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 Post subject: A little dusty
PostPosted: Wed Jun 09, 2004 9:42 pm 
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Joined: Tue Apr 20, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 32
Location: Nutmeg State
So when does your office get cleaned? <p>Our cleaning crew usually shows up to apply foul-smelling solvents to the floor and run other machinery after the bosses leave, around 7 p.m. or so. <p>We complained when they'd vacuum while we were on the phone and trying to work. So they've stop vacuuming completely.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Wed Jun 09, 2004 9:59 pm 
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Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2002 1:01 am
Posts: 8342
Location: Bethesda, Md.
Here in Washington they apparently clean the newroom every night. The Chicago Sun-Times newsroom, when I was there, was cleaned about once a month, although trash was removed more often. (The "recycling" bins for pop cans were emptied into the rest of the trash during the early morning.) The carpet was cleaned once or twice that I remember.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Wed Jun 09, 2004 10:10 pm 
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Joined: Fri Nov 15, 2002 1:01 am
Posts: 3557
Location: Cusp of retirement, grave or both
Here in Albany the place almost never gets cleaned, which I think lends a certain charm.<p>However, there was a big cleanup kick a couple months ago, and we were told that WE are expected to clean it. (One of the MEs even handed out paper towels and bottles of obnoxious spray shit, and even cleaned a desk her very own self to show us how it is done downtown! Except we're not downtown.<p>There used to be a cleanup crew here. Now there are independent contractors who clean out the crappers and a few Guild janitors to empty the waste cans.<p>Other than that, we're pretty much on our own.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Wed Jun 09, 2004 10:41 pm 
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Joined: Wed Oct 08, 2003 12:01 am
Posts: 3137
Location: Homebush NSW Australia
Leader cleaners arrive about 10 minutes after last copy to platemakers time. On the rare ocassion we are late, they are gracious enough to leave it another day.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Wed Jun 09, 2004 11:41 pm 
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Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2002 1:01 am
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Location: Bethesda, Md.
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Bumfketeer:

However, there was a big cleanup kick a couple months ago, and we were told that WE are expected to clean it.
<hr></blockquote><p>Are they insane?


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 12:47 pm 
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Joined: Thu Apr 18, 2002 12:01 am
Posts: 1399
Location: In the newsroom
Janitorial staff comes through here every evening somewhere between 6 and 7 to empty wastebaskets. Vacuums out in the hall sometimes are a distraction, but it's not an everyday occurrence. I think someone has laid down the law that the newsroom is not to be vacuumed while we are working, so I think it must be done on either Monday or Tuesday evening.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 2:50 pm 
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Joined: Fri Mar 26, 2004 1:01 am
Posts: 1025
Location: The Lexington Avenue Spaceship
Our newsroom gets cleaned magically sometime after deadline (although those of us who get stuck with the super-late Sunday advance shift on Fridays are sometimes serenaded by industrial-size vacuum cleaners). Now if only we could get rid of the mice (and I ain't talkin' computers) ...<p>I used to work at a p.m. paper where the janitors were on the same daytime schedule as everyone else. One of them was of the sort who assumes that every conversation naturally includes him, and he would come around "dusting" and "cleaning" people's desks while we were using them, mainly so he could eavesdrop on and contribute to conversations (this is when he wasn't running a vacuum next to someone trying to talk to a source on the phone). When we asked him to stop, he went to the publisher and said we were harassing him and wouldn't let him do his job. The publisher told him to wait until after deadline to clean up in the newsroom. Things then continued pretty much as they had been.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 3:31 pm 
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Joined: Mon Nov 17, 2003 1:01 am
Posts: 1324
Location: N 36° 57' 9", W 121° 24' 2"
Some brilliant mind at the small daily where I used to work came up with the idea for a spruce-up contest between editorial, advertising and circulation, with $100 as the prize for the winning "team." (I said "small;" full-time editorial was eight people.) <p>Amid protest, about half of us participated, and editorial won. But we never did see the hundred bucks.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 5:21 pm 
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Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 26
Location: Woosta
First the mice come out to clean up the rugs, then someone mysteriously fills up the elevators with trash bags, then the cleaning crew starts making noise about 2:30 a.m. But the place is always dingy anyway.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 6:05 pm 
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Joined: Sat Mar 22, 2003 1:01 am
Posts: 190
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Bumfketeer:<p>However, there was a big cleanup kick a couple months ago, and we were told that WE are expected to clean it. <p>Bumf, I don't think you were in the building at the time, but I was here for the "awards ceremony." Management gave out prizes for the "most improved" desks in each department: I think they were Swiffers or Clorox mop kits. No joke.<p>For the record, Bumf should have won one -- but didn't.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 6:10 pm 
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Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2002 1:01 am
Posts: 8342
Location: Bethesda, Md.
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by moab:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Bumfketeer:<p>Management gave out prizes for the "most improved" desks in each department: I think they were Swiffers or Clorox mop kits. <hr></blockquote><p>It's a wonder you guys get any work done at all these days.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 7:35 pm 
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Joined: Wed Oct 08, 2003 12:01 am
Posts: 3137
Location: Homebush NSW Australia
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Oeditpus Rex:
But we never did see the hundred bucks.<hr></blockquote>
There's a lesson in that.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 8:24 pm 
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Location: Cusp of retirement, grave or both
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by blanp:
<p>Are they insane?<hr></blockquote><p>Why, dadgummit, yes!


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 8:29 pm 
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Joined: Fri Nov 15, 2002 1:01 am
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Location: Cusp of retirement, grave or both
Moab is right.<p>I actually made a mighty effort to clean my desk. I even removed the olive pits from the crevices.<p>
When I did NOT win a Swiffer, I went in and bitched to the ME that I deserved one more than some of the winners did because my desk was such a sty that the degree of improvement was much greater than that of most of the winners.<p>The next day, a Swiffer was on my desk. Were it only that merit raises were so easy.<p>A little more than a week later, I was summoned by one of the various "Men with No Eyes," and he told me that I was backsliding because a tech had found half a tomato sandwich under my desk and ratted me out.<p>I got the rabbit in me now.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 9:14 pm 
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Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 26
Location: Woosta
There once was a sandwich that sat on the windowsil in the news room for about eight months.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 10:35 pm 
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Joined: Thu Nov 06, 2003 1:01 am
Posts: 81
Location: Sunny O-hi-o
It seems like they call in the carpet cleaners here about once a month. <p>Sweeping occurs almost nightly. Dusting is quite another story, however. I don't recall anything being dusted in the 2+ years I've been here. <p>The carpet cleaning is ridiculous. They dump this powder-chemical stuff all over the floor, spray some other stuff, and then sweep over the area multiple times. It's loud and smells terrible.<p>If only they would take some of this money they spend on cleaning and unnecessary gadgets and spend a little on employees' salaries ...


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 10:39 pm 
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Joined: Sat May 22, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 160
Location: Australia
A green, decaying mouse was extracted from the newsroom water cooler at my first paper. Bottled water immediately became trendy.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Sun Jun 13, 2004 8:06 pm 
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Joined: Sun Jun 13, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 46
Location: Ireland
Legend has it that a mouse was extracted from the inside of a Mac in my workplace, though that was before the parent company launched the shit-sheet, I mean newspaper.<p>The mouse was dead, having been killed (execution-style) by electrocution.<p>Jason...


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Sun Jun 13, 2004 11:19 pm 
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Joined: Sat May 22, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 160
Location: Australia
One of my colleagues just got a free cockroach in the coffee he bought at the staff diner...


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2004 12:53 am 
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Joined: Wed Oct 08, 2003 12:01 am
Posts: 3137
Location: Homebush NSW Australia
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Lee:
One of my colleagues just got a free cockroach in the coffee he bought at the staff diner...<hr></blockquote>
Welcome to NSW. (For the benefit of the rest of you this state is rampant with the beastie's Lee's state of origin is not.)<p>[ June 14, 2004: Message edited by: Paul Wiggins ]</p>


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2004 1:09 am 
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Joined: Sat May 22, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 160
Location: Australia
My state of origin is not? They're this big in Qld:
________________


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2004 5:42 am 
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Joined: Wed Oct 08, 2003 12:01 am
Posts: 3137
Location: Homebush NSW Australia
Qouth the Centrebet raven about rugby league:<p>Players wearing the Maroon of Queensland or the Blue of New South Wales suddenly develop a state patriotism that shows no bounds. The competition was proposed by Arthur Beetson, a Queenslander who spent most of his career south of the border. The names given to the teams, Cockroaches (New South Wales) and Cane Toads (Queensland) give some indication of the depth of hatred the two camps have for each other.[<p>[ June 14, 2004: Message edited by: Paul Wiggins ]</p>


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2004 9:38 am 
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Joined: Sat May 22, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 160
Location: Australia
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Lee:
One of my colleagues just got a free cockroach in the coffee he bought at the staff diner...<hr></blockquote><p>The News Ltd version of the toy with the Happy Meal.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Wed Jun 16, 2004 12:25 am 
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Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2003 12:01 am
Posts: 1112
Location: An undisclosed alpine meadow
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by 12thfret:
There once was a sandwich that sat on the windowsill in the news room for about eight months.<hr></blockquote><p>Well, now you've blown your cover! There are two people in the universe who would willingly recount the great sandwich siege of 1991, and I’m one of them.<p>But there's so much more to the story, including the Mac-graphic updates that we posted on the wall next to the offending brown lunch bag: "Sandwich On The Sill: Day 147" etc. We autopsied the thing eventually, and, as I recall, our best guess was that it had once been tuna on rye.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Wed Jun 16, 2004 12:57 am 
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Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 26
Location: Woosta
Or meatball, the publisher couldn't tell which. Imagine if it had been some of that sea bass from the Tampa Trib.


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 Post subject: Re: A little dusty
PostPosted: Sat Jun 26, 2004 7:24 pm 
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Joined: Sat May 22, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 160
Location: Australia
<blockquote><font size="1" face="TImes, TimesNR, serif">quote:</font><hr>A jury in Brisbane has heard claims of orgies in a unit used as a National Party electoral campaign office during the lead-up to Queensland's historic 1989 state election...
Prosecutor Todd Fuller suggested that in November 1989 he had been involved with two youths and another man at the unit organising sexual acts for pornographic movies...
Attempting to ridicule Crown claims, Ford said: "I just think it is preposterous you would be taking pornographic photos in the middle of a National Party campaign at that period."
"We are talking two weeks before the election. The campaign office is open almost 24 hours a day by this stage. <hr></blockquote>This story reminded me about something that happened in the newspaper building I worked in around that same time:<p>Sometimes when we'd start work, we'd find strange messages on our computer screens. An editor at our sister paper across the street thought the cleaner's 15-year-old stepson had been writing them due to some kind of rampant hormonal thing... one day a security guard checked out a closet that hadn't been locked properly and found a huge pile of porn photos starring our cleaning crew. Even though our buildings were open almost 24 hours a day, too, that hadn't stopped the head of the cleaning crew from shooting "newsroom fantasy" porn (using his teenage step-children) in the early hours of the morning.


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