Hello again, y’all! Welcome to our recurring feature, in which we discuss fun ways you can spend your time without playing computer games. Today we’re going to learn how to send a mind-buggeringly offensive email from your work address, thereby throwing your career in jeopardy and scarring one poor admin assistant for life.

I chose to do this while working at an insurance company, but any kind of depressing blue-collar office McJob will be fine. At the very least, make sure you have the following:

• 1 internet connection

• 1 powerfully retarded workmate

• 1 or more personality issues which result in outbursts of sarcasm

When these are in place, you’re ready to start. For maximum effect, give this one a couple of years’ preparation by settling deep into your rut of a job and developing a profound resentment toward life and anyone who appears to be enjoying it. Now let’s begin! You’re sitting at your desk, making desultory key-strokes while the long, desperate hours trickle by; then suddenly an email pops into your inbox! Gosh, what could this be? A love letter from an anonymous and perkily-breasted admirer, perhaps?

No, it is in fact an unsolicited email asking for your credit card details! What a surprise!

At this point, it needs to be made clear that you are not a football fan. The idea of you purchasing anything from Manchester City Football Club is laughable to the point of hernia, so there is only one possible explanation for this email: someone is trying to scam you. This makes you angry. Angry enough to vent some serious spleen all over a guy. Now, it’s usually a good rule not to send anything offensive from a work email address; but the exception, surely, is when you’re addressing your email to an amoral spammer who probably has poop in his pants. What harm could a quick, vomitingly offensive reply cause?

With “none whatsoever” echoing incorrectly in your mind, you should work yourself up to such a froth of petty fury that you’re crying tears of pure bile. These scammers, eh. What a bunch of cuntfunnels. You’re going to teach them what happens when they mess with with [forename] Q. [surname].

Sadly I have destroyed the original letter I sent, for reasons which will become obvious, but here is a radically toned-down version you can adapt to your own needs.

Now sit back with a smug smile borne from the certainty of a job well done. Make sure you savour the next 24 blissful, hell-free hours. The next morning, while you are halfway through your pretentious yoghurt flapjack, you’ll receive a call from the company director asking you to come and see him in his office. You will bound down the stairs, puffed up with self-importance, wondering what sensitive task you will be entrusted to perform this time. “[forename],” he will probably say, “we need you to locate Agent Yoplais Granola, who is currently undercover in Colombia, and deliver to him this vitally important car insurance document. The agent is all alone and uninsured. If he were to crash while evading the Hummers of the cocaine lords, he would be liable not just for his own damages… but for theirs.”

It does not play out entirely like this. After beckoning you to sit down, the director says, “so, what do you know about an email sent to Manchester City football club?” At this point, your heart decides to take a break from beating and relax for a few seconds. “…Because I’ve just been contacted by their sales manager,” your boss continues, “to say that one of their employees received an email with your address on it. The email was apparently very offensive. Very offensive indeed.”

At this moment, you are probably casting your mind back through your life, trying to remember if you raped and cooked any endangered animals, because that is the only reason God could possibly hate you this much.

The director gives you a look of murderous calm. “As you know, the company is legally responsible for any messages sent under its name, regardless of their purpose. In other words, it wasn’t just you who sent that email. It was me. It was, in fact, the entire company. So what, exactly, did we say?”

You stall. What else can you do. “I… uh… I thought they were just scammers; you know, criminals”, you say, hoping the director will see the funny side and come back with “well, their football playing ability is certainly criminally bad, oh HAHAHAHA let’s forget this whole thing ever happened”. Instead, he fixes you with the kind of gaze that would make Hitler dirty his dungarees. “The girl who received this email”, he says in a voice like two granite slabs sliding over each other, “is 18 years old, and is very seriously upset. I want you to go away, find the email you sent, and bring it to me, along with a very good explanation of what has just happened.”

Now is a great time to cover your face, because you are so fucking boned that there are dicks protruding from your nose.

Dizzy with terror, you lurch upstairs and express to the office your titanic confusion regarding what has just happened. Why the rubbery Christ would the real MCFC email you asking for your credit card details? You wouldn’t shop there if it was the last tacky merchandise store on Earth. Surely this must be some kind of retarded mistake made by a retard? There is a pause, during which you notice that one of your workmates has just turned the colour of pissed-on snow. To protect his identity, let’s call him That Stupid Cunt. You round on him, death in your eyes. “Oh God, what did you do.”

That Stupid Cunt takes several seconds to respond. “It was… uh… it was my mate’s birthday.”

Yes.

“And he’s a City fan.”

Right.

“So I… uh… thought I’d get him a football.”

With you.

“So I ordered one. That’s all really. Nothing else happened. Except I gave your name and email address because I don’t trust the internet.”

I see.

“Sorry.”

Indeed.

“Didn’t think it would do any harm. Forgot to tell you.”

Mmm-hmm.

“So is everything coolARRRRGLE please let go of my neckhhhhhargglgglargh.”

As the last spark of life twinkles feebly in That Stupid Cunt’s eyes, you suddenly realise what you have to do. You boss wants to see the email, which means he wasn’t sent it by MCFC. This is a miracle. In her shock and anguish, Jocelyn Made-Up-Name must have deleted it. If your boss actually sees this email, you will be screwed faster than you can say Cock Suppository, so you must remove all trace of it right now. You rush to your computer and frantically cleanse every trace of your sent and deleted items, then breathe a huge sigh of relief. If you can play down the severity of the email, you might just be ok.

Ten minutes later, you and That Stupid Cunt sit sheepishly before the director. You have explained the situation, and you’re fairly confident that he buys your story about the email perhaps containing the odd mild profanity, such as “fart” or “boobs”. He muses for a few seconds. “Well, gentlemen, I’m sure you’re aware of how stupid you both are.”

You and The Aforementioned Cunt nod your heads so vigorously that the director draws back a little in alarm.

Eventually he continues. “I should fire you both. But I am going to be forgiving. I’d say a bunch of flowers and a crawling apology to the lady in question should do the trick. I trust you gentlemen will be generous with the bouquet.”

You assure him that you will denude entire rainforests. The resultant bouquet, you promise, will be colourful enough to trigger epileptic fits, and will contain so many scents that anyone smelling it will immediately have an aneurysm. “Then we shall speak no more of the matter,” your eagle-nosed director says, his fingers folded in front of him in classic Blofeld pose. You get up to leave, thanking the Lord your bowels remained tightly clenched through this ordeal.

“Oh,” he says as you turn to leave, “except that you still haven’t shown me the email.”

You silently congratulate yourself on your foresight. “Sorry sir, the email is gone. I habitually clean my sent and deleted items every night, so I’m afraid it was wiped.” Yeah, that should do it. Your boss thinks on this for a moment, then replies “but won’t there still be a copy on the server?”

Aaaaand, it’s toilet time.

You must think faster than you have ever thought before. A dizzying torrent of adrenaline shoots into your brain, slowing the world down until your panicky heartbeat becomes a grim, measured pounding on the doors of hell. Think, dammit. Who is the only person who can retrieve archived emails from the Exchange server? It’s you, you fucking moron. You’re the I.T. guy. How much does your boss know about the computer systems in this place? Can you bluff him? You just don’t know. You have no choice but to try.

“Sorry, but because of space issues, the non-essential folders such as sent and deleted items are cleaned from the server once a month. On the… uh… seventeenth of the month. Which, in quite an astonishing coincidence, was yesterday. Yesterday evening.” Agonising seconds pass. He stares piercingly into your eyes, his whole face voicing a silent, protracted “hmmmmmmmmm”. Eventually he looks down and says, “well. That’s that. Don’t do anything like this again, lads.”

It is not number one on your agenda.

He gestures for you to go away. You leave the room with a wiffling slump of relief and a blow of friendly camaraderie to the back of That Stupid Cunt’s neck. For a second there, you were convinced you would have to play your one and only trump card, but no. Everything was ok. There is now no need to inform your boss that several months ago, you discovered several gigabytes of gay porn on the laptop belonging to the chairman’s son.

You can save that one for when you get caught rogering his wife in the office toilet, which is the only thing more certain to get you sacked than the email you just sent.

Filed under: Fun non-gaming activities