It's fun to talk about horrible co-workers. But what about good ones?

As many readers may know, my wife was, until last week, the restaurant critic for the Deseret News.

This was a great job for her, as she is an extremely talented writer who also has a passion for food. It was even better for me, because I was able to go to many different restaurants with her on the company dime. I'm a talented eater who has a passion for devouring food, so it was a match made in heaven.

But this column isn't about her decision to put down her critic's pen and try something new. Rather, it's about something she wrote in her farewell review.

She quoted a restaurant critic character from the Pixar film "Ratatouille" saying, "We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read."

That sentence struck a chord with me.

I've written a couple of columns recently in which I invited readers to send me stories that could be considered "negative criticism," one dealing with "work jerks" and another with horrible bosses.

People responded with many tales of colleagues and managers who truly deserved to be criticized. Their stories of bad behavior were, indeed, interesting to read, and I shared several of them in a follow-up column.

I'm still glad I wrote those columns. In addition to allowing us to offer sympathy to the victims of unreasonable bosses and co-workers, I believe bad examples can be instructive at times, teaching the rest of us what NOT to do.

However, I was surprised by the response I received to columns in which I asked for examples of "office angels" or excellent bosses.

I did receive a few replies, some of which I will share in a future column. But I expected stories about wonderful co-workers and benevolent bosses to outnumber the more critical responses. Such was not the case.

And that got me wondering why. Why does it seem to be more fun to stand around the proverbial water cooler and complain about a bad boss than to tell stories about the good deeds of our office mates? Do we really work with and for people who are more bad than good? Does telling such stories at work make us more likely to be negative with our families, too? Or, perhaps, does sharing horror stories with co-workers help us relieve stress and leave those negative attitudes at the office?

I'm not sure what the answer is, but I do know that I'm just as likely to seek catharsis by sharing negative stories as any of my colleagues are — maybe more so.

I also know, however, that this is behavior I can change. As hard as that may be, I'm going to give it a try.