“A” – The Cash Strapped Double-dipper

“A” was my first marketing boss in the public accounting industry. I was a part-timer in those days, working to complete my degree at night. My second week on the job, “A” begged me for a loan of $1,000, for one week “to cover a margin call.”  Me being a young, stupid and trusting moron who wanted only to please, I actually loaned him the money, which represented more than half of my total savings at the time. Six months later, I found myself stage whispering to him while waiting for an elevator, threatening bodily harm if he didn’t return the cash. I eventually did…get the money back, that is. Fortunately for both of us, I didn’t have to follow through on the bodily-harm threat.

During my tenure with this clown, I provided vague excuses for him when he disappeared for hours on end, almost every day. Before leaving, he’d arrange his jacket on his chair-back and spread papers around his desk to give the appearance that he had just stepped away momentarily. Eight, count’em eight, years later, I learned the firm dismissed him when it was discovered that, all this time, he’d been holding down two full-time jobs simultaneously.