Our company provides its employees with free bagels and schmears (cream cheese spreads) three days a week. Recently this triggered the following email exchange: ---Message 1--- Everyone, In the future, when the Shmears run out, please don't go digging through the fridge and pulling out any old bagel toppings. Please respect other people's property. Thanks. ---Message 2--- Unless properly marked, all items in the 1820 fridge are (for the most part) considered fair game. Otherwise, things just end up sitting in there forever. It is difficult to know what is public property and what is private property unless it is properly marked. ---Message 3--- Boy, I hope we don't have to have a policy about this. But I disagree. It is safest if you label your personal stuff, but people should NOT be helping themselves to food in the fridge if it is not very likely in the "public domain." ---Message 4--- Okay, okay, what I really meant was that to avoid confusion on certain items that are commonly thought to be public items you should mark them with your name. No one is going to take your bag lunch, or bottle of mineral water. But they might take your left over piece of pizza, thinking it was left over from a training lunch. ---Message 5--- I think you shouldn't take unmarked food. There is a health risk from food poisoning. One is never quite sure how long food has been in the refrigerator unless it is your own. I know someone who became very sick when he used mayo from a refrigerator that had been there for a while. ---Message 6--- That's an excellent point. If anyone puts poisoned food in the refrigerator, please make sure it is clearly marked with your name. ---Message 7--- For those who ate the shmear, we regret to inform you that it actually was unmarked really old mayonaisse. Please report to sick bay for treatment. ---Message 8--- I think we need to organize a commitee to gather the requirements surrounding the Shmear issues. ---Message 9 (from the QA manager)--- After that is done we certainly need to hold a design review for the poison Shmear....after all gotta make sure that poison works... ---Message 10 (from a programmer)--- We should have following waterflow process: 1. Concept Whitepaper 1a. Go back to (1) if something is wrong. 2. Functional Requirment Specification 2a. Validation and Verification Plan for (2) 2b. Go back to (2) if something is wrong. 3. Implementation Specification 3a. Validation and Verification Plan for (3) 3b. Go back to (3) if something is wrong. 4. Test Plan 4a. Validation and Verification Plan for (4) 4b. Go back to (4) if something is wrong. 5. Documentation Plan 5a. Validation and Verification Plan for (5) 5b. Go back to (5) if something is wrong. 6. Support Plan 6a. Validation and Verification Plan for (6) 6b. Go back to (6) if something is wrong. 7. Prototyping 7a. Go back to (7) if something is wrong. 8. Implementation 8a. Go back to (8) if something is wrong. 9. Whitebox Testing 9a. Validate the test result. 10. Functional Testing 10a. Validate the test result. 11. Technical Support 11a. Validate the support effort. 12. Go back to (1) always. For the next release. 12a. Validate the necessity of (12) This may not be sufficient for ISO 9K. ---Message 11 (From a tech writer)--- Ok, but I can't document this without a working model... ---Message 12--- I think we need to form a police task force called SHMEAR: Stop Hogging My Eats And Relish ---Message 13--- QA to the rescue on the poison testing. I say we have [the QA manager] test last, when we're really sure its ready to ship. ---Message 14 (From the CEO)--- Some companies remove Pointcast from their system because it bogs down the net. Some companies remove browsers form desktops because it encourages undirected surfing. Our company is debilitated by cream cheese. (There were no further messages.)
(From the "Rest" of RHF)