To think this is a really fucking weird thing to do?

[SummersB]

Brought a cake into work the other day - Banana & Blueberry, it was bloody lovely!
One of my colleagues asked me where I had the recipe from and I told her the author. I’ve previously made this before and have shared the recipe with a few of my colleagues, but in the interest of full disclosure I had no intention of sharing it with this particular one because to be honest I can’t stand her (she is a higher banding - band 6 nursing staff - and due to a massive chip in her shoulder she makes junior staff’s working life a misery by being patronising and belittling at every opportunity and is therefore really unpleasant to work with).
Another colleague just told me that a few days after I had brought my cake in she came into work with exactly the same cake, obviously having google searched the recipe and attempted to recreate it. We had a bit of a laugh about it because apparently it was shit as she’d burnt it and managed to make it really dry. But am I right in thinking that’s a really odd thing to do? Who tastes a cake their workmate baked, goes home, looks the recipe up online and comes in two days later saying “ta-da, look, you know the cake you made the other day - well I could have made any other cake in the world but I’ve decided to look it up and make exactly the same one and bring in to work too”? Or is it just me?

[ThumbWitchesAbroad]

I'm going with "yes it's weird" - if she doesn't normally bring in cakes, and doesn't have one that she likes to make, then to specifically attempt to recreate the one YOU brought in, is weird.
Especially if she fucked it up!

[calilark]

It is a little odd, but honestly its just a cake.

[Nesssie]

I am not precious about my recipes at all Well you are...

You don't sound very nice tbh

[DailyBaileys]

@Crazypaintlady -- My mil makes amazing trifles, so one day I decided to recreate one using her recipe. I make my own all the time now. I had no idea she might think I'm such a weirdo.

But that's completely normal.

If you brought your trifle to an office, knowingly two days after your MIL did, that would be odd...
imo, anyway.

[Bloomini]

It's just you.

YABU.

Weird to get this get up about a cake recipe you didn't write.

[MsJuniper]

It sounds like the sort of thing someone would do if they were trying to be more part of a group, be friendly but weren't quite sure how to break the cycle or soften their personality if they are a bit spiky or headstrong. Actually it sounds like a sort of problem-page-solution to that kind of issue!

Perhaps her behaviour has been really horrible and she's burned her bridges, or perhaps it's a window of opportunity to change the work environment culture? I guess it is up to you how you want to play it.

[Nickpan]

I love the occasional traditional Mumsnet responses!

OP: I work with an absolute arse, petty and competitive.
MN: Ooh, you sound like a bit of a petty competitive arse to me.

[ravenmum]

OP: I got together with others to laugh at someone and exclude them from my group.
MN: Ooh, you sound like a bully.

[ThatssomebadhatHarry]

Nickpan I love the occasional traditional bully responses.

Op: there is this bully in work who had the audacity to make the same cake as me, I’m offended.
Mumsnet: doesn’t really sound like anything to be offended at.
Op: yep but the cake was rubbish we had a good laugh at her
Mumsnet: now you sound like the bull
Op: Flounces off.

[snowball28]

I’ve got a colleague who always tries to best my lemon drizzle and coffee cake, bless her. Never going to happen 🤣

I’d say it’s not weird to ask for the recipe and recreate at home but a little odd to bring it into work, I would of made something else

[Confusedbeetle]

This is so childish. Like a childrens spat

[RoboticSealpup]

Lemon drizzle and coffee cake

Not in the same cake, surely?

[RebeccaWrongDaily]

CAKE WARS.

you sound really strange OP.

As an aside i thought nurses were all rushed off their feet not able to go for a wee all shift and here you are recreating and eating bake off every day.

[RoboticSealpup]

i thought nurses were all rushed off their feet

I think she may have baked the cake at home...

[sagradafamiliar]

She liked it, she made it. Not weird, nice you all had a good old laugh at her about it though

[Pernickity1]

You sound petty and bitchy OP. I'd work on that and forget the cake.

[Bluntness100]

Did you mean Mean Lemon drizzle and coffee cakes, plural. As a pp said, that's not all in the same cake is it?

[JaneJeffer]

That cake sounds disgusting but yes she sounds weird.

[Belenus]

As someone who has had to put up with a bully at work for years, I despair at the people defending the bully on this thread just to give the OP a good kicking.

I've left jobs due to bullying. Taken things as far as a successfully upheld official grievance - but still left anyway. The trouble is, from this snapshot the OP has given us I'd be hard put to spot the bully. The OP accuses the colleague, but then acts in a way that comes across as petty and mean herself. Bullies know how to disguise themselves and to manipulate others. Without knowing both sides and being able to assess any kind of pattern, it's impossible to know what's going on.

But in the end, it's a cake and so not really worth much angst.

[gamerwidow]

The NHS is rife with this sort of pettiness. My sister used to work with a team of women who were constantly trying to exclude her with stupid shit like all dressing in spots so x feels left out. It’s worse than school sometimes. You wouldn’t believe the time I waste as a manager sorting out these low level acts of nastiness.

[Bluntness100]

The thing is you hear all these stories abòut nurses being over worked, a national shortage, and here you have one of them painting a picture of them all bitching about who made the best facking cake.

[pinkgloves]

This smacks of bullying to me.

[ShortandSweet96]

Is be interested to know how old OP is..

I'm imagining a Regina George (mean girls) type character..

[ThumbWitchesAbroad]

IME, chronological age has fuck all to do with how bullies behave, although "maturity age" might have a lot to do with it!

We had a mid-40s playground bully at our school last year, who started multiple hate campaigns against various people, starting with one and then fanning out to others who associated with her, then others who associated with them too! It was ridiculous. This one had mentally never left high school, it seemed.

And I used to know a lovely lady who was in her 50s, who experienced office bullying from another woman in her 50s - so bad that my friend had to go off on stress leave. She said the worst bit was that some of the other people in the office, with whom she'd worked for many years, started to believe the bully, so it trashed her relationship with those colleagues as well. The managers knew it was all crap and the bully was "managed out" but it took far too long. :(

[Sukochicha]

I dunno, she liked the cake you made. She tried to recreate it. Bringing cake in is clearly a 'thing' at your work so she tried to join in.

I doubt anyone has enough head space to try and nick your cake making place as a form of one upmanship?