Worst task you've ever been assigned

[speedog]

So what is the worst task you've ever been assigned?

Mine has to be a task from about 39 years ago - I was tasked with digging out the stuck leg of a wood grain elevator, the leg contains the conveyer belt that takes the grain to the top of the elevator.

Now this would be tough for some people because it is an unlit, confined space that is at the lowest point in a grain elevator. But on this occasion there was some extra additional special stuff, unbeknownst to me there was a crust of about 3-4 inches of grain with rotting grain underneath on top of about 8 inches of water. Stepped on to it thinking it was the bottom of the boot (what this area is called) and broke through, now I'm standing more than ankle deep in a mix of dank water and rotting grain in a deep, dark, very dusty and confined space and if you've ever experienced what rotting grain smells like, well keeping g one's cookies down is ne'er impossible.

Nest of all, I had to scoop all that wonderful stuff up which was hoisted above me by a coworker in a 5 gallon bucket with that mess dripping on me before I could proceed with my original assigned task. Only had this happen once but it is most definitely the worst task I've ever been assigned, even worse than going down into a manhole that has hundress of dead and bloated floating mice in it - I'd take dead, bloated mice over rotting grain any day.

[OU812]

Reading Zenops posts.

[Sugarphreak]

...

[Kloubek]

I worked at Zellers in their stock room, putting myself through college - some 20 years ago. We didn't have an on-shift maintenance person or cleaning crew, so any such work that was required was delegated to me, even if it wasn't in my job description.

One day I was told that there was a mess in the men's bathroom. And god, was there ever. Someone had basically taken a few minutes to throw their shit all over the walls, floors, ceiling. This was not a small bathroom too... it was the typical 3-4 stall, multi-sink variety. I spent hours in there trying not to hurl. I told the HR person I was never doing that again. (Though she told me I would if I had to. I quit shortly thereafter)

-----------------

While not quite on topic, I felt this would be a good opportunity to share another story that happened around the same time. A courier came to our back door to deliver a package. We had a loading bay so it was several feet off the ground. He figured it would be a nice guy to give us the slip to sign, so he hopped up on top of a barrel we had right by the loading bay.

This barrel was used to house the old cooking oil from the restaurant Zellers had at the time. It was due to be picked up and was virtually full to the brim with old, rancid oil. Well, as you might guess, the lid did a rotation like it was on a pivot, and this courier dropped straight down, rib-high in this oil. We tried to rinse him off with a hose, but he ultimately had to drive away saturated in truly awful smelling sludge. I always wondered if he ended up finishing his shift, or just calling it a day....

[flipstah]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak

I started working for engineering firms here in Calgary when I was just 19... so most of my awful stuff is just office politics.

That must've been difficult, doing AutoCAD by paper, pencil, and a ruler. Slide rules were still a thing, right? :)

[codetrap]

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[Sugarphreak]

...

[dirtsniffer]

I cleaned the superstore butchers shop at night for a while. Not a fun time, Had to lift garbage cans full of bones and trimmings nose high to get them into the trash chute.

Seems easy compared to you lot

[toastgremlin]

Originally posted by Kloubek
I worked at Zellers in their stock room, putting myself through college - some 20 years ago. We didn't have an on-shift maintenance person or cleaning crew, so any such work that was required was delegated to me, even if it wasn't in my job description. Hey, I had the same job about ten years ago. Nothing like using a forklift and power loader with nothing resembling licensing or training while your coworkers decided they would rather free-climb the shelves to get stuff down.

The only good part about that job was the cardboard box compressor and even then some asshole put an entire box of spaghetti sauce (in glass jars) through one night so it broke.

Also one of the shift managers got into a fistfight with a shoplifter in the parking lot.

[Mitsu3000gt]

About 15 years ago I worked at RONA, and I was asked to sweep the gravel out of the parking lot, and given a broom & dust pan. An impossible task haha.

If there are any doctors/nurses on here they can probably beat everyone's story with ease :rofl:

[Swank]

Cleaning out the grease trap at KFC. The yellow, orange, and pink layers of rancid sludge was, to this day, the worst thing I ever smelled :barf: :barf: :barf:

[03ozwhip]

I had to pick up rocks for an entire day.....I'm a welder. Ya it was slow. Not gross or hard, just a really useless waste of a day haha

[Kloubek]

Originally posted by toastgremlin
Hey, I had the same job about ten years ago. Nothing like using a forklift and power loader with nothing resembling licensing or training while your coworkers decided they would rather free-climb the shelves to get stuff down.

The only good part about that job was the cardboard box compressor and even then some asshole put an entire box of spaghetti sauce (in glass jars) through one night so it broke.

Also one of the shift managers got into a fistfight with a shoplifter in the parking lot.

For the last year there, I did some shadowing of our security guy and got into a couple of incidents of my own; one real big one. That's a story for another time.

We were the first Zellers in Canada to get the box compressor as a pilot run. I remember that shiny blue machine well... we were so excited!

As for the forklift, I never drove ours. I only got to play with the electric power jacks; that was about it. But I do remember climbing over the pallet racking to get things. Our storeroom was so packed, climbing through the racking was a daily occurrence.

Oh, and another real shitty aspect of that job is that it was also my job to collect the carts people had left around the mall. However, I had no motorized helper, so it was just me exhaustively pushing a huge lineup of carts up hills. Especially sucked in the winter.....

[LilDrunkenSmurf]

Originally posted by dirtsniffer
I cleaned the superstore butchers shop at night for a while. Not a fun time, Had to lift garbage cans full of bones and trimmings nose high to get them into the trash chute.

Seems easy compared to you lot

I had to do this at Sobey's.

[rage2]

Originally posted by Mitsu3000gt
If there are any doctors/nurses on here they can probably beat everyone's story with ease :rofl:
Every nurse/tech that I've talked to is so used to cleaning shit coming out of people's asses it's not even a bad job anymore. :rofl:

[Swank]

My g/f is an ER nurse, she's not allowed to talk about work at the dinner table :barf:

[RY213]

Originally posted by codetrap
Cleaning the public washroom at safeway after some old guy exploded shit all over the walls. No idea WTF was wrong with him but there was shit splattered over the two walls beside the toilet at least two feet up the wall, the toilet itself was overflowed and shitty water was leaking under the door into the loading dock area.


Lmao I had the exact same experience working at Safeway.

[AndyL]

Fixing dock levelers at grocery stores... oh and any maintenance at all at a certain rendering plant in Ogden ... had to do an emergency repair one night- just close the door, was getting replaced in am... So I slice through this rubber door - to feed a chain through - maggots start pouring out of the belting... I puked right there...

Really worst - walking into a construction coordination meeting (as it appeared in my email). Very large government project, probably our companies largest single contract in 2-3 years. Spent 2 weeks from notice of meeting until an hour before meeting trying to get the file from the PM. Never got it. Grabbed what was in the computer quote, and ran with it...

Turned out it was a meeting to discuss the million dollars of custom programming and integration to a door I didn't even know we sold - with a full on custom electronics package.

Worst meeting in my life... somehow I survived, nobody caught on that I was f'ing clueless, and totally winging it...

[BerserkerCatSplat]

Once upon a time in high school, I worked for a food packaging place during the summers. One of the primary functions of this plant was to take the 100lb bulk burlap potato bags and repackage them into smaller bags for resale - the 5lb, 10lb, or 20lb bags you see at the grocery store.

That's a pretty normal job, except sometimes there would be something go wrong with a shipment, or the bulk potatoes would be of bad quality (moldy, or in some rarer cases infected with maggots) so instead of rebagging they would be dumped into bins and sent off to be processed into french fries as they would be sterilized and shaped to the point where you couldn't really tell they were once shitty potatoes.

Anyway, one day somebody realized that a bin full of 10lb bags of yellow-flesh potatoes had somehow missed being shipped out and had been hiding behind some decommed equipment in the warehouse. It didn't have maggots, no, those maggots had eaten their fill of potatoes and had become flies. Even just bumping the bin would send up a swarm of annoyed bugs. Sure enough, somebody in the office said "Yep, cut the bags open and dump them into an empty bin for fry processing." The major problems with this operation were:

- The incredible, overwhelming stink of truly rancid potatoes, which you could withstand for only a few seconds at a time
- A swarm of thousands of bugs, angry that you were disturbing their ancestral home
- The post-maggot potatoes were so incredibly rotten that they had, to a large extent, turned into some kind of potato goo. When you lifted a bag to cut it open and dump it into the empty bin, liquefied potato would ooze out of the air holes in the bag and turned the floor into a stinking, slippery mess.

We took turns using an air hose to temporarily scatter the bugs, grab a bag, dump it into the fresh bin, and then hastily retreat from the area while gagging. This went on for a good half hour until somebody in the office decided maaaaybe this wasn't a great idea and elected to just dump the nasty taters in the trash. The whole plant stank for days even after bleaching the floors.

[Rat Fink]

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[nickyh]

the one i'm doing now.

My company purchased some assets so it's my job to enter everything into my crude oil system - 1) finding their information is navigating a maze
2) i've requested documents multiple times to see transfers / ownership to be told - ok. Um still waiting...
3) I'm supposed to invoice this out - copies of contracts etc would be awesome... same dealeo, told I will get the information.
4) oh yeah, i'm also supposed to run profit projections for the new asset. Awesome...

I'm just bitching...I'm tired of having to fucking piece shit together from garbage / nothingness with little to no direction & help.

I suppose I could leave tasks 1-3 until July 15 when the shit will blow up in my face, task 4 i need to have figured out by next Friday.

[Mibz]

Thanks, guys, for making me realize I've never had it bad in my life. Even my "bad" jobs were suburban white boy privileged.

[01RedDX]

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[mzdspd]

Originally posted by Rat Fink

What's more messed up is I'd rather be breaking stiffened up fingers to fingerprint them than be an engineering technologist stuck in some cubicle pushing shitty reports and 2D CAD drawings around with no sense of accomplishment.

Well fuck.. This pretty much describes my life.. But I guess a job is better then no job in a recession, right?

[G-ZUS]

Originally posted by Rat Fink
I guess being a technologist was possibly my worst task then. I drained aircraft shitters at the airport for a living as well....and that was more fun than being a technologist :rofl:

desk jobs suck:banghead:

[max_boost]

ho lee fook guys. i am a spoiled tfw. thanks thanks. i feel much better reading this thread.

[cet]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak


Actually, before I came to Calgary, I briefly had a job was hand drafting on a table with slide rulers for shop drawings... so yeah, haha. Even made actual blue prints... you know, back when they were blue.

Hell I still own a huge assortment of professional mechanical pencils, an erasing shield, a genuine horse hair sweeper brush, and a variety of other archaic tools.

Back then drafting was truly an art form, I am kind of sad to see the skill level of the modern designer degrade to where it is now.

I was teaching an Advance Steel class a couple of months ago to a group of people from a single company. They were learning the program because their main draftsman was retiring. He still drafts everything by hand.

[SKR]

I went over to the neighbor's with my brother. He had a cow that was trying to calve, but the calf got hiplocked (the calf comes out front feet first, then the body, then the back legs. Hiplocked means it's stuck at the rear hips). When we got there the calf was already dead but the cow can die too, and she was in bad shape. We tried to get her loaded into a trailer to get her to the vet but we couldn't get her up, so the vet had to come out to the farm.

We ended up wrapping this wire rope thing around the calf, kind of around its waist I guess. You pull one end, and then the other. And it cuts the calf in half, so you have the front half in one piece and the back half is still inside the cow. Then you run the wire around the calf along its backbone and between its legs, and do it again to where you have the right leg and left leg separated from each other. Then they come out, you shoot the cow full of dope so it doesn't die, and then you're done.

That's the most unique thing I can think of. It was more hard work than disgusting. Bones and hide are hard to cut. Guts are easy.

[Type_S1]

I got a job at A&W when I was around 14 and showed up the first day to be told I am 1) cutting onions for half my shift and 2) cleaning out the grease from the stoves/cleaning the grease behind the deep fryer for the other half. I looked at the guy square in the eyes and without saying a word took off the apron thing they gave me and left.

Other then that, changing fluids at an express lube place was brutal. Reaching up under a diesel truck that was just shut off and burning your arm sucked...but you couldn't wait till vehicles cooled down cause its an express place. Also had a picker job in a warehouse for a summer to pay for school. The job itself wasn't too bad but overall it was brutal because the shift was 6pm-230am Tuesday to Saturday which completely ruined my social life that summer.

[Hallowed_point]

Hmmm...well probably working on an oyster field during a hot summer on vancouver island as a teenager. Working with the tide schedule, no cover from the sun, no proper facilities or breaks. Oh yeah, and the greek wannabe tycoon owner would spy on you with his telescope from his oceanside villa and radio the supervisors if he thought you were slacking off. Anytime I think that my job sucks, I remember soggy blistered feet from sloshing around in gum boots all day for $9.00/hr. And you would just reek of dead fish/sea weed at the end of the day. But you know what? I'd do it all again. Bunch of fuckin' crybaby pussies in this generation :banghead:

**Edit..these stories are hilarious..the exploded washroom, gino and his nasty shits, angry potato maggots..I'm dying here :rofl:

[BokCh0y]

I worked for a guy named Christian C. at an Instrumentation company about 20 years ago. He made me count screws, nuts, bolts, and washers. It wasn't even for inventory cuz i didn't have to document anything. All this while he sat on some chat thing and chatted with the receptionist about cats. Fucking mother cock sucker.

He works for a pipeline company now in SCM. Wonderful....

[HiTempguy1]

I can't really think of anything, but then again, I always tried to insure the jobs I went after didn't entail the (pun fully intended) shit work.

I remember back when I did plumbing as a labourer having blistered up hands for a whole summer because of having to use a pickaxe all god-damn-day to dig up clay for rough ins.

Now, that might not seem so bad, except from age 16-23 I weighed 135lb's on a good day. It doesn't matter how much of that is muscle, you just don't have the strength/mass to swing shit hard.

[Nufy]

Before I moved out west I had a job as a production operator at a fish meal plant.

Basically it took the leftovers from the plant, skin bones, guts etc...and processed them into a dry meal product that was sold for fish food, fertilizer etc...

Anyways, the raw product was stored in silos before entering the facility and sent in through screw conveyors.

On colder nights the product would freeze and "bridge" over the screws...

Other times in summer it would bridge for no apparent reason.

So as an operator it was my job to crawl in there and de-bridge the silos with a rake, pitchfork shovel etc...

So imagine in full rain gear, crawling in through a 2 3 foot side hatch and moving fish offal around to get it moving again.

Even worse when one night someone on the other shift tried to get it moving by placing a steam line in the hatch just before shift change.

If we had known about the "Dirty Jobs" show we would have certainly qualified.

So when I hear stories about using not porta potties and waiting to get home to take a dump I remember my days back east and laugh...

[Nufy]

Originally posted by BokCh0y
I worked for a guy named Christian C. at an Instrumentation company about 20 years ago. He made me count screws, nuts, bolts, and washers. It wasn't even for inventory cuz i didn't have to document anything. All this while he sat on some chat thing and chatted with the receptionist about cats. Fucking mother cock sucker.

He works for a pipeline company now in SCM. Wonderful....

Sabre ??

I knew that guy...LOL

[msommers]

Changing the oil out of the fryer while working at the Safeway deli was the grossest thing I've ever had to do. That smell to this day nearly makes me puke.

Actually I've worked enough customer service related jobs growing up that I think the worst task I've been assigned is dealing with people's bullshit as a person making minimum wage. It's like everyday normal people can somehow treat you like a dog to be stepped on however they see fit because you're bagging their groceries.

[C_Dave45]

Mine goes back about 25 years. We were to install new tile to the Vancouver Airport urinals.
Not wanting to close down an entire bathroom, my job was to close down two urinals at a time, and then with a grinder, grind away the years-old tile and grout that were piss-soaked. Once the grout was disturbed, the stench made you heave. I used a mask and up-to-the-elbow rubber gloves, but it was still gross.

To add insult to injury, while working away on my knees at this urinal, the other two urinals were still operating as usual. I would get up whenever someone came to take a piss...then right back down on my knees :barf: :eek:


The worst I ever SAW, (thank Christ it didn't happen to me) was working in a brand new high rise in Vancouver. As we approached the 40th floor, there was a powerful stench of shit. One of the unit's tubs had been turned into a make-shift outhouse for the framers, boarders, tapers. For weeks, they completely filled the entire bathtub up to the top with shit and piss. No one noticed until it was time to tile it, as they put a piece of plywood over the tub. Some poor labourer got the job of cleaning out all the piss/shit.

[sr20s14zenki]

Welding on a garbage bin that had previously had rotting meat in it from a meat plant.

:barf:

[toastgremlin]

Originally posted by Swank
My g/f is an ER nurse, she's not allowed to talk about work at the dinner table :barf: Has she shown you Figure 1?

[BokCh0y]

Originally posted by Nufy


Sabre ??

I knew that guy...LOL

I knew someone would figure it out....hahahahaha

These are my opinions of course.

[FraserB]

Wow, it looks like I've had it pretty good. The only bad one I can remember was having to clean up 100lbs or so of rotting pizza dough that had fallen out of the bin at Pizza Hut.

[canadian_hustla]

1. Busser at a busy downtown pub. Nothing worse (or more unsanitary) than having to spray/wash used ash trays with peoples gum in them, only to be volun-told by some hot waitress that the mens toilet was overflowing with shit everywhere and you had to clean it, and then washing up and bussing for customers including delivering food and drinks right afterwards. Worst part about it is that i was making like $6.50/hr + tips, and worked the evening shift until close (2am). I was so worried about getting mugged so i drove to work and paid $18/day to park lol

2. Wash attendant at new/used car dealership. Had to use incredibly corrosive chemicals to get the rail dust off new cars. Horrible stuff that ate through my gloves. I remember going home with burned hands on a daily basis. Worst part about it was having to wash all cars on "home row", basically a row of 20 cars that faced a major thoroughfare so it looked good or potential clientele. There is one day where i washed all 20 of them (it took 3/4 of my day), only to have it rain and ruin my work. My boss approached me and told me to wash them again and that i couldnt go home until they were clean. I told him right there to go pound sand and that i quit. I then proceeded to do a burnout while leaving their lot. Fuckers. Only good thing about his job was the rental fleet airport runs. 50 cars in one night. $10/car as many as you could. All keys go into a hat, sometimes you would get a 2 dr, 4 dr or sports car notwithstanding a bunch of us would break land speed records. Some of the guys would deliver "new" cars to the rental company smelling like burnt rubber and burnt oil, or my personal favorite one of them ran over a concrete sign in their parking lot that said no parking lol.

Oh how times have changed.

[Nufy]

Originally posted by BokCh0y


I knew someone would figure it out....hahahahaha

These are my opinions of course.

I worked for Westburne at the time...
Another shitty company.

[JohnnyHockey]

Pretty sure C Dave wins lol. ..pissed stained grout?! Wtf!

[kvg]

Originally posted by Swank
Cleaning out the grease trap at KFC. The yellow, orange, and pink layers of rancid sludge was, to this day, the worst thing I ever smelled :barf: :barf: :barf:

My first week at my first job, KFC grease trap :barf:
No one can truly under stand the experience unless they do it.

[Deetz]

Most difficult and terrible job i ever did was unload train cars during a graveyard shift. Work was loud, crazy dirty, physically demanding, and not worth the time of day. I spent half the night dodging forklifts running around also. Worst temp job i've had in my life!

[J.M.]

Originally posted by kvg


My first week at my first job, KFC grease trap :barf:
No one can truly under stand the experience unless they do it.

Lol my first job was at KFC too :rofl:

I remember the floor drain overflowing with grease/crud one time after I drained one of the sinks because the floor drain was clogged.

Nothing like trying to mop up greasy/sludgy floors just before going home.

[max_boost]

Originally posted by C_Dave45
Mine goes back about 25 years. We were to install new tile to the Vancouver Airport urinals.
Not wanting to close down an entire bathroom, my job was to close down two urinals at a time, and then with a grinder, grind away the years-old tile and grout that were piss-soaked. Once the grout was disturbed, the stench made you heave. I used a mask and up-to-the-elbow rubber gloves, but it was still gross.

To add insult to injury, while working away on my knees at this urinal, the other two urinals were still operating as usual. I would get up whenever someone came to take a piss...then right back down on my knees :barf: :eek:


The worst I ever SAW, (thank Christ it didn't happen to me) was working in a brand new high rise in Vancouver. As we approached the 40th floor, there was a powerful stench of shit. One of the unit's tubs had been turned into a make-shift outhouse for the framers, boarders, tapers. For weeks, they completely filled the entire bathtub up to the top with shit and piss. No one noticed until it was time to tile it, as they put a piece of plywood over the tub. Some poor labourer got the job of cleaning out all the piss/shit. ho lee shit. what a raw deal lol oh god