Early 21st Century Office Terms

Engineering & Science Humor - RF CafeThese engineering and science tech-centric jokes, song parodies, anecdotes and assorted humor have been collected from friends and websites across the Internet. I check back occasionally for new fodder, but it seems all the old content is reappearing all over (like this is). The humor is light-hearted and clean and sometimes slightly assaultive to the easily-offended, so you are forewarned. It is all workplace-safe.

Humor #1, #2, #3

  • BLAMESTORMING - Sitting around in a group discussing why a deadline was missed or a project failed and who is responsible.
  • SEAGULL MANAGER - A manager, who flies in, makes a lot of noise, craps all over everything and then leaves.
  • CLM - Career Limiting Move - Used among microserfs to describe ill-advised activity. Trashing your boss while he or she is within earshot is a huge CLM.
  • OHNO-SECOND - That minuscule fraction of time in which you realise that you've just made a BIG mistake.
  • PERCUSSIVE MAINTENANCE - The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to work again.
  • BODY NAZIS: Hard-core exercise and weightlifting fanatics who look down on anyone who doesn't work out obsessively.
  • CUBE FARM: An office filled with cubicles.
  • IDEA HAMSTERS: People who always seem to have their idea generators running.
  • MOUSE POTATO: The on-line, wired generation's answer to the Couch Potato.
  • PRAIRIE DOGGING: When someone yells or drops something loudly in a cube farm, and people's heads pop up over the walls to see what's going on.
  • SITCOMs: What yuppies turn into when they have children and one of them stops working to stay home with the kids. Stands for: Single Income, Two Children, Oppressive Mortgage.
  • STRESS PUPPY: A person who seems to thrive on being stressed out and whiny.
  • SWIPED OUT: An ATM or credit card that has been rendered useless because the magnetic strip is worn away from extensive use.
  • TOURISTS: People who take training classes just to get a vacation from their jobs. Example: "We had three serious students in the class; the rest were just tourists."
  • CHIPS AND SALSA - Chips = hardware, salsa = software. i.e.: "Well, first we gotta figure out if the problem's in your chips or your salsa."
  • G.O.O.D. Job - A "Get-Out-Of-Debt" job. A well-paying job people take in order to pay off their debts, one that they will quit as soon as they are solvent again.
  • IRRITAINMENT - Entertainment and media spectacles that are annoying but you find yourself unable to stop watching them. The O.J. trials, Ally McBeal, Monica Lewinsky, etc.
  • DEINSTALLED - Euphemism for being fired. Heard on the voice mail of a Vice President at a downsizing computer firm: "You have reached the number of a deinstalled vice president. Please dial our main number and ask the operator for assistance".
  • ASSMOSIS - The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss.

...from the RogerDarlington.co.uk website