> news:y_6dnRSrcb-
[email protected]: in rec.food.cooking

> I've had people swipe my change and empty my candy bowl.
> The only time I worked in an office with a refrigerator, there were
> so few of us, it just wasn't an issue.

Never will I forget the time a manager had her office looted and dog poop
left on her desk. It was too strange. On that one the police were called
in.

Michael
--
Best license plate seen in a long time.

~ S CARGO ~

To email - michael at lonergan dot us dot com

Michael "Dog3" wrote:
> "Nancy Young" <[email protected]>

>> I've had people swipe my change and empty my candy bowl.
>> The only time I worked in an office with a refrigerator, there were
>> so few of us, it just wasn't an issue.
>
> Never will I forget the time a manager had her office looted and dog
> poop left on her desk. It was too strange. On that one the police
> were called in.

I would hope so! That goes above and beyond pilfering
someone's lunch. Sicko.

nancy

Lou Decruss wrote:

> Unfortunately it seems many work places have at least one jerk like
> that. They had a customer appreciation day and we knew the lady who
> handles all the cookies and deserts for events like that. We went and
> picked them up the night before. We had to pack them up like they
> looked like they were to be shipped and put them in a locked office
> with other boxes on top of them. There was one very overweight guy
> that would have had no problem opening the boxes and eating a large
> chunk of the 800 bucks in goodies. They were always bitching at him
> because whenever someone brought treats in he'd eat half of them. He
> just didn't care and continued being a pig. People like that have no
> remorse in stealing food. He's about 40 and I'd be very surprised if
> he lives to be 50.

Big niece is like that. My first real exposure to here and her compulsive
sneaking/eating was when she was 16 and came to stay with us for the
weekend. I had made a double batch of chocolate cookies the night before we
came and my wife was upset with me because Big Niece was on WeightWatchers
and it would be too much temptation. No problem (I thought). I packed them
into tins and stuck them in the back corner of the bottom cupboard

My brother and his wife were coming for dinner that night and I made an
apple pie, let it cool and stuck it in the fridge. When it came time to
serve dessert, someone had sampled the pie. She didn't take a slice. She ate
the middle out of it. And I don't mean a forkful of pie. She ate more than
half the pie. There was only about a 3 inch ring left around the outside. I
was furious.

When Big Niece left I went to the cupboard to retrieve the chocolate chip
cookies. They were gone. The pig had eaten the entire double batch, 5 dozen
cookies. Gone.

And she was on a diet at the time!!!!!

On Tue, 8 Jul 2008 11:43:23 -0400, "Nancy Young" <[email protected]>
wrote:

>> That's so annoying. When I was younger I worked somewhere that had no
>> refrigerator and there wasn't enough lunchtime to go out anywhere. So
>> you had to bring a lunch box. You also had to make sure you kept it
>> near your work station or something would be missing. They'd take a
>> whole sandwich. Soda pop was the worst. Louise once had someone go
>> in the fridge and open her lunch and take a few bites out of her
>> sandwich and eat some of the chips she had brought.
>
>How ridiculous is that?? Grrr. What's really bizarre is that it
>seems to be universal, every office has the same stories. Blows
>my mind. Who are these people?
>
>I've had people swipe my change and empty my candy bowl.
>The only time I worked in an office with a refrigerator, there were
>so few of us, it just wasn't an issue.

What's ****ty is many people who bring a lunch do it because they
don't have the money to go out. I'd sure be upset if I had to go all
day without eating and some thief had a full belly.

Lou

Lou Decruss wrote:

>
> That's so annoying. When I was younger I worked somewhere that had no
> refrigerator and there wasn't enough lunchtime to go out anywhere. So
> you had to bring a lunch box. You also had to make sure you kept it
> near your work station or something would be missing. They'd take a
> whole sandwich. Soda pop was the worst. Louise once had someone go
> in the fridge and open her lunch and take a few bites out of her
> sandwich and eat some of the chips she had brought. Luckily we lived
> close to where she worked so she went home for lunch that day and
> started keeping her lunch at her desk.

That is bizarre.
I never had that sort of problem where I worked, but I was on the road most of
the time. A lot of the time I worked at a remote location that had aa fridge and
microwave. There were 8 of us who worked there occasionally, sometimes alone,
sometimes in groups. I used to keep a stash of Knorr soups in my file cabinet
and never noticed any missing.

We had the opposite problem. People would bring things and leave them in the
fridge and then not come back for a while, so after a week or . two we would
have a science project growing in the fridge. We started throwing out his left
overs and he never noticed.

We did have a problem with one person and the pop fund. We kept a supply of soft
drinks in the fridge and I somehow ended up being responsible for stocking it. I
used to stop at a store in the way to the location and pick up a few cases of
pop and take the money out of the cash can. We also bought coffee, cream and
sugar out of the proceeds. One time I had picked up 4 cases of pop and when I
went to recover my expenses I found an IOU in the can. One of the guy, a guy who
only worked there occasionally, had borrowed $20 from the kitty.

I have to say that looking after that pop fridge was more trouble than it was
worth. We were selling pop for 50 cents a can, which was enough to keep it
stocked and supply us with coffee. You would think that guys would use two
quarters to pay, or use a bill and task change. Nope... pennies, nickels,
dimes..

Then there are the guys who never drank pop but the first thing they did when
they showed up was to put on a pot of coffee.... and then tell us that we needed
to get fresh cream.

On Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:05:20 -0400, Dave Smith
<[email protected]> wrote:

>Lou Decruss wrote:
>
>> Unfortunately it seems many work places have at least one jerk like
>> that. They had a customer appreciation day and we knew the lady who
>> handles all the cookies and deserts for events like that. We went and
>> picked them up the night before. We had to pack them up like they
>> looked like they were to be shipped and put them in a locked office
>> with other boxes on top of them. There was one very overweight guy
>> that would have had no problem opening the boxes and eating a large
>> chunk of the 800 bucks in goodies. They were always bitching at him
>> because whenever someone brought treats in he'd eat half of them. He
>> just didn't care and continued being a pig. People like that have no
>> remorse in stealing food. He's about 40 and I'd be very surprised if
>> he lives to be 50.
>
>Big niece is like that.

Believe me Dave, She and this guy would be a match made in heaven.
They could have their wedding reception at "Old Country Buffet." When
he sits down to eat everyone leaves the table.

<snip>

>And she was on a diet at the time!!!!!

And I'll bet there was no remorse on her part. Pretty sad.

Lou

Lou Decruss wrote:

>
>
> What's ****ty is many people who bring a lunch do it because they
> don't have the money to go out.

Not always. Not everyone has long enough lunch breaks and proximity to a
restaurant. I had a summer job in an alloy smelting plant. We worked an
eight hour shift with a lunch break at some time during the shift, but we
grabbed our breaks between between heats and tapping. There was a roach
coach that came around, but we weren't always free to get out to get
something from it, and the food sucked. When I worked on a highway
maintenance crew were weren't always close enough to a restaurant, and when
plowing snow we almost always went back to the yard for instructions and to
refuel.

Some people find it more relaxing to pull out the brown back and have a quiet
lunch and enjoy their full break than to rush out to a restaurant for a quick
meal and then rush back.

I have to confess to having had it made on my last job. We were on the road
and had expense accounts. We took as long as it needed to have a meal. We
generally went to one of the closer restaurants and tried to avoid those with
slow service, but if it took mope than the allotted hour to get a meal and
get back, that's what it took.





> I'd sure be upset if I had to go all
> day without eating and some thief had a full belly.
>
> Lou

Nancy Young wrote:
> Lou Decruss wrote:
>> On Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:59:09 GMT, "Michael \"Dog3\"" <[email protected]>
>> wrote:
>
>>> A coworker who shall remain unnamed brought in a spiral party
>>> platter of cocktail shrimp for lunch; the kind where all the little
>>> buggers are arranged around the tray in perfect fashion, with a
>>> container of cocktail sauce in the center. He went to the fridge
>>> around 11:30 to fetch his snack, when he discovered someone had
>>> tampered with his lunch. The thief pilfered two shrimp, even going
>>> so far as to rip open the plastic seal on the provided cocktail
>>> sauce and dunk away. We can't be sure, but the bastard probably
>>> double dipped too. The culprit must've also been in a hurry, because
>>> the cocktail sauce was quickly ditched elsewhere in the fridge, and
>>> tray was haphazardly shut.
>
>> That's so annoying. When I was younger I worked somewhere that had no
>> refrigerator and there wasn't enough lunchtime to go out anywhere. So
>> you had to bring a lunch box. You also had to make sure you kept it
>> near your work station or something would be missing. They'd take a
>> whole sandwich. Soda pop was the worst. Louise once had someone go
>> in the fridge and open her lunch and take a few bites out of her
>> sandwich and eat some of the chips she had brought.
>
> How ridiculous is that?? Grrr. What's really bizarre is that it
> seems to be universal, every office has the same stories. Blows
> my mind. Who are these people?
>
> I've had people swipe my change and empty my candy bowl.
> The only time I worked in an office with a refrigerator, there were
> so few of us, it just wasn't an issue.
>
> nancy
>
>
I once had an employee who would rob the fridge whenever she got the
munchies. Didn't matter whose food it was, she ate it or drank it.
Finally caught her in the act one day and fired her on the spot.

She later tried to sue me for wrongful dismissal or something of that
flavor and her lawyer decided he couldn't win when he deposed the other
employees. Sometimes food thieves get what they deserve.

The odd thing is that I ran into her in a local restaurant several days
ago and she wanted to buddy up to me. I just snubbed her and went on
about my business. I did not assume that she may have changed her ways,
people like that seldom do. Besides, I am good at harboring grudges.

George

On Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:16:31 -0400, Dave Smith
<[email protected]> wrote:


>We had the opposite problem. People would bring things and leave them in the
>fridge and then not come back for a while, so after a week or . two we would
>have a science project growing in the fridge. We started throwing out his left
>overs and he never noticed.

Many places I've seen have a Friday clean out where everything left
there at 5pm gets tossed by the cleaning crew.

Lou