Human Stampede

One thing that always made me laugh in corporate America was the email announcing free food. It usually went something like this:

There are lunch leftovers in the break room. Help yourselves!

I'd receive an email like this, and then I'd stick my head out my door and watch the hungry people stampede by like a herd of wildebeests during the great migration. And I had to wonder: What the heck is so enticing about eating someone else's leftovers? Isn't that on the same level as dumpster diving?

Why would anyone run down the hall to devour cold pizza and warm sandwiches? I always thought of where that food had most likely been and the picture wasn't so appetizing. Odds are the leftovers had been sitting on a table in a conference room, uncovered, while dozens of people talked excitedly around it, spit and germs flying out of their mouths, landing on the food that others would later graciously, and unknowingly, consume. Yum-yum.

So, the next time the leftovers email circulates after a management meeting, picture your manager and then imagine eating his/her saliva. Then see how tempted you are to gallop down the hall for a slice of cardboard pizza.

The other food thing that always fascinated me was the "free" table in the break room. This was a table filled with stale candy, old canned goods and basically any worthless piece of junk one might find when cleaning out a long-ago vacated office. These items were all gathered together and placed on table with a handwritten note that said "Free."

The "free" table was especially interesting several months after a holiday. The leftover, stale Halloween candy usually showed up around January. And the old Christmas eats and treats usually appeared in late February. I suppose the really crazy thing is that these "free" things would eventually disappear and I'm sure it wasn't the trash can where they were ending up.

What's that saying, "One man's trash..."