Overly Anal People?

meggs521

New Member
Apr 6, 2005
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So I had an amusing experience at work today and figured I’d share (that and I’m bored). I’d say it’s on of the more pointless things I’ve been asked to do, and wanted to know what some things are that you’ve all had to do that are really just a waste of your time. Now I can be extremely anal about some things, but even this is beyond my level of anal-ness.

The story:

So my company has this project where we’re working on with another architecture firm rather than the architects in the office. It’s not uncommon. So yesterday we had to have half size drawings to them by 4pm. Not full size- this we knew from experience. So we plot out their 36x24 plots and bring them by.

Then this morning a guy I work with has a nasty phone call from the architects. Apparently our plotter wasn’t functioning properly and, heaven help us, instead of making the plots 24” tall, they were in fact 24 3/16”. And seeing as how it’s only 3/16” off, no one here noticed. Oh, but Mr. Architect caught us trying to pull a fast one on him and noticed the extra length. How he did this, I’m not entirely sure, unless he got his scale out just to have something to bitch about, but the drawings were wrong. So we were asked to come down to their company and pick up the drawings since our poor little plotter still can’t manage to make the prints EXACTLY 24”. And then I got to spend 2 ½ hours, measuring and cutting off 3/16” from every plot. It was amazingly fun.

But really, who complains about a paper being less than a ¼” off when the plots are a bloody DRAFT that they’re going to need another copy of in about a week. It’s not even anywhere near being a final set.

The Clifs:

An architecture firm my company is working with had me cut off 3/16” from the bottom of about 200 plots because the drawings (which were a DRAFT) had to be exactly 36”x24” for him to be able to comprehend them and our plotter cut them at 24 3/16”.



I have a bunch of similar stories about this guy, but this was my first actual encounter with him.


Happy Thursday Everyone!
 

exander

Anything but Lurker
May 23, 2006
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WOW, that sucks! I can't say I've ever had to do anything that pointless that I can think off... I have had to do similar pointless things though. I would have been pissed, but look on the bright side, you got paid for it, right.
 

Big Wang Bandit

You Can't Quit Me Baby
Feb 21, 2006
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I guess you can see it either way. This guys company(?) asked for somthing specific and diddn't get what he wanted.

For you gus you gave them somthing. You made a tiny little mistake and dont know why he is getting pissed?

Ive been on both sides and I'm sure you have too Meggs.

Not trying to get on you here but it alwas helps to see through someone elses eyes! ;)
 

meggs521

New Member
Apr 6, 2005
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South Bend
But there was nothing wrong with the drawing (scale was fine, it just had 3/32" of extra white on the top and bottom). And they're getting a completely new set next Wednesday I believe (they get new drawings once a week from us anyway). So it's just annoying.

Not to mention the guy accidentally sent the wrong background for one of the sites last time and didn't realize it until the middle of the day yesterday, so we all had to scramble and finish everything because he still expected to have his drawings by 4. But then he can't deal with the extra white even though he gave us the wrong background.

And Hells, I do understand wanting something a certain way, but these aren't even final drafts and he's not the client, so really, I don't think he has much room to complain.
 

IJ.

Grumpy Old Man
Mar 30, 2005
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I come from a land down under
I deal with 1/10's of 1/1000's of inches here sometimes so a 3/16 error would be monumental it's all relative....

Mistakes happen and it all depends on how it's handled to how much stress it causes!

scenario 1) Megs says "Bite me anal boy it's only 3/16 get a grip"

scenario 2) Megs says "Sorry for the error the corrected plots will be there as soon as humanly possible" ;)
 

Yellow 13

Lurker
Apr 4, 2006
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IJ. said:
I deal with 1/10's of 1/1000's of inches here sometimes so a 3/16 error would be monumental it's all relative....

Mistakes happen and it all depends on how it's handled to how much stress it causes!

scenario 1) Megs says "Bite me anal boy it's only 3/16 get a grip"

scenario 2) Megs says "Sorry for the error the corrected plots will be there as soon as humanly possible" ;)

What is it that you do anyways IJ?

I thought you just worked on supras all day and had a magic money tree.
 

thedave925

Since 9/16/05
Nov 9, 2005
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Tell the fucker, "don't blow a headgasket buddy".

I wish I livednext door to IJ. That way everytime I needed moola, I can jump the fence to visit his $$$tree lol
 

meggs521

New Member
Apr 6, 2005
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South Bend
HellsLegion said:
Ohhhh! Like the borders! Okay

Yes! But the actual border template was fine and everything, the printer just let it go a little too far before the automatic cut off feature came on... whatever it's called.

And I understand that 3/16" can be a big error for some things. Even for a lot of the things we design having an error of that much would screw things up pretty badly. But on the edge of a sheet of paper...

Besides, his bitchy phone call said the sheets were all 24 1/2 inches. So he sucks at measuring.

I guess I'm alone with this one though. Or maybe it's just because I'm the kind of person that isn't going to make a big deal over something like that. Sure I'd notice it, but unless it was some sort of final project where everything needed to be perfect I wouldn't say anything.
 

exander

Anything but Lurker
May 23, 2006
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I see where you're coming from, I wouldn't get upset over errors like that either especialy on a rough draft and when it was machinary fault. I had a boss like that at my first job. Needless to say he is one of the reasons I will never work for anybody ever again.
 

supra90turbo

shaeff is FTMFW!
Mar 30, 2005
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lol you guys!
Meggs I see what you're saying. From either vantage point I would be "meh" at best.


How about this one?
The owner of the dealership I work for may be either the cheapest or most anal person evar.

Background on the story:
Our own underground fuel tank at our bodyshop cracked and allowed water into it. Many rentals, customer vehicles, and shop vehicles were filled with this "gasoline" and ran water through them.
The errored vehicles had to be drained of their fuel/water.
He wanted them all drained into clear plastic 55 gallon drums.
Why? So that we could let them sit, and see where the water and fuel seperated.
I was given the task of removing the seperated fuel from the water and placing it in some other 55 gallon drums for use again... wtf.
The anal retentive part really came into play when I was all done and he looked at the barrels right up close, then told me that there was still some gas left in them. Yeah, about 1" of it... I stopped there so I didn't get any water with the "fuel", but he insisted I get all of it out...

the beauty part was when he put some in his own vehicle and broke down an hour away from bad gas ::gasps::
 

meggs521

New Member
Apr 6, 2005
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South Bend
^hahaha... I'd actually have to agree. Ever since this one guy at my office straight up yelled at me for making copies I've decided to hate them all. Except for the nice ones of course.
 

exander

Anything but Lurker
May 23, 2006
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I hate them all just because of my HS drafting teacher. It was his first year teaching and he is only a few years older than me and you guys already know how I don't think before I act... well it got out of hand a couple of times and probably have ended in fist fights if it weren't for the teacher student relationship. Funny thing was he never tried to get me suspended or anything we would just argue until he got mad enough to leave the room and not come back for a while. Most of the time it started over political stuff though.