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Bluff The Listener

BILL KURTIS, BYLINE: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT ...DON'T TELL ME, the NPR News quiz. I'm Bill Kurtis. We are playing this week with Roxanne Roberts, Roy Blount, Jr., and Alonzo Bodden. Here, again, is your host at the Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor, Peter Sagal.

PETER SAGAL, HOST:

Thank you, Bill.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Right now, it is time for the WAIT WAIT ...DON'T TELL ME Bluff The Listener game. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to play our game on the air. Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT ...DON'T TELL ME.

LEAH BOOTH: Hi, this is Leah from Madison, N.J.

SAGAL: From Madison, N.J. I know Madison well. I grew up not far from there. What do you do there?

BOOTH: Well, I am in a seminary here. I go to Drew and I am only here half the week.

SAGAL: Well, where are you the rest of the week?

BOOTH: Philadelphia.

SAGAL: So you drive from Philadelphia all the way to Madison, N.J., to attend classes and then drive home to Philadelphia.

BOOTH: Yeah, but not every day. I come up Tuesday and go home Thursday.

SAGAL: So you're basically trying to spend as little time as possible in New Jersey.

BOOTH: That's right.

SAGAL: Well, welcome to the show, Leah. You're going to play our game in which you must try to tell truth from fiction. Bill, what is Leah's topic?

KURTIS: This is going in your file.

SAGAL: Now, we've all done something we weren't supposed to do at work - stolen some office supplies, looked at Facebook, stored State Department emails on a personal server.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: This week, we read in a story of an employee getting in trouble for some unusually annoying workplace behavior. Our panelists are going to tell you about it. Pick the one that's telling the truth and you'll win our prize - Carl Kasell's voice on your voice mail. Are you ready to play?

BOOTH: I'm ready.

SAGAL: Well, all right then. First up, let's hear from Alonzo Bodden.

ALONZO BODDEN: Plumbing is beneath me. Renowned architect Willis Jefferson (ph) at a firm, Jefferson Carter and Associates, has a reputation for beautiful, artistic designs of public and private buildings. What he doesn't do is bathrooms. Well, he uses bathrooms, but he refuses to incorporate them in his designs. His associates are really getting frustrated with having to redesign his buildings with the required facilities. All this came to light when a riverside contractor got an early look at the plans for a new library and asked the city council if they could hold it until they got to the corner gas station. He said that's what library patrons would have to do and followed that with a few tasteless jokes about the reading room. When asked about the gap, Willis replied that plumbing is not the work of an artist. People pay for my vision, not to flush.

SAGAL: All right, an architect who does beautiful buildings but does not do bathrooms. Your next story of somebody getting into trouble at work comes from Roxanne Roberts.

ROXANNE ROBERTS: It started with celery sticks. When Sarah Ellison (ph) began working at a New York insurance company, she snacked on celery, carrots, apples and other loud foods. At first, Jim Peters (ph) asked her to eat in the break room, a suggestion she rejected, saying she needed to keep eating because she was trying to lose weight. So Peters began crunching on pork rinds, chips and other annoying foods. Things escalated rapidly. She began making vegetable smoothies at her desk using a loud blender (imitating blender). He retaliated by buying bacon, cheeseburgers, fries, cookies and letting them sit, uneaten, just inches from her with a desk fan directing the aroma of bacon directly in her face. Things came to a head in July when the two exchanged words. Then Peters threw a pizza crust at her and Ellison responded with zucchini and banana peel. Before co-workers intervened, Peters slipped on the peel and broke his collarbone. He's suing Ellison for assault with deadly produce.

SAGAL: A food fight at an insurance office gets totally out of hand leading to a lawsuit. And your last story of workplace malfeasance comes from Roy Blount, Jr.

ROY BLOUNT JR.: When a government agency sets up a help line, we all know that what is expected of the workers who answer the phone, that they be just blandly unhelpful enough that callers will give up and go away. But this week, we learned that it's not always that simple. Ronald Dillon, who has been answering IT calls at the New York City Health Department help desk, has, no doubt, irritated his callers sufficiently but annoyed his higher-ups even more. At first, Dillon came on too much as a real guy. I don't know, but I hear him saying things like, hey, what you got for us, unhealthy lady? Told to cut that out, Dillon started responding to callers by pretending to be a robot. (Imitating robot) What exactly is so important about your health? Reprimanded again, he went back to, I don't know, things like how about a little hip-hop health help? But apparently the robot thing had got good to him because he lapsed back into it. And this week, he was suspended. Me, I think he's lots more fun than helpers who, going strictly by the book, merely misdirect you to another department.

SAGAL: All right, here are your choices. One of these people got in trouble this week. Was it, from Alonzo Bodden, an architect who never puts in bathrooms because they are beneath him; from Roxanne Roberts, two people who got into an escalating food fight at their desks at an insurance office in New York City; or from Roy Blount, Jr., a guy on an IT helpline who simply would not stop using his robot voice?

BOOTH: (Laughter) Since I've dealt with some IT workers in my life, I'm going to say it's Roy's story about the guy who (laughter) answered in a robot voice.

SAGAL: Are you telling me that you believe that an IT guy might find that really funny?

BOOTH: I believe that might be their sense of humor, yeah.

SAGAL: Well, to bring you the correct answer - well, just listen to this.

RONALD DILLON: (Imitating robot)You have reached the help desk (unintelligible). How may I help you?

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: That was a recording of Ronald Dillon, a help desk employee at the New York City Department of Health, pretending to be a robot despite admonition from his superiors. Congratulations, Leah, you got it right.

BOOTH: Oh, my goodness.

SAGAL: You earned a point for Roy. You've won our prize - Carl Kasell recording a greeting on your voice mail. Well done, Leah. Thanks so much.

BOOTH: Thank you so much.

SAGAL: Take care.

BOOTH: Bye-bye.

(APPLAUSE) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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