Ripped ass during a meeting with practice group leader and client

[Anonymous]

I work in baglaw and hear people farting all the time. I think you are making a bigger deal of this than it is. Everyone farts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Female

I was hoping you were a man. Men are much more forgiving of farts, etc than women. Women just are not expected to fart in public.

[Anonymous]

Everyone who says "everyone farts" is probably male.

[Anonymous]

There was a special counsel in our office with horrible social skills. Chewed with his mouth open at meals and farted loudly in his office. If his name came up, there was an inevitable discussion of how gross he was. No one wanted him anywhere near a client. I think OP just let one slip and is not in this category of gross but anyone who thinks they can fart in a meeting undetected is kidding themselves.

[Anonymous]

Ha ha ha ha!

It's fine, don't worry!
Remember that no one is thinking about you more than yourself. The people around you were concentrating on the work at hand, and only gave passing thought to your emission. They have certainly forgotten it by now!

[Anonymous]

About a year ago I let out a silent but very, VERY deadly one in a small conference room with five or six other people. It was so bad that soon after the meeting leader suggested everyone "take a quick break" (not mentioning the fart of course). I don't know if anyone ever figured out it was me, I tried to just not react but I probably still looked mortified. Anyway, a year later and I still have my job so don't fret, OP!

[Anonymous]

lawyers gross

[Anonymous]

You are a man, right?

[Anonymous]

There were three people in the room.

There's no way for the other two to be sure it was you, OP.

But yeah, excuse yourself and go to the bathroom.

I thought for certain you were a guy, because in conversations discussing awkward things (like gas), usually all of the women say "you excuse yourself and go to the restroom *before* it happens" and all of the men say, "everyone farts."

[Anonymous]

OP, nothing by empathy here. This is just going to have to be an embarrassing moment, turned into a funny story later. And for all of you "excuse yourself and go to the bathroom" people - you've never unintentionally farted? Good grief! You're shaming OP for not predicting her bodily functions to the fucking minute?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Retirement party? Biglaw? HAHAHHA thanks for the comic relief. I mean, I know I'd be pushed out eventually, but I think this incident has really put me in jeopardy in the short term.

Seriously?

-non lawyer here.

Seriously, yes. To the first point, the number of people who start out in biglaw and retire from a biglaw firm must be in the low single digits. And law as I said above is very shallow, and honestly what we do isn't brain surgery by any means (especially litigators, and that is what I do). Therefore, law (like sales), is very shallow and image-based. A surgeon or nuclear scientist can get away with being socially awkward and, hell, probably shitting his/her pants in front of co-workers, because that person actually is valuable and has real skills. Lawyers are quite fungible. So you aren't a "personality fit" or you do something like insult a client (or bust ass in front of one), you can find yourself pushed out for that.

Dude, the retirement party was said in jest. Sheesh. No wonder you are panicking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I know I should have, but I figured I'd kind of ignore it. Then it started to smell bad, and that just made everything worse. Biglaw is so shallow, this could legitimately fuck with my career, or at least my prospects at this firm.

oh, geez .... talk about signs that you're at the wrong firm ...

[Anonymous]

I did exactly the same thing in a Biglaw interview when I was in law school. I wasn't asked back.

[Anonymous]

Not to overly parse, but she tried to pull an SBD; it was no accident. Hopefully lesson learned for the future. My mom list her sense of smell and farted all the time everywhere. Finally I said, you know everyone else smells that...

[Anonymous]

This thread is awesome.

I once farted right before a very annoying fellow associate came into my office. It stank to high heaven. I normally had to covertly call my office line from my cell phone under the desk to get him to leave my office but this time he left all on his own. I immediately called my husband to proudly report that I had figured out the solution to my annoying-fellow-associate problem.