The Madness of King Boss (may be contagious)

I have been observing this saga unfold for some time and documenting it for your perusal, but in truth I have no idea what the bloody hell it's all about. If you have a theory, do share it.

Our story opens some weeks ago when I happened to look over and see that there was a pile of ripped up paper scattered around The Boss's waste-paper basket. I didn't think much of this at the time, just put it down to her being a bit messy.

The following day, I noticed that the same thing had happened again, and casually remarked to The Boss that her aim was a bit off when throwing stuff in the bin. So far this is all still within the realms of the sane, yeah?

But... again. And again. After observing a few days of this I remarked that she might want to try hitting the bin as the cleaning lady would probably not relish having to pick this up each morning. The Boss assures me that she gathers up all the little bits and puts them all the bin herself before she goes home, and you know, I actually do believe her.

So it's got to the stage where I have to say something. Why, I ask, do you not just put the paper in the bin? I don't know why this is bugging me so much but it's really starting to get on my nerves. The Boss complains that the bin is too far away. Here is the chair-to-bin scenario :

I feel that this is not an unreasonable distance to travel, and yet every day, I see this happening again.

I could hold my water no longer. I tried asking why The Boss was ripping pieces of paper into tiny little bits before binning it, every bloody day, but received no clear answer and her manner, I can confirm, was decidedly evasive. Try to follow the elusive white logic rabbit here :

Here's me : "OK. Why are you scattering paper round the bin every day?"
The Boss : "Because I can't reach the bin"
Here's me : "So move the bin closer?"
The Boss : "I don't like it closer."

Here's me : "Okkkkkayy why not just put the paper in the bin without ripping it up?"

The Boss : "I don't like putting whole sheets of paper in the bin."

Here's me : "Why not?"

The Boss : "Because it's a waste of paper."

And so on. Anyway, by this stage I had become morbidly fascinated by this process.

The part of this that is really fucking with me is that I never once have seen the paper either being shredded or being thrown. Which leads me to believe this is happening while I'm not in the office.

So while my back is turned, The Boss is conducting The Ripping Up And Scattering Around The Bin Of Papers ritual, and her devotion to it appears to be reaching frenzied heights.

I mean look. Actually none of it is going in the bin. It's just right there, every day, right beside the bin, and it's slowly driving me completely bleedin' mental for reasons I don't fully understand.

THIS IS JUST NOT RIGHT says a voice in the back of my mind. Who sits ripping every piece of paper they use in the office up into tiny wee bits before scattering it around the bin? WHOM DOES THIS!! WHAT KIND OF OCCULT RITE IS TAKING PLACE IN MY FUCKING OFFICE ON A DAILY BASIS! It's got to the stage where I can see The Boss in my mind's eye, sitting there when I go out for lunch, her eyes narrowing and staring into the beyond as she hears voices only she can hear, and as she tears the paper again and again, I wonder, does she hear it scream as she rips it...

... such thoughts will rouse me from my sleep some night, drenched in sweat and shaking like a shitting dog, of this you can be sure.

Look you here, in the orgiastic abandon of the paper-ripping-and-throwing-ceremony this particular set of shredded bits actually somehow got launched about a metre through the air and wound up behind the photocopier:

Now it's getting quite artistic, as in addition to the paper, she is now branching out into other media, specifically any old bit of rubbish going :

I call this "Urban Decay & Capri Sun" :

Now with empty KFC chip packet in foreground. Classy. It's like a fucking Banksy or something :

Now who does this, every day, while their colleague is out for lunch, then tidies it again that evening after the colleague has left? WHO DOES THIS?

Brace yourself before looking -

- yes, that object in the lower right area of the picture above actually is a human fingernail clipping.

And this is apparently all building up to some kind of crescendo, as it intensifies, but where it ends I cannot guess. Is she trying to see if she can actually completely wall herself in with crap during the course of my lunch-hour?

Now plainly at least one of us actually is a bona-fide lunatic. The worrying part is I've just spent two weeks furtively photographing a bin so I think it's probably me.