Breakroom Bandits

[Dreamstalker]

Posted 'policy' for the break room fridge is anything that doesn't have a name and date on it is tossed on Fridays.

Go figure. The bottle of soda that didn't have my name on it was still in the breakroom fridge today (Thursday), but the clearly-marked lunch bag containing leftovers from just yesterday--and dated, so it was clearly less than a day old--was gone.

The soda was in the opaque and taped-closed bag, so whoever did this opened the bag with my name on it, rifled through and removed the soda, and tossed (or ate) the rest. It had to be someone on the overnight crew as it was missing when I got into work; that was going to be my breakfast. Why is it always my food that this seems to happen to?

[KuariKaydrith]

Stop bringing in the good tasting food? Seriously, I've got nothing.

We have a similar issue at my work and I've gotten to the point where I don't bring anything in with me that has to be refrigerated. And even that gets hidden away at my desk because if it's in the open people have been known to just help themselves.

[Dreamstalker]

The leftovers consisted of something that nobody here would probably even eat (onigiri and other oddities). Other people's stuff from yesterday was still there, so...and the soda is the confusing part.

[Pixelated]

I'm wondering if some over-enthusiastic clean freak coworker looked at the food, thought "EW, I wouldn't eat that" (and thus, by association, neither will anybody else) and thus tossed it, but felt the soda was still consumable?

Yeah, it's a stretch. I don't know why anybody would've bothered with it, since it wasn't "clean-out" day. Too bad you don't know whether the person ate the stuff or tossed it; if the former, I'd start bringing in catfood sandwiches and doggie "cookies" ...

[Blue Ginger]

As the person who used to have to do the fridge clean outs - GAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!
I wish people had named and dated their food. It would have made it so much easier.

The worst things I found in 15 months of the job were:
A roast chicken carcass that had been in there for 3 months
Sandwiches that were unidentifiable - well I think they were sandwiches. There were whole new lifeforms created in the containers
Assorted sauce bottles that had been expired 6 years ago (only been in the building for 4 years at that point)
Things left there by employees that had left months before - half were unidentifiable
Oranges that were green
Whole loaves of bread that were green and full of penicillin

But we don't have any reports of stolen food. Stolen containers yes, but not food.

[Trixie]

I used to keep a bottle of water in the fridge at work. It's water. It's not going to get bad. That would get tossed when they cleaned yet the jar of olives sat there for months. And right now I'm pretty sure there's stuff in the freezer from people who don't even work there any more.

[Dreamstalker]

I'm wondering if some over-enthusiastic clean freak coworker looked at the food, thought "EW, I wouldn't eat that" (and thus, by association, neither will anybody else) and thus tossed it, but felt the soda was still consumable?

That's the only thing I can come up with, as the soda is an item we sell...but the only way to know what was in the (not-yours) bag was to open it. Not that I'd put that past some people.

[wolfie]

The worst things I found in 15 months of the job were:
Oranges that were green

Why are unripe oranges so bad?

[KellyHabersham]

The worst things I've ever found in the fridge at work were a dried-out pizza slice, fuzzy green cheese, and a bag of squishy brown apples. (this being during a month when it was my turn to clean out the staff fridge at work)

[Pixelated]

At the little weekly paper I once worked at, the editor left ... and left behind a lunchbox. Which nobody found for weeks, if not months -- it was a long time ago and my memory's a bit fuzzy on the details.

And, of course, my memory's not the only thing that was fuzzy ... We had no clue what some of the items were.

[Dreamstalker]

I think the oldest thing in the fridge is a bottle of hot sauce that nobody seems to use (maybe because nobody knows who it belongs to). Funny how uncovered remains of week-old staff meals are untouched...and the fridge policy also forbids hoarding staff meal.

*debates securing this to the shelf with zipties...let's see someone throw it out now*