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Try working with these guys. |
Here we go!!!!!!
Once, a new co-worker was eating a burger for lunch, and a piece of onion fell into his shirt pocket, undetected. It stayed in his pocket all day, and--warmed by his body heat--began to smell just like B.O. This guy was VERY nice and VERY put together and well-groomed, and the secretaries in the office were torturing themselves about whether they should mention it or not, when he came out of his office red-faced with the piece of onion in his hand to confess to all that he was wondering to himself why he stunk so bad.
Otherwise, I haven't really had a problem with smelly co-workers--but try going to the public library.......
I once cared for a man with asbestosis who couldn't tolerate any perfume smell on any of his nurses...you couldn't wear scented deoderant or lotion. Really made me aware as a novice nurse...I remained careful of this throughout my entire career.
In the office-type cube-city workplaces, I would think common courtesy would prevail, but alas...
something here doesnt' pass the smell test...
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Try working with these guys. |
I'd MUCH rather have perfumed or smoking colleagues than unwashed/sweaty/farting co-workers.
My first roommate weighed in at 300+ pounds. Who cares, right? I didn't... until I found out that at that weight, she made the room smell like one giant walking armpit. Sure she showered regularly but she really needed to shower 4 times a day to keep up with the stink. Very pleasant--NOT!
What kills me is nail polish remover, for some reason. That stuff is pure poison. Once some woman sitting near me on a plane decided to "do" her nails and I thought I was a goner -- my lungs felt like they were on fire.
Ping for later read!
I worked with a smelly guy, Big, fat, sweaty, massive B.O... We tried verything subtle to get the point across, such as leaving anti-perspirant/deodorant in his cubicle when he was gone etc... Nothing worked, and he never got the hint. I always dreaded having him in my cubicle when we were working on stuff together... Finaly, I couldn't stand it any longer.
I just took to walking into his cubicle to say "Hi! How's it going?" whenever I needed to break wind...
I have a co-worker from India who eats a great deal of cumin. As well as curry, of course. I don't think he's discovered anti-perspirant, or else he is too cheap to purchase it. So anywhere he is begins to take on this curry stink, and when he gets excited he starts to exude it from his pores. It's really quite nauseating. His wife works with us too and she slathers on the Impulse Body Spray like it's going out of style. I'm surprised he lets her use so much because I doubt he would want to be asked to let her purchase it more than once a year or so. That $3.99 will break the bank dont'cha know. Once he said she's always wanting new clothes. For Pete's sake he had just let her buy a new dress not 18 months before.
A little constructive dieting can give you a very powerful self-defense shield with which to drive away annoying yuppies babbling into their cell phones next to your desk and almost any other type of human annoyance.
When I was preganant, smells really got to me. During the first one, there was a guy in the shop who took "Elvis showers" He had walked into my space, and when the colone hit me I thought I was going to die. When he saw me pale, he got closer, all concerned, Are you OK?.... ack!!
I ran passed him into the bathroom, and did just what I thought I was going to do :)
Everyone in the shop was so mad at him for making me sick, and he was so sorry. He never did it again, and several people there learned a valuble lesson in the "over-cologne" department.
Sorry, but after spending half of my working life underground and the next half negotiating (on behalf of the company) working conditions among other things, this seems absurd and part of another reality to me.
Try being a manager who has to talk with an employee about their perfume/body-odor!
I worked in a warehouse once pushing a dolly and pulling boxes from the maze of asiles. There were a dozen of us doing this when a new guy was hired. He was a country pumpkin who smelled like he hadn't had a bath in months.
We could tell from his lingering odor what asiles he had been on 5 minutes after he had left them.
We complained to the management enmass and the supervisor called him and and told him to take a bath before coming into work the next day. He never showed up.
True story:
I once had a temporary employee working at a client of ours. The client called me and told me that they didn't want her back due to her "offensive odor". They didn't offer much more by way of details, so I gathered what I could, and prepared to counsel the employee.
She came into my office the next day to be counseled on the loss of her job. I approached the subject in a round-about way, tip-toeing around the issue. I couldn't just come out and say, "They think you stink! Take a bath!".
But, I asked her, "You know...sometimes someone's 'personal scent' can put other people off. Were you wearing a heavy perfume or something that day that might have affected someone?"
She thinks about it for a minute, leans in, then says, "Oooh, you know what it might have been Joe...I think I forgot to change my pad that day.."
**end retch alert**
I used to work for my cities electric company. Part of the office consisted of a drive-thru area set up just like a bank would have. The room was maybe 5'7' and only had room for two small desks, a chair and small bookcase. One of our cashiers must have had a phobia of soap,water and toothpaste. One of our other cashiers was forced to sit in this small, locked room with him for hours at a time.
I'm in S. Florida so this gives you an idea of how hot we get and how much sweat is possible.
There were times I'd go into the drive-thru and literally gag at the smell. Finally, I'd had enough, and the other cashier was about to leave if something wasn't done about her co-workers order. I went to the director and supervisor about the problem and neither would do a thing about it, let alone just ask this particular employee to PLEASE shower and brush his teeth.
Not long after that, I left working there (amid other severe problems that went on). The other cashier stayed after finding out her co-worker was being transfered to another department.
There was a girl on our hall my freshman year of college who had a serious foot odor problem. Her roommate tried to endure it, but finally had to have a serious talk with her. Fortunately, the "stinker" took it graciously and took all possible steps to ameliorate the problem.
Now, these boys come from a culture that does not value daily showers or deodorant, and to make it worse they would go out on their lunch hour and play soccer very hard for an hour before coming back to their desks. And they would eat a lot of curry. The effect was bad enough to knock you down. Then they would wonder why the American girls didn't like them, even though they were tall, blond, gorgeous, and had six-figure incomes. They were all nice as pie, too. But they were lonely and becoming increasingly depressed by their near-continual rejection.
I had to explain to them, lovingly, that no American woman would look at them unless they started showering EVERY day and using deodorant. They thought this was very effeminate. Clearly clean American men were not as manly as they were, since everyone knows stink is masculine!
Wouldn't you know it, one of them--the geekiest of them--found a gorgeous, angelic American girl who thought his stink was nice. (They got married after a few months together and have been happily married for fifteen years.) Their relationship immediately persuaded all the other Dutchmen that it wasn't really, really necessary to go through all that nonsense about showering in order to get a pretty American girl, so they went back to stinking.
I'll tell you, being in an elevator with a bunch of smoking, reeking Dutchmen is enough to make you pass out. I love the Dutch, and the women are dainty and smell just fine, but some of the men just do not get it.
Perfume allergies are more common than we realize, I think. In our church choir, the director always reminds us not to wear perfume because being close together and singing really affects one of the members - and it isn't me because I never said anything.
I have always had a bad reaction to perfume. Usually I get a horrid headache within minutes if it is pretty strong, or close by. Sometimes I get nauseated. If it is added to soaps, shampoo, detergents, I will break out in a rash. So do a few of our kids. My mother always used to get mad at me when I was young because of it. But it isn't exactly something I could help.
Age has tamed it down somewhat, but I am still fairly sensitive to it and other chemical smells too.