Do you ever cringe yourself to sleep?

The other day someone reminded me of an awkward story that happened to me years ago and it opened up a flood of memories and stories that I'd either buried deeply because they were about me or tell at every party I'm at, because they're about someone else.

Let's call these my go to cringe stories:

The urban legend

This one is maybe my favourite but I can't verify that it's true. I've seen it floating around the internet which we all know is a reliable source of truth but I choose to believe this one is true.

Here's the scenario; Johnny is on a company wide zoom and working remotely. They feel a rumble in their tummy and need to... what's the acceptable way to say it these days? Let fluffy out of the kennel? Rip a far basically.

They do the correct etiquette and mute, toot, un-mute. Easy right.

Except they were already on mute so that flips the process to be un-mute, toot, mute.

Anyone that's used Zoom can imagine Johnny's window highlighting because they were speaking, even though it wasn't words from their mouth but whispers from below.

I need some gold pens

Many years ago I worked in a co-working space and the receptionist would order stationary and charge it to your company.

Now I may need to explain the next stage slowly for the youths but I used to post letters to potential clients. This is like printing an email, putting it in a little paper jacket, sticky taping 50 cents to it and putting it in a magic box that gets it to it's destination within 3-340 days later.

To make these letters stand out and match our branding, we used black envelopes and gold ink pens.

So I asked for an order of these gold pens because I would go through a few a week.

The receptionist was putting the order through and just as she was about to click order, her boss checked the order and saw it was something like $10,000.

You see, they hadn't ordered me several gold ink pens. They had ordered me 1, solid gold pen.

This was caught, no harm no foul. But maybe a week or two later I saw that receptionist trying to squeeze these big boxes into cupboards and under desks.

Turns out that instead of order 10 boxes of 100 tea bags. They had ordered 10 boxes of 100 boxes of tea bags. So not 1000 teabags, but 100,000 teabags.

I laugh about it for me. I cringe about it for her.

Self Discovery cards

I won't tag this person in case they've had enough of this story but it's amazing.

A business owner was putting together a welcome pack for a new starter and came across some self discover cards for leaders. Perfect. Add to cart.

Those self discovery cards turn out to be more of a guide on masturbation.

I mean, end the story there, no further explanation needed.

The worst greeting and farewells, ever?

2 stories, both me, one 1 laugh at, the other wakes me up at night.

Story 1. I have just finished interviewing a candidate and we leave the meeting room and shake hands. They continue talking but also continue holding my hand.

My mind is racing, wtf is going on and when will this stop.

So I take a step towards the exit and they follow me, still holding my hand.

To give you a solid visual, I'm on the left shaking their right hand with my right hand. This looks like we are entering a mid 17th century dance at the King's palace for a good 10 metres.

I have no explanation for why they didn't let go but I have been told many times that my hands are really soft, like really surprisingly soft. I get asked about moisturisers and such but I don't use anything, my best guess is when playing video games growing up my hands would self sauce themselves.

Story 2, not work related but maybe the one that I cringe about the most.

I'm probably 19, in Kings Cross - for the youths again, KK was where you went out at all times of night, something was always open - and with a group of friends.

We see someone we know on the door at World Bar. I have only met them once or twice but had seen them recently.

I greet them with a kiss on the cheek, well I attempt to. They were expecting something else so when I lean in, there is no receptive lean back. I'm like a tree that's been cut down falling towards them.

My head ends up resting on their shoulder. Because I'm an idiot, I don't instantly remove it, I'm trying to think how I got here and what to do next.

I stand back up and see their face of confusion and because I'm a genius, I say:

That's how we say hello where I am from

As cringey as stories like this are, everyone has them and laughing at yourself is the only way to survive.