You know the drill.
- Cursing your boss off because you know you're done and getting your money's worth.
- Leaving company vehicles in inconvenient spots for management to go and locate on their own.
- cake that says "I quit"
I understand some of us are classy gentlemen and ladies do EVERYTHING by the book, but you must know someone who departed from their jobs the ...unsettling way.
Tell me.
Finally I caved in everything, benefits, pension, holidays, everything except vacation. All I demanded was that since we all had many years in we should be eligible to take or get paid for all our vacation starting Jan 1st instead of having to re-earn it week by week. "So if I come in and quit Jan 1st, I should get a check for my 5 weeks of vacation time." Done, contract signed before Christmas.
Jan 2nd I walked in and handed in my resignation, took our biggest customer with me, and somehow they couldn't find my non compete document in HR and it may or may not have had anything to do with the fact that HR never locked their office.
Took the customer with me to a competitor, who after 9 months of working for them didn't want to compensate me for them and the other customers I brought with me so I started my own company and took all the customers for myself.
Had a nice 20 year run working for myself and raising the kids.
I know, TL/DR but both quits were quite satisfying.
Thinking back it was really immature but it was definitely cathartic at the time. It actually ended up catalyzing positive changes for me.
For some context, I was the only one of my friend group to actually graduate college in 4 years (what an idiot I was).
And I still lived in a house with all college kids. So they're be up partying all night, every night until the early morning hours and I'd have to get up early for work. Half the time I joined them and was horribly hung over for work.
Work was my first real job, I worked in the accounting dept for a waste management company. Specifically I was in charge of managing the benefits. More specifically all I did was place the medical claims from the employees into their personnel files. It was the most mind numbing boring shit you can possibly imagine. And I worked in an small office with three old ladies who would just bullshit all day about menopause or their awful lives.
I was always looking for any reason to leave the office and go to the work sites (which were dumps or garages).
When the CFO hired me he said "I can pay you X salary for the first 90 days, we'll see how you do and bump up your comp as appropriate:"
On day 90, I walked in to the CFO's office a confident 21 year old who figured out the system in 90 days. I told the CFO "I know you said we'd reevalute my salary in 90 days, so I wanted to tell you I have another job offer for "x salary" and I'll need to take it if you can't match that."
He looked at me, called my bluff and said "PJ, we like you but I can't pay you that. I hate to lose you, but here is a pink slip in case it doesn't work out".
There was no other job. I was shocked, and in my mind wondering what the fuck a pink slip was.
So, I drank for the next few weeks, and became a substitute teacher until my friends graduated and then got my first real job that actually was pretty cool and set up the rest of my career. sort of a happy ending, but what an idiot I was.
Decided to tell me (it was his turn to drive that day) around exit 14 on the turnpike that he was resigning that day
So i said, "oh, ok, are you going to wait to resign around 4:30 or so?"
No i'm going to do it right away
Oh ok, i have another question, how the fuck am i going to get home?
I care very little when someone is blaming me or if they get angry with me in real life, and I will admit my wrong doings nearly 100% of the time. I tend to sponge up whatever criticism or punishments come my way, unlike some. Not this time.
It was wonderful. Everything they said to me I just countered with some red sauce and then some more red sauce. Holy shit. I never have been more swift in my entire life. This moment in time was like the Matrix when everything slowed down for Keanu Reeves and he was blocking his attacker's punches.
18 or 19 at the time so, forgive me. Nah fuck that lol that was so fun I got to unleash all of that wild stuff I had built up over the 2.5 year ride. Most of my buddies moved on from the job, or went to night crew for more money.
The writing was on the wall, along with the other slurs written on that gross bathroom wall.
The next day was the first day of college, went to a Giants game and they beat Arizona at home, first week of the season.
So one Friday night peak of business give or take 300 to 400 hundred people eating the main bartender and assistant manager walks into the kitchen an say’s to me sorry about this I hope we are cool when the smoke settles and proceeds to light a string of had to be 1000 plus fireworks in the kitchen and say’s I quit.
Now in a kitchen with the majority being stainless steel a firework going off sounds like a gun shot, times that by 1000 the entire restaurant cleared out in a heartbeat no one paying the bills. I was pissed and my ears rung for a day but hindsight it was pretty funny.
Another story an old friend told me when he quit his job in a restaurant again the night prior to walking out he placed a few whole fish in the drop sealing of the dining room. He had his girlfriend return a few weeks later and she said you could smell the rot before you opened the door.
About ten years ago, I was approaching a decision point where I had to decide if I wanted to stay on active duty or get out. With nine years in, I was assigned to one of our alphabet agencies and had just returned from my fifth deployment. Thinking about my next assignment, I reached out to my career monitor (basically the big HR for the Marine Corps that decides where you'll be assigned next) to talk about my next assignment. The conversation didn't go the way I hoped it would go.
During our conversation, I made an offer to my monitor (another Marine Captain assigned to my military occupational specialty - MOS - group) that I would stay on active duty if he sent me to the Naval Academy to be an instructor, which would give me more time in the area where my wife is from and allow me to find some semblance of a normal life. I thought I had a decent shot at this since I extended my time in the operating forces to spend more than five years in infantry battalions (most people only stay three year stints before moving onto non-deploying support assignments) before coming to the agency, which although should have been a non-deploying assignment, I ended up deploying to Afghanistan, and I had also reached out to a senior Marine officer at the Academy regarding my interest, and he was more than happy to have me assigned there. The response from my monitor, however, was essentially, "no, you can't do back to back non-operating force tours since you'll lose your MOS credibility, so you'll have to go back to the operating forces." No matter my telling him that I had just completed a combat deployment on my current assignment and that MOS credibility wasn't an issue since my current assignment bolstered it rather than took away from it, he said the Corps didn't agree. The craziest part was that even after he begrudgingly confirmed that I had done more deployments in my MOS-capacity than 95 percent of my peers, he still said that the Corps will force me to return to the operating forces.
I didn't take my frustration out on him since I knew he was just a messenger, but I told him that I was done and submitted my resignation letter a week later. While it was a frustrating end to my active duty career, looking back now, I am glad that it ended that way since it allowed my wife and I to move on and start a family and begin a much more normal/stable life. And eventually I joined the reserves (with a condition from my wife that I would resign my commission if they tried to deploy me again), so I sort of am able to have my cake and eat it too...hmmm.
There were four of us and we had our own assignments. I was having trouble with some of my counts and even some whole lots where ending up in places they shouldn't have been. One of my coworkers was riding me about the issues and somehow knew about them before I even did. After awhile a figured he was deliberately sabotaging me and I really started to hate the job and commute.
I went in one day and he starts needling me with his stupid smirk and I had enough. I went around and messed with many of his jobs, hid things, walked out with his clipboard that contained all his assignments and notes, got in my car and never returned.
It was a pretty dick move but oh well, next day I got my old job back at $1 more per hour so I was happy.
One Saturday night, I was the only one tending bar, people were two deep waiting for drinks and I was slammed. One of the managers who used her job more as a power trip than anything else would walk through the bar, tell me how many people were waiting and then would move along instead of helping or giving me another body to help.
Finally, she comes out and tells me I need to change out the ice. I asked why and she said a glass had broken. I told her I did not break any glass and she said one of the cooks broke it on the line. So I asked why I'm going to change out the ice with a wall, a galley and a swinging door between me and the cooks. I said if she wanted the ice changed, she'd have to do it because I'm too busy taking drink requests. She said she was giving me a direct order and I'll do what she said. I told her it wasn't the fucking army, told her that I quit and I threw my apron at her.
Turns out she had to close the bar for the night and a bunch of customers walked out. Went to pick up my last paycheck and the General Manager asked me to stay and I just told him I was done with having some 26 year old treat people like crap and doing things that hurt the business all to pick up some mad money for traveling and spending.
My Dad was a self-described 'wise ass' with very little polish. As a matter of following through on his routine, he got drunk and stupid. One crazy early morning and while still under the influence, he decided to sign his reenlistment. Since the unit was re-deploying to the US, he didn't know and wasn't told that his re-enlistment required him to stay in Germany for another (3 year) tour.
After consultation with the 'barracks lawyers', he decided the only way to void his reenlistment was to be busted (reduced in rank) two grades.
The next day, he came up with a plan. There was a Platoon Sergeant (Staff Sergeant) from Mississippi, who hated my Dad because he was a loud, obnoxious New York kid from Queens. His taunting and retribution were relentless for more than a year. So, my Dad put his plan in motion the next day.
In the chow line, my Dad stepped out of line and in front of the assembled troopers in the mess hall, he cold cocked this Staff Sergeant. He broke his nose, caught a tooth in his knuckle and knocked him out with one punch. Instead of getting tossed into confinement, the Company Commander gave my Dad an Article 15 and pulled a stripe. One down.
The very next day after his Article 15, my Dad as a freshly minted Private First Class stepped out of the chow line and cold cocked the same Staff Sergeant. He didn't knock him out, but he did knock out another tooth and bloodied him up. Another Article 15... another stripe pulled and my Dad was an E-2 with honorable discharge papers in hand.
After he left the Army, My Dad drove for Green Bus lines, got married to my Mom and never heard from the Staff Sergeant from Mississippi... He threw a few more punches over his lifetime, but never took another drink of alcohol. He now lives peacefully as an 83 year old 'wise ass kid from Queens' in Massachusetts.
I finally had enough of the job said I was leaving the position at end of the week .
The owner of the company gave me the biggest guilt trip ! that I was quitting the company - hounded me the rest of the week by the end of the week I seriously thought about staying but in the end I had to leave .
a two weeks later the business closed and everyone who stayed did not get their last check .
The Boss KNEW he was going under and tried to talk me into staying to get two weeks of free work .
On the drive there my car got bogged down in the snow because the roads hadn't even been plowed yet and so I abandon my car on the side of the road and hitched a ride with some truck the rest of the way, figuring I would take care of the store business first then come back for my car on the way home.
When I get to the store there were zero tire tacks or footprints in the parking lot so I obviously didn't miss anything but I was about an hour late getting the store open do to the storm, and having to ditch my car to get there. The owner was a grade A jerk to most people but since I made him money he always treated me OK, and left me alone, at least until that morning. This morning when I walk in the phone was ringing, and when I answer it was his secretary. He probably just had her stay on the line until I eventually picked up. She said hold for... and the owner gets on. He asks me why the store wasn't open on time, and I said something about the storm and weather and he says, "maybe if the weather is to rough, you should take two weeks off without pay and go somewhere warmer." I calmly told him "how dare you" and went on to explain how I had put his store first and left my car along the side of the road, and also ruined a pair of dress shoes in the process walking in the snow, just to get it open for him. But now instead of just losing an hour of being open that morning it would be closed the rest of the day, and each day until he could get someone else in there to open and run it. I locked it back up, tossed the key through the a slot in the door and went to take care of my car.
On the drive there my car got bogged down in the snow because the roads hadn't even been plowed yet and so I abandon my car on the side of the road and hitched a ride with some truck the rest of the way, figuring I would take care of the store business first then come back for my car on the way home.
When I get to the store there were zero tire tacks or footprints in the parking lot so I obviously didn't miss anything but I was about an hour late getting the store open do to the storm, and having to ditch my car to get there. The owner was a grade A jerk to most people but since I made him money he always treated me OK, and left me alone, at least until that morning. This morning when I walk in the phone was ringing, and when I answer it was his secretary. He probably just had her stay on the line until I eventually picked up. She said hold for... and the owner gets on. He asks me why the store wasn't open on time, and I said something about the storm and weather and he says, "maybe if the weather is to rough, you should take two weeks off without pay and go somewhere warmer." I calmly told him "how dare you" and went on to explain how I had put his store first and left my car along the side of the road, and also ruined a pair of dress shoes in the process walking in the snow, just to get it open for him. But now instead of just losing an hour of being open that morning it would be closed the rest of the day, and each day until he could get someone else in there to open and run it. I locked it back up, tossed the key through the a slot in the door and went to take care of my car.
That's awesome!
The genius of it was that he only put five in the document.
Obviously, in the days before word processing.
Semperr-Fi, Captain. Thank you for your service.
It was weird.
I also used to work for a utilities company, they were terrible and were always shutting peoples utilities off. I got a new job, didn’t quit crazily or anything but I just spent the next two weeks clandestinely cancelling as many shut offs as humanly possible. Probably worked harder doing that than I had doing anything else at that place.
Some of Bob's friends weren't so lucky. They had jobs as servers and buss boys and were generally easily replaced. Often they were let go for very minor infractions or because they "just weren't working out".
The management had a particularly interesting way of letting staff go. In the kitchen was a schedule with all the workers' names and their days and hours for the week. If the manager thought someone wasn't working out, they'd go the schedule with a Sharpie and draw a thick, black line through the row with that person's name. They wouldn't call them and tell them that they'd done this. They wouldn't take them aside and explain why they'd been let go. When you showed up for work, looked at the schedule and saw the black line through your name, that was when you'd find out the you were gone. If you came to work and started working without looking at the schedule, the manager would simply say, "Did you check the schedule?".That was it.
As you can expect, many people found this pretty upsetting. A lot of the workers were teenagers and this was one of their first jobs. One girl of Bob's acquaintance broke down and cried when she saw the black mark through her name. Management thought this was pretty amusing. I guess they figured that it kept people on their toes since nobody knew where the ax would fall next.
Bob had finished his degree before the summer started and had been sending out resumes and going on interviews. As the summer drew to a close, he got an offer from one of our local defense contractors and accepted it. Since he had worked almost every weekend all summer, he figured he'd quit the restaurant job and enjoy a weekend with his girlfriend before he started his real job. So he went to the restaurant, looked at the schedule, took a marker, drew a black line through his name and left without saying a word.
Friday night rolls around. Like I said, during the weekend the place was jam-packed with people and, since was one of the last weekends of the summer, it was even more busy than a regular Friday.
Of course Bob isn't there and the place is in chaos. The manager calls Bob at home and starts cursing him out.
"Where the f-ck are you? Why aren't you f-cking here? We're f-cking swamped!"
"I don't know why you're calling me. I don't work there anymore."
"What do you mean?"
"Did you check the schedule?"
The manager puts the phone down to go look.
"Who put a line through your name? I didn't do that."
"I did."
"You can't do that!"
"Sure I can.", Bob says and hangs up the phone.
Some of Bob's friends weren't so lucky. They had jobs as servers and buss boys and were generally easily replaced. Often they were let go for very minor infractions or because they "just weren't working out".
The management had a particularly interesting way of letting staff go. In the kitchen was a schedule with all the workers' names and their days and hours for the week. If the manager thought someone wasn't working out, they'd go the schedule with a Sharpie and draw a thick, black line through the row with that person's name. They wouldn't call them and tell them that they'd done this. They wouldn't take them aside and explain why they'd been let go. When you showed up for work, looked at the schedule and saw the black line through your name, that was when you'd find out the you were gone. If you came to work and started working without looking at the schedule, the manager would simply say, "Did you check the schedule?".That was it.
As you can expect, many people found this pretty upsetting. A lot of the workers were teenagers and this was one of their first jobs. One girl of Bob's acquaintance broke down and cried when she saw the black mark through her name. Management thought this was pretty amusing. I guess they figured that it kept people on their toes since nobody knew where the ax would fall next.
Bob had finished his degree before the summer started and had been sending out resumes and going on interviews. As the summer drew to a close, he got an offer from one of our local defense contractors and accepted it. Since he had worked almost every weekend all summer, he figured he'd quit the restaurant job and enjoy a weekend with his girlfriend before he started his real job. So he went to the restaurant, looked at the schedule, took a marker, drew a black line through his name and left without saying a word.
Friday night rolls around. Like I said, during the weekend the place was jam-packed with people and, since was one of the last weekends of the summer, it was even more busy than a regular Friday.
Of course Bob isn't there and the place is in chaos. The manager calls Bob at home and starts cursing him out.
"Where the f-ck are you? Why aren't you f-cking here? We're f-cking swamped!"
"I don't know why you're calling me. I don't work there anymore."
"What do you mean?"
"Did you check the schedule?"
The manager puts the phone down to go look.
"Who put a line through your name? I didn't do that."
"I did."
"You can't do that!"
"Sure I can.", Bob says and hangs up the phone.
Semperr-Fi, Captain. Thank you for your service.
Thank you. With a few years of broken time under my belt, the Corps will finally decide at the end of the year if I'm worthy of silver oak leaves...🤷🏻♂️
As far as deployments go, fortunately for me, I've deployed in different capacity on all of my deployments, and I mean very different. My first was as an infantry platoon commander but to Guantanamo Bay to be part of the Security Force Company (basically held Lt Kendrick's position from A Few Good Man). Then I deployed to Iraq as Scout Sniper Platoon Commander the following year. Then back to Iraq the next year to Ramadi as an advisor to an Iraqi Army Battalion. Next year I deployed on a MEU as an infantry battalion intelligence officer with stints in Iraq, Africa, and South Asia. My last deployment was two years later to Afghanistan with a team from one of our Intel agencies. Then I left active duty. So I'm not sure if I was any good or if I just kept finding myself with the short straw...who knows?