“The Great Office Microwave Incident”

I used to work in a large corporate office—the kind with gray cubicles, fake plants, and a break room that looked like it hadn’t been updated since the Clinton administration. Among all the daily chaos, one mystery loomed above all: who kept destroying the office microwave?

It started on a Monday morning. The break room microwave had been unplugged and covered in sticky notes. One read, “DO NOT USE—MYSTERY EXPLOSION.” Another: “Who microwaves fish for 12 minutes???”

Naturally, the office went into detective mode. Karen from Accounting swore it was Dave from HR. Dave blamed the interns. The interns blamed "ghosts of bad takeout past." Meanwhile, the rest of us began treating the microwave like it was cursed.

But things escalated.

On Tuesday, someone tried to microwave a hard-boiled egg. That was mistake #1. The egg exploded with the force of a minor bomb. It painted the inside of the microwave with yolk shrapnel and scared the office manager so badly, she dropped her coffee and ran out yelling, “I knew this place was a death trap!”

Wednesday came with hope—someone brought in a brand new microwave. Sleek, shiny, full of promise. A “Microwave 9000,” complete with touch screen and weird settings like “quinoa” and “snack pocket.” It even beeped politely, like a butler gently suggesting, “Your burrito is ready, sir.”

But we forgot one critical thing: no one reads instructions.

At lunchtime, Paul from IT tried to warm up leftover spaghetti. He set the timer for five minutes but somehow turned on the convection bake mode. The microwave began to hum like a jet engine. Spaghetti sauce bubbled, hissed, and oozed out like a volcanic eruption. Before he could stop it, the plastic container melted into a Salvador Dali sculpture.

Smoke alarms went off. Everyone had to evacuate. The VP of Operations gave a dramatic speech in the parking lot: “We will rebuild. We will reheat again. Just… maybe outside.”

The next day, a sign was taped above the new microwave:
“ATTENTION: MICROWAVE ONLY NON-EXPLODABLE FOODS. NO EGGS. NO FISH. NO LEFTOVER EXPERIMENTS FROM THE LAB.”

It didn’t help.

The final straw came Friday. An anonymous employee (we suspect it was Chad from Sales, but we can’t prove it) decided to microwave a cinnamon roll. That should’ve been safe. But they left the metal foil tray on it.

It sparked like the Fourth of July.

The microwave lit up, the breaker tripped, and half the office lost power. Karen screamed. Paul dove under the table. The VP, who was just sipping tea, muttered, “We’re not insured for this.”

Maintenance had to be called. Again.

The microwave was removed permanently. A new sign went up in the break room:
“Microwave privileges suspended until further notice. Cold food builds character.”

People were furious. Tempers ran hot—even if our food didn’t. But after a week, something magical happened.

We started talking to each other in line for the toaster. We bonded over cold pasta. Someone brought in a hot plate and made grilled cheese for everyone. It was like Survivor: Corporate Edition, and we had finally formed our tribe.

To this day, the Great Office Microwave Incident remains legend. And anytime someone new joins the company and asks why there’s no microwave, we just smile and say:

“Let us tell you a story.”