Have you ever had one of those moments at work where you know that if you truly work your hardest for all of the hours, there won’t be enough work to keep you busy?

I totally have, and it’s more than a little frustrating.

OP worked in a plant that was closing, but there was still plenty to do.

Many moons ago I worked contract for a medical placement company in the employee health department of a rack and pinion steering plant.

The plant was scheduled to close but they were still hiring (it was a head scratcher for us too) and extra help was needed for drug screens on the new hires.

The other duties were seeing to injuries as they occurred, setting up appointments with Doc on days he would come, flu shots, and then there was THE PROJECT. Here’s where the story begins.

THE PROJECT was a collection of every medical piece of paper in that plant. All of them. Scattered in boxes, stacked to the ceiling. No sense of order at ALL.

Two of the veteran nurses would periodically adjourn down to the ‘War Room’, as it was dubbed, to do whatever they did with the mess.

I was enlisted to help one day and succeeded in only managing to screw up the Excel spreadsheet (named Apricot for reasons I’ve yet to understand) they were using to attempt to collate this mess.

When they finished their work, they read.

On days when we were slow, if we had no patients, I’d stay at my post and read.

And one of those days, the boss lady came by and decided to take umbrage at that hobby. I should add that if I was reading, everything was stocked, all other projects were done and I’d already been yelled at for sweeping up after myself.

“I’d really rather you not do that. I need you doing WORK. It looks bad.”

“Ok. What else needs to be done?”

After she looks around at all I’ve done…

“Nothing. You’re done. Just don’t read.”

So I sat. I’m not a good sitter.

It turned out that OP could do a lot of work when they kept busy.

Fast forward, she gets sick and a temporary boss comes in. I get assigned THE PROJECT. It takes a minute, but I get it whipped into shape.

First, I sorted papers into folders by name. Then I organized by dates on papers, past to recent in each file. Then I alphabetized the folders and put them in boxes. What had taken the other two nurses months on end took me a few weeks.

After that, I started a NEW excel spreadsheet. Data entry is one of my favorite things and I’m FAST. Name, DOB, first date listed, last date listed. Easy peasy.

I was blowing through 20-30 boxes a day. I only took lunch and bathroom breaks.

The boss comes back from sick leave, walks in and goes pale.

“What happened?!?”

“Nothing, I’ve been working super hard. Is it not done right?”

“It’s great, but it’s GONE!”

“Yes ma’am, I’ve made decent progress.”

She hem hawed around and finally muttered “I need you to slow down.”

Too much, in fact.

“Sorry?”

“I need you to slow down. We told them we needed at least X amount of time to complete that project and as fast as you’ve gone, there won’t be any work left to do.”

“So, what else can I do?”

“Do a box, read a book. Do a box, take a nap. Just. Slow. Down. Bring your book, or several books. Just slow down.”

And that’s how I got permission to read in my down time at work. Might not be the best MC story but after 15 years it still makes me laugh.

Reddit’s got replies!

They find it confusing, for one.

But sometimes that’s how it is when unions are involved.

A capitalist conundrum.

Basically, stay in your lane.

Someone always has a USPS story.

This is a great malicious compliance story.

I am 100% here for it.