I’ve worked with some real winners. I freeze water bottles to keep my lunch cool. I had a black plumber ask me how I got that big piece of ice through that little hole. He was very serious, wasn’t fuucking with me.

yes, I have.

You should have told him if he held it in his hands for a while it would become pliable enough to fit in the hole.

Was talking about the movie the longest day with a woman who's husband was a pilot in WWII.
Another co worker asked, who won that war?

Not enough room here for me to pass on the encounters, but YES.

There is a reason McDonald's pioneered the "Grunt and Point" menu.
Irrespective of intellect, you will get a meal.

Pretty much like a ship in the bottle type thing, eh?

Last year I had a guy working for me that was retired coast guard. He couldn't tie a rope to a handle on a bucket. How does that happen?

I'm surrounded by idiots. We all are.

One idiot away from oblivion. Amazing we can fill up with gas without the place going up in smoke.

You going tell?

And who hasn't said, quietly.

"Dammit, I know I ain't that dumb!"

And yet, you just did something epic!

Mostly myself.

I try to be that real dumb person. People expect less of me that way.

I used to be a trucker, local pickup/delivery. Some of the warehouse people I encountered were classics. Some were very good at making their jobs much harder than they needed to be.

Yes. Had an electrician that worked in the same department as I. He was dumb as crap and always said stupid stuff. I use to tell him, "If you have something to say, be quiet, otherwise shutup!"

Double. Maybe triple. Made me look like a raging genius. But I’m retired now.

I used to work in an Amazon warehouse. It was filled with halfwits and Somalis, so yes, I have worked with some really dumb people. Our own department was pretty sharp, but we couldn't make up for the other departments led by halfwits and filled with the same.

Not really.

What'd you tell him?

Not really. Thankfully.

Summer job 1969, guy says, "All I learned in chemistry is that an acid is stronger than a base."

Yes, I've worked with a few.

I do that a lot. On purpose.

It's funny. Some whose candle burn pretty bright, grin. They get it.

Others, those just flickering occasionally, think I'm dumb.

Then you have the ones smoldering, "mule meet gate/gate meet mule."

I enjoy the middle group the most. Most are certain they are "real smart".

Even before you got your education and became a professional?

I had a roofing business, I thought everyone was just high on something. Worked with some that had no concept of gravity or high voltage hazards. lol

I ended up getting a govt job with a team of civil eng, I got to be the dumb guy for 11 years there. It was bliss. Drive around for 5 or 6 hours with a GPS logging manhole lids in the street for $30 bucks an hour. Rainy days, just sit around the shop and shoot the chit with the chief about smallmouth bass and fat chicks.

Comes to mind, the old, There is no one so stupid they can't tell me something I don't know. No one so smart, there is something I can tell them they don't know.

Building full of Air Traffic Controllers. On site we had a Dr. performing the yearly medical exams for the Controllers. Though not specifically required for the exam, he virtually insisted on giving the men a digital prostate exam. So a bunch of guys and 'Donna' were sitting in the coffee 'shop', one of which had just been to see the Doc. Naturally the discussion turned to the 'digital' exam.... 'ever notice that finger has no wrinkles' (he was about 80) ... 'did he take of his Blue Angels, 6 plane, diamond formation, ring' ... 'did he have a hand on EACH shoulder' ... and on, and on........... to which 'Donna' opines.....

'...he never does that to me...'

Bless her heart!!

Yes.... I’ve had the displeasure of working with “domocrats”! memtb

I was so flabbergasted I could not think of something smart to say. I told him I put them in the freezer. He dumassed himself out of a job by cutting a live gas line in a classroom to make a repair. He was too lazy to go on roof, turn valve off.

Yep. My work prior was for an Italian family running a produce market. I worked for them from age 11 through my first summer out of college. Simply sharp they were.

Yes. A bunch. I worked for a utility, started as an EE eventually became a division manager with about 110 working under me. I found that there’s a lot of just stupid people out there. And then there’s those that are just “dumb like a fox”

But you gotta realize... at least half the people in the world have below average intelligence. That’s simple math.

A lot of these idiots were engineers also.

I worked with a couple guys that were terrible tool makers but were smart enough to avoid working and shot to the top of the ladder pretty fast

Some can’t help it i guess.


They have jobs to do.


Some don’t try to do any better.


They have jobs to do also. The chitty ones.....

A few for sure but they're not the ones that piss me off, I can deal with stupid because the stupid can at least learn the limited task at hand you just don't expect much.

The ones that piss me off are the ones that are lazy with a bad work ethic that don't even try to understand or learn. usually they're lazy ass entitled liberal college kids.

Standing by.............

Huh?

I worked for a sporting goods store in college and we sold live bait. Every January we'd get at least one of the cashiers convinced to go to where the live minnow tanks were kept and try to count the minnows during inventory.

That’s 😎 cool

Nope.

Happy to oblige.

If a half-wit works for a half-wit, which one is the quarter-wit?

I was watching the Kentucky Derby one year with a woman. “The” Derby race is the last race of the day. Many races run previous to “the Derby race”.
She sat through the whole TV broadcast and at the very end asked me “so where do they have this race”?

Was she blonde?

Wifey hates blonde jokes!

Must have been an officer.

My grandfather used to say the only thing dumber than a human being was two of them in the same room at the same time. I have found that to be sound wisdom.

I was getting fueled up at the Marathon gas and food ‘plaza’.

This ole leather-faced gal in her Marathon work shirt is changing what seems to be an empty trash can, she apparently is just going through the motions so she can justify being outside AND being able to get a smoke break in. Multitasking, bless her heart.

None of the trash cans had more than a couple of pop cans or cups in each. I counted about 8 trash cans around that gas mart.

So she is just really a chain smoker wasting barrel liners, my take. No doubt making a trash run every hour.

So she gets up by me, and I tell her to back off I’m pumping you can see, you got a lit cigg.

She says “oh hunn, its altight i been doing this a long time”

I pointed to several warnings posted by her employer about smoking and open flames and static. Jeeze. Just kept on

I went in to get a cold drink and told her co-worker, (another old hag)
She says “well....IT’S HER ONLY CHANCE TO SMOKE”

Mmmkay, bye

We had a major cable cut right outside one of our central offices. Our second level manager was trying to make a name for herself and called a meeting with all the splicers and cable techs prior to commencement of work. Most people in the room had twenty or more years placing, fixing, and maintaining lines all day every day.

She told all of us she was going to supervise the how and in what order the work would proceed. Most of us were just sitting around waiting for her to shut up so we could start fixing lines.

Sensing our impatience, she said "I don't need anyone's help to to make me look stupid." My friend replied quickly and loudly enough for all to hear..."That's true, you don't need our help."

Had a young guy on my crew who's family was moving to Washington state. He was quitting a week early to spend a few days at the Jersey shore because "there's no ocean in Washington state."

Cue up the "Here's your sign" guy

toolpusher on a job one time try to pull a piece of drill pipe out of a tool, he chained the tool to the frack tank then put a piece of chain on the pipe and tried pulling it apart with the forklift but the chain kept slipping off the tool which was smooth and round. i saw everyone gather around watching this then finally walk over and told him why don't you hook the tool on the other side of this pipe on the frac tank so it's braced against the pipe then pull the pipe out. lol, he was like why didn't I think of that. the pipe came out.

Hanco,
Blonde she was...

Another time, on the 10 year anniversary date of the 9/11 attacks, we were watching the TV documentaries of that event. When the 2nd jet flew into the 2nd tower, she looks over at me with big eyes and says “there were 2 planes”?
I just looked away...dumbfounded.
Honestly, who in the whole world who had heard of the attack, would not know there was more than 1 plane?
And she’s an American gal 😳.

Yes, democrats in a union.

Did you marry her???

another time guy I was working with wanted to bet on a fight that was going to be on HBO, I watched it live on pay for view the sat. before and I told him this but he wouldn't believe me, easiest hundred buts i ever made.

I worked behind the gun counter of a sporting goods store back in the early 1980s. The other guy who was there working with me on this particular day was asked by a woman unfamiliar with firearms which gun she should purchase for home defense. He began singing the praises of a bolt action .30-06 rifle for that purpose. I could only listen for so long, and had to intervene. The guy was a recent transplant from California who had just started working there a few weeks earlier. Super dumb. Didn't last long.

Can you imagine if she had walked out of there with a bolt action .30-06 for home defense??

I worked with a few engineers who were "conveniently stupid". They would come around and ask me things that they should know just because they were too lazy to do it themselves. I told one of them early on that I would put as much effort into this as you do.

They said the same thing.

My first real job out of college was at a well known financial services company in San Francisco. There was a really vocal minority of braindead people (the types that are social justice warriors today) and I had even less patience then than I lack now. After having to deal with these idiots for longer than I cared to, I told my boss (who is now my wife) that everyone should have to wear a patch that identifies their IQs, so I'd know up front whether it was even worthwhile to argue with them.

That idea didn't go over well at the time, but today, she agrees with my idea....

A really olllld kitchen prank is to have The Chef (at a stressful point of peak business) send a rookie off running to the basement or dry storage or wherever, to secure him an immediately essential “#10 can of steam”... or, the “Parsley Curler”... or, the “Spaghetti Straightener” etc etc. Convincing and intimidating as the directive might seem, and even in the moment of urgency that it is given, it’s still amazing to me to have to send another cook after them some 30 minutes later when they have not been successful in finding it. Never gets old.

My lady used to ask waitresses if the shrimp were boneless. More than a few had to think about it.

Hahahahaha! Classic! 30 years and I never heard that one.

We sent first year apprentice boys after a left handed pipe wrench. I grew up working with tools, so I knew better when they tried to send me.

I had 4 cases of 12 gauge shells in my basket and the clerk rang up $28.00 . I ask her to check the price and she acted insulted, then confirmed the price was correct . One of my best ever trips to wally world .

Lol. Same joke, different shop. Perfect. Amazing, isn’t it?

Holy chit. I just LOL.

I still do.

Had a " manager' once who did not understand the " keep your mouth shut or remove all doubt your a dumbazz" concept. He was " responsible for a $20 million P&L. A few of his notables:
Hey Bill, how many millions in a billion; a hundred?
Hey Bill, how many days is Cinco de Mayo?
Hey Bill, the CEO keeps saying things are "ubiquitous" in meetings; what does that mean? Answer from me; " I don't know Danny, but it's everywhere."
Hey Bill, where did you learn about ...... . "Danny, I Googled it." He said; "what's that? We were in a technology industry.
Every day I was SMDH

We had two cesium atomic clocks on the submarine that were accurate down to tiny fractions of a second. One peripheral use was setting the ship's chronometers. One time we had a seaman write the exact time down on a three by five card and then go from bow to stern and set every clock to that time.

Not so much working with as dealing with. I haven't actually had to work with real dumbasses since I was marching in the Legions. On the outside, my career field usually does due diligence in screening the idiots out.

When I joined the fuc king military

I had no idea how dumb people can get by.....

Dumb people

Eye opening experience

Just myself every time I take another project on.

😎

My boy was in the navy, a corpsman, he said the same thing. He didn’t have prejudice thought until he came back either.

Your son was a corpsman?

I had a good partner that’s a corpsman......
Good guy.....
‘How much time did your kid do?

Was he on a ship?

I am amazed every day wondering how some people even have enough sense to walk out of the house. Working with some in younger generation is like herding cats!!

Yes I have. To butcher a quote from a Bruce Willis movie, "I see dumb people, they walk around like every one else and don't know their dumb". Working with them is not the worst thing, knowing they have the right to vote is. A friend of mine worked on a fishing boat years ago and said the gal that was the cook was reading a recipe book and asked him what elevation they were at? They were tied up at the dock. Ron White said his mom said "ya can't fix stupid".

Hank Johnson, the black Georgia liberal on the Senate Armed Services Committee said this when questioning an Admiral about the proposed military build up on Guam. It's on You Tube. The look on the Admirals face was priceless.

Per Hank. "My fear is that the whole island will become so overly populated that it will tip over and capsize," Johnson said, Admiral Willard paused and replied, "We don't anticipate that."

The voters in his district keep electing him, which as I stated above is, dumb people having a right to vote is scary.

Classic.

If you really want to screw with the FNG and a bunch more,
Get me a Stillson Wrench. That isn't even a wild goose chase.

Or, a board stretcher.

Or, a Johnson bar.

Trying to get a repair done now by an idiot that seems to "think" you can charge a three contact radio with a four contact charger. Their designed to not work together but that genius seems to "think" it will and won't listen to anyone that says otherwise.

I got a call last week from a person who insisted that her computer and two monitors all broke over the weekend and would not come on. Of course my first thought was that there's zero chance all three pieces of equipment all failed simultaneously. So I asked "is your power strip turned on?" Silence on the phone for a few seconds... "never mind."

I had a mechanics helper who was a good worker, nice guy, but kinda slow...sent him about 30 miles up on a road building job to patch the outlet fitting on the little pony motor gas tank on a cat. I thought about having him braze a new fitting in, but came to my senses with him and an open flame on a gas tank, and told him to epoxy it temporarily. He had apparently never used epoxy and he called me back on the radio a couple hours later. "Doc, I don't I got enough of this epoxy stuff. what should I do"?
"Bob, I know damn well there is enough in that truck, I put it in myself this morning, two partial tubes and two brand new tubes in the cabinet under the crane boom."
"Found 'em, but the instructions say mix 50 parts 'A', and 50 parts 'B'. They ain't but barely 4 parts all told".
I'm pretty certain he was not pulling my chain.

Boomers I have hired are the worse. More than anything they spend more effort trying to look busy and not doing anything than just doing the job. They generally get sacked real quick.

In my business stupid people don’t last. So, no.

One that comes to mind , although not work related .
Me and the ex was at a campground loading the canoe for a day of fishing . Our two dogs were in the river swimming around and chasing each other in and out of the water . A family pulled up and the mother and kids get out and are standing there in a half azz prayer stance , hands clasped in front smiling and talking about how precious that was .
I’m thinking “WTH are they talking about ?”
But ignored them and called the dogs and put them in the canoe .
The mother says “excuse me , but I have a question . How on earth did you teach them to do that?”
I give her a puzzled look and ask what are you talking about ?
She says “the dogs”
I said , huh ?
She apologizes for being nosey and says she just has to know .
Know what ?
With a smug look , how did you teach them to swim like that , that is incredible .
Again I look at her puzzled , are you serious ?
Well yes I would like to know .
I laughed and said , dogs just naturally know , he’ll just pick one up sometime and toss it in , it’ll swim .
With an exasperated look , oh no ! I would never do that to an animal !
Ex and I busted out laughing and started paddling away , she says , that’s rude ! I would like to know !
We laughed harder and she ushered her kids to the car .
Tags were from Maryland, nuff said .
Kenneth

And some smart folks.

Being self employed, yes.

Yes,thats why i both a gastric and a duodenal ulcers when i retired.
Between journymen not knowing how to read a ruler,a guy spraying the oxygen gauge with wd 40,to help it go on easier,another idiot telling me the actelyne
Gauge was broken because it wouldn t screw on.guys sawing away with a hacksaw with the blade on backwards,etc.guy telling me he really needed this job,he d been out of work 6 months,but he wasn t coming in on wed. Thur. Or fri. Because he was going on a ski trip.don t get me going.

I had a secretary ask me once while she was doing some filing: "What state is New Hampshire in?" "Uh, New Hampshire is a State." "No it isn't." "Uh, yes it is." "Well, where is it then?" "Next to Vermont, sorta looks like an upside down Vermont."

Coworker that thought chicken eggs were bleached white. Just one of the MANY

Yes, several along the way, and the drugs didn’t make them any smarter either.

Another, we're out working on a habitat study, supposed to collect samples of plant A and plant B. A couple of hours into it, his bags are empty. Upon questioning he says he can't find any.

I say, "what about the one you are standing on? "

He proclaims, "that's where I am standing NOT where I am looking!"

The dumbest people I ever met professionally were civil servants in the US Air Force and the US Navy. They were really dumb and hindered the mission. One time I was assigned to a 450-person program to design a certain missile. The feds couldn't just pay us and get on with it. They had to impose a micromanagement cost control system that had nothing to do with reality. So we had 122 people "controlling the costs." The USAF probably had that many people reading the meaningless reports we submitted.

I could cite many other stories. During the first Gulf War, I was amazed that any of our planes actually got into the air.

Years ago, there was a fancy clothes store here in Bedford, satellite of
the one in Cumberland Md. Both towns are on US 220.

A guy here needed a tux, and they called down around 10 AM to get one sent up,
guy said he would get the shop helper to run it right up. 30 miles, it would
be there in an hour.


A couple hours later, Bedford called down, and was told he left hours ago.
About 5, Cumberland called, they just got off the phone with him.
He was in New York! And still hadn't found Bedford!

So, they got him turned around, and had him call every hour.
When they knew he was close, they went to the center of town to flag him down.

The customer had to come in that night, and the seamstress had to work way
late to have the tux ready for the Saturday shindig.


That said, I know a guy who hooked to a trailer in Maine.
Pulled it to Cincinnati, then realized it was the wrong one.
This paper went to Georgia, his was still in Maine.

Numbers were close, I found it by walking around, took the papers
out of the box, then went and got the truck. I had the right papers.
Hooked to the wrong trailer. (We had dozens there)
Never, ever took the papers out of a trailer until I was hooked to it again.

I used to work with a guy who would mop the floor by splashing bleach everywhere and then took a dry mop and "mopped" the floor. No mop bucket with water, just bleach and a mop. The fumes about knocked all of us out.

I felt that way about millennials

In the army we called em " Leadership Challenges"...

Always laughed at other Sqd leaders and PSG,s when they had theirs.

Then when you had em the laugh was on you.
Some one or 2 task masters at a time, but had it down skill level overall.
Just not able to multitask complex stuff.
Good soldiers but not leadership material stress think on your feet types.
Good soldiers to reup and reclass into soft shell jobs and they actually become good leaders in rear echelon jobs from their Infantry time.
I had alot of soldiers like that and had some long talks with them how being a leader in Combat arms is not a good fit for them.
You approach good soldiers like that in a core inner way and they realize alot of stuff in a good way.
Some I had recommended up the chain of command to go to the E-5 board as a infantryman and become a e- 4 p before they left to go to their new job AIT from reenlistment and reclass.
Its a call on someones potential in many cases.
Some soldiers you know will do excellent in other jobs.
Just not combat arms and the stress with it at times.

Other soldiers require constant counseling, and attempts to teach coach and mentor just dont work.
Like working with a rotten tree stump.
Need constant supervision and checking up on.
Time eaters.........
Never go beyond e4
Not promoted with TIS TIG waivers
Do your time, get your honorable discharge.
You will never see the E-5 board in this unit.
I have a counseling file that will support it 100%


In civilian jobs
We just called em so and so,s son, cousin , nephew, or brother.

Untouchables checking the block from Nepotism that will get promoted soon no matter what they fugg up or cost a company.

Standing around bullschitting weekend stories and this young gal says she was at a wild party and this drunk hippy starts puking. Apparently she felt the need to hold back his long hair and happened to notice he puked up "an entire hot dog untouched by human teeth".

The secretary chimes in with, "Oh my God, the bun and everything?"

40 couple years ago I worked with some crazy guys , some pretty sorry .
Keith was one P.O.S. and dumber than shiet . Him , Waverly , and myself was setting in a company's truck on rain delay .
Keith is talking about how broke he is and needs money bad . So Waverly starts messing with Kieth about selling some time with his wife . I figure this is going to go south quick as Kieth had a 38 laying on the dash .
But Kieth actually starts thinking out loud how he would approach his wife about it .
The guy is disgusting , he is setting under the wheel , Waverly in the middle and me at the passenger door .
So finally Kieth decides this ain't going to fly with his wife .
Waverly then says , tell you what , take all the shells out except one , stick the gun to your head and pull the trigger , if you live , I'll give you 50.00 .
Kieth looks at Waverly and says m I don't know man , if it kills me the money won't do me any good .
Waverly puts the money back in his pocket , a few minutes go by and Kieth is looking at the gun and looking at Waverly . Finally , Kieth asks will you really give me the 50 ?
Waverly assures him and Kieth gets the gun down and unloads all but one round .
He is sweating , looks ahead with a blank stare and spins the cylinder . I see the bullet line up to rotate to fire when he pulls the trigger .
I reach over open the door and step out of the truck watching as he puts the gun to his head and Waverly grabbed his arm about time it leveled with his head and pulled his arm down.
Waverly says , look you would have been dead . Kieth looks at the revolver and says gee , I would have . Looks at me and says , how come you got out of the truck , told him I didn't want that shiet blown all over me .
He says dam man you would have let me shoot myself ?
I said ,Yeah , you that stupid , pull the trigger .
He was sweating and shaking as he layed the gun back on the dash .
We knocked off , Waverly didn't come back the next day and Kieth came back after a couple days .
I quit a week later and went to work in WVA and never saw Kieth or Waverly again .
Crazy world , Kenneth

I don't want to point fingers, but, here's a couple someone very, errr, close to me did trucking.

Delivered in SLC, supposed to get an empty 53' trailer and take it to Helena. I, ooops I mean, he, grabbed a 48' special trailer with a side door and took it all the way..

Another time, he (haha) got into a construction detour in the middle of the night in Fife WA and and it looked more familiar each of the three times around the circle! Finally had to ignore a couple of signs to get out of it.

Worked for a guy, who hired a guy, who had been in prison for 23 years, since he was 17. Guy told him he was an experienced carpenter. I had to explain where 3/8 was on a tape measure, in the “yeah, that mark between those two bigger marks, but not the smallest marks” vernacular. To this day, not sure who was dumber. The ex-con, experienced carpenter who couldn’t read a tape, or the idiot that hired a guy who spent his entire adult life in the pen as an experienced carpenter.

Roofing contractor friend of mine's crew stripped the roof off the wrong house in a very expensive neighborhood.

He's still bitter. Cost him alot of money.

Last clown I worked for...I am still not sure who tied his shoelaces.

I saw naive kids get sent looking for the board stretcher. They got sent all over the job site. All the trades knew what was going on and were all in on it.

Had a lead guy convinced (briefly) that we should invest in a ratcheting open end hex wrench for a particular task.

Haven't read all of the responses - have we heard from the self-employed?

I saw a video of some dumb kid holding up a bucket to catch the sparks from a welding job. They told him they needed to recycle the sparks.




P

I am self employed, so yes.

Probably just a good employee doing what he’s told. I’ll take a kid who does exactly what I tell him to rather than a kid who thinks he knows it all.

I currently work with a few “dumb” folks. I’ll happily take them on my crew over the lazy ones.

I went to high school with this girl that was a knockout, but not overly bright. She asked a classmate if their farm raised "white meat or dark meat chickens".

I worked as an Electronic Technician in a department that had a large computer room full of mainframe computers, disk drives, & 9 track reel to reel tape drives and such. Once we had a power outage and everyone is sitting around waiting for the power to come back on. After about 1/2 hour of sitting in the dark, this clueless gal comes into the tech lab to report that her tape drive won't work. As Bill Engvall would say, Here's your sign!

I knew a young lady, high school grad in Florida, who asked me in all seriousness "what state is Conn. in?"
I just walked away.

They're out there...

Apparently so is Africa...............

My dad was talking with some of his coworkers in the lunchroom and they were talking about how the two day doe season in PENN went for them. My dad said he saw a couple but didnt get any shots and on the way out of the woods he stepped in a ground hog hole and his ankle was hurting him a little but he was ok. One of the young guys then asked him, "Did you get your foot out of the hole?" My dad replied, "No I left it in there"
His other coworkers burst out laughing, the young guy just sat there and didnt realize they were all laughing at him