Programmer Humor

I bumped into the CEO again about 10 years later at a funeral. He was thoroughly obnoxious and spent the time making fun of the deceased (a colleague of ours) and taunting my friend about how many hours he had tricked him into working for free. Then he bragged about his current business and its success. Really one of the most awful people I've ever met.

That wasn't the first deceased colleague of ours he had disrespected. We had a very skilled but very obedient guy working on our team - call him Jim - whose brother (also an colleague) was terminally ill in hospital. These brothers were good guys and popular with all their colleagues. One day Jim got the message that his brother had taken a turn for the worse and might not have much longer, so he asked his manager if he could take the afternoon off to visit his brother. Word came down from Mr. CEO: no, Jim was needed in the office so could not have the afternoon off. Being a loyal employee, Jim stayed. His brother died that evening and he didn't get to say goodbye. I left the company soon after that.

Miserable as this all was, it was a good lesson in just how self-centred and self-important some people are. This CEO is now very wealthy and still goes through life convinced he's a success and we're all losers who don't know how to do life like he does. He'll probably never figure out the truth.