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The original was posted on /r/tifu by /u/Technical_Tank_7282 on 2024-03-13 23:22:17.

So I started a new gig in maintenance, and I’m going into my 2nd week. There are daily meetings where a group of 12 meet. Today, the big wig director was present and going over quarterly company gains on a powerpoint and really getting into what we do and how it measures towards the company’s overall success. The director went through a few slides and took time to acknowledge the promotion of the now lead, mechanic who’s in his 40s, and then me as a newcomer (31). At this time (mid power point) one of the older mechanics (m59) begins voicing his grievances towards the company and how he’s been there for 44 years and hasn’t been given the same promotion as the younger guy who’s been there for 3 years. He went on and on and on for a total of 45 minutes, just bitching, (btw our meetings are generally 15-20 minutes long) and I watched our director (a very respectable, soft spoken man) fight for his life trying to keep up with the ranting. I looked around the room and saw everyone disassociate or look elsewhere in tolerance of the guys behavior. I looked down at the boxes of cookies management brought us and I interrupted the resentful man by pointing at the cookies placed in the center of the table, pretending to count them from 6 ft away, saying “Well, there’s 44 cookies for every year you’ve been let down.” A few people laughed, and the guy I geared the joke towards even smiled at first till he realized what I said. Then, our director looked at me in shock and said, “Don’t do that.”

The meeting wrapped up after the director calmed the disgruntled employee’s behavior. But on my way out, the director exhaled and slapped me on the back. Later, my manager and I ended up in a conference room together, and he was smirking and not saying anything.

I broke the silence by saying, “So I’ll start off by saying that I apologize for speaking out of turn. It wasn’t my business, and what I said was completely out of character for me.”

To my surprise, he said, “I really appreciate that, and I’m just going to tell you these guys have worked here a long time, and [name]'s resentments stem from before our new management was here. So sometimes you’ll see outbursts like the one you witnessed.”

Later I told a newbie like me what happened when he came. His response was, "Omg. That sounds awful, even without context. "

However, as a quiet newcomer, I can’t shake off the feeling of embarrassment, like I had farted really loud in a church or something. So, how bad was my joke 1 to 10? Is there a target on my back now? Good answers HEAVILY appreciated.

TL;DR: It was free cookie day, and a disgruntled employee of 44 years derailed our director’s quarterly meeting with, high powered, personal resentments towards management (his lack of promotion before the newer guys, etc etc). I pointed at the cookies and said “well there’s 44 cookies for every year you’ve been let down.”

Edit/Update: There were clearly only 2 boxes of a dozen cookies each. We all knew that. We all knew there were only 24 cookies total.