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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think the unofficial fridge monitor at work

46 replies

wowfudge · 06/05/2014 13:31

..should leave other people's stuff the hell alone?

I had a yoghurt in the fridge which I planned to have this lunchtime. It's not there. I know it was a couple of days out of date - only a couple mind - so would have been perfectly edible.

This is not the first time this kind of thing has happened so I'm pretty annoyed.

For the record, I used to clear the fridge out at my last place of work and some of the stuff in there was practically unidentifiable. Yuck. At least I emailed before I did the clear out and asked people to shift out of date stuff themselves or I would chuck it out.

OP posts:
DoJo · 06/05/2014 13:43

It is a bit cheeky to throw away someone's food, but if it was out of date they might have thought it was forgotten. Had it been in there for a while, or did you take it in to eat today? I'd be more inclined to be on the fridge monitor's side if you had been keeping it in the fridge for days on end as that would suggest it had been overlooked by the original purchaser (although I agree that an email would have been a good idea!).

MiniSoksMakeHardWork · 06/05/2014 13:44

Pop a name on a sticky label and out it over the date next time. Yes it's annoying, but make it clear it is yours and people can come to you if they have any worries. I've worked in an office with 4 people and 1 fridge. It's pretty grim when you go on a fortnight's leave and the same food is there when you get back. I'm not saying this is what you've done, clearly you haven't. But someone has to feel obliged to sort it or no one does.

BitterAndOnlySlightlyTwisted · 06/05/2014 13:48

Put your name on your stuff and ask the unofficial monitor not to chuck your food out unless you've told them they can. Some people are absolute numpties about BB dates and think foodstuffs become positively dangerous on the stroke of midnight.

expatinscotland · 06/05/2014 13:51

What Mini said. I used to do this with my food in a parent kitchen.

Callani · 06/05/2014 14:51

I'm inclined to say YABU but that's because I've lived with people who will leave stuff in the fridge until it gets up and walks away...

It depends on the size of the office, but at our rather large one the rule is that anything left in the fridge after 5.30 on Friday gets chucked whether it's in date or not. Everybody knows the rule and clears out before then and nothing gets left rotting over the weekend. Can get slightly annoying when you've got enough milk left for a couple of cups of tea but I think it's way more sensible than emailing everyone but in a smaller office maybe.

drspouse · 06/05/2014 15:05

I have thrown out milk that was two weeks out of date - and turned to yoghurt - from our work fridge.

I have never chucked out butter or yoghurt that is only a couple of days over (I may have some butter in the fridge myself that is a couple of weeks over).

There are far too many people using our work fridge for us even to know who they are, let alone whose food is whose and to email them all.

Pobblewhohasnotoes · 06/05/2014 15:13

I think yabu, you should have put your name on it.

Stuff gets chucked out of our fridge regularly, if it's out of date and no name it's gone.

Original poster
wowfudge · 06/05/2014 15:37

I do see both sides of this. What really gets my goat is that the UFM is self-appointed and I don't actually know who it is, although I strongly suspect it is one individual. Who thinks that if a carton of milk has been open for a day it is not good to use it!

The fridge is there for use by a group of staff in a given area, there are no rules surrounding its use as such. The fact that I put something in there a few days ago shouldn't mean there is more likelihood it gets chucked out surely? In fact this person is clearly only looking at dates because my low fat salad dressing has been in the fridge door a while.

OP posts:
drspouse · 06/05/2014 15:53

So the yoghurt was out of date, but the salad dressing is in date?

Sounds like a sensible fridge monitor to me.

liquidstatehasrisenagain · 06/05/2014 16:16

I had an annoying housemate that did this. I would put a sticker over the date. Yoghurt a couple of days out of date is fine to eat.

susiedaisy · 06/05/2014 16:24

I feel torn.i work in a hospital and the staff fridge can be full of out of date stuff and sometimes it's rank. So I do sometimes do a sweep of the fridge and anything that's over a week out of date and I know has been kicking about in there for ages I bin. Blush. Someone once brought in homemade soup in a margarine tub. We all thought it was marg. the fridge smelled so bad we couldn't use the staff room. Eventually we found this 'soup'. The smell still sticks in mindConfused

AnotherOneWorld · 06/05/2014 17:50

YABU.

Out of date food in communal fridges is rank.

Dreamer789 · 06/05/2014 17:55

YABU - we have had food going rotten so the fridge monitor is doing everyone a favour

Nomama · 06/05/2014 17:56

I am absolutely not in any way going to be polite to our fridge monitor.

I had a piece of goats cheese, all wrapped up, with a very long use by date. It was on offer so I had bought 2 of them. The second one sat in my little tub in the fridge for about 3 weeks and when I went to eat it it had gone.

The fridge monitor said that the fridge smelled awful and it was my cheese that was causing it! So I dug the cheese out of the bin, a little warm, which is fine as that is how you eat it, and unwrapped it, held it under her nose and asked her what exactly she could smell?

I ate it, right in front of her. When I went to put the remnants back in the fridge (to piss her off right royally) I noticed a slight smell from one shelf. It was her brie!

Now, I am not pissed off because she brought my cheese up to room temperature or that her cheese was causing the smell she complained about. I am livid because she sent an email naming and shaming me, as I had appretnly ignored previous emails (possibly because ny food was not our of date). But she said nothing by way of apology, no email, nothing.

I have sent an email, accidentally to the department rather than just to her: "My cheese was in date, wrapped and did not smell. Your brie was unwrapped, oozing off the plate and stank to high heaven. Throw my food in the bin again and I will steal all your red pens"

Yes, we are teachers Smile

DoJo · 06/05/2014 18:38

The fact that I put something in there a few days ago shouldn't mean there is more likelihood it gets chucked out surely?

I only mentioned it because a yoghurt that appears in the morning, even if out of date, is unlikely to have been forgotten, whereas a yoghurt which has been in the fridge for a few days and has subsequently gone out of date could more reasonably be assumed to have been overlooked.

Having said that, this kind of shit is why I'm so glad I work from home - used to piss me off royally when people messed with stuff in communal areas, left their skanky washing up everywhere and generally annoyed me!

PrincessBabyCat · 06/05/2014 18:41

Our place had a monthly fridge clean at the end of one of the days and everything was tossed except condiments. We were emailed and if we wanted our food we grabbed it and took it home so the cleaning people could scrub out the fridge.

Sparrowlegs248 · 06/05/2014 18:55

We do a group email before chucking stuff out.

PizzaMama · 06/05/2014 19:18

OMG! Is this thread about me?! I binned a yoghurt today that went out of date on 30/05 Confused

TBH, I have no idea how long it had been in the fridge, I just noticed it when I was getting my butter out - whoops!

PizzaMama · 06/05/2014 19:19

*30/04 even! Epic fail first post!

Original poster
wowfudge · 06/05/2014 19:21

Tbf I am more hacked off that this person is chucking stuff on an anonymous, uncommunicated basis. I have never left anything to go off chance would be a fine thing although, yes, out of date on occasion.

I will take to labelling my things. I may even put them in a container in the fridge. I've refrained from doing so because there isn't masses of space and get a couple of largish plastic boxes in there and it's pretty full.

Dojo - I still don't get why, if you thought something had been forgotten, you wouldn't just remind people? A quick email wouldn't hurt, would it?

OP posts:
Original poster
wowfudge · 06/05/2014 19:22

Yeah PizzaMama - get your hands off other people's out of date yoghurts. Did you communicate what you had done? Better check the date on your butter!

OP posts:
PizzaMama · 06/05/2014 19:27

Not on this occasion TBH but I have done in the past and just got blank looks when I asked if it belonged to anyone but I'll just leave anything I spot alone from now on Smile

SlatternMissesherGrumpyCat · 06/05/2014 19:35

On occasion in my work the fridge plug has been accidentally taken out. When this happens a certain person bins everything in the fridge, everything! Butter, cheese, ketchup, salad dressing etc. it drives me mad. The fridge door will have been closed the whole time and some of this stuff is designed to have a long life, there is not a damn thing wrong with it.

I respect the right for her to throw her own stuff out, but why mine.

Original poster
wowfudge · 06/05/2014 19:46

Ooh Slattern that's not good at all. Do you retrieve it and put it back. Like Nomama with her goat's cheese?

OP posts:
honeybeeridiculous · 06/05/2014 19:51

Think yourself lucky you don't work at my place OP
We have to name and date our food, stickers provided Hmm and woe betide anyone who doesn't label theirs as it goes in the bin, no questions asked. Our boss had to reimburse someone once as their lunch had been dumped, flippin madness Shock