What is something you know because of your job, that would surprise others? (My example is gross, thread warning!)

[Mrmen1100]

It can be anything!!

I will start..

I am a food safety inspector (local authority) and have been for over 15 years, working in two large cities, and my current job in a smaller local authority. The same theme...

Food handlers do NOT wash their hands properly after using the toilet / before preparing your food.. lack of antibacterial soap in a toilet cubicle or in a kitchen is common place.... even when I am there, hands are not washed, it is an absolute bug bear of mine.

Preparing with raw meat then handling food ready to eat.. not uncommon

Handling cash / touching screens then handling food.. not uncommon.

Yes it does put me off eating outside of my house unfortunately 🙃

I have come across a LOT worse but this example irritates me.

Your turn!!!!!

Current civil servant here, and yes, I agree. What film/TV show would you compare it to now? Groundhog Day?

That a very high proportion of domestic violence perpetrators are serving police officers.

You know all those enormous cargo ships that go chugging about the world? Some of them are up to 285,000 tonnes. The crew on them usually numbers between 18-24.

Ex flight attendant now nurse. Take antibac wipes on every flight. Wipe the seatbelt buckle, the tray table lock and the table itself, as well as the seat & armrests. Take wipes to the toilet and wipe the sink, taps & toilet seat. Use a new wipe to open & shut the door. Don’t drink the “tap” water. It’s been sitting in a festy tank.
Hotel rooms get similar treatment but also wipe the tv remote (several times) and the bedside tables. Don’t use any glasses or coffee mugs in your room and don’t sit your toothbrush up in one (they are usually wiped with a dirty cloth instead of properly cleaned) and don’t use the kettle or the iron as people will have cooked with them (boiled eggs & noodles in the kettle & toast, bacon & fried eggs on the iron) your clothes will never be the same again. Yes, people wash their knickers in the kettle and in coffee machines.

I think most parents are aware of being judged by the teachers! Most don't seem to do a good job of hiding it. It's also not surprising that teachers have favourites, even children themselves notice it. I'd be interested to know what's so bad about private nurseries though?

I agree on the generic medication. I developed horrific heartburn and pain after switching to a generic: both gp (who sent me for a scan to investigate gall bladder) and chemist said no connection to generic, went back on the branded meds and it disappeared.
Mine is that many charities, including those with a mental health focus or community development, treat their staff dreadfully.

When I worked for a council we were housed in an office block that was built in the late 1960's at the height of the Cold War.
I was sent to retrieve some boxes of files from the basement archive and was surprised to find that the "basement archive" was actually a fully equipped bombproof shelter with ventilation and filtration systems, sleeping and medical areas, kitchen, desks and telephones, a radio and was sealed with massive steel doors.
I asked my boss about it and she said that it was never going to be used as it wasn't until after the building was built that someone realised that the "chosen ones" in the bunker wouldn't be able to do much governing with the wreckage of a twelve story office block on top of them!!

I don’t know if this would be a surprise or not, but i have worked with a number of constabularies and courts, and am yet to experience any that practice the so-called ‘10% plus two’ for speeding offences.

I suspect there is degree of allowance/tolerance, but I’ve seen prosecutions for 35 in a 30, 45 in a 40, etc. I see people posting that police won’t prosecute for up to 10% plus two, but they can and do. (Rightly so, generally, imo.)

Do you know roughly how high?

Social workers and family support workers are or at least where I worked some of the most disgusting people... You honestly would not want them near your children...

We had family support workers admitting to hitting their partners calling the partners d* and fighting and all the social workers agreed that they were the same.

With one social worker who said I've got a fit dad he was a domestic abuse perpetrator.

Just so much awful, unprofessional behaviour

Senior staff bullying junior staff, covering of backs

So much bs...

I’m not saying you have not seen and heard this but that is not my experience at all.
I’ve name changed for this thread as SW get accused of all sorts on MN.

I know of a housing officer who got evicted from her HA for non payment of rent 🤦🏽‍♀️ and another housing officer who managed to get a HA house despite owning her own property as well.

I went to see a GP on one occasion and told him what I thought the issue was, and what medication I needed (commonly prescribed but usually for something else). He had a Google, agreed and prescribed 😅 It was all very sensible but did make me laugh.

I've made and thrown a Molotov cocktail, can I join?

I used to donate plasma and one day I went after having had pizza the night before. When they'd finished the donation the nurse held up the bag and showed me the layer of fat from the pizza floating on the top like oil on water.

Yes. Professor Magdi Yacoub, for instance. World renowned cardiologist.

Did you ever ride the Paternoster lift?

provided you don't throw one in here. In one of the Dick Francis novels, there is actual information about how to make an incendiary device.

I saw lots of women who thought they'd "lost a tampon up there" and not one actually had a retained tampon. And only saw two women with retained tampons in my working lifetime. Both presented with a discharge and no recollection of having forgotten to remove a tampon. The smell is indeed quite something. So is the relief that the thing visible in the posterior fornix isn't a big fungating tumour.

I think what most people forget is that with generics, the actual drug is the same, BUT the delivery system is not and it is often this part that makes the real difference. Also people do not realise that often pharmacists will swap out the branded medicines for a cheaper alternative, which although fiscally prudent and at time with CCG encouragement can end up with horrendous consequences, I had a colleague whose husband was a grand mal epileptic, the pharmacy swapped out his prescription, he then had the mother of all seizures, was off work for a year, lost his job due to this and you can guess the rest, including a rather large pay out.

People with hypermobility have trouble sitting still as well, the need to keep moving or else they start to ache everywhere. Bein in a theatre with hypermobile DH sitting on one side of me and hypermobile adult DD on the other is not a restful occasion. They both fidget all the time.

I did my degree 35 years ago (Psychology BSc Hons at UCL) and most students didn't turn up to lectures then either. We were supposed to 10 essays a term to our tutorial group and most people only managed 2 or 3. One end of term our tutor read out how many we had all done that term and sarcastically said I had made a dash for the finish by doing 3 in the last week to give a total of 5 - which put me in the top 10% of the class.

Staff can be “unqualified” and a Nursery manager can only have a level 3 certificate. Lots of parents believe they are run by qualified teachers.

High staff turnover. Usually very young staff whose hearts are not in it and why would they be on minimum wage!

Dangerous conditions. Poor engagement with children. Staff treating children poorly.

They felt like nursing homes for babies. The list goes on and on. All incidents were reported.

If you see something on a plane that looks suspiciously like duct tape, its not, its aluminium tape which is a very strong and sturdy tape. You don't need to worry that the plane is being held together by duct tape!

All my life I’ve been terrified of losing a tampon to the point I only use them if I’m going swimming, well last week at the grand old age of 42 I actually lost one, I couldn’t find the string so assumed I’d taken it out at the pool but woke in the night because I couldn’t remember using the loos at the pool so went into the bathroom and had to dig it out, the string had gone in 🤢