Hey, Sars. Love your suit.

So I work for a smallish office — about 30 employees. On the swing shift, we number eight: two guys and six girls. For the most part, we all get along great. However, there is one person — let’s call him “Robot” — who doesn’t really “mesh well” with the rest of us. It seems to us that Robot is quite socially inept, wastes a lot of time at work in various ways, and just generally doesn’t like women in a very creepy and stalker-ish way. I want to give you some examples of his behavior and ask your opinion as an outsider whether we are just obsessing over this too much or if we should really tell our supervisors what we think so that when he actually does come to the office wielding a machete and a machine gun, we can say, “We told you so.”

Socially inept is quite an understatement for Robot. First of all, he is a “low talker,” meaning it’s VERY HARD to hear him, so having a conversation with him is difficult to begin with. He likes to talk about strange things, like his past sex life escapades, his horrible marriage, and “The South Park,” as he likes to refer to it. He also has a penchant for arguing/debating inconsequential points to the verge of uncomfortableness. He also apparently has a hard time hearing, and since our job involves listening and transcribing speech, obviously this can be a problem. We thought maybe his headphones were to blame since he wears them in an unconventional way. (Picture Geordi LaForge from Star Trek: The Next Generation.) However, when he was asked about this by his supervisors (both female), he said that he wore them that way so he wouldn’t mess up his hair, although he admitted that wearing them this way made it difficult for him to hear the audio. WTF? I kid you not.

So a lot of Robot’s time is wasted at work because he has to spend extra time listening to so-called “inaudibles” and have other people come over to his desk and listen to them for him. Many times, the person listening for him has no trouble whatsoever hearing what’s being said. He also wastes time by generally doing a poor job on his projects, due to not reading the notes for the project, not understanding the notes for the project and then not asking questions about the project. When he does have a question, it’s usually an inane and remedial one in an attempt (in my opinion) to have an opportunity just to talk with someone. Just the other day, he wasted a half hour working on a project that was being done by someone else because he “misread” the schedule. He also requires a “special schedule” because, A, he’s in grad school and, B, he needs to be home on Fridays with his wife. (Presumably, to work on his “horrible marriage.”)

As for his dislike of women, we think this is evidenced in the fact that he will argue with our supervisors when they try to correct him or give him changes they made to a project of his. I don’t believe he has directly disobeyed an order from our supervisors yet, but I sense that I’m wrong. By the way, a couple of us girls have asked a couple of our guy friends in the office if they have noticed insubordinate or hostile behavior toward them, and they have stated that they have noticed no such thing, had no idea, yada yada yada.

Finally, I used to carpool with this person, but I had to stop because I was feeling very creeped out by his behavior. For example, sometimes when he was driving us home, he would slow down to 40, 45 mph on the freeway. I thought at first that this was because he was talking and driving at the same time, but then I realized that this wasn’t a problem during the day. I got the impression that he slowed down to make the car ride last longer so he could talk to me more. And these conversations weren’t the same old boring, mindless, gettin’-to-know-you chit-chat. In almost every conversation, he found a way to bring up sex, whether it be about him or me or, say, famous people. He went into some detail one night about his exploits during his “college days.” I couldn’t believe my ears. All I could do was try to change the subject. Well, since I’ve stopped carpooling with him, he has sometimes followed me to and from work. Now, granted, we work in the same building and live in generally the same area. But in order to avoid seeing him, I have changed my route several times. Well, each time, it hasn’t been a couple days before I see him driving my new route. A couple of times, he has left the office for the night, and then I have left the office about 15, 20 minutes after him, and he has been sitting in his car outside and leaves right after I do.

So, Sars, are we (am I) justified in thinking that this guy is not only creepy but also potentially dangerous? Or are we just going out of our minds?

Signed,
Shuddery

Dear Shud,

I don’t think he’s sharpening-the-knives dangerous, but he could certainly be doesn’t-get-it dangerous, and frankly, if he’s that troublesome an employee, I don’t quite see why he hasn’t been let go (although, if you work in a union shop, that kind of incompetent boob can hang on for decades once he’s passed his probation…sigh).

Keep an eye on him and document everything, but I think he’s probably “just” creepy.If you haven’t already, report all of this to your supervisor, especially the part where he’s following you, and see if you can’t at least get him moved out of your section — or yourself excused from interacting with him at all during the day — but if you can’t, well, you can’t.As I said, inept freaks like that don’t get fired as fast as they should sometimes because workplaces are afraid to get sued; if you’re stuck with him, make it clear to your boss that you want nothing to do with him.

Dear Sars,

This is about a boy. Our families have been friends for well over thirty years, and he and I always got along when we were younger, but we weren’t particularly close. I went away to college and saw very little of him, but when I came back about five years ago, he and I went to the beach with a bottle of wine to chill for his birthday. We ended up talking ’til sunrise about everything in our lives, and had the most amazingly intense connection. We’ve been best friends ever since, and we totally get each other, even though we’re very very different. (He’s old-school strait-laced, I’m bisexual-feminist-activist chick.)Add to that the fact that he’s absolutely my type of guy, physically: tall, strong build but not Mr. Musclehead, quirky nose, and a smile that makes you melt. I’m sure you won’t be surprised to hear that sometime over the last five years, I fell in love with him.

I’m not the only person who sees our connection as a more-than-friends thing. For a while there he was dating a girl who HATED me because of how close he and I are. All his friends have asked what’s up with us, to the point where he started introducing me as his “cousin” to stave off the curious questions of those who wondered at the hypercloseness between us. In fact, he has even admitted — in front of myself and mutual friends — that there’s sexual tension there. But so far, we’ve never even kissed. And I know why: my weight.

He does not like big girls. His idea of “thick” is size 10. And I? Am a big girl. I’m also 5’9″ and very well proportioned, so most folks think I look at least 50 lbs. lighter than I actually am, but I’m heavy enough to qualify for bariatric surgery for weight loss. I’m currently in the process of getting all the paperwork approved in order to have the surgery. Not because of him, or love life problems or self-esteem issues or anything like that. Not to sound conceited, but I’m an attractive girl — great hair, pretty face, busty, nice skin, and I know how to dress to accentuate the positive and minimize the not-so-positive. I’ve never had trouble getting boys (or girls) before, and I’m perfectly willing to take things into my own hands when I’m single, so it’s not that. It’s that I’ve started having health problems tied to the weight, and my family’s history of diabetes, heart disease, et cetera, means that things will only get worse over time.

So when I started on the whole surgery trip, I didn’t think about it in terms of “will he like me when I become skinny?” But the thought eventually did occur to me, and now I’m sort of flummoxed. A part of me thinks that he might very well finally act on our mutual attraction. But a part of me also thinks that I’ll resent him if the only reason he finally acted on it was because I’d lost the weight. But am I being too hard on him? It’s not like he’s rejecting me over 15 lbs., it’s the equivalent of an entire other person that I’ll be getting rid of, you know? Or should I not even be thinking about this at all because he might not even make a move, period? I know I run that risk, and I know that even if we do end up acting on it things might not work out, but I sometimes think we would have something really special together, you know? Le sigh.

Any advice you’ve got I’d be very grateful for!

Big Girls Don’t Cry

Dear Big,

Well, I think you can’t put the cart before the horse.If he acts on the attraction post-surgery, okay, but you should probably wait and see if that actually happens before you worry too much about what it means.

But the fact does remain that 1) he has not acted on it before, because of your size; and 2) you have not acted on your attraction, presumably also because of your size and because you know he’s not into bigger girls.And if he’s not into that, he’s not; I’m not blaming him.But obviously you didn’t feel secure confessing yourself either, so you’ve sort of kept it to yourself all these years, and if something does happen between you when you’re thinner…it’s a lot of baggage to carry into it, is my point.

That doesn’t have to be a bad thing; it’s just something you need to be aware of, and if something does happen between you, you need to be forthright with him about any resentments and discomfort you have with the timing of it.And if something doesn’t happen between you, you should either make something happen yourself or resolve to let it go.Again, several years of what-if is a long time, and if nothing’s going to happen…nothing’s going to happen, and it’s time for you to move forward.

I do think you should make your feelings for him plain at some point, just so you know you tried.When you do that is up to you, of course.But I think you’ve wondered about this guy long enough.I’m sure he’s a lovely person, but if he’s not The Guy…

Sars,

Please help me settle a debate.When referring to the FORTUNE 500 list in
an articles, as in “XXX Company is part of the FORTUNE 500,” does FORTUNE
need to be capitalized or italicized?Looking at fortune.com, FORTUNE 500
is trademarked with the caps, but my colleague says the NY Times usage
guide indicates the phrase should be written as Fortune 500.Since we use
the AP Stylebook, which has no reference to the ranking, I’m at a loss.

Thanks!

J

Dear J,

I wouldn’t go by Fortune‘s usage; many publications use different type to refer to themselves.I think either “Fortune 500” or “Fortune 500″ is fine, but if anyone out there works in the business press and wants to weigh in, let’s hear it.

Hey Sars,

For several years, I worked alongside a guy I’ll call Robert -– actually, he was my manager, but so laid back about it that it never really seemed that way.We sat next to each other all day, neither of us much liked the job, we talked about everything and anything, although as we were at work it wasn’t terribly soul-searching stuff.But we’d talk about things we’d done at the weekend, our childhoods, holidays, likes and dislikes, books, movies, whatever came up.It made a crappy job a million times more bearable.A few times we went out after work to various things, which was fine, though not quite as comfortable as chatting together at work.

Last year he quit the job, as he’d been intending to do for a while.It was stressful and he wanted to spend more time with his little daughter.Not only did I miss him hugely, I was disappointed not to be promoted to his job.After a few months, I quit the job as well.

The situation is that I like this guy so much, I would really like to stay friends with him somehow, but I’m finding it kind of a slog.I was commuting to the job, so now that I have left we are in different cities, an hour apart by train.We’ve met up a couple of times -– one time I was through there for something, another he was through in my city for something.I feel that both times it has been strained and I think the problem is a gender one.I guess it might be a variation on that When Harry Met Sally question, can men and women ever be friends?

Except in this case, I mean the question genuinely.I’m not used to having male friends, I have heaps of friends but they’re nearly all female apart from two -– one of whom is gay and quite camp, the other is someone I got to know originally as part of a couple.Even those two I don’t see as much as my female friends, who I speak to or see about every day.So I think that while I don’t find it hard to speak to men as such, and I wouldn’t really say that I’m a girlie girl, I’m not really used to the different rhythms of being friends with them.Dating them is a whole different thing, you see.I was really best friends with my last boyfriend, but there’s a built-in intimacy there.

I know that Robert likes me as a person, although he’s not the sort who would ever say something like that.He hasn’t made a huge effort to keep in touch with me, but I do get the odd email and the times I have suggested meeting up, he has gone out of his way to meet me and seemed pleased to see me.But when we meet, all we talk about is what movies we have seen.We both like movies, sure, and he’s currently reviewing films for a magazine, but seriously, that’s all we end up talking about even when I try to move the conversation into another field.

Here’s an example.Last time we met I mentioned a very exciting (to me) new project that I have just taken on.Every woman friend I talked to about this was instantly asking questions, expressing enthusiasm, et cetera.Even if they weren’t that interested themselves, they could see I was, so they made it a discussion.Robert, however, barely reacted and didn’t ask anything about it.Whereas, because I’d gotten him to tell me last time about how he’s renovating his house, I made a point to ask him how it was going, what exactly he still had to do, et cetera.To me, that’s what you do with friends, you talk about what’s going on in your lives, not just swap aesthetic opinions.But I’m aware that guy friendships might be different and I really want to allow for that.

If we were in the same city, I’d make more of an effort to befriend his partner (I’ve only met her once, she seemed very nice but unfortunately got drunk and started babbling rather intimate sexual details and believe me, I really wish she hadn’t).As it is, that may not be possible and anyway, one of them always has to be looking after the three-year-old.He doesn’t really seem to have a great many other friends, by the way, and I don’t get the impression that his girlfriend and he have that many common interests, apart from being together and their daughter, obviously.

I’m not sure if I need to say this, but just in case: I have no romantic interest in Robert and I’m sure he doesn’t have any in me.To hell with what Billy Crystal says.

So, my question is: is it worth me putting in the effort to be friends with Robert?It’s fun enough talking movies with him, but I’m not really going to travel to another city that often to do that.I think he’s a great guy, whom I admire a lot, but compared with my female friends I think it’s a pretty shallow friendship.But I think it would be nice to have another real male friend.Am I expecting too much?

Sally, without the Harry

Dear Sal,

I don’t think the problem here is a gender divide.I think it’s that, now that the two of you don’t work together anymore, there just isn’t that much to say.When you spend the day side-by-side in a cube farm, you wind up talking about any old thing because…why not?But once one of you leaves the job, it’s harder, because that’s what you had in common, and once you don’t have that, the conversational ease doesn’t always translate.It seems like it should, but it doesn’t always.

It’s not that he’s a guy.It’s that you don’t have similar social styles, and that can go unnoticed in the workplace, but outside of it…I mean, stay in touch with him, by all means, but it’s not supposed to be that effortful, and if he can’t come up with anything to talk about except movies, well, that’s pretty much that.Not all friendships last or stay the same; just let it go how it’s goingto go.

I’ve had the most amazing boyfriend for the past several months.He’s practically perfect in every way —
terribly smart, wickedly funny, a little shy, good-looking, treat me with adoration and respect, good job.You’d
think I wouldn’t have a problem, right?The problem is the last item on the list — his job…or at least his
perception of it.

See, even though he has a degree in natural sciences, Boyfriend manages a chain bookstore,
which I think is super-cool.I worked in book retail for a long time myself as an underling and always enjoyed it
immensly.Besides, what’s cuter than a guy shelving Homer in glasses and a smock?He makes good money and
is, for the most part, happy with his employment.

However, I’m a graduate student in English with a teaching
assistanceship at a private university.I love taking Boyfriend to my mind-numbingly pretentious and boring
official functions because he keeps me from pulling out my hair.He, however, always seems embarassed and
ashamed when people ask him what he does for a living.I can tell it bothers him and that he feels intimidated by
the academics.Hell, I’M intimidated by the academics!I hate it that he feels bad about his (cool) job.I’ve
talked to him and reassured him that nobody looks down on him at all (in fact, they all love him and I tell him so)
and that even if they did, screw ’em.But he still seems uncomfortable around my professors and even my
friends.

Short of just not inviting him to things anymore (which would just make things worse), how do I help
him feel proud of who he is?Thanks.

Torn Literati

Dear Torn,

You should just leave it alone.He knows you dig him; he knows you dig his job; if he’s uncomfortable, and if it’s not because of anything you or your friends have said or done, well, it’s his issue and he needs to deal with it on his own…and if you keep bringing up that he shouldn’t be ashamed or whatever, I think it just keeps bringing the focus around to the job and the embarrassment and blah blah, and you’re better off just leaving it be.

I mean, if he doesn’t want to go to the academic events and you drag him, that’s one thing, but if he goes voluntarily and then he’s all squirmy, well, it’s not your fault.As long as he’s got a drink in his hand and someone to talk to, he’ll live, but if he’s that mortified by working at a bookstore…he could always quit, but he hasn’t, so presumably he’s made something of a peace with it, and there’s only so much cheerleading you can do before it starts to feel patronizing.He knows you’re proud of him; that’s all you can really do.

[11/18/04]

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