God has a sense of humour..I can't beleive my dumb luck

I was invited to an electronics industry fundraising golf tournament and it happens tomorrow. I had never played golf before and had been practicing diligently for 2 months and now I am ready. I am ready to go and there will be people from my industry there, a few of who I know and many of who I don't.

I get into work today and open my email. There is the list of my 3 new partners, and who should be one of my partners!!!! This smarmy guy that I just can't stand and who has been trying to get my business for years! UGH! I have to spend a whole day with this slimy jerk who is probably formulating his sales pitch right now. 150 participants and they pulled our names out of a hat together! Kill me.

Anyone else have dumb luck stories like this?

Oye...well perhaps he'll be trying to butter up the other 2 partners. Or you could bring ear plugs and just ignore him.

Things always seem to work out that way. At least for me, whatever can go wrong will go wrong. Fortunately I have a high tolerance for bullsh!! - have to working in academia. Usually things turn out better than expected when you plan for the worst...

I had a similar situation except it was a Trivia contest fundraiser. At first I panicked, and my heart went in my stomach (I REALLY despise this person).

Then I turned on my brilliance and whooped his a**.

It has happened way too often. I guess I haven't gotten the lesson yet. The earplugs idea is a good one. To paraphrase a character in one of my favorite audio dramas, "A good set of earplugs will get you through almost anything."

Funny, I didn't get that the first time I heard it. With time I have come to fully appreciate the meaning.

Chris

Just let him know that you or your company is happy to have been invited to the tourney considering the upcoming bankruptcy. Tee hee

Sometimes I can get through dealing with people like this by smothering them with niceness. Smiling most of the time and showing them I am having a good time wether they are there or not.

I am giving my husband a 60th birthday party in October so we can use our deck and have lots of friends. His birthday is really December 29th. We all know that is a horrible time for a birthday. Well...we have it all planned complete with his daughter coming from out of town with our two young grandsons and bam!

Both of my girls are now in high school. Dont you know that that is the night of their Homecoming Dance! I was so mad. They are, of course ,going to the dance and not our party. I picked this date out a long time ago. It is a special date as it was my dad's birthday.

If things could go wrong they do.... Well, I just hope all involved have a great time. That is how we are looking at it.

kimsmom

Oh yes.
I had a colleague who was a real idiot. Everyone considered him an idiot and a bugging person. Childish, selfish, with no sense of humour, conceited, arrogant, stupid and also ignorant.

5 years ago, I had to follow a 2 day training in another city and had to travel 200 miles a day.
I tried to book one of the pool company cars and found out that they were all gone.
I then found out that the IDIOT had booked one of the cars because.....he was going to attend my same course
Soooooooooo...... I had to "kindly ask" him if I could travel with him, bear him for 2 days both during the trip AND during the training.
He spent half of the driving time telling me about his wonderful motorbike that reached 150 m/h and the for the remaing time I had to stand all the steps of his career - of course a WONDERFUL career according to his words.

Ivy,

You need to come up with a wonderfully boring story about your life (not true, of course). Tell this guy about your Aunt with a horrid, black mole on the end of her nose that you have to visit her once a month to tweeze the hairs out of it.

Then tell him about your incontinent uncle who will only allow you to take care of his "business". Then proceed to describe the entire procedure!

I think you can take it from there, right? LOL

Have a good time......or try anyway.

£eslie

I love the direction Leslie is going with this. If you can, find out what really grosses him out and make sure to have plenty of tales on that subject. I knowthat some men will nearly faint or even faint if you talk about childbirth and periods. hehehehehe

I feel like kicking butt today. I don't have a migraine, I'm full of energy, and I'm ready to stomp the idiots who give us all grief!

Chris

Oh great idea, Chris! Female stuff.....tampons, periods, cramps.....oh my!

Just watch them turn green and want to run for the hills. That's an even better idea than earplugs...do unto others as they do unto you.

Sorry taken my meds and a bit loopy but it's oh so fun.

I agree with Leslie. Talk of lady-problems is usually sufficient to scare any male into running for the hills.

At a recent dinner parte I sat at the end of the table with another woman who had given birth to twins and a guy who just recently got married. For the entire duration of the dinner the woman would bang on in minute, gory and intimate detail about the horrors of her twin's birth. The guys face was priceless, but he was too polite to object. Out of pity for the poor lamb I tried to change the topic, but she would not have any of it and steered back to telling us about her birth giving nether regions while we tried to tuck into dessert. I think it is safe to say that the poor man was traumatized and felt like he had just given birth himself.

Ahh...Petzi, one of those. Imagine how delighted and oblivious she would've been if she had a first time pregnant woman in her audience. Pure joy!

My hubby did the pregnancy well, nothing grossed him out...EXCEPT he had to leave when the projectile vomiting started. He said he had to leave when I hit a wall six feet away.

Save projectile, warm vomit as your last resort, but it should work.

In HS we got out of SOOOO many practices and runs in track. We just had to whisper to our young male coach that it was that time of the month. Hopefully at some point he figured that girls don't cycle every two weeks! We really abused that poor man.

Update: Well, I went in expecting a groan of a day, but came out with a friendship.

Last time I seen this smarmy fellow was over a year ago when I reemed him out in my office. We met up in the clubhouse and the first thing he did was apologize. I told him to forget it and we were here to play golf. Our team wound up having a great time this day. No business talk and just good natured fun and encouragement.

It turns out the neither of us are the same person outside of a business setting.

In fact, I learned that again later that day. On two occassions that day, others in the industry that knew me had asked me if I was drunk. I thought this was weird until I realized that at the office and boardroom, I keep a quiet demeanor and a poker face. But out on the course I was having a good time and my smiles and laughs were coming easy. I had nothing to drink that day.

Overall, I didn't golf very well, but I didn't suck too bad. I met a lot of new contacts and had a lot of laughs. It was a great day and my negative assumptions did not happen.

So glad you had a good day.

What a Lovely Lady you are to put ill feelings aside and start anew.

Today was a good day for me. I often wonder what my staff think when I'm silly and giggling. It's not my normal demeanor ( anymore...sadly, it used to be). Are they thinking I had a long lunch?