OK proper rant today...
I know different people have some very different ideas on "borrowing" stuff.
Some people have very strong views on property ownership, and would not dream of touching something that belonged to someone else and would expect the same for things they have.
Some people have a much more relaxed view, and feel that they could just use something that belongs to someone else if they thing what they are doing is no harm. Some people would assume they can just take stuff even if it is a consumable such as "borrowing some coffee, or milk, etc"...
I can see there are different views on this, and I an not trying to be totally anal, honest.
Of course, it makes a difference what relationship you have, and with a family in a household it is normal to borrow stuff from other people, usually asking or at least informing them. It is also usual, I think, to take in to account if people do have strong views they have made clear previously.
There are lines that get crossed! I don't mind too much my kids borrowing stuff if it does not effect me, and ideally if they ask.
What really pisses me off is borrowing stuff, not asking, not telling me, not putting it back, still not putting it back when I came to use it and got cross, still not putting it back a day later, and a day after that and a day after that, and then finally trying to fob me off with something else and losing what they borrowed!!!
You know who you are - it is not acceptable.
If I want to use something that is mine, I expect it to be where I left it and in the same state I left it (e.g. not battery suddenly flat, etc). If you can borrow it without affecting that logic, then that is generally OK, but not otherwise.
PUT IT BACK!!!
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Exactly the rant I had this morning when I got in to the office and found my laptop PSU had been "borrowed"... /me thinks motion sensing CCTV equipped with remotely operated sniper rifles will be installed if it happens again!
ReplyDeleteI'm with you there Rev... don't mess with my stuff unless you ask and are going to return it in the same condition you took it in.
ReplyDeleteReminds me of a colleague of mine got sick of his stuff being borrowed when he wasn't in the office and one night he'd obviously been in when we weren't there armed with his permanent labeller and labelled everything that was "his" (equipment, furniture, cables, etc) down to the component/board level...
So the next time he was out of the office and someone needed to borrow some extra memory we thought "ok, he's not here, we'll borrow it and put it back when the order arrives in the morning".
His desktop PC (labelled - "Dave's PC") opened up - the optical drive ("Dave's CD-ROM drive") - the hard drive ("Dave's HDD") - the motherboard ("Dave's MoBo" on top) with "Dave's DIMM 1" and "Dave's DIMM 2" installed on it...) by now we got curious... so removed the motherboard and on the bottom of the motherboard "HELP! HELP! I'M BEING STOLEN!".
When he came back into the office - after we'd replaced (actually upgraded) the memory and reassembled it all, he didn't see the funny side that we'd relabelled all the keys on his keyboard and all the buttons on his phone with his permanent labeller ("Dave's labeller") - although we may have labelled them slightly incorrectly...
It is a shame when people are driven to that! There has to be a happy medium - borrowing where it does not actually cause inconvenience, but too often that line is crossed with no remorse whatsoever.
ReplyDeleteLOL - excellent - now do one on "Putting Your Shit Away Where It Belongs And Not Leaving It Lying Around Then Coming And Asking Me Where It Is Two Days Later...Like Shoes, Phones And School Bags" so I can email our lot. :)
ReplyDelete@Paper Boy - my big annoyance is people who leave their crap laying around everywhere then not bothering to tidy up after them or put stuff in the bin (sweety wrappers etc).
ReplyDeleteThink I might get a labeller as well for that sort of thing :) "Belongs in your bedroom", "Belongs on shoe shelf", "Belongs in bin", "Why Is This Crap Here?"....
Sorry that someone has pissed you off again, Im lucky that there is only me and Steve at home , so unless he want's to borrow my makeup or under ware lol Im safe from losing stuff ! x
ReplyDeleteIt's a double-whammy if you're the prudent sort, you know, has a torch with good batteries, stapler with staples and a small posidrive without a munged tip, because 'they' make a bee-line for YOUR desk when they need something.
ReplyDeleteShadenfreude, and a lesson to leechers: Many many years ago my girlfriend and I shared a rented house with a few others. After some months a new bloke came in. The sort that's too busy/important to buy anything himself and lived off everyone else's stuff (property is theft and all that), yet was the first to ridicule when people started labelling their food. (Now I don't mind someone coming home after the shops shut and making themselves a sausage sandwich from my bread and sausages as long as they don't use the last two slices and sausages as that might be MY dinner, but he'd quite happily do that and blatantly lie afterwards, but I digress).
ReplyDeleteOne morning we came down to find him not just the worse for wear after the night before but positively green. He was holding a carton of orange juice and (just for once) asked whose it was. A quick poll and there were no takers - it had been there, open, since before we moved in almost a year earlier. We lost a lot less food after that.
I have a golden rule about food: Do Not Use It All Up! (Unless you've checked with me first)
ReplyDeleteThis is because I "know" what's there, so if I set my mind on eating something, and then find it's all gone, it is incredibly disappointing, and I have disappointment phobia (mine or other peoples').
As for borrowing tools, I have enough trouble finding where I've put them without anyone else making it harder! (I've had to re-buy tools in the past because I couldn't find the one I knew I had, and I know nobody moved them because I was living alone).
My mother had a really good way for working out whether you should do something that would affect someone else: "How would you feel if someone did that to you?"
I think it's a much-underused mental check!
@JJ - I actually have a "borrowers" tool box - with all the shitty tools that I don't actually use myself. I even bought some expensive-looking-but-made-out-chocolate Chinese screwdrivers where actual use leads them to bend or break.
ReplyDeleteSoon puts them off.