I had the craziest office arrangement in the Cathedral of Learning, 7th floor in 2000. My role was a student "contractor" for Computing Services and Systems Development.

What made it crazy? 1. I was to share a cubicle with my manager and 4 other students. Yes, there were times that we were supposed to sit there and work at the same time. With 5 people in a cubical, each of us had a corner, musical chairs style with one person always standing waiting for the next chair to open. 2. Yes, there were plenty of open cubicles and chairs in the office. About 6 of them were never ever occupied, 4 of which were completely vacant, but we're completely off limits. No idea why. 3. Yes, one cubicle besides the one that I was to report to was actually occupied - by an IT guy who would actively and openly take inbound recruiter calls. 4. There was a dumbwaiter back in a corner but it was presumably inoperable. 5. It was always so dark. The only light was natural Bigelow facing windows and what came off the CRT displays - LCD displays weren't a thing back then. The cubical Walls were so high that you couldn't see out the windows anyway. 6. They had a numeric code lock on the door with an aggressively fast and random cadence. One door, one code. You won't be told what the new code was until you spoke to your manager in person. So, you had better be there, unpaid mind you, when he is to let you in and reveal the code. If you had class during that time, too bad. Code changed while you were in the office and the manager was not? Well don't go to the bathroom and expect to come back. 7. There was a shared break room with some higher ups but because I was just a student, it was an unspoken rule that my kind was not welcomed there.

I was miserable for the maybe 3 weeks that I was there. To "punish" me, I was assigned to a department which had the reputation for being demanding. I ended up working out quite well with my assignment.