Bloody hell.

One of the chaps, Gertrude, sitting beside me in the office threw up his hands and huffed at his screen.

What's up with you?

I asked curiously. Gertrude was usually a quiet soul who ate sushi. He was not often one to make any kind of a fuss in the office.

What's up with me? This fucking rubbish. This shit that people do really gets on my goat.

He failed his arms at the screen before him like a squid smelling Hershey's chocolate.
^{Hershey's, a chocolatey treat that smells faintly of vomit and death that excites both arousal and horror in both deep water squids and some humans.}

I wheeled over and looked at his screen to see what had offended him so much. There was nothing there but a message from some Business Analyst.

Umm, so what is the problem?

I wheeled back a bit as Gertie looked to be getting even more animatedly angry.

You mean you can't see it? You don't see THAT?!

He flailed at his screen again, a little bit of white spittle foaming at the corner of his mouth like the bubbly sewage in an English river.

I peered a little more closely.

Nope, it was just an innocuous-seeming message.

No problem, I will get that added to Jira 😊

I shrugged my shoulders and hoped he wasn't going to go all Falling Down on me.

Gertie let out a squeal of frustration as though I had won the coin toss and it was his turn to be the Farmer's wife.

Truly, I am the last of my kind.

He let out a deflated hiss and threw his head back to stare morosely at the ceiling.

The eyebrow I cocked at him had more cock than a long-cocked cockney from Cockburn.

The last of your kind? What is that meant to mean? Are we in a Sci-Fi movie or something?

It is always worth clarifying if you are in a Sci-Fi movie or not. If the answer, unlikely as it may be, is ever yes then you can start pistol-whipping people and telling them that we only have four hours left.

Gertie snapped his attention away from our ceiling tiles and fixed it on me instead.

Yes, there aren't many of us left. I might be one of the last.

He shook his head bleakly.

Dude, what the fuck are you talking about?

I exercised a little of my famed diplomacy super skill.

Gertie pulled himself close to his desk and stabbed a pale pointy finger at the smiley on the message he had just received.

That, the fucking emoji. When did we all start using emojis at work? This is a business not a bloomin Facebook group. Does my head in. I swear, everyone does it now. I am one of the few that keeps things professional. Has no one got any standards? Even El Jefe blooming uses them. Absolutely laughable.

He stood up his fists clenched, if he was a cup he would have been full of angry tea.

Dude, relax man. The times, they are a changing that's all. It's no big deal.

I gently patted my hands at the air calmingly as if I were closing an albino's suitcase.

Gertie pulled himself up to his magnificent full height of about 5'8'' and exhaled furiously through his nose as if he were trying to put out a fire in a doll's house.

If you can't see the problem then maybe you are part of the problem... Oh fuck this, I need a breath of fresh air.

He wobbled an accusing finger at me.

A breath of fresh air? Mate, I think you need a wank or something.

He flipped me two fingers as he stamped off.

I laughed and wondered without a hint of irony.

What was it like to be an arse?