Silly me...

Post Reply New Topic

So this morning I was discussing a new product with my boss that she needs for a presentation at some point in the near future. When I asked her when would like to see samples by, she says, "not tomorrow, but the day after tomorrow."

I though about it for a moment and decided it must be a big rush, because 48 hours seemed like a really short amount of time to formulate a new product, even if it was just a concept for a presentation.

So I got working right away. Worked through lunch. I even freaked out a coworker by telling her our boss needed samples for the presentation by Thursday.

I showed her what I had made this afternoon, we decided it needed improvement (she hadn't even given me a prototype yet).... and she says..."don't worry...we have plenty of time."

"What!@$@#"....."No we don't, we only have until Thursday!! !!" I say very matter-of-factly...

In walks my coworker also was rushing to get her samples ready and hears what we are talking about. She tells my boss "you never said anything about Thursday, I don't have enough time"

My boss laughs. "Where did you get Thursday from??"

I tell her she said she didn't need to see the samples tomorrow but "the day after tomorrow. Which is indeed in fact...Thursday"...

Both of them start laughing hysterically...not knowing what they were laughing at I just started to laugh too (I do that a lot). Then it occured to me....

My boss didn't mean she needed the samples "the day after tomorrow." It meant "start thinking about what you want to do, and I want to see the samples in a couple of weeks." It was a figure of speech.....gah...

I think they make me crazy on purpose......

I didn't know that was also used as a figure of speech. The other times I heard the words "day after tomorrow" it was meant as in two days (although I think they were)

I would have blugeoned the both of them to death with a stapler...

WTF?!

That is ridiculous.

Why would the day after tomorrow mean some day other than the one that follows tomorrow?

I appreciate that we can sometimes struggle with being overly-literal, but I honestly cannot see how you were supposed to interpret what was said as being intended non-literally.

Why say the day after tomorrow, why not a few weeks, or soonish or some other vague time measure instead of a non-literally intended specific time frame?

I thought the day after tomorrow meant the day after tomorrow.

i;ve been embarassed at work too many times i stopped c ounting..

I'm normally ok with these things, but this one I'm not familiar with. I would react the same, without a doubt.

There's nothing remotely poetic about misleading people, so I bite my thumb at your boss. (biting thumb - Shakespearean insult, like the middle finger nowadays).

((((hugs))))

~Loving Light~

I've never heard "the day after tomorrow" used as a figure of speech!

Apparently I was supposed to tell by the tone of her voice that she didn't literally mean "the day after tomorrow," but rather it was a way of her telling me it wasn't a huge rush ("tomorrow" would have been the rush)...the "day after tomorrow" means it's still a priority but I don't need to rush.....I see the analogy now that I think about it...

Grrr.....why not just tell me what she meant. Now when she really needs something "the day after tomorrow" I'm going to get all confused.

I didn't think "the day after tomorrow" was ever used as a figure of speech.....maybe it is in her first language (English is her second language).

Anyway. At least I got a good head start on the project.

I think any of my coworkers would have taken that literally too (except maybe the one who was laughing with my boss). I asked with another coworker, also speaks my boss's native language, and she said that wasn't a figure of speech in Russian, and she said she would have also been confused.

I have a hard enough time with normal figures of speech, but I like to think I've gotten much better. It's not any eaiser when your boss makes up her own figures of speech.....

I just felt like such an idiot. She already thinks I'm ret*d....