I was just telling a friend this story, and I thought of y'all. Some of you may say “well, this was stupid” or “and you wonder why you got fired.” I always knew I was going to be fired, and this was not what I was fired for. That being said, here's the story. I used to work for a major technology company. So major that if you're in the US, 60% or more of you may be viewing this post on one of their portable devices.
I was always the loud mouth, class clown type of person. We had our team managers, and they reported to the area managers. One day, I received a message from one of my friends. It was a video of Whitney Houston singing “I will always love you.” But in this version, there's a drum hit that was replaced by a real short clip of a guy swinging his junk into a girl's face, then the video goes back to Whitney, who continues to sing the song.
Being that I am an immature man, I thought this video was hilarious, so I went around my department, showing it to people. Then, I was near enough to my area manager's desk that he noticed what I was doing. He asked me “oh, you got a funny video there?” One of my friends jumped up and shouted over the cubicle wall “don't do it! It's not worth it!” I looked back at my area manager. He said, “is this something that's going to get you fired?” I said, “I don't know, are you going to fire me?” He paused for a second, and then said, “alright, let's see it.”
I showed him the video. The look on his face was a combination of trying to hold back his laughter while simultaneously thinking “why the hell did I ask?” and of course was followed by a face palm to the max. For those wondering, it would be another 3-4 years before I got fired! And when that day arrived, it was one of the happiest of my life.