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Paralegals & Legal Secretaries

: Practical Paralegalism

Mercy, An Email Exchange Between Legal Secretaries Made Snopes.com

By Lynne DeVenny

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Or, I Found About This 'Cause Gmail Is Giving Us 30 Seconds to Undo Ill-Advised Email

Two legal secretaries got fired over a ham sandwich. Urban myth, right?

Nope, not according to Snopes.com. I can't believe I never heard this story before. As a Gmail lover, I thought Google's testing of an "undo" email button was the best thing since sliced bread, but learning about this epic legal staff tussle over a sandwich is, well, the best thing since two slices of bread were put together to invent the sandwich. (Man, what I would give for a ham sandwich right now.)

According to Snopes, in September 2005, two legal secretaries employed by an Australian law firm picked company-wide email as the means to hash out their differences over a sandwich gone AWOL from a common area refrigerator. Their delightfully venomous electronic exchange was forwarded to some of their colleagues, who then helpfully forwarded it to their buddies at other firms, and soon it was the ham sandwich sniping read 'round the world, or at least the City of Sydney.

You can read the entire exchange here, but me-OW, these gals got catty quick. I'm not sure what my favorite quote is, but Melinda's "I wouldn't trade places with you for the world...I don't want your figure!" and Katrina calling Melinda "Miss Can't Keep A Boyfriend" are tying for first place.

So what have we learned?

Gmail rocks if you can figure out the 18 steps needed to take back your ill-advised email;
Do not put your lunch in the firm fridge, i.e. keep your ham sandwich in a portable cooler with a combination lock at your desk;
Hair-pulling in the parking lot after hours is a lot less damning than e-mail; and
Melinda, by her own written admission, was a player in 2005.

Oh, and say it with me, gentle readers, your work computer really isn't yours.

Sources: Snopes.com; Mashable; Toronto Star

Full post as published by Practical Paralegalism on August 23, 2010 (boomark / email).