The Dog Ate My Hole Punch

A poll of US bosses and workers has revealed some of the lamest and most extravagant excuses made for not coming into work. The survey, commissioned by job search website www.careerbuilder.com and conducted by Harris Interactive, found that almost 30 percent of workers called in sick last year when they weren’t really and probed respondents for the most unusual excuses.

Sillier excuses Stateside cited chicken attacks and bovine housebreakers but more honest workers simply owned up to needing more sleep or time to relax. Some 30 percent of employers allowed their charges to take “mental health days” although other managers (ca. 30%) checked up on ill workers, with 15 percent of bosses having driven round to an employee’s home to see if they were faking it. Sixteen percent of employees had sacked an employee for missing a day’s work without a good excuse.

Rubbish excuses (suitably nuanced by American cultural idiom) included:

• “My fingers are stuck in a bowling ball.”
• “A chicken attacked my mom.”
• “A cow broke into my house and I had to wait for the insurance man.”
• “I burned my mouth on a pumpkin pie.”
• “I had to mow the lawn to avoid a lawsuit from the Home Owner’s Association.”
• One employee called in sick from a bar at 5pm the night before work.

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