In some jobs, being a hard worker will actually get you a bad reputation with the other employees.

What would you do if your coworkers, and even your boss, mistreated you all the time because you worked hard and got the jobs done?

That is the situation the sailor in this story was in, so when he had the chance, he got them all in trouble and his boss fired.

Check it out.

“Why is there pizza sauce smeared all over the walls?”, the bosses wondered to themselves….

20 years back, I worked on a tugboat sailing the Great Lakes.

This was a really bad company, and they’d more-or-less exhausted every available mariner living on the Great Lakes, so nobody on the Lakes would even apply to work there anymore.

As a result, I, Tennessee/Kentucky river-trash deckhand, got hired on.

From the get-go, it was an uphill battle.

A good work ethic will take you a long way.

My hard work ethic and easygoing nature were overshadowed by my Southern accent and inexperience with big cities.

‘Hick’ was one of the nicer terms thrown my way in those 6 months.

But the $$$ was amazing, and I learned to eat plenty of insults, as I really wanted the job.

After about 4-5 months, I began to get a bigger picture of the dynamic and was vastly more confident in my abilities.

At this point, I was unconsciously doing most (if not all) of the deckhands work onboard.

One way I got screwed was Galley (kitchen) Cleanup.

One of the Deckhands got Galley cleanup in the morning, one got it at night.

Naturally, as the new guy, I always seemed to get stuck with Nighttime Galley cleanup.

AM Cleanup was little more than tossing dishes in the washer and making coffee. NIGHTTIME cleanup was the culmination of an entire days worth of buildup.

Easily 45-60 minutes worth of work.

I would never put my job at risk like this.

Enter the annual Shipyard period, and this is where our tale begins.

We pulled into Sturgeon Bay (pop. 8,900) around dusk, as we had a 3-week shipyard period scheduled.

Now, this company was HARD on drinking. INSTANT firing.

Of course, because we all had no loading/unloading the next day, we all went out to some local bar that night.

My years of coal barge experience taught me grab a few drinks, then get back to the boat- we got a job in a few hours!!!

So after a half-dozen Buds, I walked back to the boat to go to sleep.

Since I was a nice guy (always trying to help out my crew, no matter what they do to me), I decided to cook them a couple pizzas.

I tossed a couple Tombstones in the oven, set COOK, smoked a butt or two, then pulled them out.

I placed them on the counter with a note- PIZZAS ON THE STOVE. CLEAN UP YOUR MESS, PUT DISHES In WASHER WHEN YOU’RE DONE.

Why would they waste the pizza like this.

Maybe it was the ‘demanding’ tone in my orders, but my note 100% set them off.

I woke up to (literally) pizza smeared across every cabinet and a sarcastic Thank You in Pizza font on the whiteboard.

I woke up at 0600 to this mess.

Since it was Morning cleanup, I figured it was not my responsibility.

I’d been getting up at 0600 (1 hour before the crew) and making coffee for 2 months, and I suspect they were used to it.

This time, the big-wigs from the office were in town (shipyard, remember), and had let the Captain know they would be aboard in the AM. And so they were.

I was in the Galley, sipping my coffee when 3 of the bigwigs came down the stairs.

I politely asked if anyone wanted coffee.

They all said Yes (former sailors) and sat in the Galley staring at the Pizza Picasso artwork decorating the bulkheads (walls)…. waiting for the Captain, apparently.

After 10-15 minutes, the Captain came down.

He had that ‘been drinking all night’ vibe to him and was promptly horrified at the state of the Galley.

Of course, he immediately tried to show off by raging against me and the state of the Galley.

I reminded him that I was night Cleanup, not AM cleanup.”

Blaming others is not a good look for a boss.

The more he tried to pin this on me, the worse he looked.

It finally culminated in him (trying to) hammer me.

“I know you have night cleanup, but couldn’t you have at least wiped down the cabinets?!!?!”

I’d had an hour to practice my answer.

“When we left Toledo last week, and I asked you for help cleaning the galley after the mess the Longshoremen left, you told me “I volunteered for night cleanup, so it’s my job, period. Well, now it’s AM cleanup, and <Other Deckhand> has cleanup.”

He doubled down and ordered me to clean the Galley to save face, but it was just digging a deeper hole.

Some people don’t know when to keep quiet.

Best of all?

My ‘shipmates’ couldn’t resist bragging about the stupid drunk escapades they’d done that night.

I called the companies 1-800 number, used a variety of accents, and ‘complained’ about what they’d been doing in Sturgeon Bay.

Some of the complaints I made (lifted straight from their stories from that night-

1. Threw their empties at the bars ‘Billy Bass-mouth’ trophy
2. Tried to take down 2 of the bars 5 mounted deer heads
3. Walked behind the bar to grab a bottle of Jägermeister to pour free shots for everyone
4. After getting kicked out (they weren’t), kicking the side of a pickup parked in front.
5. Putting empties in several mailboxes between the bar and the shipyard.
6. Knocking a bass-shaped mailbox off of it’s mount

They should have kept their mouths shut.

ALL OF WHICH they bragged about- loudly.

Long story short- 1 officer and a deckhand got fired.

The Captain had ‘Sturgeon Bay’ hanging over his head as long as i worked there (7 years), and the office never messed with me again.

Not once.

Sometimes you have to stand up for yourself by throwing other people under the bus.

Well played.

Let’s see what the people in the comments have to say about it.

Good information for context.

Do people really treat southerners poorly?

I was wondering this same thing.

These guys were real jerks.

They should have just said thank you.

It is a beautiful thing when bully coworkers get what they deserve.

This sailor played the long game and it really paid off.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a rude customer who got exactly what they wanted in their pizza.