Friday, August 01, 2008

The tea dance

There’s a plate of biscuits, many of which are chocolatey in nature, a little distance from my desk; they are leftovers from a meeting and are now for general office consumption. Being a sweet-toothed face-stuffing git, I naturally want to scoff a load of them. But unfortunately I also have some remaining semblance of a conscience, so I can’t really justify to myself simply going up and grabbing a fistful, nor even going to get just one (repeatedly) without some sort of socially acceptable pretext.

I now find myself getting up for cups of tea at a remarkable rate, and as I pass the biscuit plate, which I concede involves taking something of a diversion, I modestly pick one up. In fact, I even offer to get other people teas as I go (although my failing memory means that I neglect to offer biscuit-fetching), so basically I’m being altruistic as I gorge myself.

Shortly, phase 2 of my plan will kick in, as the substantial quantity of tea I’ve already had works its magic and gives me another perfectly legitimate reason to get up.

As they say, a happy worker is a productive worker.

4 comments:

Matt M said...

Shortly, phase 2 of my plan will kick in, as the substantial quantity of tea I’ve already had works its magic and gives me another perfectly legitimate reason to get up.

In my experience, it's always best to pick them up on the way back. People tend to regard taking food into the bathroom with you as a little odd.

Niall Smith said...

We always have biscuits in our office.

We had two packs of M&S belgian chocolate biscuits on our table and i swear to god i was very productive his afternoon.

Anonymous said...

You also need a strategy to prevent others from taking the biscuits.

Classic tactics include sneezing over the plate, or picking up each biscuit and examining it in turn.

Finding ways of limiting opportunities for rival biscuit predators, eg passing the plate round when they've just taken one, is also key.

Niall Smith said...

Tim i just lick stuff i want.

Works a treat.

I probably shouldn't admit to this but i have. All's fair in love and chocolate biscuits