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How many times what you said something to someone sarcastically and it’s gone completely over their heads and they wound up getting mad at you?

It’s happened to me a few times and the person either stares at me blankly or freaks out because they thought I was being serious. This has led me to believe that you should probably only use sarcasm around people you know really, really well. I’m sure I’ve offended some of my old customers at my old job at the grocery store. It’s hard to recover with just a “Oh, I was just joking! It was sarcasm!”

Luckily, where I’m working now we use sarcasm frequently and most of our clients get used to our whacked out sense of humour. There’s a saying that goes “Sarcasm: Just one of the services we offer.” We’ve probably taken it a step further by saying “Emotional abuse: Just another service we provide.”

I wonder sometimes if it can go too far. How much sarcasm is too much? I know there’s always a time and place to be sarcastic, like with family and friends but never at a funeral; with your coworkers but never during a job interview … you get my point.

So, how much sarcasm do you use on a daily basis? Does it usually go over your head when someone’s using it?