New Frivolous Item: Microwave Locks

Passive-aggressive microwave owners, take note... er, make notes...?

I read through several of the comments. Most people assumed that no situation was bad enough to warrant getting one's own personal office microwave. The OP was over-reacting and employees cleaning up after themselves was the obvious solution.

They've obviously never worked for my company.

We have four nuke boxes and a refrigerator in one breakroom, and several more distributed throughout the other three breakrooms and office area. But none of them are ever clean... well, hardly ever. The temps and seasonal employees have serious cleaning aversions, as well as personal accountability ignorance and trash-can avoidance issues. The management tried to solve these problems by assigning one of them to do the daily cleaning of common areas and restrooms, but to no avail. She quit within two weeks and I have to wonder why it took that long. Surprised she didn't quit the first time she had to take rotten chicken parts out of the previously-clean-and-unused drinking cups. Or scrape up the food trash from behind the soda machine, where a large rat had relocated it piece by piece.* I noticed that having "one of their own" do the housekeeping hadn't slowed down their tendency to trash the place anyway.

Because of the constant state of the microwave interiors, crudded up by the varied items cooked therein (including, but not limited to, all manner of exploding cheeses and tomato sauces, bread bags and other assorted non-microwaveable plastics, and the occasional insect) I can honestly see why someone would want their own unit. I try to avoid using them at all. My supervisor has his own microwave in our office and I'll use that one on occasion. A padlock hasn't been necessary thus far. I can see it coming to that, though, if anyone else ever discovers it's there.

*I personally have done both of these, when we were between housekeeping solutions. I didn't quit only because my fool self had volunteered to clean the breakroom sight-unseen, and because after cleaning the men's bathroom, not much else could assault my senses that day with any real effect.

This Barn Isn't Big Enough For The Two Of Us

More peevish misspellings:

A manager at work apparently slept through part of English class. I know exactly when he dozed off, too... right in the middle of learning "cognizant." It's obvious, because he doesn't know that there is a third syllable in the word... he says "cogniz."
"Let's be cogniz of the fact..." And no, he isn't deliberately abbreviating it.

Browsing a message forum (always a hotbed of proper grammar and spelling, of course) I ran across another one that bothers me: "reigns." Not like the reigning queen of the trailer park, but used as reins: "He should hand the reigns over to..."
Now, in a tongue-in-cheek manner, it would be fine. In fact, the example I read today was intended as such. However, I see it misused so often that it warrants listing. If horses had reigns, who followed Mr. Ed to the throne?

The same people who use "reigns" seem to be notorious for "putting on the breaks." If I'm trying to stop in a hurry, and I get breaks, I'm in trouble... or maybe the deer I'm about to hit is the one in trouble... either way, it can't be a good thing. I try to avoid breaks as much as possible. By pulling back on the reigns, of course.