Sideswipe: May 10: Asked for French city chic

Asked for French city chic but got two loos? Photo / Supplied

Stuff up at work? Come on, fess up

1. First day of job in educational reference library located in old an primary school hall with floor to ceiling windows. I couldn't see computer screen due to sun, so tried to pull heavy duty curtains. The whole lot came down, including the guy on a step ladder who'd just finished hanging them.

2. During a night-shift I updated the grid on the Telegraph website crossword without updating the clues. The day-shift guys had to deal with all the angry emails. There were many.

3. Filing job at a bank many many years ago. Printed off some shall we say "flirtatious" emails with the boy I was seeing. Accidentally stapled them to the loan reports. Filed them. Couldn't find them again once I realised what I'd done. For all I know, they're still there ...

4. Accidentally pressed "correct all" instead of "cancel" when spellchecking a feature I'd written about a local businesswoman. The next day I got a call from her husband asking why The Birmingham Post had printed an article naming his wife "Natasha Psychopath".

5. I once sent a company wide virus warning by forwarding the email so they could see what it looked like should they receive one, and forgot to remove the infected attachment.

(Via @B3ta.com on Twitter)

How a secretary made a $6 million dollar donation

Sylvia Bloom. Photo / Supplied

Sylvia Bloom was a legal secretary who worked with lawyers in New York. Friends knew her as frugal — someone who used the bus and trains rather than buy herself a car to travel from her modest home to her workplace. Over the course of 67 years, she worked for the Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton law firm, and when she died at the age of 96 years old, she made a $6.24 million donation to the Henry Street Settlement, a not-for-profit social service agency that distributes scholarships and aide to disadvantaged people. It was the largest by a single donor in the organisation's 125 year history. How did she make her fortune? Her niece told the New York Times: "She was a secretary in an era when they ran their boss's lives, including their personal investments. So when the boss would buy a stock, she would make the purchase for him, and then buy the same stock for herself, but in a smaller amount because she was on a secretary's salary."

Author's homework help flop

Author Ian McEwan tried to help out his son Greg, who was writing a high school essay about a novel he had read. After talking to his son about about the story and things he should think about, the son ended up with a measly C+. The irony is that the essay was about one of McEwan's own novels — Enduring Love (1997). McEwan told the Los Angeles Times that the experience made him feel "a little dubious" about his books being assigned in schools.